{"id":1824,"date":"2008-08-05T18:48:08","date_gmt":"2008-08-05T18:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"0"},"modified":"2008-08-05T18:53:58","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T18:53:58","slug":"syrian_general","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/?p=1824","title":{"rendered":"Syrian General Killed By Maritime Sniper"},"content":{"rendered":"

Over at Abu Muqawama<\/a>, Charlie posts a information bleg from Andy Exum, abu muqawama himself:<\/p>\n

Charlie got this email this morning:<\/p>\n

\nUh, Abu Muqawama wants to send out an RFI to the readership of, uh, AbuMuqawama.<\/b><\/p>\n

Can one of you link to these two stories about this assassinated Syrian general<\/a> — who was allegedly shot from a boat<\/a>, in the sea — and ask the readership whether or not shooting someone with a sniper rifle from a f*cking boat (which is, presumably, rocking and unsteady) is or is not the hardest thing in the world. I mean, how feasible is this? <\/p>\n

\nAM (from Beirut)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Here’s the Washington Post story<\/a>:<\/p>\n

A Syrian general shot to death at a beach resort over the weekend was a top overseer of his country’s weapons shipments to Hezbollah, according to opposition Web sites and Arab and Israeli news media. <\/p>\n

\n…<\/p>\n

\nThe Free Syria<\/a> Web site of Abdul Halim Khaddam, a former Syrian vice president now living in exile, said a sniper on a yacht shot Suleiman. The Saudi-owned Asharq al-Awsat newspaper said he was struck by four bullets fired from the direction of the sea.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So I turned to my handy panel of experts – members of a private listserv on shooting that I belong to. The members are often military or police, and are far more knowledgeable about shooting and shooting history than I am or than the average mall ninja<\/a> you’d meet in a gun store or online.<\/p>\n

Here’s a spectrum of the replies:<\/p>\n

It’s certainly possible – perhaps even easy. Don’t forget that shooting from a small craft is only a problem in an unsteady sea. Anchored off the coast (probably no more than 50-100 yards from the beach or harbor), in a yacht (rather larger than a dinghy or rowing-boat, with a keel, which helps stability), and in a calm sea (and the Mediterranean can be a millpond at times, particularly in the early morning), such a shot would be no problem at all for a competent marksman – and Mossad probably has some of the most “competent marksmen” in the world!<\/p>\n

There are also stabilized weapon mounts available for use from small craft. I know Israel has them on larger weapons on its patrol craft, and it wouldn’t take a genius to miniaturize such a mount for use with a sniper rifle. Israel produces some of the world’s best equipment in this line, after all. However, I don’t think such a mount would have been necessary in a calm sea.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

and<\/p>\n

If you look up what little information is available on army sniper Adelbert “Bert” Waldron, you’ll find a passage in Gen. Julian Ewell’s on-line book claiming that, with a single shot, Waldron shot a VC sniper out of a tree at 900 meters from a Riverine boat. I remain dubious, but I suppose all kinds of things happen in this crazy world.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

and<\/p>\n

Simple, you shoot on the up-roll. \ud83d\ude09 <\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

and<\/p>\n

I did a lot of patrols on rivers in RVN, and they are usually flat calm. I
\ncan see enough stability to make a precision shot. I would need more details
\nto pontificate further…<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

and then the skeptics<\/p>\n

Hey, they did it in Shooter and Spartan. So it must be possible, right? <\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

and<\/p>\n

I say no, and I saw Spartan as well.<\/p>\n

\nYou can do lot’s of things in the movies, like fly wearing just a cape. Shooting from a boat, unless your victim is also in your boat or you’re using the Big Mo’s 16 inch guns, can’t be done.<\/p>\n

\nOr I could be wrong.<\/i><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So overall, a bunch of highly experienced and trained shooters do think it’s possible. Over to you, Andrew…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Could a sniper have killed a Syrian general from a boat? Armed Liberal says maybe…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1824"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1824\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/marcdanziger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}