IRAQ: The Mystery Sniper of Najaf

StrategyPage.com ^ | April 28, 2004

[Alberta's Child]

I remember reading an article back in the 1990s about a lethal Croatian sniper who wreaked havoc on the Serb army in the 1993 war between those two former Yugoslav republics. The sniper was nicknamed "the Archer," and he could not be identified publicly because he was actually a Croatian who had emigrated to Chicago some years ago but went back to fight for his home country.

[ApesForEvolution]

Thanks! We all know that some of our allies in Iraq are not highly publicized regarding their 'contributions'.

This would be a great reason WHY...

[No Blue States]

He would also sling one side of his poncho over his shoulder before shooting him.

;0

3 weeks now they have been trapped as Truth Table mentioned. No ammo or weapons can make it in, or other supplies. Meanwhile 1200 of them have been killed(from another article).

I think this is a good strategy. Although wanting to level the whole town is a constant temptation for me, most of the soldiers letters I read suggest they want to kill only the bad guys and help the common people. I want whatever they want.

When ,not if Najaf or Fallujah falls, it will also be disheartening to other dead enders in other Iraqi cities. And the whole "insurgency" could collapse like a row of dominoes.

[SquirrelKing]

Just give me one of them thar rifle-guns...

[taxcontrol]

Take one good man, add lots of training on how to hide in an urban environment, plus some training on how to shoot (extreme precision is NOT required in most cities - 300 yards or less), mix in a good (does not need to be great) rifle, add a silencer and some time.

What you get is one terrifying weapon.

God bless the rough men who serve in far away places so that we can sleep safe.

[SquirrelKing]

The sniper is probably special forces (seal or delta).

A good read is Bowden's Killing Pablo. He describes the taking down of drug lord Pablo Escobar by Bogota policemen. The shot was in the rain, running across a sloping rooftop - right between the eyes. Officially US involvement was only in surveillance & support but supposedly Delta operators were noted later as wryly saying things like "pretty good shot, huh?".

[freedomlover]

[Publius6961]

BUMP!

[Blessed]

>There are any number of Kurds who would gladly shoot every last Iraqi in Najaf.<

I was thinking same thing or maybe a Mosad agent.They have "passed' in Arab countries for years.

[vanmorrison]

In "Citizen Soldiers", Stephen Ambrose' book about the events shortly after D-Day, he describes how the US Army got lucky when an ordinary soldier from Georgia, carrying an M1 rifle, happened to stumble on a large group of German officers behind the lines who were directing a counter-attack from a motor pool. The soldier, a crack shot like Sgt. York, was able to shoot every officer in a matter of minutes, thus decapitating the German Army in the field, critically denying them the ability to respond to the push from the beaches.

He was making the point that the soldier had learned to handle a rifle when bird and deer hunting as a kid, not as a result of Army training. The US Army had a lot of soldiers like this guy in uniform then who could perform these kinds of feats on the spot as a matter of course. Yamamoto once said that invading America would be impossible because the Japanese Army would be facing a rifleman "behind every blade of grass".

How truly different we are today!

[tkathy]

If our troops have the city surrounded, how can a sniper get in and out??? Something fishy here.

[John H K]

I suspect a Hispanic Delta guy in civilian Arab clothing, given intensive Arabic language and culture training, and a small folding sniper rifle that's concealable, just setting up, taking a shot, and then just walking out of where he was and going somewhere else and taking another shot.

I dimly remember some article a couple years ago about various SF guys, mostly Hispanic who can visually pass for Arab easily, getting language training and whatnot for intel activities....

[DuncanWaring]

Ping.

[ErnBatavia]

Maybe's he's American. Or French

I think we can safely rule out the latter...

[Only1choice____Freedom]

Splinter Cell

X-Box fans are everywhere. Even in Najaf.

[michigander]

There's a story going around 'bout how some 20 Redcoats got killed by a ghost
or some damn thing, carried a Cherokee tomahawk.

[Truth Table]

###A good read is Bowden's Killing Pablo.###


Will Check it out.

[Rebelbase]

"One thing that really saddens me about the majority of the Iraqis over there is that they seem to be really apathetic about their "Freedom"

I fear that apathy in the long run for Iraq. The concepts of Liberty and Freedom have no historical significance for these people.

Domination by a dictator or tribal ruler is all they have known for generations. Its hard to imagine that someone would prefer an iron hand to chosing your own destiny, but then I've never know anything but Freedom.

[John Jorsett]

Imagine how a $200/head bounty paid for each al Sadr gunman taken down would enhance recruitment...

I'm not sure that I'd want to provide this sort of incentive. Some of the interested parties might not be too choosy about who they consider a "gunman."

[TheDon]

"I could understand some fears while Saddamned was around, but he is out of the picture now."

Actually, Saddam is still breathing. Until that is corrected, his former subjects will continue to fear him and his loyalists. That is why Saddam must be executed ASAP.

A great many people who are brave enough to stand up for Iraqi freedom, are lying in Saddam's mass graves. It will take time for the Iraqis to be convinced they are in control of their own destiny. We must be patient for that to happen.

Now if we can just get the Demorats to stop scaring the Iraqi people with their cut and run propaganda...