‘American Sniper’ Kyle would ‘shrug and laugh’ at critics

Paul Moseley/AP Jim DeFelice told the Day after day News that former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle would be ‘laughing off’ evaluation of the movie based on his life and time in Iraq and afterward.

Former Navy SEAL Chris Kyle would be “laughing off” the evaluation of “American Sniper” if he were alive today, so says the co-writer of his bestselling autobiography.

“He would shrug and laugh. He had no regrets about fighting. He was a fighter, just very enthusiastic about fighting and doing his job,” New York writer Jim DeFelice told the Day after day News Tuesday.

“(Kyle) was sure he was doing it right, following the rules,” DeFelice said after costs countless hours with the late Marine who served four tours in Iraq and is widely considered the most lethal sniper in U.S. military history.

“The rules of engagement he was operating under were so tight, he had the luxury of never doubting himself or second-guessing a shot. He had a bigwig looking over his shoulder the whole time,” the writer said.

DeFelice spoke to The News after the new Clint Eastwood-directed film based on his book garnered six Oscar nominations, pulled in a record-breaking $ 105 million at the box office last weekend and generated some sharp controversy.

Filmmaker Michael Moore has been one person who has spoken out objecting to cataloging Chris Jyle as a hero. ”We were taught snipers were cowards,’ Moore said on Twitter on Sunday. 

Filmmaker Michael Moore was at the front position of the debate after he used social media to question the film’s depiction of Kyle as a hero.

“My uncle killed by sniper in WW2. We were taught snipers were cowards. Will shoot u in the back. Snipers aren’t heroes. And invaders r worse,” Moore wrote on Twitter Sunday afternoon.

The “Bowling for Columbine” documentarian later used Facebook to clarify his thoughts and praise actor Bradley Cooper’s Oscar-nominated performance.

But Moore zeroed in on Eastwood, blaming the director for characters who kept “calling Iraqis ‘savages’ throughout the film,” and finished by saying he still thinks “most Americans don’t think snipers are heroes.”

DeFelice said Moore is entitled to his opinion, but that he believes Chris was a highly trained marksman who was a “target of choice” for insurgents—so he drew a disproportionately large amount of fire from armed insurgents, leading to his high body count.

“If you were fired upon, you could fire back. If someone had a rocket propelled grenade carried in a certain way, you could shoot,” DeFelice said. “You had to be doing something aggressive against an American or an Iraqi civilian to be eligible. Planting an IED (improvised explosive device) would count.”

The author, who’s now effective with Kyle’s widow Taya Kyle on a follow-up book called “American Wife,” due in May, said Kyle was anything but a rogue or a coward, serving four tours in Iraq with fellow Marines he considered his extended family.

“The only things Chris regretted—and this might sound cliché—were the two guys he couldn’t save. The ones who died as he watched in Ramadi. Those are the things that haunted him,” DeFelice said.

Kyle returned home from his last tour and was with honor discharged in 2009.

Bill Bramhall Bill Bramhall’s cartoon for January 21, 2015, which poked fun of Moore’s criticisms of the movie.

He worked with DeFelice and Scott McEwen to write “American Sniper” in his own voice and was collaborating with Cooper on the screen adaptation when he was killed by an emotionally disturbed fellow veteran with PTSD at a Texas gun range in 2013.

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