Military pets perform critical roles in the service of their country. Pet Vets parachute into hot zones, playfully jump on grenades, or lead a charge to the mess hall garbage cans. Hero or lazy mooch? Both raise the morale of our warriors on the eve of battle.

Let Loose the Dead Dogs of War!

• King Neptune the Pig, Mount Pleasant, Illinois: Died 1950
• Calculator the Dog, Fort Benning, Georgia: Died 1923
• Joachim, Vet Dog, Hartsdale, New York: Died 1972
• West Coast War Dog Memorial, Riverside, California

A Special Sad Pet Vet Story from Rapid City, SD

Ellsworth Air Force Base was home to the legendary Master Sergeant Bismarck, the GI's beer-drinking, officer-hating mongrel mascot of World War II. A generation of air force personnel believed his final resting place was at the end of the Ellsworth runway. In the mid-1980s, base officials vainly searched for Bismarck's remains, hoping to bestow honors on the fifty-pound canine.

Finally Bill Aisenbrey, a retired corporal with veterinary duties, fessed up. Aisenbrey said he kept it secret that Bismarck developed a gangrenous infection in 1951 and was destroyed, then cremated in the base incinerator. "Nobody would believe me anyhow," he said."Or they might have lynched me. He was very popular with the GIs."

[From a story by the Rapid City Journal]