"Do you really need to stab when you have a blade capable of taking someone's hand off?"--Wolf 1989
This is the most to-point reply I've seen so far. A chainsaw can't stab but would make a terrifying self-defense weapon
if you had it in your hands at the time. And therein lies the rub--for me the all-important question that has not been asked is, when would you ever have need of stabbing with a khukuri or indeed of "taking someone's hand off"? Or of stabbing with any blade for that matter? If we examine those potential situations, I think you'll find they are such that, a) they involve self-defense or your attack on another living creature, b) they're highly unlikely to occur at a time when you're carrying your khukuri around, and c) the advantage afforded by carrying a knife at the ready in such situations is not solely dependent on that knife's ability to stab or not stab, but on other factors.
So with some reluctance I'll enter the armchair warrior world of onanistic what-ifing: When would you need to stab, period, and could those situations occur when you're already carrying a khukuri? Are we talking about a situation in which you must fight off a wild animal? If so, one (esp. if he's from THIS crowd
) might actually be carrying a khuk. But having something--anything--of length (even better if it's sharp) that puts distance between you and Grendel is your point of advantage, not which way it cuts. I imagine--but do not know firsthand--that if a bear were to attack me while I was chopping wood or playing caveman, I'd be relieved I had _some_ weapon in my hand and wouldn't immediately wish it had been a khuk instead of an axe or machete or whatever.
Are we talking about being attacked by someone wielding a knife? I would posit that the Freddie Kruegers and Jason Voorhees' of the world do not hang out in the deep woods, and that effectively carrying your khukuri around (unless you're a Ghurka in the service) in areas where you
are likely to be attacked will prove quite difficult. By "effectively" I mean a method of carry that will not garner questions from the police (ie open carry) and that will allow you to quickly put it into your hand from where it's carried. The khukuri does not excel at this combination. If anyone has ideas for a quick-draw khuk concealment holster, I'd love to see it.
Are we talking about being attacked by someone
not wielding a knife? If you
do for some reason have a khuk in your hand, I can't imagine they'd make you their target. Thieves are cowards and look for people whom they don't expect to fight back. And if you must, speed is of the utmost importance. I don't care what's in your fanny pack or backpack if you're beaten down while slipping it off your shoulder and unzipping it. The original poster wrote that he's been thinking "about what makes a survival/heavy woods-brush/fighting knife lately". In my opinion, nothing does all of those things well. "Fighting" with a knife does not occur as most people imagine it. Most times someone will be using a knife on you will not involve a "fight" at all, but an ambush. This is not Japanese cinema and predators don't tend to announce their presence, square off, and spend five minutes making dramatic speeches while holding their katana hilts and looking away. My point is, you probably won't have a knife ready and trying to draw it might get you killed. Stabbing belongs primarily in the "fighting" category of use, and there are many smaller, lighter, much more concealable (and still legal) options for arming yourself with a defensive weapon. A few months ago I was attacked by three men while riding my bicycle from one town to another at dusk on a rural road here in Mozambique. They appeared quite literally out of nowhere and ordered me to get off the bike and leave it on the ground. One had a machete and another had a piece of iron rebar, the last was unarmed. Even though I could have tried to draw my leatherman multitool from its place on my belt, I think that would have got me cut up bad. My instinctive, faster (and successful) response was to hop off the bike, pick it up by the frame, and use IT as a weapon to chase after them while shouting bloody murder. If I had gone for a visible weapon, they would at least have taken my bike.
This post is not to say the khukuri will not do wicked things to someone in combat given the opportunity.
This retired ghurka recently took on 40 thieves with one and won. It is to say that for the rest of us, if you're going to need to stab with something, you probably won't have a khukuri available and can certainly ready something else much faster, therefore the ability or lack thereof of the khuk to stab is a moot point for me and shouldn't diminish its status as an effective survival tool, because stabbing is not on the short list of a big survival knife's "must" features (if you're carrying a karda for those small pokey tasks...), and the combination of times when you
need to stab and can have a khuk in your hand ready is almost an empty set.
I'd like to leave you with a quote from the late great Carl Cestari and then thoughts from Major W.E. Fairbairn, both of whom knew better than most how knife defense works:
"
As far as defense against a knife goes, many (most?) such encounters are going to be ambush-type scenarios. Therefore, I actually think you're probably better off, at least initially, just dealing with it empty handed. Arrest and immobilize the weapon-bearing limb, then neutralize (i.e. incapacitate, maim, or kill) the body attached to that arm.
Deploying any weapon under pressure is difficult, a folding knife (which is probably what most of us carry most often) is even worse due to the number of actions that have to happen to have it ready for use. All too many people "fixate" on trying to draw a weapon instead of just dealing with the threat. You have to establish dominance before trying to access a tool or you're going to be stuck behind the curve."
But "catching" a knife is really risky business, and Carl admitted this. In his later years, for times when you're being attacked with a knife, Major W.E. Fairbairn advocated creating distance with an object (chair, bike, whatever), or barring that a "lightning-fast kick to the groin," or simply running. The knife he helped design to give soldiers a better option than these, unsurprisingly, looks nothing like a khukuri. To be successful, its design is solely devoted to concealability, quick presentation and pure, fast stab capability.
Every tool does something well. No tool does everything well. Feel free to criticize my reasonings above; I'm here to learn, contribute, and wouldn't bother writing all this in just any forum community:foot:
In any case, you probably want to do the major dressing out of a big fish with the kukri anyway.
, Chopping wood and prepping tinder & kindling, Cleaning fish & prepping BBQ. Haven't skinned anything with them, but I have no doubt that they would do a fine job, particularly the Pen. They baton, wedge, shave & they pry. They cut rope, they pound pegs, they've even chopped hard boiled eggs...
