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Russian Sniper Rifles in Iraq
July 14, 2006: From time to time the troops in Iraq have captured old Soviet sniper rifles, including some of their version of a "heavy" (12.7mm) sniper rifle. As far as can be determined, the Russian rifles have mostly been used by just ordinary unskilled gunmen. While there have been occasional reports of activity by trained snipers on the classified side, these haven't been very numerous. Marines recently reported to the media that they believed they were dealing with a trained sniper in western Iraq. Since Saddam had trained snipers in his security forces, it's rather surprising that there hasn't been more sniper activity. Saddam bought a lot of the SVD (Snayperskaya Vintovka Dragunova) Dragunov Sniping Rifle during the 1970s and 80s. The SVD was one of the first rifles designed and built exclusively for sniping. Other nations have, and still do, modify sporting rifles for sniping. The 7.62mm, ten pound Dragunov has a ten round magazine, is four feet long and, even with crap ammo, is very accurate out to 600 meters. Saddam has several hundred trusted Sunni Arabs trained to use the Dragunovs, but few of these guys have been encountered.
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