Approximately 4,000 War Dogs served our Armed Forces during The Vietnam War. All were classified as equipment and termed expendable! Roughly 250 were reassigned to other military installations. The several thousand surviving heroes were either given to the South Vietnamese Army or euthanized, by order of our government, in its haste to withdraw from the country. American base camps, now completely abandoned, are littered with War Dog graveyards, once maintained by their handlers as hallowed ground.  No War Dog remains have ever been exhumed and returned to American soil for proper burial.

American families donated many dogs to the cause. Not one surviving War Dog hero was ever returned to an American Family to live out the rest of their life in peace after the Vietnam War.

The above information is from the National War Dogs Memorial Fund Foundation. My own experience with these dogs is mostly limited to what I've read and heard over the years. I did have a brief encounter with one of these intrepid animals, but he had been separated from his handler and recovered by a Special Forces patrol from Trai Trang Sup in Tay Ninh province, where I was stationed with an Air Force radar detachment.

He was allowed to run loose in the camp, and the one thing I remember about him is that he seemed to regard the Vietnamese as human bowling pins. He liked to knock them over, but he never actually bit one. Scared the hell out of more than a few, though. 

Every now and then, instead of just rumbling over some poor soul and moving on, he’d pause to admire his handiwork. As he stood panting over his unhappy victim, tongue lolling out between those gleaming teeth, you could see the poor guy lying there praying, “Lord, I hope he remembers where each of us ranks on the food chain.”

I'm not certain, but I believe someone from his unit came and collected him. I don't recall the circumstances of his separation from his handler except that the parting was not voluntary; he wasn't a runaway.--T. P. Woodfork

Anyone wishing to donate to the National War Dog Memorial Fund should go to their website located at the following URL: http://www.wardogsmemorial.org/