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Old 03-31-2020, 02:53 PM   #383
Icelander
 
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Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
Default Re: There's Knifework That Needs Doing

Quote:
Originally Posted by Polydamas View Post
Like I said, the list will include FMA and Japanese martial arts, but I don't know what is local to the Caribbean and no more than two steps away from the social network of the Night Riders. In the 1980s, Japanese and Filippino martial arts were the fashionable, reasonably widely available, reasonably combat effective weapon arts in the United States so folks as different as Marc MacYoung and 1st Lt. Elizabeth Moon, USMC (Ret.) picked them up, but in the Caribbean in the 1980s most of the instructors who have used a blade in anger are probably locals trained in local traditions (which include dancing and field work as well as fencing).
At the start, most of the senior security people will have the kind of background that mercenaries in Africa from the 1960s to 1970s and security professionals for mineral and petroleum companies have. The first 'recruits' are about 50% from the US and 50% friends of friends* from the older men, but later recruits skew perhaps 60-70% US citizens. Still, the US military influence on the initial curriculum is probably only about a third, just because the most senior people tend to have served elsewhere.

*Which means former Legionnaires, other French soldiers, British and Commonwealth, ex-Rhodesians and South Africans, etc.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Polydamas View Post
But most of those won't speak English or be able to visit the United States or be used to teaching foreigners.
The training takes place in Dominica and St. Lucia, with the formal compound being built in St. Lucia.

First head of the training camp in St. Lucia was Ziggy Wagner, former Waffen-SS and French Foreign Legion, who was old, but still spry in the late 1980s. As Ziggy got older, Archibald Stewart-Calthorpe, former SAS officer with a background in legitimate security contracting work since 1970, took command of the camp in 1991.

Their chief NCO, from 1990, was RSM Joseph Khumalo, lately of the Zimbabwean Army, former Selous Scout and Rhodesian African Rifles. In fact, at age 76 in 2018, Khumalo still trains people from his home in Dominica, along with sons, sons-in-law, grandsons and any number of other relatives.

The instructors were a mix of former Legionnaires, Selous Scouts, Vietnam vets and others.
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Last edited by Icelander; 03-31-2020 at 04:13 PM.
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