The Most Deadly Sniper in American History

A young cowboy from Texas who joined the elite US Navy Seals became the most deadly sniper in American history. In a book published this month he provides an unusual insight into the psychology of a soldier who waits, watches and kills.

As US forces surged into Iraq in 2003, Chris Kyle was handed a sniper rifle and told to watch as a marine battalion entered an Iraqi town.

A crowd had come out to greet them. Through the scope he saw a woman, with a child close by, approaching his troops. She had a grenade ready to detonate in her hand.

“This was the first time I was going to have to kill someone. I didn’t know whether I was going to be able to do it, man, woman or whatever,” he says.

“You’re running everything through your mind. This is a woman, first of all. Second of all, am I clear to do this, is this right, is it justified? And after I do this, am I going to be fried back home? Are the lawyers going to come after me saying, ‘You killed a woman, you’re going to prison’?”

But he didn’t have much time to debate these questions.

“She made the decision for me, it was either my fellow Americans die or I take her out.”

He pulled the trigger.

Kyle remained in Iraq until 2009. According to official Pentagon figures, he killed 160 people, the most career sniper kills in the history of the US military. His own estimate is much higher, at 255 kills.

According to army intelligence, he was christened “The Devil” by Iraqi insurgents, who put a $20,000 (£13,000) bounty on his head.

Married with two children, he has now retired from the military and has published a book in which he claims to have no regrets, referring to the people he killed as “savages”.

Read more…

American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History

Abbey Watson: The 13-Year-Old Record-Holding Powerlifter

Bacon… The breakfast of champions!

Abbey Watson is 105.75 pounds. She can squat with 143.3 pounds. She can deadlift 176 pounds. And for these feats of strength, Watson has eight different world records and 23 U.S. and Colorado state records.

Here’s the kicker: Watson is only the eighth grade. Impressed? There’s more. Yahoo News reports, is that Watson, 13, only started weight training in this capacity three years ago.

What is the key to Watson’s success? Perhaps, it’s that bacon is her favorite food, which her coach Jonathan Sabar said would be fine in a “well-rounded paleo diet”. But Sabar’s theory is more likely:

“I think the reason Abbey is lifting weight that surpasses adults is because she‘s never been told she can’t do it.”

KUSA reports that Watson hopes to go to the Olympics for weightlifting someday.

Source…

Random Riddle

Fire
Hold your mouse over for the answer.
You may enjoy me on a summer’s night,
While other’s prefer to fight.
In many people’s homes, I am generously fed
Unless I show up uninvited.
I never stop being hungry
and consume anything that lies before me.
In fact, I am hungrier after I ate than before.
Striking me will only anger me more.
People create me.
But they won’t let me go free
Terror I often bring
For I can destroy almost anything
Many people need me to live
For the many things I give.
Although I can show you your way
You can only hope where the end of my path lay
What am I?
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