w.I.d.t.h.6. Chapter 2: I...

Initiative

Initiative is the easiest self-defense principle to understand and the hardest to achieve. In combat initiative is basically control. It is control of the pace of combat and the ability to impose your will upon the enemy. As law abiding citizens we never start a defensive engagement with the initiative. Therefore, we have to wrestle the initiative away from the bad guy. The winner of a fight is the person who has the initiative at the end. This is true in tank battles, in fist fights, in naval battles, and in self-defensive shootings. So, how do we get the initiative away from the bad guy as law abiding citizens? The easiest way to do it is to start moving forward towards them. In Professor Visitacion, founder of Vee Arnis Jitsu, came up with several "commandments of self-defense" one of which is this: "I can move faster forward than you can move backwards." That's the easiest way to seize the initiative. If you become the attacker, then you cease being the victim. The most aggressive person usually wins in a fight. I had a motto for my unit during the Battle of Sadr City: "Shoot first. Move forward." Now as civilians and law abiding citizens in a civilized country we cannot always be the ones to shoot first, however if we start moving forward and attacking the bad guy, then we successfully take away the initiative from them and we start driving them backwards. When they start retreating, they give up the initiative and they start losing. In a battle, the person that's moving forward, gaining ground, is winning by securing territory. The person or the army that is always retreating, giving up ground, is called the loser. People that train to shoot or fight by going backwards, are training themselves to lose. They are surrendering initiative to the bad guy. Law enforcement does this a lot. Law enforcement has a philosophy of "buying space for time" and that time gives them the chance to de-escalate, or to effect an arrest, or do other law enforcement things. This is incredibly dangerous because it is giving the initiative to the bad guy repeatedly with every step backwards. As self-defenders we are not required to do that. As self-defenders, if somebody attacks us and they intend to do us grave bodily harm, we have the right to defend ourselves effectively, and the quickest way we do that is to take the initiative away from them by moving forward... ....and causing Damage, wich I will cover in the next chapter in detail. Basically, Damage has to do with with accuracy and targeting and being efficient and effective in what you do while moving forward, but the most important thing is to become the most aggressive. Simply put, causing damage is more than just running at him swinging your arms like a windmill ineffectively, or spraying bullets inaccurately, so some training on targeting is necessary to effectively secure the initiative. How we target to cause Damage varies by weapon system and we'll get into that in the next chapter. The important thing is to attack and do so effectively, and that secures the Initiative. Defense doesn't win fights. Ending with the initiative wins fights, battles, wars and self-defense situations. Like and Share! Soule www.Easy6Training.com

W.i.d.t.h.6. Chapter 1: W...

Weapons. In his book Clear and Present Danger Tom Clancy once wrote that the first rule of unarmed combat was "don't get into it." This fascinated me because at that point I was about 3 years into studying martial arts and it was the central focus of my life. I was especially fascinated with the philosopies of martial arts such as Bushido and the animism associated with the various Shaolin animal styles of Kung Fu. Clancy's quote got me thinking that maybe kickboxing, of whatever style, was not the be all and end all of being a warrior. So, I started to focus more on weapons training in the martial arts. As a teenager that mainly meant ancient weapons like the bo staff and swords rather than firearms, but unlike many martial artists I did not see a moral distinction between guns and knives. Many martial artists are, bizzarely to me, vehemently opposed to firearms, believing them some sort of disgrace to their "Ancient Chinese Secrets" or something. Introducing weapons to training begs the question, though, when using them would be justifiable? I studied ten different martial arts over twenty years as I moved around the country and the world, and they all called themselves "self-defense systems." Only one of them was actually an unarmed combat system that taught useful self-defense principles, the rest were crap. Even the good one didn't fully understand what self-defense is. In his book When Violence is the Answer, Tim Larkin defines self-defense as a legal determination made by a criminal justice authority after the fact that what a person did was justifiable violence. It is not a set of skills or a system of martial arts. To meet that standard several things have to be true in a situation. One, you have to be in imminent danger of being maimed, raped or killed. Two, you have to be without other options, such as escape or utilizing social skills to de-escalate the situation. In other words, bar fights are not self-defense, but every martial art I studied was teaching me how to win bar fights, and calling that "self-defense training." It wasn't. But that brings us to the good news about Weapons. In an actual self-defense situation, where those standards are met, as opposed to a bar fight, you are perfectly justified in using whatever weapon you can get your hands on. If somebody is actually trying to maim you, rape you or kill you, there are no limits to the tools you can use to defend yourself unless you live in a criminal-loving jurisdiction run by lunatics like New York or Chicago. If you do live in one of those places, you should move. If you live in a sane place, where you are allowed to defend yourself, and somebody is trying to maim you, rape you or kill you, it's perfectly justifiable to shoot them, stab them or even run them over with your car. Which gets me back to Tom Clancy's quote: "The first rule of unarmed combat is: Don't get into it." There's no reason to get into a fist fight with a psychopath who is trying to do you or your loved ones grievous bodily harm. Find a weapon and use it. 1) Anything can be used as a weapon with a little creativity. Look at the world around you constantly and identify potential weapons. I once watched an Arnis master beat a sixth degree black belt senseless with an empty water bottle by doing knife patterns on his face so fast that he fell down backwards, so anything can be used as a weapon. Beer bottles, chairs, soup cans, cars, knives, keys or best of all a firearm; anything can be used as a weapon, because: 2) My brain is the real weapon. My body is a decent enough tool for my brain to use for self-defense, but I can extend its lethality by putting another tool in my hand, but the real weapon is the human mind. The human mind that designs aircraft carriers and bombers and their bombs, as well as samurai swords, the longbow or a sniper rifle. The brain is your weapon. It is also your adversary's weapon, which makes it your best target. I will talk more about that when we get to the "H" chapter. Thus, in conclusion, 3) "The first rule of unarmed combat is: don't get into it!" Like and Share Soule www.easy6training.com