It started with a picture of the puppy on Ronny Perryman’s Facebook page and an innocent ‘Like’ of the picture. Perryman, a senior NCO in the US Army’s 24th Infantry Division stationed in Afghanistan, had posted the pup’s picture after his unit had adopted the stray they’d found in a drainage pipe after a firefight.
Back home in Texas, Stephen Harrington, a former army buddy of Perryman’s, clicked the ‘Like’ button on the pup’s Facebook picture and started a journey that would take him from Texas to Fort Stewart in Georgia, and the dog from Afghanistan to the same Army base.
“Ronny and I had served together in the same unit during the First Gulf War,” said Harrington. “A while back, I found him on Facebook and we kept in touch.”
Perryman, like Harrington, had left the Army but now served in the Army National Guard. His unit volunteered to deploy to the fighting in Afghanistan early. One day in late 2009, after his recon unit fought off an enemy roadside attack, one of the men under Perryman’s command heard the sound of a dog whimpering. He found the small pup, no more than a few weeks old, cowering in a nearby drain pipe. Knowing the Afghani view of dogs, the soldier, Corporal Ryan Kirby, took the dog back to their base.
Named Recon, the pup soon became the unit’s unofficial mascot, cared for by all but especially Corp. Kirby. Soon after adopting Recon, the unit was moved to a forward base and they were faced with what they would do with their mascot. What they did know was that they could not leave the pup at the base, where it would be killed by the Afghani soldiers, who detest dogs.
When Perryman posted Recon’s picture on Facebook and told Harrington that they were worried about the pup’s future in Afghanistan, Harrington recalled hearing about dogs rescued from Iraq and brought to the U.S. He approached coworker John McPeak, who is a Senior Trade Compliance Manager for international oilfield services company M-I SWACO, for help.
“If I didn’t know how to get the dog to the U.S.,” McPeak said, “someone I know will. It’s all I do all day.”
McPeak’s job is to coordinate shipments of barite ore and other products into the U.S. and he works closely with U.S. Customs on a regular basis. He knew that he could put his expertise and his contacts to work and find a way to help Harrington’s former Army buddy to get Recon out of Afghanistan and to the U.S. He approached Linda Mills, the director of export compliance for the Concorde Battery Corp., and fellow member of the International Compliance Professionals Association (ICPA). Mills referred McPeak to a group called Operation Baghdad Pup, whose mission it was to help soldiers bring home their pets from Iraq.
What McPeak learned there disappointed him. He learned that Operation Baghdad Pup was not involved with dog rescue from Afghanistan, but they could lead him to other resources that might be able to help. One of those resources was Pamela Constable, deputy foreign editor of The Washington Post.
Constable had been the paper’s Kabul, Afghanistan Bureau Chief and had worked extensively throughout the region since the late 1990s. McPeak reached out to her and learned of an underground animal shelter in Kabul, the Tigger House.
Tigger House is run by the Afghan Stray Animal league, a U.S. based nonprofit organization that operates a shelter and low-cost veterinary clinic for homeless, abandoned and sick or injured animals in Kabul. In addition to caring for animals in Afghanistan, they could help Harrington and McPeak get Recon out of the country for Perryman and his unit.
Once they realized that they might be able to get Recon to the U.S., McPeak and Harrington were faced with the logistical challenge of making that possibility a reality. Tigger House told them they would have to pay more than $3,000 for the pup’s vaccinations and transportation out of the country.
“So many times,” said Harrington, “I’d seen posts of Facebook that said, ‘if you want to support our troops, paste this into your Status.’ I thought, ‘if you really want to do something for our troops, help us bring this dog back to the U.S. for this unit.’ These guys have to say goodbye to their families when they are deployed. Dogs like Recon provide the family that these guys leave behind. Then they’re often asked to leave that family behind when they return home. This was more important than a care package because every time they’d look at this dog, they’d remember the good times.”
Harrington started posting snippets about Recon’s story, along with more pictures of the pup with the soldiers at their main base on his Facebook status. He asked that if people really wanted to do something for our troops serving in Afghanistan, ‘then please donate so we can bring Recon to the U.S.’
Donations quickly started coming in, from friends and friends of friends who took the idea of rescuing this pup across Facebook. In just one and half months, they had raised the $3,000 they needed, all via Facebook.
“We got an offer from one company in Nebraska,” said McPeak. “I don’t know how they’d seen it, but they wanted to help pay. It literally went viral.”
Harrington emailed Perryman and told him they had the money, that they had connections in Afghanistan, the Tigger House and Pam Constable, who could help spirit Recon out of the country. They had made arrangements for Recon to be taken out of Afghanistan to Islamabad, Pakistan and then flown to John F. Kennedy Airport in New York. Perryman agreed to take a dangerous drive across Afghanistan and deliver Recon to Tigger House.
But then the delays hit. It would take time to get Recon from Kabul to Islamabad. For several weeks, Harrington and McPeak, along with countless Facebook fans waited, not knowing if all their effort would pay off or if Recon would somehow be killed or otherwise prevented from leaving the country.
“At the end of January,” said Harrington, “I suddenly get a photo of Recon. He’s being walked by Pam in Islamabad. The email says he’s going to be at JFK in two days.”
McPeak quickly sent a message via Facebook to a friend in New York. “Could you please pick up this dog at the cargo terminal and take care of him for a couple of days?”
His friend agreed and met Recon’s plane. He took the pup to his home on Long Island. From there, another friend took Recon to New Jersey. An ICPA member, Rick Miller, drove through a blizzard to get Recon and ferry him to North Carolina. From there, Recon was picked up by a former member of the unit who had broken his back in three places after being struck by an IED on his first patrol in Afghanistan. Recovering in Augusta, Georgia, First Sergeant Boyles drove to North Carolina to bring Recon home with him.
By this time, late February, the unit was due to return from their tour in Afghanistan. Harrington recalls thinking that it would be amazing if he could be at Ft. Stewart, with Recon, when the unit deplaned.
At the time, Harrington was only a contract worker for the M-I SWACO IT group. He did not have a guaranteed job and he did not have vacation time that he could take to make the trip. He also needed help to get a plane ticket from Houston, Texas to Savannah, Georgia.
“I’ve always been pretty bold,” he said, “so I told Max Richey I need to talk to him.”
Richey is VP of Supply Chain at M-I SWACO and John McPeak’s boss.
“I told him the story about Recon and somehow he knew what I was going to ask. He gave me enough airline miles that I could book a flight on Delta Airlines to be at Ft. Stewart when my old unit came home.”
Harrington flew to Savannah and rented a car. He drove to Boyle’s house in Augusta and met Recon for the first time. Harrington had planned for the two of them to meet the returning unit but Boyles was not up to making the long drive from Augusta to Ft. Stewart. The unit was due to arrive on Sunday but he would have to be back on Monday morning for formation. Still recovering from his injuries, he felt he could not make that trip.
“I told him to call his platoon sergeant and ask to be excused from formation. He did and told his platoon sergeant why he needed to miss formation. The guy okayed it without question.”
Harrington and Boyles, with Recon, drove the 115 mi to Ft. Stewart. For Harrington, it was to be a trip of mixed emotions. He had been stationed at Ft. Stewart during his time in the Army.
“It was a homecoming for me in so many ways,” he said. “I hadn’t been there in 18 years.”
Harrington had hoped to have Recon on the parade ground when the 24th stepped of their military transport plane but the MPs refused to allow the dog onto the grounds. That part of the homecoming surprise would have to wait.
Finally, after a day’s delay arriving, the unit stood in formation on Ft. Stewart’s parade grounds. After being released, Perryman saw Harrington and the two men spoke in person for the first time in nearly 20 years.
“I hadn’t told Ronny that I was bringing Recon.”
Due to Army regulations, the unit had to reassemble at their barracks. When they did, Harrington was waiting for them, this time with Recon. The unit saw their mascot for the first time in months.
“Kirby lost it,” Harrington recalled. “He was beside himself to see Recon safe and actually in the U.S.”
Called back to one final formation before dismissal, the unit lined up. This time, however, Recon sat next to them and when they were called to attention, he stood and barked.
“The dog was as much a part of the unit as the rest of the soldiers.”
Revised on December 21, 2010
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Could you please pass me Pamela Constable’s email address. I have a dog I am trying to get back to the US.