“American Sniper” aside as part of the culture wars, snipers have never been been very popular, even by their own side.
If captured in WWII, particularly on the Russian front, snipers were often summarily executed (but then, so were regular SS).
It wasn’t just the Soviets and Germans. Such executions occurred during our civil war and others. There was a lot of antipathy felt towards them.
Snipers lie in wait, concealed, sometimes in elaborate camouflage (`ghillie suits’) and they can do a lot of damage before getting away.
Much of their training is in setting up for the shot undetected and then escaping.
After seeing your buddies/comrades dropping dead from heard but unseen gun shots and being unable to spot the source, snipers were something like submarines forced to surface—after days or weeks of terror, convoy corvettes and destroyers kept shooting until they sank. Even their own infantry found snipers a little creepy.
So, more facts for the premise of the movie: it takes balls to snipe.
Snipers haven’t always been heroes, but Chris Kyle was the real deal.
At one time there were those of the opinion that anything other than hand-to-hand combat was dishonorable (look a man in the eye...) So, dropping bombs from an aircraft was less than honorable. Now we drop bombs and kill people with drones and little is said. Things change over time.