Lisa Rogak - The Dogs of War: The Courage, Love, and Loyalty of Military Working Dogs

For Christopher Brendan Rogak

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

At this point I must sound like a broken record, but thanks still must go first to Superagent, aka Scott Mendel.

Then Peter Joseph at St. Martins/Thomas Dunne Books, as well as Tom Dunne for coming up with the idea for The Dogs of War and entrusting the execution of the book to me. Thanks as well to Sally Richardson and Matthew Shear.

On the nonbusiness front, kudos and thanks to both Michael Murrays fortitude and his sense of humor. For the second time in less than a year, he had to deal with me in the throes of writing a book in a very short time and didnt once flinch well, maybe once . Next time, next book: Vienna is waiting.

Next, to the buddies who provide me with a place for me and my laptopand Ruby!to land every so often: Thanks for making my first year of nomadic life all it could be, and much more. First, in New Hampshire: Cheryl Trotta, who helps keep my life somewhat organized in exchange for massive amounts of linguine vongole, pulled pork, chocolaty things, and decent Chianti, and to Sam Trotta, to whom I will be forever known as Good Mommy; Dean Hollatz and Leslie Caputo, who put up with my luggage explosions and last-minute appearances in exchange for temporary custody of my KitchenAid mixer and lots of fun late nights; and of course Bob and Reagan DiPrete because .

In Charleston, thanks to John Willson and David Porter for making Monday nights so fortifying that I could then proceed to effortlessly slog my way through the rest of the week chained to the computer. Special thanks to Kristen Lane, who waved her magic wand and fixed the AC on a 100-plus degree day only three days before my deadline.

In Pennsylvania, thanks to Joe and Gail Galusha and their family, which now includes Little Shitaka Bambinathe Queen who will outlive us all thank you for making her part of your lives. And to Jill Gleeson, the fire-haired crazy Irishwoman, thanks for keeping the dream alive of spending a couple of weeks in some foreign country where we will undoubtedly leave a trail of scorched earth behind us.

Finally, in Berkeley, Princeton, Baltimore, and wherever else we happen to be whenever the planets align, which isnt as nearly often as it should be, thanks to Alex Ishii for coming in under the wire.

CONTENTS

PROLOGUE

HUNTING OSAMA: A DOGS-EYE VIEW

On the night of May 1, 2011, on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border, a highly trained military working dog named Cairo braced for ascent in one of two Black Hawk helicopters. Together with two Chinooks serving as backup, the copters would be making a trip across the border on a very special mission to Abbottabad, a city about forty miles north of the capital of Islamabad. Cairo, a Belgian Malinois, a breed known for its acute intelligence, sat alert, ears occasionally twitching, supremely attuned to the mood of the human soldiers traveling with him.

Though hed accompanied them before on numerous missions, this one would have felt different. For one, the whir of the engine and rotors was muffled. Both Black Hawks had a unique cowling, or tail assembly, designed to cut down on the noise of the choppers rotors. The helicopters were also equipped with technology designed to elude radar.

And while most trips in the Black Hawk were pretty straightforward out-and-backs, this one took more twists and turns along the way as the pilots steered the birds along a mountainous region where radar coverage was spotty at best. After all, this mission was so top secret that the seventy-nine commandostwenty-four from the highly elite Navy SEAL Team 6knew that the only way they could pull it off successfully was to get in, do the job, and then get out before the Pakistanis could send their own military after the intruders.

Cairo also would have sensed that there was something unusual about this mission. His unit had been training with greater than usual intensity in recent weeks. And his fellow humans were generally pretty talkative and gave him an occasional pat on the head, but not this time. Now they were quiet, occasionally offering a few words. They looked down at their feet more than usual. Cairo picked up on the mood and sat at attention instead of lying down for the journey as he tried to decipher the emotions of his comrades.

One more thing: The men around him were outfitted for anything and everything, in full battle regalia; besides the handguns and M4 assault rifles, they had night-vision goggles strapped to their helmets.

Cairo was fully geared up as well. Unlike the non-elite military working dogs who never quite took to wearing a simple bulletproof vest, he was comfortable wearing his K9 Storm Intruder vest, a canine bulletproof flak jacket that cost around $20,000. Among other features, the Intruder had a night-vision live-action video camera mounted on a stalk that sat right between his shoulder blades. The camera captured the action low to the grounda dogs-eye viewand his handler had already inserted the tiny earbud that was connected to a wireless transmitter into the dogs ear. That way, his human partner could whisper commands from several hundred yards away while watching the live-action images captured by the camera on Cairos back.

The dog knew this mission was different for another reason: There was the possibility that hed be shimmying down from the copter along a cable. His handler had already attached the special harness that they had used in countless practice sessions to leave the chopper while it hovered in midair and the wind from the blades churned up dirt and debris from the ground. He also wore his Doggles, goggles for dogs. While his human partners had their night-vision goggles ready, Cairo didnt need them: Canine vision improves with darkness.

As they got closer, the humans got quieter. Cairo picked up on the mix of nervousness and steely resolve that was pouring off the SEALs around him. At one point his handler placed his hands around the dogs vest and shook it, like he was towel-drying him after a bath. This was to make sure that there was no noise from anything jangling or moving, which could alert the inhabitants of the compound on which they were zeroing in.

Occasionally Cairo heard one of the men say Geronimo. His ears twitched. Hed heard that word before during the intensive training sessions of the last few weeks. It referred to the bounty of the night, code name for Osama bin Laden.

The members of the ber-elite SEAL Team 6 had only one chance to get it right. But in this case, the stakes were so much higher than usual. They had studied and practiced, and practiced some more. There was absolutely no margin for error.

The dog had trained intensely too. Unlike other military working dogs trained to sniff out a specific kind of explosive or to find a particular drug, Cairo was a specialized search dog known as a combat tracker who could sniff a piece of clothing and then find the person to whom it belonged, even if the scent was several days old.

However, given the nature of a Navy SEALespecially those on the elite squads like Team 6Cairo was also prepared for any scenario, with a wide bevy of skills to draw upon. In the pursuit of bin Laden, Cairo could use his abilities in a number of different scenarios. He could lead his fellow SEALs to the room where the prey was hiding, then provide a positive ID, whether the target was dead or alive. And if the prey happened to escape in the melee of the raid, Cairo could track him down, tackle him, and keep him trapped until his human reinforcements arrived. He could also alert his fellow troops to the presence of explosives, trip wires, and booby traps in the vicinity.