Soviet sniper

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Soviet snipers, also referred to as Russian snipers, played an important role during World War II (known as Great Patriotic War in the Soviet Union, in Russia, and in some other post-Soviet states). It is estimated that these snipers killed or wounded over 40,000 German soldiers during the war.

1 Doctrine
2 Rifles
3 In fiction
4 Famous Soviet Snipers
5 External links
6 See also
7 References

[edit] Doctrine

Soviet, Russian, and derived military doctrines include squad-level snipers, which may be called "sharpshooters" or "Designated marksman" in other doctrines (see "Sniper" article). They do so because this ability was lost to ordinary troops when assault rifles (which are optimized for close-in, rapid-fire combat) were adopted.

Soviet and Russian military doctrine uses snipers for long-distance suppressive fire and targets of opportunity, especially leaders, because during World War II they found that military organizations find it hard to replace experienced non-commissioned officers and field officers during times of war. They also found that the more expensive and delicate sniper rifles could match the cost-effectiveness of a cheaper assault rifle given good personnel selection, training, and adherence to doctrine. For example, the Kremlin Regiment's snipers reportedly killed 1200 enemy soldiers for the loss of less than one hundred men. The Soviet Union also used women for sniping duties extensively, and to great effect, including Lyudmila Pavlichenko (who killed over 300 German soldiers) and Nina Alexeyevna Lobkovskaya. Additionally, they found that sniper duties fit women well, since good snipers are patient, careful, deliberate, can avoid hand-to-hand combat, and need higher levels of aerobic conditioning than other troops.

After the introduction of the SVD, the Soviet army deployed snipers at platoon level. Those snipers were often chosen from personnel who did well in rifle shooting while members of DOSAAF. Such snipers were estimated to have a 50% probability of hitting a standing, man-sized target at 800m, and an 80% probability of hitting a standing, man-sized target at 500m. For distances not exceeding 200m the probability was estimated to be well above 90%. To attain this level of accuracy the sniper could not engage more than two such targets per minute.^[1]

[edit] Rifles

Two rifles commonly used by modern day Russian snipers are the SVD or the SVDS. The SVD was designed to provide special fire support, not as a standard sniper rifle. Its main role is to extend effective range of fire of an infantry squad up to 600 meters.

The SVD is a lightweight and quite accurate rifle, capable of semi-auto fire. The first request for a new sniper rifle was issued in 1958. In 1963 the SVD (Snaiperskaya Vintovka Dragunova, or Dragunov Sniper Rifle) was accepted by Soviet Military.

The SVD replaced the Mosin-Nagant rifle used before and during World War II. Although the rifle was replaced, the calibre remained unchanged from the 7.62 x 54 mm R which is still in use today, not only in sniper rifles, but also in General purpose machine gun (like the PK).

[edit] In fiction

A Hollywood film called Enemy at the Gates was made about Vasily Grigoryevich Zaitsev, a sniper who fought in the Battle of Stalingrad. The plot of the movie is based on a section in the eponymous book by William Craig which fictionalizes an alleged duel between Zaitsev and a German sniper. During the battle, Zaitsev killed 242 Germans. While he is arguably the most famous Russian sniper, there were thousands of snipers in the Russian Army. The battle between the German sniper and Zaitsev was not documented in any reference from the Soviet army, although a similar battle between Zaitsev and German named Heinz Thorvald is recounted personally by Zaitsev.

The role of a Soviet sniper is also portrayed in the game Call of Duty which contains similar scenes to Enemy at the Gates.

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

In Tom Clancys novel The Bear and the Dragon a veteran WWII Soviet sniper uses his old sniper rifle to take out a Chinese general during a Chinese invasion of Russia.