Firefighters pull a pig as they try to rescue it from a well at a pig farm in Huanghua township of Leqing, Zhejiang province, April 25, 2014. Seven local firefighters successfully rescued a 300 kg (661 lbs) pig which fell down a well on Friday morning, local media reported. (Photo by Reuters/China Daily)

A man dressed as Hindu god Shiva, smokes during an annual Hindu religious festival locally known as Shyam Baba festival in Ajmer, in the desert Indian state of Rajasthan, April 12, 2015. (Photo by Himanshu Sharma/Reuters)

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.

Female pilot Anna climbs out the cockpit of Japanese electronics company Suidobashi Heavy Industry's newly unveiled robot “Kuratas” at the Wonder Festival in Chiba, suburban Tokyo on July 29, 2012. The “Kuratas” robot, which will go on sale with a price tag of one million USD, measures four meters in height, weighs four tons and has four wheeled legs that can either be controlled remotely through the 3G network or by a human seated within the cockpit. (Photo by Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP Photo)

A hippopotamus is sprayed with water on a hot summer day at Anna National Zoological Park in Chennai, India on April 26, 2017. (Photo by Arun Sankar/AFP Photo)

In this photo taken on Saturday, April 29, 2017, a candle is lit in a roadside shrine as the sun sets across a nearby lake of Pineia in the village of Souli, in the Peloponnese region of southern Greece. Made of iron sheeting, stone, wood, concrete or marble, tens of thousands of such shrines punctuate Greece’s roadside scenery, a common sight in a country that has one of the European Union’s worst road fatality rates. (Photo by Petros Giannakouris/AP Photo)

Forgotten Guerrero. A female member of the community defence force holds her weapon. Since early 2019, the village has been attacked repeatedly by Los Ardillos cartel, prompting residents to take action. Rincón de Chautla, Guerrero, 10 June 2019. (Photo by Alfredo Bosco/Luz with the support of Le Figaro Magazine, Winner of the 2020 Humanitarian Visa d’or award, International Committee of the Red Cross/International Festival of Photojournalism 2020)

A striking funeral worker takes a break near a casket placed at a parking lot as they protest over changes to a host of procedures and regulations, during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak outside the department of home affairs in Soweto, South Africa, September 16, 2020. (Photo by Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters)