I was talking with Harvey about my Will it GURPS of the Kennedy assassination and she asked if the shot was really hard or not.
One thing I expressed was the distances weren't terribly long for a rifle.
I reminded her of the time we spent on a 100 yard range once and said, "that's as far away as Kennedy ever got from Oswald."
She said, "that was pretty long..."
I replied, "But did I have any trouble hitting with my Springfield?"
"Oh!" she said.
The difference in elevation and the movement of the car are complications, but not insurmountable ones.
It's moderately difficult, not impossible.
It is within the skill set of most hunters.
The actual range, I am informed, was 88 yards. That's less than the length of a football field. About any decently-trained rifle shot (and Oswald had been, let us not forget, a Marine---and Marines are specifically trained in riflery) could have done it.
ReplyDeleteIt still gerfs me that there are people in the Gun Community that act like hitting someone at over 50 yards with a rifle is um-possible. Geez, there are people that use slug-guns and hit targets at 100 yards over open sights.
ReplyDeleteAs has been repeatedly noted, Oswald's Marine training means the shots were not impossible. Also as often noted, many hunters take game that is moving faster at further distances. As you say, moderately difficult, certainly not impossible or even improbable.
ReplyDeleteBack in those days semi-sporterized military surplus rifles like Oswald's were commonly used by hunters to good result. The Carcano is a more than good enough rifle, it was a pretty popular choice in those circles back then. Accurate enough and certainly fast enough action to get off that many shots. I've got a couple of Carcanos and I think I could probably make those shots. I think I could probably even do it with something like a Mosin Nagant M44, which is a balkier action than the Carcano. I'm guessing that Oswald probably spent some time practicing somewhere as well as he planned his location and knew what the distances would be. A Marine or a hunter would do both and we don't know that Oswald wasn't a hunter in addition to being a Marine. Not much is talked about his background other than being an ex-marine and having defected to the USSR for a while.
-swj