# Female snipers **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 13, 2005, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100 "2005-10-13T17:37:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/21 "2005-10-14T12:47:19Z")
I would suggest this whole “men are better at X, women are better at Y” line of thinking is really only useful for fairly mainstream & low-training tasks. When you’re talking about a skill that only one in a thousand people can be taught to do adequately, I’d suggest that the effects of the person’s 1-in-1000 individuality will swamp the effects of their 1-in-2 gender. As you get waay out to the who’s the best sniper , best astronaut, etc., in the WHOLE world, you might run into issues where gender again appears. e.g. the best American football offensive center is always going to be male becasue of the size required to be the best. As to sniper or astronaut it’s not obvious what biological feature would both a) confer the decisive advantage and b) be strongly sexually dimorphic. IMHO, to assert that “The very best X peson in the world is male/female, so therefore males/females are better suited for being X’s in general” is simply not logically defendable. It’s faulty logic even more than it’s faulty biology. ---
**Author:** ![Chairman\_Pow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/838e76/32.png) [@Chairman\_Pow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chairman_Pow)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/22 "2005-10-14T13:27:40Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > I would suggest this whole “men are better at X, women are better at Y” line of thinking is really only useful for fairly mainstream & low-training tasks. I don’t see how, “who makes better shift managers at McDonald’s, men or women” is any different. The first part of answering to the OP is determining if a valid comparison can be made. > [@](#): > > When you’re talking about a skill that only one in a thousand people can be taught to do adequately, I’d suggest that the effects of the person’s 1-in-1000 individuality will swamp the effects of their 1-in-2 gender. Shouldn’t we be able to figure some rudimentary statistics for comparison even if our samples are only 1 in 1000? How about, “only one in 1000 McDonald’s workers make it to shift managers, it’s useless to compare men to women in this regard.” > [@](#): > > As you get waay out to the who’s the best sniper , best astronaut, etc., in the WHOLE world, you might run into issues where gender again appears. e.g. the best American football offensive center is always going to be male becasue of the size required to be the best. As to sniper or astronaut it’s not obvious what biological feature would both a) confer the decisive advantage and b) be strongly sexually dimorphic. Obviously, men make better linebackers because of their size and strength when looking at elite individuals. Sniping is an equal-opportunity profession. IMHO, to assert that “The very best X peson in the world is male/female, so therefore males/females are better suited for being X’s in general” is simply not logically defendable. It’s faulty logic even more than it’s faulty biology. [/QUOTE] Nobody’s said this though. The question was phrased in the plural. While examples of superior individuals have been cited, no one has taken those statistical extremes as basis for proof. Conversely, IIRC the USMC sniper (male) who is widely considered to be the best (name escapes me, he’s got a book out) has about 60 kills. Granted, I think those were likely more impressive than the two women mentioned above (i.e. this guy was sent into an area essentially on his own to get one high profile target vs. shooting Nazis swarming over the countryside), so perhaps defining their performance in terms of raw numbers isn’t the best metric. I also recall a Finnish guy who killed 300ish Soviet soldiers during and after WWII. ---
**Author:** ![BF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/b5ac83/32.png) [@BF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BF)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/23 "2005-10-14T16:21:26Z")
[Carlos Hathcock](http://www.navysealteams.com/hathcock.htm). 93 confirmed kills. ---
**Author:** ![kushiel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbce88/32.png) [@kushiel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kushiel)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/24 "2005-10-14T17:37:14Z")
> [@Der Trihs](#): > > Hey ! It was also mentioned in the video game _Metal Gear Solid_; with two such references, it _must_ be true ! I was waiting for someone to bring up Sniper Wolf! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![FlightlessBird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/cdc98d/32.png) [@FlightlessBird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlightlessBird)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/25 "2005-10-14T18:52:55Z")
A little bit of a hijack, but let’s look at a sport that deals with some of the same aspects as shooting. Consistency and patience. I like the poster above who mentioned checking out biatheletes. But what about pool? For some on fathomable reason men are better at pool then women. I don’t have a cite, but when I used to play a lot of pool the top men would always be better than the top women. Now I see that there’s a different association for Women and Men. Why would this be? it can’t be that men are stronger. In pool, only one shot counts strength, and when you’re playing a more classical game (straight pool, billiards) there is no break, so why the difference in success? ---
**Author:** ![FordPrefect](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e99b99/32.png) [@FordPrefect](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FordPrefect)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/26 "2005-10-14T19:23:13Z")
> [@Crandolph](#): > > I believe modern military snipers now mainly work in teams of two. Not sure how that might affect things though. Now I have visions of hot girl on girl sniper action while waiting for the target to appear… ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/27 "2005-10-14T21:16:27Z")
From Wikipedia : > [@](#): > > Simo Häyhä (December 17, 1906 – April 1, 2002) of Finland is regarded by many as the most effective sniper in the history of warfare. Using a relatively primitive Mosin-Nagant Model 28, Häyhä sniped 542 Soviet Union soldiers in the Winter War between November 30, 1939 and March 6, 1940, when he was seriously wounded. Sulo Kolkka was also a Finnish sniper during the Winter War who sniped approximately 400 Russians, as well as killing another 200 with a submachinegun. Finnish snipers were called cuckoos by Russians because they mistakenly thought the Finnish snipers were located in trees. At the end of the Winter War a Soviet general is said to have bitterly remarked, “We gained 57,000 km² (22,000 square miles) of territory. Just enough to bury our dead.” > Vasily Zaitsev was a sniper who burst into fame during the Battle of Stalingrad, credited with sniping 242 German soldiers. He became a folk hero for his bravery at Stalingrad and for killing the German master sniper instructor Major Thorvald, in an extended sniper-countersniper duel. However, there are debates as to whether Thorvald actually existed, or was the invention of Soviet propaganda writers. Zaitsev was the main subject in the movie Enemy at the Gates, a fictionalized account of sniper-warfare in the Battle of Stalingrad. Lyudmila Pavlichenko was a female Ukrainian sniper with 309 confirmed kills during World War II. > Gunnery Sergeant Carlos Hathcock of the United States Marine Corps sniped 93 confirmed kills of North Vietnamese soldiers and Viet Cong guerrillas during the Vietnam war. He is the subject of two biographies, Marine Sniper and Silent Warrior. > Delta Force snipers Gary Gordon and Randy Shughart were both killed in action during the Battle of Mogadishu. It is estimated that together they shot over 100 Somalis. Both men received the Medal of Honor, posthumously, for their actions. > The longest-ever recorded and confirmed sniper kill was made by Master Corporal Arron Perry of the Canadian Forces in Afghanistan during combat in 2003. Using a .50-caliber (12.7 mm) MacMillan TAC-50 rifle, Perry shot and killed an opposing combatant soldier from a distance of 2,430 metres(1.5 miles). ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2005, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/28 "2005-10-14T23:23:08Z")
> [@Cynical Optimist](#): > > As far as female snipers go, I can’t wrap my brain around the fact that [Dr. Ruth](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Westheimer) was an Israeli sniper. I love learning semi-random neat things like that. Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![WVBrady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/74df32/32.png) [@WVBrady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WVBrady)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2005, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/29 "2005-10-15T00:45:57Z")
“As far as female snipers go, I can’t wrap my brain around the fact that Dr. Ruth was an Israeli sniper.” FWIW, Simo Häyhä and Vasily Zeitzef were both little guys. Both of them remarked that one reason they became snipers was that the officers thought that they were too little to be good, regular soldiers. I am not sure how big Carlos Hathcock was, but I know that he was very thin. As another aside, there were reported to have been about 2000 Soviet women snipers during WWII. Only about 500 survived the war. "While at basic training we were told by our Drill Sgts that women are easier to train because the “normal” woman hasn’t handled a gun, and is willing to listen and try what is tought. The men mostly have shot weapons, and tend to think they are “the best shot in the world” so first they have to break the bad habits before building up the better ones. If this is the case then it wouldn’t be that women are better, but that people that haven’t handled weapons before are just easier to train. -Otanx " I suspect that the Drill Sgts were trying to use psychology on you to try to get you to follow directions. It certainly doesn’t jibe with the examples of Vasiliy Zeitsev (deer hunter from remote area), Carlos Hathcock (already an established target shot and hunter from the mid-west), Alvin York (hunter and local target shot from the hills of Tennesee), Audey Murphy (subsistence hunter for his family in rural Texas). In a similar vein, Chuck Yeager (Hamlin, WVa 🙂 ) said that of the enemy aircraft shot down in WWII by American pilots, about 90% of the enemy planes were shot down by about 10% of American pilots and all of these 10% were country boys, who had grown up shooting guns. Brady ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [October 15, 2005, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100/30 "2005-10-15T14:10:52Z")
successful (as in more-than-once-and-living-to-tell-the-tale) sniping depends more on fieldcraft than shooting ability. Country-living candidates will have an advantage there. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/female-snipers/326100.md?page=1)