On snipers...

The topic of snipers feeling sympathy for their victims came up in class today. Oswald certainly seems like he doesn't want to take the shot--he likes Kennedy, is glad that Jackie looks good for the immortalizing photos, and feels sorry for hitting Connally. Is this strange for a sniper? Isn't the long range shot a way of distancing yourself from your victim, unlike Ruby's incredibly personal killing of Oswald? You're just supposed to pull the trigger and hit someone really far away.

When this topic came up in class, my mind jumped to some other source I had read/seen/heard that argued the opposite: due to the highly accurate nature of sniping (aiming at specific body parts) and the close-up view offered by a scope, snipers are by necessity emotionally invested in their target--and thus the really good snipers are the ones who can push aside their feelings and pull the trigger knowing exactly what they are doing: taking a life.

Trouble was, I couldn't remember what work of fiction this was from. Was it Enemy at the Gates? I've only actually seen a clip of that movie in Mr. Butler's class. What else do I watch that would go in-depth about sniper psychology? The episode of Quantum Leap in which the protagonist inhabits the body of Lee Harvey Oswald?

Eventually I remembered that it came from the anime series Area 88. I'm not a big consumer of anime, but I watched this series in its entirety while I was sick one time after stumbling across numerous references to it on the Wikipedia page for "aircraft in fiction." I mean, who doesn't love a TV show that consists mostly of what-if battles between Cold War-era fighter planes?

While perhaps not as deep or literary as other sources (and not terribly realistic in its depiction of the nameless sniper, who has the timing and precision to pull off a serial assassination you'd expect from a murderous Rube Goldberg, plus a gun with high-explosive bullets), the eighth episode of Area 88 has a few things to say about snipers and war photographers.

If you don't care to watch 23 minutes of airplanes, explosions, and odd choices of background music, the discussion of sniper psychology starts around 6:56. The audio is Japanese, but there are English subtitles.

If we were to put these fictional long-range shooters on a spectrum, Oswald would seem to be at the "ineffective softie" end and Area 88's sniper at the other, with Raymo in between. Raymo has the precision and focus during the shooting, but as soon as he gets the shot off and sees Kennedy's head explodes he goes into a sort of out-of-body adrenaline mode. The anime villain is little more than a self-aiming gun.

Even with his pseudo-remorse, Oswald pulls the trigger, satisfying Shinjou's assertion that a sniper "does what he does fully understanding that his action leads to the enemy's death." It's just that his actions don't lead to his target's death, since he's inconsistent and isn't using the best rifle.