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Jim Parks
He Needed Someone to Tell Him
The child swung from the sniper's wrists, played with his hands,
peeked at me from between tiny fingers in the VA hospital waiting
room.
"Are you this many?" I held up four fingers.
The sniper looked on from behind wrap-around shades and a frayed
baseball cap.
Some 1,000-yard kill shots climb five feet, then drop vertically on
target. Permission is never granted to fire the .50 at little kids
carrying weapons in pillow cases to insurgents who wait for them at
ambush points.
"Do you think I did the right thing?"
I said, "Yes."
He looked at the little girl; then he smiled.
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