http://www.usatoday.com/life/2004-07-13-iraq-dog_x.htm?POE=click-refer

By Rebecca F. Johnson, USA TODAY
She survived beatings with sticks. And the rocks thrown at her. Even the roundup by animal-control workers, who claimed her mother and siblings.

Patriotic puppy: Terri and Chuck Magee are caring for Lucky, whom their soldier son rescued from Iraq.
USA TODAY

Now, Lucky, the aptly named dog, has a home far away from the Iraq and Kuwait border where she was rescued by U.S. Army soldiers Pfc. Chuck Magee and Sgt. Daniel Christman, members of the 514th Maintenance Company. She is waiting for Magee at his parents' house in Hinsdale, N.Y.

Call it puppy love. And it happens fairly often to soldiers stationed in war zones.

The military forbids adopting, caring for or feeding any type of domestic or wild animal by soldiers serving in other countries, says Capt. Bruce Frame, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command.

But the order is not rigorously enforced, and many soldiers cannot resist when they see abused or abandoned animals facing an uncertain fate in battle-torn areas.

"In any war, we've seen that American soldiers will befriend a stray dog or a hungry cat," says Laura Salter, U.S. director of the World Society for the Protection of Animals, an agency that guides and assists soldiers in the adoption process. "Our soldiers want to do good and help others, and it extends to animals."

Magee and Christman first encountered Lucky in May after her mother came searching for food in the trash near their camp. At the time, they didn't realize that she was trying to feed her litter of seven puppies.

"She was in a sorry state and was hardly recognizable as a dog," writes Magee in an e-mail. "It is tough for any U.S. soldier to see a dog suffering and starving, and we started throwing scraps of our leftover food to her."

The mother and her puppies lived on an adjoining Kuwaiti farm where they suffered repeated beatings with sticks and pelting with rocks. But the soldiers could not protect them because the farmer was on his own property and not threatening U.S. troops.

Soon the puppies began traveling back and forth with their mother between the soldiers' camp and the farm, until after one of the beatings they stayed at the camp for good.

Magee says the dogs became part of the team and began behaving like sentries, barking at strangers who approached their position.

But one day, when the soldiers returned from duty, they found Lucky alone, shaking and whimpering beneath a shrub. Their fellow soldiers informed them that the dogcatcher had shown up and captured the rest of Lucky's family. The soldiers decided then to find a permanent home for the sole survivor of the litter.

Christman could not send her to his residence at Fort Drum, N.Y., because he lives in the barracks, so Magee arranged to have Lucky live with his parents until he returns to the USA, perhaps next month. The International Veterinary Hospital in Kuwait vaccinated and housed Lucky until she could be flown to New York, and Christman paid the $1,300 for her transport out of his own pocket.

"It was worth every penny to see her healthy and happy in the (USA), and I only regret that I could not save the rest of her family," Christman writes in an e-mail.

Magee's mother, Terri, says she didn't find it surprising that her son wanted to adopt the stray mutt, which is probably a cross between a German shepherd and a hound. "Chuck is so tender-hearted," she says. "If he sees something getting hurt, he wants to protect it, no matter what it takes."

Lucky now enjoys daily mile-long walks with Magee's family and is slowly learning to eat dog food. The new people in her life say she is playful and charms everyone who comes around.

"She's really a beautiful dog," says Monica Irvin, a friend of the Magee family who picked up Lucky at the airport. "I understand what made all these men over there go through trouble to save her. As soon as you see her face and her eyes, you know. She's got that look."