War Dogs

I heard Susan Orlean interviewed last week on the NPR. She was talking about her new book, Rin Tin tin, and while I am not currently in the business of promoting other people's books (!), I will tell you that I am going to order hers because it sounds fascinating and I think I should have it in my library. Think of it as a Seabiscuit for dog lovers--she spent eight years researching Rin Tin Tin and in the process uncovered some fascinating facts about dogs that caught me by surprise.

For starters, I did not realize that Rin Tin Tin was literally born on a World War I battlefield or for that matter, that dogs were used so intensively during World War I. Horses, I knew because of War Horse, but dogs...I confess my ignorance. In addition, she mentions that during World War II, when America decided to start a canine corps, people literally sent their own dogs to war, to form the first US Canine Corps. They wrote their dogs letters, sent them Christmas cards and often never heard or saw them again once they "enlisted" them in the war effort.

Today, of course, the military trains its own canine corps--as we saw in the Osama Bin Laden raid--and they continue to serve in active duty. On the heels of this comes a story in a recent New York Times about the toll that war takes on these devoted companions. Dogs, just like people, can develop post traumatic stress disorder. In fact, according to the piece, more than 5 percent of the approximately 650 military dogs deployed in combat, do develop symptoms of this disorder and are retired.

There are some questions about treatment--which often amounts to R & R, and sometimes medication--as well as to whether or not these dogs ever truly "get over" their experiences. According to Dr. Nicholas H. Dodman, director of the animal behavior clinic at the cummings School of Vet Medicien at Tufts, "It is more management. Dogs never forget."

We should never forget them.