Question to all active / veteran Military soldiers. What knife did and do you carry?

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The old larger Benchmade Emerson model. Sog multi tool with the gears. Spyderco ATR full SE. Old Carbon V Cold Steel Recon Tanto. Every thing an Airborne Infantryman could ever need.
 
emerson cqc-7, started out with a gerber 06 auto that was issued to me and I hated it, got hooked up with a cqc-7 and carried it, my entire time I was active duty until my career ended.
 
Two "always have on me" were:

Folders were usually Spyderco Endura. Still the biggest bang for your buck, IMO.

I had a Spartan transition tool (later became known as the SOCP dagger) on my kit. If you've got the training, this is one of the best things going for external carry.

Anytime I was living in the field, or deployed to the sticks without electricity, running water, etc. A medium sized fixed blade was a nice thing to have. Went through plenty of bigger fixed blades, once I got into knifemaking I carried one of my 1/4" thick medium tantos with approx 5" of blade.

I've been out for just over a year now, still using the same stuff. Once I find stuff that works I stick to it.
 
Interesting to see a lot of SAKs and multi-tools as folders. Based on some of the "marketing" out there, I would think everyone needs a 1/4" thick, blacked-out, super-steel folder.
 
ChrisB507 said:
Based on some of the "marketing" out there, I would think everyone needs a 1/4" thick, blacked-out, super-steel folder.
Click to expand...

I had one of those (tiger striped, to be exact) in mid 2007

It took a 12 ft fall off a rooftop fighting position on to hard packed dirt/gravel ground and the blade shattered in 3 pieces. I was impressed.

Returned it, got a new blade, decided I wasn't cool enough/didn't need the bulk and weight. Got home and traded it for a Glock, lived happily ever after.

I saw a similar situation with a fixed blade from the same company, guy took a short fall and after going to pull the knife out of the sheath, discovered it was in two pieces.
 
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I was about to say - I don't know about super steels toughness now but 10 or so years ago everybody mentioned them as brittle and "chippy." I was more careful with the couple S30V folders I used not for fear of breaking them, but not wanting to repair the edge. No fear of metal staples, nails, banding, etc. with so-called lesser steels. Little dents or rolls in AUS8 or similar come out as fast as a routine touch up with S30V.
 
I carried a 2 blade Old Timer that a DI stole, and later bought 34ot at the px and later added an original Leatherman, still have both 30 years later. I now carry a Case peanut that I got for Fathersday a few years ago and a trapper or sodbuster.
I sent my son a TOPS/BUCK folding tanto and a 1970 Case barlow. he carries the barlow for now because the US Marines don't want them stabbing each other. I also have a Leatherman wave and a bk14 to send him when he gets to the next duty station.
 
In my 21 year career, I carried a Multi tool (first gerber, then Leatherman) more then a knife. The multitool got way more use. When I was a 18 year old Knuckle headed Private, I had a cheap boot knife that one of my Sgt's confiscated...

I had an EK boot knife I lost out in the Mojave Desert....

I bought a Gerber Mk 11 I carried a lot and never used, that I sold years ago...
and I finally settled on a Multi tool... The big Rambo knives looked cool, but was usually a sign of an Amateur or Younger in-experienced Soldier.

They look cool in the Movies, but have no real world application...in my experience and take up a lot of space.
 
I served in a Ranger Battalion and later the 82nd Airborne Division in the 80's. Not a lot of tactical knives
available back then. I had a Valor lockback or Valor butterfly knife as a folder and an Ontario Pilot Survival Knife and Gerber Mark I. Picked up a Randal too but never carrried it.
Today I use various Sub $100 fixed blades and usually carry a Benchmade Mini AFCK or an automatic folder like a Protech or Microtech.
 
USAF 1988-1998

Was in communications as a repair tech. Served in a mobile com unit. Always carried a Buck 110 and a leatherman multi tool. Also several SAK's (kept loosing them).

There was nothing I had to do that these tools couldn't handle, and easy to sharpen.

I put that buck through hell, and it just always did the job. If I damaged the edge, I would just put it to the stones and it would come right back.

I miss that knife.
 
Air Force Security Police (Active '83-'87). I had a small leather pouch with a stainless clip in which rode my fathers issued "US" pocket knife. I can't remember who made it as several vendors supplied them. It was the stainless pocket knife with the outside that looked like diamond plate. The pouch would go on either my leather gear or web gear depending on what we were doing.

In the field I had my fathers USAF Pilot's survival knife and the issued bayonet.

I had a small knock off of a gerber MKI boot knife at the time but I never really carried it.

Now days at work, heavy is a Leatherman Surge and my 2001 Microtech L-UDT. I always carry the L-UDT work or not.

I'm happy that I just scored a "new" Vero beach one to have as a back up as I'd not been keeping track of the knife world since I bought my first UDT back in 2002. I don't like the looks of the newer ones.

TG
 
I carried an issue Benchmade auto clipped in my pocket, had a couple different ones depended on the day which were used
a leatherman Surge on my belt always,
a leatherman MUT and a benchmade Nimravus on my IBA as well as an issue benchmade strap cutter,
an old school Camillus fighting knife ('KA-BAR" style) on my ruck and an issue VTAC Tomahawk,
and either a SAK or old school "demo" knife in my pocket.
 
Today I'm still in and daily carry
the same leatherman Surge
the same "demo" knife or SAK Tinker
and a Buck 345 that was special engraved and issued to just our unit during the last deployment, clipped on my pocket.
 
I didn't serve but my dad did. He carried a US issue pocket knife. It was made by Camillus in the same year I was born. My wife's father recently found one in a house he helped clean out which was made by Camillus in the year she was born. Kind of neat. Anyway, my dad also carried a US Air Force pilot's survival knife and an old Camillus Electrician's knife. He still has all of them and still uses the Electrician's knife.
 
When I was an Air Force cop, I started with a small SAK and an original Leatherman tool. I eventually moved to a Spyderco Endura and upgraded to larger Leatherman tools or the SOG Power Plier. On my first trip to Bosnia, I took an AF pilot's survival knife, BM Mini AFCK, Gerber Gator, and Gerber tool, but ordered a BK-2 while there. Second trip to Bosnia, I took the Mini AFCK, Leatherman Super Tool, and CS SRK. After I left the SP field, I rotated BM, Spyderco, SOG, and CRKT folders over the years.
 
Active Duty Army 92-95, I carried either a small Schrade lockback with the black delrin handle, an SAK (don't remember which model but it had scissors and a phillips screwdriver) and a Gerber multi tool.

On my LBE I carried a KaBar and bayonet. Probably a little over kill but I was an 18 year old private once too!

Today I typically carry a Kershaw Crown, a $15 knife I picked up that's surprising good.
 
I carried a S&W tanto linerlock I picked up in a PX in Kosovo, and a Cold Steel Hai Hocho fixed blade.
 
Army Infantry officer, 1990-94. Carried a Bucklite 3" blade on belt. Usually had a SAK in pack somewhere. Had a Cold Steel SRK for CDI factor but never used it for anything more glamorous than cutting roots while digging fighting positions or opening MRE's. Sometimes had an M-7 or later M-9 from arms room. Military Intelligence officer, 1994- 2004, all of the above plus a Camillus issued pocket knife my section sergeant was able to get us issued and an Ontario USAF pilot's survival knife. 2004-Present, Judge Advocate, Benchmade folder (small Mel Purdue, I think), plus before going to Iraq I was issued a Gerber multi-tool and a seat-belt cutter. Like most actual service members and veterans have said, the Rambo/ninja/giant survival knife for combat use is a bunch of marketing crap. The real trigger pullers have too much other stuff they have to carry, and there is only a finite amount of weight one infantryman can carry (and MOLLE space on body armor).
 
I alway had my gerber multi tool and my m7 bayonet with a double side hair poppen edge its 1095 steel and easy to get sharp and tough as nails and my folder was a benchmade stryker auto
Us Army. 96-02, Nbc NCO
 
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