“Package guns” are those find-them-in-WalMart type of deals where you get a rifle, an attached scope, and maybe a carry case for a set amount of money. The scope is invariably some variable of the 3-9x variety and the gun is usually a no-frills model. Theyre a nice package for someone getting their feet wet in hunting or for someone on a tight budget. But… is it any good?
The guys at 9-Hole Reviews usually work with military-use guns. In this video, they jokingly and tongue-in-cheek refer to this type of guns use in the ‘documentary’ movie ‘Red Dawn’. You don’t go to war with the guns you want, you go to war with the guns you have. How would a package gun like this acquit itself as an impromptu mid-range rifle? It acquits itself fairly well.
A standard trope of almost every ‘invasion’ book and movie is some non-military dude running around with his hunting rifle nailing invading soldiers from distance. Is it an accurate trope? Well, it’s certainly happened. Is it likely that one woodtick with a hunting rifle is going to materially stop an advance of enemy troops? Beats me. Certainly things come to a temporary halt when someone starts dropping bullets into a dismounted group of soldiers, but it doesn’t seem to stop the advance…it just delays it momentarily. But, hey, Im no expert.
The evidence, at least from this video, seems to support that a good shooter with a Tractor Supply Christmas Sale rifle can pose a reasonable threat at distance. And..doesnt everyone have a gun like this somewhere?
One person with a rifle can and has made a difference. Simo Hayha (iron sights only!) and Carlos Hathcock come to mind. Even though there were in the military they were essentially a farm kid with a rifle, many times alone. The damage done delayed and hindered the advancement of a larger force. Russian women snipers targeted German officers and messed up many an otherwise routine day to krauts dependent on being told what to do at all times.
If I remember correctly, way back in the Rev War, an old man kept riding through the woods and taking single shots at the retreating redcoats. The story says the British were demoralized and hurried their retreat back toward Boston. They did not want to fight back against the unseen sniper.
Snipers can certainly make you rethink your plans for attack. Those listed by Jimbo were legendary.
As someone who never dropped a point shooting torso-sized silhouettes with iron-sighted M-16s at 500Y, anyone who can’t at least equal that with a scoped hunting rifle should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.
As for how that’d fare against military troops at that range, bear well in mind that any decent machine gun in .30cal or better should be able to put your hide on a barn door at double that range, given enough ammo, a beaten zone, and a halfway decent gunner.
I wouldn’t plan on taking second shots from the same firing position unless you want a short but interesting life.
That’s why military sniping generally starts at 500Y, and expects you’ll be taking shots out to 1000Y, if you want to go on more than half a mission, with a firm reliance on you displacing before the first round hits.
When American forces were faced with well-trained Afghan snipers, the typical response was to swat those flies with 155mm artillery, or 500# bombs, and the contest was usually a decisive defeat for the sniper.
Unless one has huge tactical superiority vs. Turd World troops, or operates in urban or wooded/jungle terrain with lots of places to hide, sniping isn’t a good long-term career prospect.
Häyhä got away with it in the snow 80 years ago, but against anyone with a modern thermal sight, he’d be a footnote to a patrol report in about a day, as any 50 YouTube videos of folks shooting up coyotes and feral hogs at night will demonstrate.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sdjb-nGbkGQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yk0uvoSWA2I
I was at a 500 yard range the other day. I rang steel at 500 with both a bone stock Savage 308 and a Ruger ranch in 5.56. Did not need the 30/06. Although I have one of those as well
Against modern military with thermal equipped drones?
As the squad level drones have limited battery range, a pretty good chance none are airborne so that first shot is your best.
Better as Aesop said be moving on and I’d add a decent idea how to defeat thermals.
Against thugs, knocking out the leadership is pretty good. Still need the shoot and scoot going.
every time I see a video of a drone attack, I wonder why someone with a 10ga goose gun isn’t lobbing lead at it
Jimbo. while I’m not much of a skeet shooter myself, a few of us pooled some cash for a cheap Walmart quadcopter and tried it out.
First, we got good at flying it. Kind of fun. Then we Macgyvered a drop system and played around with dropping a Paintball on a target about the size of an open tank commanders hatch. Stationary doable but that drone would have been almost in the Commanders face.
We rigged a RC Big Wheel car with a cardboard target of the tank commanders hatch for movement. Nearly impossible to hit even moving fairly slowly.
And finally, we decided sadly to do the Skeet thing on it.
Was amazingly HARD to hit as the copter driver was doing slashing curved flights at us.
BTW Burst radii of an RPG armed first person done EXCEEDS the range a heavy shot turkey shot downed that copter.
You might shoot it down but will be killed anyway.
Drones especially thermal equipped ones are a problem.
There’s a place for a scoped low-priced “hunting” rifle, but it’s not as a substitute for a “proper” military sniping rifle.
Rather, it’s in the low intensity conflict response to occupation. Think Nazis in western Europe or Red Dawn. And it’s not for use against uniformed soldiers (for the most part) it’s as a weapon to eliminate the collaborators and politicians who enable a successful occupation, and the secret police and commissars who have to move among the population semi-covertly with only light weapons.
Trying to play at being Simo Hayha against a platoon-sized patrol will net you — maybe — one or two kills. And then a drone or a JDAM or a midnight delivery of a dozen door-kickers will eliminate you.
The “hunting rifle” is for the mayor of the little town in Red Dawn. For the staff of the “Friendship Center.” For the “good citizen making the best of a bad situation” who provides information to the occupiers’ forces and their local helpers. Not while they’re in public. In the back, while they’re alone and walking home from the grocery or dropping their kids off at school.
And one should be far more concerned about the forensic trail that is left behind than with the ability to make a headshot at 900m. The rifle for this role is disposable, One good shot, then it’s dumped. So you’ll want more than one of them. “Sterilized”: no paper trail of any sort. Serial numbers thoroughly removed so they can’t be recovered by X-rays or acid etching. Taken down completely and cleaned to remove any fingerprints, any DNA, and hairs or fibers that could serve as evidence. Then stored in a clean container until needed — to be handled only while wearing gloves and clothing that will blend in with the locals while minimizing the chances of leaving trace evidence.
Same goes for ammunition, though you won’t need much of it for each disposable rifle. Factory fresh common off-the-shelf stuff that will never be touched with bare hands. Fingerprints will etch brass cartridge cases and the\se etched cases can and have been used to identify shooters, not just in civilian crime but on the battlefield as well.
Discipline. Strong enough to pass over rewarding “high value target” shots if there’s any chance of you being identified. A dead collaborator or even a senior commissar is not worth the loss of a shooter. Especially when the shooter will be identifiable and thus provide the means to identify and roll-up an entire active cell.
Pardon me but a sterile disposable rifle. For collaborators?
Last time I heard that was a Mack Bolen novel.
Ok, how are you going to zero that rifle? Any decent range shot will need more than a borescope zero.
Concerned about DNA, a good thing. BTW are you aware that YOU are shedding DNA everywhere you go? If they are Interested Enough to go full CSI on you then area DNA swabs will be used.
Wearing Clean Room type clothing to prevent that might make you NOT looking like a “local”.
I’d be far more concerned about the near constant cameras around the area. Even if too far away (maybe given High Def being really common now a days) the route you took leaving and the cameras I’d use to track that route is a problem.
But I’m sure your get away vehicle is also sterilized… As is the second one and so on.
I’d be concerned that someone who was just around the area, looking out the window would see you and get a reward for turning you in. Commies have always rewarded snitches.
If you drop a collaborator or even more “exciting” a Commissar you’re never going back to your “normal Joe Job”. No hospital staffer by day avenging angel at night.
I’d have to figure a much better choice for collaborators would be a sharp knife in a quiet alley, or perhaps as much as a good silenced .22 automatic pistol with multiple options for caching it for later retrieval.
And while a dead collaborator is a good lesson, so is one limping for life after a non-lethal kneecapping.
Some people and some deeds merit capital punishment, but the sight of the local would-be quisling limping up the road every step for every single day would speak thundering volumes about the error of treasonous dealings with the enemy.
You kill leaders.
But making pawns switch sides? Without the enemy finding out until it’s too late? That’s priceless.
Not a Mack Bolan fan.
But I am a student of history, and of insurgency/counterinsurgency in particular.
Collaborators have always been a much greater threat to a resistance movement than run of the mill occupation troops. The French resistance in WW II faced more danger from the Milice than from the Wehrmacht. Likewise the IRA from the RUC and “B Special” part-time constabulary rather than the British Army (including the SAS).
How will such a rifle be zeroed? Same as any other rifle. Then cleaned and packed away with a box of ammo in a secure cache location until needed.
If it comes to the point where there are collaborators and commissars in need of shooting, it’s safe to say that the days of “Normal Joe” life are long over.
And snitches will be getting more than stitches at that point. Informing will be — must be — a capital crime in such circumstances.
Aesop’s points about knives and silenced .22s are valid, but outside the scope of a discussion about “package guns.”
If we’re broadening the discussion of hardware, some quite unpleasant things have been done with mason’s hammers and electric drills. The Royal Victoria Hospital in Belfast became a world leader in orthopedic surgery as a result of such actions. With good surgical care only about 20% of recipients will be permanently disabled.
I notice that you didn’t address the CSI issue of YOU dropping DNA all around in your counter snitches efforts. You DID bring it up in your sanitized thoughts friend.
If you get the powers that BE THAT Interested in your efforts, then full CSI efforts will be in play. AREA SWABS it’s a thing, looks a lot like a vacuum cleaner BTW as I’ve seen them in action.
THAT’S why I mentioned sanitizing rifles to be Disposable wasn’t going to let you live a go to work normal life.
Nor did you address the effects of near constant surveillance in our modern world, nor the factor that someone looking out the window with one of those ubiquitous cell phones (with HD Cameras) in your attempts to do the snitch.
Aesop has it right, when we get to the American “Time “O Troubles” sterilizing your to be disposed of rifles isn’t worth the squeeze.
BTW for those who think turning off your cellphone or even “pulling the battery” is a successful option. Just last week in my buddies Search and Rescue effort they PINGED a “dead battery” cellphone to locate a young lady.
Seems the aux battery inside the cellphone that keeps its clock working can do the PING.
We’ve done the same thing with modern vehicles that have OnStar, Syris music and so on.
And that’s CIVILIAN S&R tech.
With all the advancements in cordless drills, I imagine tooling someone these days would a breeze. Just remember to bring a spare battery. Imagine the mortification if your provo buddies had the guy restrained and your Dewalt was as dead as non swimming texan.
To me this just re-enforces the Jeff Cooper ‘Scout rifle’ concept. Sufficient power, sufficient range and no fripperies.