Nowadays, the military seems to be so focused on hi-tech hardware that people seem to have forgotten about the basic skills of a good soldier other than able to hit an enemy 1000 feet away with your rifle-- it's bayonet fighting!

In a real war and in the heat of a battle, soldiers may come face to face with one another (whether in the thick tropical jungle or in built-up areas). A soldier will see the face of his enemy in a flash of moment. Sometimes, it's so close, you can't point and shoot. BUT you can kill the enemy will your bayonet fixed to your rifle -- if you know your bayonet fighting well. Knock out your enemy with the butt of your rifle or with a straight thrust to his heart and twist as your pull your rifle out.

It's either you do this... or your enemy sticking his bayonet into your heart. It's got to be fast and instinctive.

An M-16 is a good weapon to fix a bayonet on. So is the AK-47. They are strong and tough rifles. I'm not sure the more recent types of rifles are long or tough enough to have a bayonet fixed for fighting face to face.

So you think bayonet fighting is important?

Of course, if not for anything else, it's a tradition of soldiering.

U.S. Army FM 21-150 covers bayonet fighting and other hand to hand techniques: http://atiam.train.army.mil/portal/a...150/ch7.htm#p3

Personally, I wouldn’t carry a bayonet because I am handy with a bolt action rifle, and I like my targets around 300 yards to 1000 yards. There are a lot of countries that focus so much more on melee than we do; for example, not many men can fight a North Korean fanatic and live to tell about it (if you ever see these nuts fight, you’ll know what I’m talking about). I wouldn’t want to fight an Islamic terrorist either because they are often hopped on hashish. The little bastards get shot, and even though they bleed to death later, they fight like nothing happened because they are too drugged up to feel anything!

Behave yourself high speed.

Well often in a real actual war where you're against a competent enemy, fighting can end up hand to hand.
Bayonet skills can give your guys the edge in situations like that.
But nowadays because American firepower is so much better the chances of American or American supported forces actually getting that close to the enemy is rather small.

There are only two kinds of bayonet fighters...

...the quick...


....and the dead.

Same could be said of pedestrians

It can be really handy to master bayonet techniques

Cheers:
Doc.S

Food for thought:

Firepower alone may be insufficient to drive a determined enemy from his position. Where confined spaces or situations may not permit the reloading of the rifle or the use of grenades, the bayonet may become the primary weapon in destroying the enemy. It is essential that bayonet training is conducted regularly to instil aggression, self-confidence and psychological preparation in both the individual and the team.


A quote:

"We did fix bayonets because I believe bayonets kill people and are useful............It certainly saved my life."

From a Major in the Scots Guards during the Falkland Island War.

I had the privilege of meeting a Medal of Honor recipient named Walter Ehlers who earned his award over three days of fighting in Normandy. At one point, he took out an enemy mortar position and killed the 9 Germans who occupied it with his bayonet. One of my buddies asked him why he would assault a position like that, and he told us, "I had a bayonet, they didn't."