Explained: Why Do Countries Have Marine Mammals In Their Military Operations?

As per a review of satellite photos by the commercial organisation Maxar and the United States Naval Institute (USNI), Russia has positioned trained dolphins at the entry to a main Black Sea port, ¡ª to safeguard a naval base from possible Ukrainian attacks.

According to H I Sutton satellite images, a submarine expert who specialises in the utilisation of marine mammal pens, wrote for the naval institute, two portable dolphin pens were shifted to the Sevastopol harbour in February, around the time Moscow initiated its invasion of Ukraine.

Russia Deployed Dolphins to the Black Sea

The war dolphins are intended to defend Sevastopol and its resources from strike. During the Cold War, both the United states and The Soviet started training marine mammals for combat activities. Traditionally, they patrol the region around their deployment and alert carriers when they see any mines or divers.

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The Black Sea, and particularly the port of Sevastopol, is strategically significant for Moscow. It provides Russia with connectivity to Ukraine's southern boundary, including the crucial port of Odessa. If Russia takes Odessa, it will cut off Kyiv from commerce and have an easier time infiltrating the state's western portion. Russia launched an offensive on Odessa but was unable to take it.

At the last tally, the United States had approximately 70 dolphins and 30 sea otters designed to protect strategic points. Less is understood about Russia's unique capacities, but reports do highlight the fact that it has trained a number of whales and dolphins. A white beluga whale wearing a Russian strap with a camera mounted appeared off the shore of Norway in 2019. Several referred to the whale as a spy, while many others wished to provide it a temporary shelter. The strap was removed from him and he was officially named Hvaldimir by the locals.

As per the Moscow Times, during the Soviet period, Moscow used the Sevastopol ground to prepare dolphins to hunt for mining areas and plant explosives on vessels.

Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Ukraine acquired those marine mammals and retrained them as therapy animals for young individuals with special needs.

Russia appears to have increased its reliance on special forces marine mammals in recent years. It has spread its territory in the Arctic with the help of a small group of whales and dolphins. Satellite photos has reported the existence of beluga whale pens at the Arctic marine base Olenya Guba. As part of its engagement in the Syrian Civil War, Moscow also positioned marine mammals to the Mediterranean in 2018.

Why dolphins and how does the navy do this?

According to experts, the two major reasons behind deploying dolphins for military operations are ¨C the first is that their bio-sonar is superior to almost any mechanical sonar ever created. Dolphins generate sonar vibrations from one¡®s foreheads and can detect objects which humans cannot.

Second, they can dive deeper than human divers on multiple occasions, attaining underwater depths that humans might otherwise only reach with robotic systems. Dolphins can detect opponent forces by detecting sound vibrations bouncing off heavy calcium deposits in human bone fragments, and they can detect mines buried by clay and silt on the sea bottom by detecting the air void within the mine's casing.

According to findings, the dolphins reside in netted pens released from floating docks and thus are fed a customised meal of herring, mackerel, and other fish on a routine basis. Each dolphin is taught to identify specific kinds of targets, such as people, moored mines, or bottom mines, using positive encouragement with food and compassion. When it comes to work, the naval officer communicates with the dolphin using whistles and sign language.

Naval officers transport the dolphin to a small watercraft including one edge cut down to a waterline, allowing the carriers to continue driving to the search window and softly slide the mammal into the water. They then use a transducer, which emits specific sensory tones into the water to indicate to the sea mammal that it is time to locate. Once the dolphin has located its target ¡ª either a person or a mine ¡ª it is returned to the raft, which then quickly leaves the region so that sailors can take over the task.

History of war dolphin

War dolphin operation is not new for Russia: the state used these sea soldiers to identify submarines, flag mines, and safeguard vessels and harbours during the Cold War, as per a slate report. Many states have been enlisting all such intelligent, flexible creatures to undertake underwater army activities for more than fifty years, according to the report.

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A combat marine mammal is a trained cetacean or pinniped that includes Bottlenose dolphins, seals, sea otters, and beluga whales as few examples. The US and Soviet combatants had also trained and utilised marine mammals for a variety of purposes.

These mammals have been given training to identify and rescue lost naval swimmers, protect navy ships from enemy divers, detect mines for future clearance by divers, and assist in the location and restoration of equipment lost on the seafloor.

In 1960, the U.S. Navy launched a programme to operate with dolphins and sea otters to aid in defence, mine recognition, and the introduction of innovative submarines and underwater armaments.

At Kazachya Bukhta, near Sevastopol, the Russian Navy ran a research facility to investigate the military applications of marine mammals. The Russian army's dolphin programme is believed to have stalled in the early 1990s.

Tichka, a Russian military Beluga whale, fled twice in 1991 and 1992, traversing the Black Sea and being admired by the people of Gerze, Turkey, who dubbed him Aydn.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian Navy took over the Soviet army dolphin programme. The BBC reported in March 2000 that the Ukrainian navy had relocated their army dolphin initiative from Sevastopol to Iran. Iran purchased the creatures, and the chief coach continued his study at the country's new oceanarium.

The United States Navy's Marine Animal Initiative, based in San Diego, California, trains dolphins and sea otters. A few of their dolphins come from the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. Navy used war dolphins in the First and Second Gulf Wars, and their use dates all the way back to the War in Vietnam.

Wikipedia

In 2007, approximately 75 dolphins were in the programme, and in 2019, approximately 70 dolphins and 30 sea otters were noted to be in the programme.

Ukraine reportedly "resurrected" the war dolphin programme in 2012. Moscow took over the Ukrainian dolphin programme following the invasion of Crimea in 2014.

According to a claim, the programme was demilitarised just before invasion, with all war dolphins either sold for commercial purposes or killed by natural deaths. A counterclaim contends that dolphins died patriotically as a result of their hunger strikes and resistance to their Russian assailants. In future military dolphin study, Russia reportedly planned to use modern technology to visualise the dolphin's biosonar impulses.

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