Which Strikes, Which Submissions Earn the W? by Mark Hatmaker

Be patient with me, as before we get to the answer to the above question of bestest strike ever, most effective submission under the heavens, we’re going to take some seemingly unrelated side-roads.

·        We’re going to walk with Netsilik hunters.

·        Ponder the large part that a few lumps of sugar played in the D-Day invasion.

·        Quote a little Ralph Waldo Emerson.

·        Lay out legendary Field Marshall Erwin Rommel’s simple test for evaluating field officers.

·        Tell why WWII British Commandos and US Army Rangers praised soil engineers and geologists who never saw battle.

·        Quote a little Smokin’ Joe Frazier

·        And then, finally, answer the titled question and offer a suggestion or two about how we can add more W’s to our own combative curriculum vitae.

Netsilik Hunters

The Netsilik are indigenous peoples who inhabit the far north. Much of their survival is based upon hunting prowess. The land they inhabit is windswept trackless terrain and ofttimes snow-covered and featureless rendering the few familiar navigation points there obscure or non-existent. Not to mention the frequent bouts of thick advection fog that lies over this already difficult to navigate terrain. This fog can be so dense as to reduce visibility to a mere half-meter.

And yet, the Netsilik are seldom lost. Why might that be?

Well, likely many factors, but the one we’ll focus on here is, before an advection fog even sets in, the wise Netsilik are always paying attention to the wind. They note the prevailing direction of the wind. If/when an advection fog drapes the terrain they use the “feel” of the wind as a reference-compass.

Notice that they notice the timbre of the wind before it is needed. It is too late to note the utility of wind direction when you can’t see where it is coming from or blowing to. One must be mindful and vigilant before one needs to be mindful and vigilant.

D-Day & the Bad-Ass Medicine of Sugar Lumps

Like a highlight reel worthy KO kick to the head or “fade-to-black” rear naked choke, our images of D-Day are often colored by newsreel pyrotechnics of Spielberg-esque cinema-mastery. 

But…these representations often obscure thousands upon thousands of unseen/unknown small efforts that pack large results.

I quote from Invasion: They’re Coming by Paul Carell a documented blow-by-blow account of the D-Day invasion from the German side of things. Mighty illuminating.

“A quarter ounce of sugar—just three lumps—dropped into the water of a concrete mixer, was enough to rob two-hundredweights of concrete of its strength, for if calcium combines with sugar, instead of with carbon dioxide, a readily soluble calcium saccharate is formed. Thus, if a member of the French Resistance succeeded in getting himself employed by the Germans near a concrete mixer he could cause extensive damage to the defenses by dropping quite small quantities of sugar into the mix or into the stored materials. The concrete shield of a gun-emplacement or the roof-slabs of a dugout might be sufficiently weakened to crumble like sandstone if hit by a shell.”

Again, small seemingly undramatic efforts, like noting the wind or knowing a little fundamental construction chemistry can pay LARGE dividends.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

This is the eminently useful Mr. Emerson from The Conduct of Life.

“We spread the same amount of force over much time, instead of condensing it into a moment. '... At West Point, Col. Buford, the chief engineer, pounded with a hammer on the trunnions of a cannon, until he broke them off. He fired a piece of ordnance some hundred times in swift succession, until it burst. Now which stroke broke the trunnion? Every stroke. Which blast burst the piece? Every blast. " Diligence passe sens " Henry VIII. was wont to say, or, great is drill.”

Rommel’s Test for Ability

Rommel valued officers who did not merely ordered to do.

He valued those in the mix, in the trenches not behind the lines, behind the scenes or mere speculators or spectators.

He knew that working alongside his men gave him a realistic view of the matters at hand, fostered camaraderie, and that all work, even the so-called scut-work was part and parcel of being a warrior.

When he met new field officers, he would say, “Let me see your hands.“

When the officer in question peeled off his gloves, if the hands were calloused and scratched from setting fortifications and laying barbed-wire he knew he had one he could rely on. 

If they were soft and protected he knew, in essence, that the man before him did not note the wind, did not know the value of small things such as lumps of sugar.

Three Cheers for Soil Engineers

Pre-invasion or covert operation small squads of British Commandos or US Army Rangers were often sent to potential landing sites, not to perform some dramatic act of film-worthy sabotage but to collect soil samples.

These men risked their lives to, hopefully, bring back small canisters of soil from potential landing beaches. Sand from shoals. Chipped rock samples from cliff faces.

These would be brought back and examined by soil engineers and geologists who would then pronounce with authority such things as...

“Tanks will mire in this meadow crossing” “Paratroopers can’t fast-march in this terrain” “Landing craft will be stuck hundreds of yards from shore leaving many men to drown” “Grappling hooks will not hold on this rock-face and they will be mowed down.”

Again, seemingly small efforts---large impacts.

Smokin’ Joe Frazier

This is Smokin’ Joe on knowing the “wind” before you need to know the wind.

“You can map out a fight plan or a life plan, but when the action starts, it may not go the way you planned, and you’re down to your reflexes—that means your [preparation.] That’s where your roadwork shows. If you cheated on that in the dark of the morning, well, you’re gonna get found out now, under the bright lights.”

The Pragmatic Moral of the Tales

We often look to the dramatic incident, the last thing, the big show and assume that is the majority of the tale. We see the big overhand that dropped and stopped but fail to count all of the preparatory jabs that accrued damage in the preceding rounds, all of the subtle shifts, weaves, and slips that robbed power and form from the eventually KO’d opponent.

We look to the shoulder-ripping kimura/Double-Wristlock and itch to hit the mat and work our own finisher asap, but we often get blinded to the meticulous pinpoint precision of ground-control that preceded the tap. In other words, we overvalue the submission and fail to marvel at the knee-to-knee block, false crossface and far-pocket step that paved the way.

We often pursue the big, the cinematic, the final results at the expense of the “unseen” that preceded.

To ignore such factors is to fail Field Marshall Rommel’s “Let me see your hands” test.

In big endeavors ALL is chosen and noted with care. Plunging to end-results in training and thinking will likely insure that those wished for, hoped for results will always elude your grasp.

We must note wind, callous our hands, do the roadwork, take our soil samples now and every day.

Then…then we are walking the wise warrior path.

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