Modern American Snipers

by Chris Martin

  Held four times a year, each SFARTAETC session mirrors an SFSC class. As Murphy explained, “They’ve been able to combine the final exercise between SFARTAETC and [SFSC]. The assaulters and snipers come together for training operations at the end of the courses, working together the way they would in reality.”

  * * *

  The shift from Special Operations Target Interdiction Course to Special Forces Sniper Course was more than just a name change.

  Following a similar path previously blazed by the overhauled U.S. Navy SEAL Sniper Course, SFSC was modernized and expanded to reflect the post-9/11 realities of sniper employment in combat.

  A glimpse into the effectiveness of the Special Forces Sniper Course was provided by the results of the 2011 International Sniper Competition, which was won by Master Sgt. Kevin Owens and Sgt. 1st Class Terry Gower, snipers from B/2/3—the 3rd Special Forces Group CIF Company.

  The year before that, the title was taken by SFSC instructors Sgt. 1st Class Chance Giannelli and Sgt. 1st Class Edward Homeyer, both of Company D, 2nd Battalion, 1st Special Warfare Training Group.

  Applying the lessons gleaned on the modern battlefield and marrying them with rapidly developing technologies and an enhanced understanding of the hard science of ballistics (the nuances of which are complex enough to push a Cray supercomputer to its breaking point), the updated SEAL and SF courses represent a larger trend in the training of long-distance shooters.

  The U.S. Army Sniper School and even the Marine Scout Sniper Course have been similarly augmented in recent years as well, while a whole host of advanced classes—both inside the military and via third parties—exist to further hone snipers’ abilities.

  Practical and realistic scenarios are emphasized, as is the total comprehension of a multitude of factors that can affect a bullet’s trajectory, from the initial pressure on the trigger to its flight across hundreds, if not thousands, of meters. Today’s snipers are instructed on the use of ballistic computers—which come in a variety of forms, including smartphone apps—to help streamline the process of calculating these complex firing solutions.

  “The days of Kentucky windage and ‘feeling’ are over,” said Todd Hodnett, the president of Accuracy 1st.

  Hodnett is a leading figure in this increasingly rational and digitized sniper age. He also stands as one of the most sought-after instructors among USMC and SOF snipers.

  Perhaps surprisingly, the Texan himself doesn’t have a background as a military sniper. He was a farmer and a rancher who grew up shooting prairie dogs. He gradually found his way into competitive pistol and sniper competitions and garnered enough success—national championship victory–level success—that the military came to him rather than the other way around.

  Hodnett’s ballistic engines have changed the way spec op snipers approach the craft and his reticle designs are already in wide use.

  “We have taken a very math-driven scientific problem and removed the myths from the equation,” he explained. “We did this by making the science work for us. No more shooting every one hundred meters for DOPE—that is laughable nowadays. It’s not opinion; it’s fact. The math is always right. The bullet doesn’t lie and doesn’t get to vote. Everything I teach is based off where the bullet hit, not just a standard generic ballistic chart. We can be so much better than that.”

  And if the results of the 2010 International Sniper Competition served as evidence to the credibility of SFSC, consider that the winning team—SFSC instructors themselves—attributed their victory in large part to receiving instruction from Hodnett prior to the competition.

  In fact, the top three teams in both the Open and Service class all trained under Hodnett.

  After attending a ten-day session with Accuracy 1st, USMC Scout Sniper Cpl. Ryan Lindner said, “Training with Todd Hodnett has taken our capabilities to a level that I didn’t think was possible as a Scout Sniper. Todd has really revolutionary tactics about shooting around, over, and within buildings.”

  In other words, he knows his stuff.

  Hodnett’s methodology is based around streamlining extremely complex ideas into equations that allow shooters to determine solutions and send precise fire downrange in a matter of seconds.

  “When it is boiled down to the basics of ballistics, you have MV [muzzle velocity], BC [ballistic coefficient], and DA [density altitude], which gives you a TOF [time of flight] to the target,” he explained. “Elevation is the easy part; wind is everything—the ability to look at mirage or look at terrain and see the orographic or katabatic effect of winds across terrain. I think that everyone had the same issues with ballistic engines when they started up. Things didn’t work out real well. We didn’t know why but the bullet didn’t always hit where we wanted or thought it should.

  “That’s when I started truing my ballistics. Really, all I did was take the answer the bullet gave me and made the predictive ballistics match the actual flight path. Then I was able to place my methodology into ballistic engines. This started in the supersonic algorithm and then I worked on the subsonic portion of the algorithm. Now truing is common and everyone has adopted it.”

  When Hodnett first came onto the scene to train special operations snipers, the community was still largely set in its ways. However, that has changed in recent years. He explained, “At first, most of the POIs [programs of instruction] that were taught in the school houses had not changed in the past thirty years. And like with everything, some don’t like change because it takes them off their own self-appointed pedestal. Lucky for me, I don’t see much of that now.

  “In the past, each group was different and they had their own way of what they thought was correct. But most groups have changed and are now on the same path. That’s great to see.”

  According to Hodnett, the adoption of modern technology has been a major factor driving the various sniper courses in a similar direction or risking being left hopelessly behind. “When you look at all the equipment the guys use today … I have watched the change form 10x scopes to 20x plus, and the use of ballistic engines which really takes us of out of the ’70s. I have heard snipers tell me they felt cheated by what is being taught at sniper school. The world has changed and most of the military has followed with the new changes.”

  As a result, SOF snipers in general have stepped up their games considerably. He said, “It’s crazy to see how far the skill has progressed in just the last six years. From scopes to ballistic engine usage, lasers, and night vision—the conflicts of the past decade really allowed SOF men to step into the twenty-first century in gear and technology. Second focal to first, reticle changes to maximize speed and accuracy, and so on.

  “What is most exciting is the changes are still coming. We are working on new projects all the time. It’s a great period to be a part of the long-range community. I am always humbled by the class of individuals that I get to work with on a daily event. And I feel very fortunate and blessed to be a part of the change that has affected the sniper community across the board.”

  * * *

  The Iraq War was the definition of a target-rich environment and the special operators were not the only snipers in the thick of it.

  A one-time 3/75 Ranger sniper by the name of Staff Sgt. James Gilliland selected and trained a ten-man sniper section at the 2nd Battalion, 69th Armored Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division dubbed “Shadow.”

  Gilliland’s band of conventional snipers produced results that would have to be deemed special, erasing an estimated two hundred enemy fighters during a single five-month deployment in 2005. Gilliland himself accounted for nearly a third of those, including one from 1,250 meters with an M24—among the longest ever recorded by a 7.62mm rifle.

  That same year, 1st Battalion, 67th Armored Regiment, 4th Infantry Division sniper section leader Timothy Kellner was credited with 139 confirmed kills—and had another hundred or so that were never formally confirmed.

  There was controversy related to the actions of the “Big Army” snipers
as well. Three snipers of the 501st Infantry Regiment’s 1st Battalion sniper section—the “Painted Demons”—were charged with murder while operating in the so-called Triangle of Death region south of Baghdad in 2007.

  They were accused of killing unarmed Iraqi citizens in three separate incidents in cases of either mistaken identity or a compromised hide site, and then planting weapons or bomb-making materials on their victims to make the shootings appear justified.

  Two, Staff Sgt. Michael A. Hensley and Spc. Jorge G. Sandoval Jr., were acquitted of murder but found guilty of lesser charges. The third, Sgt. Evan Vela, was found guilty despite Hensley’s admission that he ordered Vela to take the shot.

  Adding some additional intrigue is their alleged connection to a classified “baiting” program instituted by the Asymmetric Warfare Group—the same unit of which former Delta and Ranger hero Greg Birch served as Command Sergeant Major until retiring in ’07.

  According to the sworn testimony of then-Lt. Matthew Didier, the platoon leader who oversaw the Painted Demons’ sniper operations, AWG provided the unit with items such as fake detonation cords and explosives used to lure potential targets into both the snipers’ sights and their acceptable rules of engagement.

  Didier’s statement claimed, “If someone found the item, picked it up, and attempted to leave with the item, we would engage the individual as I saw this as a sign they would use the item against the U.S. forces.”

  * * *

  The torrid pace of operations in Iraq that pit two ever-shifting networks into direct conflict on a daily basis also resulted in a rapid evolution of tactics as both sides adjusted to account for the other.

  While JSOC SMUs are expected to achieve the desired results across even the most difficult of scenarios, they do not do so without first stacking the deck in their favor.

  Units like Delta Force and DEVGRU are not meant to engage in fair fights.

  As a Unit sniper explained, “The only fair fight is the one you just lost.”

  Delta’s operators are always far more talented, better trained, and better equipped than their adversaries. And if that’s not enough working in their favor, they always strive to seize the initiative with the element of surprise on their side and then strike decisively, through the use of both overwhelming speed and (relative) numbers.

  This philosophy has long been summarized in the Unit’s mantra: “surprise, speed, and violence of action.”

  However, the regularity of the hits of this fashion—as impressive as they may have been with Little Birds dropping in from seemingly nowhere, charging assaulters disembarking and kicking in doors in a fury of concentrated chaos—threatened to make them predictable, and thus vulnerable.

  Insurgents could simply lie in wait—as was the case in the deaths of Horrigan and McNulty—to take advantage of any SOF tactics they may have seen and dissected.

  To stay ahead of the curve, the Tier 1 assault teams adjusted their tactics. Instead of storming in loud and fast, they began to tiptoe their way into compounds, eliminating or capturing HVTs who were lying in bed rather than lying in wait. They utilized suppressed HK MP7s quiet enough not to stir sleepers separated from the attack by just a couple inches of wall.

  The old mantra was supplanted by a new one: “silence, stealth, and decisiveness of action.”

  However, that approach too is susceptible to booby traps and suicide bombs.

  As the war wore on, assault teams became more and more likely to simply stay outside, call the target out, or call in a five-hundred-pound JDAM at the first sign of trouble.

  GM, a former 3rd Battalion Ranger, said, “You know, guys want to clear rooms and all this stuff, and guys still do. But they got away from it because it’s so dangerous with the suicide bombers and stuff. Guys just started doing call-outs. ‘Hey, come out of the house or we blow the house up.’

  “It’s way easier than trying to go through the door. You’re totally in control when you do a call-out.”

  Brian Watts, the former F-16 pilot, added, “The buildings over there … they’d booby-trap everything. If they had any issues and you had somebody on station—whether it was us or an Apache, why send guys in if it’s not a guy you’re trying to take back and interrogate?”

  When JSOC finally cornered Zarqawi in the village of Hibhib in June 2006, the JOC at Balad Air Base instructed an F-16C to put a pair of five-hundred-pound bombs—a laser-guided GBU-12 and a GPS-guided GBU-38—on his roof rather than risk another narrow escape, even with a Delta operator en route via the 160th SOAR express just minutes out.

  B Squadron’s white-hot pursuit of Zarqawi during Operation Arcadia bore fruit. JSOC’s eclectic team of ’gators (interrogators) coaxed critical information from a captured AQI facilitator by playing on his ego. They were tipped on how to decipher the particulars of meets between Sheik Abd Al-Rahman—Zarqawi’s spiritual advisor—and the AQI emir himself. The prisoner also passed along the locations of fifteen or so Zarqawi safe houses in the Baqubah vicinity.

  While the task force dedicated an inordinate number of highly valuable ISR platforms over an inordinate amount of time—especially considering the pace of this supercharged campaign—to track the movements of a man they believed to be Al-Rahman, they lacked incontrovertible evidence that they were actually following the right guy.

  Two recce operators from Delta B Squadron supplied the necessary proof. Yet again, they attempted a perilous clandestine reconnaissance mission through the most unwelcoming parts of Baghdad.

  During one of the most heated periods of the war, when civilians were routinely pulled from vehicles and executed at militia checkpoints, the Delta snipers again draped themselves in local attire and negotiated the dangerous city in an unassuming sedan.

  Playing Al-Rahman’s movements to their advantage perfectly, the vehicles crossed paths in opposite directions and the recce team hit the bullseye with the shot fired from a camera.

  This evidence bought the larger plan of tracking Al-Rahman more time, a decision that proved critical in at last finding and fixing Zarqawi.

  The bombs that finally finished him triggered fourteen additional raids. Two Delta B Squadron troops, an SAS assault team, a pair of 3/75 Ranger platoons, and a SF CIF element divided the objectives (safe houses and moving vehicles) and unleashed a series of simultaneous killing strikes meant to decapitate al-Qaeda in Iraq in the immediate aftermath of their leader’s death.

  Zarqawi somehow survived the initial blasts, only to die minutes later after being retrieved off a stretcher and pulled from an ambulance by the Delta operators who leapt off of MH-6 Little Birds moments earlier.

  JSOC took no time to celebrate despite at last succeeding in what had become a three-year obsession—one that literally fueled a special operations revolution.

  Building upon the first wave of raids that immediately followed the bombing, almost forty more were conducted the following evening. Together, those actions netted twenty-five more captive terrorists and killed another. Those statistics shot up to nearly 150 raids, close to 180 captured, and more than thirty killed in the days that followed.

  * * *

  In the early ’80s, the FBI raised an elite counterterrorist capability of its own—the Hostage Rescue Team. HRT was heavily inspired by, and patterned after, the Army’s Delta Force. To this day, its operators are split up into assault and sniper troops and trained in similar CQB techniques and held to similar standards, albeit with a civilian, law-enforcement bent as stated by its motto: Servare Vitas—“To Save Lives.”

  While Delta Force and SEAL Team Six racked up scores of HVT kills in Iraq and Afghanistan, the FBI HRT has garnered its own fair share of headlines in recent years.

  In February of 2013, the unit successfully breached a bunker and dispatched the kidnapper behind it, downing him with precise fire to rescue a five-year-old hostage in Alabama.

  Months later, HRT was at it again, tracking down a fugitive across miles of mountainous Idaho terrain, freeing yet another ki
dnap victim with the return of accurate and lethal fire.

  In April of 2014, the unit’s assaulters took down a North Carolina apartment complex at midnight to secure a hostage who was about to be dismembered and apprehended his five captors.

  And in July 2014, the HRT saved a South Carolinian, storming a home and apprehending three Mexican drug cartel thugs who had taken him captive.

  Almost since its inception, the HRT has been no stranger to perilous high-stakes missions—and occasionally the controversy that can accompany them. The FBI HRT’s reputation absorbed serious damage after playing critical roles in the fiascos at Ruby Ridge and Waco. And conversely, it was buoyed by the successful captures of a number of the most wanted men in the world over the years, including Beltway snipers John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo in Maryland, pirate leader Mohammad Saaili Shibin in Somalia, and Boston bombing suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev in Massachusetts.

  However, until very recently, one thing the Hostage Rescue Team did not do was rescue hostages.

  That assessment is not exactly fair, nor precisely accurate. In 1991, the Hostage Rescue Team did successfully retake the Talladega Federal Correctional Institution from 121 rebelling Cuban inmates, freeing nine hostages in the process. However, the HRT’s track record of the more traditional sorts of HR missions for which it derives its moniker was rather skimpy, to be generous.

  Its first of that sort didn’t actually come until the unit had been in existence for a full quarter-century—and actually took place in Iraq with a large portion of the credit going to the 75th Ranger Regiment’s 3rd Battalion Sniper Platoon.

  Throughout the Global War on Terror, HRT operators have routinely embedded with JSOC task forces; in addition to their world-class gunfighter talents, they lend expert investigative and SSE (sensitive site exploitation) skills to missions that further enable the rapid seizure and processing of intelligence materials to spur subsequent raids.

  And in this capacity, a 3/75-attached HRT operator stumbled across the mission for which his unit was originally conceived.