W. Hock Hochheim's February 2007 Web Log

 

 

Each month,

Hock's Blog covers:

 

-Hock True Cop Action Story-

 

-True Knife Fight Stories-

 

-True Gun Fight Stories-

 

-Hand, Stick, Knife and

Gun Training Methodolgies-

 

-Sardonic Humor-

 

-Political Commentary & News-

 

-Guest Authors-

 

-SFC News-

 

-A Fine Look at Mrs. Peele-

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Unarmed vs. The Knife

All new! 2-DVD set.

On sale now

Click on title

 

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SFC Big 2

Hock * Halleck

March 17, 18 Romeoville/Chicago, IL

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SFC Eagle Classic T-Shirt

"Thrive in Chaos!" for $25


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Dull Edge Training Folder Knife

On Sale now!

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Knife Congress Shirt
Use Knife to Save Your Life! $25

 

 

 

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Force Necessary/Police Judo

"Old school meets new school

meets old school again"

 

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11 Year SFC Anniversary!

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February 2007

SFC HEADQUARTERS DOCTRINE

HOCK'S Web Log

 

 

"Read by Thousands Round' the World!"

 

 

 

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23 February The T, the A, the S, the E, the R of Taser

Did you know that the inventor of the Taser, used the words "Thomas A. Swift's Electric Rifle?" Based on his affinity for the old Tom Swift adventure books he read as child?

http://www.semp.us/biots/biot_231.html

These adventure books, very popular in the 50s and 60s such as Swift and the Hardy Boys and for the girls Nancy Drew, were the Harry Potters of their day. Jerry Stiller and Tom Cruise are making a Hardy Men movie about the Hardy boys futher adventures as adults.

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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21 February 2007: The Dead Baby

In Dallas, TX now, the city has started a Baby Moses program, where unwanted babies can be dropped off at fire stations and safe havens, no questions asked, rather than be abandoned or killed. As I watched this news feature on television, my mind flipped off into the various dead baby cases I had worked in the past. All have a snapshot stain in my brain of one telling moment, one sight.

 

One case involves what is the most ironic moments of my life, as it is intertwined with the law, races, friendships, death, abortion, poverty, education...well, so much it is too hard to typecast it all. I will just have to tell you, and I promise you won't know what to do with it either.

I will start by recalling Sam Till for you. Many or our officers knew a Sam Till. Sam lived in one the projects or "poor" parts of our city, and yes, it was the black part of town. Sam was Vietnam vet and a retired, high-ranking, Army NCO. He was a hard working, ambitious, person and ran two successful businesses, one a large, city-wide, sanitation company, and the other, a well-established, funeral home. On any given day, you might spot Sam supervising a garbage truck, even loading one on a route, or giving a sermon at a funeral, or driving the limo to a graveyard. He often came to crime scenes and collected the murder victims, or scrapped together the suicides. Sam pitched in and did it all.

One day, he and two workers saw a crazed man beating one of our officers and trying to take his pistol. Sam and the men jumped on the criminal and saved the day. Sam was one of the locals who renovated his house and remained in the projects as many successful people did. It was where he grew up! Where he wanted to be. He was even mildly involved in city politics and become involved with various good causes.He had several good sons that stayed out of trouble.

Through the years as a patrolman or a detective, Sam supplied me a lot of information about people he knew and suspected of crime. I could go to him anytime for intell and gossip. He, in turn would give me a phone call if he thought he'd discovered something. I think he knew I meant well for the community. He also knew that one of the most influential people in my life was a black NCO and therefore I mustn't have been much of a racist. But, racism was a problem back then, not as bad as before the 50s and 60s but still bad in the 70s and 80s. I would hope things have improved some as we walk about our lots in life today.

I was a brand new detective (technically new for Texas, as I had been one in the Army), in 1980 and I was dispatched one chilly evening to meet a patrolman about a "family" problem in that part of the city. When I arrived to this sprawling, older home, a patrolman introduced me to a mother and father in the living room. The parents had become burdened with a problem and neither they, nor the patrolman, knew what to do about it.

"Sandra has not been well, and her friends have told us something," the mother said. "Sandra was pregnant. And we had no idea."

No idea? Yet, I saw the family, color portrait on the wall. The parents were big people and Sandra, who looked to be 12 years old in the picture, was a very, very big girl.

"Her friend told us she was pregnant and she had the baby," the father said. "She has not been to school in a week. She's been throwing up...we just thought she was sick."

"Where is the baby?" I asked.

"No one knows, " the officer added.

"Sandra's friend says she had the baby last night," the mother said.

"Where?"

"In there," the father said, pointing to a bedroom.

"Have you looked yet?"

"No, Mr. Hock, we are afraid to look."

"Any...crying?" I asked with trepidation.

"No. Sandra is in there now. She won't open the door."

"Well, Mrs. Rankin, this is your house and you can go anywhere in it. Lets go," I said. We all stood and the mother announced to Sandra that we were coming in. The room was quite large, yet it was stacked and cluttered with...with just about everything you'd find in a house, times ten. Clean clothes. Dirty clothes. Furniture. Just stacked and gross, all atop a dirty carpet.

The mother started to explain why we were there. Sandra was now about 15 years old and still quite a large young girl. It was possible to live around her and not detect a pregnancy. Possible. As they talked, as she denied, I started prowling the room, lifting and looking. There, pushed against the wall, buried in towels and clothes, was a newborn baby. Dead.

The parents knew I'd spotted something and in an instant they charged over to look. They moaned and screamed as I left the house for my sedan radio. I requested our crime scene man, Russell Lewis, to come, as well as my supervisor, Detective Sergeant Howard Kelly. Kelly would contact the Juvenile detective to take over any investigation. The girl, would be charged for something back then that would be virtually ignored and impossible to prove. Stillborn? Starved? Killed? Not to sure what the prosecutors would do.

Now, none of this is really why I am telling you this story. I am trying to keep these details brief. What came next...is why. A funeral home was called to handle the dead body after we processed the crime scene. Sam Till took the call and drove right over as soon as he could...in his garbage truck, not the Till Funeral van, as Sam was out delivering a truck to his yard and was already nearby. Sam came in and was greeted by the parents as long friends. He sympathized with them. There would be a proper funeral. The family left the house for the police station.

Sam had a towel in his hands and we walked to the bedroom and up to the baby. He was talking about something the whole way. He grabbed this black baby by the ankles and we went out on the street. While we discussed whatever it was, he laid the towel down on the passenger floorboard of the sanitation truck and laid the baby atop it. We said goodbye.

As he drove away in the garbage truck, I stood rather dumbfounded on the city street, as I knew I had just witnessed a most ironic, twisted, odd, social statement/situation. I mean how can I describe this? How can I convey what I thought? What I felt? I don't know myself. I have a vivid memory of that moment in my head. I just don't know what to do with it.

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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18 February 2007: True Military knife Fights - Continued (WW II)

"We needed some of the ammo, and there was some Jerry explosives right there. We needed it badly, you know. A Jerry sat on a chair in the archway, and another one was puffing away on a fag about 10 meters away, in the dark, his back to me, too. Walking around. I thought if I could stab the Kraut in the chair, simple, maybe I could run up and stab the other too. I got up to the bloke in the chair. It was about 4 a.m. you know, the best time to work such things. He may have been asleep. I grabbed his mouth and stuck me' dagger into his throat. I tipped the chair back, and he died. Just died right there. But I had to twist and twist the blade, like screwing it in like a screwdriver, ya' know? Just like that. I laid the chair back on the ground.

The other Jerry with the fag just wandered off! Never even heard us. I cut some of the bands on the boxes that was holding the gear, with that very same bloody dagger, and off I went with some."

Sidney Lawrence, Commando Combat, Lithglow

 

Excerpt from Hock's, 1990s, out-of-print, Military Knife Combat book. All of these, some 50 true stories will appear again in a future Knife book.

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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16 February 2007: Tackling the Problem.

The stars were all aligned this week at an Ohio police academy. We had the training suit gear, the long rows of mats, healthy police officers and the subject was the Police Judo "Enforcement Takedowns" Module. One of the most common, police takedown occurrences on the list is the ubiquitous tackle. Yet, in the annals of modern, police training, NO ONE EVER practices or explains it. Did I say EVER! NEVER! This is a giant and dangerous disservice to both cadets and to veteran officers.

In ours and many programs the common tackle is covered. I teach the same tackle segment that Jim McCann teaches, except when Jimbo has a special sport group of submission-only students. But we have the same takedowns and counters. And, like a citizen, or an athlete, If an arrest process goes bad, an officer may have to tackle someone very much like a shoot-fighter or UFC style practitioner. Front-to-front with follow-ups. Despite what is said about "not-wanting-to-go-to-the-ground," a tackle sometimes evolves as the best way to take down and control the suspect. It just...seems to evolve with the situation. If you have been there you know what I mean. Often, an officer slips off his first encounter plan and finds himself near the suspect's leg, or holding onto a stumbling perp. Tackle!

Many frontal confrontations! But, police and enforcement personnel often have to tackle from behind, as in chasing after someone, or like a football player as a "secondary chaser" coming in from an odd angle, a geometric angle not found in one-versus-one ring fight textbook or street fights.

In our academy scenario the officer briefly talks with the suited-up, suspect face-to-face, then this stuntman cusses, turns and runs. The officer pursues. Officers must be acutely aware of their size and shape when they tackle a fleeing suspect. This measurements dictate their plan. There are high grabs, mid-section grabs and leg grabs. There are "leap-ons and pull-overs." Then, there is a "flattening out" for lack of a better term, that officers can practice which rides the suspect down and still keeps the suspect on the bottom side.

One old-school police warning about the leg grab tackle is to remember to let go of the legs and climb higher up the suspect when you hit the ground. It has been noted that too many officers just reflexively and instinctively cling on to the legs even while the suspect turns, wiggles, scrambles and strikes the the officer. An officer must also remember if they are alone, how far away help is and if back-up is right there to help.

One major thing to be aware of the "Double-the-Force Concept" we use in every takedown module, regardless of whether it is in the hand, stick, knife, gun or Police Judo courses. Suspects try to take your energy, add to it and then roll just "one more time," to get on the topside for pummeling, or killing and/or popping up to escape. Officers can also double the force against the suspect's momentum.

At the academy we also did some experimentation with shoves. A shove on the back, rather than a tackle! Often the suspect went FLYING! (see prior month's blogs for shove-chase stories)

Of course, the tackling officer is armed and some 40% of the time, the suspect is also armed, making the arrest and control part of the tackle tricky when they hit the deck. When the officers at the academy tackled their stuntman and the two started a struggle on the ground, I reminded them, "Okay! OKAY! Today we are just tackling. And you are now in the Enforcement Ground Fighting Module problem. And that, is the subject for another day!"

Knowing these tricks, exercising and experimenting with them, and possessing a working knowledge of your size, strength and explosiveness are all important, especially when you tackle the problems with tackling.

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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14 February 2007: Adrenaline Soup's on!

When we decide to cook some soup, primordial or otherwise, there are two ways to do so. Ironically, these are also the two ways that our body cooks and serves up the stew of adrenaline hormones. One way is to have a pot of soup over a slow-burning, low heat and the other is to place the pot on a burner and crank the heat up to the red-hot maximum.

The soup on high/fast heat is not unlike the quick, burning blast of adrenaline when we are suddenly shocked into angry or fearful motion. It rockets up to a hot flash and sometimes if we eat it too fast? We might burn our tongue! Better served and consumed at half-heated.

The soup on the slow burner? Well, if we leave it there and we come back, the soup will slowly steam away, leaving a hard-caked residue and possibly damaging the pot. This is not unlike the adrenaline of the slow burn some people experience when they stay stressed, worked-up and over-excited for too long. Sometimes you even burn a hole in the pot and can't use it again.

Yes, cooking up the primordial soup is a lot like cooking adrenaline. You need the soup to live but if its too, too hot or left to cook way too long, your tongue, or the "cooking pot," is going to be damaged.

 

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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12 February, 2007 H. John Poole

I was at a seminar recently and a guy asked me had I heard of John Poole. This practitioner had not been in the military and I was taken aback that anyone outside a rather small, military click had ever heard of him. H. John Poole is an American military author and a Marine combat veteran of Vietnam, specializing in small unit and individual tactics. His books focus on the role, training, and skills of the individual, and for NCOs.

I stumbled upon his name in a PX in Camp Penedleton, CA on a teaching seminar. The Marines who escorted me there said that Poole was "outside the box" and filled in the gaps in standard, accepted doctrine with his wizened experience. So much so, that they were surprised his books were on sale on the Camp.

Poole , was agent for the Illinois Bureau of Investigation in Chicago, and then enlisted into the Marine Corps as a Sergeant where he rose to the rank of Gunnery Sergeant (aka "Gunny") , a rank highly esteemed within the Marine Corps and among the military in general. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel (Lt. Col.) before leaving the Marine Corps. His great books are:

Right now, Phantom Soldier is on the desk of my Ohio hotel room. This is the third time I have read it. They are the kinds of books you need to keep re-reading every year or so.

 

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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10 February, 2007: New CQC Dispatches...

...is in the process of being sent, via email, worldwide. If you haven't gotten your's yet? Send me your state, country and email at HockHoch@aol.com

It comes to you in an virus-free, attachment. Please open it up. We have great articles in there, to include access to action footage of the recent US Army Ultimate Fighting Contest. Plus articles on combative science and medicine, military, martial arts, crime and a little humor.

Speaking of humor, next month Buffalo Nickels returns, as he has been on an extended vacation skiing in all the new, deep, northeastern USA snow.

Remember my mission is to save you time, scan and surf the news and research and hand it right off to you with a click of a button. And its free.

So OPEN it up and take a look. Hey! Its free!

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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8 February, 2007: The Teach Act

So, you found a good article in "Inside Kung Fu" or "Whoop-Ass Weekly" and it contained how-to pictures. You run to the copy machine and make 16 copies of it to hand out in your Thursday night class. Ever do that? Guilty! (I am holding up my hand). Is this a real serious offense? If so? How much?

There are always discussions on the legal use and swapping of teaching material. In a subject as broad as ours, this includes many articles, books and films. One just came up the other day on our talk forum. In the copyright law, there is a "fair use doctrine," allowing for the use of news and material under certain restrictions. These restrictions vary now in this multi-media world we live in. I will only be able to write on this as to what I know pertains to two key words. Training and Profit. And then only in the United States.

You may download news clips, articles and material under what is called the "Teach Act." which is a federal law that says "Copyright right law provides educators with a separate set of right in addition to fair use, to display and perform other's works in the classroom...regardless of any medium."

What is fair use, exactly? In the end, a judge or jury would decide that if you were ever challenged, but common sense will usually tell you. One key thing I learned was "keep it very short" and give proper credit to the source, but it goes deeper than that. I am about to release a new CQC Dispatches (new look and mission - by the way - proud of it) and we send our people off to many other webpages for the full articles. One reason I do not have to ask permission from each to do this? I am not charging anything to make and send the E-Magazine. If I were profiting this way? They would want a piece. But the E-publication is free. The place I send you too, gets the benefit of exposure. The ads on those pages get seen more, etc. An advertiser is paying for an ad on that webpage so it will be seen by as many people as possible. I help. Second reason - my purpose is to educate and I generally fall under the Teach Act.

When I ran the old CQC Magazine with pay subscribers and bookstore sales, this caused us to jump through many more legal hoops. We directly made money and they wanted part of that money. But when services are free, like this blog or CQC Dispatches? The well is dry and the intent is more pure. Now, I still receive some money indirectly because of these pure intentions, but you know what happened to me just today? The heater in my pick-up truck went out and its like 30 degrees out there today (No, I do not have a new Hum-V I paid for in cash). Homey, like you, still needs...money!

Attached is a PDF copy written our own Mad Professor Jeff Allen on this subject.

http://sageperformance.com/drjeffallen/DrA/Related-Documents/copyright.pdf
It is ironic that we are forwarding you something to read in a way, isn't it? But it is for education. Note it does not have any related ads such as you would find in a newspaper webpage, so non-ad sources may be a little less patient with their product being tossed around.

It can be tricky. In the end, will the publisher or author become mad at you? Why? That is a key question because a lawsuit can be filed on just about anything. What is your intent? Was it kept brief? Was it properly credited? Questions a lawyer asks and a judge or jury decides.

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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6 February, 2007: USS New York

"She was built with 24 tons of scrap steel from the World Trade Center.

She is the fifth in a new class of warship - designed for missions that include special operations against terrorists. It will carry a crew of 360 sailors and 700 combat-ready Marines to be delivered ashore by helicopters and assault craft.

Steel from the World Trade Center was melted down in a foundry in Amite, LA to cast the ship's bow section. When it was poured into the molds on Sept. 9, 2003, "those big rough steelworkers treated it with total reverence," recalled Navy Capt. Kevin Wensing, who was there. "It was a spiritual moment for everybody there."

Junior Chavers, foundry operations manager, said that when the trade center steel first arrived, he touched it with his hand and the "hair on my neck stood up."  "It had a big meaning to it for all of us," he said. "They knocked us down. They can't keep us down. We're going to be back."

The ship's motto? "Never Forget" "

For more see: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=1800575

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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4 February, 2007: The Jailhouse Superbowl Ring

Saturday morning, 1970s. Patrol.

Our city boasted two Superbowl player residents. And the two of them were as different as day and night and as racially typecast as one cold imagine. One was a retired white guy in a big house with many investments. The other was a black guy from what one might call our slums, or projects. He had no such investments. And no such home. He was older but still playing ball and every off season he would return home. And every season seemed to get into trouble of some sort. Both wore the big brash and legendary Superbowl ring. I never met the white guy, but did meet the black guy. In fact he kind of saved my ass one Saturday morning.

In one "hood" in our city we had a place called "The Wine Tree." It was bar, but not a bar. It was an open house with a jukebox and the booze flowed (illegally sold) along with the drugs. An old, crippled man named Willie lived in the back rom and "ran" it. Through time you learn, either by emergency calls or by investigation that much of that area's crimes, at some point started, ran through, or ended up at the Wine Tree. Did Willie have a liquor license? A business permit? Who the hell knows? It was a house. An open house party. The attendees parked everywhere and the dancing and drinking and conniving and hustling spilled out onto the pounded down and dry front lawn, and out on the streets.

The next mornings there were still stragglers hovering about the Wine Tree and one morning a neighbor reported a fight in progress out front. I was a young turk back then and worked this district, once called "61," and was fearless as I was dumb. As I drove up I saw at least three men arguing and another two interceding and peacemaking. The peacemakers weren't doing so well.

I got out of the car and and tried my hand at it, but these men were charged up on who-knows-what, in their thirties and pissed off. My Gestalt therapy training just wasn't working and two men crashed in on each other. I dove in trying to separate them. And wild fists were flying. The third jumped in and I'll tell you it was a free-for-all. And I wasn't winning. I wound up half-wrestling, half-punching with one of them as the other two, struggled off a few feet. Then one of them pulled knife. it was a switchblade. He was cursing up a storm and this whole event was going down very badly, degrading into a chaotic soap opera with some bloodletting on the ticket. One of the onlookers handed the unarmed man a knife! And now, it spiraled into a real mess.

"Put down those knives!" I ordered, as I grappled with the guy messing with me. HA! That didn't work and I knew this would end with my gun out and six different kinds of crazy. But, I couldn't get to my revolver. The peacemakers bailed back about 15 feet when the knives came out. These two goons cursed a blue streak and started dueling! Slashing and stabbing at each other in wild lunges and swings.

Then suddenly a stout black man charged up. He hit the guy I was hooked with using his shoulder and we both pushed this pain-in-the-ass off. Then he ran up to the knife party and belted one of them in the side of his head, with an elbow or a fist I couldn't see. It was a sucker shot as the man did not see it coming. Stunned, he dropped the knife on impact. I pulled my Colt Python and stepped before the other armed man and told him I'd kill him if he didn't drop the knife. The guy that was fighting with me shared my gun barrel time as I told them both to freeze on the spot.

This hero snatched up the knife from the ground and walked over and took the knife from the hand of the other guy under my gun. I ordered all three men on their knees. I had two pairs of handcuffs on my belt and three men, and I wondered where my back up unit was. I cuffed the guy fighting me the most with one pair, then split my second cuffs with the knife fighters. One cuff to the right hand, the other to his right hand. This way if they both ran off, it would not be easy to run. In theory, one faced one way, one faced the other, but in actuality, one of them would cross their arm over for them to run. It did make an escape a bit awkward. But they didn't run. Code of the West back then was they'd be shot if they did, whether true or not. When in doubt, refer to the Code.

Just about the time I got them cuffed, other units arrived and we carted the men away. Armchair, Sunday-Morning Quarterbacks would say that I should have waited in the squad car until this back-up arrived. But how do you do that? Imagine sitting in a police car like a timid, church mouse while men fought with knives for several minutes just a few yards away? Impossible.

I had to get the name and address of this hero who charged in to help. He was all smiles and told me. I'll call him "Ray Wilson" here. At the station, our Patrol Lt. Gene Green wandered into the book-in room and wanted the sitrep. After the report, he said,

"Ray Wilson?" he plays for the ____________________. Ya' met Ray! Ya' see his big Superbowl ring? He comes home every off-season and stays with his momma. He gets into some kind of trouble every year."

"Well, he sure helped me out of a mess here. Seems like a nice guy!" I said.

"Just wait," Lt. Green added." You'll see him in here for something' er another. He comes home and cleans up after his relatives and friends. He has a helleva family. Always in trouble."

About a month later we were on midnight shift and I walked though the station to the squad room. The old headquarters was situated kind of funny because you had to walk through the book-in room of the our jail to get to the squad room. There on the book-in room bench, sat a handcuffed Ray Wilson. He was arrested for assaulting some men with a baseball bat. Some kind of a family, revenge/vendetta.

His possessions were laid on the counter, ready for safe-keeping collection. A worn wallet. Some pocket change. An old watch. A belt...and a golden, Superbowl ring.

"Take care of that ring," Ray asked cordially.

"We always do, Ray," the arresting officer said.

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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2 February, 2007: Execution in the Desert

I have read many military and historical books through the years but the following account is a unique one from the famous Lawrence of Arabia and his book The Seven Pillars of Wisdom. I don't think I have read such an, in-the-field execution narrative as this. Lawrence is sent on another mission leading his tribal coalitions across the North Africa in World War 1...

"At last we camped, and when the camels were unloaded and driven out to pasture, I lay down under the rocks and rested. My body was very sore with headache and high fever, the accompaniments of a sharp attack of dysentery which had troubled me along the march and had laid me out twice that day in short fainting fits, when the more difficult parts of the climb had asked too much of my strength. Dysentery of this Arabian coast sort used to fall like a hammer blow, and crush its vinims for a few hours, after which the extreme effects passed off; but it left men curiously tired, and subject for some weeks to sudden breaks of nerve.

My followers had been quarrelling all day; and while I was lying near the rocks a shot was fired. I paid no attention; for there were hares and birds in the valley; but a little later Suleiman roused me and made me follow him across the valley to an opposite bay in the rocks, where one of the Ageyl, a Boreida man, was lying stone dead with a bullet through his temples. The shot must have been fired from close by; because the skin was burnt about one wound. The remaining Ageyl were running frantically about; and when I asked what it was, Ali, their head man, said that Hamed the Moor had done the murder. I suspected Suleiman, because of the feud between the Atban and Agey. l which had burned up in Yenbo and Wejh; but Ali assured me that Suleiman had been with him three hundred yards further up the valley gathering sticks when the shot was fired. I sent all out to search for Hamed, and crawled back to the baggage, feeling that it need not have happened this day of all days when I was m pam.

As I lay there I heard a rustle, and opened my eyes slowly upon Hamed's back as he stooped over his saddle-bags, which lay just beyond my rock. I covered him with a pistol and then spoke. He had put down his rifle to lift the gear; and was at my mercy till the others came. We held a court at once; and after a while Hamed confessed that, he and Salem having had words, he had seen red and shot him suddenly. Our inquiry ended. The Ageyl, as relatives of the dead man, demanded blood for blood. The others supported them; and I tried vainly to talk the gentle Ali round. My head was aching with fever and I could not think; but hardly even in health, with all eloquence, could I have begged Hamed off; for Salem had been a friendly fellow and his sudden murder a wanton crime.

Then rose up the horror which would make civilized man shun justice like a plague if he had not the needy to serve him as hangmen for wages. There were other Moroccans in our army; and to let the Ageyl kill one in feud meant reprisals by which our unity would have been endangered. It must be a formal execution, and at last, desperately, I told Hamed that he must die for punishment, and laid the burden of his killing on myself Perhaps they would count me not qualified for feud. At least no revenge could lie against my followers; for I was a stranger and kinless.

I made him enter a narrow gully of the spur, a dank twilight place overgrown with woods. Its sandy bed had been pitted by trickles of water down the cliffs in the late rain. At the end it shrank to a crack a few inches wide. The walls were vertical. I stood in the entrance and gave him a few moments' delay which he spent crying on the ground. Then I made him rise and shot him through the chest. He fell down on the weeds shrieking, with the 'blood coming out in spurts over his clothes, and jerked about till he rolled nearly to where I was. I fired again, but was shaking so that I only broke his wrist. He went on calling out, less loudly, now lying on his back with his feet towards me, and I leant forward and shot him for the last time in the thick of his neck under the jaw. His body shivered a little, and I called the Ageyl; who buried him in the gully where he was. Afterwards the wakeful night dragged over me, till, hours before dawn, I had the men up and made them load, in my longing to be set free of Wadi Kitan. They had to lift me into the saddle."

Great book. Well written - with that great intellectual, insightful, British prose of the day. Please read. Slowly and savor. Much to learn from it about our problems if today.

For more on Lawrence. http://telawrence.info/telawrenceinfo/index.htm

 

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1 February, 2007: CQC Group Rank, Instructorship or Just Train, 4 -Day Combat Camps-2007

Let's start the year off just right, with listing the first half of the 2007, 4-day camp, news. No matter what your current status is - rank Beginner? Basic? Advanced? Expert? We will cover material you need to move up and onward. Or simply train for knowledge and exercise to add-on or build your own self, your way.

 

 

Cincinnati, Ohio, March 8-11

Gent, Belgium, March 30-April 1

Frankfurt, Germany April 6-8

(all seminars build the ranks for the CQC Group)

 

 

 

Any comments? Continue the thread on the talk forum! http://www.hockscombatforum.com

Report back to Headquarters! http://www.hockscqc.com/

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