« When a man sees a dying animal, horror comes over him: that which he himself is, his essence, is obviously being annihilated before his eyes cease to be. » – Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace

After centuries of living being threatened, early humans have gradually cleared Earth from their predators. Since then, the most dangerous animal alive for men is itself; and humans have been constantly improving their techniques to kill each other, from the most basic hammer to atomic bombs. The other animals, far from representing a threat for mankind as a species, became potential allies in this happy process of self-destruction. Horses, dogs, elephants, but also dolphins, bats, monkeys and more have been enlisted and raised to fight among armies through History, until nowadays.

Early domestication and ancient warfare

The first animals to be tamed by men were wolves (that turned somehow into small poodles centuries after), as hunter-gatherer tribes needed companions to help them hunt prey. With the beginning of breeding, dogs were found a new use to watch over herds of sheep, cattle and pigs. Horses came after, granting nomadic tribes a huge improvement in their lifestyle. But its spreading did also make agriculture easier, as well as communication between different villages and cities. As different tribes and groups were growing, the competition for resources became harder; therefore, horses as well as other animals became also useful for war.

In order to establish domination over larger territories, any army needed either an access to the water or horses to connect settlements between each other, and reach them quick enough to face rebellion or invasion. That’s why all civilizations around the Silk Road, from Europe to Japan, started to use horses in their armies until the First World War. Strength to break enemy lines, quickness to encircle and pursue the infantry, and endurance to carry supplies for the troops indeed made horses the most used animal in wars. But some animals with some specific features were more likely to fulfil certain tasks.

Communication

In the field of communication, horses gave humans the ability of riding longer distances. The Mongol Empire, relying on horses for basically everything, invented a really sophisticated postal system (yam) that would be used by Russians until the telegraph. But pigeons or doves were also tamed to carry important messages from one place to another, ignoring the natural obstacles. To carry supplies, oxen and donkeys were appreciated for their endurance.

Sentries, scouts

Because of their really good sense of smell, they were also used a lot on checkpoints or borders to prevent enemy infiltration, or to detect ambushes. Geese also became famous for warning the garrison of Roma of an attempt from the Celts to penetrate the city at night.

War machines

On the battlefield, animals were often a key for victory. If horses gave a huge advantage to any army fighting on a flat land, first with war chariots or cavalry, dogs were also really scary and powerful when they were trained for war: they gave a huge psychological advantage to the Spanish during the conquest of the Aztec Empire. In other places, such as the Middle East or North Africa, camels were more efficient than horses to evolve and fight in the desert. Some armies also used elephants as early tanks, such as Persians, Carthaginians, Indians or Khmer. The Khmer (current Cambodia) even used ballistas on their elephant’s back, making a first example of mounted artillery. Facing elephants a few times, Roman tacticians also used pigs set on fire to scare them.

Modern Warfare

The use of animals didn’t stop with weaponry improvement. Because of the progress of artillery and gunpowder, elephants or heavy cavalry vanished, but lighter units were still involved until the Second World War, while elephants were still used for logistics (by the Japanese army or Red Khmer in the 70’s). It’s been recorded that Swedish King Charles XI might have tried to constitute moose cavalry units to prevent the lack of horses in Scandinavia, and some moose might also have been involved in the Winter War that occurred between Finland and Soviet Union in 1939-1940. But moose were scared at every gunshot, therefore they were mostly used for logistics. As the battlefields became more static, constantly under artillery fire, humans had been looking for new animals to use for infiltration or spying missions, thanks to technological advances.

Spying

Collecting information about enemy positions and movements was a task that animals couldn’t take care of – because they cannot talk. But the invention of photography made it possible to design small cameras that could be carried out by pigeons, dolphins or belugas. The CIA even tried to set them on cats to spy on Soviet officials during the Cold War. More recently, migration birds were equipped with devices for spying purposes in the Middle East.

Mine clearance

If trained dogs, cats or even dolphins can spot landmines, rougher techniques such as “let’s send a flock of sheep on this land full of mines” were also used by the US Army after landing in Europe.

Drones and counter-drones

Equipped with an explosive device, bats, dogs, rats, seals or pigs were used as kamikaze by armies around the world to destroy tanks or bunkers. But the invention of drones made that obsolete, a drone being cheaper and more precise than an animal to train. More recently, police and military forces started to train eagles to catch or destroy spying drones around places with sensitive information. Even today, there is evidence that the Russian military is using dolphins to prevent drones from attacking Crimean harbours.

Animal war stories

A Baboon on the western front: during WWI, “Corporal Jackie” was a mascot baboon that was shot twice on the front among the South African troops in Europe and Middle East. Thanks to his ability to spot enemies at night far better than human and to his war wounds, he was promoted corporal and awarded a medal, before coming back to South Africa to die peacefully in 1921.

A Cat on a (few) ship: “Unsinkable Sam” awarded his nickname by surviving three shipwrecks. First on a German battleship that sank in the English Channel, he was rescued by the Royal Navy where he survived another battle (while the ship didn’t), before being transferred on an aircraft carrier. After the sinking of that one, they removed him from the Navy and he ended his life in Belfast a few years after the war.

The Polish Bear: Wojtek was a small bear sold to Polish soldiers that were going through Iran to join the British forces after the Polish invasion. The bear would live among the soldiers, drinking beers, wrestling and sleeping with them during their campaign in North Africa. At the end of 1943, he was incorporated as a private by his Polish comrades so they could bring him with them to Italy to pursue the war, where he actually helped them carry ammunition during an important battle that would lead to the liberation of Roma. Promoted corporal, he died in 1963 at Edinburgh Zoo.

Conclusion

These new experiments didn’t replace the first companions of mankind, such as horses or dogs: they weren’t used that much in history than during world wars: 30 millions of them were used in WWII. Most armies are still using them as sentries, detection devices or also symbols or mascots, another use of animals really important for the morale of the troops. This long history of collaboration between men and animals isn’t really one. As far as we know, animals weren’t concerned by human wars, and weren’t really asked their opinion about dying for political matters. Some great stories of friendship between men and animals may have emerged during this time, but most of them were sad stories of mass murder. Some were awarded medals, even promoted as a human fighter, but most of them died as the humans: in France, 1,500,000 soldiers died for 1,140,000 horses during WWI, a huge blow for rural areas relying on horses for everyday tasks. Now that mechanisation has progressed, we’re not using them as before, but their replacement by machines already tells us a lot about our way of seeing them: tools that can be replaced.

Youen Le Bris

Sources:

Jean-François Brun, « Le cheval dans la Grande Armée », Revue historique des armées, 249 | 2007, 38-74.

Duverger, Christian. « Cortés, conquistador du Mexique », Revue Historique des Armées, vol. 277, no. 4, 2014, pp. 3-16.

Brohm, Jean-Marie. « Le chien, une figure de compagnon polyvalent », Topique, vol. 142, no. 1, 2018, pp. 31-42.

Damien Baldin, « De la contiguïté anthropologique entre le combattant et le cheval », Revue historique des armées, 249 | 2007, 75-87.

Tyler Essary , « These Drone-Hunting Eagles Aren’t Messing Around » 17/02/17

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