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Gazing through the telescopic sight of his M24 rifle,
Army Staff Sgt. Jim Gilliland, leader of Shadow sniper team,
fixed his eye on the Iraqi insurgent who had just killed an
American soldier. His quarry stood nonchalantly in the fourth
floor bay window of a hospital in battle torn Ramadi, still
clasping a long barreled Kalashnikov. Instinctively allowing for
wind speed and bullet drop, Shadow's commander aimed 12 feet
high. A single shot hit the Iraqi in the chest and killed him
instantly. It had been fired from a range of more than three
quarters of a mile, well beyond the capacity of the powerful
Leupold sight, accurate to 3,300 feet. "I believe it is the longest
confirmed kill in Iraq with a 7.62mm rifle," said Sgt. Gilliland,
28, who hunted squirrels in Double Springs, Ala., from the age
of 5 before progressing to deer, and then to insurgents and terrorists