Book Review: Desert Sniper by Ed Nash

Desert Sniper follows British citizen turned YPG/SDF foreign fighter volunteer through his experiences fighting with the SDF in Syria during 2015-2016. Ed was motivated by his desire to go and fight an enemy that none of the world seemed to care too much about fighting, which at that was the so-called Islamic State. Once he got into northeastern land mass in Syria known as Rojava, he actually became a sniper for the SDF, supporting SDF infantrymen in such campaigns as Hasaka, Shidaddi, and finally in Minbij where he ended his service in Syria.

What makes Desert Sniper an important and thorough perspective on the experience with fighting against the Islamic State is that Ed is older, educated, well-traveled, and well-versed in conventional military subjects despite not serving himself. This allows for Ed to step a few feet back in the book at many junctions and make intelligent assessments and observations of anything from the geopolitical scale such as when videos leaked of SDF fighters shooting Javelin anti-tank missiles at Isis suicide bombers that caused discomfort in Turkey to certain attitudes among the Kurdish YPG when it came to small unit tactics while under fire.

Unfortunately for Ed, his return to the United Kingdom was met with charges of terrorism despite his actions against some of the worst terrorists the world has seen. This is a common trend among many countries these days which is truly sad in many ways. It is as if the United States and the EU seem to have this concept of having a monopoly in fighting evil.

But for us at Silah Report, Ed leaves behind a number of valuable observations in regards to the small arms in use among the SDF. We’ll go through a number of them here.

In reference to DShK and ZPU employment, Ed writes this on Page 82-

“Dushkas come in a range of calibres, but their use is worthy of more detailed description. The gunners take great care to reload them a single round at a time, as these weapons were intended for accurate re rather than hosing down the horizon. The gunner would carefully adjust his aim depending on the fall of shot until it was on target. The dushkas might have been based upon anti-aircraft guns, yet they were quite effective as a support weapon in the sort of war we were waging. They were certainly better than heavier weapons we had available, which suffered from the crews not being able to train properly because of a lack of ammunition.”

He mentions “Dushkas” in the plural. This is backed up by conversations with SDF fighters in Syria where ZPUs are referred to as a “Dushka Arba-Tash-o- Nus”, or Dushka fourteen and a half in Arabic in reference to the 14.5mm cartridge.

In perhaps one of the odder terms of small arms terminology being indigenously altered is reference by the YPG to the forward assist of an M16A2 or M16A4 rifle as the “Sniper Button” on page 65.

“The YPG, however, refused to accept this. at some point they had been told that the forward assist was, in fact, a sniper button. If you wanted a bullet to have more velocity and accu- racy you pushed the button while ring. In my time there I explained continually that this wasn’t the case. Countless other foreign volunteers, many former soldiers with an inti- mate knowledge of the gun, would do the same. On several occasions I broke the weapon down, showing exactly how the forward assist worked. Nothing doing. The YPG’s train- ing taught them it was a sniper button, and nothing would convince them otherwise. I suspect that at some early point in the organisation’s history an M16 had fallen into their hands. Some self-proclaimed expert had taken it upon himself to explain the weapon and, when asked what the bolt assist did, had made up the sniper button story.”

This is one of the more bizarre passages but fits perfectly with what the YPG had become during the fighting against the Islamic State. One half-baked theory behind this is if by placing a shooters thumb on the forward assist during the firing cycle it does relieve pressure on the left side of the receiver as is a technique commonly done within many precision rifle circles in the United States.

On Page 247 he talks about employing the 14.5mm Şer Portative, made from ZPU barrels-

“The new Şer Portative performed perfectly and we realised that the first model must have had some manufacturing defects. The new bullets also proved to be a boon. The armour-piercing rounds would punch clean through the thick concrete walls and supports – I could see the splinters and dust showers that each threw up in the rooms we were targeting – but the high explosive really escalated our impact. Though the tarp obscured most of the entrance we could see into the top of the loading bay. The ash of the explosive rounds when they impacted was very large, like a grenade going off, anyone sheltering in there would be having a really bad time.”

In addition to describing the weapon system itself on Page 242-

‘“It’s a baby Şer!’ I exclaimed.

‘It’s a Şer Portative,’ the commander told me. ‘We have been given it for testing.’

I had seen the Şer 14.5mm heavy rifles at the sniper tabor before they had been withdrawn from service. This new weapon had the unmistakable thick barrel of the Şer, but was much shorter, capable of being carried and used by one man if necessary. The Russian 12.7mm round is a powerful projectile, but the 14.5mm really raised the stakes. What we had was a one-man cannon!

The original Şer was a brute that needed two men to carry it and was meant to kick pretty hard. They also tended to destroy the scopes in about twenty shots or so. If such a beast could be a handful, how would this sawn-off version com- pare?”

Conversations with SDF fighters reveal that the word Portative is also used to describe anything collapsed or in a smaller variant such as an M4 being compared to an M16A2. Also, this technique of blasting through thinner building walls was used to great effect by Ed’s sniper team.