'White Feather' The Marine Sniper Who Shot through an Enemy’s own Rifle Scope

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comment about your experience because the filmora team will be giving away a free one-year license to a lucky viewer download filmora 10 in the link in the description below today and give it a try white feather the u.s marine sniper who shot through an enemy's own rifle scope in military shooting circles american carlos norman hathcock ii is a true legend for he was a u.s marine sniper who's credited with killing at least 93 enemy soldiers in the vietnam war from incredible distances with pinpoint accuracy though ruthless and calculating when hunting down his prey behind his professional persona was a caring family man who saw killing as an end to a means as he felt it for every one of the enemy that he killed he would be potentially saving the life of some young american soldier carlos came from humble beginnings being born in 1942 at little rock in arkansas and was raised by his grandparents after his parents separated when he was very young from an early age he would go hunting in the woods with his dog using an old one-shot 22-caliber rifle to help put food on the family table throughout his childhood he dreamed of becoming a u.s marine so as soon as he reached 17 years of age he enlisted in the corps his basic training was carried out at camp perry on the shore of lake erie in ohio this turned out to be the perfect place for carlos to further improve and develop his natural talent for shooting as the camp had the second largest outdoor rifle range in the world he soon showed himself to be a crack shot who was also naturally meticulous and precise when it came to the battlecraft of marksmanship his talent soon quickly won him many championship shooting matches including the prestigious wimbledon cup for long range shooting in 1965 the competition required the contestants to hit targets with pinpoint accuracy from 1 000 yards away then carlos was deployed to vietnam as a military policeman but this wouldn't last for long as the us marine corps was starting to wake up to the fact that the vietnam war was a very different kind of war soon there was the realization that there was a desperate need for fresh and innovative tactics if the war was to ever be won so one of the new ideas put forward was to dramatically increase the number of snipers they were using and carlos was an obvious candidate after completing a sniper training course in south vietnam his deadly skills were soon put to use for most of his sniping career carlos was happy to use the standard us marine sniper rifle the bolt action winchester model 70 which was in the powerful 30 odd 6 caliber this rifle had a five shot magazine and came with a telescopic sight that magnified the target by up to eight times but on occasion he used a browning 50 caliber heavy machine gun that he had personally modified and added a telescopic sight too this was an extremely heavy and clumsy weapon being over five feet long and when tripod mounted weighed in at just under 130 pounds nevertheless in the right circumstances this weapon with its powerful round could not be matched in terms of both range and lethal effect carlos proved this in 1967 when he used it to set a new world record for the longest-range sniper kill hitting an enemy vietcong gorilla squarely in the chest he was transporting rifles while on a push bike at a range of 2500 yards which is nearly one and a half miles it took the 50 caliber bullet over two and a half seconds to travel that distance to the target to give you some context it would take you 20 minutes at a brisk walk to cover the same distance this record was not beaten until 35 years later in 2002 by a canadian sniper in afghanistan carlos had built up a formidable reputation during his time in vietnam in fact he proved so effective as a sniper that he gained the nickname of white feather after the white feather he always wore on the band of his bush hat carlos was able to get in the bubble a zen-like mold where he was in a state of utter complete absolute concentration where every breeze and leaf meant something he would even be able to go without proper sleep for days as he tracked his target one time he killed the sadistic female vietcong platoon leader called the apache woman she was a vietnamese platoon leader interrogator and sniper with a high number of kills but what she was known most for was her torture methods apache would take great pleasure in torturing captive u.s marines including flaying them alive she would do this with an earshot of the u.s base so they could hear her victims screams carlos hearing this had had enough so he took up the task to eliminate her even if it was an obvious counter counter-sniper trap he noticed her going to the toilet and called an artillery strike on the position killing three of the vietcong snipers as she got up and fled carlos landed a shot and she fell he then made a follow-up shot just in case as white feathers tally started to mount the enemy began to fear him so much that they put a thirty thousand dollar bounty on his head which is over a quarter of a million dollars in today's value for anyone that killed him this was by far the highest bounty put on a u.s sniper during the entire conflict so many enemy snipers tried to claim this bounty but all failed miserably most dying in the process as he ruthlessly picked them off one by one on one occasion he was in a sniper duel with an elite enemy sniper code named the cobra while tracking the cobra carlos noticed the sniper's glint from his scope studying the crosshairs from the winchester model 70 onto it he squeezed the trigger the bullet had traveled at a long range through the sniper's own telescopic sight straight into his eye socket killing him instantly carlos realized that to make such an incredible shot that the cobra must have spotted him at the same time he understood that he was just slightly quicker that time and had a great respect for his foes abilities he took the rifle as a souvenir and tagged it although he would never see it again at times carlos had to make difficult decisions one of his shots 1500 yards away from a hilltop was on a 12 year old vietcong gorilla who was transporting weapons and ammunition on a bicycle to an enemy patrol he didn't want to kill men and certainly not children when he realized if action wasn't taken that the guns would be used on his fellow marines he gently pushed his thumbs on the 50 cal's trigger firing a shot at the front wheel of a bicycle sending the boys somersaulting over the handlebars the warning shot didn't make the boy run away as planned when he picked up an ak-47 and began firing at the hill carlos dropped him dead with one well-aimed shot this situation would go on to haunt him forever carlos volunteered for a mission just days before the end of his first deployment this mission was to eliminate a north vietnamese general in his own headquarters deep in the forest he had to do it at a close range of 800 yards or less and he was to do it alone without a spotter this was the mission where he removed his white feather out of his hat carlos put vegetation in his buttonholes and straps and covered his skin and camouflaged paint to match the surroundings as the general emerged from the plantation house and walked towards his car carlos held his breath and squeezed the trigger killing the general with a shot to the chest no one had seen the muzzle flash and no patrols came after him carlos would eventually be credited with an official confirmed total of 93 sniper kills but the true total was probably several hundreds more as the system for acknowledging confirmed kills was stringent in the extreme as it required an officer and a spotter to be present when the kill was made in 1969 his frontline combat career came to an abrupt end from the lvt-5 amphibious armored fighting vehicle he was in struck a mine as it traveled on a highway near his marine base the vehicle became engulfed in flames but despite this carlos courageously went about rescuing several fellow marines from the inferno even though there was the danger of the vehicle's ammunition exploding at any moment carlos suffered severe burns to his body as he did so in a critical state he was medevaced by helicopter to a nearby hospital ship and once his condition had stabilized he was sent to a naval hospital in tokyo japan later he was flown back to america for specialist treatment at a burns hospital in san antonio texas he received the purple heart medal for being wounded in action that day but it was not until 30 years later that his bravery was recognized and he was awarded the silver star for his gallantry it took him several months to recover from his burns once he had returned to active service he stayed in the united states spending the next few years helping establish the marine corps sniper school in quantico virginia but by 1975 he was starting to be in poor health as he had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and over the next four years his health declined even more this was to such an extent that in 1979 at the age of just 37 years old and now a gunnery sergeant he was forced to retire just 55 days short of 20 years of service due to medical grounds civilian life was not at first an easy thing for carlos to adapt to he suffered from depression and his marriage nearly failed because of it but eventually he worked his way through it taking up shark fishing which provided him the challenge he needed to keep himself focused he also became an instructor to various police departments and u.s special forces teaching the finer points of sniping to a new generation of sharpshooters sadly the multiple sclerosis would eventually claim his life in 1999. he was just 56 at the time of his death his son would follow in his footsteps by joining the u.s marines carlos had a special high-grade variant of the m21 semi-automatic sniper rifle named after him the manufacturer's springfield armory named it the m25 white feather tactical rifle in his honor carlos's original military military-issued sniper rifle can be seen at the marine corps sniper museum in quantico virginia where it's currently on display you

Channel: Simple History

Views: 1,639,095

Rating: 4.9402051 out of 5

Keywords: simple history, animated history, educational, education, usmc, whitefeather, Carlos Hathcock, American, marines, Vietnam War, US Marine corp, Camp Perry, Winchester Model 70, sniper, sharpshooter, telescopic sight, 50 cal, Vietcong guerrilla, zen like mode, Apache woman, bounty, sniper duel, Cobra, american heroes, men of valor, North Vietnamese, nva, cold war, LVT-5 amphibious, Purple Heart, Silver Star, Marine Corps Sniper School, Quantico, Virginia, M-25 White Feather, Lông Trắng

Id: nHZzfMXz5U8

Length: 12min 10sec (730 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 23 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/phoneboxlamp]

Spoiler alert: simple history is fucking garbage