TKD and weapons

[Daniel Sullivan]

Actually, that's an interesting thought about "a specific weapon or specific scenario". Obviously there are particular dangers specific to a bat versus a knife versus a gun but above and beyond that, one thing we teach and practice is:

- Sequence off of a punch, kick, or object -
1. Body Evasion (get out of the way!)
2. Block (hard block or soft parry)
3. Manipulation Of The Limb (control the weapon)
4. Counter ( return damage to the attacker : )

and that applies marvelously well across a lot of weapons in a lot of scenarios (note: there are some slight modifications for a gun but the general principle still holds).

So we train the techniques against the weapons, but we train and reinforce the principles behind the techniques. Each technique is an implementation of that sequence. The motivation being that when faced with a weapon and/or situation not trained for, you can still fall back to those principles

In general, yes. But there are specific weapon situations that few, if any empty handed weapons defense classes address.

Suppose you are not the one being threatened; your girlfriend is. How do you defend her?

Gun defenses are fine. But what if the gunman is more than three feet away? I haven't seen any realistic ones for that.

Or suppose they have the gun pressed into your back?

Or suppose the gunman has a machine gun and is holding you and a room full of others hostage? Or just you? Anyone really want to tangle with a machine gun? And how many people with machine gun disarms published in Blackbelt Mag have actually disarmed a hostile enemy with a live machine gun with their hand on the trigger? Five will get you ten that the answer is zero.

Daniel

 

[FearlessFreep]

Disclaimer: I'm not an expert but my instructor is ex-Special Forces and ex-CSPD SWAT who has trained SWAT teams from his military background an dis also currently time training troops at Ft. Carson. Most of my background from this is in Hapkido (defense) or some Kali (offense for sticks and blades). So while I'm not the most experienced myself in using these techniques, hopefully I'm not blowing smoke when I say my instructor knows his stuff and we take it pretty seriously. I'm doing my best to represent as much as I know

In general, yes. But there are specific weapon situations that few, if any empty handed weapons defense classes address.

Suppose you are not the one being threatened; your girlfriend is. How do you defend her?

Gun defenses are fine. But what if the gunman is more than three feet away? I haven't seen any realistic ones for that.

Not *directly*. The strength of the gun is distance, the weakness is close distance. Anybody with a gun who gets within arms reach is trying to use the gun as an intimidation to get you to do something. If they wanted to kill you they'd stand a few paces away and just shoot. It's this former situation that most defenses are built around. If the person is a few feet out of range but still trying to intimidate you, etc...there are some 'social engineering' techniques you can use to close that gap that may, or may not work.

Or suppose they have the gun pressed into your back?

Actually, relatively speaking, that's not much harder *mechanically* than anything else. Lack of visibility lowers your odds but the real danger is that it's harder to get your center mass out of the way the lower the weapon is, front or back. Pointed at your head is actually the 'easiest' to avoid because it's a smaller target that's easier to move. I say 'easiest' because, well, it's still a *freakin' gun and you're unarmed* so everything here varies between "you're really dead" and "might have a very slight chance of living" anyway. And you did not say if it was center back or off-angle, escort-style (they are the same, and different)

Or suppose the gunman has a machine gun and is holding you and a room full of others hostage? Or just you? Anyone really want to tangle with a machine gun? And how many people with machine gun disarms published in Blackbelt Mag have actually disarmed a hostile enemy with a live machine gun with their hand on the trigger? Five will get you ten that the answer is zero.

We actually do train against an AK-47, we have a simulation one and when we train with it, we put the full cage helmet on so we can jam the butt of the weapon into the face and still keep our teeth I don't know if he's (my instructor) ever faced a live situation like that, but he's trained with people who have.

But now we're getting to an absurd level a bit Not that the situation is absurd but because we're beyond what I think is rationale to worry about on day to day life for most people (including me! thank God)

But then to address your concern, there are situations for which there simply is not effective *unarmed* defense bearing in mind that when we talk about fighting ranges (everything from ground to clinch to hands to feet) 5 feet with a gun is pretty much a winner. Actually, any unarmed vs weapons scenario the person unarmed is at a *significant* disadvantage to start out with so realistically speaking, if you think a armed encounter is a likely enough threat than you should be training to *use* a similar weapon and be carrying it on you, like dancingalone said way back when

Granted that, if you are training unarmed responses to armed attacks, then from my caveat about, you should really be training with someone with a background in the environment. Because, yes, I've seen the crescent kick gun disarms, too, and worse and if the person you are training with doesn't understand the dangers of the weapon, they cannot teach you how to.

Some examples:
- Do your gun disarms deal with friends and family in the vicinity? If you can only take the gun one way and your wife is over there......
- Do your gun disarms deal with ejections? Do you address the heat/noise/and slide of a weapon fired in mid-technique
- Do your gun disarms deal with weapon retention? There are techniques used to counter someone trying to control the gun, if your control of the gun does not addresses those retention techniques, you will not get a second chance.
- Do your knife defenses address what counters a knife fighter will use. If your countering the 'jason attack' (overhand swing down) with a highblock, probably not. Like dortiz said, there are a lot of ways your knife defense can get you cut up just as bad, or worse.
- speaking of which, do your knife defense teach *where* to get cut? Ok maybe that's worded bad, there is no good place to get cut but there are less bad ways to get cut
- Do your defenses teach *when* to act?

 

[Earl Weiss]

Couldn't load the 2nd link for some reason but I saw the first video. Chris, is Mr. Park's demo an accurate representation of the knife defenses taught in the ITF? The techs he showed are a mixed bag in my opinion, some clearly more practical than the others.

There are a few textbook knife defenses in gneral choi;s materials. What you saw in GM park;s video was a demo. As you know demo techniques are often geared to wow a crowd of people from the general public showcasing an individual's talents which in GM Park's case in his prime were considerable. These are not neccessarily what you would do for practicality.

 

[Earl Weiss]

My school has bsic empty hand techniques for a variety of weapons. These are ;
1. Run Fu and / or
2. Nike Jitsu

 

[Earl Weiss]

Basic Knife defense Scenarious:
1.He has a knife and you don't - run like hell
2. You have a knife and he doesn't - Cut hard, fast and often.
3. You both have knives - wake up, your dreaming.

 

[FearlessFreep]

2. Nike Jitsu

I call it "Nike-Do" but the principles are very similar

 

[Daniel Sullivan]

I call it "Nike-Do" but the principles are very similar

Naikido?

 

[chrispillertkd]

Couldn't load the 2nd link for some reason but I saw the first video. Chris, is Mr. Park's demo an accurate representation of the knife defenses taught in the ITF? The techs he showed are a mixed bag in my opinion, some clearly more practical than the others.

Mostly demo stuff. That being said, many of Gen. Choi's early students were amazingly gifted athletes. If someone could make some of those techniques work it would've been GM Park in his prime. I highly doubt he would teach the high-kicking stuff as standard ho sin sul against a knife weilding opponent, however.

If you're interested in seeing the second video it's on youtube. Just search for ITF hosinsul. It should be the first video to come up. The gentleman in the video was an ITF 6th dan and the narrator (Robert Walson, an early American expert on TKD, a former CIA agent, and a friend of Gen. Choi's - who also does a brief voice over on the vid) mentions he's also a 5th dan in Yudo. That being said, his hapkido influence if obvious.

Pax,

Chris

 

[Earl Weiss]

the narrator (Robert Walson, an early American expert on TKD, a former CIA agent, and a friend of Gen. Choi's - who also does a brief voice over on the vid) mentions he's also a 5th dan in Yudo. That being said, his hapkido influence if obvious.

Pax,

Chris

Interesting that no one seems to know whatever became of Robert Walson. Now that the story has come out about him being CIA, perhaps that was some alternate identity