John—the teacher—said simply, indicating John—the student—“This is the sniper. We’ll go out on the range now.”
The sniper nodded a greeting. The two Johns nodded back, and the three men hiked up a low hill behind the house. On the top, Hunter viewed a full rifle range and a government-issue grey building on the east that he presumed to be the pistol range. John Smith I handed Hunter—John Smith II—a pair of binoculars and pointed at a target 800 meters in the distance. It was shiny brass an—despite the distance—it was readily visible through the binoculars. Hunter took note of the paper cutout of a man who was pointing a rifle at them. Hunter nodded his understanding. Then John Smith I pointed further up the far hill above the 800 meter mark at a second target which was painted a brilliant blaze orange. Similarly that target had a paper cutout of a menacing character.
The sniper spoke next, “There are two targets—one at 800 meters and the second at 1600 meters. We will work on the closer target first. When you can put five shots consistently in the heart at .5 MOV, we will turn our concentration to the further target and repeat the exercise. Next, we’ll practice, practice, practice on hitting the sniper’s T Kill Zone; that’s the imaginary T formed by a horizontal line half way across the eye brows on each side and vertical line straight down the nose from the horizontal to the chin.”
He opened the gun case and took out what appeared to be a pile of leaves and branches and handed it to Hunter.
“This is your ghillie suit poncho. I have a second one for you in a desert pattern. For the work I understand you need to do, this offers the best chance to move quickly and to avoid being seen in the camo. Please put it over you and assume the prone position.”
Hunter was familiar with the ghillie suit—a type of camouflage clothing that is designed to break up the human outline and help the wearer blend into nature—but had not seen the poncho style. He remembered that the jump suit and the two piece style he had used in Viet Nam were somewhat cumbersome to put on and take off and were a real impediment to running. He could stow the poncho quickly or ditch it at a moment’s need and could see the reasoning in the trade-off with the poncho allowing more mobility and the other styles’ somewhat more effective camouflage. The poncho, made of military grade synthetic thread, looked remarkably like heavy foliage. It consisted of an inner shell of sound-insulated, soft, nonitchy cloth covered with netting and the synthetic string in a piled leaves woodland pattern.
Hunter took the poncho, lay down prone, and pulled the camouflage gear over his body with his head in the fitted pouch at one end. The sniper lifted an immaculately clean and recently oiled Steyr-Mannlicher SSG-69 PII sniper rifle and placed it carefully in Hunter’s hands. The SSG-69 is the Austrian Army’s standard issue sniper rifle, the PII is the police modified civilian version of the same weapon. The SSG is extremely accurate and several international competitions have been won with it.
The sniper said, “This is the best sniper rifle money can buy which is not made in the United States. I personally tested and set the sights.”
He affectionately patted the ZF69 scope.
“I guarantee that the weapon can shoot with an accuracy of sub .5 MOA; and in the last three days, I’ve personally fired five round sets which were consistently sub .25 MOA. The ZF69 scope is graduated for firing out to 800 meters; but of course, you can still hit a target at 1600, although your spread will increase; and you will have to be content with a chest shot. I like the PII because of its heavier contour barrel with no iron sites, and it has an enlarged bolt handle.”
Hunter remembered the definition of MOA—a minute of arc or arcminute is a unit of angular measurement, approximately one inch at 100 yards, a traditional distance on target ranges. The usual use of the term refers to shooting an average of 1-inch groups at 100 yards with greater accuracy being expressed in fractions of the standard inch groupings. He was aware that the groupings would spread the greater the distance of the target from the point of firing and that adjustments of the scope would be required to compensate for the distance factor, but he could not remember the formula for compensation for distance and/or windage. He was pretty sure that the sniper would refresh his memory; so, he did not advertise his inadequate knowledge and memory.
The sniper opened his brief case and took out three Boze over-the-ear sound suppressors, and each man put one on. He mimed to Hunter about loading the sniper rifle’s magazine, and Hunter took the proffered 10 round box magazine of 7.62 X .51 NATO ammunition and snapped it into place. Hunter then took a moment to adjust the length of pull from 12¾ inches to 14 inches by adjusting the removable spacers in the butt of the ABS Cycolac synthetic half stock. This helped him to compensate for the moderate weight—4.6 kg—of the weapon with its long 25.6 inch barrel. He gently fingered the triggers, double set for extra control and accuracy, and waited for the command to fire, trying not to hold his breath.
“Caution on the range,” the sniper ordered although none of them could hear his voice.
“Fire five rounds at will,” he said and gestured to Hunter with five upraised fingers.
Hunter took a breath, let it out slowly and fired the first round.
The sniper shook his head as he watched through field binoculars as the first round connected two inches to the side of the paper target cut-out’s head. Hunter looked up at the sniper who held up two fingers and shook his head. Hunter fired the second round and looked up again to see two fingers. He was flinching. He took care to squeeze the triggers for the third shot rather than to pull on them as he had been doing which obviously was creating a jerking as he fired and was unacceptable.
The third round gained a gesture from the sniper of an O formed by his thumb and index finger of his right hand and a finger passing through the O. Bulls eye. Hunter set his teeth in determination and fired the next two rounds in quick succession. The sniper handed him the binoculars. Hunter found the holes in the target for all five rounds. There were the two holes to the left of the target’s head and three in the head with a spread of about two inches between each of the three. He knew they would have been kill shots, but he was also quite sure that the sniper would scoff at his limited accuracy.
The sniper and John Smith II removed their sound suppressors and indicated to Hunter to do the same.
“Not bad for a rookie,” the sniper said with a grin.
Hunter shrugged, chagrined.
“Do it again.”
Hunter lay in the uncomfortable prone position firing round after round. As he did, he was annoyed by the relative effort required for cycling the bolt action, but realized that his accuracy was not impaired so long as he concentrated. After each five rounds, a new paper man automatically snapped into position on the metal target. After two hours of firing, Hunter’s last five sets were grouped in .50 to .25 MOA distances apart, and the sniper nodded his grudging approval.
It was now 1515 hours, and Hunter’s powers of concentration were wearing thin. The sniper recognized his pupil’s problem and called for a rest. The three men ate candy bars, and Hunter closed his eyes for a power-nap. The sniper and John Smith II nodded their approval of their student’s ability to fall into a brief refreshing sleep, a trait that would likely stand him in good stead during arduous times while he was on mission assignments.
Hunter slept for fifteen minutes, then abruptly awakened and was fully alert.
“Okay, sleeping beauty,” said John Smith II, “let’s get back to work.”
“Sorry, I guess my eyes got tired.”
“No need to apologize, John, you need to be able to rest when you can. Later, we’ll do drills to push you to the point of exhaustion and force you to perform; and that will be a real test of your powers, believe me.”
“Okay, John,” said the sniper, “now let’s go for the 1600 meter target. Same drill. You’ll shoot until you can at least make a good head shot, but preferably, you should be down to .50 MOA, all right?”
“I’m ready.”
The
men replaced their over-the-ears sound suppressors; Hunter cloaked himself in the camouflage poncho, adjusted his telescopic sights as best he could estimate for the distance to account for the expected errors of parallax, and fired off three rounds in rapid succession. None of them hit the head, but all were close and all were grouped to the left of the target’s head. Hunter reworked the adjustments and fired off two more. One was dead on between the target’s eyes, and the second was slightly above and to the left of the first.
“That was pretty good shooting,” he said to himself.
The sniper lifted Hunter’s sound suppressors and said quietly, “Bad job, John. You fired three useless misses, alerted your target; and he wasn’t there for the fourth and fifth. By the end of that series of shots, the enemies had triangulated in on you, fired off a rocket; and you were toast. You and me have to go back to school; so, you can get the adjustment formulas down pat and can make the alterations fast. Otherwise, you are going to be a useless dead sniper. In the real situation you’ll need to make chest shots.”
Hunter’s temper flared, but he held his peace. His rational mind told him loudly that the sniper was altogether correct. There was no room for error in this lethal game. A miss here and there on the range didn’t get you killed; but the real world was most unforgiving; Viet Nam had taught him that, if nothing else. He gritted his teeth, made minor adjustments, and fired the next five rounds. All of them placed in the head, three in the T Kill Zone. He estimated the MOA as less than 2 and maybe as close as 1 for a couple of them. Not perfect, but the target was dead, not him.
The sniper took the rifle, lay beside Hunter, and did a few quick mental calculations, then tweaked the adjustment knobs. He fired sets of two, checked the accuracy with his binoculars, tweaked again after each set, and on the last set put three shots at less than .50 MOA in the T. Then, he handed the rifle back to Hunter.
Hunter was impressed. He had always been a good shot, but never that good. He was determined not to be beaten by the young upstart. He sucked in a big breath, let it out, did it again, and fired off five shots into a fresh target’s head. The grouping was less than two inches top to bottom and three inches side to side and was centered on the middle of the target’s forehead.
The sniper lifted Hunter’s sound suppressors and whispered, “beginner’s luck. But you’ll get the brain stem if you fire a trifle lower.”
Hunter flashed him a good-natured finger, reloaded and re-fired. The sniper finally stopped him after five more near-perfect sets, all near enough to the T to have killed a living target.
“Okay, good job. But you’re lucky there’s no wind. Tomorrow, we are going to have a big wind machine up here, and we’re going to use a sound suppressor for your shots. Both of those factors will add a measurable degree of difficulty; and we will be at it all day, I’ll bet. I’ll also have you concentrate on the chest for a lot of your shooting.”
Hunter remembered that John Smith I had said that he had his marksmanship medal, but that the sniper would teach him how to shoot. That was certainly an accurate prophecy. He was pleased with himself, and was gradually beginning to feel that he was getting back into the groove.
Back at the house, the men showered, made a hearty stew and a salad, and drank diet sodas. After they rested for an hour, the sniper and John Smith II led Hunter into a projection room. There were no comfortable overstuffed chairs there, just regulation metal desks and chairs.
The sniper delivered a lecture on sighting and shooting.
“Here is a book on my lecture; so don’t worry overmuch about taking notes. I’m sorry to say, but to do your work well and safely, you are going to have to know this stuff. I’ll start at the bottom line for simplicity’s sake. Your beautiful rifle has a beautiful, but modified scope. It is a Zeiss 6-24 X 72. The SAM, or Shooter-supporting Attachment Module, which measures and pro-vides aiming and ballistic relevant data and displays this to you in the ocular of the sight it is developed for.”
The instructor detailed the relevant information about the SAM’s has different integrated sensors integrated and how it calculates the actual ballistic compensation.
“It memorizes up to four different ballistics and four different firing tables and displays the info into the ocular. So it is possible to use one SAM with four total different weapons without an additional adjustment. It will do most of your work for you. The scope is mounted on the tough Zeiss ZM/VM mounting rail system in case you bang your weapon around, which you will. The BDC—Bullet Drop Compensation of ballistic elevation feature—we have had incorporated assists you in compensating for wind drift, air density, and for different cartridges.”
He smiled. Hunter shook his head and smiled back.
“Go ahead and gloat, sonny, your day will come,” he muttered inwardly.
“Of course, you have a mil dot reticle for stadiametric rangefinding; so, you have a personal visual means of estimating ranges in addition to the fancy automatic stuff. You will be a trained user, and trained users can relate accurately the range to objects of known size, the size of objects at known distances, and can compensate for BDC and for wind drift at known ranges which allows you to make a mental note about the accuracy of what the gad-getry is telling you.”
The sniper and John Smith I alternated during a three-hour lecture on reticles, parallax compensation, bullet drop compensation formulae, integrated laser range finders, preferences for scope bases, rings, mounting rails, and rail interface systems, optical parameters including magnification and objective lens diameters, the value and problems of variable lens, field of view, and exit pupil size.
Hunter looked quizzically at John when he said ‘exit pupil size’ because he had never heard the term.
John said, “That’s defined as the objective lens diameter divided by the magnifying power. All you need to know is that ordinarily, that number should equal the diameter of the dilated iris of the human eye, about 7 mm. That is usually reduced by factoring the age of the shooter, and yours would be closer to 6 mm. However, a larger exit pupil size makes it easier for the shooter’s eye to find the light source and to fix on the target more quickly, especially if the target is moving. Yours has been set to 9 mm for that reason, and the diminution of focus is compensated for, we think, by all of the other features of the telescope, especially the best lenses in the world, in our opinion.”
Hunter was astounded at the specificity that had gone into customizing his sniper rifle. He knew that it had to have cost the government a mint to produce such a one-of-a-kind rifle and sighting system.
John went on to tell Hunter that the government had also provided three other rifles and that all of them were manufactured outside the United States for plausible deniability. The other rifles were of more common occurrence and even less suggestive of the U.S. origin than his highly customized gun.
“Tomorrow and the next day we’ll fire your standard issue 1891/30 rifle from the former USSR, and the Beretta M501 from Italy. We have some silencers for you to get used to. They are much improved from the Viet Nam era. In particular, the new ones allow a much more effective range. You look beat. Grab whatever you want to eat. At the crack of dawn tomorrow we’ll go on our little constitutional run with a few twists, then the three of us will indulge in a little boyish fighting to warm up for the day’s shooting.”
“Sounds great to me,” Hunter said.
It was getting late. He had never been a late-nighter, and this night he was so worn out that his speech was slowing and in half an hour would be slurred. He forgot to brush his teeth or to take off his clothes and fell asleep lying prone cross-wise on his bed.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Hunter awakened before the 0630 witching hour and was proud of himself for being out of bed when John Smith knocked softly on his door.
“Nice day for a run,” John said.
“I’m ready,” Hunter said and quietly cursed the shoelaces on his running shoes for getting knotted.
He was fully alert
and out of his room in half a minute with his shoes tied with an extra knot. The two men set a hard pace as soon as they left the house. The dogs snarled and barked, and their K-9 keepers snarled orders to be quiet which the dogs obeyed instantly. John led the way along a twisting path through the adjacent elm tree woods which required them to concentrate to avoid running into trees or branches. John abruptly turned and headed straight up a fifty yard incline and waited for Hunter on the ridge top. Hunter hated to admit it, but he knew when he was beaten.
“So, I have more work to do,” he said, mildly chagrined by his deep inspirations.
He fought the urge to put his hands on his knees to help him to catch his breath and to prevent syncope. That would be the ultimate humiliation.
“Any idea why we just took that path?”
“Sure I do. I have to be in better shape in the case where I have to run away to avoid capture or being shot in the back.”
“Bright fella.”
John smiled, and Hunter laughed.
“We’ll see,” Hunter said. “this isn’t over. We’ll have this conversation again at the end of the three months.”
It was John’s turn to laugh.
“Ready for more lessons?”
“Show-off.”
He knew that he had just been subjected to his first object lesson of the day.
John set off again. This time he sprinted from one large tree or rock to another, stepped out of sight, then burst out again. Hunter took the hint and copied him. After half an hour, he was sweating profusely, but found himself becoming more able to capitalize on the brief periods of rest afforded by the momentary hiding efforts. That was a lesson—number two.
John led Hunter back to the cottage’s lawn at a sprint, then stopped abruptly, and stood waiting for Hunter to catch up. Hunter was puffing and nearly out of breath. John suddenly whirled around and performed a deft hip throw—Osae- Komi-Uki-Goshi—putting Hunter cleanly on the ground and straddled the still very much out of breath Hunter in the Jiu Jitsu mount position.
Sheep Dog and the Wolf Page 10