Joe and I were training at a Portland park, wrapping up the session with self-defense drills, when he inquired in a cagey fashion, that once we got back to his truck he would like to see what kind of knife I carried, and how he might decide his carry option.

Seated in the passenger seat, I showed him that I have a neck knife, a skinning knife, that a hunter would hang on his breast bone from parachord that could be easily accessed with gloves on. I have mine suspended from my belt by the yank chord over the front pocket. The butt of the knife hangs down in the front pocket. I may slip my hand in and grip it in an ice-pick grip and then when I pull my hand out the knife will clear the case after the case clears the pocket.

That is if I am ready.

If I am surprised and getting beat up, beat down, or spun around, I train shelling with my left hand or grabbing with it while I seek the chord above the pocket with my two bottom fingers on my right, the small digits which govern gross motor skills, not my larger precision digits. I can then pull the chord until the case and knife slide into my hand and then yank.

This is assuming unarmed disparity of force, the most common type of serious attack in America, where 2 to 5 larger and or younger men attack an unarmed men and stomp him. Police have long been trained to shoot a subject who is kicking a downed person, as this is known to be lethal. The severe thing about current unarmed violence in America is that the most likely result of a 3-on-1 unarmed attack is that the defender is placed in a stomping position and is totally subject to the dubious good will of his attackers, which is intrinsically lethal and very often crippling.

This carry system is based on my inability to open most knives with one hand, especially in cold weather, and the fact that the ice-pick grip is a last ditch defensive grip, offering no range or reach and best against close range unarmed attacks.

I prefer multiple carry.

Other than a small fixed blade, I like tiny, two inch blades with a thumb post and also slide case cutters that I can open in a pocket with one hand. The problem with these is they are only effective against wrist and neck and this looks like an attack from a legal forensic perspective.

For a right handed man, the carry options are:

-Front pocket [for a variety of types]

-Front Change pocket [for very small knives]

-Side pocket [just for floor fighting]

-Belt sheath [for case knives or fixed blade]

-Back pocket [which is the best attacking option and also the best ranged option in case you are granted reaction time]

-Side coat pocket [best for razors and tools that can be opened while in the pocket]

-Left breast pocket or shirt collar [pens and clips]

-Belt buckle [An option I do not like as a primary because it brings the drawing hand nearest to attacker and the tools available, push daggers, are sometimes classified as offensive weapons.]

Below is a combination I suggest:

-Primary defensive for range: a non-edged weapon in the back pants pocket that can be accessed while stepping back and checking. Folding rules, straight edges, a hand stick or bottle-opener work well here.

-Secondary low line: front change pocket or front pocket, either a very small fixed blade or a razor knife or pocket knife that can be opened in the pocket or as it emerges. Being able to access this will require practice in shifting the right leg back as you raise the left hand for a check or shield or clinch and lower the right hand into the pocket.

-Secondary, high-line: pen in shirt pocket, hat, sap cap

-Outerwear, coat pocket should have a mag light or other item that can be held in the pocketed hand as the coat may impede the drawing of other defensive tools.

Finally, True Carry tools, something that is already in the hand, like an umbrella or rolled up magazine, these are the most ideal defensive weapons.

The thing to remember about the knife is that it is likely your nuclear option. Law Enforcement, is, of course, keen on maintained the State’s monopoly of lethal force by severely punishing gun use. However, there is a very deep American prejudice that runs through all levels of society and is greatly reflected in the joy that most American feel when we find out that some small nation has offended us and our awesome death machines will be carpet-bombing, precision-bombing such said folk “back into the stone age.” Keep in mind that te knife is a stone age weapon. So expect no empathy from information age persons. I mean, the most sacred thing America collectively does is bomb iron age nations back to the stone age.

This mind set is partially vested in the MAD Mutually Assured Destruction policy that was the chief deterrence against nuclear war through the Cold War. It seems to come from the European use of guns to threaten blade-armed people they deemed inferior, with a higher order of weapon.

Whatever the cause, the American way of force is to threaten total annihilation. An American intrinsically empathizes with pointing a gun and saying, “Leave me alone,” or “obey my badge, or I’ll shoot.” An American does not empathize with holding a knife, minding your own business, [making no threat] and then stabbing the attacker. You see, the Good Guy/Bad Guy fantasy at the center of the American lie has hallowed the rude verbal threat, and has discarded the intrinsic idea that to have hands laid upon us by an enemy is reasonable cause to use lethal force.

The knifer is always the bad guy in American TV and movies. This extends toward warfare and is most deep and, I suspect, reflects that this nation was formed as industrial life came into being. There is an old war-gaming joke:

“An infantry force comes to a hill held by a pill-box with a machine gun.

“The Russians charge up the hill and get mowed down until the machine gun runs out of ammo. They eventually bayonet the defenders.

“The Brits take their time laying siege to the hill and eventually root out the defenders.

“The Germans go around the hill, cut the defenders out of supply and communication and eventually get the surrender while they thump rear echelon troops.

“The Americans call in the Air Force and remove the hill—repeat as necessary.”

So, please, consider that almost no American, except for peoples of Amerindian ancestry, regard the use of a knife in a self-defense situation as reasonable. Those people who regard the knife as the weapon of the bad guy are most often people of European and African ancestry, and these are the people who staff law enforcement, the judiciary and juries. In this light, give yourself a [non-club] blunt weapon option for a first line of defense and do remember that having a knife means little if you cannot check your attacker with your empty hand.

For instance, if you cannot check-off your attacker, and he is agitated and punching or grabbing, he may very well not feel the edge or point of your blade. It is standard courtroom wisdom, that a second stab cannot be regarded as self-defense, even though most attackers who are stabbed take numerous stabs without even thinking they have been stabbed, feeling rather that they have been punched to little effect.

For this reason, I would suggest, for a young man such as yourself, who still has tangible cause to live on for years to come, that you should stab and slice deeply into the outside of the thigh. That offers pain signal and disability through cutting of the outer ligature and avoids cutting the femoral artery on the inside of the thigh. Stabbing below the belt and avoiding the groin is better than cutting the hand when it comes to making a legal defense that you were the defender, as unarmed people being attacked with knives often take defensive hand wounds.

Good luck, Joe, and remember, that America hates you for taking it upon yourself to defend your own person, rather than voting on the latest law and the military technology to enforce it by goon squad.