Re:Tricks of Trench Warfare (2020)
by spywaregorilla on Monday June 14, 2021 @11:11AM
(#27503516)
Hmm, I'm not militarily experienced obviously, so I'm not going to push this any more. I guess my last statement is that I believe you're correct, but it still seems like the creation of an additional system to safely designate a calibration target would be beneficial, especially to the side. Giving away your position sounds more error prone.
Other comments about what calibrating actually means seem to have filled in that missing intuition though.
Are your questions also coming from a standpoint of modern tech. such that a sniper could accurately measure range using a modern rangefinder?
This was circa the 1916-1918 time-frame. Modern range finding equipment did not exist, and what did exist at the time very likely required someone carrying a rather large range finding target over to the enemy lines to use to determine range (with the obvious negative result to that poor individual).
With no easy way to determine range (distance to target) beyond eyeball estimates, the only real way to sight in the sniper rifle was by taking test shots at a target and watching where one's bullet actually lands as compared to that target.
The entire setup of an army, all its communication mechanisms, and systems of control and safety measures, are focused on telling you about what is happening forward along the axis.
Trying to figure out if it's safe to fire backwards is going to be massively error-prone as nobody is set up to tell you this and asking it is going to cause massive confusion.
Also, you can hit things that you can't see, with ricochet and fall of shot.