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

T
ARGETS
A
mong our first jobs was to help the Army reclaim the area around
a hospital along the river in Viet Ram. The four-story concrete
building had been started and then abandoned a few years before.
The Army wanted to finish it for the Iraqis; decent medical care was
a big need out there. But they couldn’t get close to it to do any
work, because as soon as they did, they came under fire. So we
went to work.
Our platoon, sixteen guys, teamed up with about twenty soldiers
to clear the nearby village of insurgents. Entering town early one
morning, we split up and started taking houses.
I was at point, carrying my Mk-12, the first guy in each building.
Once the house was secure, I’d go up to the roof, cover the guys
on the ground, and look for insurgents, who we expected to attack
once they knew we were there. The group leapfrogged forward,
clearing the area as we went.
Unlike in the city, these houses weren’t right next to each other,

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so the process took longer and was more spread-out. But soon
enough, the terrorists realized where we were and what we were up
to, and they put together a little attack from a mosque. Holed up
behind its walls, they started raining AK fire at a squad of soldiers
on the ground.
I was up on one of the roofs when the fight started. Within
moments, we started firing everything we had at the bad guys: M-
4s, M-60s, sniper rifles, 40-mm grenades, LAW rockets—
everything we had. We lit that mosque up.
The momentum of the battle quickly shifted in our favor. The
soldiers on the ground began maneuvering to assault the mosque,
hoping to catch the insurgents before they could slide back into
whatever sewer they’d emerged from. We shifted our fire higher,
moving our aim above their heads to allow them to get in.
Somewhere in the middle of the fight, a piece of hot brass from
another gun—probably an M-60 machine gun next to me—shot
against my leg and landed in my boots next to my ankle. It burned
like hell, but I couldn’t do anything about it—there were too many
bad guys popping up from behind the walls, trying to get my people.
I was wearing simple hiking boots rather than combat boots.
That was my normal style—they were lighter and more
comfortable, and ordinarily more than enough to protect my feet.
Unfortunately, I hadn’t bothered to lace them up very well before
the battle, and there was a space between my pants and the boot
where the brass happened to fall after it ejected.

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What had the instructors told me in BUD/S about not being able
to call “time out” in battle?
When things quieted down, I stood up and pulled out the casing.
A good wedge of skin came out with it.
We secured the mosque, worked through the rest of the village,
then called it a day.