American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U. S. Military History

M
ISPERCEPTIONS

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P
eople think that snipers take such incredibly long shots all the
time. While we do take longer shots than most guys on the
battlefield, they’re probably a lot closer than most people think.
I never got all caught up in measuring how far I was shooting.
The distance really depended on the situation. In the cities, where
most of my kills came, you’re only going to be shooting anywhere
from two hundred to four hundred yards anyway. That’s where
your targets are, so that’s where your shots are.
Out in the countryside, it’s a different story. Typically, the shots
out there would run from eight hundred to twelve hundred yards.
That’s where the longer-range guns like the .338 would come in
handy.
Someone once asked me if I had a favorite distance. My answer
was easy: the closer the better.
A
s I mentioned earlier, another misperception people have about
snipers is that we always aim for the head. Personally, I almost
never target the head, unless I’m absolutely sure I’m going to make
the shot. And that’s rare on the battlefield.
I’d much rather aim center mass—shoot for the middle of the
body. I’ve got plenty of room to play with. No matter where I hit
him, he’s going down.
B
ACK TO 
B
AGHDAD

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A
fter a week on the river, I was pulled out, swapping places with
another SEAL sniper, who’d been injured briefly earlier in the
operation and was ready to get back into action. I’d had more than
my fair share of kills as a sniper; it was time to let someone else
have a go.
Command sent me back to Camp Fallujah for a few days. It
was one of the few breaks in the war that I actually welcomed.
After the pace of the battle in the city, I was definitely ready for a
brief vacation. The hot meals and showers felt pretty damn good.
After chilling out for a few days, I was ordered back to Baghdad
to work with GROM again.
We were on the way to Baghdad when our Hummer was hit by
a buried IED. The improvised explosive blew up just behind us;
everybody in the vehicles freaked—except me and another guy
who’d been at Fallujah since the start of the assault. We looked at
each other, winked, then closed our eyes and went back to sleep.
Compared to the month’s worth of explosions and shit we’d just
lived through, this was nothing.
W
hile I’d been in Iraq, my platoon was sent to the Philippines on a
mission to train up the local military to fight radical terrorists. It
wasn’t exactly the most exciting assignment. Finally, with that
mission complete, they were sent to Baghdad.
I went out with some other SEALs to the airport to greet them.
I was expecting a big welcome—here my family was finally

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coming in.
They came off the plane cussin’ me.
“Hey asshole.”
And much worse than that. Like everything else they do, SEALs
excel at foul language.
Jealousy, thy name is SEAL.
I’d wondered why I hadn’t heard anything from them over the
past few months. In fact, I was wondering why they were jealous—
as far as I knew, they hadn’t heard about anything I’d been doing.
Come to find out, my chief had been regaling them with the
after-action reports of my sniping in Fallujah. They’d been sitting
around hand-holding the Filipinos and hating life, while I’d been
having all the fun.
They got over it. Eventually, they even asked me to do a little
presentation on what I’d done, complete with pointers and stuff.
One more chance to use PowerPoint.