Warriors and dogs bond on battlefield

• Dogs are trained to sniff out explosives
• Dog, handlers have strong bonds on the battlefield
• When dogs retire, handlers can adopt them

CAMP LEJEUNE, N.C. — The shrapnel tore into his midsection and blood was squirting from his right leg. Marine Cpl. Joseph Singer plugged the hole in his leg with a finger and fretted about his dog.

"Make sure my dog is all right," Singer told his colleagues as a medevac helicopter approached. "Don't forget my dog."

It was one of his last memories

before waking up in the United States. A medic on the aircraft jabbed him with morphine and he went under.

Explosives-sniffing dogs and their handlers have emerged as one of the most effective weapons in the fight against improvised explosives, the Taliban's weapon of choice in Afghanistan.

They can be more effective at times than sophisticated technology. Insurgents can build bombs with plastic parts to avoid metal detectors and use wires so jammers don't work. It's harder to trick a well-trained dog's nose.

The dogs are trained to sniff out explosives.

"If the odor is there you can't hide it from the dog," said Staff Sgt. Scott Chirdon, the chief trainer at a military dog platoon here. The Taliban recognize the value of the dogs and try to disguise the smell of the roadside bombs and target the animals and handlers at every opportunity.

"The Taliban is always trying to defeat them," Chirdon said. "The dogs keep fighting through it."

The bonds between dog and handler on the battlefield are as strong as those between Marines or soldiers.
"I never thought there was the possibility of getting that close to a dog before I had this job," Singer said.

In fact, Singer had no interest in becoming a dog handler until he joined the Marine Corps.

Singer, 22, grew up in Coal City, Illinois, a small town about 60 miles southwest of Chicago. After high school he went to a nearby junior college, but he found himself drifting back to the same crowd of childhood friends, many of whom would never leave Coal City. He was looking something more.

"I turned to the military to bring some discipline in my life," Singer said.

After boot camp he went to military police school. The Marine Corps was giving him exactly what he wanted. "I started to see who I could grow into," Singer said.

One day an instructor came out and asked the class, "Who likes dogs?"

Singer knew nothing about dog handlers though his family had dogs while growing up. He raised his hand.

What followed was months of schooling, where he learned to be a handler and trained dogs. It was eye-opening. "If you put your mind to it you can train a dog to do anything," he said.

In 2010, Singer was assigned a dog, named Dollar, and deployed to Afghanistan for the first time. He learned just how hard the work could be. Singer walked for days carrying more than 100 pounds on his back. He carried his own supplies and a weapon in addition to the dogs' water, food and medicine.

He loved the job.

"I never thought there was the possibility of getting that close to a dog before," Singer said. "There were nights when it was so cold out that I would have him crawl into my sleeping bag with me just so I could stay warm."

Singer returned to Camp Lejeune and was assigned Yona. The two didn't get along at first. Singer was used to Dollar, who required stronger discipline. Yona didn't react well to a strict approach. The more he yelled the less she did.

Singer thought the pair wasn't a good fit. "At first we were fighting back and forth," Singer said. "If she didn't want to do something that day she wouldn't do it."

"It took a lot of time of us battling back and forth to find out what she needs to work," Singer said.

By the time, they got to Arizona for pre-deployment training, the two were clicking. "That's when I felt we were going to be an amazing team," he said.

Back in Afghanistan this spring Singer and Yona were assigned to Marine special operations forces, which regularly went on dangerous missions into remote parts of Helmand province. The small teams inserted by helicopter at night.

In July Singer and Yona were on the first day of an operation to scout out an area north of a U.S. patrol base.

They hadn't been on the ground long before they found a cache of rocket propelled grenades and explosives inside a mud-walled home. They blew it up and were heading back to a compound where they could rest as the sun was coming up.

Shortly after Singer lay down he heard an explosion and screaming. A Marine and an Afghan soldier were injured by a grenade fired from a launcher mounted on an assault rifle. The team called in a medevac helicopter to evacuate them.

Singer and a Navy corpsman were looking over the damage when another grenade came into the compound. Shrapnel sprayed all over the two. Blood was pouring from his leg and it felt as if all his ribs were broken.

He had earlier placed Yona in a room next to where he had laid down under the overhang of a mud-walled home. The dog was unharmed.

Singer was carried to the helicopter by four Afghan commandos. Yona boarded the helicopter too, attempting to get past the Air Force crew to get to her master who was laid out on a stretcher.

"She thought I was laying down to play with her," Singer said.

Singer was given a shot of morphine. It was the last time he would remember seeing Yona before their reunion at Camp Lejeune. He was transferred to Germany and then the United States, spending weeks in the hospital, part of that time in a medically induced coma.

Yona was among the first things he asked about when he came to, said Singer's mother, Jennifer Cherveny. Cherveny had rushed to Germany to be by her son's side. There she ran into the commandant of the Marine Corps, Gen. James Amos, and the top enlisted Marine, Sgt. Maj. Micheal Barrett, who were visiting injured troops. She told them her son was worried about the dog.

Back in the United States, Barrett, sergeant major of the Marine Corps, personally brought Singer a photo of Yona from Afghanistan to prove he was doing well.

Singer plans to get out of the Marine Corps in a few months at the end of his initial enlistment. He is considering a career in dog training.

"I just ended up being good at it," he said. "It feels natural."

Today, Singer is mostly recovered and back at Camp Lejeune, where he has reunited with his dog. Under a cloudless sky on a recent day, Singer tossed a rubber toy to Yona, a Belgian malinois.

"I come here every opportunity I can," he said, reaching down to pet Yona. "Just looking at her I get happy."

When dogs here retire, handlers get first crack at adopting them. Chirdon said Singer is first in line to adopt Yona.

But she's not ready for retirement yet. Yona is 8 years old and shows no sign of flagging. "I can see her going for another three or four years," Singer said. She's in line for another tour in Afghanistan.

Singer said he tries not to think of the risk involved in going back overseas. Yona has had four combat deployments. This year the working dog platoon at Camp Lejeune deployed 30 dogs and one was killed. In the previous deployment two dogs were killed.

"We look at it as she will take care of that Marine and the team she supports and if something happens, then she did what she was trained to do," Chirdon said.

Singer knows that the first duty of working dogs is to sniff out bombs. "They are not your pets," Singer warns new handlers checking into the unit.

Still, Singer can't help but think about the future when Yona will be his.

"I'll have her go everywhere with me — in my truck have her hanging out of the window," he said. "I'll probably let her sleep in my bed."