Legend of the American Sniper | Full Documentary

[Music] the biggest misperception that i that i have always since the day that i i came around the marine sniper community was was we're not cowboys you know we're not we're not john wayne um we don't think we are we know we're not uh we know who we are we're marine scout snipers but that's why the marine comes first in that in that phrase it's marine scout sniper [Music] three main misconceptions about a scout sniper i would say that they're not prima donnas in terms of uh their shooting ability which some infantry would categorize them as uh here comes murder incorporated you know top gun and uh they're not they're they're there to do a specific job to support the infantry that's the first misconception the second misconception is that they think snipers have this concept of one shot one kill i gotta tell you that's not always the case especially after you've been out in the field quite a while and lastly i i would say that uh the sniper is not an elitist at all uh he's part of a special group of highly trained individuals such as force recon navy seals army rangers green beret those kinds of people but they're still part of the supporting part of the infantry they're they're supporting arms to the infantry everything supports the infantry including snipers people think snipers shoot well we do shoot but that's really only about 15 of what a sniper does you know there's so much more to being a military or a police sniper than just above average marksmanship skills we need to be able to shoot sometimes pretty far out there but none of that matters if you can't plan the mission if you can't get to the location undetected if you can't get to the right location and only then is there an opportunity for a shot and then you have to be able to get away to do it again so there are some very important valuable skills that are that are in place before we ever get to the point where we can talk about shooting i can talk about the vietnam era snipers one of the misconceptions i believe are the confirmed kills if you look in any vietnam sniper's record you can go to the military department department of defense there is no record of any confirmed kills during vietnam the numbers were important to the military to report back to the american public that yes we suffered this many losses but we killed this many of the enemy so numbers were pushed and i think even snipers were encouraged to report numbers what you see in movies portraying the sniper is very much of a facade it doesn't get anywhere near the depth the thought processes that they tried to attribute to the sniper are not truly valid first misconception i would say would be the intelligence level that just anybody could get out there and do it i'm not saying it takes someone of above average intelligence but if you take a look at with the curriculum it was hard enough the curriculum back when i went through division sniper school the program has only gotten better over the years the information that these uh young marines and soldiers and sailors and airmen are having to having to digest within a short period just a matter of weeks is amazing so i would say the misconception first of all the misconception of the intelligence level of a scout sniper the second thing i would say is the misconception that they don't have consciences stigmatism of a cold-blooded killer it would amaze people to know how many of them are family men have wives have children the third would be that they take pleasure in their work i've seen a lot of movies to where they're just really enjoy their work the movies and the media do pret have a portrayal of police snipers um sometimes it's very exaggerated uh i think you see the glitz and the glamour of the job and stuff like that you don't necessarily get to see the all of the training uh in the constant uh continuous updating of skills that goes with that uh people think that you know we just come out and we pull the rifle out and you know pull the trigger not the case at all i mean day in and day out of shooting and sharpening those skills so if the time comes that you know you can be counted on to do what needs to be done hollywood portrays it totally different we have 48-man teams plus out there with us it's not a one-man show you know if you're shooting you got a spotter somebody's got to be on security someone's got to be on the radio it's it's your whole team combined and what makes a scout snipers not one individual person once you get to understand and know why a sniper does what he does and what he has to go through to do it uh you you don't take that feeling uh of him being a lone wolf or a rogue or you know a loner type thing in today's military that's discouraged it's not a quality that that the military is looking for in a sniper they they need uh they need a clear-headed well-adjusted individual that can operate well within a group because these aren't these aren't individuals out there against uh against any enemy anymore they're groups groups of soldiers fighting is a cohesive coordinated military unit against the enemy and we've raised sniping to a fine precise art form and it doesn't tolerate individuals that can't operate well within the group [Music] from the time sniper started sniping they've been probably one of the most feared people that's out on the battlefield just because of the nature of what we do you know without warning all of a sudden pounds somebody's shot you don't know where it came from and it's accurate and it's getting to everybody what do you do and that still exists today anytime the snipers are out there if you know snipers are out there you get that cold dread right at the back of your neck and there's nothing you can do about it and we like that to be perfectly honest with you because i know that i can be out there and not shoot anybody but still have a positive effect on the mission just by being out there if i do have to shoot people well then has an even more pronounced effect on the mission the american sniper is often the most highly trained soldier in combat things that he's going to be asked to do once he is in the operational environment are going to test him and they're not just going to test him mentally they're going to test him physically they're going to test him emotionally and they're going to make him reach deep down inside and bring out the the most and the best of what he's able to deliver if anyone can claim the essence of the true warrior spirit the one who sacrifices and fights for the greater good of his comrades and the greater good of his country it is the american sniper who is this warrior he is all thanks to all men a mission no matter what it is how difficult demanding how impossible it might seem a sniper is up to that mission he will accomplish that mission with what he has available to him the sniper first and foremost is a hunter his weapon a rifle his prey another human being none have embraced this world better than the american sniper the sniper shoots his targets from distances beyond the reach of ordinary weapons and the ordinary marksman he shoots his targets with the highest precision rifles of the time he uses the best optics of the time and most often he shoots his targets from concealed positions the sniper is the man of myth and legend [Music] few can measure up to what it takes to become a sniper and those who do will surprise you selecting individuals to be trained as snipers was a very uh important part of what we did you had the basics which was they had to be a good shot to start off with they had to have a good record they had to have a year to do in country to get involved in the training program some of them had to extend but even more importantly was their attitude [Music] i've been asked what kind of a person would you like to have as a sniper and i guess my response is someone who can entertain themselves a half a day sitting on a porch whittling on a stick the best snipers are guys and girls i won't make it sound like only men do this who are detail-oriented who are meticulous who are chess players they like the mental aspects of being able to fire precision weapon they like the intellectual angles of being a good observer and being sneaky and getting into position covertly and being there i would say that you probably have to be comfortable in your own skin you have to be able to spend extended periods of time alone or with one other individual no communication no verbal communication and i would say probably the biggest thing that i've found over the years my involvement in being a marine corps scout sniper is you have to be physically conditioned you have to be mentally conditioned and you also have to be spiritually conditioned if the only reason they're wanting to go into that environment is to feel what it see what it feels like to kill a human being they're that's that's that's not that is exactly the wrong motivation uh they do have to have the capability to do it when the pres you know when the situation presents itself i would say the list to list the qualifications they're going to have to be smart appearance to the contrary in my own case here they're going to have to be in good excellent physical condition will certainly help if they've had considerable experience field experience in terms of before they went in you know hunting competitive shooting that sort of thing shooting certainly is a is a prerequisite you have to be a good shooter but that is not the determining factor that is going to keep you alive you've got to get when you're when you're operating in operational status you've got not only you've got to get out there and get into position to make the shot after you make the shot you got to get yourself back out of there alive it takes a certain mentality you've got to have a survivor instinct and a drive to keep pushing no matter what the odds because the odds are against you out there you're outnumbered a sniper has to be very patient and has to have a lot of common sense and one of the most important parts is that a sniper has to be truthful when you're out there in the environment by yourself or with your spotter you can come up with all kinds of stories and and make yourself look pretty important but the the sniper has to be meticulously truthful the the average guy that becomes a becomes a marine scout sniper the guy the guy that i always looked for uh when i was a chief scout my platoon i looked for that guy that was outgoing i looked for that guy who when you walked into a room he was the one that confronted you because he didn't know you um you look you look for the guy that that when you say hey let's go it's time to roll he's the first one getting up off his butt and and making it happen um when you say hey guys you know by zero eight we got to have this done he's the guy that when you when you come walking across yeah you know the motor pool he's the guy loading the truck that's the guy that i'm looking for um and the same thing in the social setting you know there's more to it than just you know what the the face the sniper wears when he's you know in the uniform you know i'm looking for the guy that that knows how to have a good time he knows how to laugh he knows how to relax um you know any and he wants that camaraderie ship uh he he wants the fellowship of his brothers you know uh i've never i've never had good success you know bringing people in that are that are secluded you know a lot of times people said well that's you know that's the snipers they all stay to themselves you know they they're the guys that only hang out with other snipers well you know maybe that's true um to an extent but it's because of that bond that we all share you know as marine snipers you know we've we've we've went out there alone and and you like to say unafraid but you know to be honest with you you know you go out there and it is it scares the hell out of you um but you look for those guys that you can lean on you know those guys that keep you strong and those are the types of people that i like to be around and that's what i found myself with all the time when selecting guys to to come to the platoon or or even get when i would pull guys from my own team uh you know i'd want that guy that was uh not afraid to get muddy he wasn't afraid to to fire his weapon and then have to sit there and clean it for two or three hours um you look for the guy that's got the you know the background you know of of growing up hey you know he's the one talking about going out and doing uh fishing trips and camping trips with his dad or his pals you know uh he's the avid hunter he's the woodsman field craft's a huge part of being a marine so you want that guy that knows how to go out there and get his hands dirty and and wipe them on his pants and and keep going part of the the legend around sniping is that all successful snipers at one time you know hunted rabbits or the family didn't eat or that kind of thing and to a large extent that's that's very true the people that we see who are really good at military sniping are also really good at hunting and have a background in hunting because that's what we're doing we're hunters of gunmen in the military sniping field so if you are oriented toward an outdoor hunting uh you know vigorous lifestyle then you've probably got an advantage coming into this line of work but that doesn't mean a city boy can't do it too because we've got those and they're good so but that's one of the things you know we have legends we have myths and uh and that's one of them but that's not necessarily a myth that we see that all the time and i think that's true to a large extent i'm a hunter i've always been a hunter and it's also interesting now that we're talking about this that you know some people are hunters and experience military combat and then don't ever want to hunt again and i know quite a few of those people i've not experienced that you know military combat is in a compartment of its own and when it's over that compartment gets shut and those are really good memories of their bad memories but it's shut so hunting for me is still as good as it always was but there's there some very uh some very profound psychological things that go on uh you know for a basic infantryman involved in a firefight there's a lot of noise and smoke and commotion and chaos and and there goes a bad guy and everybody shoots and okay he falls down somebody got him but he might not ever figure out who it was so there's some detachment there that can be applied when a sniper puts a reticle crosshair on a person and presses the trigger and sees their head collapse and a big pink mist blow out the back there's no denying what happened or who did it so in your heart you've got to be right with why that was necessary and why it was you know my job to do it and if you're not you can have some pretty severe problems if you are then you're able to uh to deal with it and go on and understand the necessity of the mission and the fact that you're saving lives by doing what you're doing we go through years of training doing trying to learn a skill set and you never really learn it and even when you're in country you're still learning every time you go out on a mission you're learning constant learning it's tough to get a grasp on everything the sniper trainee will need to perfect many specialized skills and abilities training will be mentally and physically demanding he'll have to learn how to handle a variety of firearms he will have to get himself into peak physical shape he'll have to learn a unique set of battlefield tactics he'll have to learn the physics of bullet trajectories [Music] learn how the flight of a bullet is affected by environmental conditions and since the sniper doesn't act alone he'll learn how to work as one with his spotter in vietnam 1965 1966 the concept of what is most effective for snipers boil down to two guys a sniper and a spotter well army sniper school depending on where you go if you go to the active component school at fort benning it's five weeks long when you've got weekends off if you go to the guard school at camp robinson it's four weeks but there's no time off it's day for day some days are 14 hours some days are some days don't end it just depends all kinds of military orienteering of course the marksmanship known distance shooting unknown distance shooting where you have to determine the range and dope the wind and do it all yourself and then you either hit that target out there or you don't uh mission planning calling for fire the theory behind sniping the tactics involved uh stalking of course is a huge piece and you do several kinds of stocks you'll do tree stocks grass stalks water stalks and of course they like to send you in you know in the winter time and the nastiest possible weather and then there's uh it's all rolled up in the end of the school in phase two and we do an ftx that's three days long mission after mission after mission starts with isolation mission planning and then you go you insert by any of our normal insertion methods we use helicopters a lot you do the mission whether it's a reconnaissance and reporting piece or whether it's actual lethal precision fire on a target and then you do the extraction and exfiltration piece and then they had kind of a surprise for us there was actually a sear piece involved that we didn't know about you know survival escape resistance evasion and all of a sudden everyone's captured and we get interrogated and roughed up and hooded up and then we managed to escape and if you remembered where the escaping invasion rally point was that you got briefed on days ago you know 40 50 hours ago then then you were supposed to head there with your partner and quite a few made it quite if you didn't and of course the exercise started over for them so it's a pretty good training some pretty intense training sniper skills start with marksmanship it's a complex skill set that transforms the trainee from a good shot to a sniper first off in the marine corps every marine is a rifleman and the intent is to have every marine be a good shot to begin with so the idea of a marine engaging a target accurately is expected but then you get into the sniper who was professionally trained to reach out beyond those ranges that the infantry typically are maximized to five six hundred yards at maximum that's when the sniper begins to engage his targets up to including over two thousand yards the greatest technological advancement to combat sniping was when we put the rifle telescope on top of the rifle and you doubled or even tripled operating ranges for snipers when the first sniper started doing his work the two greatest obstacles he had to overcome were range estimation and what to do about the wind well those are two key problems for snipers because range estimation is critical we know gravity acts on the bullet so the minute you fire it starts to follow the earth and you have to elevate the barrel launch the round up to a higher maximum ordnance so that it'll fall once acted upon gravity uh at a longer distance to you to where you've zeroed well we get trained and taught in the mill relation formula we have the mil dot reticle in the scope and you look at it and you're able in your mind's eye to break it down into tents and compare what the target looks like to the reticle and then work a formula and tell you how far away the target is and there are some people who are great at using the mill relation formula the problem is it absolutely is dependent on a couple of things one is you've got to be able to see the target well enough to mill it accurately large portion of the target so if you've got a guy in high grass and you can only see this much it doesn't work very well the target pretty much has to be standing still so that you can compare its size to the reticle well if he's moving and ducking and weaving and bobbing and running and doing the things that people do that doesn't work the other problem is you got to be able to hold the rifle still enough to mill the target so if you're in the middle of a battle and you're looking at a mountainside of rocks and the only thing that you see out there besides those rocks is muzzle flashes well it's very difficult to muzzle to mill a muzzle flash and get a range estimation reading because you have to know the size of your target in inches to make the formula work so nobody knows or can tell me what the size in inches of a muzzle flash is or the size in inches of iraq is in afghanistan the evolution of sniping in the military and the marine corps has come a long way since its first inception when i started in the late 70s and in the early 80s technology has played a big role in that the inherent accuracy of the weapons has become a lot better the skill sets that the individual snipers have acquired over the years has gotten a lot more in depth the fundamentals of making a scout sniper the field craft skills the rain's estimation the land navigation use the technology to your advantage because you have it available to us and i'm saying that from the perspective of someone who didn't have it up until when we did have it but never forget the basic core fundamentals that are taught at the scout sniper school and the scout sniper advance course as taught in their fundamentals and what they find out is when you're breathing because of the rise and fall of your chest your crosshairs are moving also and what they want to do is they want the crosshairs on the rifle to be stationary when they squeeze off the shot because that equates to the barrel being stationary so they're taught what's called a natural respiratory pause in which they will stop breathing at some point either on a full exhale or a full lungs and hold their breath for a heartbeat or two let the crosshairs settle still and then fire the shot while the rifle is as stationary as they can make it on the ranges they practice shooting against stationary targets they're being very cooperative but in real world situations people move they they're they're animated they're moving their heads they're moving their their bodies around in some cases they're walking or running so they're not being cooperative in your efforts to shoot them and snipers need to be able to adapt to that and be able to shoot a target that is not cooperating and not being stationary so it takes learning how to move your position to manipulate the rifle to make sure your cross areas are on a part of the target to provide the proper lead distance so that when the shot is fired that it will still strike the target even though it is on the move and it takes practice it's not something that's easy to pick up after learning to shoot accurately at great distances to shoot accurately under all environmental conditions after learning all of that the next most important set of field skills is called the stalk stalking school what happens is you show up with your your gun bag which is uh something kind of sort of like this uh it serves as a shooting mat it also protects the weapon when you're moving through the bush and whatever optic you have on the rifle in army sniper school we not only have a day optic similar to this one but we also had a day night optic called the pbs 10 which was much bigger and in the stalking phase of school they made us have that on the rifle so that we were forced to hide that big 100 millimeter lens as opposed to a 40 millimeter lens makes it makes the level difficulty much higher what happens is you uh put on your ghillie suit and paint up and they issue you three rounds of blank ammunition and you sneak out in the woods and they walk you through the stock lane and they'll say here's the truck you can see it the instructors are there with their binos and they're on the back of the deuce and a half or a five ton truck and they walk you to the far limits of the lane and they'll tell you this is your left limit and it's marked this is your right limit and it's marked so you've got to stay in that lane and then every how far back you go it could be 300 meters it could be a mile and they'll tell you this is your start point you've got you know x number of minutes to veg up and take natural vegetation and combine it in with your ghillie suit and your equipment and then they'll tell you okay guys time starts you're now under observation and they walk away so you now have three hours to go however far that distance was it could be 300 meters could be a mile you've got to get within a certain amount a certain distance of those observers on the truck you've got to get a shot fired at that point when that when one of you fires a shot a guy who's called a walker who's got a radio and an orange road guard vest he'll come over and he'll get within five meters of whoever fired that shot and he'll call the guy on the truck and say okay i'm within five and so at that point the guys on the truck have a general idea where you're at and they start looking five meters around that walker and if they find you you're busted you're done you fail you've got to leave the lane if they don't find you then they'll ask you where you want it and what they're asking for is they're getting ready to hold up a piece of paper with either a letter or a number on it and your job is to identify it correctly so when they ask where do you want it does that mean you want them to hold it on top of the binoculars they're looking through to the right to the left or down below and depending on the firing position you've picked out there in the woods somewhere you might tell them i want it on the right side of the vinyls so they'll hold it up and you've got to be able to have a clear line of sight in other words a good line a good line for the shot so that you can read this card and tell them it says whiskey there's a big w so the walker will call back and say okay sniper says identifies whiskey and if that's correct then they'll say okay have him fire a second shot so then now while everybody's watching right where you're at you have to fire a second shot and still be undetected so naturally we worry about things like loose leaves on the ground because they're going to blow up in the air if you're too close to the back of a tree even from a blank the muzzle blast out of a 7.62 rifle is going to blow bark off the tree and give away your location any type of disturbed vegetation or anything like that will get you busted if you manage to get that second shot off and they're still looking for you they're gonna say okay get within one meter so now the walker's gonna be on top of him sometimes literally on top of him and if they still can't find you they'll tell the walker to put his hand on your head and he'll reach down and put his hand right on top of your head and at that point you've pretty much passed that stalk but then you still have to exfil there's another five points there's 25 points total available on the stock in order to get that last five points you've got to be able to exfil again without being detected it doesn't always go that way sometimes you you get up there and you fire your shot and of course when you fire all the vinyls on the truck swing right over the location the shot came from and next thing you know you hear a radio you hear a guy getting closer and closer and closer and of course you're on the ground in the ghillie suit you're all covered up with a veil and your world exists of whatever you can see through here and you don't move because you know they're looking for you well suddenly you see a pair of boots right here and they're like okay stop and he stops and your heart's going 150 beats per minute and because you know there's other snipers out there there's other other candidates out there stalking and you're really hoping that they're talking him into one of those guys and not you and sometimes that happens the next thing you'll hear is take three steps forward and he walks away from you and your heart slows back down and then they'll say sniper at your feet you'll look around negative and you'll walk off and so then your heart rate goes back down and you don't dare move you're still as a statue for 10 minutes until someone on the other side of the stalking lane fires and takes their attention away from you and then you do your thing sometimes though they walk right to you and the boots are right here by your head and you know what's coming and the guy says yeah reach down with your left hand and there's a sniper retribution and then they'll tell you over the radio how you got busted you know what gave you away what what led them right to you and so we would rather learn under those conditions out in the world where they're not just looking for you with binos but you know small arms return fire and that kind of thing i don't know that things have changed at all i hear people speak of revolution and training and but uh i think that there's been an evolution but the the more things change the the more they stay the same first and foremost the marine scout sniper is an infantryman uh the thing that i've always admired about them is that they put more emphasis on the individual skill sets of the infantry and they they try to master it land navigation marksmanship of course map reading camouflage concealment you know communications procedures and the technology has increased greatly in in the last several decades but uh the actual training and skill sets has not changed much at all the marine needs to be able to shoot move and communicate and so regardless of what equipment is added to his pack his skill set largely remains the same camouflage is the key to any sniper's mission and camouflage for any sniper begins with his camouflage clothing blending in with the environment is part of the hunter's tactics ever since the first hunters stalk their prey matt mitchell is a marine scout sniper who is intimately familiar with every piece of sniper equipment [Music] here we have uh the ghillie suit you can see three ghillie suits on display here mounted on tripods all right the ghillie suit is essentially a camouflage util utility uniform that's been modified with items you can find in clothing stores fabric stores burlap which is made into strands here hung from netting which is sewn into the uniform itself now snipers when we're training we will don this uniform and uh attach vegetation to the burlap and weave it through in and throughout the netting and uh and we'll attempt to conceal ourselves while our peers through binoculars or spotting scopes are then looking for us the ghillie suit has been a training tool for for military snipers for decades teaches the fundamentals of camouflage and concealment the sniper will add vegetation to his ghillie suit from the local surroundings vegetation then adapts the sniper to the landscape rendering him nearly invisible sniper uses the ghillie suit in training to reinforce fundamentals of camouflage and concealment what the sniper is trying to do is best blend in with his environment by reducing his outline reducing his contrast background and i'm going to show you uh a few of the different kinds of ghillie suits we have up here and what what comprises a full ghillie suit a full gilly suit being a veil which is a hood or a boonie cover that again has been modified with netting and with strands of burlap and cord attached to it so you have your veil which goes over your head you have a jacket again a camouflage utility blouse modified goes over your your torso and you're on through your arms and then you'll have pants which again have been modified so your entire body can be covered with vegetation now when is a sniper gonna don a complete ghillie suit vice just a blouse and veil it depends on the operational requirement that the sniper faces in theater where other gear other kit items are going to be on and around the sniper's body a veil would more than likely be appropriate in training where the the objective of an exercise a particular training exercise is total concealment from from pure observers sniper is going to want to don his entire ghillie suit and veg his entire body when the sniper prepares for his training on a stalk and ultimately his mission on the battlefield he will need to take with him his weapons rifles handgun and knife spotting scopes tripods to steady his rifles and optics communications and survival supplies all packed for rapid deployment and elusive movements right now i'm going to talk about the packs that snipers use to carry that gear this here is a an old standard issue mountain ruck and it's a favorite among military snipers because of its large carrying capacity simple to use external pockets most importantly a metal frame with a hip support you're not going to see that on too many modernly issued packs and comfortable straps all right little modification is needed to this ruck to carry what a sniper needs to carry in training or in combat this is a day pack similar to the ruck it's going to carry snipers gears his optics his water his food his navigation equipment and batteries out into the field or into theater a day pack differs from the mountain rock in that it's smaller it does not have a metal frame and it's generally more cushioned in both the straps and the back it's going to have less carrying capacity and therefore it's used for missions of a shorter duration or oftentimes simple patrols all right what we have here is a flak jacket or a flak jacket goes over the body sniper and it's going to carry through this molle webbing a lot of the gear that a sniper needs on his body at all times things like 556 magazines pistol magazines even his pistol a gps and and other pouches really up to that sniper's preference what he does with other pouches in order to put other mission essential gear in his flak jacket so you can have it on them at all times and finally what i'm showing you here is a it's a battle belt and again it's going to carry pieces of mission essential equipment to accompany what's not carried on the flak again here we have a 556 mag some pistol mags a pistol holster and an escape invasion pouch which is going to have items that a sniper is going to need should a mission go wrong the sniper also carries with him a variety of mounts or tripods for the stabilization of his weapons and spotting scopes i'm going to talk to you about how snipers acquire targets first first one i want to talk about here is it's called a spotting scope and this particular one goes to 24 power all right it's mounted on a small tripod for stabilization and typically a uh an observer will accompany a sniper and acquire targets he's going to watch for and adjust rounds that the sniper is engaging that target with to correct that sniper onto that target should he miss this here is a laser rangefinder it's mounted on a tripod again for stabilization stabilization is especially important for a laser rangefinder which is shooting out a laser upwards of three or four kilometers that laser needs to bounce back and hit this device in order to acquire the correct range and again an observer will employ this once a target has been acquired to get the correct range on the target so the sniper can then dial that range onto his onto his weapon these are binoculars all right everyone knows what binoculars are and military snipers and observers use these much like they use their laser range finders or their spotting scopes in order to scan the battlefield four targets acquired targets finally here we have a night vision device that is attached to what's called a halo the halo goes around a sniper's head which holds that night vision device in front of his eyes the importance of of a piece of gear like this allows a sniper to patrol insert move through a battlefield to get where he needs to go in order to accomplish his mission without the aid of visible light however a military sniper's most important pieces of equipment are his rifles his bolt-action long-range rifle and his m4 defensive weapon i'm going to talk to you about a couple of the different rifles that snipers employ the first thing i'm going to talk to you about is gas guns there's a couple of different variants of m4s an m4 is is the sniper's primary defensive weapon he's going to use it to engage targets while on the move when he hasn't had the chance to set up a shooting position with his bolt gun the weapon will be used in close quarters and to break contact with the enemy [Music] this weapon here this m4 is equipped with a sound suppressor on the end of the barrel and uh an aimpoint optic daytime optic but it is the sniper's long-range rifle and optics that distinguishes him from the other soldiers on the battlefield i now want to talk about some of the actual sniper rifles being employed by our modern military snipers from your left to your right we have the m21 the m40a5 and a variant of the m24 mounted on each of these weapons is a high-powered scope [Music] eventually the sniper will want to personally tailor his long gun to fit his individual preferences and requirements a tradition that goes back to the american sniper in vietnam so at some point in a sniper's career you know you whether you're a police sniper or a military sniper you you get to the point where you just love the shooting and you know that the shooting is a an important part of it so you want to do more and more and that leads you to spend money to do stuff and acquire equipment and shoot on your own time and the longer you spend in the profession the more involved you're going to get with this so i've got a couple rifles here these are personal rifles that i can show you that are pretty close to what we use in the military but they're they're personal and and i've got some gear on here that you wouldn't necessarily see in the military uh this is an ar-15 uh it's got an 18 inch barrel uh this particular one was made by larue tactical here in leander texas it's accurized it's incredibly accurate it's about a half minute of angle gun i've got a leupold scope on it as you can see i've painted it up i've got a little bipod and some backup sights and so i do a lot of training with this rifle i also hunt with this rifle because it closely mirrors you know what i might use at work on a mission another rifle is uh this one is 556 or 223 remington this one is 7.62 or 308 winchester uh so this is my dedicated bolt gun my long gun this one shoots by means of a bolt action it's got a 10 shot magazine it's a it's built for rugged rugged use and an extreme accuracy i've got a night force scope on it you know and i've got an adjustable cheek piece here so so i can shoot either very tight groups or i can shoot you know precise shots at longer range ranges that today extend beyond 1000 yards [Music] how much does all of the sniper's equipment weigh so you can see with all of our weapons our optics these tripods and our other assorted gear the modern military sniper on top of his 200 pounds of body weight is is looking to leave the wire with upwards of 150 pounds on his body in the 21st century in many important ways there's little difference in the training of the law enforcement sniper from his military counterpart the guns are often the same the fundamentals of marksmanship are the same the personality and psychological profile are the same the field craft skills are much the same and the extreme physical conditioning is also the same however in other very important ways there's a world of difference between the military sniper and the law enforcement sniper one of the misconceptions about snipers is that we're out freelance hunting around you know and while that may have happened in past conflicts those days are pretty much over now we go out as a small element attached to a patrol in support of that patrol or their mission and when we get in contact everybody's job is to close with and kill the enemy now on the police side it's much different there are subtle differences but they're significant when a police sniper shoots it's because he's preventing the imminent commission of a dangerous felony crime he's preventing somebody from being seriously bodily injured or killed the primary focus and the primary mission of a police sniper is to observe the crisis site whatever it is a barricaded person or a hostage situation and report the intelligence back to the team so that they can develop a plan and to let them know about any things that are critically changing that would obviously change the plan and then when necessary immediately interdict with lethal fire to prevent somebody being killed or injured well that's not the same for a military sniper it's exactly the opposite as a police officer you have a whole different set of rules uh military you've got rules of engagement uh law enforcement you got the use of force continuum [Music] when i was a police officer we had a very strict set of guidelines um our use of force continuum was was a statewide continuum then of course then it it trickles down from there you have you know your own individual states you got your own individual departments then you get your own individual teams policies that you got to follow as far as use of force is concerned with the sniper role in law enforcement what you got to deal with a lot of time is you got to deal with not just your own situation but you got to be able to intelligently perceive what's going through the entry team's mind what's going through the hostage's mind what's going through the active shooter's mind the bad guy per se and you got to be able to formulate all that together into one nice neat package before you can decide ever as a as a law enforcement sniper to take or not take a shot with that being said a lot of times just the presence of a weapon isn't enough for a law enforcement sniver to take a shot uh let's let's say it's a hostage situation um you know what what are gonna be the end result if i take that shot and that that bad guy's holding that weapon to that hostage you know is it gonna incidentally cause him to fire do i have a shot that i can i can instantly incapacitate him with so he can't pull that trigger you know there's all kinds of variables that come into it and the biggest difference there is is you can't just shoot that round and forget it you own that bullet and what what that does is it puts you in a mindset of you've got to be able to hit your target because once you pull that trigger on that sniper rifle that bullet's gone forever i mean you can't take it back innocent lives are at stake there is no exception for collateral damage in law enforcement uh you know unaccountability of of a round fired uh you know per se like in in in iraq if if i was to fire around as a as a marine sniper and i missed yeah it's a it's a personal shot to the gut for me but that bullet's gone and and we forget about it um but in law enforcement i fire that round where did it go did it go into a house did it go into a neighborhood did it go through a wall did it hit somebody sitting in their living room what happened to that round and we got to know um so the only acceptable result is we have to hit what we're shooting at as police officers you need to understand and hopefully you'll carry this back to your own individual agencies if they haven't already been told this that there is no legal requirement for you to get special authorization from some third party to use deadly course many people credit the lapd with starting the first swat teams and initially swat teams were modeled after small military units where they would have entry personnel they'd have grenadiers and they would have a team sniper and originally the first swat teams were components of five and six and eight-man teams which is much different from what it is today and because they were copying the military model most of the training initially copied the military model as well so many of the original police snipers were sent to whatever military schools they could get them into or they made use of military training materials and tried to cobble together their own training programs and in those days the training for snipers primarily hinged around teaching marksmanship and very little emphasis was put on the other aspects which is the observation and reporting some see the swat team with its deadly sniper as the militarization of the police force but others see it as just providing better and more effective security for the community the public often views a police tactical teams and swat teams and sniper teams is very militaristic however they're really very similar in that fashion they're very different in the same breath police swat teams and sniper teams basically are the next level of police service generally we handle things that basic patrol officers aren't equipped or trained to handle as police swat teams and sniper teams we get more extensive training and have higher caliber of special weapons and things of that nature so as it's seen as often seen by the public it's a very militaristic aspect of policing we're police officers just like every other officer that's out on the street just with more training and different weapons and tactics we get emails and letters from people all the time saying they want to be a sniper how do they become a sniper and you have two choices either become a police officer or join the military that's the first step i mean there are no civilian snipers where you're walking off the street and apply your trade so you have to become a police officer or join the military and you're going to serve out whatever initial services are required speaking from the police aspect you have to go through the academy you're gonna have to do your probationary period and at some point in time hopefully there's an opening on the local swat team again usually there's a probationary period on swat where you're learning the other basic skills of swat operations and hopefully at some point in time an opening arises on the swat on the sniper team and the guys can try out for and and hopefully get chosen for the sniper team and then their school after that and then ongoing training as they go through the rest of their career so it's not something that you wake up one morning and decide i'm going to be a sniper it's a journey the public should feel safer with the swat teams because we're really there to resolve the problem as safely as possible that's our whole objective as a tactical team is just to resolve any high-risk situation without anybody getting hurt that's our ultimate goal so people should feel safer with you know if they have a tactical team in their region or within their police department because it is an extension of their police department our training has always been limited to police and military only and we don't bend the rule for anybody so there's always people out there in the civilian sniper market who feel like we're being elitist or we feel like we're superior to everybody else because we don't allow them to come to our classes and of course they make the argument that they do more shooting than any police officers do and they're better shots than they are and the police officers would benefit by learning from them or they'd be embarrassed because the civilians would now shoot them and i keep putting trying to put them in perspective that the sniper school isn't strictly about shooting that these guys are learning the overall skills of being a sniper artist it's a complete package if you spend every single weekend practicing shooting and these guys get to go shoot once a month i would hope that you are a better shot than they are but you're not shooting in the same kind of environment you are you're shooting at a stationary paper target with no pressure on you other than whatever peer pressure that you might exert these guys are going to be in situations where they may be laying in position for 10 12 hours exposed to the weather exposed to all the elements they're out there after having worked a full eight or ten hour shift they've got little or no sleep little or no food they've got people down range screaming bloody murder for help you've got some deranged bad guy with a gun to somebody's head and you're now in a situation where you've got to make a single shot cold and it's got to be perfect and you know that if it's not perfect the wrong people are going to die and you're going to spend the next couple of years of your career fighting for your freedom and fighting to keep from going to jail in the 21st century the american sniper finds himself the most highly trained individual across all the law enforcement agencies today we have sniper programs in every aspect of law enforcement in the swat teams and hostage rescue as well as military and they go beyond just simply the forward operating forces going against an enemy in warfare we've got border patrol they've got snipers u.s customs they have snipers we have snipers on special operations in other places interdicting the drug cartels snipers are everywhere and they they do a good job do a good job for everybody and they save lives warfare is about missions whatever the battlefield requires of a sniper he adapts to that situation and that's that's the underlying part of the of the scout sniper that has not changed since the civil war since the revolutionary war he adapts he overcomes he adapts to the mission he's all thanks to all men however the sniper has his own unique missions missions different than any others on the battlefield yet at the same time the sniper is a part of the larger mission with his long rifle superb marksmanship and unique battle skills the sniper doesn't win wars but he makes victory possible for his comrades and arms [Music] typical marine sniper is is viewed obviously in a lot of different ways not only in society but but in the marine corps itself you know society looks at at snipers as as you know the guy that takes the you know the magic shot the the long range shot the impossible uh you know the impossible kill with that with that precision rifle what they don't understand is is that there's a lot more to it than just pulling the trigger snipers are asked to do a variety of things typically what a sniper will find himself doing in the modern day and age is is going out and and moving to an objective undetected and then remaining on that objective for days at a time until that critical point culminates whether it be the location of enemy forces that provide a target of opportunity for the sniper or it could be you've gleaned enough information from that that target site and you've reported that information back effectively and accurately and the unit commander decides that it's time to take action with with the larger uh more dominant force and at which time you you slip away into the darkness as they say to me shooting an enemy combatant that's just what it is an enemy combatant if i shoot him and i kill him that means that many marines lives are saved because of that one action my one bullet saved maybe not have saved anybody it could have saved 10 20 20 lives you know that's the guy's putting in an ied now he's not saving 400 000 vehicles with one shot my 200 my 2.75 round saved 400 000 plus worth of equipment saved lives and there's no hesitation it's him basically it's him me or one of my marines definitely choose him what does a sniper do he saves lives he saves lives by taking out the really bad guys the scout sniper is an infantryman i think that the public has this concept that this one guy this lone wolf is out uh you know you know meandering his way around the battlefield uh looking for targets and um there is no one guy anywhere in the marine corps the scout sniper is part of a scout sniper team uh doctrinally it's a it's a shooter and a spotter it's a two-man team um because they need security and because they have to carry so much equipment the the teams that are being used in theater now are usually going out a lot larger than that the sniper rifle is almost a crew serve weapon because you're part of a team and your small team is supporting a rifle company the rifle company's supporting an infantry battalion the infantry battalion is supporting all of the efforts that's going on in your zone and so that's i i try to when people ask me about the snipers are about sniping i always try to emphasize the fact that they're infantry um it's infantry that carries the brunt of the nation's battles and and that they're part of a team there is no lone gunman best thing about being a scout sniver is being out there with four to eight man teams being out there by yourself doing doing missions from higher but it's all on you as a team leader it's your responsibility to take those guys out finish the mission and bring them home and there's no 12 24 man platoons it's just you you and your guys and there's nothing beats that so the sniper is part of a larger mission part of the larger military operation in general the sniper kills to protect the lives of his fellow soldiers his buddies the sniper also has specific objectives when he goes into the field [Music] one of the roles of a sniper is intelligence while they're in position for hours and days at a time they'll see many things that the normal troops would not see i would emphasize that it's a secondary role not a primary role it's a role that's taken as a result of their position and where they're at and the time and their observation abilities and their the skill and observing that they they develop their primary role is to kill the enemy the goal of the sniper is not to kill just any enemy the sniper's goal is to kill value targets his mission is to take out high value targets plus to put psychological pressure on the enemy if they have shots coming in in to their position you don't know where it's coming from you don't know how many people are out there you don't you don't have a clue other than there's a guy laying dead at your feet and a shot came from some place that hit him that's got to shake you up it it is to demoralize the enemy and to overwhelm his desire to fight to continue to fight so the sniper is very important there also to deny him access to communications if he can't call for help if he's shut off by radio then he's stuck and then deny him access to crew served weapons machine guns mortars anything that has a devastating effect we want to take those guys out too so those are that's the primary mission of the sniper also to observe enemy activity and report well everything we do is a combined arms concept you know we've got the infantry out there and we've got helicopter gun ships and we've got fast attack aircraft and artillery and mortars and stuff so it takes a person who's been a sniper for a while and has an advanced level of experience to realize this is a high value target and this shot is at the limit of my effective range or the high value target didn't show up where we thought he would and i don't have a firing solution for over here i've got one for out there and he's only there for a few minutes i don't have a lot of time maybe instead of shooting i need to call for fire or call for helicopters or whatever assets i have available on this particular mission you won't have artillery all the time on call there's a lot to it that you don't get taught in school and this is why you know you can't count on a ten week or an eight week or a five week or whatever week school to produce a capable sniper it'll produce a guy who's qualified to go out and carry the rifle and do the job but then it takes years for that guy to develop the kind of experience where he can be in an ambiguous situation and then get it right the most common misperception of the marine sniper is is that we don't just pull triggers we go out there and we collect and report we can relay communications we can call for fire we can you know control aircraft we can you know interdict targets of opportunity we're a force multiplier once the bad guys know that you know i may be an insurgent i'm dedicated to my cause but i'm not stupid nobody you know i may wear a dress and rubber flip-flops it doesn't mean i want to get shot so when the time comes to sneak out to this road intersection and arm this ied well the last eight guys that tried it got smoked by somebody out there we don't know who it is where he's firing from but the last eight guys got shot how excited am i going to be about sneaking out that road intersection probably not much and that's the effect we have and sometimes it works well enough that we can deny the enemy complete areas of terrain because they have a certain knowledge that if they operate in that terrain they're going to be killed for the sniper once the high value target has been killed he needs to return to the base safely the need to move after you shoot is absolutely critical because the first shot is going to typically get their attention and if you're fortunate you're going to take out your target if required a second shot can be done but at that point typically the receiver whether it be a single individual or a unit will be able to detect where that sound came from and at that point your position is compromised and anything from return fire to automatic weapons or even mortars can come in on that position so you want to get out of there as quickly as possible the sniper has evolved from the lone rifleman to the two-man team the sniper and his spotter but in today's modern warfare even that has changed these men are highly trained they're highly skilled they're very disciplined they're dedicated not just to the marine corps but they're dedicated to their brothers that are within that platoon that they operate in uh due the fact that you're operating in such a small team a small element uh you know the days of operating in the two-man team are almost gone uh you know we're operating in much larger numbers now as a unit of snipers so with that being said you have to be able to rely on on that guy to your right and your left um and that that brings out the heart in in that individual brings out that emotional bond you know that piece of trust uh you know that some places you won't find that kind of thing for every sniper that time will come the time when he will find himself faced with pulling the trigger pulling the trigger with a human being centered in the crosshairs of his scope when we get a mission and travel with the infantry typically the infantry will drop us off and from that point on it's our responsibility to find a good hide position from which we can observe the battlefield or where targets of opportunity would present itself typically a day could go by two days go by without any activity at all boredom would set in only followed by the observation of multiple targets at one point and you pick up the sniper rifle begin your assessment of the situation for which you've already done your homework in terms of writing known distances to certain terrain features road intersections buildings so you you have a pre-knowledge of how far certain distances are when the enemy comes into view and you're ready to engage them you confer with your spotter as to the distance the wind and the trajectory in terms of its elevation are you higher than the target you're going to engage which typically you are because you're on the high ground and that has to be calculated in at which point your heart goes from a very sedentary board position to a very high intense heart rate because you know you're about ready to pull a trigger on another human being and with that comes the mental discipline to be able to control that beat of the heart because the pulsation coming out of your carotid artery is transmitted through the rifle and of course there's a scope bouncing up and down and you want to time it in between the bounces to get the target so there's a tremendous amount of mental discipline required before you even pull electric so in afghanistan one night we were up on this plateau we crossed a river and we were doing a mounted presence patrol in an area where we had a lot of contact so we cross the river we get up on this flat and we decide to do what we call a seals halt stop lookless and smell so we get out of the humvees and we just turn them off we wait and see what happens up ahead of us about five or six hundred meters is a restricted narrow kind of a pass and that's where they like to hit you and we know that the enemy operates in small teams that way if they ever get torn up they don't get torn up too badly they only lose a few people and they'll run around out there at night with two three-man teams and they'll gather up hit you and then take off so we can see some lights they signal occasionally with flashlights and we can see them out there so everybody's got a pbs 14 which is a night vision monocular but it only works out to a few hundred meters i had the pvs-10 night sight i was good out to 800 meters so i got my rifle out and i turned it on i started looking around and i see three guys and they're about 700 meters away roughly maybe a little farther and two of them have aks and one has an rpg and they're moving toward us in like a little ranger file one behind the other and so we know right away that the enemy is moving toward us they're closing with us at least one team so how many other teams are out here don't know till the fight starts they're either going to hit us here if we stay here long enough or they're going to move to that pass and hit us up there if we go through there they also have the opportunity to hit us at the river crossing we just did if we decide to go back that way so knowing that i could see farther than the other guys because of their limited night vision i had an m14 rifle on that mission with the site mounted and i had a magazine of just tracers so i called the patrol leader and i said hey here's what we've got [Music] my plan is if we get all the gunners oriented i'm going to shoot the one guy in the back by the time the round gets there and hits him all the gunners will be able to shoot at my tracer impact because they can't see the guy but they'll see that tracer hit and then they can shoot at that location with everything they've got before the other guys have a chance to really get away at 700 plus meters the round's gonna hit before the sound gets there hence the old saying you never hear the one that gets you that's why if you heard it it's already gone by so if i hit the guy in the back the other two hopefully will go what happened to ahmed and that gives us just enough time to put some machine guns on so that's what we did i shot the guy in the back uh in the back of the little file he fell sure enough for just about a second they turned to look and then realized what was going on well by that time there was a whole lot of ordinance in here because the round i fired passed through the last guy's abdomen we call it a screamer shot and sparked up in the air off a rock well that was easy to pinpoint so a couple 240 machine guns a couple 50 cal machine guns and a mark 19 grenade launcher a few seconds later that was over they were over with and then so you know your battle damage assessment i could see right through the scope what happened to all three of them so that was easy that was three kills they were done nobody else in the area but that's that's a an example of how you actually shoot movers after all the training after mastering all the sniper gear after becoming one of the best shots on the planet after becoming one of the fittest young men in the world after all that the sniper is still going to be tested in combat tested when he must make his first kill it's a very personal strange kind of job because you're looking the guy right in the eyes when you're killing at some point in time the situation may turn to the point where you have to put your crosshairs on that individual and look them in the eye and shoot and kill them and it's not something that everybody in the world has the emotional makeup to be able to do so that's one of the things that sets snipers apart from everybody else can you willfully and intentionally shoot and kill another human being and then live with the consequences afterwards knowing that you didn't do it out of anger or malice but you did it because it was your job and because the circumstances forced you to that situation where you had to do it that's what the sniper has been trained to do and one of the key factors in sniper selection in the marine corps sniper selection is the sniper is a very stable human being if if you've got a guy running around with a born to kill t-shirt on swinging through the trees they don't want him you know he's a loose cannon he's potential trouble you want a guy who's not bragging about himself who's very happy with himself who has no doubts who is at ease with the world we want a guy who highly values life you don't want a killer you want somebody who regards human life sacred so when he does pull the trigger it's an important reason to pull it that way you maintain discipline there's nobody out there looking for revenge revenge corrupts your mind you have to be focused on executing the mission it's about the mission it's another day at the office and these bad guys the impact they have if we don't kill them they kill a lot of people who are innocent they kill my brothers and sisters and so i'm actually saving lives some people maybe have a misconception that you know the killing is what is what attracts the people you know that those that are that are snipers or seek to be snipers are wanting to be snipers just in order to kill [Music] now that's not entirely out of the realm of you know a fact uh but it's more of a it's the challenge it's it's like a it's sort of sort of like a hunting trip it's it's you know it's the adventure and the challenge but um i know myself and and most anybody that i've had any contact with during those times or since [Music] we really felt like and feel like we were doing more of a service in terms of saving marines let's face it i mean the nva and what uh what little vc activity there was left at that time they were out to kill marines and i never did anything to anybody that wouldn't have done the same thing to me first if we'd had the chance and uh nor to another he also would have done the same thing to another marine if he'd had a chance so now that we're older and maybe mellowed a little bit [Music] i will say that i don't harbor any uh i my conscience is either either clear or i don't have a conscience i mean but but i don't uh you know i don't look back and fret and regret as far as the training we were always taught that you're protecting your fellow marines so it was never in the context of killing another individual it was from my perspective it was i'm taking care of my fellow marines and that's what made it easier for me to deal with having made peace with what you were going to do [Music] having understood the higher purpose for your act having completed your training that moment when you take your first human life is unlike anything else when a scout sniper is trained he's anticipating the fact that he knows that he's going to go out and begin engaging the enemy and taking lives and i'll give you a personal example my very first kill bothered me and i went back and i had a tough time dealing with the fact that i just killed another human being coldly without him even knowing i was there unlike the infantry that moves through the brush and sprays and prays as they call it with bullets that have to whom it may concern our sniper bullet has somebody's name on it who that somebody is is the son father brother of a family that you have to deal with and that's something that you try to separate that emotion i have never heard of a sniper having fired once and then quit the profession one of the things i can talk about a little bit is is the first kill that seems to be a topic and you know through the the training in the marine corps there's a lot of mental conditioning brain washing going on whatever you want to call it and even in the snipers the the mental conditioning is that we actually got to a point where we wanted to get that first kill at least i did and once i had gotten in the sniper two and was around the other snipers on the seventh marine regiment there i wanted to be in that club they would talk about their their kills and what they had done and stuff and it was really something i thought i wanted to do and then the day it actually happened i was out with a i hadn't been in the platoon very long and i was out with sergeant webb and he actually handed me the rifle we saw a column of vc going upside the hill and he said here you take this one and one of them happened to stop in the trail and i shot him and that was the first one i really knew that i had hit and killed there was no doubt about it and it was a head shot and it wasn't what i thought it would be it i i knew i couldn't go back i just killed a man that was standing there and it was different i mean it wasn't what i expected a part of me was was glad i got it and a part of me just knew that that you know i had just broken one of the commandments thou shall not kill and i had and i'd killed a man simply for standing there and you know it left an impact but i got over that the problem was at the time is i had not dehumanized those people and i think to maintain the sanity and as time went on i and watched i watched other marines get wounded get killed i watched friends get killed and i completely learned to dehumanize those people and i went from that affected me to it absolutely having no effect i actually got to the point where i felt if i could just kill all of them we could all go home around 2005 we had an incident in the city that i work in where our patrol officers had responded to a scene where a subject that had been identified in several armed robberies was in a certain apartment they confronted this subject he had made threats to the officers that he was going to shoot him and he basically barricaded himself inside the apartment so again the page went out to the tactical team we arrived on scene surrounded the location again we always try to initially make communication try to you know let them know hey come on out for your safety and our safety you're under arrest just turn yourself in that's always the best option for us doesn't always happen that way but we always initially start with that so the subject didn't want to come out we continued to try to make communication tried to use various tactics and uh you know things to drive him out of the location he wasn't coming out uh eventually he uh this subject had made he was on a third story uh apartment building and and uh he had made his way up into attic spaces so at one point our team had to move up into the attic to try to uh you know take him into custody well he had made his way up through one apartment gone across and dropped down into another apartment we had already evacuated the building so there was nobody inside however the last building that he had got into he had armed himself with a handgun and as the team began to approach that apartment from the ceiling he began shooting at the team that was in the attic uh so at that point uh you know there was a exchange of gunfire between the team in the attic and him and he continued to shoot at him again we had the the location surrounded and at that point you know we're in fear for the safety of our operators in the attic or any citizen that you know a stray bullet could come out of that apartment and hurt so uh the particular i was on the back side of the apartment and uh you know he came to the window that i was basically covering and so i had a shot on him and shot the subject and the tactical team moved in and we take initially take him into custody and bring the medics in as quickly as possible however he was deceased at that time the one thing that you can't prepare a military sniper or police sniper for you can train them all about stalking you can teach them to be magnificent shots and how to fast rope out of helicopters but the one thing you cannot train them for adequately enough is the actualities of pressing a trigger on a live human being and then seeing the results of your work in the scope people react differently to that in my experience it's just my experience the first one is the hardest you know but after that it does get easier i mean there's a lot of sniper legend and lore but that part is correct it does get easier as you go but the first time you know you have some fundamental questions you have to answer and hopefully if you've been prepared properly for this job when that time comes a lot of those questions have already been answered in your heart before you ever arrive at that place where you're pressing a trigger on somebody it is necessary immediately necessary in the police sniper's case or you wouldn't be there sniping today in the american military is clearly a young man's game and at the end of their training the military snipers are ready to deploy to country to engage the enemy on the battlefield the american sniper is the best trained warrior in combat ready to aid his comrades and tackle any [Music] mission you

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Length: 91min 22sec (5482 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 15 2022