Granted, going a few years without practice will degrade a shooters ability to fire accurately at 500 yards. But at ranges under 100 yards?
Question:
Where is the evidence that shooters who can hit a target at 200, 300 or 500 yards, if they go four years with just a little practice, won't be able to hit a target at under 100 yards?
If you cannot provide any, than you obviously don't know much about military sharpshooters.
. . .
Of course. No answer to my question. Jack cannot provide any evidence to support this claim that someone's ability to hit a person, even at ranges under 100 yards, would greatly diminish within a few years of not practicing, even if they had the ability to shoot accurately at 200, 300 or 500 yards.
But can I meet the same sort of challenge? Find an example of someone's skill not going downhill after more than a year of no shooting practice?
Yes. And I don't have to go far in time or distance from Dallas, 1963.
The Texas Tower Shooting by Charles Whitman in 1966,
Charles Whitman was trained in the Marines and had a very similar rating to Oswald. He scored 215 (close to Oswald's 212) in his Marine's marksmen test and like Oswald was rated at the level of "Sharpshooter". Like Oswald, he had shown he could hit a human size target at 200, 300 and 500 yards.
Whitman left the Marines in December 1964. The Texas Tower shooting occurred in August 1966, a year in a half later. Oswald had been out of the Maines for four years in 1963.
How well did Whitman shoot? Unfortunately, very well. He killed 15 people and wounded 31. The longest range in which he killed someone was 500 yards. His ability to shoot accurately was not diminished by his lack of practice over the course of one and a half years.
Someone tried to take him out with a rifle fired from an airplane. Whitman managed to hit the aircraft twice before the aircraft wisely moved out of range. Even though Whitman, like Oswald, only practiced at hitting stationary targets, he was still able to hit a flying airplane. So it is no surprise that Oswald was able to hit a moving limousine which travelled at 13 mph or less during the Dealey Plaza shooting.
Of course there are some differences. Whitman bought a new and better quality rifle. But still, the Carcano rifle was certainly adequate, using the iron sights, at ranges under 100 yards.
Oswald had been out of the Marines for four years, whereas Whitman was out for only one and a half years.
On the other hand, Oswald had his rifle for over six months and had some opportunity to fire it in practice. Indeed, his wife said he did that. Whitman, in contrast, and just bought his rifle that morning and had no chance to practice with it before he started shooting from the tower.
I have no experience with shooting rifles. But my guess would be, if an experienced rifle shooter was entering a shooting contest, at targets less than 100 yards away, he would choose a Carcano rifle which he had experience with over a more expensive rifle that he had no experience with.
