Was Killing the Puppy a Way of Coping for One Marine?

March 5, 2008 — -- Many war-weary veterans of the Iraq War take kindly to the animals they meet abroad — some of them have even gone to great expense and trouble to bring dogs back home with them at the end of their tours of duty.

What, then, provoked one U.S. Marine to let himself be videotaped apparently flinging a yelping puppy over a cliff, bursting into laughter at the sound of the animal's body hitting the ground below? The tape of the apparent incident has rocketed around the Internet, provoking a firestorm of criticism.

The motivation for such an act, if it did indeed occur, may be as complex and deep as the U.S. war that has dragged on for more than four years, experts told ABCNEWS.com. Chief among them: Having to live with the constant fear of being injured or killed might have led this Marine to take his aggression out on a defenseless animal, several psychologists said.

"Most of the time war is about chaos and the fear of being wounded or killed," said David Spiegel, professor and associate chairman of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Stanford University School of Medicine. "And so you're constantly confronting those fears and one of the ways to confront that may be by showing you're the one that renders other creatures helpless."

"The thought is that 'I'm not the one who gets thrown off a cliff, I'm the one doing it,'" said Spiegel.

The clip depicting the puppy's horrific treatment garnered tens of thousands of hits on YouTube before it was taken down. The U.S. Marine Corps launched an investigation into the identity of the Marine after it issued a statement calling the apparent act "shocking and deplorable." The videotape's authenticity has not been verified by U.S. authorities.

How much time the Marines shown in the video served abroad is still unknown, but several mental health professionals told ABCNEWS.com that people who treat animals badly may act out because of their oppressive surroundings or sometimes as a result of the shock they might have suffered -- be it the horrors of war or an abusive parent during their childhood.

"There may be personality variables that predispose people to [harm animals]," said Allen Enton, the past president of the American Psychological Association's division of family psychology. "But it also may be somehow stimulated by some context like being in a group situation or feeling oppressed and down and wanting to just get back at the world."