In the age of complex weapons systems that are capital, technological, and infrastructure intensive, the mere rifle could almost be an afterthought compared to sleek fighter aircraft, laser guided munitions, attack helicopters, and satellites.

Technology-intensive, war-fighting systems like these are mainstays of modern militaries and are also quite costly.

Yet, the right man with a rifle can be a serious force to be reckoned with; he has the power to disrupt military operations carried out by ground forces at the cost of what ultimately amounts to pennies on the dollar.

Clandestine sniping (urban guerrilla sniping) is an effective way for technically disadvantaged forces to combat and aggravate larger, dominant occupying forces in an urban setting. The merits of clandestine sniping stem from the psychological fear that impacts occupying forces, from the fact that snipers avoid collateral damage, from the anonymity of these clandestine marksmen, and from the flexibility in tactics that guerrilla snipers are able to employ. Moreover, these snipers are a viable means for attrition warfare, which takes a toll on occupiers’ time, treasure, and lives.

Traditionally, it was said that snipers spooked everyone—even those in their own ranks. In modern day, snipers’ comrades are not as put off as they once were. The late American SEAL sniper, Chris Kyle, practically became a celebrity after retiring from the military, for example. For enemies, the terror and threat of snipers are very real. (Back when Mr. Kyle was working in Ramadi, the insurgency put a large bounty of his head. And though Mr. Kyle is not the kind of urban sniper I am writing about, many of the things I am writing about also apply to him and his tactics in urban sniping). The fact is that fear of snipers is very real and strong enough that it can destroy someone’s will to fight without any shots being fired. Any person who is aware of snipers in a conflict zone would logically play it safe; therefore it would not be unreasonable to assume that a security force or troops in a risky area would probably perform their military/security duties haphazardly for fear of being exposed to sniper fire. This fear of sniper fire has the very likely potential to disrupt the operations of a given occupying force in a given area.

Placing this pressure and stress is invaluable to whomever is heading that sniping effort. Seeing how most guerrilla cells, militia groups, and other non-state actors do not have the type of funding that formally organized militaries do, these groups inherently benefit from putting the kind of pressure that clandestine sniping provides on their adversaries. Not only is this a low cost tactic, it also does not require extensive training or specialized equipment.

The PIRA (Provisional Irish Republican Army), a group labeled as a terrorist organization by numerous governments, ran a tight urban-clandestine sniping campaign for decades until the fighting was called off, (and Sinn Fein and Gerry Adams became legitimate in the late 1990s). PIRA, frankly was an innovator in modern terrorism tactics, and its urban sniping was considered paramount; it is not without reason why many terrorist groups imitate the tactics of PIRA. And this is not just limited to urban guerrilla sniping. They are responsible for the TTPs (tactics, techniques, procedures) of hijackings, bomb making, and other such violent acts in a modern context. In 1993, in South Armagh, Northern Ireland, British soldiers simply stopped doing their jobs after a PIRA sniper crew completed a string of successful attacks in the area. One Royal Scots platoon was reprimanded because they falsified information about vehicles passing through their assigned checkpoint; the soldiers matter-of-factly did not want to man their checkpoint since it was likely PIRA snipers would engage them. Checkpoints, with their highly visible and predictable nature tend to become a given target for guerrilla sniper attacks—enemy soldiers are often exposed and display the same patterns day after day.

A notable way that PIRA cashed in on sniping-fear in Northern Ireland was to place sings that read “Sniper at Work” depicting the silhouette of a man with a rifle. According to a 2006 British military report, these signs along with media hype, aggrandized sniper fears and inherently affected British troops’ morale and performance — like in 1993 in South Armagh. Similarly, some insurgent factions in Iraq record their actual urban sniping operations and disseminate them through various media for propaganda purposes. They believe that broadcasting their footage generates fear and demoralizes Americans and other occupying Westerners.

“The idea of filming operations is very important, because the scene that shows the falling soldier when he is hit has more impact on the enemy than any other weapon, especially after we saw the great concern of the enemy and the western media [sic].”

This quote is attributed to a sniper brigade leader in Baghdad. According to a Pentagon policy report, it was part of a narrative in an insurgent propaganda video. This media strategy is similar in concept to thePIRA “Sniper at Work” signs, but perhaps more pro-active.

Sniping, especially in an urban context, can also wreak psychological havoc on a civilian populace. Two prominent but distinct cases are the “Siege of Sarajevo” and the “DC Sniper Attacks.”

Consider the case in the former Yugoslavia:

After the Soviet Union fell, the Com-bloc/Warsaw Pact states soon followed suit. The Balkan region which had been unified as Yugoslavia and led by Serbians in Belgrade, disintegrated into its more traditional and ethnic zones. When the communist pact fell through, the notorious southern European “powder keg” ignited again as various ethno-political groups tried to seize control. The urban battle over Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, resulted to be a horrendous incident in the Balkan conflict. The Serbians who laid siege to the city employed sniping as a terror tactic. Serb snipers fired indiscriminately on anyone be it women or children; everyone was engaged. As a result, the main arteries of the city were cut, and people opted to live indoors out of fear. One prominent and wide boulevard in Sarajevo was even dubbed “Sniper’s Alley,” as many were murdered there.

It wasn’t until visual obstacles, used to break up lines of sight and lines of fire, were placed on major streets that residents of Sarajevo could cautiously choose to venture outside. The fear of snipers in part helped to create the subterranean tunnel underneath the airport in Sarajevo because people who tried to flee by running across the tarmac were often killed by sniper fire. This tunnel literally turned into a lifeline for Sarajevo.

Consider the case in Washington D.C.:
On a smaller scale, the indiscriminate killers John Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo (known as the DC Snipers) also disrupted daily life for residents of the Washington DC region, which the pair clandestinely stalked. The fear of being shot, can be life-altering and extremely unsettling. A study done by the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Washington DC-area residents concluded that many people suffered from psychological issues such as PTSD in the wake of the Muhammad-Malvo shootings. For example, out of 1205 surveyed adults that lived in the area, 45% reported that they visited public spaces such as malls and parks less often than they did previously; moreover, 5.5% of those surveyed admitted to missing at least a day of work due to the shootings. The study also found that women who lived within a five mile radius of any shooting incident were more likely to show signs of traumatic stress symptoms.

Collateral damage is never popular with the residents of the area where it happens. Such destruction polarizes the local populace and becomes a roadblock between that local populace and an occupying security force and each others’ cooperation. In other words, it is hard to capture “hearts and minds” if someone else is destroying a city unintentionally or otherwise. The urban guerrilla sniper never has to worry about collateral damage that could cost him and his group support from local populace; it’s a reality that could have negative consequences and could even jeopardize their goals. The lack of collateral damage grants these urban guerrilla snipers anonimity. Anonymity for a sniper is also important because being able to easily and discreetly disappear back into the public at large is a valuable advantage. After all, when one combines anonymity with surgical precision that avoids serious damage, one has the keys to a successful “cloak-and-dagger” operation. The anonymity of an urban sniper grants him great freedom of motion in an area; the sniper’s avoiding of collateral damage ensures that he will not raise unnecessary attention. In addition, highly discreet urban snipers can add to the fear they spread every time they take a shot. For example, discretion was useful to the Chechens fighting in Grozny in the 1990s. The Russian Army preferred to use indiscriminate firepower (such as shelling and leveling entire city blocks at once). Chechen guerrillas figured out that the closer they kept to Russian units, the less effective the Russian’s large firepower became. This tactic is known as “hugging the enemy” and renders bombs and shells useless lest one side would be willing to sacrifice its own soldiers.

Guerrilla fighters, including urban snipers follow no rules, unlike legitimate militaries that need to adhere to protocols and doctrine. The guerrilla fighter has free creative license to devise different tactics that might suit their situation; this flexibility is also what helps make urban sniping an efficient method to combat a larger, more powerful force. Different guerrilla groups like to use different sniping methodology: in Grozny, Chechens employed “sniper martyrs,” or persons who stayed in put in the same spot and racked up a body toll until the Russians eliminated them with something like a helicopter attack. This tactic was successful because prior to the counter-attack, it would draw out many Russian soldiers into the kill-zone — it was like shooting fish in a barrel. Sniper-martyrs had an unnerving effect on Russian soldiers because in addition to fighting to the death, the Chechens liked to position themselves out of view, deep within a building making it difficult for their enemies to return fire. As a result, Russian counter-sniper policies were brutal. If a suspected sniper was caught, they could expect a merciless “interrogation.”

Another tactic urban snipers use is to shoot from within a moving platform — usually a car or van. This allows the sniping team to maneuver right in front of a target, take the shot, and evade security forces immediately. Once the getaway vehicle is able to blend in with normal traffic, it becomes much more difficult to track down. Dressing like a civilian and driving around with a typical car is camouflage for urban snipers since it appears uninteresting and does not attract any attention. Vehicles are modified to have snipers’ hides within; seats are removed and small, discreet firing ports are cut out. The tactic of sniping from mobile platforms was first put to use by PIRA sniper crews in Northern Ireland (especially by the successful crews of South Armagh), and this tactic has notably spread to Iraq, where it is commonplace. For example, in many Iraqi insurgent propaganda videos publicized by a faction called the “Islamic Army” which depict guerrilla sniper attacks on American security forces, the camera angle seems to be level with the target suggesting that the shooter is at ground level — same as the target. This most likely means that the sniper was operating inside of a vehicle that was parked nearby whatever security checkpoint the snipers were targeting. In once instance, in a place called Habbaniyah in Iraq, US Marine counter-snipers successfully neutralized a typical guerrilla sniper outfit once their cover had been blown. One of the urban guerrilla snipers they shot was hiding inside a vehicle and also had a camera set up to record kills for propaganda purposes.

Interestingly enough, Iraqi insurgents picked up the tactic of shooting from a mobile platform from the DC snipers (who probably attained the idea from PIRA). John Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo operated out of a blue Chevy Caprice Classic, which is a full-size sedan with ample room. The back seats were modified and a hole was cut out in the trunk area to be used as a gun port; all windows were also tinted. Continuing with the trend in Iraq, some “car snipers” have even taken their tactics to the next level by using certain cars as decoys. When a sniper shoots from a vehicle, a nearby vehicle will immediately flee the scene while trying to simultaneously attract attention to distract security forces while giving the real sniper an opportunity to flee unnoticed.
On a smaller scale, the effective management of counter-forensics was a chief strategy for PIRA to avoid prosecution by British authorities. While this is not a sniping tactic, counter-forensics best-practices allowed PIRA snipers to continue in their clandestine operations while seriously mitigating their risks of being caught through forensic analyses. If PIRA snipers were careless, they could leave a goldmine of evidence behind for British investigators which could ultimately mean that someone could find themselves in the notorious “Long Kesh”, the H block of HM Prison Maze. Because of this, PIRA snipers were meticulous. Snipers did everything from taking a full bath to rid themselves of gunshot residue, to burning their set of clothes in a furnace after an operation. PIRA snipers did everything possible to avoid getting caught and maintain their terror campaign. The main point here is that not all snipers operate the same. Some might simply hide deep in abandoned building in a war zone, but that may not work for others, who would rather be close to the enemy and have the ability to make a clean getaway. Also, some do not have to worry about “evidence” as much as others, depending on the area and situation in which they work in.

Clandestine sniping often aids a disadvantaged side wage a war of attrition because sniping pressure can take a toll on an adversary and interfere with their operations. The Russian Army itself used sniping as a form of attrition in Stalingrad, the deadliest battle of the Second World War. Stalingrad was actually the first time in military history that urban snipers were used to great effect in a major war; Soviet snipers shot careless German soldiers, and made it a point to stalk high value targets such as machine-gunners, NCOs, or people directly in charge at the front lines any time they could. The Soviets also made use of flexible tactics to spread terror. Terror, as we have discussed is an effective way to interfere an enemy’s operation. The rubble of bombed-out Stalingrad offered an infinite amount of sniper’s hides, which made the situation all the more dangerous for the German invaders. In addition to the direct military benefits of using snipers against enemy forces, their efforts raised morale among their fellow ranks. So significant was sniping to the USSR at that time in 1942, that an ad-hoc sniping school was established on the front itself. This school was led by Stalingrad’s most famous sniper, Vassily Zaitsev. What made this man special was his understanding and the way he applied snipercraft to the battlefield; he used a common rifle, a Mosin-Nagant 91/30(pictured at the beginning of this article), after all. His strategy chiefly consisted of observation and action after watching the enemy make mistakes. Collectively, Zaitsev and his trained snipers were said to kill an estimated 3000 enemy soldiers.

A weaker force can take advantage of urban guerrilla sniping because if done properly it can have a devastating effect on a superior force. The cost of willing participants, basic rifles (which do not have to state of the art; cheap 70-year old rifles or typical civilian hunting rifles work fine), ammunition, and some other assorted amenities does not compare to for example, the cost of a helicopter gunship. For a group who is down, but not out, urban guerrilla sniping means that fighters have an affordable way to fight someone who would otherwise obliterate them. The guerrilla sniper also is not bound by rules of engagement, giving him the freedom to use whatever tactic he thinks will work best depending on a scenario. He or she also gets to remain anonymous, which allows them to move freely about. This is why a military force has to pay attention to these kinds of threats. Being careless could ruin everything.

This writing is based off a research paper I wrote a few years back for a college class. The writing has been refactored and edited and now reads better than ever. I have some sources and books I studied to write this. I am happy to provide those upon request. All photographs used in this article were sourced from Google Image search. I do not take any credit for them and simply want to use them for editoral purposes.