I would like some insight / thoughts on building an edged weapons program

[ak74auto]

I currently work with a NG unit whose sole mission is to see to it that deploying units get trained up on various AWT's (Army Warrior Tasks)
and Battle Drills along with an assortment of tasks, drills, and procedures.


Among the things that are being taught is level I Combatives, but nothing in the way of edged weapons work. I have proposed putting one together and the SGM seems interested. Now I need to make a clear short program. The program will be short, and no contact(unfortunately) will be allowed among the participants.

Any thoughts ?

[Ernest Emerson]

Dear ak74auto,

This is a tough one to answer. Are you saying that the participants cannot contact even if using rubber (dummy) knives?

In my opinion, edged weapons training is a full contact environment. Minimal contact training unfortunately generally resorts to a form of "sword fighting" and in no way reflects the realistic of hand-to-hand combat with edged weapons. Sorry if I seem to be offering little in the way of advice but as an instructor to a number of military units over the years, we've always played really hard. Try to convince the SGM that you can't learn to swim without getting in the water.

Best Regards,


Ernest R. Emerson