Germans tried to make canines literate

Only a month ago it was revealed that the Nazis had planned to kill allied forces with poisoned sausages if they managed to set foot on German soil. Now an equally unlikely weapon in Hitler's armoury has emerged talking dogs. The Germans saw canines as being almost as intelligent as humans and tried to train them to "speak", read and spell, a university academic claims. They even conducted experiments in man-to-dog telepathy. Hitler, a well-known dog lover, hoped the animals would learn to communicate with their SS masters, and supported a special dog school set up to teach them to talk. Nazi officials recruited so-called educated dogs from all over Germany and trained them to tap out signals using their paws. Some were said to have been able to imitate the human voice, with one apparently uttering the words "Mein Fuhrer" when asked who Adolf Hitler was. Another was said to have "written" poetry. The Germans hoped to use the animals for the war effort, such as getting them to work alongside the SS and guard concentration camps. The experiments are reported in research by academic Dr Jan Bondeson into "unique and amazing dogs in history". Dr Bondeson, of Cardiff University, visited Berlin to scour obscure periodicals to build up an account of the more out-of-this world Nazi ideas. From / Gulf News