This teacher used a chair as a shield and to make space between himself and the attacker, however there is no one taking the next essential step in the video – incapacitating the attacker. Hit him with the chair, hit him with something, stop his capacity to attack.
You have to go on the offensive. It’s great if you can stop the first first few stab attempts, but what then? Are you just going to wait until he’s gets bored?
Everything else has failed; end their attack by going on the offensive.
Story Summary:
On October 13, 2023, at around 11:00 local time, a fatal knife attack occurred at Gambetta high school in Arras, France. The attacker, a 20-year-old Russian national of Chechen origin named Mohamed Mogouchkov, was a former student of the school. He killed a French language teacher and seriously injured another teacher and a security guard. Witnesses reported that he shouted “Allahu Akbar” during the attack. President Emmanuel Macron, who visited the site, praised the slain teacher for coming forward to protect others, stating that he had “without doubt saved many lives.” The attacker was known to security services for his involvement with Islamist extremism and had previously alarmed teachers with his views. He was arrested and is now in custody. The French anti-terror prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation for “murder in connection with a terrorist enterprise.”
00:05 – Intro 01:44 – Citizens arrest a man – what methods do they use? 02:21 – What are wrist locks and armbar takedowns? 03:36 – How do they differ from other methods? 04:10 – Arm drags are not equivalent to armbar takedowns 04:28 – Performance in combat sports 04:44 – So why do police train this way? 06:08 – Why do we teach police this way if it doesn’t work? 07:17 – Fighting is impossible to understand without doing it. 08:14 – Discussing examples 09:41 – Safety concerns 11:43 – Do wrist locks and armbar takedowns have any use at all? 12:41 – What should we teach instead?
One man manages distance, avoiding risk of the sucker punch, then uses a head kick to knock out the other man who continues to press forward despite warnings.
Bystanders, brawls, and the court of public opinion
The narrative surrounding an event can often be as influential as the event itself. Public opinion and the perceptions of bystanders can significantly shape the narrative, even if they do not have full context or understanding of the situation.
This is particularly true for police, who in recent years have seen worsening results in the public discourse.
The “court of public opinion” is now increasingly magnified, where social media and online platforms can amplify and distort narratives. Our actions, especially in public situations, can have far-reaching consequences beyond the immediate confrontation; despite millions of interactions where nothing noteworthy happens, a single bad police interaction can even lead to protests and unrest in other countries.
My message here is ultimately simple – give some consideration to how you might appear to bystanders in any given situation. Facts are subservient to emotion.
Police in Australia recently stopped a man who had taken the passengers of a tram hostage while armed with a knife.
When police arrived it started with a contain and negotiate strategy, until the offender stated that he was going to kill people on the tram and grabbed a woman, pointing the knife at her.
With the imminent threat to the life of the woman, Members of the Critical Incident Response Team entered the train armed with a Taser and rifle, a combination of lethal and less-lethal force which is an important detail here.
The first discharge of the Taser did fail, probably due to the thick jacket the offender was wearing.
Luckily this Taser model has two cartidges that can be fired in succession, and the second shot was effective at achieving neuromuscular incapacitation.
Being in a confined space like this with someone who is armed with a knife is extremely dangerous, watch my video about police in knife vs gun scenarios to understand more.
If the Taser failed as they often do, using the rifle was extremely risky, as there were multiple members of the public behind the offender and any shots fired can miss, pass through the offender or ricochet and potentionally harm or kill the victims. Going hands-on could potentially result in the police getting killed themselves.
They were faced with an extremely dynamic and unpredictable scenario with no perfect options and potential negative outcomes no matter what they did.
This could have gone horribly wrong but it didn’t, well done to these police who managed to achieve the best outcome.
It is essential to first understand how to effectively take on a single opponent from the other side – as a group – before considering the best approach as a single defender.
There are two core roles:
Primary – Engages / draws attention
Secondary – Performs flanking movement / blindside attack
One engages while the other attacks from a second angle – just like the raptors in Jurassic Park
Engagement could mean anything from a physical attack to body language and verbal engagement.
As we can only face one direction and effectively fight one person at a time, we are vulnerable to any secondary attack from whoever we are not focused on.
When you are operating in a group against a single opponent, divide yourselves between these roles. One takes their focus, allowing the other the other to attack without repercussion.
Engage simultaneously, give them two problems at once and find opportunities to hit them when they aren’t looking at you.
Method as single defender
Now we have an understanding of basic group tactics, how do we address it?
The often-repeated advice is to “line them up”. Although this is not a bad idea in principle, it can be difficult to achieve maintain as your opponent will counter this movement. Any improvements to position are temporary and will result in a back-and-forth struggle.
As a result, we will often need to capitalise on more subtle positional shifts.
Position (Angles + Distance)
ANGLE: Use movement to keep opponents within a 90 degree angle to front, as much as possible.
DISTANCE: Maintain a staggered distance. They may never perfectly “line up” for you – however, if one is within striking range and the other is not, we have achieved at least a fleeting moment where we can address a single opponent, without being attacked by the other.
Angle and distance management require constant movement.
EXPOSED TO SECONDARY/FLANKING ATTACK AND OPPONENTS ARE CLOSE + EQUAL DISTANCE
LATERAL MOVEMENT TO REGAIN CORRECT POSITION AND STAGGERED DISTANCE
Target switching
The ability to target switch is more important than positioning. Good position can be difficult or impossible to attain for more than a fleeting moment.
We must identify, prioritise and engage with the secondary. Failure to do so means you will suffer a blindside attack.
Identify the secondary opponent. Maintain awareness of opponents moving in your peripheral vision; they will be positioning to attack while you are focused on their friend.
Prioritise the secondary. Even if you are physically fighting with one, when you sense the secondary is committing to their movement, prioritise and address them.
Rapidly disengage from your primary, engage the secondary.
This could mean nothing more than eye contact, or a physical attack.
Check their movement, stop the attack, do not allow them to take the initiative.
Do your best to maintain good position (angle and staggered distance). This may not always be possible, but do your best.
It is paramount that you rapidly switch targets to check their movement, stop the secondary attack, and take back the initiative.
Stalling
Another method they might use is stalling. It will shut down your movement and ability to target switch.
This involves one opponent simply holding on and not doing much while their friend does the real harm. This can often happen on the ground, but is a problem whether standing or ground.
To combat this, you need to learn how to grapple – clinch, sprawl, break grips, break contact, wrestle, defend and stand up.
If you don’t know how to clinch, wrestle and fight on the ground, you are defenseless against being taken down and held on the ground.
Crossing the line
The two opponents can work to set up the their blindside attack, but we also have to be cautious not to put ourselves in that position.
PRESSING FORWARD ON PRIMARY……CREATES EXPOSURE TO SECONDARY
Do not press forward to pursue a retreating opponent if it will expose your flank.
Final note
Above all, you need to be better at fighting than all of your opponents combined, because that is literally what you are up against. All the tactics and knowledge in the world won’t matter unless the size, skill, strength, speed, experience etc. disparity between you and the other party is large enough to overcome them.
