Orders to kill adopted puppy leave Florida soldiers mourning

Sun-Sentinel ^ | 12-11-2003 | Roger Roy

[Cagey]

It's against the rules for U.S. soldiers in Iraq to have pets, but the skinny black puppy that wandered up to the Florida National Guard soldiers at a base in northern Iraq wouldn't go away.

So the soldiers from Alpha Co. of the 2nd Battalion of the 124th Infantry Regiment adopted the mutt and named her Apache after their radio call sign.

But Army regulations finally caught up with Alpha Co. and Apache.

Family members said Wednesday that the soldiers were eventually forced to obey orders and have the dog killed.

"My husband was devastated," said Maggie Ford of Melbourne, whose husband, Sgt. 1st Class Bill Ford, had hoped to bring the dog back to Florida. "We all cried when we found out."

[Cagey]

Sadly, sometimes "This isn't your Father's Army". What a shame.

[Cagey]

Sgt. 1st Class Bill Ford of Melbourne poses with Apache, a stray dog Florida soldiers adopted near Balad, Iraq.
(ROGER ROY/ORLANDO SENTINEL)

[AppyPappy]

I bet we'll never know who issued the order.

[knak]

aww, how sad

[CasearianDaoist]

Those rules have always been there. They just should have been more clever about it.

[aynrandfreak]

Couldn't they give it to any Iraqi family inside the Green Line?

[freeeee]

scumbags

[mewzilla]

I don't get it. Aren't there dog teams with various countries' armed forces? Those dogs are in Iraq. When the dogs go home, they're put in quarantine, then released after the required time. Why weren't these guys allowed to do that with this dog?

[Old Sarge]

It's a stupid rule, and stupid rules are meant to be broken.

She could've been delcared the unit mascot, and MWR might've taken the job. But, NO!

Where's PETA? Hello? Who let all these crickets n here?

[freeeee]

Couldn't they give it to any Iraqi family inside the Green Line?

Or how about let it go. No, they just have to kill it.

losers

[mfulstone]

That really grieves me. At Ky Ha, RVN, we had a mutt we called "boozer" because of his love for beer. He was still hanging around when I left for the states. He was probably the only thing I missed about Vietnam.

[ZULU]

Soldiers in EVERY war in EVERY army have had pets.

Propbably the A-hole who ordered this is the same A-Hole who brought charges against Lt. Col. West.

Well, at least the dog isn't suffering anymore. To Muslims, a dog is a foul, unclean animal, and never the recipient of affection. Perhaps its their loyalty, courage and affection which turns off the Islamites.


Mr. Nixon's administration ordered hundreds of American Dogs, used successfully in warning of Viet Cong attack, saving their owners, etc. left behind when we pulled out. They probably wound up in cooking pots. They had a show on T.V. a year or so ago interviewing the G.I.s who worked with these animals and had their lives and the lives of their buddies saved by them. They were actually crying, so close was their attachment to their dogs. Some of the dogs were so successful, that apparently the Viet Cong put a bounty on them, which could be collected by turning in their ears.

Sometimes the Government s#cks! Maybe ALL the time!!

[Puppage]

were eventually forced to obey orders and have the dog killed.

Oh, BS. They prolly took the pooch somewhere away from camp & dropped it off. They wouldn't kill it.

[ambrose]

And here's the real reason the dog was ordered shot (buried in the body of the article):

While affectionate with the 130 or so soldiers in the company, Apache could spot a stranger instantly and would bark and growl menacingly. She seemed to especially dislike officers, and in September nipped at a captain from another company who got too close.

[browsin]

Or how about let it go. No, they just have to kill it.

Maybe they figured it would starve to death if they let it go,and felt killing it was the most humane thing to do.I dont know,but i'd like to think that's why.

[ZULU]

Muslims don't keep dogs as pets. Check out "Ask the Imam" on the net. They use them as guard or draft animals but never as pets. Some wacko saint or something in their religion said some angelic visitors refused to enter his tent because a dog was present.

The visitors were probably devils from hell,and the saint was probably a nutcase.

[Agnes Heep]

Fluellen was pretty upset when the order came down to kill all the prisoners. But then again, they were French, so I'm sure he got over it.

[Agnes Heep]

Fluellen was pretty upset when the order came down to kill all the prisoners. But then again, they were French, so I'm sure he got over it.

[flutters]

The last 2 paragraphs of this article:

Kim Alfonso said her husband recently had her mail him some clothes their 3-year-old daughter had outgrown so he could give them to children in the local villages, who often wear little more than rags.

"You have to keep things in perspective," Kim Alfonso said. "It's not like one of our guys was shot. We're talking about a dog. But it is sad."

[CasearianDaoist]

There are ways around this, or at least there used to be, particularly in-country. They probably had some d*ckhe*d rotate in and he wanted to show them what a regular army clown he was.