Could genetically enhanced dogs of war be the first step to a super-soldier?

Evening Standard · Lucas Chancellor · 2026-11-05 07:01 UTC

With backing from the CIA and Pentagon-tied billionaires, start-up Warhound wants to develop a new elite breed of service dog

Palmer Luckey, a defence-tech billionaire appointed by Donald Trump’s Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to lead the Pentagon’s review of future warfare, is an unlikely dog breeder. He has teamed up with Ben Lamm, whose biotech company Colossal is working on bringing the woolly mammoth back from extinction. Together they have launched Warhound, a start-up using frontier genetics technology to develop a new elite breed of service dog. Lamm has likened it to a “Captain America programme for dogs,” which makes it sound like it was concocted by a couple of overexcited 12-year-olds, but the company is no joke. With a valuation of roughly $1.2 billion and $200 million from investors including the CIA’s venture arm, In-Q-Tel, it will combine three cutting-edge technologies: gene editing, cloning, and external AI gear.

Warhound will collect stored cells from top-performing military dogs — mainly Belgian Malinois and German Shepherds, plus some Labradors. These cells will be edited using Colossal’s CRISPR gene-editing tools, before being cloned into puppies by cloning company, ViaGen. The dogs will then be fitted with military gear from Luckey’s defence company, Anduril, including body armour and sensors linked to AI battlefield systems.

Are a couple of tech billionaires toying with an X-Men fantasy?

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