VIDEO: The Truth About Knife Defense

WARNING: THE FOLLOWING POST CONTAINS GRAPHIC IMAGES AND VIDEO
No one wants to get stabbed. The compulsion to avoid being stabbed and shot is completely normal. However, if you find yourself in the most unfortunate position of facing an armed man and you are completely unarmed you can survive and even win, but it's not like you've been lead to believe.

Self defense is like religion. It takes a large group of insecure people and gives them what they need to hear. Self defense and martial arts makes people feel safe and confident. Most people seek out these endeavors because they are scared or think they are insufficient in certain areas. That's OK, we all felt this way at one point or another. Martial arts calms those fears and gives them something tangible to do about it without actually having to do it. Martial arts have been engineered to manage those fears.

Martial arts instructors tell their students "Do this and you won't get hurt." "Do that and you will discourage your attacker without having to hurt him." Now I don't believe they do this with malicious intent, they believe they are telling the truth. It's just that they have been fed misinformation, just like their instructor and their instructor's instructor.

I should know, I used to be one of them.

Look, no one in their right mind wants to get hurt or hurt someone. We want to live our lives and not be bothered. Unfortunately, there are people who don't feel the same way and who don't really care if you live or die if you have something they want. Now you have a choice: hedge your bet and hope nothing ever happens or do something about it.

Because you're even reading this you obviously want to do something about so here goes.

Let's get one thing straight: weapons defense or any self defense for that matter is like going through a wall of flame. You know there will be pain involved, but how much depends on how fast and how hard you go through it. Dancing around the fire will get you burnt to extra crispy. You're best bet is to go through it and charge hard.

The same holds true for self defense. Most people want to avoid the risk of injury and pain of self defense. So they dance around it and provide solutions that make you feel warm and fuzzy. They will show you methods that will appear to work and wrap the attacker up n a neat little package. While this appeals to your natural aversion to pain and violence, it is incredibly and dangerously wrong.

First, it trains you to believe that the self defense scenario will follow a specific pattern. He attacks like this, I do that. He does something else, I do something else. You are trained to think an attack is a finite set of moves when in reality those finite set of moves are infinite. The only thing finite about an assault are the common denominators of any attack: distance, position, momentum and balance. Everything else is secondary. In fact, what the Self Defense Training System tells us is that everything else is almost irrelevant.

Second, there is pain in self defense. Even if you hit him, you're hand will be sore and bones may be broken. Your best bet is to prepare for the inevitable and get ready to endure and inflict pain. Defending against an all out knife assault isn't any different.

If you ask any martial arts instructor about defending against a knife one of the first things he will tell you is "you will get cut." But then he proceeds to show you a technique that has you focusing on controlling the weapon and keeping it away from your body, being very careful not to let the weapon touch you. Like this guy here:

Here is a typical knife defense


A couple of key points you need to take a look at:
1. Expert says that if he get's stabbed in the belly, the fight is probably over.
Ask this guy if the fight was over:

You're body is designed to withstand a lot of punishment. Most knife assault victims, without any training at all, have suffered severe stab wounds and didn't even know they were cut until AFTER the conflict. So the bad news is, you will probably get cut, but the good news is you won't even know it, you won't die instantly and you will still be able to fight. What you need to do is to train aggressively, hit hard, take ground and destroy what ever it is in front of you. In the Self Defense Training System (SDTS) you learn how to hit and cause damage from Module one through Module 12. It is imperative you develop the skill set to do this.

2. The Fancy Wrist Lock.
OK, stop looking at the picture above. I know, it's gross, but the guy actually survived. Anyway, sliding up the elbow and performing a joint lock requires finite motor skills and the HUGE assumption that you're going to be able to identify the attack and react accordingly. t requires your target to remain still and to STOP HIS ATTACK. Hey, if this attacker wanted to gut him from his A-Hole to his appetite, do you think it would look like this?

When you practice with friends in a well lit training facility, these techniques appear to work. The only problem is, you both know what is going to happen. Even if it's a "random" training drill, you still have practiced it enough where your attacker literally knows how to approach you and you know which type of attack is coming next.

In the real world, there's a split second where your mind needs to grasp the reality of the situation (We call this the "OH SHIT!" moment). One second you're thinking about what this guy wants from you and the next "BAM!!!" He's stabbing the crap out of you.

When the attack happens, it's surreal, that's why you need a method of training that puts you on auto-pilot. You need to flip the switch and attack. Methods that teach complicated movements will cause your mind to freeze while systems like the SDTS that teach you a handful of core techniques and train you on how to adapt those methods to different situation work in the crucible of reality.

3. What is this cutesy bullshit of stabbing the guy with his own knife? Are we really taking this seriously. I've seen every one from Bas Ruetten to this guy do this crap. Just knock him the F#$K out!!! That's it. I'm sure, in this particular case, the bad guy isn't going to resist since he was just trying to gut you a split second ago. Especially since the expert HASN'T EVEN HIT HIM YET!!!! I'm sure your attacker is just going to sit there while you fillet his kidneys.

This defense also depends on the presumption that you're going to be attacked with a single thrust. If you think he's going to attack you with a single technique, think again...

This is what a worse case scenario looks like:



So kids, what did we learn from this video?
10" blade and the victim didn't die instantly. Wait, what? He got stabbed and didn't fall down?!?! (Maybe he's a witch).

Seriously, this is as bad as it gets, you're sitting there one minute thinking how many hours you have left on your shift and then BAM you're getting skewered. No harsh words, no posturing, the bad guy just comes up and starts stabbing you. Looks like the security guard was trying to what...grab the knife. His reaction to control the weapon only leads to him being stabbed over and over again. Good luck with that tactic. Look at it this way, at least if you get stabbed in the body, you'll have an open casket.

Next you have stuff like this:



Now this guy says a lot of correct things, he starts off strong except the "if you get stabbed you will probably die instantly". He's correct with the continue striking but of course he knees the guy in the body which is a lot tougher than hitting him in proven knock out spots. And then what does he do? On his initial contact...HE GRABS THE DAMN KNIFE ARM.

Listen, if you happen to wind up with it OK. The problem is that the split second you search for it, you're done. You can't train like that. When the "fit hits the shan" and you start trying to control the stabbing arm you will be locked into completing that task before you start striking him.
This is important to understand and goes over a lot of people's heads. If in some point you are trained to control the weapon "AS A PRIORITY" you will try to control the weapon until you have control of it. This is how we act under stress. If you chase the weapon the attacker will then do to you what you should be doing to him and that is: BEAT YOU TO A PULP. Great you have two hands on the knife, he has one hand free to destroy you with.

Training is all about developing habits. Tactics are a set of techniques based on a specific set of priorities. Your priority is to disable and injure the attacker as fast as possible.

Plus, the bad guy makes it easy with a "looping" type of attack. I teach assailants to ATTACK PISSED OFF. Keep the assault tight and strong.

What works is simple, avoid the initial attack and then destroy the attacker. This defense from Module 8 of the SDTS actually fits with what the krav maga guy was telling you better than the technique he demonstrated.

The only real, proven method for any knife attack is to ATTACK, INJURE AND DISABLE THE ATTACKER AS FAST AS POSSIBLE. Take a look at this A-HOLE:



*Just a note. I got some responses to this video saying "why don't you kick the knee or why are you hitting his back." First, I'm only hitting his back because I don't want to kill him He's my friend and I've grown attached to him). My strikes are really going for the back of his neck. Second, why in the world would I bother with his knee (a secondary target at best when I'm knocking him out). Sometimes I forget that the clips go out to non SDTS members.

This is an outtake from Module 8 of The Self Defense Training System "Weapons Defensive Tactics" and yes, the A-Hole is me. Which is another truth. This is an outtake from Module 8 of the SDTS and this goes with the knife defense blog post. I should point out that the strikes are to the back of target's neck. His back gets hit because I've grown attached to him over the past few decades. In realty, this is the only type of proven defense to actually work under real world conditions. Evade or PREEMPT the initial attack and then take the target out as fast as possible. Which means attacking his most vulnerable areas as fast as possible. The head and neck are the most obvious choice for two reasons. First, its a target rich environment offer you many places to knock hm cold. Second, it controls his direction, power and ability to use the weapon.

You don't get points for a partially correct answer. A lot of guys have the correct response with an initial evade/strike. But then they go chasing after the knife. WHY BOTHER?!?!?!

If you don't knock the guy out with the first shot, you still have a fight on your hands and even if you do grab the weapon hand/limb, he still can injure you with strikes as well.

If you knock him a little silly or even get him to pause he won't be stabbing you and you will have an opportunity to inflict more damage on him. The more injury he suffers the less dangerous he becomes. If you get him to pause and then go for the knife, you've just given him the opportunity to recover and realize that he's got a fight on his hands.

If he's knocked out, he's not stabbing anyone.

"But what if one of his friends comes along and picks up the knife and stabs you?"

A: Use some common sense. If he had another friend there intent on killing you, don't you think he would have stepped up while you were beating the crap out of his friend?

Also, are you going to sit there and watch while some guy comes along and picks up the weapon...OR are you going to stop hitting him and take the time to chase the weapon if he happens to drop it?

Let me see, he drops the weapon and you're going to stop attacking him, go get the weapon and give him an opportunity to recover and attack you again. I'll take my chances continuing my counter attack. Besides (all you budding budo-lawyers) wouldn't using his weapon against him be an act of murder?!?!?!?! That's a dig, I really don't care.

A weapon, any weapon is only as dangerous as the maniac wielding it and getting cut while you're pummeling someone to a pulp is a 180 degree different than getting stabbed while someone is killing you.

Finally, it's the rhythm of how you train. Self defense has a rhythm. It is 100% all out in a short burst (like a drag car race). There isn't any posturing, there isn't any time. There is only GO and NO GO. Once you decide to act it must be ruthless and brutal. Methods of self defense that feature sparring are counter productive to methods of self defense. Sparring and sporting based systems teach you to size up your target and look for openings while self defense trains you to attack and take whatever you can get. It is a "ready-fire-aim" formula.

If you spend most of your time sparring and grappling you're doing you're undermining your defensive tactics. Self defense trains you to determine intent and then act ruthlessly and viciously without quarter. This is why you should always avoid conflict unless it's absolutely necessary. Because it's not getting him to tap or say uncle, it's you fighting for your life.

Train Honestly,
Damian Ross, CEO The Self Defense Company

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