Within the army of “militarized” dolphins used by the US Navy to protect naval bases and detect weapons

DELPHINE have been used by the US Navy for decades.

Officials have used the intelligent creatures to detect underwater explosives, warn enemy swimmers, and protect naval bases.

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Dolphins have been trained by the Navy since the 1960s.

The US has at least 70 bottlenose dolphins at its naval base in San Diego, California.

Five dolphins were used by the Navy to repel enemy swimmers in Vietnam’s Cam Ranh Bay in the 1970s.

Dolphins were used for underwater surveillance during the 1987 Iran-Iraq War.

And pods were deployed in the early stages of the Iraq war in 2003, Task and Purpose revealed.

The use of dolphins in the Navy was originally classified before the program was declassified in the 1990s.

This led to allegations that the creatures were being used as offensive weapons – claims that have been vehemently denied by the US Navy’s marine mammal program.

Dolphins are an extremely valuable commodity due to their excellent hearing abilities.

They are known for their echolocation abilities.

According to the Naval Information Warfare Center, this ability helps them detect mines placed deep underwater while combing the oceans.

Dolphins can find mines and drop transponders that help crews recover explosives,

Bob Olds of the Marine Mammal Program told WLRN, “They’re really good at finding things.

“Perhaps her most impressive ability is her ability to find objects that are completely buried beneath the sea floor.”

Lt. Josh Frey who was part of the US 5^th Fleet, which was based in Bahrain between 2002 and 2005, told MSNBC in 2003, “The ability that mammals bring to demining efforts is that they have a very sophisticated form of biological sonar … to help them evade predators.” and find food.

DEMANDING CREATURES

“These natural adaptations make the mammals valuable to the Navy’s human personnel.”

Frey revealed that dolphins will be removed from the ocean before the detonation takes place.

Dolphins can dive hundreds of feet below the surface and there is no risk of animals getting sick with The Bends.

Bends is a form of decompression sickness and can affect human divers when nitrogen gas is released from the bloodstream.

It is caused when divers rise to the surface too quickly.

Dolphins don’t just spot missiles; They can also protect naval ships from threats.

DEFEND THREATS

The creatures are able to block potentially threatening swimmers intent on harming naval vessels or the people on board.

The sea creatures also protect the waters around the Naval Base Kitsap submarine base.

More than 2,000 nuclear warheads are stored at the base in Bangor, Washington.

Dolphins have been deployed there since 2010, Navy spokesman Chris Haley told Insider in 2015.

The US is not the only country using dolphins as part of its military operations.

Russia deployed two capsules at its Sevastopol naval base after its flagship, the Moskva, was sunk by Ukraine earlier this month.

According to satellite imagery analyzed by the US Naval Institute (USNI), the two dolphin shells were moved to the Black Sea base in February, at the start of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

‘KILLER PODS’

Dolphins could be deployed for counter-diving operations and used to prevent Ukrainian forces from entering the port.

Sevastopol is the main naval base of the Russian Navy, where a large number of ships are anchored.

The ships stationed at the base are vulnerable to underwater attacks.

Russia has in the past trained dolphins for military use and used them to attack foreign vessels carrying mines.

The Soviet Union Navy had a number of marine mammal programs including dolphin training at Kazachya Bukhta near Sevastopol.

The mammals were capable of planting bombs on ships and attacking divers with weapons strapped to their heads.

And in the 2000s, Iran bought mercenary marines to destroy US ships with mines.

Some have even been trained to swim to enemy boats with mines attached and blast holes in the ships – and themselves.

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