A special bond between soldiers

"If something ever happened to him, I'd never work canine again," Graves said as Udo did a practice run across a field dotted with remnants of once-lethal explosives and other weapons.

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Handlers are expected to keep their dogs "on odor" by putting them through such training every month, to ensure they don't lose the ability to detect TNT, C4, AK-47s, wires, metal and the other threats that insurgents have planted across Iraq.

"If they took him out, I'd kinda wish they'd take me out too," Graves, a former police officer from Oroville, Calif., said as Udo loped nearby. With each successful find, Udo was rewarded with a toss of his favorite toy, a rubber cone.

"It's a helluva thing, owing your life to a dog," Graves said.

Before each deployment, troops are asked to update their wills. Graves included a request to be buried with Udo should they die together. It has happened before. Last July, Cpl. Kory D. Wiens, 20, and his Labrador retriever, Cooper, became the first soldier-dog team killed since Vietnam. They were buried side by side in Wiens' hometown of Dallas, Ore.

If you spend time with the soldier-dog teams, it becomes clear that the key to being a successful canine handler is to love dogs and to adapt to their childlike needs.

"If you deal well with kids, you'll deal well with dogs," said Rose, who has a husky and a dachshund back home in Kansas. "You're working with about a 3-year-old mentality."

Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Blake T. Soller knows that all too well. Last April, his 4-year-old dog, Pluto, couldn't resist leaping over the side of a cargo ship into New York Harbor, 60 feet below. Soller jumped in after Pluto and stayed with the 87-pound Belgian Malinois until a Navy boat picked them up. Neither was injured.

The U.S. military has used dogs in combat zones since World War II and deployed about 4,300 to Vietnam between 1965 and 1973.

According to the military, 281 died in the line of duty there, but hundreds more died after the war ended and U.S. troops departed. Back then, there were no provisions for military dogs to be adopted when their careers were over. Most were euthanized or left behind to uncertain fates.

That changed in 2000, with a law allowing retired military dogs to be put up for adoption at the Military Working Dog center at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas. They range from small breeds such as beagles to hulking hounds.