303 (comics)

303 is a six issue comic book mini series created by Garth Ennis and Jacen Burrows, and published by Avatar Press. The story targets a mature audience.

The story spans two parts titled "Afghanistan's Plains" and "Black Arrow" (after a monologue in J. R. R. Tolkien's The Hobbit) each consisting of three issues and centers around a Russian Spetsnaz colonel. In the first part the colonel leads a Russian team investigating a plane crash in Afghanistan. Violence soon erupts after first British and then American military forces become involved in the investigation. In the aftermath, the colonel helps a wounded British Special Air Service trooper who translates a document found on the plane. The document suggests that there is a high level conspiracy in the United States; that the global war on terror was started in order to facilitate the west taking over the oil rich Middle East. In the second part the colonel travels alone to the United States in order to carry out a self assigned mission, where he first faces a sheriff troubled by the loss of his wife because of the deficiency of their insurance. The story also focuses on the problems of illegal Mexican immigrants apparently exploited at a slaughterhouse called "McHell". The Colonel eventually assassinates the President of the United States with the intention of stopping the Global War on Terror, using a Lee–Enfield rifle using only iron sights, firing from behind a closed window.

The title of the series refers to a .303 British calibre Lee–Enfield rifle.