Sergeant Rex: The Unbreakable Bond Between a Marine and His Military Working Dog Paperback - 2012

Prologue


WE START THE WALK.

IED Alley stretches before us, a deserted length of rubble-strewn, sunbaked dirt. To the uninitiated, thereâÈçs nothing obvious here that screams out violence and danger. To me, gazing down IED Alley is like peering into the very jaws of hell.

On either side of the route are the broken mounds of shattered earth and the craters where roadside bombs have blown themselvesâÈ'and all too often their targetsâÈ'to smithereens. But luckily, typically, Rex, my search dog, is out front alone and unperturbed, eager to sniff out the bombs.

IâÈçve felt fear every day that weâÈçve led these patrols. ItâÈçs been my constant companion here in Iraq. But this morning, the terror had me gripped as never before.

It was Rex who gave me the strength to get up and to carry on. He sent me one lookâÈ'Come on, partner, we can do this; you got me by your sideâÈ'and I knew then that I had to raise my game to the level of my dog.

I look to my fellow marines as my own brothers, and Rex and I are tasked with keeping them safe from the insurgentsâÈç bombs out here. Having my courageous, crazy, stubborn, loyal, dedicated, devilishly handsome dog by my side helps me deal with the enormous stress of that responsibility.

I gaze down IED Alley and give Rex the command, the magic words: âÈêSeek. . . Seek. . . Seek. . .âÈë But right now theyâÈçre rasping out from a throat thatâÈçs dry and constricted with fear.

In response, Rex is off. His nose starts going like a suction pump: slurp, slurp, slurp. HeâÈçs dropped his muzzle low to the ground, and heâÈçs vacuuming up the scent just inches off the dirt. His tailâÈçs horizontal behind him, the end flicked up just a fraction, as his head sweeps from side to side.

IâÈçd know that posture anywhere: Here I am on the search, and IâÈçm loving it. Rex always has loved sniffing out the bombs. ItâÈçs like he was born to do this work. From the earliest days of training he was one of the few and the proudâÈ'an unbeatable Marine Corps arms- and explosives-detection dog.

IâÈçm a couple of paces behind him, his lead looped around my left hand. My M16 assault rifle is slung over my back on its sling, and IâÈçm gripping my Beretta M9 pistol in my right hand. My rifleâÈçs too long and unwieldy to use much when searching with my dog.

If Rex steps on an improvised explosive device, weâÈçre both as good as done for. But weâÈçve been ordered to clear IED Alley so our patrol can pass through it, and the two of us out front on foot is the only way to do it.

To Rex, clearing the route of death is all a fantastic game. IâÈçve shown him a flash of his rubber ballâÈ'his rewardâÈ'and he knows if he finds the target scent he gets to play with it. ItâÈçs only me whoâÈçs racked with this visceral, heart-stopping fear, fear that the next step RexâÈçs paws take may be his, and my, last.

RexâÈçs whole focus is his sense of smell now, and thatâÈçs how heâÈçs navigating. HeâÈçs moving through a world defined by scent. HeâÈçs tracking smells on the hot, dusty air, his footfalls dictated by the direction those odors are coming from. He lifts his head now and then to check on his locationâÈ'that heâÈçs not about to walk into a wall or tumble into a ditch.

WeâÈçre a third of the way down IED Alley. My pulse is thumping like a jackhammer. Every time Rex raises a paw and places it onto the baking-hot earth, I tense for the blast. But I force myself to keep moving forward with him, and the sweatâÈçs pouring off me in buckets.

ItâÈçs shortly after first light, yet already the temperature out here must be pushing 100 degrees. If itâÈçs this hot for me, how must it be for Rex, all wrapped up in his thick, shaggy, charcoal-brown coat of fur? But nothing seems to faze my dog, not even the burning Iraqi sun thatâÈçs beating down on his head and shoulders.

I see Rex approaching a small patch of dirt ahead of us that looks as if it might recently have been disturbed. The difference in this area is minimal, just a slightly different color from the earth all around it, as if itâÈçs been dug up and tamped down again.

An unusual area of terrain is one of the signs that an IED may be buried there. IâÈçm hyperalert, and my threat radar is working overtime. I try to work out what might lie beneath that patch of dirt, because I canâÈçt let Rex go walking right over it. Not for the first time since we deployed to Iraq, I curse the fact that I donâÈçt have X-ray vision, that I canâÈçt see the bombs lying just below earthâÈçs surface.

Rex pauses just a few paces short of that patch of dirt. His nostrils flare, and suddenly heâÈçs sucking in great lungfuls of air. He turns his head this way and that, sampling the scent, until heâÈçs got his nose pressed up tight against the hot mud of the earth.

Rex snuffles hard a good few times, then glances back at me. His sparkling amber eyes are wide with the thrill of the search. ThereâÈçs an unspoken bond between us. I can read his every expression, and I figure I can pretty much read his mind.

This look means: Hey, I really think IâÈçm onto something here.

âÈêEasy, boy, careful,âÈë I whisper at him. âÈêEasy does it, Rexy. What you think you got there, boy?âÈë

He moves ahead a foot or so until heâÈçs level with the patch of dirt. His muzzle swings left and right, before heâÈçs staring right at it. He pokes his snout forward, until heâÈçs sniffing at the very surface of that disturbed area.

His entire body goes rigid. He gives me a quick, intense, piercing look: FreakinâÈç hell, get in here and check this out!

I feel my blood run cold. Rex never false respondsâÈ'signaling that heâÈçs found something when actually he hasnâÈçt. ThereâÈçs some kind of explosive device buried right in front of my dogâÈçs nose, of that I am 100 percent certain.

I donâÈçt know why IâÈçm sureâÈ'it can only be in response to the unspoken message thatâÈçs flashed between Rex and meâÈ'but I lunge forward, and with one hand I grab his collar and haul him backward.

In my mindâÈçs eye I can picture a gleeful Iraqi insurgent hunched over a detonator device, punching the firing pin, and hoping to blow the shaggy dog and his handler into shreds of flesh and gore.

With my free hand I reach for my radio so I can send out an alert to the rest of the patrol strung out behind us. I press the Send button and yell out a warning: âÈêThereâÈçs aâÈ'âÈë

My words are lost in this deafening roar of an explosion. I hit the dirt and elbow myself forward and dive on top of Rex, to shield him from the blast. But an instant later I sense that itâÈçs not the bomb in front of us thatâÈçs gone off. If it were, weâÈçd both be dead by now.

Just to the east of us above the palm trees, a massive plume of smoke and debris is fisting into the sky. An IED has been triggered there, to one side of our road.

The harsh, juddering crackle of gunfire thunders out of the smoke and dust as the insurgents unleash a barrage of fire in a follow-up attack. I roll across Rex, getting my body between him and the pounding gunfire.

IâÈçm wearing body armor; Rex isnâÈçt. IâÈçm not about to let anyone shoot my best buddy. I wrap all six feet of me around him and pull his thick fur in tight against me.

As I hold him there, I whisper into his ear: âÈêItâÈçs okay, boy, itâÈçs okay. ItâÈçs all gonna be all right. . . .âÈë

Âû 2011 Mike Dowling

Mike Dowling enlisted with the US Marine Corps in 2001. He was awarded the Navy & Marine Corps Achievement Medal for his Iraq operations with his dog, Rex. Dowling currently lives in Los Angeles, where he serves on the advisory board of two wounded-warrior nonprofit organizations.

Damien Lewis is a lifelong dog lover and award-winning writer who has spent twenty years reporting from war, disaster, and conflict zones for the BBC and other global news organizations. He is the bestselling author of more than twenty books, including several acclaimed memoirs about military working dogs--Sergeant Rex, It's All About Treo, Judy, and The Dog Who Could Fly.