Hunters - U.S. Snipers In The War On Terror Page 2

  It must be said that the role of scout/snipers among the U.S. Army and Marine Corps infantry is slightly different from those in Special Operations. Special Operations snipers have an extended variety of specialized skills to include sniping, but those in the infantry battalions concentrate exclusively on sniping and working in sniper teams.

  The first step to becoming a sniper in the U.S. Army and Marine Corps infantry begins at sniper selection. Every few years, new snipers are needed and candidates are chosen after having taken part in a selection. Good eyes, good behavior, a strong body, and an even stronger will are needed to make it through this trial. Sniper selections test the mental and physical aspects of a candidate. The object is to weed out the soldiers and marines who turn up for the wrong reasons. Those who question themselves or doubt their ability should not attend.

  For Army sniper Adam P, his battalion sniper selection was four days long.

  We were first given a physical fitness test and several candidates were eliminated. We were then given a written test made up of basic common tasks like calling for fire, first aid, and medevac procedures, followed by classes on range estimation, target detection, and other basic sniper tasks. The next three days were a combination of mental and physical challenges, culminating with a nine-mile ruck march with an eighty-pound pack. We started with fi fteen men, and by the time we got to the ruck march, we were left with only four. During the march we lost one, leaving three guys, including me.

  In the Marine Corps, selection is known as indoctrination and it stresses the same ideas. One sniper opened up about how he oversaw a selection process:

  I made it hell on the candidates during my first selection process as a monitor. I wanted as many Marines to quit as possible, to keep the community elite. In the Marines, three words strike fear and misery into sniper candidates. Find A Pole!

  It means to immediately, just as the words are said, elevate your feet on anything nearby. It could be a desk, a chair, a windowsill, the hood of a car, a tree, or even a pole. Once there, we commenced push-ups. It doesn’t seem like much, but after a week of this happening around thirty times a day, along with pack runs and pool time mixed with brain-jarring tests while under sleep and food deprivation, quitting seems like a dream come true.

  When the selection process is through, and if you’ve made it into the scout/sniper platoon (Marine Corps) or the reconnaissance and surveillance target acquisition platoon (Army), the next step is the infamous scout/sniper school.

  Essentially snipers pride themselves on the ability to do three things well: shoot, move, and communicate. Shooting is the most recognized skill, but without being able to move undetected and the ability to report your activity to higher, shooting is a non-factor. Together, these skills and more are the building blocks taught in scout/sniper basic course.

  The U.S. Army Scout/Sniper Basic School is held in two locations. One is at Fort Benning, Georgia, and the other is on Camp Robinson, Arkansas. While the courses teach the same doctrine, there are a few differences. Camp Robinson’s course is instructed by Army National Guard soldiers and is broken up into two segments, while the cadre at Fort Benning is made up of enlisted and former enlisted snipers and is five weeks straight.

  Both schools, however, cover the same curriculum. Sniper students learn a combination of several field crafts and skills, including land navigation; patrolling; stalking; target detection; field sketch; range estimation; ghillie construction; urban operations; hide selection, construction, and occupation; as well as tracking and counter tracking and much more.

  Marines in the scout/sniper platoons earn the title of sniper at one of four basic scout/sniper schools: First Marine Division on Camp Pendleton, California; Second Marine Division on Camp Lejeune, North Carolina; Stone Bay at Quantico, Virginia; and Third Marine Division on Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii. Each of these schools stresses the same curriculum and produces some of the best snipers in the world.

  Since 2001, the Marine Corps sniping program has seen many changes, the primary being that the basic course is now eight weeks long as opposed to ten. From this course, students gain a strong understanding of shooting and ballistics, stalking, field skills, and much more. Another change is that the final two weeks are now incorporated with an additional three weeks and are part of the five-week team leaders course. The TL course teaches mission planning, sniper employment, more in-depth training with communications and supporting arms, and other responsibilities directly associated with the TL position. Upon graduation, Marine snipers earn the military occupational specialty of 0317, and just as important, they earn the right to be called a Hunter of Gunmen, or HOG.

  Beyond the Books

  Clearly, all military snipers learn the skill to become a sniper through their basic courses. Learning, however, does not stop there. Though sniper schools teach the skill, they also teach a handful of essential qualities not learned through books, with the first being teamwork.

  Gone are the days of individual snipers operating alone. Nowadays the concept of at least a two-man team has proven to be more efficient for snipers to kill and to survive. In sniper school, students are never solo and one instructor at First Marine Division Scout/ Sniper School explains why:

  We implemented the one-arm’s distance [students’ distance from their partners at all times] rule in order that they may learn accountability, and to ensure they’re cognizant of what is going on at all times.

  We try to stress good habits in our students. Mentally, it keeps the guys driving on because they can push each other (specifically regarding their type-A personalities). In essence, they try to be better than their partner out of pure competitiveness. Also, learning to work with others and being that “team player,” guys gain maturity and experience. This serves as an opportunity to learn other tricks of the trade, or one might have a solution to a problem the other student never considered as well. Lastly, “iron sharpens iron.” With that in mind, students not only learn to work with each other, but even teach or disciple others.

  Now, we as instructors try to give each student responsibility so that this may be a growing experience for him. Without responsibility, how and when will he learn it? Big boy rules apply here, only because these students will become team leaders. In addition to that, the instructor staff gives each student their all, fully knowing that someday we might operate alongside these Marines. This doesn’t mean the students take advantage of this opportunity, and quite often, they dismiss it.

  For the students who are lacking in leadership, we put them in charge. All too often, their peers will help them learn to mature. Otherwise, we focus on those areas where they are lacking, and build on their strengths because teamwork builds character, maturity, endurance, strength, and leadership.

  To survive school, and combat, snipers learn to trust their teammates. Of course, in school all individuals must master all of the skills independently, but to survive it all, teamwork is also needed. This is true especially during the shooting phase.

  Students must master both shooting and spotting to qualify for known and unknown distance shooting. Each must trust in his partner’s ability to provide exact calls for wind, distance, and second-round adjustments to hit the target. If this ability is not there, the spotter will fail the shooter, and the shooter will fail sniper school.

  Known distance is the easy aspect of sniper shooting. To pass the known distance portion of First Marine Division Scout/Sniper School, students must hit at least twenty-eight of thirty-five targets starting from three hundred and ending at one thousand yards. Effective communication is necessary, as students will be tested with moving and bobbing targets at six hundred to eight hundred yards, and exact wind adjustments are needed for students to hit targets at one thousand yards.

  Unknown distance is more difficult. During unknown distance training, the shooter gives the spotter his target’s dimensions and the spotter is responsible for calculating the distance through formulas. To pass, the team must trust that each
person knows his job and can properly adjust the shooter’s round should he miss.

  Unknown distance qualification is based on a point scale at the U.S. Army Scout/Sniper School in Fort Benning, Georgia. To pass, students must receive 70 percent or better. With ten targets, students are given ten points for a first-round hit and five points for a second-round hit. This starts with two minutes to range a target using a scope. After the two minutes, students have ten seconds to engage. If they miss, they receive an extra ten seconds to re-engage. To complete this program, the team needs rapidly to apply formulas and wind and elevation adjustments, and to trust each other’s abilities.

  In sniper school, students are also taught the rewards of perseverance. One sniper mantra defines this perfectly: suff er patiently, and patiently suff er.

  Suffering is the name of the game for snipers, and during school, students learn this quickly. Bad weather, long movements, hunger and fatigue, equipment malfunctions, hassle from the instructors, and generally any type of setback is to be expected, but the best thing a student can do is take it all in stride. The concept is that suffering in training leads to success in combat, and that adapting to any situation leads to overcoming the obstacle.

  Instructors teach this by purposely pushing students to their limits, and the reason is twofold. First, the instructors only want to qualify those who really want to be there. The stress during school is needed to make those who do not truly want to operate quit, because the worst possibility for a sniper team in combat is to have a teammate who does not want to be there.

  Second, men who’ve been pushed to their limits and succeed gain heaps of confidence, and to be a sniper you need just that. Snipers must be certain that they can accomplish any mission, not only for their survival, but also for the success of the supported unit’s mission.

  School also teaches individuals to think independently. The problem in this area is that sometimes the proper use of a sniper team is not determined by the sniper teams themselves, which can lead to poor employment. For snipers, the mentality is to stay one step ahead of their enemy in every way. For this to happen, sniper team leaders need the freedom to make decisions that are vital for success. If that freedom is not established among the supported unit or the battalion, then the team is already at a handicap in its capability to be instrumental.

  Another quality students learn from sniper school is patience. This is especially needed during the stalking phase. The experience gained from here then spills over into other aspects of sniping.

  Stephen Johnson, a Marine sniper, describes his experience:

  The aspect that stands out the most from my learned patience from stalking, in sniper school, is the marksmanship aspect at the end of the stalk. Even though we shot blanks, I still remember the difficulty in assuring that everything was correct. I remember the mental checklist—did I camoufl age well, is my blast lane long enough, can I burn through the vegetation to confirm sight of the objective, shadows, defl ection—all running through my head simultaneously.

  This aspect of training I found to be absolutely true when confronted with an insurgent placing an IED alongside MSR bronze near Haditha, Iraq. I remember that day vividly.

  It was clear and crisp with a steady wind reaching gusts of twenty miles per hour. It was the middle of the afternoon when a white truck stopped at the road intersection and two males got out. This immediately drew my attention as I sighted in behind the scope to get a better view of what they were doing. They couldn’t have stopped at a better spot in relation to where I was set up. It was almost as if they ended up directly in my line of sight.

  Unfortunately for them the driver of the truck jumped into the back of the truck bed and picked up something heavy. I could tell by the way his back was slumped over, and he struggled to hand it to the passenger waiting alongside the truck. He received it and ran to the side of the road. This immediately led me to believe that they were planting a roadside bomb.

  From my training and experience I knew I had to act. I tracked the suspect through my scope until he stopped along the edge of the road. This would be my one opportunity. All my training began to race through my head as I refused to accept missing a shot. I lined up the crosshairs on his chest silhouette and applied a slow and steady trigger squeeze. He immediately hit the ground as I saw a pink mist spray from his body.

  Just as during stalking, my final firing position was undetectable. The patience needed for making this shot transferred from training to real life and was successful.

  Marine sniper Jon S. also describes two very similar situations, one during school, the other in Iraq.

  During sniper school, my final objective was to make two shots at an unknown distance. My partner and I waited in position over twelve hours to make the shots. We needed every ounce of energy to stay awake because we’d been moving for four days straight, constantly going from one mission to another with resupplies in between. By the final day, we were exhausted. As we waited, the order to shoot was finally given over the net, and if we’d been complacent, we would have failed.

  In Iraq, during Operation Phantom Fury in Fallujah 2004, our team had been awake for over twenty hours. Insurgents continued to fl ank the company we were supporting and our team was asked to over-watch for a platoon moving to secure an area. Everyone in our team was exhausted, but when we were in position, my spotter noticed three men with weapons moving towards the Marines in front of us and we eliminated them. After we killed them, I realized how the situation in sniper school mirrored actual combat.

  Snipers also need patience because not every mission undertaken will produce a kill. The chance to kill can take anywhere from weeks to months, or it may never be presented. In the same way, patience is required for a sniper to make the best decision on how to kill the enemy. Very rarely does the enemy travel alone, either in Iraq or Afghanistan. For snipers this means using the perfect weapon to strike in order to increase the maximum body count. Often, snipers make the difficult decision to deny themselves the use of the sniper rifle and to rely on supporting arms. This may sound logical to most, but for a trained sniper it is a heavy sacrifice not to engage with the sniper rifle.

  These skills and qualities produce men who become force multipliers for their units. They also give the snipers the tools they need to carry out their primary function—to kill the enemy.

  Killing

  For military snipers, killing is their purpose, and it is crucial to their survival. Militaries have recognized the need for a sniper’s precision, and there is no other time more crucial for accuracy than the Global War on Terror. Snipers have proven to be the perfect solution in environments where civilians are present and collateral damage needs to be minimized.

  The act of actually sniping someone in combat is thought to have something mystical about it. Any combat sniper, however, will tell you that there is no aura during the kill; it is just a squeeze of the trigger, and nothing else. It is common for snipers to experience the nervous feeling—buck fever—during their first kill, stemming from the fact that they are actually about to fulfill the goal of all of their training.

  By and large, the will to kill is ingrained in most snipers before they reach sniper training. Since sniper communities are made from the infantry or Special Operations units, the men have learned to kill from the start of their training. By the time sniper training is completed, taking the life of an enemy is simply the job they’ve been assigned to do.

  One U.S. Army sniper instructor says:

  Sniping is first and foremost about killing people. If one does not think that this is something they can handle, then sniping is not for them. Many people say that killing a man is the worst thing they have ever had to do. This may be true for them, but for me and most snipers I know, it is only a job. Killing the enemy is a task given, and snipers execute this task because it must be done. For most that I know, it ends there. There are images and things that will stick with me for the rest of my life, but pulling the trig
ger on an armed enemy trying to harm friendly troops is not something that will bother me now, or ever.

  I, and all the snipers I know, agree with this mentality. I’ve been asked, “How do you deal with killing people?” My reply is that I know that everyone I’ve killed was an enemy combatant, and was intending to harm friendly troops or myself, and I can live with that. I believe that some snipers may have a hard time dealing with killing if there are uncertainties involved.

  Tools of the Trade

  The equipment and weapons used by snipers in the military differ between services and units. The common factor among all, though, is the primary use of a 7.62mm NATO round. Each unit also uses heavier sniper rifles for farther distances and armor penetration. Night vision, thermal imaging, radios, global positioning devices, high-powered optics, periscopes, tripods, night sights for the sniper rifle, laptops, cameras, and suppressors are the typical equipment available for sniper teams.

  In the conventional Army, scout/snipers have three weapons available for use. The first is the M24 Sniper Weapon System or SWS. Many snipers consider this their bread-and-butter weapon for its proven reliability in combat. This is a bolt-action, 7.62mm rifle made by Remington and is very similar to the M40 series that Marine snipers use, with some minor differences such as stock and scope. The longest recorded shot in Iraq was 1,250 meters (4,000 feet) by an Army sniper with this weapon.