Outstanding essay! It warmed my heart you referenced Don Pentecost. So much to unpack here. I’ll definitely save this one for the archives. Two things that came to mind, Booth succeeded in spite of being a civilian because he had the will, and he rehearsed. He planned, and he prepared, and he set the literal stage,
His training as an actor: rehearsing until it’s perfect, thinking through blocking and moving, and keeping calm/ improvising under pressure, are all skills crucial to successful operations, when militarized.
Lastly, on improvised weapons in a totalitarian state, I immediately thought of this quote:
“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more - we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward." - Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn , The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956
In the gulag, the water was spiked with fluoride so that people did not get the idea that if you were going to die anyway, why not die fighting for your freedom?
Your quote is as worthwhile as the article, if not, more so. During an attempted coup every citizen waited in their homes as the events unfolded hoping the authorities would regain control. No one thought to organise neighbourhood groups to consolidate weapons including kitchen knives and garden tools and plan how to ambush the insurectionists if and when they came. I consider they would behave simiarly if it happened again.
Now I know what to do when the apocalypse starts. Thanks.
"Likewise they know that they’re about to fight a knife attacker, they’re gassed up and hyped and eager… They’re not unaware, or drunk, or groggy or tired, or just confused and unable to put two and two together in the 2 seconds it takes to get stabbed 4 times."
In the beginning of the MMA video one of the guys was talking about how his knee was injured because some guy lowered himself from the ceiling onto his head, then a few seconds clip of that happening is showed. In other words, trained MMA attack killer gets caught unawares and doesn't fight back instinctively, just cowers and let's himself get hurt w/o retaliating.
This is something that has to be trained into most people. Long ago I worked as a bouncer for several years, and to this day it's a bad idea to push or grab me from behind.
There were some great Russian Knife combat videos out there as well. Retired Spetsna special forces teaching the techniques. Just wow. Train slow fight fast.
Fantastic essay, thank you, much appreciated. I'm an knifemaker, and sure appreciated the images of the imprivsed knives.
One small point...smokeless powder doesn't "detonate" it "deflagrates" which is a technical term that means it burns very quickly. Generally, we just say it burns. It's related to subsonic vs supersonic speed of propagation.
If your smokeless powder charge detonates (ie explodes rather than burns quickly) then it will probably blow your gun to pieces in your hands.
I hope you don't mind me mentioning this...I'm a lifelong shooter and ammunition reloader.
Ah interesting. You're right. I knew blackpower deflagrated but didn't realize cordite and nitrocellulose derived smokeless powders still didn't just detonate.
Don’t underestimate the knife in a knife v gun situation. I had the good fortune to take the edged weapons class at Gunsite. The instructor would have been very much in agreement with this article. One of the things he talked about and demonstrated was that handguns have two flaws that are exploitable. First, they are very highly directional - a quick step/lean/duck and you can get inside the wielder’s decision cycle. Second, most people threatening you with a gun are using it to control you - if they meant to shoot you, they already would have, and changing mental gears from “control” to “kill” takes time that can be used to close with the gunfighter.
In short, within two or three long steps, in his opinion a sufficiently motivated and aggressive knife fighter has the advantage over a gun fighter.
Yes, I can see it. If I am the gunner and the knifer is advancing, my first instinct is to shout telling him to stop. Then to drop the knife. If he continues I'll shout and retreat and only fire when he is almost in my face. How do I know?
I am untrained to use either weapon though I often carry a small spring loaded knife and retractable baton. I once encountered a muscular mentally ill vagrant advancing on me and that's what I did with my weapons. Thankfully, he stopped and began cussing me.
Indeed. Most people would do the same. They are using their guns to control the other person (very common), not to injure/kill them. It is that changing of mental gears, from control to kill, that creates the time/space for your opponent to attack.
There's good writing. There's great writing. Then there is amazing writing that includes a Corb Lund quotation. That was a great piece. I'll be thinking about it for years now I bet.
Best money I spend on substack. Please keep it coming.
And they keep whinging and kvetching about that supposed monopoly of violence, this market is more accessible than most realize, thanks for showing just how much this is the case.(an aha moment for me as well)
Well its a great post about knife fighting because its such a neglected field... handguns you can read dozens of books on them and still be an amateur compared to the people who really know what they’re talking about.
I’m a student of English Lit and Political Philosophy. I like to think i see contexts and sociological dynamics others don’t... as soon as you get into established competitive technical fields with real experts my value add collapses
Fascinating, but the martial arts video is not entirely persuasive. MMA is still sport fighting, not real self-defense fighting. True self defense is about training reflexes to get in a *dirty* disabling shot before the knife fighter has a chance to stab: a kick below the six pack, a cupped hand to the ear, a knife hand or knuckle to the windpipe. All that armor, and the reflexes trained by sport fighting nullify true self defense moves.
What is dramatically demonstrated is the ineffectiveness of grappling vs. a knife -- at least if the knife fighter is also a martial artist, which appears to be the case in the videos. Jiu jitsu should allow one to readily disarm a hand holding a knife -- if you can grab it in time. The martial artists repeatedly failed -- despite the fact that such grabs are legit moves in UFC fighting.
Now it could be that self defense reflexes as I described above are useless against knives. I'm just saying that the video above does not demonstrate this.
We never know how our content will land. Also, the Substack gremlins suppress content that is actually useful. My content is siloed because I speak the forbidden, and I am hidden in plain sight. Freedom of speech not reached they call it ....
The truths are being stomped on, and you might have just touched on the forbidden truth here. The powerful pretend guns are the problem because that is their agenda.
In infantry school the drills would talk about the spirit of the bayonet. They’d ask “what makes the grass grow”. The reply was “BLOOD”. Check out the link for a pic.
I have recently been reading “The martial arts of Indonesia” by Donn F. Draeger, and the amazing whimsy that the Indonesians exhibit in their knive-designs makes the mall-ninja creations you can buy on eBay seem sensible.
Excellent post! Yea them Rwandans know how to party. Some estimates almost a million people killed by farm equipment. Great movie about it called Hotel Rwanda if you haven’t seen it.
They did a lot in that film to try to shift blame to Europeans, claiming they invented African tribal conflict, or were responsible by failing to intervene hard and fast enough.
Great article, but it seems like you greatly exaggerate the effectiveness of the knife because it appeals to you philosophically. You are very right to point out the *martial artists unable to disarm knife* video as well as identifying the idiotic MA vs Knife morality play trope, but there are also tons of videos of normal people managing managing to defeat bladed attacks by men with their bare hands, improvised weapons, in small groups etc. let alone women as you claim.
Also if I remember correctly there is another segment in the ultimate martial artist show (maybe a different season where two martial artists basically defeat 2 or more simulated knife attackers though they "succumb" to their wounds.
Also not to sound like an Aikido fag (never liked it never done it) but there is a pressure tested style of Aikido where the competition consists of one stabber (albeit with bad form required by rules but with lots of practice) and one grappler alternating, some of the counters are actually very well employed by amateurs who pressure test knife defense unlike 99% of real and fake martial artists
There is virtually no violent crime where I live and I carry a folding knife I can open one-handed with a pocketclip wherever I go just because it is a tool I use everyday. When I'm in the city, it's doubly risky, because firstly I might have to use it and secondly because it's illegal to carry and the chance of a routine police check is so much higher.
So the only place I realistically might have to use it in defense is the one I might get into trouble for carrying it. Sucks.
We are always equipped for unarmed combat; everything else requires preparation, and then if you drop your weapon, you just arm your opponent against you.
I like the term field pick-ups because any weapon on the field is yours once you pick it up.
Till then it is your mind, body and 'will to survive' which will make the difference.
A dagger to the neck is easily done, by distracting the W other hand. You fail to mention that gun trigger pull weight is the most important element of Accuracy, it avoids gun cavitation , when shooting a target- Many police have high trigger pulls, supposedly for safety- Good luck in a stress situation hitting a moving target. 2.5 LBS-4LBS is ideal. Personally have shot 100’s of thousands of rounds, one rule, always 6 FT away from target or discharge immediately. Most LEOS are no match for extremely high round count, experienced accurate shooters, especially with 10MM single action, striker fired weapons.Some people experience no fear & can calmly terminate targets,<8% of people can do it. Repeatedly.
There’s a Fighting Technique from IDF called Kava Magda - often spelled differently - Goal is to disable anyone who’s a threat, with no regard for damage to target. Kill, Damage, in seconds - U don’t want anyone to even touch you. Some of it is classified.
Razor sharp Daggers W good blood grove R the best, Sharp-Curved, full Tang knifes R great for slashing the neck. U are correct that Hollywerid is promoting a false reality that is by intent, to weaken people & make them easy to manipulate or terminate. The word Gun Violence is a made up term for Violence . Except Violence is Violence- By knife , Rock , gun , crossbow, its all the same- Blades are historically used far more often than guns.
Outstanding essay! It warmed my heart you referenced Don Pentecost. So much to unpack here. I’ll definitely save this one for the archives. Two things that came to mind, Booth succeeded in spite of being a civilian because he had the will, and he rehearsed. He planned, and he prepared, and he set the literal stage,
His training as an actor: rehearsing until it’s perfect, thinking through blocking and moving, and keeping calm/ improvising under pressure, are all skills crucial to successful operations, when militarized.
Lastly, on improvised weapons in a totalitarian state, I immediately thought of this quote:
“And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?... The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin's thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! If...if...We didn't love freedom enough. And even more - we had no awareness of the real situation.... We purely and simply deserved everything that happened afterward." - Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn , The Gulag Archipelago 1918-1956
In the gulag, the water was spiked with fluoride so that people did not get the idea that if you were going to die anyway, why not die fighting for your freedom?
Your quote is as worthwhile as the article, if not, more so. During an attempted coup every citizen waited in their homes as the events unfolded hoping the authorities would regain control. No one thought to organise neighbourhood groups to consolidate weapons including kitchen knives and garden tools and plan how to ambush the insurectionists if and when they came. I consider they would behave simiarly if it happened again.
Now I know what to do when the apocalypse starts. Thanks.
Knives are also the weapon of choice for the discerning post-apocalyptic warrior.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpVfNGWK3ko
===
"Likewise they know that they’re about to fight a knife attacker, they’re gassed up and hyped and eager… They’re not unaware, or drunk, or groggy or tired, or just confused and unable to put two and two together in the 2 seconds it takes to get stabbed 4 times."
In the beginning of the MMA video one of the guys was talking about how his knee was injured because some guy lowered himself from the ceiling onto his head, then a few seconds clip of that happening is showed. In other words, trained MMA attack killer gets caught unawares and doesn't fight back instinctively, just cowers and let's himself get hurt w/o retaliating.
This is something that has to be trained into most people. Long ago I worked as a bouncer for several years, and to this day it's a bad idea to push or grab me from behind.
==
There were some great Russian Knife combat videos out there as well. Retired Spetsna special forces teaching the techniques. Just wow. Train slow fight fast.
Fantastic essay, thank you, much appreciated. I'm an knifemaker, and sure appreciated the images of the imprivsed knives.
One small point...smokeless powder doesn't "detonate" it "deflagrates" which is a technical term that means it burns very quickly. Generally, we just say it burns. It's related to subsonic vs supersonic speed of propagation.
If your smokeless powder charge detonates (ie explodes rather than burns quickly) then it will probably blow your gun to pieces in your hands.
I hope you don't mind me mentioning this...I'm a lifelong shooter and ammunition reloader.
Ah interesting. You're right. I knew blackpower deflagrated but didn't realize cordite and nitrocellulose derived smokeless powders still didn't just detonate.
Don’t underestimate the knife in a knife v gun situation. I had the good fortune to take the edged weapons class at Gunsite. The instructor would have been very much in agreement with this article. One of the things he talked about and demonstrated was that handguns have two flaws that are exploitable. First, they are very highly directional - a quick step/lean/duck and you can get inside the wielder’s decision cycle. Second, most people threatening you with a gun are using it to control you - if they meant to shoot you, they already would have, and changing mental gears from “control” to “kill” takes time that can be used to close with the gunfighter.
In short, within two or three long steps, in his opinion a sufficiently motivated and aggressive knife fighter has the advantage over a gun fighter.
Yes, I can see it. If I am the gunner and the knifer is advancing, my first instinct is to shout telling him to stop. Then to drop the knife. If he continues I'll shout and retreat and only fire when he is almost in my face. How do I know?
I am untrained to use either weapon though I often carry a small spring loaded knife and retractable baton. I once encountered a muscular mentally ill vagrant advancing on me and that's what I did with my weapons. Thankfully, he stopped and began cussing me.
Indeed. Most people would do the same. They are using their guns to control the other person (very common), not to injure/kill them. It is that changing of mental gears, from control to kill, that creates the time/space for your opponent to attack.
Excellent points Tim.
There's good writing. There's great writing. Then there is amazing writing that includes a Corb Lund quotation. That was a great piece. I'll be thinking about it for years now I bet.
Best money I spend on substack. Please keep it coming.
And they keep whinging and kvetching about that supposed monopoly of violence, this market is more accessible than most realize, thanks for showing just how much this is the case.(an aha moment for me as well)
Prisons are full of creative tools of violence.
“Hutu-Centrists” lol'ed too hard on this...
This was a great analysis of knife fighting.
I would love to hear one for handguns (since that is more applicable to the USA).
Well its a great post about knife fighting because its such a neglected field... handguns you can read dozens of books on them and still be an amateur compared to the people who really know what they’re talking about.
I’m a student of English Lit and Political Philosophy. I like to think i see contexts and sociological dynamics others don’t... as soon as you get into established competitive technical fields with real experts my value add collapses
If people did not have guns or knives, rocks would be the tool of the day.
Great article.
Fascinating, but the martial arts video is not entirely persuasive. MMA is still sport fighting, not real self-defense fighting. True self defense is about training reflexes to get in a *dirty* disabling shot before the knife fighter has a chance to stab: a kick below the six pack, a cupped hand to the ear, a knife hand or knuckle to the windpipe. All that armor, and the reflexes trained by sport fighting nullify true self defense moves.
What is dramatically demonstrated is the ineffectiveness of grappling vs. a knife -- at least if the knife fighter is also a martial artist, which appears to be the case in the videos. Jiu jitsu should allow one to readily disarm a hand holding a knife -- if you can grab it in time. The martial artists repeatedly failed -- despite the fact that such grabs are legit moves in UFC fighting.
Now it could be that self defense reflexes as I described above are useless against knives. I'm just saying that the video above does not demonstrate this.
Arguably the best essay on the knife in current existence. Well done.
Share it then! This has gone surprisingly less viral than I expected for a landmark essay
I made a podcast explaining the fakery online here. 95 percent of the Internet is fake; this might explain some things:
https://open.substack.com/pub/soberchristiangentlemanpodcast/p/s2-ep-27-95-percent-of-the-internet-a22?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=31s3eo
We never know how our content will land. Also, the Substack gremlins suppress content that is actually useful. My content is siloed because I speak the forbidden, and I am hidden in plain sight. Freedom of speech not reached they call it ....
The truths are being stomped on, and you might have just touched on the forbidden truth here. The powerful pretend guns are the problem because that is their agenda.
I posted it on a a forum and it was removed, the excuse given "copywrite material". I'll try again.
Lol. A little too much truth maybe.
In infantry school the drills would talk about the spirit of the bayonet. They’d ask “what makes the grass grow”. The reply was “BLOOD”. Check out the link for a pic.
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=time+to+make+the+grass+grow+meme&t=iphone&iar=images&iai=https%3A%2F%2Fi.pinimg.com%2F736x%2F40%2Fef%2Fcf%2F40efcf2c2ada569b90d2a43e872406b8--us-military-the-grass.jpg
What a brilliant yet disturbing essay, Kulak!
I have recently been reading “The martial arts of Indonesia” by Donn F. Draeger, and the amazing whimsy that the Indonesians exhibit in their knive-designs makes the mall-ninja creations you can buy on eBay seem sensible.
https://www.amazon.com.au/Martial-Arts-Indonesia-Traditional-Weapons/dp/0804852774/ref=sr_1_4?crid=2N0RAXZ6W224K&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.KZZxWs-ix7JV7ODG-dsxKPEpeSFQCI-p3W88IKdWlC9A9YwQgRBB6XvHn9N95fZzjCUJu7OSLowSZ2xSFaH7d1TBvZL09_TmSfrdrLhAhK0pZdwsUuE8p-tnYvE7hDHXWc02479W0hqFa70vlJDtP0mOe4uAtC6FtRWDDYThfYVjAJFpOG1jZ-OL0s8DjhV0z-Y0jwU1lDItCD_nUT09AJCsPEsV8GgOHhSj4L-0EXL0YlLy1aOFeE6o-E50WQD5EUQ2L73weAEfNN0__-B7lE1PM-RrSWHCSjHEfjMs0RM.bxOzrUSv6IaUZF34lJeOb6sMBxn-qggDi7ren44Q3MQ&dib_tag=se&keywords=Donn+draeger&qid=1745562354&sprefix=donn+draeger%2Caps%2C273&sr=8-4
Also, you may be interested in “The Sicilian blade” by Vito Quattrochi, which teaches the knife fighting technique of the Sicilian people.
https://archive.org/details/the-sicilian-blade-the-art-of-sicilian-stiletto-fighting-desert-publications/page/n25/mode/1up
Excellent post! Yea them Rwandans know how to party. Some estimates almost a million people killed by farm equipment. Great movie about it called Hotel Rwanda if you haven’t seen it.
They did a lot in that film to try to shift blame to Europeans, claiming they invented African tribal conflict, or were responsible by failing to intervene hard and fast enough.
Other than that it's a good film.
Yes, lots of blame whitey going on.
The CIA did fly a mind control plane over my head to kick off the violence. Worth checking out. I think it was called Project Spellbook.
Oh nice, like they tried in the Philippines?
Ain’t it always smh lol
People improvise.
Great article, but it seems like you greatly exaggerate the effectiveness of the knife because it appeals to you philosophically. You are very right to point out the *martial artists unable to disarm knife* video as well as identifying the idiotic MA vs Knife morality play trope, but there are also tons of videos of normal people managing managing to defeat bladed attacks by men with their bare hands, improvised weapons, in small groups etc. let alone women as you claim.
Also if I remember correctly there is another segment in the ultimate martial artist show (maybe a different season where two martial artists basically defeat 2 or more simulated knife attackers though they "succumb" to their wounds.
Also not to sound like an Aikido fag (never liked it never done it) but there is a pressure tested style of Aikido where the competition consists of one stabber (albeit with bad form required by rules but with lots of practice) and one grappler alternating, some of the counters are actually very well employed by amateurs who pressure test knife defense unlike 99% of real and fake martial artists
There is virtually no violent crime where I live and I carry a folding knife I can open one-handed with a pocketclip wherever I go just because it is a tool I use everyday. When I'm in the city, it's doubly risky, because firstly I might have to use it and secondly because it's illegal to carry and the chance of a routine police check is so much higher.
So the only place I realistically might have to use it in defense is the one I might get into trouble for carrying it. Sucks.
Learn joint breaking, no weapon except your mind and body. I explain in a podcast episode.
I have many years of Judo under my belt. You are correct, a broken joint ends a confrontation instantly.
I still do cherish my knife as an honest tool and find it unfortunate that carrying it means risking a weapon charge.
We are always equipped for unarmed combat; everything else requires preparation, and then if you drop your weapon, you just arm your opponent against you.
I like the term field pick-ups because any weapon on the field is yours once you pick it up.
Till then it is your mind, body and 'will to survive' which will make the difference.
A dagger to the neck is easily done, by distracting the W other hand. You fail to mention that gun trigger pull weight is the most important element of Accuracy, it avoids gun cavitation , when shooting a target- Many police have high trigger pulls, supposedly for safety- Good luck in a stress situation hitting a moving target. 2.5 LBS-4LBS is ideal. Personally have shot 100’s of thousands of rounds, one rule, always 6 FT away from target or discharge immediately. Most LEOS are no match for extremely high round count, experienced accurate shooters, especially with 10MM single action, striker fired weapons.Some people experience no fear & can calmly terminate targets,<8% of people can do it. Repeatedly.
There’s a Fighting Technique from IDF called Kava Magda - often spelled differently - Goal is to disable anyone who’s a threat, with no regard for damage to target. Kill, Damage, in seconds - U don’t want anyone to even touch you. Some of it is classified.
Razor sharp Daggers W good blood grove R the best, Sharp-Curved, full Tang knifes R great for slashing the neck. U are correct that Hollywerid is promoting a false reality that is by intent, to weaken people & make them easy to manipulate or terminate. The word Gun Violence is a made up term for Violence . Except Violence is Violence- By knife , Rock , gun , crossbow, its all the same- Blades are historically used far more often than guns.