Other mistake: When Swagger is dialing in his sight to shoot the Denty Moore stew he is dialing in the windage but they show the elevation moving.
Character mistake: When Donnie (spotter) is giving Swagger ranges to fire, he doesn't tell Swagger what hold to use.
Other mistake: If you look at the license plate on the government car that mark Wahlburg is driving, they are not government plates but regular Pennsylvania license plates. The next scene the driver tells the FBI guy that they are government plates which they are not.
Revealing mistake: When Swagger is going to see the Russian sniper, the bait, he takes out one of the guards with a wire around the neck. The only problem here is that the wire isn't even close to the guard's neck. (01:26:10)
Character mistake: Spotters never say 'Fire' when ready, instead "Send it".
Factual error: Right after the 'trap' for Swagger, two soldiers enter the house with Swagger waiting for them on the inside. Swagger shoots the first one twice, but after wrestling with the 2nd one for a bit, Swagger shoots through the safety helmet to kill the 2nd soldier. This would be impossible since these helmets are made to withstand much tougher weapons that a 9mm Beretta. What's even worse is that the blood comes out on the other side, meaning that the bullet pierced the helmet twice. (01:31:40)
Factual error: Camp Lemonier is placed in Djibouti, not in Ethiopia.
Factual error: It is stated that Colonel Johnson cannot be charged because the crime was committed outside the United States. The movie is treating him like he is a regular American citizen when he is in a fact a military member. All active military members, like the colonel, are subject to uniformed military code of justice no matter where the crime was committed. Anyone who attempted to prevent the colonel from being charged would be arrested.
Suggested correction: Crimes are evaluated on a crime per crime basis - Military courts have exclusive authority over all crimes considered purely military crimes which include sedition, failure to obey an order, or insubordinate conduct, among others. However, most crimes violate both civilian and military law and in those cases it may be tried by a military court, a civilian court or both. In this case, this would have fallen under International Law and could be tried by civilian courts although I believe it would be tried by the Hague as crimes against humanity.
Continuity mistake: The scene where Sarah is changing Bob Lee Swagger’s wound dressing. As she removes the old dressing her hair is half pulled back and very sleek/straight looking. Cut to Swagger as you hear her rip the tape. In the next shot she is applying the tape to the gauze and her hair is now completely down and very wavy.
Continuity mistake: In the scene on the mountain top, Sarah picks up the senator's Beretta and shoots Payne. She fires 4 shots and then you see the slide lock back. When the angle changes the Beretta's slide is closed. Even if she closed it in the half second the gun is not visible, that would have been audible.
Factual error: When the Ethiopian Archbishop is killed you hear the gun go off and the Archbishop dies almost immediately, but as Swagger also points out, the hang time would actually be around 5 to 6 seconds (and it would take the sound up to 11 seconds to travel that far). Which means that, when we see it from the gun's point of view, there should be quite a long wait for him to get hit. (00:27:55)
Continuity mistake: In the beginning of the film when Swagger and Donnie begin fighting insurgents, Donnie spots an enemy officer in a yellow jacket with a radio behind a red truck and Swagger shoots him down. Shortly afterwards we see this same commander alive, exiting the red truck and taking cover. (00:05:15)
Revealing mistake: In the stolen FBI black car Mark Wahlberg is driving over the guardrail into the river the trunk flies open, revealing the inside of the car trunk. The mistake is that everything inside the trunk has been stripped out including the carpet because the car is going to be in the water for the film.
Factual error: In the mountain scene, Wahlberg shoots a sniper through the scope. This is a common myth in Hollywood. Tested by Mythbusters. It is impossible to shoot up a sniper scope due to the amount of glass and the thickness and angles of said glass. The bullet is deflected, even at point-blank range.
Character mistake: In the opening scene, Donnie the spotter gives the range to the the truck as "870 yards and closing." It cannot be "closing" as the camera angle through the scope shows the vehicle driving right to left but definitely diagonally away from them, not toward them. This is further reinforced because the adjusted range for where they choose to take the shot is given as 900 yards. (00:03:45)
Suggested correction: I think "closing" here means closing in on the US convoy not necessarily actually getting closer to the snipers themselves.
Factual error: In the movie the senator cannot be charged for the conspiracy because the crime took place outside the United States. In reality, the senator would be charged with conspiracy regardless of where the actual crime took place. Simply being overseas does not give an American citizen immunity.
Continuity mistake: When Swagger is fixing himself up in the FBI car, the amount of blood behind him keeps changing from shot to shot.
Factual error: During the mountain ambush scene, Agent Memphis gets shot while wearing a steel plate. In reality, he probably would've been seriously injured if not killed by the fragments (called "spall" or "spalling") of the bullet when it hit the plate.
Continuity mistake: When Bob is preparing to shoot, the bolt for the rifle is out, but in the next shot, it is closed.
Continuity mistake: When Memphis is being tortured, you can see when they force him to drink water that they've pulled several of his teeth out. When Swagger rescues him, he has a full set of teeth.
