WTF! – Missing killer dolphins surface to fight Pirates?

August 22, 2009

Its 2005, New Orleans has just been hit by Hurricane Katrina, and you’re a Navy Commander charged with the duty of telling the President that uhh…. somehow three dozen highly trained dolphins are lost …err, went rogue. (Yes, highly trained dolphins) Absorb the absurdity that is now floating around in your head and imagine the awkwardness of having to brief the President on this. Fortunately, President Bush was in office and he’ll believe just about anything…

Navy Guy: “No, well you see…Mr. President, 36 killer dolphins abandoned their posts and escaped from the Gulf of Mexico.” Bush: “GODAMN!! SH*T!!! Wait a second, did Rummy or Condey put you up to this?”

FACT #1 – Dolphins have long been trained by the military

Ok back to reality, military animals have long been used by militaries all over the world. The U.S. and Russian militaries have generally used them to find lost divers or to locate underwater mines. Military dolphins are currently deployed all around the world, and have been used in many conflicts including the Vietnam and the First Gulf War. Recently the use of military dolphins has expanded to include attack-and-kill missions.

The US Navy admits it has trained dolphins for “light-offensive” warfare; which I interpret to mean dolphins were trained to swim into enemy waters with with signs/flags strapped to their dorsal fin containing anti-enemy propaganda and/or ethic slurs. During Vietnam “warrior porpoises” were the centerpiece of the “Swimmer Nullification Program”, which protected strategic Vietnamese harbors against infiltration by enemy frogmen. After detecting an enemy, they were trained to pull off his face mask and flippers, tear the air-supply tubes, and finally “capture him for interrogation.” I don’t know if that qualifies as “heavy-offensive” but it sounds awesome. I contacted the Navy but they declined my request for an explanation, but they did not confirm nor deny the use of dolphins in “heavy-offensive” warfare.

FACT #2 – Dolphins kill for fun, and have killed humans before

Dolphins are the only known animals other than humans that kill other species for pleasure or sport. Scientists have unsuccessfully tried to find out why dolphins kill for fun but have narrowed it to two possible explinations- they kill to impress female dolphins, or they kill because they think its freaking hilarious.

In Vietnam, killer dolphins were actually responsible for the deaths of 40 Vietcong divers. As one former dolphin trainer for the CIA put it, they were taught to kill, initially with knives attached to their flippers and snouts. Later many dolphins were equipped with large hypodermic syringes loaded with pressurized carbon dioxide; and when the needle was rammed into an enemy frogman the rapidly expanding gas would cause the victim to literally explode. Awesome right? No, too much friendly fire. Apparently an alarming number of dolphins ended up exploding by ramming each other.

FACT #3 – Escaped Dolphins are armed & dangerous

The Navy has refused to confirm that any are missing, but do you think the Navy would really tell us if they’ve misplaced 36 highly trained and armed dolphins. Interestingly, intelligence gathered by experts close to the U.S.’s marine fisheries service, who study the US navy’s dolphin training exercises, have confirmed the dolphins escaped. The missing dolphins were equipped with cameras and remotely fired ‘toxic dart’ guns. The military planned on shooting terrorists and spies underwater.

FACT #4 – Thousands of dolphins unite to stop pirate ship

Thousands of dolphins blocked the suspected Somali pirate ships when they were trying to attack Chinese merchant ships passing the Gulf of Aden. The Chinese merchant ships escorted by a China’s fleet sailed on the Gulf of Aden when they met some suspected pirate ships. Thousands of dolphins suddenly leaped out of water between pirates and merchants when the pirate ships approached to board the Chinese vessels. Either Aquaman is now working for the Chinese, or the dolphins are finally getting the Somalis back for all the years they dumped toxic waste into the ocean.

Conclusion & Hypothesis

Take a minute to process all that yummy ridiculousness floating around in your brain. Did the Navy trained dolphins plan their escape? Let’s see…they are super smart, and highly trained. It is a little weird that none of the trained dolphins stayed. Even weirder is that they escaped at precisely the time when the Navy was distracted by Hurricane Katrina.

Finally, I don’t know if the AWOL dolphins were responsible for the hit on the Somali pirates, but the possibility (however minuscule) that they did is freaking awesome!!

More pictures of military animals, enjoy!