Riding Shotgun

You know it's serious when the dog is riding shotgun twitter.com/SEALofHonor/st…
— SEALofHonor (@SEALofHonor) April 26, 2013

“He’s not a dog. He’s a Marine.”

CBS' NCIS is the top show on television and the reason why is that it is well written, has a great cast lead by Mark Harmon and shows why HONOR, COURAGE & COMMITMENT matter, especially today more than ever.

I just watched an episode called "Seek" which covered the story of a Marine & his faithful Black Lab " Dex ". It aired earlier in the states but here in Afghanistan, we get the shows a few weeks/months behind the times.

As usual, the episode was great and I was emotinally touched by the story. Gibbs and his people got the bad guys and took care of those who needed his help. But there is more to it than that.....The story touched my heart as it involved a Marine and his faithful K9 buddy.

Here is the rest of the story from the Marine Times/AP. This great episode was dedicated to a real life pup and to "military working dogs and their brave handlers everywhere".

I'm glad that NCIS is one show we can count on in the vast wasteland that is broadcast network television.

Semper Fi and Semper Fidos to all those who stand in harm's way.  Your efforts and sacrifices are appreciated.

Navy SEAL’s loyal dog prompts ‘NCIS’ episode

The Associated Press
Posted : Saturday Mar 23, 2013 15:00:46 EDT

DES MOINES, Iowa — The legend of Navy SEAL Jon Tumilson and his faithful Labrador retriever, Hawkeye, continues to grow.

A now-famous photograph of Hawkeye guarding Tumilson’s flag-draped coffin in 2011 inspired this week’s episode of the hit CBS television series “NCIS,” according to one of its executive producers.

“It all started with a photograph,” co-executive producer Scott Williams wrote on the show’s blog. The inspired result: Tuesday’s episode, “Seek,” the night’s top-rated show.

“It served as yet another stark reminder of the sacrifices made by our military men and women and their families (pets included),” Williams wrote. “It also set the wheels in motion for the (March 19) episode.”

Jon Tumilson, 35, who was born in Osage, Iowa, and grew up in Rockford, Iowa, died in Afghanistan in August 2011 when the Chinook helicopter carrying him and 29 others was shot down.
His cherished black Lab, Hawkeye, led Tumilson’s family into the funeral.

What happened next resulted in a photo that became an Internet sensation.

When Hawkeye’s new owner, close family friend Scott Nichols, went to the front to speak, Hawkeye came with him. The dog soon walked to Tumilson’s flag-draped coffin, dropped to the floor, and stayed there, as if on guard.

Tumilson’s cousin, Lisa Pembleton, captured the moment on behalf of 1,500 mourners at Rudd-Rockford-Marble Rock gym in Rockford.

The image prompted people around the world to comment on its depiction of faithfulness, companionship, bravery and duty.

Now, “NCIS,” which follows special agents of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service, has joined the legions inspired by the photo.

This week’s episode opened with a soldier and a mine-sniffing dog in Afghanistan who watch as a boy’s soccer ball rolls onto a live mine, which explodes.

Just after the soldier and dog lead the boy to safety, a sniper shoots the soldier. The dog lies at the side of his fallen master.

Later, the lead character, special agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, says of the episode’s canine star, Dexter, “He’s not a dog. He’s a Marine.”

Many of the nearly 1,000 people who had commented on the producer’s blog post by Friday evening said the show, which incorporates a scene reminiscent of Tumilson’s funeral, brought them to tears.

The episode was dedicated to “military working dogs and their brave handlers everywhere,” Williams wrote.

The show won the ratings competition in its time slot, pulling in 19.8 million viewers, more than twice the No. 2 program, “Splash,” on ABC, and more than any prime-time show that night, according to the Nielsen Co. ratings.

Tumilson’s family hopes veteran actor Mark Harmon, who plays Gibbs, and others in the “NCIS” cast will help dedicate a statue of Tumilson and Hawkeye at Fossil and Prairie Park in Rockford this summer.

“We will be unveiling a life-size bronze statue of Jon and Hawkeye this summer in his hometown, and would like to personally invite Mark, and any of your cast members, to come and celebrate that special event with us,” Tumilson’s brother-in-law, Scott McMeekan, wrote on the “NCIS” blog.
Neither members of Tumilson’s family nor representatives of CBS could be reached for comment.

Our K9 Battle Buddies

" The Dog is a Gentleman; I hope to go to his Heaven, not Man's." - Mark Twain

 

Roger that Mr. Twain

SEMPER FIDOS - Military Dogs Are Our Military's Best Friends

SEMPER FIDOS - Man's Best Freinds are a true " Force Multiplier" out here in Afghanistan

After the fight, they can heal the wounds of war just by being there for our wounded warriors.

 

An unbreakable bond

In this Sept. 14, 2011 photo, a U.S. Marine dog handler plays with military working dog Fuli, at Camp Leatherneck, Helmand province, Afghanistan. Handlers and their dogs, that sniff for explosives or narcotics or track down wanted persons, patrol together, day after day. Sometimes, they sleep side by side in military cots. They face the same dangers together. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley)


Our K-9 companions prove again and again why they are " Man's best friend " - No one who has spent time on the field of battle will ever challenge how much dogs make a difference in the lives of our soldiers. I know that in my time overseas in Iraq & Afghanistan, it was easy to see that the pups made a big difference for those who are at the " tip of the spear"


Military dogs and handlers patrol in Afghanistan
By CHRISTOPHER TORCHIA, Associated Press – 1 day ago

FORWARD OPERATING BASE JACKSON, Afghanistan (AP) — After the suicide bombing, the U.S. Marine dog handler lay on a stretcher, his bloodied legs laced with shrapnel. They brought in his wounded dog, too. Blood dripped from the haunches of the Belgian Malinois.

Seven Afghans died in the insurgent attack on Sept. 8 near a Marine battalion headquarters in southern Afghanistan. Sgt. Kenneth Fischer and his dog, Drak, were flown by helicopter to a bigger base for emergency treatment, then out of the country for surgery. Both will head to Texas for rehabilitation, and eventually, in line with military custom, Fischer will adopt Drak and take him home.

"I have literally spent more time with Drak than I have my own daughter," Fischer, 27, said by telephone earlier this week from his hospital bed at a military medical center in Bethesda, Maryland. The Marine had worked with 4-year-old Drak for two years and spent a total of nine months in Afghanistan. His daughter, Cheyenne, is 19 months old.

Much is made of the bond among men at arms, but the union between man and dog in a combat zone seems just as tight. Handlers and canines that sniff for explosives or narcotics patrol together, day after day, linked by a leash and an innate understanding of each other. Sometimes, they sleep side by side in military cots. They face the same dangers together.

A unit of handlers and dogs operates out of Camp Leatherneck, the main Marine base in southern Afghanistan, home to insurgent strongholds. The teams fan out in Helmand province and beyond, working with Marines and other branches of the U.S. military, as well as Afghan forces and, at times, British troops.

Eight of the 30 handlers have been wounded this year, but Drak was the only dog to be wounded, said Staff Sgt. Morris Earnest, supervisor of the unit, which is part of the III Marine Headquarters Group. Half went home because of the severity of their injuries. Three of those lost limbs to homemade bombs, but their dogs emerged "without a scratch."

Tucked inside the Leatherneck compound, a memorial pays tribute to Marine Cpl. Max William Donahue, a dog handler killed last year, and dogs that have died in attacks or from heat exhaustion and other causes in past years. A simple white cross, erect in a bed of pebbles, lists their names on wooden plaques hanging from the crossbar: Frida, Grief, Murdock, Torry, Chico, Dixie, Patrick, Marko.

"From a few of the finest. To the finest of the few," the memorial reads.

On Aug. 6, 30 American troops and eight Afghans died in a helicopter crash in eastern Afghanistan, and a U.S. military dog on board was also killed.

Dogs serve a small but valued role for the U.S.-led coalition that seeks to quell Taliban groups and transfer security responsibilities to Afghan forces in time for the withdrawal of foreign combat troops by the end of 2014.

Ideally, the dogs, which include labradors and German and Dutch Shepherds, give an edge in unearthing boobytraps laden with explosives or detecting drugs in a region where the Taliban reaps profits from poppy harvests used in opium production. A handler and his dog usually follow behind a sweeper with a metal detector at the front of a single-file patrol.

An Associated Press team at Forward Operating Base Jackson, headquarters for the 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, witnessed the early treatment of casualties after the Sept. 8 suicide bombing in the district center of Sangin. While Fischer and other wounded were cared for, a trio of dog handlers tended to Drak, muzzling and hoisting him onto a stretcher before rushing him to a helicopter.

"He should be OK," Fischer said 10 days later by telephone, his voice raspy after having tubes inserted down his throat during treatment. "At first, there was some talk about him losing one of his legs, but not so much anymore. Knowing Drak, he should be fine."

Drak, trained to find narcotics, is being treated at Dog Center Europe, a U.S. military facility in Germany. He will be transferred for more care at Lackland Air Force Base, a training site for military dogs in San Antonio, Texas.

Fischer plans to head there, too. His wife has family there, and he wants to be with Drak, whose name is a variation of Drac, or "devil" in Romanian.

"When he meets people, he can be calm and relaxed," the Marine said. "When we go outside, he's excited and rambunctious and likes to play, and I'm the same way."

What Drak doesn't like is shooting. During gunfire training, he lay down beside Fischer, calm and meek, until it was over. He did the same during a Taliban mortar attack.

"He is a very obedient dog," Fischer said. "He will only listen to me. Somebody else will be around and give him commands and he'll just look at them like they're stupid."

Fischer wants to resume his Marine Corps career. But, he said, Drak can spend his days lying around at Fischer's home at his duty station in Twentynine Palms, California, or playing frisbee, one of the dog's favorite activities. He acknowledged it will be "some time" before they get there because of their injuries.

Sgt. Mark Behl, a dog handler who helped Drak the day he was injured, said it helps to fit a calm handler with a "high drive" dog, or an "excited person with a bored dog."

Placid and amiable, Behl said his dog, a German Shepherd named Fuli, is "a handful."

Dog handling under the stress of danger is a subtle, pinpoint profession. Behl said he knows Fuli so well after two and a half years together that he can tell whether he is sniffing idly, perhaps on the trail of another animal's scent, or has detected something serious, such as the ingredients of crudely made explosives.

"There's a lot more to the job than just holding the leash," said Behl of Cottage Grove, Wisconsin. "I know to keep him moving or to let him work."

At the same time, he must know when to pull Fuli away from a threat, aware of the hidden bombs that have killed or maimed many troops in Afghanistan.

Fuli has a vexing habit during patrols in cornfields of running into adjacent rows of corn and getting his leash tangled around the stalks. But he plays ball with Marines back on base, boosting their morale.

"At the end of the day, the dog is going to come up and lick me in the face," said Behl, who grew up around dogs. "It's a little taste of home, just having an animal."

K-9 Soldier "CUJO" gets the care he needs as he is medevaced out of Afghanistan

I am glad to see our K-9 Soldier "Cujo" got some TLC for his battle wounds. Poor Pup !

Our K-9 Brothers deserve nothing less as they make a big difference out here for the troops.

Military Working Dog Medevaced with Shot Paw
by Glenn Anderson / MILITARY.COM August 16, 2011

As some of you Kit Up! readers may have seen — last week Military.com sent two of the editorial staff to Bagram, Afghanistan to look at the USAF’s Aeromedical Evacuation teams and the various phases of care delivered to our combat wounded.

Thanks to the USAF’s Air Mobility Command we caught a ride from Ramstein to JB McGuire / Dix / Lakehurst and I got the chance to chat with some of the flight crew about the things they’ve seen and experienced in their job.

It turns out that just two days earlier they had a very special guest on their C-17 – this military working dog is named Cujo and while the crew didn’t know a lot of details about what happened to him they told me he had been shot in the leg a few days earlier and was given the same professional and competent level of care as his human colleagues during his med-evac. He is expected to make a full recovery.

Going to the Dogs.....How Service Dogs are helping more people

My MILBLOG seems to be going to the Dogs !!!!

As the casual reader might guess, I am keenly devoted to our four-legged friends and all that they can do for us.....

They are "devotion on 4 legs" and only worried about us....they live in the moment and show no concern for their own welfare, only that of their human companions.

I would like to work with organizations that increase the ability to utilize dogs for areas where people need assistance and where the K-9's physical abilities of smell, hearing, sight and presence can aid those who need a 24 hour a day companion. The Dog is a noble creature and one we can count on, just as he has counted on us for many centuries.

latimes.com
Service dogs are beyond fetching

Their use is growing. They help guide the blind, perform tasks for the physically disabled and may even help people with epilepsy and autism.
By Karen Ravn, Special to the Los Angeles Times
July 18, 2011

One moment 15-year-old Glen Gregos was a happy-go-lucky kid riding a motorcycle. The next he was the lucky-to-be-alive victim of a terrible accident, paralyzed from the chest down.

Now 54 and a resident of Woodland Hills, Gregos has built a rewarding life — college, marriage, a successful banking career, a daughter who just graduated from college.

Still, for decades after the accident, Gregos faced challenges every day from simple things most of us take for granted — going to the grocery store, going out the front door. And then six years ago, his life took another dramatic turn. He met Beulah — a.k.a. Miss Bo — a black Labrador retriever who has been at his side, 24/7, ever since — to open doors, carry bags, pull his wheelchair, pick up anything he drops on the floor and cheer up any black mood he falls into.

"It's hard to put into words everything these dogs do for you," he says. "It's physical. It's emotional. It's all-encompassing. You probably have to live it to understand it."

Miss Bo is not considered a pet. She's a service dog, a concept first introduced with guide (or seeing-eye) dogs for the blind, perhaps as far back as the 16th century, though it wasn't until 1929 that the first guide dog training school in the U.S. opened up. By the 1970s, people had started training dogs to help with other disabilities, and that trend has continued.

Service dogs now include dogs that can open cupboards and drawers, alert someone to a ringing telephone, assist someone during a disorienting seizure, help someone keep their balance or get back up after a fall, not to mention dogs that can sniff allergens in the air or low blood sugar on someone's breath.

"Here in the U.S. we have a highly individualistic culture — creative, experimental," says Lynette Hart, director of the Center for Animals in Society at UC Davis. "It's like a caldron for coming up with new things that dogs can do for us. And dogs love to work. It's a very natural marriage for them to help people."

This has been a boon for many who, like Gregos, have had their lives changed by some extraordinary dogs. But potential pitfalls abound. "There's almost no regulation," Hart says. "And everyone wants to do what they want to do."

Sometimes people want to call their dogs service dogs even though they're really not. And sometimes people want to believe dogs can do things even though there's no real proof they can.

Many dogs have a natural knack for providing comfort, companionship and emotional support to their people, who often consider that a pretty big service. But it doesn't make those dogs service dogs. Neither does a capacity for warding off crime by looking or sounding formidable. According to the 1990 Americans With Disabilities Act and new regulations put in place in March, a service dog must be trained to perform a service for a person with a disability that is directly related to the person's disability — turning lights on and off for someone who's paralyzed, for example, or alerting someone who's deaf that a smoke alarm is blaring.

Many organizations train one or more kinds of service dogs, and in general their programs follow a pattern set by the early guide dog training organizations: careful breeding followed by puppy-raising by volunteers who begin the basics of obedience and socialization, and finally intensive training by professionals. (Potential human recipients also are carefully screened, trained and matched to dogs.)

Guide Dogs for the Blind, the first guide dog training school on the West Coast, relies solely on Labrador retrievers, golden retrievers and crosses of the two. Training organizations for other types of service dogs often do too. "They have wonderful temperaments," says Katie Malatino, public relations coordinator for one such organization, Canine Companions for Independence, headquartered in Santa Rosa. "They're a good size for the tasks they have to do, and they have an instinct to retrieve, which comes in handy for picking things up off the floor."

Canine Companions for Independence provided Miss Bo to Gregos in November 2005. These days she is always on call if Gregos needs her, which is not to say that she never has any fun. "She has toys," he says. "We play ball. But once she gets vested up" — wearing the vest that identifies her as a service dog — "she knows, 'OK, I'm ready to work.' " (And people who see the vest should should know and respect that too.)

Like any good service dog, when she's working, Miss Bo is unperturbed by loud or unexpected noises ("bomb proof," Malatino calls it) and undistracted by other animals or people — unless Gregos gives her special dispensation. Which he often does.

"I put her in a 'sit' and let people pet her," he says. "I want to create more awareness about these special dogs. I wasn't aware of them myself for a long time. I'd think, 'What can a dog do for a guy in a wheelchair?' "

The Americans With Disabilities Act says service dogs get to go wherever their people go: grocery stores, restaurants, libraries, amusement parks, boats, buses, trains, planes and no-pets-allowed hotels. New regulations issued this spring establish two exceptions (which would surely never apply to Miss Bo): Service dogs can be banished if they get out of control or if they transact certain business indoors that should have been seen to outside.

Not everyone knows the rules. Gregos once spent several hours convincing officials at a hotel with a no-pets policy that they were obligated to let Miss Bo in. "One side of me thought, 'I don't want to stay here anyway,'" he says. "But the other part thought, 'They've got to be educated.' "

Even beyond the issue of ignorance, service dog use is not without controversy. One problem is cheaters.

"A lot of people try to skirt the system," Gregos says. "I see it all the time." Some will claim that their pet dogs are service dogs that help them with disabilities they don't really have — and they can get away with that, because the law doesn't require people to present proof of their own disability or their dog's capacity to deal with it. (It doesn't help that service dog vests are readily available online.) Proprietors may deny entrance to dogs that arouse their skepticism, and that's fine if they're right. If they're wrong, it can lead to a fine of a very different kind.

Another problem is that there are no industry-wide standards for trainers or dogs, leaving disabled people on their own to determine how much they should trust an organization's claims. "Guide Dogs for the Blind — they're very reputable," says Dr. Melissa Bain, chief of the Behavior Service at the UC Davis Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital. "If they graduate a dog, OK, I trust it." But not every organization has the same long history of success.

Of course, some claims are easier to validate than others. It's easy to see if a dog can pull a wheelchair or open a refrigerator door. But seizure prediction? "The trouble," Bain adds, "is if people rely on the dog and nothing else, that could be dangerous."

Sometimes the question isn't whether a particular dog can perform a task but whether some tasks are even canine-ly possible. Take seizure detection again. "Is that legitimate?" Bain says. "Maybe."

In 1999, a British epilepsy specialist and a behavioral scientist/animal trainer reported that by giving dogs a reward every time their owners had seizures, they had been able to train some dogs to warn of oncoming seizures as much as 15 to 45 minutes before the seizures occurred. Their paper in the journal Seizure inspired a demand for such dogs.

Today, the Epilepsy Foundation says on its website, "while some people have been very pleased with their new canine friends, others have been disappointed." The foundation "recommends that people take great care in reviewing trainer claims and results, especially when thousands of dollars are involved."

More questions arose in 2007 when four of the seven seizure-alert dogs in a study in the journal Neurology were found to be warning people of psychological, not epileptic, seizures. Psychological seizures, caused by mental stress, can often be eliminated through counseling — without drugs — making warnings beside the point. And in one case in that study, a dog's "warning behaviors" were found to set the seizures off.

Service dogs for children with autism have inspired a debate all their own, with some districts reluctant to allow the dogs into their schools because, they argue, the dogs cause too much trouble — other children may be scared or allergic; child and dog may require extra supervision.

But, in fact, the value of service dogs to children with autism is less controversial than it is for seizures. "One of the main things our dogs do is provide safety," says Kati Rule-Witco, executive director and placement specialist for Autism Service Dogs of America, a training organization founded in 2002 that's based in Lake Oswego, Ore. "Often children with autism will run off. Parents have trouble just going to the grocery store. Our dogs provide a way for families to go out safely."

A 2008 study in the journal Qualitative Health Research looked at what happened when service dogs were brought into 10 families with children with autism and found that they did, indeed, enhance safety and facilitate public outings. When the child and dog go out into the community together, the dog is tethered to the child but also connected to the adult caregiver since that's who holds the dog's leash. Autism service dogs are also trained to keep their cool no matter what their young charges do (hug, squeeze, lie on top of the dog) and to take positive steps to cope with negative behavior (nudge or lean against the child, maybe even stop the child from hurting himself).

All of this costs money, a lot of it. That's true for training any service dog. Some organizations — like Guide Dogs for the Blind and Canine Companions — can operate on donations alone. But not all. Autism Service Dogs of America says the average cost for breeding, raising, training and placing one of their dogs is $20,000, $13,500 of which families are required to pay before they are placed on the waiting list for the next available dog.

The website for Autism Service Dogs of America has testimonials from 10 satisfied families who use words like "awesome" and "miracle" to describe their dogs and the jobs they do. They firmly believe that their money was well spent. But not everyone is convinced.

Bain notes that research so far has not compared service dogs to ordinary family dogs, and she suggests the latter might do just about as well. "Maybe a child feels better sitting next to the dog," she says. "There's no way to tell if special training does any good."

Gregos has no such questions about the good that Miss Bo's special training has done for him. But she'll be 8 in August, and the time is coming when she'll need to retire and he'll need to get a new service dog. Then Miss Bo will change from service dog to pet dog and spend the rest of her days with the man who says that having her has been "magical since Day One."

Iran's parliament passes a bill criminalizing dog ownership - One more sign that the Mullahs have their heads stuck up their own Six

Jeffrey Massoon in his article " Dogs never lie about love" writes this about our best friend, The Dog:

"...no other species has ever indicated that it regularly prefers the company of a human to that of members of its own species, with the single exception of the dog. While we have domesticated many animals, only the dog has domesticated us. The dog chooses us, not because it is confused about our identity, not because dogs think we are the marvel of creation, but merely because dogs love us. It is such an amazing fact, and so counterintuitive (so profoundly unlovable do we think we are) that almost nobody can accept it as fact. Dogs love us not only because we feed them, or walk them, or groom them, or protect them, but because we are fun. How astonishing! "

Man and our K-9 Friends made an unwritten agreement about 15000 years ago. We would provide them warmth, shelter and easy access to food - In return, they would protect us from the dangerous things in the dark that wanted to have us for dinner. This "pact" is likley the longest unbroken agreement in the history of mankind.

So, when you come across a segment of our species that mistreats our K-9 friends, calls them "unclean" and further outlaws having a K-9 in your home, it makes me wonder if those folks have a major screw loose. The common-folk in Iran have obviously figured out that the Dog is a perfect companion but the Mullahs and their farked-up version of reality are in serious need of a "check-up from the neck up"

I have serious issues with any group that doesn't recognize our 4-legged companions for what they are...Man's best friend.

A Craze for Pooches in Iran Dogs the Morality Police
Western TV Makes Owning Pups Fashionable, Despite Ayatollah's Fatwa
Farnaz Fassihi/The Wall Street Journal

Iranians have turned to the Internet to organize antigovernment protests. Now they're flocking online to defy another Islamic Republic edict: buying and selling dogs.

Pooch lovers in Iran are clicking on popular websites like Woof Woof Iran Digital Pets and Persianpet to pick their favorite canine, study dog grooming or swap pet tales.

Buying and selling dogs is illegal in Iran, unless they are guard dogs or used by police. Dogs are considered "haram," or unclean, in Islam. Until recently, keeping dogs as pets was limited to a small circle of Westernized Iranians.

But access to satellite television—and American programs depicting families playing with pups—has turned dog ownership into a sign of social status in Iran.

"It's the latest fashion now to buy each other puppies as birthday gifts," says Amin, a 25-year-old. He had never pet a dog until traveling to a village two hours outside Tehran to obtain a German Shepherd puppy.

Authorities are striking back. Last year, Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi issued a fatwa, or religious edict, denouncing dog ownership. In April, Iran's parliament passed a bill to criminalize dog ownership, declaring the phenomenon a sign of "vulgar Western values."

This summer, so-called morality police are cruising the streets looking to enforce the anti-dog law. The punishment varies from a fine of up to $500 if the dog is seen in a public space to temporarily confiscating cars and suspending drivers' licenses if the dog isn't contained in a carrier inside the car.

To evade detection, pooch owners are resorting to middle-of-the-night walks and driving hours to the countryside just so their pets can roam. Vendors charge the equivalent of up to $10,000 for top dogs and operate so covertly that some blindfold potential buyers en route to the kennel.

"It was crazy," says Ali Shekouri, a 32-year-old businessman who pursued three dicey strategies before obtaining a local beagle. "After a while I didn't know if I was buying a dog or dealing in an international drug trade."

When Mr. Shekouri set out to buy a puppy last year, a friend first took him to a small electronics shop in downtown Tehran near the grand bazaar. In actuality, it was a front for a middle-aged man selling dogs. After enduring a one-hour intense interview to make sure he wasn't an undercover cop, Mr. Shekouri was whisked away in a car to the kennel's secret location. During the ride, he says, he was blindfolded. He didn't find a pet he liked.

Mr. Shekouri then turned to the Internet for his puppy hunt. A quick Google search provided over a dozen domestic websites scattered across Iran from Rasht, a coastal city in the north, to the southern city of Ahwaz.

The Rashtpet website offers puppies from a database of photos. First the buyer must wire a payment—between $500 and $10,000 depending on the breed—into a bank account. Then the illicit pet is delivered within two weeks by a truck driver who hides the dog amid the cargo, according to Mr. Shekouri and the website.

The Petpars website promises a puppy equipped with a faux international passport hand-carried from Ukraine via a flight passenger. Mr. Shekouri says he was told he would receive his puppy in the arrival lounge of Tehran's international airport. Fed up with the hassle, he eventually settled for a beagle from a local breeder.

Dog-selling websites like Rashtpet and Petpars confirm they import dogs by paying traveling Iranians to act as illicit couriers and claim the puppies are their own. While importing dogs for sale is illegal, passengers are allowed to bring personal pets in on commercial flights.

The flight from Ukraine to Tehran has been nicknamed "the puppy flight" because many of its passengers, mostly university students, are carrying puppies for sale, according to several pet website owners who import from Ukraine.

When airport authorities caught on last year, they increased the tax on importing pets from $50 to $800, according to sellers. Some dog vendors diverted their operation so dogs are transported from Ukraine to Armenia and Turkey and from there smuggled in the cargo section of tour buses and trucks returning to Iran, vendors say.

"We have a large and very capable network expanding from Iran to Europe and beyond to help unite Iranians with dogs," says the 30-year-old owner of Petpars, who asked that his name not be published.

Sanaz, an art student in Tehran, bought a St. Bernard puppy from a student coming from Moscow. Now the dog is the size of a small pony and she doesn't know what to do with it in her small apartment given the restrictions on walking dogs in public.

On the entrance to many of Tehran's parks and neighborhood gardens, a municipality sign reads: "Pets (dogs…) are absolutely prohibited from entering the park."

"I used to take him out for walks but the police have stopped me several times and threatened to confiscate him, so I just take him to the roof of our apartment building now and pray he doesn't bark," says Sanaz, who, like many owners, declined to use her surname for fear of having her pooch confiscated.

Milad, a 24-year-old owner of a white terrier, had a harrowing run-in with the morality police. He was driving home in Tehran with the dog in the front seat from a friend's house when a police car spotted him and signaled for him to pull over. He refused and, he says, the police chased him to the door of his house. He opened the car door to let the dog escape but an officer jumped out and pulled a gun on the dog, he says.

"I threw myself on my dog and said, 'You have to shoot me before you kill him,'" Milad says. A group of neighbors came out to defend him and, he says, eventually the police backed off from killing or confiscating the dog. But they suspended Milad's driver's license for six months and took his car for three months.

Write to Farnaz Fassihi at farnaz.fassihi@wsj.com

If you see this dog coming for you, run ! - ROBODOG, the next development in tactical K-9 battle rattle

" Awesome use of the technology DUDE !"...Having FIDO hooked up to the latest hi-tech gadgets gives better movement capability than any robotic platform could ever hope to attain....Loyalty, devotion to the soldier and a no-quit attitude already hard wired into the DNA....Man's best friend at home and on the Battlefield....I salute our 4-legged friends.


The Bulletproof Dog That Stormed Bin Laden's Lair
BY Elbert ChuMon May 16, 2011
FAST COMPANY MAGAZINE

If you see this dog coming for you, run. Thanks to his extensive training--and customized body armor that can cost upwards of $30,000--he's bulletproof, can hear through concrete, and can record high-def video of missions, even in the dead of night.

Since the moment it was revealed that the "nation's most courageous dog" [Update: named "Cairo"] served alongside the 80 Navy SEALs who took out Osama bin Laden, America's fascination with war dogs has hit a fevered pitch. And while the heart-tugging photos of these four-legged heroes are worth a look, so is the high-tech gear that helps them do their job.

Last year, the military spent $86,000 on four tactical vests to outfit Navy Seal dogs. The SEALs hired Winnipeg, Canada-based contractor K9 Storm to gear up their four-legged, canine partners, which it has used in battle since World War I. K9 Storm’s flagship product is the $20,000-$30,000 Intruder, an upgradeable version of their doggie armor (you can check out the full catalogue here). The tactical body armor is wired with a collapsible video arm, two-way audio, and other attachable gadgets.

"Various special ops units use the vest, including those in current headlines," says Mike Herstik, a consultant with International K-9, who has trained dogs from Israeli bomb-sniffing units to the Navy SEALSs. "It is much more than just body armor."

The big idea behind the armor add-ons boils down to a simple one: the key to any healthy relationship is communication. Each dog is assigned one human handler. To operate efficiently in a tactical situation, they need to be connected.

So how much high-tech connectivity does a dog get for $30,000 anyway?

Using a high-def camera mounted on the dog's back, handlers can see what the dog sees, using handheld monitors. Jim Slater, who cofounded K9 Storm with his wife Glori, says footage is stable because the entire module is sewn into the vest. With unpredictable light conditions, like middle-of-the-night missions, the camera adjusts automatically to night vision. The lens is protected by impact-resistant shielding. And since we're talking about SEALs notorious for amphibious assaults, the system is waterproof.

In Abbottabad, the patented load-bearing harness would have enabled a Navy SEAL handler to rappel from the helicopter with his dog strapped to his body. Once in the compound, the dog could run ahead to scout as the handler issued commands through an integrated microphone and speaker in the armor. The proprietary speaker system enables handlers to relay commands at low levels to the dog. "Handlers need to see and hear how their dog is responding," said Slater. "In a tactical situation, every second counts." The encrypted signal from dog to handler penetrates fortified barriers like concrete, steel-fortified ships, and tunnels. That translates to standard operating ranges up to four football fields.

The armor itself protects against shots from 9mm and .45 magnum handguns. Slater is a veteran police dog trainer and built the first vest after a prison riot. He realized he wore full riot gear, while his K9 partner, Olaf, was basically naked. So he started making vests. The weave technology catches bullets or ice picks like a mitt wrapping around a baseball; knives and sharpened screw drivers wielded by prisoners require tighter weaves.

Keeping the armor strong, but light, is a priority. "Every gram counts for our clients. So we prefer advanced fibers and innovative textiles," said Slater. "The entire communication module is 20 ounces." The average armor weighs between three to seven pounds, depending on the size of the dog and the level of protection.

They’ve even gone stealth. A silent hardware system prevents any metal to metal contact--you won't hear any jangling or see any reflective give-aways. K9 took the average 150-gram V-ring and developed a 5-gram version made of a Kevlar, poly-propylene, and nylon fiber blend. "It’s actually stronger, rated to 2,500 pounds. Completely silent, and ultralight," said Slater.

Of course, these systems don't come cheap--and it's the dogs themselves that are the real investment. The Navy’s first Master Military Working Dog Trainer (a trainer of other dog trainers), Luis Reyes emailed from Afghanistan: "There are many products that help MWDs [military work dogs] and many are ‘cool’ but not necessary. No amount of money can replace the life of a canine that saves the precious lives of our troops in harm's way."

Although new tech is the buzz, what put K9 Storm on the map is dedication to customization. Its mainstay dog armor is the more-affordable $2,000-$3,000 base model. Each vest they make is custom sized for the dog. "The fit has to be perfect or it will flop around," said Slater. That hinders mobility, or worse, can cause injury.

Clients can measure dogs themselves, or Slater will fly out for dog fittings. They’ve done 15-pound West Highland Terriers--which look like playful white puffballs but were bred to scare badgers out of holes, and are helpful in drug raids with confined spaces like air ducts. On the other end are St. Bernards, which push 240 pounds.

K9's client list spans 15 countries, from China to Switzerland. Buyers include SWAT teams, police and corrections agencies, security firms, search and rescue units, and border patrols. Slater and 12 employees spent years developing a proprietary computer-assisted design program to translate measurements into accurate patterns, which are hand sewn. However, it's as much a tech company as it is an armor manufacturer.

The next phase of development includes plans for remote-delivery systems and enhanced accessory functionality. They describe a system that would help dogs transport medical supplies, walkie-talkies, or water into constricted areas like rubble. They're also planning new appendages like air-level quality meters for mines.

No word on mounting mini heat-seeking missiles just yet. So, for now, bad guys will only have to tussle with highly-trained fangs exerting 700 pounds of pressure per square inch.

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WAR DOGS...There's a reason why they brought one along when they went to take down Bin Laden

In the enclosed picture, U.S. Marines from the 2nd Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment of the 2nd Marine Expeditionary Brigade wait for helicopter transport as part of Operation Khanjar at Camp Dwyer in Helmand Province in Afghanistan on July 2, 2009.

I've been to Camp Dwyer and it is in the middle of Helmand Province.....Dogs are the unsung heroes of the War in Afghanistan.....I love our K-9 Troops and support them whenever I see one on base here.


War Dog
There's a reason they brought one to get Osama bin Laden.
BY REBECCA FRANKEL MAY 4, 2011 - Foriegn Policy Magazine

Dogs have been fighting alongside U.S. soldiers for more than 100 years, seeing combat in the Civil War and World War I. But their service was informal; only in 1942 were canines officially inducted into the U.S. Army. Today, they're a central part of U.S. efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan -- as of early 2010 the U.S. Army had 2,800 active-duty dogs deployed (the largest canine contingent in the world). And these numbers will continue to grow as these dogs become an ever-more-vital military asset.

So it should come as no surprise that among the 79 commandos involved in Operation Neptune Spear that resulted in Osama bin Laden's killing, there was one dog -- the elite of the four-legged variety. And though the dog in question remains an enigma -- another mysterious detail of the still-unfolding narrative of that historic mission -- there should be little reason to speculate about why there was a dog involved: Man's best friend is a pretty fearsome warrior.

The question of how the dog got into bin Laden's compound is no puzzle -- the same way the special ops team did, by being lowered from an MH-60s helicopter. In fact, U.S. Air Force dogs have been airborne for decades, though the earliest flying dogs accompanied Soviet forces in the 1930s.

Dogs usually jump in tandem with their trainers, but when properly outfitted with flotation vests they can make short jumps into water on their own. A U.S. Navy SEAL, Mike Forsythe, and his dog, Cara recently broke the world record for "highest man/dog parachute deployment" by jumping from 30,100 feet.

According to Mike Dowling, a former Marine Corps dog handler who served in Iraq, there's a simple explanation for why the Navy SEALs took a dog along on the Osama raid: "A dog's brain is dominated by olfactory senses." In fact, Dowling says, a dog can have up to 225 million olfactory receptors in their nose -- the part of their brain devoted to scent is 40 times greater than that of a human.

"When you're going on a mission," Dowling says, "a raid or a patrol, insurgents are sneaky -- they like to hide stuff from you. But a dog can smell them. .... [Think about] Saddam Hussein ... what if Osama had been [hiding] in a hole in the ground? A dog could find that. A dog could alert them to where he's hiding because of the incredible scent capabilities. ... You can only see what you can see. You can't see what you don't see. A dog can see it through his nose."

What's really going on in Fido's Head?? Scientist try to answer this important question

"To err is human, to forgive, canine." - Unknown

Our four legged friends are a god send....think how empty our lives would be without them and how poorly we would have advanced without our K-9 buddies??

I value man's best friend, more than I can really tell you...of course, if the could really talk, then we would have an interesting relationship with them....

"The dog is a gentleman; I hope to go to his heaven, not man's." -
Mark Twain, Letter to W D Howells, 4/2/1899


Here's the latest on what scientist think is going on inside Fido's head.

Inside the science of how dogs think
November 18, 2010By Randi Kaye, AC360 Correspondent

Sit! Shake! Quit barking! Get off the couch! Go find your toy!

Ever wonder what your dog is thinking as it gazes at you while you are barking commands?

Duke University's Canine Cognition Center in Durham, North Carolina, is one of the few labs in the country focused on how dogs think.

"We're excited about describing the psychology of our dogs," says professor Brian Hare, the lab's director. "Different dogs solve different problems differently. And what we want to understand is: What is it that either makes dogs remarkable as a species or what is it that constrains the ability of dogs to solve problems?"

To test the dogs' ability, Hare and a team of graduate students put dogs through a variety of games similar to those you might play with young children.

"We don't want to look at cute pet tricks. What we want to know is, what does the dog understand about its world?" Hare said.

Hare has been analyzing our four-legged friends for about 15 years. He says dogs have figured out how to read human behavior and human gestures better than any other species has, even chimpanzees.

"The way they think about their world is that people are superimportant and they can solve almost any problem if they rely on people," says Hare.

Children start relying on adults' gestures when they're about a year old. That's about the same age that dogs start to recognize and rely on humans, too, Hare says.

When both I and Hare tried to direct Hare's dog Tazzie to a cup that had a treat in it, Tazzie took his master's cue and went toward the cup. I was a stranger to Tazzie, so the dog didn't rely on my information.

"He's grown up with me," says Hare. "We do lots of stuff together. He's never met you before, so he's saying, look, if they're both telling me where to go, I'm going to trust the guy who I'm with all the time."

According to Hare, this proves dogs are complex social animals who understand they have different relationships with different people.

"They really narrow in and pay attention to you and they want to know what it is about the world that you can help them with," he says.

Researchers at Duke are studying dogs to better understand their limitations. If they can identify why dogs make mistakes, they believe they can help them improve. That could mean making dogs better at working with people with disabilities or better at working with the military.

They are a very different species and they think about the world differently than we do. And we need to figure out what are the constraints on how they solve problems, how is it that they think differently from us. And I think that we're going to be able to have a much, even richer relationship with dogs than we already do if we figure all that out," says Hare.

The professor says even though domestication has made dogs smarter, they are not perfect. Still, they're so smart, he says, that they can understand the principle of connectivity.

"They know they're connected on a leash and [dogs reason] 'Well, now I have to listen, because if I don't do what you say you can stop me. Where if I'm ... not on a leash, well, yeah, I know the command but I don't have to listen to you now,'" explains Hare.

And just like children, dogs also understand that if you turn your back, they can misbehave, especially after their owners have told them not to do something.

"Your dog takes the food you just told it not to take, and you're really upset because your dog disobeyed you, and you think that your dog is not obedient. Well, no, no, no, your dog was obedient but it realized that it could get away with it," says Hare.

At the end of the day, dogs may rely on humans, but they also use their skills to manipulate their owners and the world they live in. And even though dog owners like to think they're in command, the professor says it may actually be Fido who is really in charge.

5. COMMUNICATION – WOOF, WOOF - BARK, BARK, BARK

It is amazing that Dogs have a fine tuned ability to communicate effectively in their pack without having a large vocabulary. They are able to let others know what’s going on with subtle changes in their stance and also with their vocal cues.

The other evening, Tessa, my Border Collie/Dalmatian mix saw something outside she didn’t like. She set up and started to growl softly and then let out a Bark – Bark – Bark. The other dogs were not in the same room or in sight of what was going on but they immediately started a unison of barking as a way of saying “OK, I’m with you, even though I’m not sure what you are barking at…” This went on for a few minutes until all the dogs were standing together in a cacophony of bark, bark, bark. They were telling who ever it was outside, “We’re together, we see you and you better not try coming in here…” It was a clear message to intruders or cats alike – Get lost.

I have never been more amazed than when one of our Dogs will attempt to mimic human speech. This usually happens when they are insistent about something like it’s time for a walk, their supper or something else and they will move their mouth in a very human like manner. It sounds like the noise Charlie Brown’s teacher made in the Peanuts specials – a Wahh- Wahh-Whaaa noise. The Dog is working very hard to mimic our speech and say, “Hey – this is important to me…pay attention!” -

Dogs communicate effectively with the Woofs & Barks but also visual signs like stance and positioning of their ears and snouts. Dogs have also learned to take visual cues from us as 90% of what they learn from humans comes from watching our faces and our eyes. Between their hearing acuity and the effectiveness of their visual communications, Dogs surpass us and are more in tune with the pack than we could ever be with our peers. If we were able to pick up 10% of the ability that Dogs use to learn from those around us, we would be better listeners and communicators.