Do the armed forces teach ground fighting?

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1

Don’t know if this is an dumb question but I thought it would be interesting to know…

My question is to anyone who has been in the armed forces and trained in unarmed combat - to what degree, if any, are groundfighting skills taught?

From what I have seen (limited) - any demonstration or footage of soldiers doing unarmed combat training seems to almost exclusively deal with striking range and possibly some joint locks for disarms.

If ground fighting is not taught to any real degree what does this say about its perceived usefulness in a life or death situation? My guess would be that the soldier would want to finish any confrontation with some focused strikes rather than go to the floor and be at the mercy of the other guy’s comrades.

If this is actually the case then what implications does it carry for us civilian martial artists? If ground work is of little value to the army then is it of little value to us?

As I say - I don’t know so this is all hypothetical. I could be talking total BS.

2

Makes sense to me mate, but I’m sure a life or death battlefield situation carries additional factors which may make groundfighting less necessary.

I personally can see the value of groundfighting in civilian life as opposed to battlefield life.

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If ground fighting is not taught to any real degree what does this say about its perceived usefulness in a life or death situation

Well, just ask the infamous “Hockey Dad”. Oh wait you can’t because he is dead. He was “ground and pounded” to death. If he had some ground training we might have been able to ask him.

4

Army basic training has adopted some BJJ, and the Army Rangers train BJJ basics to a large extent. I also beleive the Marines are incorporating it. If you go to the army’s web site, you can see guys grappling in fatigues during basics. I remember one clip of a nice guard pass to a hammer-lock.

5

Yes they do…

http://www.adtdl.army.mil/cgi-bin/atdl.dll/fm/3-25.150/toc.htm

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If you want more…

http://www.ejmas.com/jnc/jncindex.htm

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It also depends on what unit/branch they are in. There is no one program for unarmed training for all branches of the armed forces.

8

As u can see from the links above that the army and special forces have adopted BJJ and boxing/muy thai strikes as a major focus in their hand to hand combat curriculum. BUT please note…they really don’t work on this alot! Most of their training is with weapons and scenarios. From what I’ve heard the BJJ and other hand to hand discipline training is for INSPIRING a WINNING ATTITUDE ala Vince Lombardi.

9

Legend has caught the correct.

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Legend is right more or less.

Is this a troll attempt? Seriously–I’m not trying to be a jerk, just asking that you admit it if it is…

The requirements for personal self defense are a bit different than those of being a good soldier. I don’t want them training H2H. I want them shooting people, blowing them up, learning unit tactics and how to function as an integrated whole. H2H is a small small focus compared to weapons.

Warfighting and Selfdefense–unrelated in almost every way.

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Merryprankster - it’s not a troll attempt. As I said - “could be a dumb question” - its just that the army people that I know get some pretty sparce training in unarmed combat and they didn’t really have much clue.

I was just interested to see what they actually do on a more general basis - so thanks for the answers.

Sometimes I think weird thoughts… but you only learn by asking.

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Also - point taken about H2H being a minor issue in comparison to weapons training. However, you do expect (at least some areas of ) the forces to be at the cutting edge of all ranges of combat - long and close range.

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I do know that some US Marine Recon troops have been training pekiti-tirsia kali in the Phillipines along with the Phillipino marines.

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ground fighting

When i went to boot they were beginning to introduce this belt system which you earn a belt as soon as you passed certain close combat requirments. We learned many mixed martial arts and take downs. Also some pressure point training. This past summer at officer candidates course they taught some more hand to hand fighting. They dont teach that much but just enough to survive. Our recon units learn sambo and get more hand to hand classes than us.
JOhnny
Semper FIdelis

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Sambo? BJJ? Whats the matter? they couldn’t find someone to teach them Matrix Fighting?? What a crock. THat stuff is as effective for a field soldier as a deadly Spork kata…

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Why in the hell would you groundfight in a battle? That sound slike a prime way to get bayoneted in the stomach.

17

Here is what little I know.

The Armed Services evaluate a lot of different MA for H2H on a continued basis.
Hence a lot of people claiming to have taught the Special Forces when in reality the only demoed it for 2 Days.
The H2H training will naturally reflect the current trend/development in MA..

Most H2H training I understand is done to keep troops fit and in “fighting spirit” during non-active times.

H2H might be fun in fatigues, but try it as a fully equipped trooper that carries gear, flak jacket, kevlar helmet, etc and all of a sudden the game looks less fun.

Cheers.

18

Originally posted by dre
Why in the hell would you groundfight in a battle? That sound slike a prime way to get bayoneted in the stomach.

who knows? maybe because they realize that at some point during some type of mission, they may need it. Also from what I understand, the H2H is used to instill agressiveness in recruits. A friend of mine is in the marines and is taking part in the marine corps martial arts training. They have a belt ranking system and learn the basics of many things. they train pressure points, basic throws and escapes, striking and some bjj. for weapons, they train the bayonet and of course firearms.

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Dre: people lose/drop weapons in combat all the time, making H2H training absolutely necessary.

Imagine being caught and held as a POW, knowing you’ll most likely be tortured to death in a matter of days. They’ve taken your weapon, your shoes, your warm coat, etc, and you have only your mind to defend yourself. Most of us military guys had to learn SERE (Survival Escape Resistance Evasion) training for just such a scenario. Most of this training involved ground/H2H combat.

TaoBox - just what is your problem with Matrix training? Are you talking about going around town, wearing a ridiculous outfit, hanging with Larry Fishbourne, and saying crap like “I know…kung fu!” I happen to be a student of Al Garza’s Matrix System, if that is what you are referring to, and I can tell you that it is very effective.

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Seven Star :

“who knows? maybe because they realize that at some point during some type of mission, they may need it.”

Maybe, but still , seems like a waste when on a battlefield it moght get you killed.

“Also from what I understand, the H2H is used to instill agressiveness in recruits.”

Boxing would do that, and at a lower price to the government :slight_smile: Traditional Ju Jutsu might be good (since it was desinged for battle) , but modern BJJ would be unsuitable, since it places you at the mercy of other, standing enemy soldiers who are all heavily armed.

Don’t get me wrong, BJJ is great for bouncers, security gaurds etc, when you’re out to just protect someone/somthing without wanting to get sued for using exessive force or whatever. When you have soldiers though, you want themto break some faces.

“They have a belt ranking system and learn the basics of many things.”

This joggs my memory, I read about it somwhere. . .

Tiger :
“people lose/drop weapons in combat all the time, making H2H training absolutely necessary.”

I think I’d agree with that. But if you have no weapons, cahnce of surival and remaining uncaptured are probably slim. Anyway this is secondary to the point, I don’t agree with GF being inducted as a primary h2h primary defence.

“Imagine being caught and held as a POW, knowing you’ll most likely be tortured to death in a matter of days. They’ve taken your weapon, your shoes, your warm coat, etc, and you have only your mind to defend yourself. Most of us military guys had to learn SERE (Survival Escape Resistance Evasion) training for just such a scenario. Most of this training involved ground/H2H combat.”

Why groung though? I mean, you are surrounded by people that hve no cumpution of killing (in general). So they see you trying to westle some gard, bam, you’re dead. You’ve just been shot. Or stabbed by the knife that the gaurd carries. I’m trying to get at the point that GF leaves you vulnerable to other people (that is, other than the one you are fighting) and weapons , both of which are everywhere in warfare.

These things don’t exist very much in civilian life though. In a drunken bar fight, no one will bayonet you in the back, but someone will during a battle.