Posted on 01/30/2006 8:49:49 AM PST by saquin
On Saturday, I took the day off and spent it at home resting, studying for the TOEFL and the GRE and hanging out with my friends whose main subject at that day was the Baghdad Sniper. Baghdad Sniper is a man who shoots US soldiers with his silent guns. He fires once and vanishes just like ghosts. There is never a follow-up shot, never a chance for US forces to identify him. It’s a matter of seconds. You’ll never hear it.
In my neighborhood, a new phenomenon is incredibly increasing. CDs with videos of this ghost shooting at the US soldiers in Baghdad are being sold and exchanged by young men and teenagers who are incredibly interested in that mysterious sniper. As people say, he uses silent guns in his shooting and he never missed a target.
On August 5 of last year, the Guardian published a story about the sniper. The Guardian’s Rory Carroll quoted Specialist Travis Burress, 22, a sniper with the 1-64 battalion based in Camp Rustamiyah, saying "He's good. Every time we dismount I'm sure everyone has got him in the back of their minds. He's a serious threat to us."
"Juba" is the nickname applied to that sniper by the U.S. military in Iraq. He is alleged to be an accurate sniper, having killed and wounded up to several dozen U.S. soldiers. He fires only once and disapperas from his position, leaving behind no evidence of his whereabouts.
According to the CDs and internet posted videos I watched, the Baghdad Sniper waits for soldiers to dismount, or stand up in a Humvee turret, and then shoots. He has killed from 200 meters away.
Ok now, to be more frank, this sniper becomes a “hero” in my neighborhood. Yesterday, there was a group of young men gathering in an internet café watching series of his attacks on a website called, Ogrish. “He is so brave,” one young man said. “He is not a terrorist. He kills the occupiers only,” the other said with his both eyes concentrated on the computer’s monitor. Images of US soldiers being shot by that sniper was aired on Aljazeera more than once, specially in the period before I went to the U.S.
The only indication that Juba is the same individual each time in these incidents is a single bullet casing and a note left behind at the location where he is believed to have been. The message, in Arabic, "What has been taken in blood cannot be regained except by blood. Baghdad Sniper". These items were found only after nearby buildings. "Juba's" existence, however, is not proven. He may not exist, or he could be a combination of many different insurgents. It is also possible that Coalition forces have killed one or more "Jubas," but each time a new one emerges.
Click here and download 'juba_sniper_video.wmv' (Part of entire video). This is the Ogrish link to the video of some of the attacks the sniper did against the US soldiers.
Hardly a difficult distance to kill from. Most Marines can hit a plate size target 4/5 times with an unbraced weapon while standing from that distance.
It is war. The odds are that any insurgent Iraqi sniper will eventually take one in the head.
On the good side, I think the sniper ledger is extraordinarily lopsided in our favor. Most of these news people, and/or Iraqis have no idea what our sniper forces do, or how they are deployed.
Of course, I would rather the score be lopsided a gazillion to nothing in our favor, but they are shooting at us.
Heck, I got lousy eyes, and I can just about hit that with my Garand.
Do you have any sources on this statement? I follow these things pretty closely, and I had not heard this statistic. Where did you get this information? I would expect there to be multiple sources on this.
Check the link in post #10. The article was in the Christian Science Monitor.
I did searchs on multiple keywords and found it.
I know. That was in the previous link. But that is the only place this is mentioned anywhere. I did a Google search on 15 marine death sniper fallujah, and was only something at the Daily Kos (nuff said) and the CSM.
This is something that I would think would have gotten much greater exposure. Where did the CSM get their information, and why has it not reached a larger audience?
It is not that I necessarily doubt this, but I read a range of defense related publications including things like "Proceedings" and "Aviation and Space Weekly" and so on in addition to more online sources than I can name, and have seen nothing about it.
Maybe DevSix has some information on these snipers. He previously mentioned to me AQ had imported some Chechen snipers into Iraq.
Thanks for checking.
Regarding Chechen snipers....without a doubt... they operating (on hire) for the insurgents/terrorists within Iraq. We are certain of this. Though we are talking a very small number.
Many more Chechen fighters have been encountered in Stan then in Iraq -
It seemed that that would be a very large event...I wonder if someone isn' t getting it mixed up with the marine snipers who were killed in the IED attack...
Allahu fubar!
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