Inside the Crosshairs Read online

  “During six months of action, the Rogue sniper team, never more than eight men, accounted for 105 confirmed enemy kills. We had several guys wounded but none killed.”

  Army snipers trained and operated quite like their Marine counterparts. Sergeant Ed W. Eaton of Walla Walla, Washington, entered active duty in October 1968 and arrived in Vietnam the following May as an infantryman in B Company, 3rd Battalion, 60th Infantry, 9th Infantry Division. Eaton recalls, “From the first time I heard that the division had a sniper school, I was interested. I immediately requested the opportunity to attend. I wanted to be a sniper worse than anything—well, not more than a bartender in Saigon or a general’s aide, but if I had to be a grunt this is what I wanted.”

  Eaton attended one of the army’s first formal sniper classes, those conducted by the 9th Infantry Division, and during his last six months in-country accounted for twenty-seven successful engagements of enemy personnel. “Like the other units in the 9th,” Eaton remembers, “we had the usual forms of employment, including setting up with infantry companies to cover opportune fields of fire. We also conducted night hunter missions, where members of a two-man team would occupy each door of a Huey helicopter and cruise the rivers after dark. Using Starlight scopes, we would look for targets. When we spotted the bad guys, we shot a tracer round at them. Then two Cobra gunships would roll in and hose down the area.”

  Most of Eaton’s kills were at ranges of 500 meters or more—but not all. On one occasion Eaton went on a company sweep operation during which the unit established a defensive position near an abandoned village shortly before sundown. According to Eaton, “The company commander asked me to set up just outside the perimeter to keep an eye on the village. After it got good and dark, I quietly moved out to my position to scan the area through the fuzzy green hue of my Starlight scope. Immediately to my front, only fifty meters away, I spotted a VC squatting near a hootch. He must have heard me moving, because he was cupping his hands to his ears to hear better. He may have heard me, but I saw him. I froze and then watched to see if he was alone or maybe part of a larger element. Nothing moved for several minutes; I decided it was time to do away with this guy and find myself a better location. I knocked him on his back with one shot—my shortest as a sniper.”

  Eaton, who turned twenty-one while in sniper school, also had success on the night hunter missions. “We were flying at 500 feet one evening. I lay on the chopper’s floor looking out over the side through a Starlight scope mounted on my M21 rifle.[4] Suddenly I observed a sampan on a river with one person aboard. The waterway was closed to all but military navigation, and it was after curfew. I prepared to fire. It’s hard to hit anything from a moving helicopter, especially since you are shooting downward through lots of turbulence, but all I had to do was get close.

  “I shot a tracer to mark the target,” Eaton continues, “and waited for the Cobras to fire up the area. They swept in, illuminated the sampan with their searchlights, and then broke off without firing. When we returned to base to refuel, I asked the Cobra pilots, ‘Why didn’t you guys fire? Was it a woman or a kid?’”

  “The lead pilot laughed and said, ‘No, man; there was nothing left for us. You got him right in the chest. That was a great shot.’

  “I added the kill to my count. But I must admit, it had to be my luckiest shot.”

  Despite these exciting, successful missions, Eaton adds, “Mostly sniping is a boring, lonely job. You wait hour after hour taking turns on the scope or Starlight with your partner. Sometimes one shot, one kill. At other times you spot so many of the bad guys that you have to call in artillery and air support while you just watch and direct the show. Then you pick up and go home, only to go out on another mission and then another. Sniping in Vietnam was not always a perfect science. Charlie would show you a different face every time—the man who was best prepared and had the best all-round weapon won, and that is what life is all about. Death may be a sniper’s job, but surviving was also my goal.”

  * * *

  White, Kugler, Eaton, and hundreds of other Marine and army snipers in Vietnam proved that long-range shooters still had a place on the battlefield—and they proceeded to take their role to a new level. Combining modern technology in weapons, ammunition, and telescopes, U.S. snipers in Vietnam used the experience and traditions of centuries of precision shooters to perfect their craft. They made such a lasting impression that even after the war in Vietnam finally ended, the one-shot killers remained an active and important component of the armed forces of the United States.

  CHAPTER 2

  The First Marksmen: From Stones to Gunpowder

  BY definition a sniper is someone who uses a special weapon system to shoot at an individual from a protected area far from the target. Logically, then, the history of snipers and sniping parallels the development of weaponry. In turn, the development of weaponry follows the history of warfare, which is as old as mankind itself and varies little from the struggles of other creatures. The needs for food, propagation, and territory inevitably lead to conflict among and between all species, mankind’s intelligence and culture notwithstanding.

  What sets man apart is not his desire to eat, mate, or survive—or even his desire to dominate his environment. Rather, the distinguishing factor is his ability to develop weapons and master skills using them to overcome opposition. Likewise, what has set the sniper apart from other warriors is the ability to maximize accuracy and stealth to neutralize the enemy from a distance.

  For hundreds of thousands of years warfare more resembled “the hunt” than modern combat. Humans were few, space and resources were vast, and little need or reason existed for men to engage in warfare with each other. Yet archaeology reveals the steady evolution in armament, from early man’s throwing of stones to his constructing instruments of battle that included rocks tied to wooden clubs. Refinements led to tapered points attached to sticks, which became spears and javelins, and sharpened broad heads on wooden handles, which became axes. While brute strength and excellent reflexes remained the most important characteristics of a warrior, accuracy was a close second.

  Recent discoveries suggest evidence of human, or at least humanlike, activity on Earth more than one million years ago. While clubs and rudimentary axes were the mainstay of early man’s arsenal, the evolution of weaponry during most of this period focused on further shaping and refining flint spear points. At some point, man adapted eighteen-inch to two-foot wooden handles with convex ends to hold stones. These throwing sticks basically lengthened the hunter’s arm, allowing him to throw projectiles with more force and for longer distances.

  As early as 30,000 B.C., humans used leather slings to propel stones and short spears. About this same time the bow appeared, enabling early man to shoot arrows to kill his food and to engage his human enemies—especially from afar. The most important aspect of these early weapons is that they shared a characteristic with all arms that followed: they were only as effective as the skills of the individuals who used them.

  By 10,000 B.C., man had developed agriculture, domesticated animals, mastered pottery, and established stable communities. As polished projectiles replaced crudely chipped arrow and spear points, man experimented with stronger bow materials and better strings to increase the distance and penetration power of his arrows.

  The evolution of weaponry took a quantum leap when man discovered the properties of copper about 3500 B.C. and learned to mix the metal with tin to form bronze, allowing him to refine his arsenal as well as enhance his jewelry and household utensils. In about 1000 B.C., development of the technique of smelting iron into a harder, more rigid metal added to man’s ability to further improve his weapons for hunting and fighting. Metallurgy technology, however, advanced slowly, and widespread use of iron did not take place until the fourteenth century B.C. in Asia Minor and the eleventh century B.C. in Europe.[5]

  Any description of exactly how the ancients employed their evolving weapons must be supposition because th
e development of written languages did not occur until long after man had spent hundreds of centuries hunting and warring. One fairly early written record of a battle describes a confrontation between the young Egyptian pharaoh Thutmosis III and revolting tribes of Palestine and Syria. In 1469 B.C., Thutmosis defeated the rebels at Megiddo Pass, north of Mount Carmel, Palestine, using a crescent formation of soldiers armed with swords and spears and supported by bowmen.

  That battle epitomizes the centuries-old tactic of using massed formations, in which overall strength is more important than individual accuracy. The only weapons capable of reaching a range farther than arm’s length—arrows, thrown spears, rocks from slings, and rudimentary catapults—were usually employed in mass volleys rather than single aimed shots.

  There were exceptions. An early example of a single soldier’s overwhelming a larger, stronger opponent appears in the Bible’s Old Testament. According to Samuel, chapter 17, when the Philistine and Israelite armies met (about the eleventh century B.C.), Goliath, a Philistine giant standing more than nine feet tall and protected by a brass helmet, chain mail, and an iron shield, challenged the Israelites to produce a champion to meet him on the plain between the two armies in individual combat.

  According to verse 11, the Israelites “were dismayed, and greatly afraid.” Only a shepherd boy with no battle experience volunteered. Refusing armor and sword, David selected five smooth stones from a nearby brook for his sling before he advanced against Goliath. Verse 49 notes, “And David put his hand in his bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote the Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sunk into his forehead; and he fell upon his face to the earth.”

  David ran to the stunned Goliath and decapitated the giant with his own sword. The inspired Israeli army proceeded to attack and destroy the enemy army. A single, well-aimed stone had turned the battle and won the day.

  From the earliest records to modern accounts, however, historical documents generally focus on the accomplishments of field commanders and their armies. Cyrus the Great is one early military commander about whom substantial records of conquest have survived. From 546 B.C. until his death about seventeen years later, Cyrus established the Persian Empire by conquest.

  The key to Cyrus’s strength was his concentration of great numbers into tight, mutually supporting formations. His soldiers fought shoulder to shoulder against the enemy, doing their damage with the spear and sword. At that time armies often numbered as large as 50,000, with soldiers massed twenty men deep into lines only 2,500 meters long.

  Slings, spears, and arrows still played a role, but protective armor and chain mail decreased their effectiveness. A single, well-aimed projectile remained important, however, and, on occasion, alone could sway the outcome of a battle. In 401 B.C., Cyrus the Younger, supported by 13,000 Greek mercenaries, attempted to take the Persian throne from his brother, Artaxerxes II. Cyrus and his army were on the verge of victory at the Battle of Cunaxa when an unidentified Persian soldier hurled a spear at Cyrus, striking him just below the eye and killing him. Cyrus’s army immediately retreated homeward.

  While swords and spears dominated the battlefield for thousands of years, the use of the bow and arrow inevitably influenced combat. When communities went to war against their neighbors, bowmen, who had skillfully hunted for food and successfully competed in holiday and festival shooting contests, joined the ranks of the army in archery sections. Once in battle, bowmen fired in volley at a high angle (to send their arrows over the defenders’ shields) or directly at unprotected troops. Archers also aimed their missiles at cavalrymen and horse-drawn chariots that began appearing with armies as early as 1000 B.C. The very best men with the bow, however, often operated semi-independently to deliver single, well-aimed arrows at enemy leaders.

  Although bowmen contributed to the outcomes of battles, most soldiers disdained them, believing the archers to be cowardly fellows who skulked on the outer edges of battlefields in relative safety waiting for the opportunity to launch arrows against better, braver men.

  As populations multiplied and nations formed around political and religious leaders, warfare increased in frequency and scale. Yet, for the time bow and arrow marksmanship remained secondary to the sword and spear, which ruled the battlefield. When those standard weapons were not enough to guarantee success, adaptations appeared. Macedonian Alexander the Great conquered much of the known world between 336 and 323 B.C. with an army built around infantrymen armed with fourteen-foot-long pikes, twice the length of his enemies’ spears.

  Julius Caesar, expanding the Roman Empire between 59 and 44 B.C., wrote in his third-person account of the battle that defeated the Gauls titled The Gallic War, “The situation was critical and as no reserves were available, Caesar seized a shield from a soldier in the rear and made his way to the front line. He addressed each centurion by name and shouted encouragement to the rest of the troops, ordering them to push forward and open out their ranks so they could use their swords more easily. His coming gave them fresh heart and hope. Each man wanted to do his best under the eyes of his commander despite the peril.”

  But the spear and sword tactics would encounter changes that would alter the face of warfare. Legions of Rome lost a relatively insignificant battle at Carrhae in 53 B.C. that provided a preview of the future. Parthian (Iranian) cavalry armed with bows attacked Roman infantry under the command of Consul Crassus. The 10,000 Parthian cavalry, supported by 1,000 camels that carried nothing but extra arrows to resupply the mounted bowmen, annihilated the equal-size Roman force.

  The horse-mounted bowman would soon rule the battlefield, but only after another innovation. Because an early cavalryman riding bareback or on a padded blanket had only his horse’s mane to hold on to, shooting arrows accurately and reloading quickly proved to be extremely difficult. The invention of the saddle with stirrups, probably in India during the first century B.C., provided cavalrymen a stable platform from which to fight, making it one of the most significant military developments in five hundred years.

  In the fifth century A.D. the first army composed almost entirely of horse-mounted archers conquered much of southern Europe and challenged the might of the Roman Empire. Attila the Hun, known as the Scourge of God to his enemies, assembled an army of 100,000 soldiers. Each Hun soldier rode into battle mounted on horseback and armed with a bow and multiple quivers of arrows. He led from one to seven additional horses that carried additional arrows, water, and all the supplies need for an extended campaign.

  Hun bowmen could accurately shoot arrows up to 100 meters at individual targets and double that distance by firing at a high angle. Swords, axes, and maces rounded out the Huns’ arsenal for close-in fighting, but the bow became their most influential weapon on the battlefield; the proficiency of individual bowmen had finally gained status. Some accounts suggest there were Huns who could shoot down a bird in flight or pierce an enemy’s eye at 100 meters.

  For killing at a distance, the range of the weapon and the personal proficiency of the warrior had become the most important characteristics for successful engagement. Those traits only increased in significance with the next major advance, which had the greatest impact on warfare to date.

  No records document the exact development date of the crossbow, but the Chinese historical work titled Shih chi, composed about 100 B.C., mentions the use of the weapon in the battle of Maling, China, in 341 B.C. The Chinese document also notes that the weapon had uses beyond the battlefield. According to the Shih chi, Chinese emperor Ch’in Shih, who died in 210 B.C., gave instructions for preparations of his tomb and “commanded the artisans to make automatic crossbows and arrows so that if anyone dug in and entered they would suddenly shoot and slay them.”

  The crossbow first appeared in Europe with the Roman army in the first century A.D. F. Vegetius Renatus notes in his writings of A.D. 386, De Re Militari, that crossbowmen were a regular part of the Roman army. The fact that the author does not go into detail probably indi
cates that the weapon had been present for some time. Art of the period in France and Rome shows soldiers armed with crossbows.

  With the fall of the Romans in the fifth century A.D., the crossbow mostly disappeared from Europe for 500 years. Because Rome’s enemies did not adopt the crossbow, the bow, sword, and pike remained the primary weapons.

  The crossbow did not reappear on the Continent until improvements in its bow, arming mechanism, and projectiles again brought it to the forefront as Europeans prepared to embark on Crusades to “liberate” the Holy Land. Composition materials had made the bow stronger and levers allowed the operator to more easily pull the draw string to the trigger. These modifications increased the weapon’s range to 150 meters. Wooden shafts with iron tips, known as bolts, replaced the traditional arrows and could penetrate armor and chain mail.

  Crossbowmen carried hundreds of bolts and copied the archers’ technique of firing in volley. However, marksmen who proved their accuracy with the weapon sought and engaged individual targets. These early marksmen were often successful in bringing down enemy leaders. English King Richard the Lionhearted, after gaining success and fame in the Crusades, returned home to engage enemies in Europe. In 1199, a crossbowman in the army of the Bishop of Limoges fired a bolt into Richard’s shoulder during a minor skirmish. Gangrene set in, and the single, well-aimed crossbow bolt resulted in the death of the English king.

  In 1453 another crossbowman turned the tide of an entire battle with a single bolt. An unidentified soldier in the Ottoman army of Mohammed II, the Conqueror, fired a bolt that seriously wounded John Giustiniani, the leader of the defenders of Constantinople. With Giustiniani no longer able to rally his men, the Ottomans quickly overran the defenses and captured the city.