We tend to think of the dogs that served as military K9s in the Vietnam War as being German Shepherd Dogs, but Labrador Retrievers were also there. While GSDs filled the ranks as scout dogs, Labs were favored as tracker dogs after the successful experience of the British. Labs were great tempered, tolerated the heat fairly well, and favored the dead scent of ground sniffing. Their alerts were often nuanced: The wag of a tail, the twitch of an ear, a head tilt, or simply stopping in their tracks.

For a long time, however, the Army’s tracker dogs were a big secret. It wasn’t just that the army didn’t want to tip their hand that they had a new “weapon” in tracking down guerrillas. It was that they didn’t want to create an international incident.

The truth of it was that Army lacked tracking experience. Their previous experiment with Bloodhounds ended poorly because the dogs made such a racket as they followed a scent through jungle leaves and undergrowth. Conversely, the British knew exactly how to work with sniffing dogs. Asking them for help, however, was dicey. London had signed the 1954 Geneva Accords that partitioned Vietnam in half, and required foreign forces to leave. If the Brits openly helped the Yanks with their dog issue, the Soviets or People’s Republic of China could very well accuse them of violating the spirit of the accords. Making things worse was that the British Jungle Warfare School was inside Malaysia, and like Britain, Kuala Lumpur had a neutral stance on Vietnam.

The three countries eventually agreed to train tracker teams at the British Army’s school in Johor Bahru. They also provided the 63rd Infantry Detachment Combat Tracker with its first three dogs: Bruce, Lucky and Sambo. The two year old Labs began an eight month training period and were expected to experience combat action for up to six years. Their wonderful temperament made transitions between handlers easy, and while they were never trained to attack, they absolutely defended their handler or team in certain scenarios.

Two years after the project started, the U.S. finally began training their own trackers at Fort Gordon in Georgia. The Army came up with its own organization, trimming one dog and its handler from each element. The ground combat branch also attached Viet Cong defectors—known as Kit Carson Scouts—to the tracking units. Nevertheless, the teams still struggled to find the elusive guerrillas. According to reports kept in the National Archives, only around 80 suspected insurgents were detained by the 63rd Infantry Platoon between 1969 and 1971.

After the war was ended, the Army disbanded the tracker units. In 1973, the ground combat branch compiled one organizational document spelling out the requirements for various special dog teams, but the teams would only be recreated “as required.”

In time, the canine teams were required again, in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. Unlike Vietnam, the service of these dogs was appreciated even after their tours were done. You see, the Vietnam war was the only war in American history where “war dogs” were not officially allowed to return home after war.  Of the roughly 4,900 dogs of different breeds that the United States that served in Vietnam, around 2,700 were turned over to the South Vietnamese army, and a staggering 1,600 were put down. It remains a shocking, shameful chapter in that war and for the Army. In November 2000, President Bill Clinton signed “Robby’s Law” (H.R.5314),” a bill that requires that all Military War Dogs suitable for adoption be made available for placement after their service. It also requires the Secretary of Defense to submit a report to Congress each year on the “disposition” of  MWDs – the numbers adopted, transferred to law enforcement, euthanized, etc. Unfortunately, it was too late to save “Robby,” whose former handler fought valiantly to adopt him, but to no avail.

Robby’s Law was updated on December 31, 2020 to give handlers first priority to adopt the dogs with whom they worked. It also introduced language about contract working dogs that have been transferred to the 341st Training Squadron at Lackland Air Force Base.

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