Children enjoy and participate in a traditional street race of “carruchas”, the name for makeshift wooden cars in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, December 18, 2021. Children enjoyed the race marking 10 years of persevering this tradition. (Photo by Ariana Cubillos/AP Photo)

Ana Mendez Casteñeda smokes marijuana during “Fumaton 420” outside the national Senate in Mexico City, Tuesday, April 20, 2021. The demonstrators are calling for the legalization of marijuana. (Photo by Marco Ugarte/AP Photo)

Richard Winsor, Ashley Shaw, Zizi Strallen, Glenn Graham, Nicole Kabera, Harrison Dowzell, Will Bozier and Cordelia Braithwaite during a photo call for Sir Matthew Bourne's The Car Man at the Royal Albert Hall, London on May 11, 2022, a reinterpretation of Bizet's Carmen, staged in 1960s American diner-garages with a specially expanded 65-dancer production for the hall, as part of its 150th anniversary. (Photo by Ian West/PA Images via Getty Images)

An entertainer walks during snowfall at the Exhibition of Achievements of National Economy (VDNKh) in Moscow, Russia on December 18, 2022. (Photo by Yulia Morozova/Reuters)

Members of the Indian Army Service Corps (ASC) team known as the “Tornadoes” display their motorbike skills during Independence Day celebrations in Bangalore, India, 15 August 2023. India is marking the 77th anniversary of its independence from British rule. (Photo by Jagadeesh N.V./EPA)

“La Diablada” dancers take part in a celebration in honor of the Virgin del Carmen, patron saint of Chile, in Santiago, Chile, Saturday, July 16, 2022. Hundreds of cowboys in woolen ponchos and families on wooden horse carts lined up to receive a priest's blessing in the huge esplanade in front of the National Sanctuary of Maipu on Saturday afternoon. (Photo by Esteban Felix/AP Photo)

A lynx cub that followed a villager in the forest, is fed by a mother and her son for 2 days at the Koyulhisar district of Sivas, Turkiye on October 4, 2023. After 2 days, the lynx cub was taken under protection by the Sivas Department of Nature Conservation and National Parks teams. (Photo by Serhat Zafer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)

Throughout the course of the long war in Afghanistan, Coalition troops have relied on thousands of military working dogs to help keep them safe, and make their jobs easier. The dogs are trained to detect explosives, to find illegal drugs, to search for missing comrades, or target enemy combatants. Not only are they active on the front lines, but behind the lines they serve as therapy dogs, service dogs, and loyal companions. They also share the same risks as the ground troops, suffering injuries and sometimes death on the battlefields. Gathered here are images of these dogs and their handlers in Afghanistan and back home, from over the past several years, part of the ongoing series here on Afghanistan.