US WAR DOGS HERITAGE MUSEUM | NATIONAL HEADQUARTERS
They have four legs, cold wet noses and tails that often wag furiously. Yet the Defense Department classifies its working dogs as equipment. Advocates for the four-footed troops want this to change. “When you lose a military working dog, you can’t just take another one off the shelf,” said Debbie Kandoll, founder of Military Working…
When an insurgent rocket attack badly injured Cpl. Dustin Lee while he was on patrol in Iraq, his shrapnel-impaled partner, Lex, picked himself up to lie over Lee – an effort to protect him. “He knew Dustin was injured,” said Lee’s mom, Rachel. Lex was his bomb-sniffing dog. Lee didn’t survive his injuries, but Lex…
Now that military dogs are taking on a larger role in combat, they’re also taking on more of the risks that come with going to war, including developing post-traumatic stress disorder. The New York Times reports that more than 5 percent of the approximately 650 deployed military dogs are developing some form of canine PTSD. While…