Tag Archives: k9

Cammies, KA-bars and GSDs

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“Marine War Dog and Handler, Vietnam, circa 1970”

Note the kennels in the background with the sandbagged roof. From the Craig Spraggins Collection (COLL/4154) at the Marine Corps History Division

Of note, the WMD handler is wearing the Marine Corps’ “lowland” variant of the ERDL camouflage uniform, which predated the much better known M81 woodland BDU by more than a decade. The Marine also has a standard M1911A1 in a very non-standard holster that could be a modded M1916-style flap holster but I believe is actually just a commercial leather revolver holster, accompanied by a K-Bar fighting knife attached to the holster by a leather tie.

Another installment of the same team

Odds are the Marine has coupled the two weapons together at his strong side to be able to use either with his right hand as the dog would be controlled by his left.

Dogs get the chop

In related news, the Marines are cutting back on their military working dogs, a staple of the service since the Great War, as they aren’t needed to fight China, apparently. Currently, the Corps has 210 four-legged MWDs and 260 two-legged handlers/trainers. After the snip, that will fall to 150 and 210, respectively. Of note, once a dog enters the training program, it takes six months to get them ready for the Fleet.

Securing those who secure the maps

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Established in 1996, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is a little-known government body that is both a combat support agency under DOD, and an intelligence agency of the United States Intelligence Community. It sprang from the old Army Map Service (AMS) / U.S. Army Topographic Command (USATC) and has some 16,000 employees, headquartered at Fort Belvoir, who are all about mapping and tracking military and strategic objects.

They just released, through ODNI, a really interesting piece on their nine Explosives Detection K-9 teams.

Clara, a 3-year-old female yellow Labrador retriever, is known as NGA’s residential high jumper. When Clara first met her partner, Officer Mike Muten, she was so excited, she tried to jump over her kennel wall at ATF

Clara, a 3-year-old female yellow Labrador retriever, is known as NGA’s residential high jumper. When Clara first met her partner, Officer Mike Muten, she was so excited, she tried to jump over her kennel wall at ATF

The first six-week phase of training focuses on imprinting, which is a form of learning that typically happens at an early age and lasts the lifetime of the animal. During this process, a K-9 is offered an explosive compound to smell, and then given a food reward. Repetition is vital, which is why the smell-eat process may be repeated up to 200 times a day.

Once imprinted, the dogs are then taught to alert their handlers by sitting when they smell the odor. At that point, the cycle of detection — smell, sit, eat — is complete.

The second phase of training, which lasts for 10 weeks, introduces the K-9 to its handler as the two begin working together to refine their search techniques. This phase is vital to both the dog and the handler, as they begin to develop their bond and learn how each team member goes about conducting such an important mission.

During this period, the handler learns the dog’s personality and tendencies, which helps them to recognize the subtle clues their canine partner cannot vocalize.

Based off a finite group of explosive components, ATF estimates there are 19,000 explosive formulations.

More here, including a ton of photos if you are puppy-inclined.

Ahh, my favorite people often aren’t

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At SHOT you run into all sorts of people. I shook hands this year with Lou Ferrigno, Jesse James, R. Lee Ermey, lots of industry types and sharpshooters, Second Amendment attorneys, politicians etc.

However, after running into Arkos, a four-year-old Belgian Malinois service dog, complete with mandatory ear-and eye-pro at Industry Range Day on Monday, I knew it was going to be a great show.

The dogs of SHOT Show 2016 (1)

With 500,000 rounds fired at 170 booths, doggles and muffs are legit required. And yes, that is my reflection.

Therefore, I give you the Dogs of SHOT Show.

“Cry ‘Havoc!’, and let slip the dogs of war”

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While, yes, it may be a phrase from Act 3, Scene 1, line 273 of William Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, and was likely written sometime around 1599, both Caesar’s army and those of Shakespeare’s own time, as today, contain military working dogs and canine mascots.

And the one thing that unites them all, is our desire to mark them as part of the unit.

U.S.S. New York circa 1896. Ship’s tailor The dog is Nick.

U.S.S. New York circa 1896. Ship’s tailor The dog is Nick.

Sergeant Stubby, the mascot of the 102nd Infantry, 26th Yankee Division WWI

Sergeant Stubby, the mascot of the 102nd Infantry, 26th Yankee Division WWI

Gefreiter Hund A German WWI era mascot dog complete with his own jacket with rank button, feldmutze with cockade and his very own Iron Cross Second Class. Photo via Flickr https://www.flickr.com/photos/48140075@N04/6337681189/in/pool-971387@N24/

Gefreiter Hund A German WWI era mascot dog complete with his own jacket with rank button, feldmutze with cockade and his very own Iron Cross Second Class. Photo via Flickr

Those Germans love their dogs... another WWI era shot

Those Germans love their dogs… another WWI era shot

devil dog marine poster

1925. "Sgt. Jiggs." The Marine Corps mascot in Washington, D.C., with an actual Marine. National Photo Company Collection glass negative

1925. “Sgt. Jiggs.” The Marine Corps mascot in Washington, D.C., with an actual Marine. National Photo Company Collection glass negative

Sgt. Jiggs, close up

Sgt. Jiggs, close up

M1919 with sled dog Alaska WWII

M1919 with sled dog Alaska WWII

Finnish soldier and dog in position near Kiestinki, 25 April, 1942, note the Mosin rifle

Finnish soldier and dog in position near Kiestinki, 25 April, 1942, note the Mosin rifle

You will take this Mauser and like it

You will take this Mauser and like it

Observer

Flak Observer

Co-pilot

Co-pilot

Field promotion

Field promotion

U.S. Scout dog, Luzon, 1945

U.S. Scout dog, Luzon, 1945

The official mascot of the United States Marine Corps, English bulldog Pfc. Chesty the XIV, sits for his official photo at Headquarters Marine Corps Combat Camera in the Pentagon, Arlington, Va, May 15, 2013 at Headquarters Marine Corps Combat Camera, Pentagon, Washington, D.C. Chesty the XIV will officially take over as the mascot when his predecessor, Sgt. Chesty the XIII, retires in the fall of 2013. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Adrian R. Rowan HQMC Combat Camera/Released)

The official mascot of the United States Marine Corps, English bulldog Pfc. Chesty the XIV, sits for his official photo at Headquarters Marine Corps Combat Camera in the Pentagon, Arlington, Va, May 15, 2013 at Headquarters Marine Corps Combat Camera, Pentagon, Washington, D.C. Chesty the XIV will officially take over as the mascot when his predecessor, Sgt. Chesty the XIII, retires in the fall of 2013. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Adrian R. Rowan HQMC Combat Camera/Released)

WMD memorial at Eglin AFB. Image by Chris Eger

WMD memorial at Eglin AFB. Image by Chris Eger

Russian Cyborg Tank Killing and Bomb Sniffing Dogs

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An now, for something completely different

The Russians are now equipping their bomb-dogs with Walkie Talkies and Small cameras to serve as remote control bomb-sniffers. In the West this is done with ROV robots, however the Russians think they can do better with Dogs..

The Soviets were well known for oddball Animal experiments. It should be remembered that for more than 100 years the Russians have done this research.

The Russian scientist Ivan Petrovich Pavlov was born in 1849 in Ryazan, where his father worked as a village priest. In 1870 Ivan Pavlov abandoned the religious career for which he had been preparing, and instead went into science. There he had a great impact on the field of physiology by studying the mechanisms underlying the digestive system in mammals.

For his original work in this field of research, Pavlov was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1904. By then he had turned to studying the laws on the formation of conditioned reflexes, a topic on which he worked until his death in 1936. His discoveries in this field paved the way for an objective science of behavior.
The Soviets, always eager to find weapons to get the upper hand, created a unit of Anti-tank dogs before WWII

(Russian: собаки-истребители танков or противотанковые собаки; German: Panzerabwehrhunde or Hundeminen, “dog-mines”) were dogs taught to carry explosives to tanks, armored vehicles and other military targets. They were intensively trained by the Soviet and Russian military forces between 1930 and 1996 and used in 1941–1942 against German tanks in World War II. Although the original dog training routine was to leave the bomb and retreat so that the bomb would be detonated by the timer, this routine failed and was replaced by an impact detonation procedure which killed the dog in the process. The U.S. military trained anti-tank dogs in 1943 for use against fortifications, but never deployed them.

Creepier Still is the Russian Cyborg Dogs, apparently of the 1940s-1960s….while this has not been proven, it has not been disproved.


There is even video of a disembodied head blinking and licking its face.

“Experiments in the Revival of Organisms (1940)”

Russia Strong! In an homage to Yakov Smirnov, “In Russia, Dog walks YOU!”