more on scopes



Well as I have said before I must be clairvoyant as last week I had
just posted my views on the use of telescope sights both for hunting
and in regards to the purchase of the "gimmick scope".

This months "Precision Shooting Magazine" has an article by Author Roy
Chandler that has been training snipers since 1952 and whose views on
telescopic sights just happened to mirror much of my own experience in
the hunting and target shooting fields.

Chandler roundly condemns both the cheap variable power scope and the
"gimmick scope" just exactly as I have and for the very same reasons.
Chandler acknowledges that the cheap variable power does indeed change
point of impact and the "gimmick scopes" like the 'Mil-dot" scopes
(that are usually very expensive in the upper end scope lines) are
totally worthless in actual use. Here I agree 100 per cent with
Chandler. Lets face facts when you are half frozen and hanging off
the side of a mountain, tired cold and hungry the last thing in the
world you are going to be able to do is the metal gymnastics required
of the Mil-dot Scope.

Chandler has similar views as he states that using gimmick scopes and
then changing point of impact by cranking on the adjustment knobs will
result often in the user failing to change the scope setting back to
its original zero. I concur as out in the field I never change my
sight setting in scopes when the wind comes up or I shoot farther than
my scope is set for.

Both Chandler and I know that hits in the field whether in the field
of hunting or combat often result in very little time available for
quickly aiming and shooting making fiddling around with a "gimmick
scope" an absolute exercise in futility. The new gimmick Shepherd
scope with four different adjustments and 8 cross hairs really takes
the cake in ridiculousness.

As I have said before, when hunting varmints and especially big game I
have always either had a low power fixed scope or in the case of my
using a variable scope had it set at its lowest power and very seldom
did I ever have the need or the desire to crank it up.

Chandler and I both know the futility of using gimmick scopes in the
field and that hits in the field come from field experience both in
relation to advanced rifleman skills and the ability to estimate
distance, windage and mirage, not from relying on a machine to do it
for you and quickly as enemy soldiers and big game animals do not
stand around stock still in picturesque poses, rather they tend often
to move around and many times very quickly, giving you no time to do
the metal gymnastics of a mil-do scope or start cranking the four
different adjustments found on the new Shephard gimmick scope.

Chandler's article covers the U.S. militaries use of the lower power
fixed scopes of WWII to the Redfield variable power 3x9 of Viet-Nam
and the advantages and disadvantages of both.

Chandler discusses the use by Europeans of the fixed lower power
combat snipers scopes as opposed to the U.S. current use of the higher
10 power fixed scope and the advantages of and disadvantages of both
philosophies AND HOW BOTH EUROPEAN AND U.S. PHILOSPHIES ARE WRONG.


He would like to see a return to the lower power variable military
scope of no more than 10 power. Why? In observing a man standing at
1,000 yards (way beyond the skills of most military snipers) the man
will appear as being no more than 100 yards away so why go beyond a 10
power scope. Makes a lot of sense to me. The variable power could
also be turned down to low power to assist the sniper in his own
defense when suddenly attacked at close range.

Again this makes sense to me as my own use of low power scopes in
big game hunting enabled me to take very quick shots a game that was
often only off the end of my gun barrel. The 1 power Leupold scope I
bought having an astronomical wide field of view at right off the end
of the gun barrel ranges.

As an aside in WWII on the Russian front that employed perhaps more
snipers than any other conflict in history proved that in sniping the
ranges were as a rule very close and often as close as 25 yards, not
the Hollywood movie ranges of 1,000 yards and beyond. Long range
sniping skills are often not the hallmark of the average military
sniper as if you are not a trained rifleman before you go into the
military the military does not have the time or money to change you
into another Carlos Hath*** by any means.

I might mention that once I had the shocking experience to compete in
several rifle matches with a Viet-Nam sniper who I soundly beat in
every match I entered with him. Again this disproved the myth of the
"super trained and invincible Hollywood movie type military sniper".
Some of them need all the help they can get and giving them less than
optimum equipment really makes no sense, but try and tell that to the
Neanderthals that procure weapons for the military. If the military
had any real knowledgeable experts on weapons out there we would have
never got stuck with the Remington M40 either, but that's another
shocking subject for another time.


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