Question for military or ex military personnel (soldiers)

[Pomsbz]

This conversation has gone from fixed blades to what a soldier carrys...The Col. talked about how we forget what works in battle and start getting people killed,listening to people that think they know what works.


2 Panther

Ya the Army takes offense when you tell them their full of Crap and then prove it to them...the Col.'s C/M was trumped and all of Us that severed under him know it. The Military hates to be proven Wrong.


2 Panther

Given how bad your English spelling and grammar are, are you sure that you are an adult American, never mind one who served?

 

[GermanyChris]

Hi! Opinels and SAKs were the most common, both at the Alpine Military School in Aosta and at the Regiment during the years I have served (1991-1992 Italian Alpine Troops). No fixed blades were supplied by the Army, besides very dull bayonets. I remember very few fixed blades, more on the hunting knife types rather than tactical/military knives.

Soldiers are going to carry what they're going to carry we can trawl the net for months finding modern soldiers carrying every manner of knife because soldiers are every manner of people. This thread started out innocently enough but turned into a belt measuring contest when people didn't get what they expected.

Yes when I went through mountain warfare school no one carried a fixed blade either but then I can only remember 2 or 3 guys who did in total.

We really should probably bring this back on topic and everyone can put their belts back on. A 3 or 4 inch fixed blade would probably be handy and lighter than the same size folder but giant pick stickers should probably stay at the FOB

 

[rustyrazor]

100% agree Chris... is starting to get back on track, and agree again that huge knives are almost completely useless compared to their weight.

The Whip: yes, that is one of my own. still carry it, but i replaced the handle with some afghan wood.

 

[K.O.D.]

My cousin was a marine captain in a communications unit, two tours of Afghanistan, two of Iraq. Everything he carried was standard issue. USMC 1998-2006. Graduated at Annapolis 1997. NYC FBI field agent 2006-2015, got promoted to field agent supervisor last October, now working in D.C. as of June.

His brother-in-law, served same time he did, but:

Graduated 1st from West Point, Captain in army rangers. He carried whatever was issued as well. He's a big shot corporate type with an mba from Harvard.

I agree with everyone, carry what you're issued.

Sent from my VS986 using Tapatalk

 

[GREENJACKET]

A little history:
Battle of Waterloo, and so too the American War of Independence earlier, then the bayonet charge was a battle winner. The Cavalry had its sabres. Green Jackets with their short rifles were issued Sword bayonets because of their short Baker rifles.

American Civil War and bayonets were still useful though rifle firepower was effective further and further out, to the point that getting to bayonet charge range was difficult. Cavalry were using heavy revolvers, multishot, pistols over swords. Big knives were in fashion for all sorts of reasons.

Boar War showed that the bayonet charge was on the way to being suicidal due to actual high volume rifle fire, but the bayonet would persist. The bayonet was getting shorter again for many armies.
The WW1 saw old habits die hard with long bayonets and cavalry still in vogue. The mobile rifle cavalry was still being advocated though those tactics never really happened as a mobile warfare never really got going due to advances in artillery and the heavy machine gun. Trench knives and clubs had their place but the grenade was the weapon for trench fighting.
WW2 saw the end to cavalry at last, as the tank took over; still a lot about though. Bayonets were still part of the bolt action rifle weapon system, though getting shorter and shorter again. The Japs bayoneted a lot of Chinese civilians. The submachinegun, and shortly after the assault rifle, made the bayonet even more redundant. Grenades were the better option for close quarter battle.

There after the short utility bayonet persisted, more for moral and the unreliability of self loading rifles. There were still bolt action rifles used in Korea. The last solid use of the bayonet that I knew of was in the Falklands War. Stuck on the end of the long FN Fal/SLR and the fact that the assaulting troops were running out of ammo in the final assault; the rifle was a 7.62.
Running out of a magazine's ammunition is still a concern due to the very high rates of fire and speed a magazine can be emptied.

With the advent of the bullpup and short carbine assault rifles, and greater reliability, plus effective fire at far greater ranges, then the bayonet has finally in practice become redundant. Well I think so. Their use is still taught more as a aggression teaching aid rather than anything more.

Which just leaves the practical use of a small field knife. Be that fixed or folder, a good knife still has its use. Its just not a weapon system, but a utility tool, and doesn't have to be very big to do that.

 

[jackknife]

A little history:
Battle of Waterloo, and so too the American War of Independence earlier, then the bayonet charge was a battle winner. The Cavalry had its sabres. Green Jackets with their short rifles were issued Sword bayonets because of their short Baker rifles.

American Civil War and bayonets were still useful though rifle firepower was effective further and further out, to the point that getting to bayonet charge range was difficult. Cavalry were using heavy revolvers, multishot, pistols over swords. Big knives were in fashion for all sorts of reasons.

Your history is a bit off.

Att he battle of Waterloo, the French made repeated efforts to break the small squares the British forces had formed up in. The British square was 20 meters wide and four ranks deep. It put out enough firepower with firing by volley that the French cavalry had very heavy losses trying unsuccessfully to break the square. The same thing happened at the Battle of Lutzen in 1813. Very green inexperienced French troops held off experienced British and Prussian cavalry with squares. The only thing that repeatedly broke the square was horse artillery. Since the square was only 20 meters wide, it was a small target, and regular artillery firing from just in back of the line was not accurate enough to hit them, so horse "galloper guns" were used. Small light and highly mobil field guns that could be brought up fast and set up in front of a square and blast it apart.

In the American civil war, bayonets didn't amount to much casualty count at all. Something about a bit less than 1 percent. That's a very very low percent in a conflict in which the main firearm is still a muzzle loading rifled musket like the .58 Springeild. But unlike the smoothbore muskets of before, the .58 Springfield had an accuracy range of 300 yards out. Pickett's charge was a disaster because of the rifle killing most of the southern forces before they got within range of a bayonet charge.

Even in the 1800's, bringing a knife to a gunfight was a very bad idea.

 

[Jens Schuetz]

Showing pictures with soldiers and big knives doesn't say much about their utility or numbers, though I like those pictures a lot.
I bet there are 100 times more pictures of military men without those kind of knives.

Either way, if I'd to serve again, I myself would carry one but only because I'm a knife nut.
I'm also honest enough to admit that it's not needed and it would be mostly for the fun of it and probably justified to others by some imaginary highly unlikely scenario. Like that one time when a pretend enemy (our platoon leader) snuck into our guarded position and went into our tent. A knife would have enabled him to take us out more silently than a suppressed pistol and he could have escaped undetected.

Civilians asking for self defense knives are sillier than military men? Well civillians usually don't wear body armor or guns. A knife could be more handy for them than full battle gear. Cost and inconvenience vs. benefit and low likelyhood of an encounter could make a blade a better choice for a civilian than for a soldier. At then end it's all about personal perceptions and it's hard to criticise anyone for that.

 

[GREENJACKET]

Ahh Waterloo.
Napoleon's last ditch attempt to break the British Alliance's line was to send in his Old Guard before the Prussians arrived in overwhelming force towards the end of the day. (The mud and the fact French horse artillery had already been smashed earlier gave Napoleon little choice). The French Old Guard not only marched into the wall of The British Guard's musket fire but were also charged in the side by The British Light Infantry, who having fired one volley then went for it bayonets fixed. The Old Guard broke and the rest is History.

Pickets Charge, I've walked the battlefield at Gettysburg (and Waterloo (now altered, ruined, for a massive monument)). At the beginning of the American Civil War tactics were not far removed from Napoleonic (same for Crimea); some cannons were identical. However, the superior rifles made such tactics redundant. Pickets charge actually broke through and the battle might have turned. But their casualty rate, getting the break through, was so high there weren't enough standing to carry the day. In fact such a pitiful amount that those that made it to the top were just brushed aside. All the tactical doctrine was rewritten; eventually it almost reverted to trench warfare. Same went for the Crimea, which did turn into a type of trench warfare.
The Boar War proved the effectiveness of accurate rifle fire and the futility of the bayonet charge. WWI wasn't an over the top bayonet charge, but more a move to advance as artillery should have cleared the way. Sadly, though artillery was the killer weapon, it still couldn't remove all heavy machine guns and the wire. Doesn't take many heavy machineguns to stop an infantry attack. From the start Generals were hoping for fast manoeuvre warfare, but that never happened until the tank.

For today, conventional warfare isn't the issue, the big players can win that bit. But what they can't do is sort the politics and leadership which prolongs the onslaught. We will continue to have small wars until the politics is sorted.

 

[Quiet]

Showing pictures with soldiers and big knives doesn't say much about their utility or numbers, though I like those pictures a lot.
I bet there are 100 times more pictures of military men without those kind of knives.

Either way, if I'd to serve again, I myself would carry one but only because I'm a knife nut.
I'm also honest enough to admit that it's not needed and it would be mostly for the fun of it and probably justified to others by some imaginary highly unlikely scenario. Like that one time when a pretend enemy (our platoon leader) snuck into our guarded position and went into our tent. A knife would have enabled him to take us out more silently than a suppressed pistol and he could have escaped undetected.

Civilians asking for self defense knives are sillier than military men? Well civillians usually don't wear body armor or guns. A knife could be more handy for them than full battle gear. Cost and inconvenience vs. benefit and low likelyhood of an encounter could make a blade a better choice for a civilian than for a soldier. At then end it's all about personal perceptions and it's hard to criticise anyone for that.

Ding. Thank you. :thumbup:

 

[Danke42]

For those soldiers the knives are a touchstone. They do nothing strapped to their armor except give a boost of confidence when you brush your hand against the hilt.

I've seen bibles and rosaries; photos of loved ones, big machetes, and all manner of other practical and impractical lucky charms carried.

 

[rustyrazor]

For those soldiers the knives are a touchstone. They do nothing strapped to their armor except give a boost of confidence when you brush your hand against the hilt.

I've seen bibles and rosaries; photos of loved ones, big machetes, and all manner of other practical and impractical lucky charms carried.

kind of an unfair comparison if you ask me. If you look at a knife as a fantasy self defense weapon only, then yes it does give a boost of confidence and that's all it is likely to be useful for... other than to throw at stuf when you're bored. I think if you read some more of the posts in this thread, you'll find out that a lot of those fixed blades are used for thousands of possible chores that are completely unrelated to fighting, but almost entirely related to military or at least an outdoor style of life.

 

[Danke42]

kind of an unfair comparison if you ask me. If you look at a knife as a fantasy self defense weapon only, then yes it does give a boost of confidence and that's all it is likely to be useful for... other than to throw at stuf when you're bored. I think if you read some more of the posts in this thread, you'll find out that a lot of those fixed blades are used for thousands of possible chores that are completely unrelated to fighting, but almost entirely related to military or at least an outdoor style of life.

That's not what I said at all. I've seen people strip down ration packs to ditch all the excess packaging and save weight in their ruck and at the same time carry a full sized new testament in a leather case.

Soldiers are very often impractical and when left to their own devices will make a lot of questionable decisions.

We've established you carried a fixed knife. Did everyone in your section carry one?

 

[GREENJACKET]

Danke42 makes a strong point
Although I carried a combat sized knife it was because I was into knives. Carrying one is reassuring. However, fixed or folder a small knife can do 99% of the utility knife jobs that a soldier does daily.
I put up the Glock knife earlier in this thread, not because its a great knife, but its just the ticket for digging mud out of tank tracks; well a good pointy tool thing that doesn't really matter what you do with it. But a small knife could probably make a stick thing to do those jobs just as easily.

The essay on the bayonet was just to highlight how the battlefield has changed.

Non of the combat sized knives, 5-7 inches, can chop for toffee. Take the excellent ESEE Junglas, its no great chopper when compared to a saw or an axe. Can't think what its good at other than being big. For unknown reason I'm still a fan, but its a truck tool, for the fun of it, and an high cost one at that. No one is going to carry one far. So if they can't chop then how much sharp keen cutting edge does one need? 3-4 inches?
How much leverage can a 5-7 inch tool, let alone a 3-4 inch, tool give and how often is that important. Pry open a tin (which is dangerous)?
A small knife, light weight crow bar, and a saw would do it.
The one knife can do it all theory is getting a bit dull, especially if you actually have to do any real work with one. After years of being a knife enthusiast I've progressed back to the beginning, to a folder or small hunting knife like the small Survive Knives GSO's.

Thats just the direction its going at the moment.

(Had one soldier who carried a huge bottle of tomato ketchup in his bergen everywhere as he wouldn't eat anything without it! There could be a thread on ridiculous things soldiers haul about in combat; the big chopper knife wouldn't be that outrageous?!!)

 

[GermanyChris]

I carried a knife just like this in my three tours in Afghanistan I lost it messing with my Jeep and I actually joined BF to find another one. I was selected long ago to go to Belize to go through their Jungle school and conduct some marksmanship training for them. There were a 30 US soldiers down there during my rotation 10 of us were regular Army and the rest were spezialkind one of those guys gave it to me. During my time in the service I never felt a need to own a big knife since this one did everything this modern infantry soldier ever needed I simply never felt "under knifed". While I've never been special in any way I've done all the cool stuff that soldiers are supposed to do like go to Jericho, sling load plan and rappel, fail out of Ranger school three times, and closed my eyes every time I've jumped out of an airplane even now. There just isn't in my experience a need for a big knife no matter the circumstances people dream up. I've never needed or desired a big knife for:

"The mission of the Infantry is to close with the enemy by means of fire and maneuver in order to destroy or capture him, or to repel his assault with fire, close combat, and counterattack. The Infantry will engage the enemy with combined arms in all operational environments to bring about his defeat." FM 3-21.8

 

[rustyrazor]

That's not what I said at all. I've seen people strip down ration packs to ditch all the excess packaging and save weight in their ruck and at the same time carry a full sized new testament in a leather case.

Soldiers are very often impractical and when left to their own devices will make a lot of questionable decisions.

We've established you carried a fixed knife. Did everyone in your section carry one?

I'd agree with impractical for the most part... and i have seen the very same thing as you with regards to huge bibles, and massive knives as well. I even carried a joker playing card for years until i gave up on luck. i read that as you were comparing a knife to rosaries, bibles and other practical or impractical lucky charms... i may have taken it wrong. sorry if i missed the mark, i was only stating that there may be other more practical applications than various other other lucky charms you mentioned and not everyone has fantasies about being jim bowie when they're in uniform as seems to be the thought on here lately.

No... not everyone carried a fixed blade. i'd say 30% went fixed maybe.

 

[rustyrazor]

Danke42 makes a strong point
Although I carried a combat sized knife it was because I was into knives. Carrying one is reassuring. However, fixed or folder a small knife can do 99% of the utility knife jobs that a soldier does daily.
I put up the Glock knife earlier in this thread, not because its a great knife, but its just the ticket for digging mud out of tank tracks; well a good pointy tool thing that doesn't really matter what you do with it. But a small knife could probably make a stick thing to do those jobs just as easily.

(Had one soldier who carried a huge bottle of tomato ketchup in his bergen everywhere as he wouldn't eat anything without it! There could be a thread on ridiculous things soldiers haul about in combat; the big chopper knife wouldn't be that outrageous?!!)

This may be the single best idea anyone has ever had about military curiosity... i knew a guy who carried a collapsible toilet seat in his ruck because he hated squatting.

Like you, I'm sure i started carrying a fixed blade due to my love of them too and that might be a big part of why i love them still... i have it on me and like to use it, so i keep using it for non knife things and since it's been used for so many dumb things over the years, it might give me a bias toward needing it more than i would otherwise.

 

[Danke42]

I'd agree with impractical for the most part... and i have seen the very same thing as you with regards to huge bibles, and massive knives as well. I even carried a joker playing card for years until i gave up on luck. i read that as you were comparing a knife to rosaries, bibles and other practical or impractical lucky charms... i may have taken it wrong. sorry if i missed the mark, i was only stating that there may be other more practical applications than various other other lucky charms you mentioned and not everyone has fantasies about being jim bowie when they're in uniform as seems to be the thought on here lately.

No... not everyone carried a fixed blade. i'd say 30% went fixed maybe.

I'd place a small bet that your organization was a spearhead/tip of the spear one and maybe the tasks you had to perform were a lot more outside of the box than a typical modern soldier.

 

[Seriousbladeno1]

[video]https://www.google.ie/imgres?imgurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.military-shop.net%2Fgalerie%2F44%2F000.jpg&imgrefurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.military-shop.net%2Fdetails.php%3Fpr%3D44&docid=atwO5x2hvQzFlM&tbnid=6IQ7TWvqgfc41M%3A&w=640&h=398&client=ms-android-h3g-ie&bih=512&biw=360&ved=0ahUKEwjG0ZyMxLLOAhWmKMAKHSaPAugQMwgcKAIwAg&iact=mrc&uact=8[/video]

Here is few pictures of bayonet Vzor 58 we were issued and carried

 

[Seriousbladeno1]

https://www.google.ie/imgres?imgurl...LLOAhWmKMAKHSaPAugQMwgkKAowCg&iact=mrc&uact=8

 

[Seriousbladeno1]

https://www.google.ie/imgres?imgurl...bLOAhVVGsAKHQIGDRsQMwhTKDAwMA&iact=mrc&uact=8