Women Make The BEST Snipers!

Damn right we do!

Here's a Q&A based on a series of conversations I had at a bar last night.

Q: Why a female sniper? That seems out of place.
A: Just the opposite. Shooting instructors say that women have better hand-eye coordination and concentration than men do.

Q: But women aren't tough enough for combat.
A: Try telling that to women in America's armed forces today. Or the Israeli Defense Forces. Then get back to me with an answer after you regain consciousness.

But seriously, women have made excellent warriors for millennia. Indeed, had it not been for Russian women snipers, the battle for Leningrad in World War II could have been won by the Germans. These women out sniped Wehrmacht snipers, killing them and removing them as a threat. The women then decimated German officers and non-coms.

The lasting terror they sowed might be responsible for the extreme fear that White Tights reports inspire among Russian conscripts.

Q: But a sniper as a good character? Aren't they all icky, weird psychos?
A: Only among clueless authors and screenwriters.

First of all, winning a war means killing and terrorizing the opposing forces better than they kill and terrorize you. Just because a sniper can reach out over the distance and kill a target is no sneakier or evil than a drone operator who is thousands of miles away from the Hellfire missile they use to wipe out a terror cell.

The sniper is the ultimate realist. There is no room for denial: they kill other humans in order to save the lives of their comrades. While a mortar or artillery unit or a fighter pilot all have a degree of psychological distance with the killing they do, snipers do not.

Snipers must accept personal responsibility and that requires an uncommon degree of psychological and emotional toughness.

In addition, the sniper is the only truly surgical military strike weapon. Collateral damage is virtually unknown. The sniper does not spray shrapnel around their target, do not mis-target a bomb or missile. They must identify the target -- often by looking straight into the eyes of the victim-to-be.

Finally, the sniper is a terror weapon that can inspire panic among the enemy and destroy unit cohesion. This can allow small groups of the sniper's comrades to successfully engage a larger, superior enemy force.