Properly
trained Police Dogs are taught to do the following:
-
Search
buildings and areas for unauthorized persons.
-
Track
Criminals and search for lost children, etc.
-
Search
for evidence dropped by criminals in flight.
-
Search
for hidden explosives, narcotics, chemicals, illegally taken game
and cadaver substance.
-
Pursue
and apprehend, with minimum force, criminals fleeing a serious
crime and arrest.
-
Apprehend
on command only and in Protection of the Handler.
Police
K-9 dogs, properly trained and handled, give Law Enforcement
officers one of the finest non-lethal aids in the prevention and
detection of crime.
From Before Biblical Times To The Present
When we go to war, they go to war.
Throughout the histories of warfare, from the days of
the Egyptians, the Greeks and the Persians and the conquests of the
Roman Empire.
To the United Nation's Police Action in Korea, the war
in Vietnam, the Gulf War, and more recently during the war in
Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo.
Dogs have undergone active service at the sides of
their masters, they have played the role of hero, by showing bravery
under fire, saving lives (often by sacrificing their own), and
bringing comfort to the injured and infirm.
Atilla the Hun, used giant Molossian dogs, precursors
of the mastiff, and Talbots, ancestors of the bloodhound, in his
campaigns.
During the Middle Ages, war dogs were outfited with
armor and frequently were used to defend caravans.
And in the Seven Years War, Russian dogs were used as
messengers by the army of Frederick the Great.
Napoleon had dogs posted as sentries at the gates of
Alexandria, in Egypt, to warn his troops of any attacks.
Two centuries earlier, on this side of the Atlantic,
they helped the Spaniards conquer the Indians of Mexico and Peru.
Then later on, it was the native North American Indians
who were to develop the use of dogs for pack and draft work, as well
as for sentry duty.
In the early part of the 14th Century, the French Navy
started to use attack dogs in St. Malo, France, to guard naval dock
installations. These were used up to 1770, when they were abolished
after a young naval officer was unfortunately killed by one of the
dogs.
The first recorded American Canine Corp was during the
Seminole War of 1835, and again in 1842, in Florida and Louisiana,
where Cuban-bred bloodhounds were used by the army to track the
Indians and runaway slaves in the swamps!
And during the bleakest time in the history of the
United States, the Civil War, dogs were used as messengers, guards
and as mascots.
In 1884, the German Army established the first organize
Military School for training war dogs at Lechernich, near Berlin;
and in 1885 wrote the very first training manual for MWD.
In 1898, during the Spanish-American War, dogs were
used by Teddy's Roughriders, as scouts in the jungles of Cuba.
By the early part of the twentieth century most
European countries were utilizing dogs in their armies and for
police work.
In 1904, Imperial Russia used ambulance dogs during the
Russo-Japanese War; trained by a British dog fancier, who later went
on to establish the first Army Dog School in England, at the start
of The Great War.
The Bulgarians and Italians employed dogs as sentries
during the war in the Balkans and in Tripoli, as did the British on
the Abor Expedition in the Himalayas.
Dogs were used in sizable numbers in both World War I and II,
particularly by the Germans, French, Belgians; and proved to be of
considerable value!
In 1988, the Israeli Special Forces sent bomb carrying
Rottweilers on a suicide mission, code named "Blue and Brown,"
against enemy bunkers in Lebanon.
And when the Berlin Wall came down, Nov. 9, 1989, the
East German communist government was using 5,000 dogs just to patrol
the wall and another 2,500 watch dogs plus 2,700 so called horse
dogs to patrol their borders.
During the Gulf War, at least 1,177 highly trained
German Shepherds were use by the French forces to guard and protect
their troops, supplies and aircraft. The USA used 88 teams.
But it was initially during the days of the Roman
Empire, that entire formations of attack dogs, frequently equipped
with armor or spiked collars were sent into battle against the enemy
as a recognized and effective instruments of offensive warfare.
However, recently with the development of modern long
range warfare and the consequential change in military tactics, the
value of dogs as combat soldiers has steadily diminished.
But at the same time their usefulness in other military
activities has increased.
This is their story and in some ways, mans as well !
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