# Are (US) military drill instructors particularly skilled in unarmed combat? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [October 4, 2024, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457 "2024-10-04T21:13:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2024, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/21 "2024-10-05T12:16:57Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > which basically means I can “grab, twist, pull” someone’s genitals off or “270 break” their arm, or stab a sentry in the taint and cover his mouth before he screams… you know, useful stuff. Just to be clear, this is sarcasm. All these moves really are taught, but practicing them involves a willing opponent with whom you conduct a choreographed engagement while audibly reciting the steps and moves while its done. Everything seemed to include the “grab, twist, pull, grab” of the genitals. Passing the first level of certification required executing so many moves against a constant flow of opponents in a certain amount of time. It was actually the same guy, but since you’re inflicting “kill moves” or disabling moves, that same guy jumps back up to simulate being a new person. Since you’re being timed, you need a fast opponent as well if you want to pass. SOF eventually replaced the program with MACP. LINES was popular because there was no Army program at the time, and a lot of SF guys were already training with Donvito, the founder of the system. Matt Larsen created MACP while he was in the Ranger Regiment, and it spread to the entire Army, replacing every local and unit program. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2024, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/22 "2024-10-05T13:26:35Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > That lieutenant was a badass. Not just in staying calm under pressure, but in having established a sufficient rapport with his troops that he could communicate with them with a flick of the eyes and a nod. Which is exactly the sort of badassery that’s needed by the XO of a training camp. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/23 "2024-10-06T13:24:32Z")
Not the military, but my son works in a prison, where the potential for hand to hand combat is a constant thing. He has shown me pictures of himself where he looks like he was in a horrible car crash, after a training session with his colleagues, and his colleagues took the worst of it. And he absolutely loves his job. ---
**Author:** ![Zakalwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zakalwe/32/270_2.png) [@Zakalwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zakalwe)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/24 "2024-10-06T16:28:18Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > I was in the navy 40 years ago and in boot camp we got not one smidge of hand to hand combat nor even anything in small arms training. After all, with a few exceptions, sailors tend towards crew-served weapons, a CV being the ultimate example of such. Ditto. My buddies always ask if I learned to shoot in the Navy. I tell them I shot a grand total of 5 rounds with a 45-frame .22 pistol in boot camp. I was flight deck crew on an aircraft carrier, if we need handguns, we’re fucked already. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/25 "2024-10-06T16:42:28Z")
I know a couple of naval officers who qualified for Expert Pistol and Expert Rifle, mainly because it would give them two more decorations to wear on their ribbon bars. ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/26 "2024-10-06T20:07:46Z")
> [@Zakalwe](#): > > I was flight deck crew on an aircraft carrier, if we need handguns, we’re fucked already. Maybe one of these would be more useful in that case: > [@Would an updated boarding ax/gun work properly?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-an-updated-boarding-ax-gun-work-properly/1007161): > > So in the midst of looking up weird weapons for a story I may or may not write, I came across information about this [combination boarding ax/rifle](https://www.boardingaxe.com/swedish.html). It’s apparently workable (though you obviously couldn’t run around with it ready to fire whilst fighting). My question is, could you remake it with a more modern shotgun/rifle inside the handle? Or would something like the kick make it unwieldy? I don’t know anything about guns. ---
**Author:** ![Zakalwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zakalwe/32/270_2.png) [@Zakalwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zakalwe)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/27 "2024-10-06T21:44:08Z")
> [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](#): > > Maybe one of these would be more useful in that case: The enemy is, ideally, not supposed to get inside a 250-300 mile circle around us. We are force projection. If we’re down to needing boarding axes, that what our brothers and sisters in the Marines are for. I don’t even know the bosun’s call for “repel boarders”. 🙂 I would imagine it starts “holy fucking shit!”. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/28 "2024-10-06T22:37:16Z")
> [@Zakalwe](#): > > The enemy is, ideally, not supposed to get inside a 250-300 mile circle around us. We are force projection. If we’re down to needing boarding axes, that what our brothers and sisters in the Marines are for. If an enemy is somehow boarding an aircraft carrier, reality has fallen on its ass. Not only is a carrier one of the fastest vessels in a strike group, it is also surrounded by several _Arleigh Burke_-class destroyers and at least least one _Ticonderoga_ class cruiser (at least, for now), plus support and special purpose ships. And I don’t know how you’d scale the hull without a jetpack. On the other hand, if you knock out propulsion or damage the hull sufficient to preclude conducting flight operations, you’d turned a uniquely capable multi-billion-dollar air superiority and power projection asset into the world’s most pointless superyacht. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/29 "2024-10-06T22:40:16Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > I know a couple of naval officers who qualified for Expert Pistol and Expert Rifle, mainly because it would give them two more decorations to wear on their ribbon bars. (Raises hand) Ditto but pistol only and enlisted. They are dead last in order of precedence. > [@Zakalwe](#): > > I would imagine it starts “holy fucking shit!” Except the Royal Australian Navy. There it’s, “Crikey!” ---
**Author:** ![Zakalwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zakalwe/32/270_2.png) [@Zakalwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zakalwe)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 10:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/30 "2024-10-06T22:53:29Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > you’d turned a uniquely capable multi-billion-dollar air superiority and power projection asset into the world’s most pointless superyacht. I always wondered, if I had Bill Gates or Elon Musk money, could I buy a retiring CV or CVN and convert it. The world’s greatest floating party. ---
**Author:** ![Kropotkin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kropotkin/32/18045_2.png) [@Kropotkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kropotkin)\ **Post date:** [October 6, 2024, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/31 "2024-10-06T23:17:14Z")
Of course, the record for the world’s longest floating houseparty belongs to the Alabama Tiger. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/32 "2024-10-07T01:09:56Z")
> [@Zakalwe](#): > > The world’s greatest floating party. The USS Hornet in Alameda, CA is owned by the Aircraft Carrier Hornet Foundation, which is a 501(c)(3) non-profit. And they’re happy to host parties. Not really seaworthy anymore, though. The USS Intrepid in NYC is another example. You could probably make it seaworthy again with enough money. Probably not with a nuclear reactor, though. ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/33 "2024-10-07T18:21:19Z")
> [@Zakalwe](#): > > I always wondered, if I had Bill Gates or Elon Musk money, could I buy a retiring CV or CVN and convert it. It has been speculated in fiction. > **[Snow Crash](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_Crash#Summary)** > > Snow Crash is a 1992 science fiction novel by Neal Stephenson. Like many of Stephenson's novels, its themes include history, linguistics, anthropology, archaeology, religion, computer science, politics, cryptography, memetics, and philosophy. > In his 1999 essay "In the Beginning... Was the Command Line", Stephenson explained the title of the novel as his term for a particular software failure mode on the early Macintosh computer. Stephenson wrote about the Macintosh "When the computer crashed and... > [@](#): > > …a media magnate named L. Bob Rife beginning to emerge… > > the Raft, a huge collection of boats containing Eurasian refugees, is approaching the West Coast of the United States. The center of the Raft is **L. Bob Rife’s yacht, formerly the USS Enterprise nuclear-powered aircraft carrier.** But, of course, it’s fiction in a strictly anarcho-captitalist post-national society, where the US government is reduced to an irrelevant rump and government services devolved to corporations, so it would take a failed nation-state for a functional warship (with live weapons) to pass into the hands of the highest bidder. Not even Russia, in its egregious privatization looting of state assets, got that bad. As far as I know. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/34 "2024-10-07T18:47:44Z")
Aristotle Onassis’ yacht [Christina O](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christina_O) was originally a Royal Canadian Navy frigate. The idea is not completely outlandish. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/35 "2024-10-07T19:05:52Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > This happens all the time, actually–if you’re not talking about two people who would otherwise engage in an actual fight, but decide just “spar” instead. If you’re talking about sparring as part of training, this is the backbone of the Modern Army Combatives Program. Repeatedly practicing moves with willing, compliant opponents has limited value once the technique is learned. That was a chief complaint on the L.I.N.E.S. combatives program that SOF had a few decades ago. Every move was basically a “kill move”, so practicing and sparring wasn’t really practical. Which meant the skills weren’t really mastered, and what was learned depreciated quickly. Sparring is not the same as actual combat and can’t take the place of proper training. It is still an excellent exercise for any form of martial arts. You can, and should develop strength, stamina and other necessary skills in other ways, however sparring provides some of the specific conditions used in actual fighting situations. Your statement below indicates this is well understood. > [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > That is in addition to being great training and physical exercise. MACP sparring is ubiquitous across the Army. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/36 "2024-10-07T19:31:52Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Sparring is not the same as actual combat and can’t take the place of proper training. It is still an excellent exercise for any form of martial arts. I would tone that down a tad - substitute “Good” for “Excellent” and wiggle it down to most forms of martial arts. For example, Tai Chi’s form of sparring is called push hands and its utility is a matter of opinion and varies with the form of push hands. I think of sparring as a sport, comparable in some ways to tag. Yes, it builds skills like any other martial exercise. But there’s an instinct to conflate MMA with self defense and honestly they are very different. We’ve had these kinds of threads before and the consensus was, “No, I saw very little hand-to-hand training in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s.” It’s interesting that things have moved on a little. MACP link: > **[MACP - Special Operations Combatives Program](https://ussocp.com/macp/)** It endorses live sparring, “in order to be useful in cultivating a Combative culture.” But what I found most intriguing was the research they conducted, self-defense technique being something that isn’t currently understood in a systematic way to my knowledge: > When fighting started in Afghanistan, we began to conduct post active interview with soldiers who had experienced hand-to-hand combat. We created procedures and an interview format that drew out important lesson that might otherwise be missed in a simple narrative. Among some of the many questions that we asked: What equipment was the soldier wearing? What was the tactical situation? In the years since then, we have conducted hundreds of these interviews and adjusted the curriculum to the new lessons learned. For instance, every hand-to-hand fight we have documented has involved grappling, but not a single one has involved only striking (although, striking is always part of grappling). Also, around thirty percent of the fights end with gunshots. Fighting in an environment where everyone is armed means that the fight is most frequently over who controls the weapons. This provided some much much-needed empirical verification _in one particular violence context_ that, “Most fights go to the ground”: They didn’t find a single example of the kind of strike-only encounter that spectators view in boxing or kickboxing. I’d like to take a deeper look at their dataset. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/37 "2024-10-07T19:40:54Z")
> [@Measure\_for\_Measure](#): > > For example, Tai Chi’s form of sparring is called push hands and its utility is a matter of opinion and varies with the form of push hands. Yeah, that shouldn’t count as sparring. The advantage of sparring over individual exercise is dealing with an opponent, someone who doesn’t do what you expect, isn’t going to give you a moment of rest when you need it. Going to ground and other grappling should be a big part of it too. Again, it’s exercise, not the real thing. ---
**Author:** ![Measure\_for\_Measure](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/measure_for_measure/32/557_2.png) [@Measure\_for\_Measure](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Measure_for_Measure)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2024, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/38 "2024-10-07T19:55:13Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Yeah, that shouldn’t count as sparring. The advantage of sparring over individual exercise is dealing with an opponent, someone who doesn’t do what you expect, isn’t going to give you a moment of rest when you need it. Push hands has all of that. It’s an excellent way of teaching certain skills within the Tai Chi curriculum (IMHO). Yes, I’m responding to what you wrote but perhaps not what you meant. So what’s my point? I’m channeling [Rory Miller’s](https://www.chirontraining.com/) _Meditations on Violence_ which notes that violence encompasses an incredibly varied set of encounters (and that self defense techniques are often oriented towards a relatively narrow set). Martial arts schools in turn are pretty varied and resist generalization (not that we shouldn’t attempt that). By way of perspective, I’ve practiced one style for over a decade now - for fitness. I’m not planning on taking on a battalion of ninjas: I’m more concerned with enhancing my life expectancy by making a habit of exercise. The style has a self-defense component, but I’m a SWM who has aged out of the typical male on male fighting demographic. I still find it interesting because, well I’m a dude. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2024, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/39 "2024-10-08T01:38:37Z")
> [@Bear\_Nenno](#): > > I attained Level 1 Certification in L.I.N.E.S. which basically means I can “grab, twist, pull” someone’s genitals off or “270 break” their arm, or stab a sentry in the taint and cover his mouth before he screams… you know, useful stuff. MACP teaches much more basic fighting skills and concepts like closing the distance, gaining the dominate position, finishing the fight, etc. This reminds me of when my Asian-American schoolteacher wife moved up from teaching elementary school students to middle and high schoolers. The smartasses in class, noticing her distinctly Asian features, would ask her, “Mrs. Clark, do you know kung-fu/karate?” She’d look them right in the eye and say, modestly, “Not much, just enough to kill someone.” She had surprisingly few disciplinary problems when she was a teacher. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2024, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457/40 "2024-10-08T18:39:21Z")
Found a LINES video. Wow! That takes me back. As you can see, there is no sparring. All the training is on a willing, compliant opponent. With MACP, once you learn the move, you do it against an opponent who isn’t trying to let you do it. And you spar. A lot. For anyone who thought I was crazy: “Grab, Twist, Pull, Grab” followed by “270 break” [https://youtu.be/geSaeg\_1Tcs?t=1389](https://youtu.be/geSaeg_1Tcs?t=1389) There’s even a wiki article: [LINE (combat system) - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LINE_(combat_system)) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-us-military-drill-instructors-particularly-skilled-in-unarmed-combat/1008457.md?page=1)