|
|
Marksmanship:
The Sniper's job is to till with a single shot. Calmly and deliberately he takes out his target from the rough security of his hiding place, even moving off in persuit when his prey is highly valued. He is a master of fieldcraft and, above all, of the art of marksmanship.
The sniper has to prepare two things before he sets out to do his job: himself and his weapon. His own preparations may have taken years of training: first and foremost is the position he takes up when it comes to firing a round.
The four basic firing positions are: Prone, sitting kneeling and standing. Which one you adopt depends on the individual circumstances, but your aim is to adopt the steadiest firing position in a location which gives you an adequate field of fire and good cover.
There are five elements involved in taking up a good shooting position.
Natural point of aim:
The first point is to ensure that you have a natural point of aim. The secret of
achieving a natural point of aim is to make the rifle an extention of your own body, so
that you point it at the target without thinking, just as you would your finger. You can
test yourself like this: with a rifle to your shoulder, take aim at a target, then close
your eyes and relax. If the rifle is still pointing at the target when you open your eyes
again five or ten seconds later, then you have a natural point of aim.
Bone support:
A steady, reliable shooting position needs support from your bones, not from your
muscles. When lying prone, your left hand is forward, palm up. The wrist is straight and
locked, the rifle lying across the relaxed palm of the hand; the left forearm and elbow is
not directly underneath the barrel, the arm muscles will have to work to hold the rifle
and it will not be steady. The rifle butt is held firmly into the shoulder, the right arm
and elbow out at an angle to help from the "shoulder pocket" and to give
balanced support.
Right-hand grip:
Your right hand must hold the stock firmly, thumb over the top, and forming a
"spot-weld" against your cheek. The trigger finger should just touch the
trigger, so that it can come straight back without itself touching the stock and perhaps
spoiling the aim. Don't slacken your hold on the trigger. A loose grip may make you jerk
the trigger at the last moment. The point of contact between the thumb and the cheekbone
is called the spot weld. Keep the cheek pressed firmly against the thumb so that head,
arm, hand and weapon all act as a single ynit, keeping the eye still in relation to the
sight both before and after firing.
Breathing:
If you breath normally while you're aiming, the rise and fall of your chest will
spoil the shot. Instead breathe in as usual, release part of it and hold the rest while
you aim and fire. Don't try and hold the breath for too long - more than 10 seconds, and
you'll produce muscular tension and involuntary movement.
Squeezing the trigger:
How you control the trigger is probably the single most important aspect of
marksmanship. It is the key to firing off the round without disturbing the way the weapon
is lined up with the target. Your finger should touch the trigger somewhere between the
tip and the second joint - the exact position is up to you; it depends on the size of your
hand, the size of the rifle's stock and the way you hold your hand. It's very difficult to
hold a rifle perfectly still and, instead of trying, the sniper concentrates on getting
perfect hand/eye co-ordination. Unless the round is fired at the precise moment that the
cross-hairs are over the target, it will probably miss. That may sound obvious, but is
actually all there is to say about marksmanship. The best shots are generally quick ones,
where everything comes together straight away, and there's no time to drift off. But even
so, it's most important not to snatch at the trigger. A good exercise is to balance a
small coin on the mussle and see how still it stays when you squeeze off a dry shot.
Wind and weather:
The wind and other weather conditions can make a very great difference to where
the bullet strikes the target, and also has an effect on the sniper unless he's lying in
the prone position. The wind direction is refered to by the clock system.
Light conditions:
The light effects how you see the target. In general it seems that people shoot
low on bright, clear days and high when it's gloomy and overcast. But this may not apply
to you! The answer is to keep a logbook that details the weather conditions on each day of
shooting as well as recording your performance.
Humidity and temperature:
Damp, humid air is thicker than dry air, so will resist the passage of the bullet
mose when it's on its way to the target. This slowing down will cause it to drop faster
than normal, so your shot will strike low. High temperature has the reverse effect. Hot
air is thinner than cold air, so offers less resistance to the bullet, sending it high.
You should also make sure that your rifle doesn't stand in the sun. One side getting
hotter than the other will cause it to warp - not much, but enough to throw your aim off
by a long way at three or four hundred meters. Keep your weapon and ammunition dry. Wet
ammo is colder than dry. Warmer ammunition works more efficiently than cold, making the
round go high. If some is dry and some wet, you'll get different results from different
rounds, so if you can't keep your ammo dry you are better off making sure it is all
thoproughly wet and reduce elevation when shooting.
Using the starlight scope:
The AN/PVS-2 Starlight Scope allows you to shoot accurately even in the dark. It is battery powered and uses whatever natural light is avaliable (moonlight or the light of the stars) and amplifies it, allowing you to see targets which would be invisible otherwise. Unlike Infra-red sights, the Starlight Scope cannot be detected by the enemy unless you are careless and fail to keep your eye pressed firmly against the rubber eyepiece. If you do leave a gap, some of the light emitted by the eyepiece will shine out around the eyeshield and onto your face.
The Starlight Scope increases the weight of the rifle by 2.7 kg, so it is very important to have a good firing position and a steady hold technique. If at all possible, adopt a supported firing position such as from the lip of a foxhole or the prone position. If the sky is overcast and there is little moonlight or starlight available, then the scope will not give you such a good view, but its capabilities are much increased if it is possible to illuminate the target area with flares or starshell.
Under artificial illumination the starlight scope is far superior to the naked eye and gives you exellent depht and clarity of vision. Fog, sleet or snow all reduce the usefullness of the scope, and so does dense vegetation, but the view in lightly wooded country on a moonlit night is very good.
Looking across a body of water such as a stream or lake increases the capabilities of the scope, too. The starlight scope is a valuable item of equipment and must not be allowed to fall into enemy hands. If it seems likely that the sight could be captured, it must be evacuated or, failing that, derstoyed. If it is necessary to destroy the scope twqo methods are possible:
Prone shooting position:
Offering the lowest silhouette, this position is well adapted both for cover and for a stable firing posture. To assume the correct firing position, stand facing the target with the left hand well forward and the right hand grasping the stock at the heel of the butt. Spread your feet comfortably apart and drop to your knees, grounding the toe of the rifle butt well forward on a line between the right knee and the target.
Roll down on your left side, placing the left elbow well forward on the same line. Use your right hand to force the butt of the rifle into your right shoulder, grip the small of the stock with the right hand, and lower your right elbow to the ground so your shoulder are now level.
Secure a spot weld and use your left elbow as a pivot when adjusting your position to find a natural aiming position. You have a well balanced position if the crosshairs of the target move between 6 o'clock and 12 o'clock as you breathe.
Shadow effects:
If you are not looking directly through the telescope you will see shadows in the field of vision. If crescent-shaped shadows like these appear in the sight, the bullet will strike to the side away from them.
Check list:
Breathing effects:
Take in breath, the crosshairs move straight down through the centre of the target between
12 o'clock and 6 o'clock.
If the crosshairs move down at an angle, your elbow is not properly supporting the barrel.
To achieve the correct position, move your body to the right by pivoting around your left
elbow.
Canting:
Tipping the rifle from side to side, so that the muzzle is no longer directly vertical
with the sights, is known as canting. All the calculations involved in setting up the
rifle's geometry are useless if you don't maintain this vertical alignment, as you can see
from the illustration. Gravity causes the round to fall vertically in the course of its
flight - it won't compensate for you canting the rifle!
Zeroing and trajectory:
Zeroing a rifle means setting up its sights so that a round fired in perfect conditions will go through the centre of the target. Bullets do not travel in straight lines between muzzle and target. In the vertical plane they travel in an arc called the trajectory. The further a bullet has to travel on its way to the target, the higher trajectory it must make. That's why sights have to be re-set to take range into account. The line from your eye to the target is a straight line, and it intersects the trajectory of the bullet at just two places: somewhere close to the end of the muzzle, and at the target.
Boresighting:
One way to zero the rifle is to boresight it. Remove the bolt, and support the rifle on a bed of sandbags. Look through the breech and down the barrel, adjusting the rifle's position until you can see the centre of the target through the centre of the bore.
Without moving the rifle, look through the telescopic sight and see where the cross-hairs fall, adjusting windage and elevation until they coincide with the view down the rifle's barrel. Now all that remains to be done is to adjust the elevation by the standard amount for the range you're covering - three and a half minutes for two hundred meters, and so on.
You can zero your weapon by firing it on the range under test conditions, too. Fire a three round group, and observe where it falls. Make corections to the sights and try again, repeating the procedure until the three rounds are falling on target.
