A Hero is Only as Good as His Weapon

Fill Your Hand You S.O.B!

Do you recognize the title? If you do then you are showing your age. This is a quote by one of the great television cowboys of all time, John Wayne, playing Rooster Cogburn in the movie True Grit. He was screaming this phrase at his enemies as he rode them down. To “fill your hand” means to arm yourself. And when it comes to fighting and the martial arts it may not be a bad idea.

Usually weapon training is reserved for the intermediate and the advance levels when someone trains in the martial arts. This idea was really brought around when martial arts moved from the battlefield and into the civilian world for self-defense. Not only that but when the arts were being taught to children the weapons were reserved for when they were older or could at least have enough control to not injure themselves.

In the old school this was not the case. When martial arts were used for survival weapon use was a regular part of training. Students would learn weapons along with unarmed combat. Winning in a fight for your life was the focus and not just improving one’s strength and dexterity. The best way to have an edge is to arm your self,”fill your hand.” This has always been and will always be true.

Every martial artist at some point should have at least a basic knowledge of weapons. There are those like myself that advocate to be pure fist fighters. Yujiro Hanma and I believe that weapons make the fighter lazy. At the same time Yujiro is a fictional character and a superhuman. But seriously, there are martial artists that avoid using weapons. This may be noble but it is quite foolish. They may not have a need to use weapons but they fail themselves if they ever have to confront an opponent that is armed.

Even if you do not like weapons you should know the basic classes and how they work so that if you find yourself at the end of an attacker’s blade you will know what possible methods they will use to strike you. Having this information you will be better able to make a decision on what techniques you can use to defend against them.

Example, if you were attacked by someone wielding a gun would you know how to defend against it? No! You would not do some cool disarm that you saw one time. That would get you shot. If you could recognize what type of weapon it was, where the safety was, and how powerful the round was you cold then determine what you had to hid behind so you would have good cover. Diving over and hiding behind the couch is not a real thing. I don’t care how often it happens on action movies.

All weapons have the same basic use. They are meant to strengthen your attack somehow. And there are endless varieties spread all over the world. The decision of what weapon you learn to use is usually left up to your teacher. He or she will decide what weapon to teach you from the list of weapons they know. What do you do if your teacher does not have a weapon that you want to use? I got it. You just go online and pick the weapon you really want. Don’t do that. Aside from being really disrespectful you will be missing a great opportunity.

There is a chance that the weapons your teacher will teach you will be in the same class as the weapon you really want to study. “Ryu Ho what in the world do you mean by same class?” What I mean is this. Weapons, all weapons, can be grouped into a few categories and subcategories. And when you learn a weapon from one category it is not a great stretch to quickly pick up other weapons from that same category.

Weapons can be blunt or edged, long or short range, projectile, chemical, and soft.

The three main categories that most people are familiar with are blunt, edged, and projectile. Blunt and edged weapons can be either long or short ranged. Of course projectile is a long range weapon. That is kind of the point of it being a projectile. Chemical weapons are lesser known but can be both long and short range as well as projectile. Soft weapons are those that are flexible in nature or have a joint. Both the nunchaku and the bullwhip are soft weapons.

The first thing the new weapon student needs to be made aware of are the attack angles. All attack angles on the body are the same.

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Aside from projectile weapons that have only one attack angle, straight it, and chemical weapons that are area effect and don’t really have a defined attack angle, each hand weapon, long or short, will strike along one of these attack angles.

Blunt weapons are meant to damage the body with, you guessed it, blunt force trauma. The effects are bruises, broken bones, and vibrating shock. Blunt weapons are easy to use and relatively safe to the user. The most basic blunt weapons are the staff and the club. These weapons go back to the ancient man. They are as old as time and though antiquated they are no less effective for melee combat.

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Edged weapons are probably the most popular, made so by books and movies. The most popular among the edged weapons is of course the sword. The hero in every classical story always wields a sword. However, the most powerful edged weapon in history was the spear. This took the range of the staff and deadlines of the edge and combined them. This birthed the grandfather of combat, the spear.

The effects of edged weapons are more devastating than blunt weapons. Where blunt weapons break bones the edged weapons can sever whole limbs. Getting hit in the leg with a club can possibly break your femur. That would be a very bad day, but that same strike done with a sword may not break a bone but it will open the skin. Edged weapons, it I have not said it already, are those that have sharp edges or points. They are meant to penetrate the body to damage organs and bleed them out.

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There are two main techniques with edged weapon. It doesn't matter if it is a tactical folding pocket knife or a two handed great sword. Edged weapons are meant to slash and stab, and the more devastating technique is a stab. Slashes may cover more surface area and even cripple a body, but stabs can end life in a few seconds.

Soft weapons can have elements of either blunt or edged classes. However most soft weapons are blunt for the safety of the user. Having a blade flying around you can be just as dangerous for you as it is for your opponent. Soft weapons are those that can bend and flex as part of their use. As I said the nunchaku and the whip are examples of soft weapons but so are the kusari-gama, the cord for hojojutsu, and the three sectional staff.

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Soft weapons can use a whipping action to add to acceleration to the striking portion of the weapon. When someone uses a whip and you hear that loud pop at the end, that is the tip breaking the sound barrier. At that point the end of the whip is moving faster that the speed of sound. Imagine that striking you in the eye or the groin.

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Projectile weapons are the most preferred of the modern man. In ancient times there were warriors known as peltists that were experts at throwing things at their opponents. This is the most rudimentary form of projectile use. Pick something up and throw it. The Gods of war blessed us with the most powerful projectile weapon before the invention of the gun. That was the bow and arrow. In ancient war archers could really be a great equalizer on the battlefield. They were the ancient equivalent of artillery.

Most projectile weapons have sharp edges on them but there are also blunt ones as well.

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Chemical weapons attack the senses and disrupt the body’s systems to take it out of homeostasis. The human body is a complex mesh of many integrated systems all working in tandem with one another. They must all remain in balance if the body is to function properly. When the balance is compromised the effects can be devastating.

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Animal venom and poisons, harmful and even deadly to humans, can be found naturally occurring throughout the world. Some have learned to harness these toxins and weaponize them.

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The effects of a chemical weapon vary depending on what substance is used and how it is delivered to the body. There are those chemicals that can affect the breath. These are called choking agents. There are those that affect the blood, not allowing it to oxygenate the tissues of the body. Nerve agents attack the nervous system and stop the brain from communicating with the rest of he body. There is a particularly cruel agent called a blister agent that affects the skin and the sinuses. Blister agents cause the skin to form pustules, crack and bleed. It may burn the eyes, nose, and mouth of the victim. Blister agents’ sole purpose is to make someone suffer.

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Civilian chemical weapons come in the form of mace or pepper spray, tear gas, and even malodorants. Look up that last on for an interesting read. There are some primitive tribes that have mastered the art of combining plant matter and certain insects to produce curare, which has a paralyzing effect.

Now I only mentioned poison because it is in the realm of chemical weapons. And I do encourage you to research them for the sake of gaining knowledge. By all means feed your curiosity. However, truly dealing in poisons may have harmful if not deadly consequences and I urge you do not attempt to actually make or use anything you may research.

As you can see there are many different weapon types and all of them have their uses. Remember this, people are dangerous, not weapons. Someone with the intent to do harm will always be more dangerous than someone who is armed and does not have the want or the need to hurt others.

I forgot to mention weapons of opportunity or improvised weapons. These are common objects that can be brought into a fight and function as conventional weapons to substitute when you are unarmed. Learn staff techniques and there will be no stick that you will not be able to use to defend with. If knife techniques are all you know and you happen to have a ballpoint pen or a screwdriver handy you will not be without aid.

I have grown tired of typing. It is your turn to do your research and fill your hand you s.o.b. Go learn a weapon. Ask your teacher about it. He or she will steer you in the right direction. Now turn it off. Put it down. And go train.