On 20 Sep 2001, at 18:34, Derek Martin wrote:
> But what would have been the outcome if just a handful of brave souls
> on each plane fought back? After all, the terrorists were weilding
> only knives... the odds are you'd get cut if you resisted, but that's
> better than being dead, isn't it? And if those passengers who
> resisted knew how to defend themselves, their odds of being injured
> would be that much more deminished, and the odds of them succeeding in
> putting down the terrorist threat would be that much more enhanced.
> And where is the harm in learning to defend yourself? It will
> probably have other positive effects, like improving your overall
> physical condition, too.
As someone who HAS studied self defense I wanted to point a
couple of things out here.
Disarming a knife weilding assailant is much harder than the
movies would have you believe, especially in an enclosed space.
Any semi competent person with a knife can do absolutely horrific
damage to someone in a short period of time. Even having studied
and practiced the art of disarming a knife weilding attacker, I can't
say that I could do it without being seriously, and I mean seriously
hurt, perhaps fatally.
Also, knives are NOT "safer" weapons than guns. What I mean is
that knives are just as dangerous as a gun if the person with the
knife knows what they're doing. They're actually more dangerous
than a gun at close range. Not to be crude or overly graphic, but
even a semi skilled person with a knife is capable of opening you
up "from stem to stern" in less than a second. In the limited space
of an airplane you have to approach them head on.
As an example of the above, if you ever take any firearms training
(or study martial arts) you'll hear of the "21 foot rule". Essentially it
states that against an opponent who does not possess a "ranged"
weapon (one that can be used to strike at distances, i.e. a gun,
spear, etc.) that you need to maintain at least 21 feet of distance to
be safe. The reason is that 21 feet represents the minimum
distance required to unholster, draw, aim, and fire two shots at an
attacker who is running at you wielding a weapon. The attacker
could have a knife, club, axe...whatever.
Now, if you know you're going to die anyway then taking on a
person with a knife makes sense, what do you have to lose? But
those people undoubtedly thought it would end like most hijackings,
with all of them alive and unharmed. Additionally, there are reports
that the terrorists claimed to have a bomb, not much you can do
against that.
Finally, as you yourself said, it's extremely hard to make yourself act
in situations like that, no matter if you're trained or not. Everyone's
heard stories about people with a black belt in some martial art
getting their butt kicked in a real fight. It's one thing to train for
those situations, it's another to be able to deal with them when they
present themselves.
I'm all for people learning self defense in any form, I encourage it.
But believe me when I tell you it's not as easy as it can seem.
Chad
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