The US Army Rangers of WWII were modeled after, and partly trained by, the original British Commandos. This amazing footage gives us a look inside their training and preparation prior to deployment. The focus of the film is on physical training and battle inoculation but there are plenty of interesting glimpses of the really fun stuff scattered throughout.
Oh…and just in case you don’t know me well enough to know what I mean by “fun stuff”, I mean weapons handling, live fire drills, bayonet fighting, machete fighting, knife fighting, hand-to-hand combat and silent sentry elimination. Enjoy!
“Our soldiers must have fighting spirit. If you call that hating our enemies, then we must hate with every fiber of our being. We must lust for battle – our object in life must be to kill…Since killing is the object of our efforts, the sooner we get in the killing mood, the better and more skillful we shall be when the real test comes.”
“The struggle is for survival—-KILL or be KILLED.”
Signed,—Lt. Gen. Lesley James McNair
Chief of the Army Ground Forces
I’m not really a big fan of Kung Fu in general. Quality control is difficult to maintain in the Chinese styles and most of what I’ve seen looks way too flowery and complex to be of much practical value.
That said, there is good Kung Fu out there and when it is good it usually is very good. I said “most” Chinese styles look too flowery and complex, but I must admit I’ve also come across a few Kung Fu forms that looked like straight up street fighting, bare-knuckle boxing or military combatives. The truth is that China is a big place with a really large population base and a long history of martial arts training as part of the culture. When somebody says they practice “Chinese Martial Arts” they could be talking about pretty much anything from the ultra-lethal to the utterly insane.
One form of Kung Fu that I do find very interesting is San Shou (also known as Sanda). What San Shou is, fundamentally, is a Chinese variation of Kickboxing fought under several distinct sets of rules. You could also call it Full Contact Sports Kung Fu and you wouldn’t be too far wrong (though I understand there is also supposed to be a military combat version).
What makes San Shou really interesting, aside from the fact that it is fought full contact, is that the style heavily emphasizes the use of throws in conjunction with kicks and punches. The aim of the game is to put the other guy on the floor and it doesn’t matter much whether you achieve this by striking or grappling as long as you can manage it without tripping over yourself.
From a self defense point of view, this kind of a sparring system is pure genius. Knocking someone down in the street is almost as good as knocking them out and most other sport grappling systems don’t place nearly enough emphasis on developing the skills to remain upright (which is not easy).
In most other Boxing/Kickboxing sparring systems, it is difficult to emphasize killer instinct and the importance of finishing off an opponent quickly. You can’t go for the knockout every time you spar, and so you’ll naturally learn to hang back, conserve you energy and even trade blows a little. This is completely different from a real fight (or full contact match) were the goal is to knock your opponent’s head clean off (and preferably get hit as few times as possible in the process).
Allowing throws as a regular part of your stand-up sparring seems to me to be a very intelligent way of solving this problem. Now your sparring sessions become much more goal oriented. You’re not trying to knock the guy out, but at least you still are trying to put him on the floor. This is a much more practical form of training then just dancing around for a prescribed period of time and sniping at each other with long range kicks and punches. Having a specific, achievable goal teaches you to be decisive (and when you’re fighting is definitely a time when you need to be decisive).
I haven’t yet had much first-hand experience with San Shou myself (and probably won’t have time to do much, as long as my primary focus remains on JKD) but everything I’ve learned about it so far (including the casual lesson I took this morning) would seem to indicate that this is a particularly potent system and definitely worthy of much further attention and study.
This is a documentary on the selection procedures of the Australian Special Air Service Regiment.
Watching this brings back a lot of memories for me. I did my selection with the Australian Commandos, not the SAS, but the two are similar in a lot of ways.
If anything I would say that the SAS course looks a lot more professional than what I went through, which is not really a surprise. I doesn’t really look like it’s physically any harder than what we did, but nor does the documentary really do justice to just how hard it really is. Carrying that pack is tougher than it looks.
Just came across this clip today, this is Joe Lewis fighting in the first ever Kickboxing match held on US soil. This is so far back they hadn’t even invented the term “Kickboxing” yet, and they advertised this match as “Full Contact Karate”.
Lewis, who would later become known as the father of American Kickboxing, came into the match with prior training in Western Boxing, Japanese Karate and Jeet Kune Do, having been a private student of Bruce Lee for some time prior to the event.
Both fighters look like they’re in terrific shape, though readers with some prior knowledge of Kickboxing may notice that we’ve made some improvements in technique since then. Personally, I find it absolutely fascinating to take a look at history in the making.
My unarmed combat is better than my weapon skills.
My stand-up fighting is better than my grappling.
My punching is better than my kicking.
And my offense is much better than my defense.
If I ever really wanted to specialize and excel at something in martial arts, probably the best bet for me would have been western boxing. Even then, I most likely would always have been known as more of a slugger than a technically skilled boxer. That’s simply what experience, physique and emotional disposition have made of me.
But the truth is I’ve never really wanted to be a specialist. Never even considered it. Because I can’t imagine anything more embarrassing than becoming a great boxer and then finding out I was completely unable to wrestle when my life depended on in.
So I’m a generalist brawler. That’s simply what experience, physique and emotional disposition have made of me.
This morning I discovered another little gem left for us by our friends on YouTube. This time it’s Navy SEAL Hand-to-Hand Combat with Frank Cucci.
First, a little bit of background to the program. When Frank Cucci joined the SEALs, he came in with some degree of prior training in Western Boxing and Karate. At that time, according to Frank, there was no regular, consistent hand-to-hand training being done within the teams. Being a martial arts guy, Cucci saw the need for improvement in this area soon became involved in the establishment of a regular program.
The systems that Frank and the SEALs chose to form the basis of their hand-to-hand program were Muay Thai, Jeet Kune Do and Filipino Kali. Frank himself went on to train with some of the top names in the business, including Chai Sirisute, Dan Inosanto and Paul Vunak. Vunak actually ended up being hired full time by the SEALs for several years as a private contractor.
The hand-to-hand techniques seen in the first video below you may recognize as being almost entirely pure Muay Thai Kickboxing. This, according to Frank, served as the primary foundation for the entire program. In fact, it is not until forty-seven minutes in that Cucci even begins to cover some of the dirty fighting techniques familiar to us from JKD and WWII Combatives…
Part 2 is more of a mixed bag of techniques and, at times, their selection seems almost random.
The tape begins with a focus on clinching, takedowns and throws which integrate pretty seamlessly with the Thai. For my money, this was the most informative part of the presentation. All too often in seems that our only options for clinch grappling are sports methods or overly complex Aiki and classical Jujutsu. It was a nice change to see some stuff that was fairly simple and yet still combat orientated (i.e. not primarily aimed at putting both of you down on the floor).
Inexplicably, the section on takedowns ends with Cucci demonstrating a couple of variations on the ankle lock as a finishing technique, but with very little explanation as to how it is actually performed. Immediately following is a section entitled “Freeform Training” which seems to consist entirely of Frank demonstrating Jun Fan/JKD trapping and grappling absent any explanation as to what is meant to be achieved. If I did not have a background in JKD already I would not know what to make of this section. As it is, I’m kind of wondering what it’s doing on the tape. Everything else so far has been very simple and straight-forward.
Following this, coherence of the presentation falls apart for a while. Cucci moves on from Freeform Training to Grappling and ground-fighting. That grappling techniques shown look good but, unfortunately, no attempt is made to establish any sense of context or basic concept of fundamentals first (as was done with the stand up portion of the curriculum). Rather, it seems, we are simply bombarded with an array of techniques taught along the lines of “if he does this, you do that”. Quite frankly, I don’t think it would be possible for the viewer to learn anything of use about ground-fighting from this section unless the already had a background in grappling of some kind to build on.
The Modern Army Combatives literature does a much better job of introducing this kind of material in a logical progression.
After the grappling section, we come back to standing for a brief segment on JKD trapping and the straight blast. This could easily have been the best section of the entire tape if explained more clearly but instead just ends up looking over-complicated when compared to the Thai material presented earlier. Admitedly, Muay Thai is considerably simpler than Jun Fan JKD, which is the main reason why I often say I’m glad I learned to Kickbox before starting Jeet Kune Do (and also why I’d always recommend at least six months of Kickboxing before taking up any form of Kung Fu or Karate).
The last half hour of the presentation is focused on close contact weapons. This section is absolutely pure Filipino Kali/Eskrima and looks pretty good to me, for whatever that’s worth. Frank certainly moves very smoothly with the stick and knife, though one might wonder what they Navy SEALs are doing if they’re out getting into knife vs. knife and stick vs. stick duels…
Conclusion: Frank Cucci’s Navy SEAL hand-to-hand program is (or was, Frank’s been out of the Navy for a while now) primarily Muay Thai Kickboxing and Filipino Martial Arts, supplemented with a little bit of JKD and submission grappling…absolutely all of which widely practiced by civilians all over the world!
There really aren’t any secrets in the martial arts, anymore.
Before I studied the art, a punch to me was just like a punch, a kick just like a kick. After I learned the art, a punch was no longer a punch, a kick no longer a kick. Now that I’ve understood the art, a punch is just like a punch, a kick just like a kick.
Bruce Lee
In Karate, they teach you to punch with a corkscrew motion ending with the fist turned over palm down and the impact focused on the first two knuckles. The reasoning is that since the first two knuckles are larger, they’re better able to absorb the force of the blow and less likely to break on impact.
In Wing Chun Kung Fu and Jeet Kune Do, they teach you to punch straight out with the fist held vertically and the impact taken on the three bottom knuckles. The reasoning is that it’s easier to keep the wrist straight in this position and the knuckles are protected by spreading the impact over a wider area.
In modern Boxing, they teach the corkscrew motion ending with the palm down and knuckles aligned horizontally on most strikes (though opinions on the “correct” way to throw a hook seem to vary considerably).
Most boxers don’t seem particularly fussed about which knuckles they land on for the obvious reason that they’re punching wearing padded gloves.
Some kickboxers still adhere to the two-knuckle theory, which is probably just evidence of the historical link between Kickboxing and Full Contact Karate.
Old-school Boxing literature, on the other hand, seems to support the three-knuckle theory while recommending both the horizontal and vertical fist alignments for different purposes.
There was a time when I used to wonder which theory was right. Which is actually the “best” way to throw a punch? The truth is, it doesn’t really matter which method you choose…as long as it works for you. But if you’re still wondering which is the one true “correct” way to punch someone in the face…you’re not really asking the right questions.
Perfect alignment of the fist will vary considerably depending on what kind of target you’re punching at and what angle you’re punching from. Precision can pretty difficult with gloves on and is close to impossible in a bare-knuckle brawl. A whole lot of theory goes out the window when your target starts jumping around and punching back at you.
Sometimes my punches land on two knuckles, sometimes on three. Sometimes I’ll hit with a vertical fist, sometimes horizontal. Often I’ll make contact with my fist held at a forty five degree angle, occasionally completely inverted.
You need to have tough hands and strong wrists. Roll your fists tight and keep your wrists straight. Aim at the middle of the target and hit as hard as you can. Keep hitting until the man goes down. That’s pretty much all you need to know as far as theory goes.
A new website has just come on line that offers free video lessons in Jeet Kune Do.
What’s the catch?
Uh, well, so far there doesn’t seem to be any. You have to give them a name and e-mail address, of course. Once you’ve signed up they’re going to try to up-sell you on a “premium” membership for about thirty bucks a month, but you don’t have to pay anything to sign up and there’s an awful lot of free stuff to see. It looks like there’s somewhere between an hour and an hour-and-a-half worth of footage, at first glance.
Now, I haven’t had a chance to go through all of this footage yet, so I can’t swear that it’s all golden, but I am familiar with the group who’s putting it out and they usually produce pretty decent material.
This isn’t the sloppy, B.S., pseudo-JKD you’ve probably seen on YouTube. The primary instructor featured on the series is Jeremy Lynch of the well established and respectable Wednesday Night Group. D.M. Blue and some others may step in also.
I should point out also that this is not intended to be a certify-by-video course or anything silly like that. This is just something that you can use to supplement your live training or, worst case scenario, as a guide when no instructor is available.
I spent an hour and a half today going over all the basic trapping, sensitivity and Chi Sao drills we’ve done so far in JKD. He also showed me a lot of variations on the drills today that came a lot closer to realistic applications than the stuff I’d seen previously.
Right now, my head feels like it’s about to burst. Trapping is a whole new game and I feel like I’m just beginning to appreciate where it really fits into the big picture.
The hardest part is getting over the prejudice that all standup fighting must look more or less like Boxing.
When you change the rules, you change the game. That’s why BJJ is not the same as Judo is not the same as SAMBO. Japanese Kickboxing is not the same as Muay Thai primarily because the rules are different. Savate kicking differs from that seen in other forms because it assumes you’re wearing shoes and not fighting barefoot.
JKD has a lot in common with Kickboxing but the structure is different because the rules are different. JKD also has a lot in common with MMA, but the rules are still different there, too.
I have a picture in my head of what effective fighting is supposed to look like. Slowly, I feel as though the picture is being expanded to encompass a whole new range of possibilities.
