Despite his high age for a soldier, 58-year-old Vyacheslav Kovalskiy has retained exceptional eyesight. This Ukrainian, former businessman, now a "sniper" within a counter-espionage unit of the Ukrainian security service, the famous SBU, is said to have broken the world record for long-range shooting on a battlefield on 18 November, by eliminating a Russian soldier at the end of the war. 12,470 feet, or exactly 3800 meters. The Wall Street Journal, which was able to interview the man who is now considered a war hero in Kiev, also analyzed the video of the shooting taken by the Ukrainian unit, which also made the rounds in the Ukrainian media. "I think the Russians will now know that we are capable of this. Let them stay at home and be afraid," the Ukrainian sniper told the American media.
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Many of the data taken from this filmed sequence are consistent with the Ukrainian claim, but the New York daily specifies at the same time that this "record" cannot be confirmed with certainty, as some ballistics experts have expressed doubts at the sight of the images. The previous record was set in 2017, when a Canadian sniper shot from a distance of 3540,4 metres in Iraq. Nevertheless, even higher records were set during training, especially by French people. A warrant officer of the 4150th Fighter Regiment hit a target 2016,4210 metres away in <>, with the Russians claiming an unrivalled record of <>,<> metres the following year. But these last two values have not been achieved in actual fighting.
Nine long seconds
Vyacheslav Kovalskiy and his "spotter" - the person who accompanies a "sniper" and carries out certain observations and measurements for him - were not in training. The two servicemen were in the disputed Kherson region on November 18 and were able to observe a group of five Russian soldiers cutting wood on the left bank of the Dnieper River. One of them was giving orders. It was this "officer", as the Ukrainians call it, who was the target of the sniper. In the video, the "spotter" observes the scene and gives his order to fire. Kovalskiy pulls the trigger, the shot goes off. This is followed by 9 long seconds until impact - a time consistent with the distance, analyzes a ballistics expert in the Wall Street Journal. The Russian soldier bent over and fell, while the other four soldiers fled. This is actually the second shot fired by the Ukrainian sniper, the first having missed its target, reports the American daily.
At this distance, such a feat actually looks more like artillery fire, with a parabolic trajectory. Of course, you have to take into account the distance, but also the temperature, the humidity level, the wind speed and even the curvature of the earth. Thus, at the end of his clever calculations, Vyacheslav Kovalskiy had to shoot 100 meters above his target. "For marksmanship, there are so many variables that are hard to quantify that in reality, anything over about 1300,12 yards is more a matter of luck than skill," Steve Walsh, a former Marine Corps sniper instructor, told the WSJ. Brad Millard adds in the article of the American daily that at this distance, the Ukrainians cannot be certain that the shot was deadly. "He had no chance of surviving," Kovalskiy said, referring to the speed of the bullet and its caliber (7.<> mm).
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For the Ukrainians, the "sniper" is not the only hero of this deadly record, because the weapon used is also partly Ukrainian. This is the MCR Horizon's Lord sniper rifle, which is 1.82 meters long and weighs a whopping 16.7 kilograms. A partially Ukrainian weapon because the barrel, on the other hand, is made in the United States while the scope is Japanese.
It will probably never be known with absolute certainty whether the Ukrainian sniper actually broke a world record, but history is nonetheless crucial for Ukrainians plagued by doubt in the winter of 2023. The summer counteroffensive was a failure, even President Zelensky was forced to admit that the "expected results" had not been "achieved". Meanwhile, Western arms aid is drying up dangerously amid a political crisis in the United States, where Republicans in Congress are still opposed, at this stage, to voting a new package of support for Kiev. In Europe, the target of one million rounds of ammunition delivered in 2023 will not be reached, the German defence minister recently announced. And that's not all: Russian forces are pressing their adversary all along the front line, including in Avdiivka and Bakhmut in the Donetsk region. This is not the time for collapse in Ukraine, but concern is growing in Kiev, where internal political divisions are emerging.
Boosting Ukrainian morale
In this difficult context, maintaining the morale of the troops and the population appears to be a priority. Vyacheslav Kovalskiy's achievement, if true, will not change the situation on the ground, but it will boost Ukrainian morale, in the same way that the myth of the "ghost of Kyiv" at the beginning of the war galvanized the country. In hindsight, however, the story of the distinguished pilot flying over the Ukrainian capital aboard his MiG-29 had turned out to be greatly exaggerated. One can also think of the Soviet "snipers" during the Second World War, particularly highlighted by war propaganda. In particular, Vasily Zaitsev, known for killing 225 German soldiers during the Battle of Stalingrad. On February 22, 1943, he was elevated to the dignity of "Hero of the Soviet Union." While he is particularly known for having been depicted - partly fictionally - in the film Stalingrad, it was another Soviet, Ivan Sidorenko, who was the most successful sniper, with 500 claimed victims. Nearly 2000,<> women were also "snipers" in uniform with the red star during World War II.
Warrior figures evolve along with technology. In Ukraine, drone operators are thus mythologized, as their machines saturate the sky, dumping hollow charge grenades on armored vehicles and artillery pieces. Since November, in their war propaganda, Russian media and bloggers, with videos to back it up, have been worshipping a Russian soldier called "Uday", a drone operator in the Kupiansk region, who is said to have killed 19 Ukrainian soldiers and wounded 200 others in 300 days, although this cannot be independently confirmed. With each new conflict, war heroes are renewed.
