The term is supposedly linked to Jim Cirillo and the The old NYPD Stakeout Squad. Active from 1968 until 1973, the Stakeout Squads was created to address the rash of armed robberies of small stores in NYC. during that time period. Their success rate was so good that local politicians decided to disband the unit because because of the number shootouts involved.
For a little more detail on the Stakeout Squad, click the link below;
Here we have another article on the basics of Unarmed Close Combat from frequent Blog contributor Steve Forester.
Momentum In Unarmed Close Combat
by Steve Forester
There are four tenets of close combat.
They are POSITION-DISTANCE-BALANCE-AND MOMENTUM. The more I understand, the more I realize how important concepts like these are over things like techniques.
In this brief article I’ll be talking about MOMENTUM.
Carl called this Aggressive Forward Drive and his article of the same name is one of THE best articles on close combat I have ever read. The drop step (derived from Jack Dempsey’s method of getting power into his boxing strikes) gets you started. As Carl Cestari states in the article, you drop step into him at the same time your attacker moves into range.
Now this is important: his forward movement, combined with your forward drive, DOUBLES the collision force. i.e. doubles the power of your strike.
Continued aggressive forward drive motion drives him back and off balance. He has no power while off balance (while you maintain yours by correct stance and footwork as in the second post). Driving him back with continuous strikes till he trips over something and goes down. Or use a convenient wall as vertical 'ground'.
All well and good but I see no one really doing or teaching it. All the combat sports, KM, TMA, heck - everyone - teach to strike and recover back to the same spot. Look at the rear toe kick for example. Everyone performs this by kicking and then pulling the leg back to it's original starting position. How about letting that kicking foot slide down/ stomp down hard instead of withdrawing and let the MOMENTUM carry you into another strike.
I recently completed an on-line course ($197 ) titled 'Striking Mastery'. Advertised as how to effectively strike even if not large, or strong. What it boiled down to was identifying and attacking vital points of the body with maximum body weight force.
Guess what? The same thing concepts Carl taught in 2001, or 1991. Carl’s ‘Operation Phoenix’ video gives all the information on vital target areas and effects one could ever want, as well as various methods of accessing them. Now look at OS-1 and OS-2 (Carl’s first two Unarmed Combat videos) for striking with total body weight. Look at the hip and shoulder strikes and driving knees and how Carl is striking with total body weight.
Now do I think the class was ripping off Carl or anything? I do not. I think it is simply that if one studies and distills things down enough, it starts to look the same. (i.e. reach the same conclusions independently.)
To use Carl's phrase: "This is how to win fights". Study combat anatomy and physiology, learn to strike with maximum body weight, control balance and distance. And ATTACK FIRST!
Same stuff that has been said here for the last 24 years now. Yikes! Almost a quarter of a century. I find it is easy to read the words and understand their meaning, but then not really being able to practically apply them.
Maybe I am just dense, but it was only after retiring in 2017 and devoting myself full time to close combat that I really started to learn 'the secrets'. Which I have found can only can be learned through training.
Again, maybe I am dense, but I am amazed at those who study first this, and then that system, or a combat MA that involves thousands of techniques. I have enough trouble understanding just basic close combat.
This video is a follow-up to the Blogpost from this past Sunday. Now I'm not trying to turn this place into the AARP Self Defense Blog. The thing is that the most common victims of violent crime are women, really young people (ie: kids), and seniors. Usually they are less physically able to defend themselves. While using awareness and mindset should always be your primary line of defense form criminal assault, there are times when you will be caught unawares and a physical response will be called for.
Most Self Defense classes are geared towards adult males in their 20's, 30's, and to a degree in their 40's There are of course those dedicated holdouts in their 50's and 60's. But the reality is that most self defense training is oriented towards the young and still relatively physically fit.
The substance of this post however is for those either in late middle age or already into their senior years.
Now to be clear, the biggest problem with most Self Defense training these days is, quite bluntly, that most schools over-complicate their training with a laundry list of techniques. The reality is that most criminal assaults are simple violent attacks, preceded by an ambush. Having a laundry list of techniques to mentally go through after someone has gotten in your face and laid their hands on you is pretty much a recipe for "paralysis by analysis".
You need a fast simple response. One that in fact does not need to lay your attacker out on the ground unconscious. If you can do it, great. If not, if you can at least disorient or hurt him enough to stop his immediate attack, then you need to leave the scene and not hang around while he recovers.
As I said above, this video is from the same source as the one about defending yourself while seated. And as with that video, the simple two strike combination will work for anybody willing to train it. And while it looks too simple to work, the eye jab followed by a kick or knee to the testicles was taught to Allied Commando group in WW2 called the Devils Brigade by a man named Dermot 'Pat' O'Neill. His style of unarmed defense had the same 2 part strike combination that was referred to as "Poke and Kick" Karate.
For those of you who may have never heard of O'Neill, the link below will give you a brief history of his Career.
So, watch the video above and decide for yourself whether the simple technique is something that should only be done by Senior Citizens.
Now this video is targeted as being for Seniors. However I'm pretty sure it would work just as well for anybody who suddenly found themselves confronted by an assailant when seated on a bus, commuter train, park bench, etc. This small group of techniques are direct, and uncomplicated, with very little athleticism really needed.
