Quote Originally Posted by Schuld View Post
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The DM programs are a hodge-podge, some generated in-house (often informally run by qualified snipers or, if USAR/NG unit run someone whose regular job is as a police marksman), other COI have been run by US Army Marksmanship Unit (USAMU), by US Army Sniper School's parent command, and by various major police SWAT units for geographically collocated deploying military units. I believe some SFG(A) have made SOTIC Level II courses available to other units, in the tradition of 10th running the SHAPE International Special Training Centre Sniper for NATO. Assistance with both materiel and POI have been provided by many and various unit-contracted private-sector firms.
Hodge podge is good; no one has all the right answers. Many units also use contract training at Blackwater, Gunsite and so forth.

Many M-14s have had the cosmoline scrubbed off and an ACOG slapped on. Other units have paid to have completely remanufactured M-14s equipped with HSLD stocks and scopes.
Which is more than adequate -- most of those are used far more for their range and penetrating power rather than for their accuracy.

A Designated Marksman is nothing more than a particularly good shooter in a Squad; he is NOT a Sniper and there should be no attempt to make him one and / or to burden him with exotic gear.

I think AMTU Ft. Bragg sniper school went through 2 iterations, first in '76-'78 under Emerson,...
Who had little to do with it. Emerson, I mean. Hatchet Hank was many things, a good, much less superlative, tactical and technical guy was not one of them.

First: who you are infusing those skills into? Are they already 19D/scouts or 11B/regular infantry?
By definition.

Second: what do they need to do? Precision shooting, observational skills, penetration skills (stalking/infil/exfil methods), generalized scouting skills, intelligence-gathering skills, eclectic and wide-ranging sniper-specific skill sets (i.e.: anti-tracking, how can you use only glass and not dial? if you have M80 and not Lake City ammo how do you sort-select or even improve the issued rounds, where do you find the patterns to construct armored loophole plates and what are the methods of disguising loopholes in long-term hides, who makes the best trench periscopes, etc., etc.)....

Probably Occam's Razor is: will the DMs always be in the role of supporting the squad/platoon/company, or will the squad/platoon expect to occasionally support the DM in specialist activity? If the first, then shooting/observing, and if the second, then a low-attrition mini-scout-sniper course might be required.
They support the Squad. Period. The other things are sniper tasks.