Modern American Snipers (32 page)

“See, I told you. I knew we got those fuckers.”

“Aww … shut up.”

*   *   *

When the 3rd Battalion Ranger snipers operated in the alien landscape of Afghanistan in 2004, they took on some expanded sniper ops in addition to the direct action role—stalking, setting up in hides, reconnoitering, and the like.

However, this was not out of any particular faith placed in the section by the line platoons. Rather it was largely driven by the snipers making themselves useful to demonstrate their worth.

The sniper platoon's value would become more than evident in subsequent deployments to Iraq. But at the same time, the scorching pace of operations and the urban nature of the conflict saw them transition into almost a pure direct action role where climbing skills and the accurate delivery of short-range, quick-twitch sniper fire were of paramount importance.

Now back in the open of Afghanistan—and with considerably more pull with the battalion—Irving helped push the snipers back to a more expansive mission set. However, this time it was highly prized by those above them.

“That was my claim to fame I guess, if you want to call it that,” he said. “At that point it was normally only direct-action-type stuff. The longest shot you'd take is fifty or a hundred yards or whatnot. When we were in Afghanistan, the minimum engagement was like three hundred. I pitched this deal to my commanders—‘Hey, let us go out on this op and actually do what snipers are trained to do, which is stalking, staying out for five days, just to go get a guy.'”

Irving was actually recruited himself for the mission he would later pitch to his commanders by the anonymous elite—the Regimental Reconnaissance Company.

Inside the Regiment, RRC is legendary. Outside, it's largely unknown. It exists in a role similar to Delta and DEVGRU's recce assets—specializing in close target reconnaissance—only minus the sniper capability.

In fact, their talents were so valued that in 2004 JSOC pulled RRC out from under the 75th Ranger Regiment and put it to work directly for the Command. In response, the 75th Ranger Regiment's sniper platoons reorganized so that the Rangers would retain an organic recon capability.

Former 3/75 Ranger sniper Pete Careaga explained, “Once we lost them we couldn't use them as much as we used to. So the reconnaissance mission had to be done in-house. At first, the snipers had to do the reconnaissance mission. I remember many days being out there all week just gathering information because [RRC] was busy doing more important stuff.

“So they took half of our platoon, the snipers, and made them a recon platoon. They also recruited some more guys from the line to plus up those numbers so they could become full platoon while also recruiting snipers a bit more heavily as well to make up for the shortfall. That didn't slow us down; it just kind of rearranged our numbers a little bit.”

But now several years later and all but a distant memory to the 3/75 sniper platoon, the elusive RRC was back on the scene. A small team of RRC Rangers approached Irving and his spotter and presented them with a mission they could not refuse—a five-day mission behind enemy lines to track down an HVT.

On day four, Irving was positioned on a roof and overwatching 2/5 Marines as they attempted to take control of a hostile village. The suspicious arrival of a man on a moped with a bag of tools caught his attention. Minutes later, that bag of tools was revealed to be an RPG pointed directly at a Marine Humvee at point-blank range.

The Reaper sent a round from his cherished SR-25 from 743 meters away.

“Holy shit, dude; you blew him out of his sandals.”

The insurgent's sandals had not moved. His body, meanwhile, slumped on the ground several feet away. The Marines were suitably impressed.

On the fifth day, the hybrid RRC/sniper element was joined by a larger Ranger assault force to finally take down the targeted individual they had been tracking.

However, after breaking off from the assaulters, the smaller team found itself engaged in a sudden and overwhelming 360-degree ambush. Meanwhile, their potential reinforcements were engaged in a blistering firefight of their own as they approached the objective and were in little position to help.

It got worse—
much worse
—for the Reaper when he realized he had also come under the glass of an enemy sniper. He found he didn't much like being on the other end of the equation.

When he was with the Marines just before, he had heard tales of “the Chechen”—a sniper rumored to have logged some three hundred kills fighting against the Russians and now the Americans. While Irving knew how those kill count rumors went, he immediately recognized his hunter possessed serious skill.

“That one I still dream about to this day,” Irving said. “At that point in my career, I had already killed a shit-ton of people, and it's cool. But when you're on the other end of a scope and he's really good too, it kind of puts you in your place. Maybe I'm not that good.”

Pinned down in a small ditch with sniper rounds cracking inches away from his head, the Ranger sniper recalled the mental aspects of his training. He first sorted out the sniper's distance utilizing the snap/bang theory. “You hear the snap of the bullet and you count from one to five in under a second. When you hear the bang of the rifle, the number you land on gives away the distance. I knew how far away he was so I started to think about the different buildings, figuring out where I would be.

“If you're good, you're going to be a spot no one would ever think of, which is what I try to apply. If there's a big building and a pile of dog shit, I'm probably going to put myself in that pile of dog shit and cover myself as opposed to that big, tall building because that's where everybody is going to look. That's where he fucked up.”

Irving had earlier noticed an odd building with a curtain hanging up in the window that was the correct range he was looking for. Suspecting he may have found the hide, he decided to make sure … by sticking his head up.

But only for an instant. The Chechen fired and missed, but Irving's spotter saw the telltale movement in the window.

“I knew it! I knew that's where that guy was at.”

Irving identified the location but found the sniper was too experienced and too well trained to effectively countersniper. He explained, “It took quite a while to find him and spot him. He had everything down to a science but one simple mistake gave him away. But we still couldn't shoot him because he was shooting through small, little holes in the building. Special Forces guys use that a lot—they have a special school just for shooting like that, and he was applying it. He was damn good.”

Still pinned down by the sniper, the ambushers started closing in on their position. Irving's spotter next noticed two men three hundred yards away headed in their direction. Irving was unable to make visual contact for fear of giving the Chechen sniper just the look he needed so he talked his teammate though the shot instead.

“Which way are they walking?”

“Left to right.”

“Okay, what angle?”

“Thirty-five degrees.”

“They are only three hundred yards in front of us and they are walking really slow. Give them a .3 lead.”

The spotter squeezed the trigger of his .300 Win Mag.

“Oh fuck.”

“What?”

“‘They're not moving. They just stopped.”

“Well, fucking hit them then.”

“Oh never mind. One of the guys has his hands in the air now.”

“Roger that. What's he doing now?”

“He's strutting around.”

“What? Did you hit him?”

“I don't think so.”

Irving laughed when he recalled the conversation. “He has a .300 Win Mag and at a thousand yards that hits like a .357 at point-blank range.” One of the RRC Rangers popped his head up and said,
“Fuck no. You hit him.”

“What do you mean?”

“His whole shit is red.”

The sniper explained, “He was wearing a white man dress. I popped my head up a little bit and just saw this arterial spray of blood coming out this guy's arm.”

“Hey man, how the fuck do you not see that?”

The wounded fighter's movements resembled an awkward dance, which Irving assumed was related to his brain suffering from the massive blood loss. Once he fell, the other insurgent attempted to apply a tourniquet with his turban.

“It was the worst tourniquet I've ever seen,” Irving said. “It was a like a weird bow knot. That was the first time I've ever seen that happen.”

*   *   *

The eye-opening deployment continued to deliver fear-and-adrenaline-imprinted memories. On time, Irving's spotter knocked a combatant's head clean off with a shot to his upper chest. And the Reaper later collected his longest combat kill—883 yards.

Again ambushed and pinned down under the light of day, AH-64 Apache gunships arrived and engaged the fighters three hundred yards to the sniper team's left. Rounds then started to streak in from directly in front of their position.

Irving noticed a man dressed in all black. “I got down behind the gun and I'm looking at this guy and he's just spraying away—a long way away. Finally I'm like, ‘Fuck it. I'm going to attempt this shot.'

“I'm shooting over this little stream and the stream is going from left to right and the wind is going from right to left. He was up on a hill a little bit. I dialed it for seven hundred and accounted for the slight wind. And I shot.”

The bullet hit the ground just in front of its intended target. The Taliban tribesman looked directly where the round impacted and then traced his eyes up to where he intuitively calculated it must have come from.

“Instead of doing another equation, I just took where the bullet hit and basically did like when you copy and paste something,” he explained. “I just held that much more to his body. By the time he looked up to where he thought the bullet came from I had already sent another round.”

Just as the man's gaze came up, he was impacted in the sternum.

“When the bullet hit, there was no question. Sometimes guys run or spin around a little bit. This guy dropped like an eighteen-wheel truck was dropped from three thousand feet and landed right on his head. He just collapsed. It was weird. That was the cleanest, best shot I ever had. It was intense.

“That was the most memorable shot I ever had. I could see his face. I still know what he looks like to this day.”

*   *   *

Irving also helped expand and redefine the way that 3/75 Ranger snipers would operate during direct action missions, actively looking to engage targets during approach, ahead of the final assault.

He explained, “Every single night for four months we were in pretty good firefights. My whole mentality was that I knew I could cover the guys. Instead of having this long drawn-out firefight, it would only take one or two rounds to end the whole thing. So we started walking in front of our element and if we would spot guys, we'd call it up.”

“Hey, dude, we got some guys five hundred yards in front of us that are armed.”

“Roger that. Take them out.”

Irving continued, “Before the team even reaches the building, I'm taking out targets. If possible, I don't want the entry team to have to worry about firefights indoors. I want them pretty much already covered.

“
For most of the deployment, I was staying out in front and hitting guys,” he said. “And when the actual raid happened, I would take my ladder off my back or free climb a building to cover my guys. Anybody ran out with a gun, I'd shoot those guys. Crazy deployment.”

*   *   *

The Reaper earned another title—Master Sniper—a rare honor that signifies an especially accomplished Ranger sniper with extensive school, combat, competition, and teaching experience.

Following the lead of his idol, Carlos Hathcock, Irving was inspired to relay what he had learned to the remainder of 3rd Battalion Sniper Platoon.

“As a Master Sniper, you're like the go-to guy. You've done it all, been to all the schools, and actually applied all that in combat. There are only a handful of Master Snipers.

“And as soon as I got out, I wanted to be training everybody now in the 3rd Battalion who is a BDM [Battalion Designated Marksman] or sniper. When I got back, one of my tasks was to write a handbook for everyone in the 3rd Battalion. I wrote that book and revised it and all the guys read it and applied it.

“That next deployment, a lot of guys came back with a significant number of kills—nothing wazoo—but several kills apiece.”

During Irving's standout deployment, the thirty-five men in the platoon he was attached to killed “hundreds of guys … and not just regular guys, high-value targets.”

That was nothing new for the 75th Ranger Regiment. “According to documents that the Ranger Regiment has put out, we've killed and captured more high-value targets than any other conventional or special operations unit out there,” Irving said. “We've been constantly deployed and the numbers speak for themselves.”

And now with Rangers of the 75th Ranger Regiment's GWOT golden age returning to civilian life, those numbers and the stories behind them are beginning to be told. Irving wrote about his wartime experience in
The Reaper: Autobiography of One of the Deadliest Special Ops Snipers.
Meanwhile, several other post-9/11 Rangers collaborated to provide firsthand accounts in
Violence of Action
, which leaves no doubt as to the Regiment's significance in modern warfare.

*   *   *