Former Soviet Trainers Show Methods

[mrtnira]

This is about some Soviet trainers who did some videos for a Japanese martial arts video company in the early-1990's. The videos were the training undergone by agents and para-military police of the Soviet Union. The videos are now re-released as DVDs, which is why I bring it up.

Background

In 1940, a two volume hand-to-hand combat training manual was accepted by the NKVD. It was the combat form of SAMBO. The NKVD was responsible for external intelligence operations (later run by its generational offspring the KGB, and which are now run by the FSB). The NKVD also was responsible for internal security within the Soviet Union, and its offspring is the MVD.

The Soviet Union never had a year of peace. From the time of the Revolution in 1917/1918, there was large scale civil war and then internal wars of resistance to the Soviet empire, the Second World War, followed by more internal wars of resistance against the Soviet empire, and the Cold War in which Soviet troops and agents were deployed around the world in support of aligned nations engaged in proxy wars.

With this as the scene-setter, the combat manual reflected techniques that are swift, brutal, and look a lot like gutter fighting.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1990, a lot of state-funded institutions were left to fend for themselves. With that, many KGB, MVD, and military specialists went to work for the Russian mob. The trainers in the videos mentioned in this thread were on the up-side and did a set of instructional videos for the Japanese Quest (or Queststation) company, which is what I saw at the time. I got them from a policeman in Vladevostock. (Japanese site: http://www.queststation.com/)

The videos are now available in DVD format and more easily accessed through budovideos.com, since they have an English website.
http://www.budovideos.com/shop/custo...roductid=17616
http://www.budovideos.com/shop/custo...roductid=17617

If you want to see combat techniques of the Soviet period as taught to officers of the internal security troops, reconnaissance specialists, agents, and others, these videos put the two volume NKVD combat SAMBO books into motion. The two DVDs represent accurate military and martial arts history worth having. DVD 1 has some practical self defense for women included in it.... The original four VHS tape set was compressed into two DVDs, so it has a little "give" in it because it was shot for a broader audience. You'll know it when it shifts into the instructors' core curriculum.

[DdlR]

Thanks for the heads-up. The government-sponsored development of CQB systems during the 20th century is a really fascinating topic.