Navy Dolphins: Trained to Kill

Reports from the Ukrainian port of Sevastopol say that three dolphins being trained by the military - have gone missing. The dolphins were apparently part of a team of five on a training exercise - which seems to have gone wrong. The Ukrainian Defence Ministry has denied the reports. Tim Ecott takes a look at the science behind the use of dolphins in warfare.

In recent years confirmed military operations involving dolphins have taken place with the U.S.A. and Iran. Iran has deployed retired Ukrainian dolphins to act in mine clearance operations in the Strait of Hormuz. And the U.S.A. has deployed them in Monte Negro to help train the local navy in mine clearance technics. The idea of using dolphins in the military dates back to the early 1960s, when the U.S. 

Navy wanted to research how they could detect underwater objects using sonar. At that time experiments were carried out with dolphins, sea lions and even beluga whales. It quickly became obvious that dolphins could be trained to carry underwater cameras, find and retrieve objects and act as underwater guards. According to Yury Platchenko, a former Soviet Anti-Sabotage Officer, quoted in the local media in Sebastopol, "Male dolphins often wind absent without leave, when there were wild females in the area." Dolphins were trained in Sebastopol for the Soviet Navy as far back as 1973. They were trained to find military equipment, such as mines on the sea bed, as well as for attacking divers. The Ukrainian source said that the dolphins that have gone missing, may have gone in search of females. Dr. Justin Gregg is a researcher with the Dolphin Communication Project. Did he think that the missing dolphins could have run off in search of love?

“Runoff is certainly possible, they're certainly very obedient, but they might have their own agenda, get into something and then disappear. Although, from what I understand of dolphins that are trained, especially if they are heavily trained, is that they generally don't do that and if they do do that, they will come back for two reasons. One – because it's in their training, and two – because that's how they get their food. Often dolphins can be born in captivity and have no skills in hunting and forging at all. And when they are in the ocean, they would starve to death if they didn't go back to get food from their trainers. So, in all likelihood, they’ll go back to what they're familiar with, if not to follow their training to at least get their food.”

Dolphins have an unrivaled place in human affections, certainly when it comes to our view of their positive qualities. Ever since the TV series “Flipper” hit the screens in the early 1960s, the idea of the friendly, clever marine mammal that might help human beings has been firmly entrenched in the modern mind. In the 5th century B.C. Herodotus tells the tale of the poet Arion who was saved from drowning and carried safely to land in the Peloponnesus by a dolphin. But sensational reports have emerged that some dolphins for naval use could even be trained to kill enemy personnel. I asked Dr. Gregg how realistic such claims were.

“It's certainly possible. I know that the U.S. Navy has always denied that dolphins were trained for anti-personnel reasons, but it's not inconceivable that you could train them to do things. Even if it was a simple thing, like bring an explosive device or syringe placed on the dolphin’s head and sort of poke it or jab it into a diver. That doesn't require very complicated behavior to do that. And they're certainly capable of learning it. So that's entirely possible, I think in Ukraine they stated specifically that they're training their dolphins for these sorts of missions.”

Some people obviously believe that training intelligent mammals like these marine mammals is unethical. What sort of arguments are there against using dolphins in this way?

“The arguments that you see are based on either rights or welfare. There're ethical concerns with using any animal in a combat situation, where it would be subject to harm or death, because the animal itself doesn't have the ability to choose whether or not it wants to do that. So it's being forced into dangerous situations by the demands of its training. So it would bring its own ethical concerns and that would be true of all animals in combat situations - dogs, horses etc. So you always have the contentions of those who think that's just simply unethical, regardless of how intelligent the animal may be.”

For now, the fate of the Sebastopol dolphins remains a mystery. Last year the U.S. Navy announced that they'd be replacing their mine hunting dolphins with underwater robots within the next two years. Around 80 bottlenose dolphins are based with the U.S. Navy in San Diego and additional animals work in Washington and Georgia, as well as on deployment abroad. The Ukrainian Navy reportedly restarted its dolphin training program last year with the team of ten animals from the Black Sea.

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