The antagonist is the Free State sniper lying on the opposite roof. I shot right straight through his scope, didn't touch the sides. The protagonist in the short story The Sniper is the rebel sniper stationed on a rooftop near the OConnell Bridge. When Hathcock tracked him down, he didn't miss: 'I was just quicker on the trigger, otherwise he would have killed me. Over the course of four tours, Kyle fights a number of vicious AQI operatives, including a Syrian sniper named Mustafa that serves as Kyle's foil, as well as another guy nicknamed The Butcher. The Cobra took a shot at Hathcock and his partner, but only blew a hole in Hathcock's partner's canteen. To achieve that end, the Cobra began murdering Marines in hopes of luring Hathcock into the open. Not a lot is known about who the man actually was, but Amr Salama. But he's most remembered for a duel with a dude called the Cobra.įor context, the North Vietnamese had placed a $30,000 bounty on Hathcock's head, and the Cobra intended to collect. The character, which American Sniper called Mustafa, is based on an actual top Iraqi sniper who the US military called Juba. According to Hathcock, his greatest shot dropped a woman named Apache who delighted in torturing Marines. But if I didn't get the enemy, they were going to kill the kids over there.' Even so, there were a few lives he eagerly ended.

As he put it: 'You'd have to be crazy to enjoy running around the woods, killing people. Despite his knack for long-range homicide, Hathcock saw death as an odious necessity rather than a goal.

Mustafa sniper