01 May 2008 08:14:50

Herbert Cannon

Realistic Training for Hand to Hand in Life or Death Situations

Past time to get back on topic. This is real event. This is a US soldier in Iraq and it is a bit long; but contains a good lesson. It is night time and a firefight has already started. They are being shot at. Here is an example of what practical training is all about in the words of the soldier: " A guy came out at me out of a doorway that was covered by a blanket, I couldn't see who it was. I couldn't tell whether he had a gun. I just started beating the crap out of him. I was hammer fisting him down, I wasn't going to just shoot the blanket because it could have been a kid. I figured, nice time is over and we need to get out of this and get some cover now because this is getting real crappy and its right out in the open. When the guy fell, we saw he was a man with an AK- 47. Jimmy stitched him up and I went in the room. I thought Jimmy was right behind me. But his long gun went down and he was transitioning to his pistol. He was engaging a different threat. I went into the next room and ended up there alone. The enemies were sticking their guns out of the window, trying to kill our other guys, who were entering the house like ducks in a row. I went down the line, from left to right, and started whacking them. There was so much going on outside they didn't realize I had come in. They didn't have any electricity, no NVGs, and it was really dark. I shot those guys. I was getting pretty deep into this magazine and I needed to change mags real quick. While I was doing that I could feel someone coming up behind me. I thought it was one of my guys, but it wasn't. The enemy whopped me on the shoulder with something, maybe it was a wooden beam, and crumpled me down. I got hit so hard that I saw white lights, floaters. Bam. I got hit and went down to one knee. The guy jumped on my back and tore off my NVGs. He was kneeing me in the back and clawing in my eyeballs. I reached up with my right hand - he was pretty big boy with beard and a ponytail - and I got him by the back of his head and flipped him over. When I did, my elbow hit the ground and put my dislocated shoulder back in its socket. Now we were face to face in the dark. The thing that really paid off for me was having done a lot of hand to hand combat training in gear. I fought a lot of guys with my full gear on. A lot of people will do combat training slick, without gear. But you gotta fight with your kit on to make it more realistic. It is a totally different animal when you have a rifle, pistol, shot gun, frags, bangs, smokes, and eighty-five pounds of 'lightweight' gear on. You cant get away with all those amazing kung fu moves. Those aren't in your arsenal. We were face to face and my left arm was raging and I thought, Man, its you or me, dude, and it aint gonna be me. I want it more than you do. You're not going to kill me. I got a life at home. My comrades got a life at home. And we're coming home. If this guy got past me, he could have shot my guys in the back. I went to biting on him. I could smell his sour breath. He was pulling around all over my gear and I was worried about him pulling a grenade pin or pulling one my breaching charges and blowing both of us up. This had to end. I couldn't reach my rifle, pistol or shotgun. My left arm wasn't working so well. I pulled him by the hair close to my body with my left hand, and with my right hand I "shot putted" his head. I broke his neck. I finished him off with my 9mm pistol..................." The rest of the chapter is a description of the firefight. "Tony Pyror is a Green Beret and has been with the Special Forces for fourteen years. A mighty bull of a man at five feet eleven inches and 235 pounds. He bench presses more than twice his weight. He went into combat wearing the medallion of St Michael. the patron saint of soldiers, taped to his dog tags. He earned the Silver Star on June 12, 2002 and keeps a chunk of his collarbone in a jar.".................... Except is from the book " Heroes Among Us - First Hand Accounts of Combat From Americas Most Decorated Warriors In Iraq and Afghanistan." Something you will not hear about on CNN, MSNBC, CBS, NBC, ABC etc. Lessons - train with realism, stay strong, and live!! PS: long hair and beards are excellent hand holds in a fight.