White Tights (Mythical Female Snipers)

[Raellus]

I'd never heard of these ladies before but apparently this is a persistent urban legend circulating through the Russian armed forces since the late '80s. I saw a reference to these "white tights" in a pulp mythology book while browsing at the book store. A google search turned this up:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Tights

Anyone heard about these chickss before?

Could make for an interesting T2K encounter/NPC/or femme munchkin PC. Normal PCs could use this myth to their advantage. I dunno. Just thought I'd post it here and see what else comes up.

[dragoon500ly]

Never heard of these before; although in WWII I have seen claims that as many as 40% of all Russian snipers were women with some sniper units running as high as 60%.

You will also hear about tank regiments manned by women, combat records are very non-existant so this may be more of a propaganda claim.

The famous claims of aviation regiments manned by women are true, but their combat records also show that they were committed to fairly quiet sectors; they were also issued older ac designs.

There were several mortar units that were made up of women and did see combat, the handful of reports that I have seen gave them high marks.

Soviets also formed truck regiments of women, a lot of them were used in the convoying of supplies to Leningrad during the seige as well as Stalingrad during and after the battle. According to Soviet accounts, they were a hell of lot more willing to take risk in delivering supplies than the men were....

[Adm.Lee]

No, I've not heard of blond Baltic mercenary snipers. 'Twould be perfect in a Merc2k game, though! I suspect it's something like the Vietnam War-era rumors of the "Phantom Blooper," a Marine who defected to the VC and used an M79. Some Russian soldiers were shot without seeing where from, mostly head shots, and this wild tale of a super-accurate sniper takes off.

EDIT: Now I remember what this sounds like. In "Living Daylights", one of the Dalton-as-Bond flicks, the KGB general who is "defecting" set up his Czech mistress as a sniper, hoping that Bond would kill her. He tries to reinforce the concept with a line like, "Did you see that? It was a woman! KGB uses women snipers all the time!"

If it is well-known that the KGB (and Red Army and GRU) trained female snipers, and some of them are/were Olympic biathletes, and maybe some of them were Balts; then it sounds reasonable that one or more of them would be anti-Soviet, could have gone mercenary, and begun shooting at Russians.

[Matt Wiser]

Actually, the two all-female bomber units (587th and 46th Guards) were very active. 46th Guards Night Bomber Regiment were the famous "Night Witches". Half of the awards of "Hero of the Soviet Union" (anaglous to the MOH) won by women went to members of this unit. There were also female pilots spread out in other units: Il-2s for example. And the 586th Fighter Regiment boasts the only two female aces in history (so far).

There was a husband-and-wife team on an ISU-122 assault gun in 3rd Baltic Front. She was the commander, he was the driver (all-officer crew). Instead of spending their honeymoon at the divisional rest center having some...intimate time, they spent it at the front, killing Germans.

[Bullet Magnet]

Originally Posted by Matt Wiser

There was a husband-and-wife team on an ISU-122 assault gun in 3rd Baltic Front. She was the commander, he was the driver (all-officer crew). Instead of spending their honeymoon at the divisional rest center having some...intimate time, they spent it at the front, killing Germans.

How romantic.

Now, imagine if the war had gone on long enough for them to have children...the family that slays together, stays together?

[95th Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Bullet Magnet

How romantic.

Now, imagine if the war had gone on long enough for them to have children...the family that slays together, stays together?

That's a scary thought, but considering what the Germans where doing to Russia you can't blame the folks for their mentality.

[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by Matt Wiser

Actually, the two all-female bomber units (587th and 46th Guards) were very active. 46th Guards Night Bomber Regiment were the famous "Night Witches". Half of the awards of "Hero of the Soviet Union" (anaglous to the MOH) won by women went to members of this unit. There were also female pilots spread out in other units: Il-2s for example. And the 586th Fighter Regiment boasts the only two female aces in history (so far).

There was a husband-and-wife team on an ISU-122 assault gun in 3rd Baltic Front. She was the commander, he was the driver (all-officer crew). Instead of spending their honeymoon at the divisional rest center having some...intimate time, they spent it at the front, killing Germans.

Heard of them, the Night Witches flew older aircraft in interdiction and night harrassement missions. But all of the Soviet-era records that I have been able to access shows the female units posted to quieter areas of the front. This does not mean that women did not serve in other units! There are a lot of accounts of female machinegun crews, one Stalingrad account of a flamethrower team of women, and others of women serving in tank rider units and as PBI....

On the other hand, the White Tights....there is quite a bit of urban legend tied in with this group. Even the Russian sites always start off with "it is reported".

[Abbott Shaull]

Funny seeing that there fair amount of female trained Snipers going back to WWII.

If they had came from their former Republics of the Soviet Union it would be ironic. I can think of only few other job a lady could do and make decent money that are just as questionable.

[Abbott Shaull]

Besides explaining why you have your a$$ handed to you due to bunch female snipers I guess not as embarrassing as trying to explain why a supposed '2nd rate' force is stopping you.