Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
13
All the Soldiers Gone
You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you'll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
—Siegfried Sassoon, “Suicide in the Trenches,” 1918
Dogs have been used during war for centuries: first for attack, then for scenting the presence
of enemy soldiers, then for sending messages to the front, and then for finding bombs and
mines. Starting in the nineteenth century, dogs were also tasked with finding wounded sol-
diers. Through it all, the dogs' stated purpose in war was to focus on finding the living rather
than the dead. Dogs were supposed to assist in the heat of battle, not find the bodies in its
aftermath. Canines were simply additional cogs in the machinery of war.
Nonetheless, immediately after a battle, triaging among the dead and the living is a critical
task. The Red Cross knew that better than any organization. World War I saw the first
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