Читать книгу Krav Maga Tactical Survival - Гершон Бен Керен - Страница 6

Introduction

This isn’t simply a book about Krav Maga, but one that teaches you how to use Krav Maga in real-life situations. There is a huge difference between knowing how to “mechanically” perform a technique and being able to actually get that technique to work during a real-life confrontation. If you don’t understand how violent situations occur and develop, and the situational components that accompany them, it is unlikely that you will be successful in dealing with physical violence, however many techniques you may know. Rather than simply present an encyclopedia of techniques, I have tried to demonstrate what real-world violence looks like and how Krav Maga can be used to deal with it. This is not a book about techniques, but about solutions to violence—which may be non-physical as well as physical. To this end, I have tried to employ not only my firsthand experiences of violence (and those of my contemporaries and colleagues), but also academic research I have been involved in and privy to, along with that which is available in the public domain. I firmly believe that it is important not to limit what you teach to your own experiences, however broad you may believe they are, but to ratify and compare them to those of others, and to that which has been academically proven. Too often, the self-defense and personal-safety industry teaches, and presents, what are merely good ideas and well-intentioned strategies and tactics, which may not have any solid basis in reality.

The techniques and situations described in this book are aimed at educating the reader as to how different types of violent situations develop and play out. They are not designed to be taken as blueprints that accurately describe and reflect every situation that you might encounter. In 99 percent of mugging scenarios, for example, handing over your wallet to an assailant pointing a gun at your head will be the most effective solution; however, if they have a finger on the trigger and their hands are shaking, due to either nerves or withdrawal (most muggings occur to support a drug habit), it may be safer to perform a disarm immediately in case they inadvertently shoot you. The situation determines the solution; there should never be a set of rules you blindly follow. Because of this, you need to understand the dynamics of violence, including how different aggressors are motivated and operate—the same knife threat may be applied by individuals with different motives, and so may require different solutions. If you don’t take this into account in your training, and simply treat a knife threat as a knife threat, you are not training for reality.

An aggressor’s motivation is one of five different situational components that you will need to take into consideration when determining solutions. These five different components are:

1. Location/Environment—Where does the incident take place? A public street, your house, etc.?

2. Relationship—What is your relationship with your aggressor? Stranger, acquaintance, friend, etc.?

3. Motive—What is motivating your aggressor? Financial gain, sexual satisfaction, ego, injustice, etc.?

4. State of mind—What are you thinking/how prepared are you? Are you surprised, resigned, in denial, etc.?

5. Third parties—Who is with you? Are you alone, with friends, with kids, etc.?

Not all violence is the same. A person who puts a knife to your throat may do so for a number of reasons. They may be attempting to rob you, or they may want to abduct you, or they may have just become enraged by something you have done (or they think you’ve done). This could occur on a street, in a parking lot, or in your own home. It could be committed by someone you know, rather than a total stranger. You might not be on your own; you may be with friends or family members, and if you have kids, they may be present, too. Knowing how to perform a knife control or disarm is really only one part of the story, as depending on the situation there may be more effective solutions, and a disarm may in fact be detrimental to your safety. Understanding how these different components interact and change the dynamics of a situation will allow you to choose and implement an effective solution. This book attempts to educate you about how to solve these situations safely, rather than just how to perform various Krav Maga techniques.

Krav Maga is a practical system, and our approach to using it should be practical as well. It has come a long way from the 1940s, when Imi Lichtenfeld designed it as a system of close combat for a soldier with a pack on his or her back. Where violence on the battlefield was simple and direct, the aggressive and violent situations in which modern soldiers and civilians find themselves are much more complex; the modern infantryman has to perform peacekeeping and law-enforcement roles, and civilians have to deal with muggers, sexual assailants, and drunks in bars. While the techniques of Krav Maga are still simple, the situations where they may need to be applied are far from simplistic, and Krav Maga has evolved and developed in order to remain effective and applicable.

This book is divided into four parts: the first part looks at striking and blocking; the second at armed scenarios; the third at unarmed assaults and the situations in which they occur; and the fourth at throws and takedowns. Although this book stands alone, I refer in places to my first book, Krav Maga: Real World Solutions to Real World Violence (published by Tuttle), as I didn’t want to duplicate any of the information or techniques contained therein. Once again, I have tried to demonstrate the simplicity of Krav Maga, the concepts and principles upon which it is founded, and the way it reuses and builds on existing techniques and movements, rather than trying to create new ones. Ultimately, this book is about survival. It is not about ego or being right; as the Hebrew Bible states, “It is better to be a live dog than a dead lion.”