To me, this is similar to saying “Whether you fall off your bicycle or crash a motorcycle into a wall, the outcome is the same.”
I don’t see it that way.
You can bear a punch or kick with much less severity than you could a stab or slash. The penalty for missing a block is nowhere near as life or death as the penalty for avoiding a headshot from a knife. So, in my opinion, the outcome isn’t the same. The same is true about your method of Body English and footwork against an empty hand fighter Vs. someone armed with a blade.
Combat involving bladed weaponry is misunderstood by many people. Training for knife proficiency is almost a separate study to whatever system you are training, including Filipino and Indonesian Martial Arts. It is very intense and very comprehensive and needs to be fully studied. It is more than a few basic slashes and stabs, it is in itself a separate system. To train against the knife you have to learn to be a knife fighter. Why? For the same reason catching a thief requires you to think like one. Knife fighters are the most precise, extreme and dangerous people you can ever face in a fight of any kind. Unlike the inexperienced purse-snatcher, drunk or schoolyard fistfight, they have a host of advanced strikes, counters and techniques that makes defense very difficult. This is the nature if the game itself, and if you can learn to fend off a knife fighter then the inexperienced mugger or assailant is so much less of a task to deal with. You cannot simply "add" a few techniques of Kali blade work to your martial art, you will miss the details that make it work, as well as the recognition of where it won't.
If you are focusing on mere techniques then the principle they were developed on will get lost, and you will probably use the technique at a time when it is least appropriate. It is the underlying principle you want to look for, that's what makes it work. Discover what allows the same technique to work for people of widely varying body shapes & strengths. This is an important area that is seldom addressed. The knife has its own unique theory of use, its own language. Wielding it competently isn't a casual skill, it takes years to achieve anything resembling mastery. There are no hard & fast rules for knife play, you must take into consideration so many different variables that it would be impossible to categorize them minimally.
If you leave the concept of "Style" out for a moment, you will find a large portion of blade craft is ubiquitous. It has no real home other than itself, and therefore can lend itself to any style of technique. Due to the nebulous nature of knife fighting, there are also many abstract theories & motions that can only live in their own category, perhaps "dirty tricks & sneaky moves" being the most succinct. Many people get caught up in the aspects of style in the martial arts, what system has the best moves, the most complete repertoire, hundreds of forms, etc. This is a mistake when addressing the knife, you should instead examine the weapon itself. What does it do? Unlike the stick, the blade is at once powerful without the use of muscles, and lethal without the background of a martial art. It only has to touch you to do damage, A child could kill with it in seconds, by accident.
You must approach this area of training with utter seriousness, and develop it to a high degree. You don't have to necessarily be strong to use a knife, the knife has all the power. It only has to touch you to do damage. All the knifer really provides is a weapon delivery system and it can come in at varied speeds, with erratic motions and awkward angles. The sight of this can be more frightening than the application of it. A common saying in many Martial Arts schools is “Nobody is more dangerous and unpredictable than a beginner. You have no idea how they’re going to move.” Think of a person with a knife in his hand, moving in this kind of unpredictable lurch. Even to the experienced knife handler, this is a nightmare.
The area of practical knife skills are sorely neglected in many martial arts, and for whatever reason, many instructors have an insurmountable aversion to learning and teaching it. I think this stems largely from the fact that knife skills can’t be as easily classified or categorized as empty hand styles. I mean, you can see the logic behind a Wing Chun fighter’s philosophy of “We fight close, because others are uncomfortable with that range”, or the Aikido “Blend with your attacker’s motion & he will be defenseless” Jiu Jitsu is easily identifiable as the brutal older brother of Judo and Aikido. Even simplistic kick and punch arts like Karate or Taekwondo have an immediately identifiable value as far as they go. But there is a multitude of conflicting theories and patterns that are at once expert and suicidal at the same time. Knifework cannot be dragged through the same obstacle course you came through with your empty hand skills. It takes a certain kind of instructor to face this truth, because honesty demands courage.
You can see why the knife is so avoided, or often as not, approached so unrealistically. If you examine the end result of many of the aforementioned arts, you will see a recurring pattern of “block – strike - kick – grapple - subdue”. Maybe not in that exact order, but many of the elements are always present. Although serious injury or death is not impossible, it is rarely, if ever, the chief aim. In fact, restraint and control are always touted when training traditional arts, particularly the Japanese arts.
This is where the knife truly separates itself, for the pattern here is “draw – kill” or at least “draw – maim”. Such a stark contrast holds little interest for someone who has dedicated his life to a twelve-step martial arts program, especially one with a boatload of ethics tied behind it. It is cold and harsh, with an unforgiving attitude in combat and very little (if any) moralistic code behind it. It is, however, truth in it’s purest sense: People can die easily, especially if they are unprepared for reality. I believe truth often carries with it the inherent necessity for change. The most common expression when real change enforces itself is “Why didn’t anyone warn us?” Truly, they did not hear. Or, hearing, they chose not to listen.
I have concentrated on a small part of the language of the blade in this article, and admittedly have not addressed the moral or legal implications here. That wasn't the point, so I left it alone. I will post another article on such later, if there is interest in it.
