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Now, I'm obviously not saying a shelter is useless - far from it, a good shelter is the best thing since sliced bread if you're wet and cold and/or injured. But even so, if you need to make a shelter, you have quite likely already screwed up somewhere along the way. The general rule in avoiding bad things is not to screw up. That's unfortunately sometimes almost impossible, but some things make screwing up much harder, and other things make it much easier. False assumptions are one of the best ways to increase your chances of screwing up. Furthermore, if you look at military survival training in Europe, particularly in Russia and Scandinavia, you'll notice a glaring lack of huge knives. Fixed blades have always been the way to go here, but not large and heavy and clumsy fixed blades, but relatively compact ones. And when soldiers are trained in shelter building and similar activities here, they are trained to use minimal tools, so they can do it even if they've lost or broken their priceless knife, two or three. A compact fixed blade is an enormously useful tool in building a shelter, and while it doesn't chop down branches or trees like a big chopper knife, it does help a lot if you know how to use it. 
Peace and love. 
Also, survival is come as you are, not as you'd like to be -- big chopper, small folder or no knife at all.
I missunderstood appologies.
In that environment and many we encounter a small knife is not usefull. A large knife and or saw is more usefull the knife being the most usefull even over a hatchet as many times it weighs less takes up less space and does more stuff.
All this being said I dont carry a large knife dayhiking as the risk is much less than 10 miles into nowhere.
This is what works for me under those conditions and circumstances.
Sorry for the missunderstanding.
Skam
I have tried. A least two Moras snapped in half when lateral force was applied at a level that a Falkniven F-1 would not notice. I mention that result because people in a hurry to get wood open often apply lateral force. Crisis often results in behavior that is not a model for good judgment or sensitivity to a tool's limits. The Moras surely did not act like they were spring-tempered. (The snapee's were two standard, red wood handled models [$7.00 each at a gun show], driven/batoned flush into the end of a maple round and pushed sideways. The tangs started pulling up into the handles before they broke. Still pretty tough. Not something you should do to such a thin, hard knife.)
F-1's have the better part of a full tang. They appeared on eBay in the last week for "Buy It Now" for $89.99. That suggests than a well-regarded "bushcraft knife" (that the Swedish and U.S. military regard as a "survival knife") can be had for under $100.00. I don't know to whom that is "low" cost, but it is what it is. Certainly not several hundreds of $$.
) Alright, I should have mentionned "in normal use", since I would not even think about prying, since I hardly see any use for it. I was refering at things like batoning it full speed in hard wood. I mean, you can baton without holding back.
Actually it's not fair since thickness is observed on the spine while sharpness is observed on the edge, yet many thick knives on there spine get pretty thick near their edge too.
I mentioned "run of the mill thick knife" or someting like that, not always. Simply noted that I've seen more "thick" Kabars broken while batoning "the right way" than moras, thickness doesn't necessarly means tougher. Fact is I've seen many thick knives with poor heat treatment (thick grains...) but that's just me.
I won't discuss various benefits of knives. I have an F1 (actually I have two) and it is relatively inexpensive compared to the quality.
I haven't broken a Mora batoning (have tried the cheapies, the SWAK, and the 2000), but they sure tear up the batons compared to something thicker, like an F1.
Yup. Lots of "thick" knives with obtuse final bevels. My limited experience with batoning the A1 is that it does less well than the thinner F1 on some woods and as well on others. I, personally, don't think of the A1 as a "bushcraft" knife, but others do and that's all good.
Granted, there are poorly made knives. I simply can't draw a generalization that thinner knives are tougher than thicker knives. I suspect, without being able to prove it, that the opposite is true, but strong enough is . . . . enough.
Maybe that is what you wish to discuss, and that is certainly your right. But the topic is:
)Oh well, I just didn't want to embark in long stories about bushcraft. Who holds the truth about bushcraft anyway? Aussies? Kiwies? late RM's fans? Kochanski? Bushcraftuk? Bushmen in Kalahari? You? Me? I don't care too much since I don't care much about how should be labelled what I do: bushcraft, woodcraft, boy-scout-craft or anything-else-craft.
I think I may have worded myself a little badly, no doubt being drunk as a skunk (but nowhere near as drunk as the Skunk, most likely
I meant not to say that indigenous peoples always use a small knife - quite to the contrary, in fact. I meant to say, that unlike some others have claimed in this thread, indigenous peoples do not always use a large knife. That's not to say they always use a small knife either. What kind of knife they use depends on two things, generally, those being their environment and the availability of decent metal for knives. In the tropic, as you said, they tend to favor large blades, goloks, machetes, things like these. In that environment, that is the solution that works. On the other hand, in places like Scandinavia, machetes do no work well at all, and smaller fixed blades and axes rule the land. Usually, the people who live in place X are the best authority on what works in place X. So, being a Finn, I would take the locals' advice and take a machete to a tropical jungle, and I'd expect them to trust me when I say their machete is next to useless on Scandinavian land and suggest they bring a decent small fixed blade and a good hatchet or an axe. So, yes, those who use a machete in the tropic do absolutely know what they are doing. They would not survive otherwise. On the other hand, if they brought that machete to, say, Finland, they would find it rather useless and cumbersome in all tasks compared to a puukko and a hatchet.
Strictly speaking, Finns do not have the leuku. The indigenous Sami people of Lapland use the leuku, mostly for working with reindeer and chopping (yes) the dwarf birch shrubs that grow there for wood. They have little need for an axe, since there are either rather few trees to chop or there is plenty of easy to handle shrubs to use for firewood. The Finns use the leuku more as a curiosity tool and as a sign of respect towards the Sami culture than anything to actually replace an axe or a hatchet. I personally very much like the leuku. The Sami always carry the leuku with a smaller knife, similar to what you will find Kukri users doing with the karda knife.