It was late—an indistinguishable, bleary-eyed hour. In front of me
was a large dog, snapping his jaws so hard that his teeth gave a loud
clack with each bark. His eyes were locked on me, desperate for the
toy I was holding. But he wasn’t playing—he was freaking out.of the bed was Dyngo, panting over a
pile of shredded pillows. Through-
out the morning, his rough play left
scratches where his teeth had broken
the skin through my jeans.
On the flight home, Dyngo was al-
lowed to sit at my feet in the roomy first
row, but he soon had bouts of vomiting
in between his attempts to shred the
Harry Potter blanket I’d brought. The
pilot announced Dyngo’s military sta-
tus, inspiring applause from the whole
cabin. When we reached my apart-
ment, we both collapsed from exhaus-
tion. It would be our last bit of shared
peace for many months.I
met Dyngo in 2012 at Lackland
Air Force Base in San Antonio. I
was working on a book, War Dogs :
Tales of Canine Heroism, History, and
Love, and had heard about how Dyngo
had saved many lives in Afghanistan.
His bravery had earned his handler,
S.Sgt. Justin Kitts, a Bronze Star.
In early 2011, Kitts and Dyngo
boarded a helicopter on their way to a
remote outpost in Afghanistan. Dyngo
wore a wide choke chain and a vest
that said MWD Police K-9 to indicate
that he was a military working dog.
The plan for the day was familiar.
The platoon from the U.S. Army’s 101stAs I cautiously held my ground, his
bark morphed from a yelp to a shout.
Then he gave a rumbling growl. That
was when my trepidation gave way to
something far more primal: fear.
This was no ordinary dog. Dyngo,
a ten-year-old Belgian Malinois, had
been trained to propel his 87-pound
body toward insurgents, locking his
jaws around them. He’d served three
tours in Afghanistan, weathering gre-
nade blasts and firefights. This dog
had saved thousands of lives. Now he
was in my apartment in Washington,
DC. Just 72 hours earlier, I had traveled
across the country to retrieve Dyngo
from Luke Air Force Base in Phoenix
so he could live out his remaining
years with me in civilian retirement.
That first Arizona night, Dyngo sat
on my hotel bed waiting for me. When
I got under the covers, he stretched
across the blanket, his weight heavy
and comforting against my side. As
I drifted off to sleep, I felt his body
twitch, and I smiled: Dyngo is a dog
who dreams.
The next morning, I gave him a toy
and went to shower. When I emerged
from the bathroom, it was like step-
ping into a henhouse massacre. Feath-
ers floated in the air. Fresh rips ran
through the white sheets. In the middle88 september 2019
Reader’s Digest