Need help with William Manchester's description

[4v50 Gary]

I'm reading William Manchester's Goodbye Darkness: A Memoir of the Pacific War.

"Not only was he the first Japanese soldier I had ever shot at; he was the only one I had seen at close quarters. He was a robin-fat, moon-faced, roly-poly little man with his thick, stubby, trunk like legs sheathed in faded khaki puttees and the rest of him squeezed into a uniform that was much too tight. Unlike me, he was wearing a tin hat, dressed to kill. But I was quite safe from him. His Arisaka rifle was strapped on in a sniper's harness, and though he had heard me, and was trying to turn toward me, the harness sling had him trapped."

I'm not sure what a "sniper's harness" is but I think he means the rifle sling. I'm no expert on WW II Japanese sniper equipment and my knowledge on equipment is limited to what Peter Senich wrote. Unfortunately, Senich crossed the Styx years ago so I can't correspond with him like I used to.

Thought's on Manchester's statement?

 

[rem700nut]

not an expert ,but from what i have read ,some jap snipers ,tied thereself off in top of palm tree's ,maybe that is what he is talking about

 

[Sunray]

"...think he means the rifle sling..." Nope. The guy was hung in the tree with a body harness. Kind of like a parachute harness but home made. Or just tied himself to the tree with rope. Far more likely than anything formal like a para harness.
And just because the guy was left behind and hung in a tree shooting at people doesn't make him a proper sniper. During W.W. II and since, anybody shooting from a concealed position got called a sniper. Lot of that being Hollywood.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Sorry guys but I should have mentioned the "sniper" was inside a grass hut. Manchester burst into the first room and discovered then and there that there was an inner room. Fully cognizant that he may have alerted the sniper, he burst into the second room and fired one round with his 1911. He missed and hit the grass wall. His second shot hit the fellow in the femoral artery and he bled out. Manchester promptly threw up and soiled himself.

 

[Mk VII]

I think he means a setup like the M1907 sling, with the loop that you put your arm through.