Confirmed Kills

It's Not a Competition

by

Thomas W Bruner

copyright 2001 Sniper's Paradise

When you are a military sniper, you log the number of your kills or wounded. This should never be considered a competition among snipers. If any officer or senior NCO makes it one, they do not understand the role of a sniper, nor are they doing their job. Thinking of it as a competition might actually get a sniper killed since a sniper might loose focus and put him in more danger than necessary. Snipers have a job to do, and how many kills one sniper has compared to another sniper is irrelevant. The only time snipers should compete is during sanctioned sniper competitions.

During Vietnam, as most know, Carlos Hathcock had 93 confirmed and Chuck Mawhinney had 103 confirmed. They were both excellent marksmen and they saved many lives. Two Army snipers had a higher body count, but again, this is not about counting or competing. This is about doing a tough job.

The old standard for confirming kills usually required the witness of an officer or the collection of data from the dead enemy soldier. To collect data from the body the sniper would have to physically move to the dead soldier.  This is not welcome option in most cases.  So its easy to see that one sniper could have 50 confirmed and 200 non-confirmed, and another could have 85 confirmed and 50 non-confirmed. Does that mean one is better than the other? It doesnt matter. How about a sniper team that calls in an air strike on 200 enemy, and another team takes out 100 enemy soldiers with an artillery strike. Should these be considered confirmed or non-confirmed? Do we expect a sweep team to come through and count the number of kills and pass it on to the OIC of the sniper unit? The answer is No.

Most know that Carlos Hathcock had MS. After being one of their best marksmen and after saving the lives of men from a burning am track, receiving burns all over his body, he was retired early by the Marine Corps.  Carlos only had another two months of time left till full retirement. Carlos was left holding the bag full of medical bills. He did his best to pay for all medical treatments by overseeing a police sniper school in Virginia Beach and he told his story to the world .  He told us his story through Charles Henderson, in the book, Marine Sniper. With help from others in the USMC, Carlos was awarded the Silver Star just a few years before he died.

After the war, Chuck Mawhinney went home and never mentioned his job as a sniper in Vietnam. He was quiet man that did his duty to the best of his abilities. It came out that Chuck had more confirmed kills than Carlos, which starts discussions by many as to who was the top marine sniper in Vietnam. It even starts ridicules arguments over who is better. Chuck was awarded the Bronze Star, so does that make him any less of a soldier or reduce the level of commitment he gave? Were these men, or any of the other snipers in competition with one another? No, not to my knowledge. Most were soldiers who just did their job to the best of their abilities. As one sniper put it - The only thing we were counting were the number of days we had left to go home.

The Marine Corps is now allowing the sniper team, without the presence of an officer, to determine weather they had a kill or wounded, this is just for the log book. Snipers today will spend more time as forward observers and observers of areas of operations than killing. Some may never kill, but they must be prepared to take that shot, without hesitation. If we get into a full-scale war like Vietnam or Korea, then the full-scale killing will begin. The job of saving American lives is the focus, not the counting. The final numbers prove nothing and mean nothing.