THE AGE OF UNDERSTANDING

Ultimately, everyone who reaches 'the age of understanding', if ever, is responsible for their own health and survival, and well-being even if governments attempt to regulate and improve their respective health conditions or to rectify their health problems at public expense. Trying to rectify the specific problems of individuals who have devoted a lifetime or a significant part of their life to becoming obese,alcoholic, drug addicted,etc. places an enormous financial burden and strain on any health insurance or health plans and on all treatment centers and establishments as such is often futile and the effects of a lifetime of indulgence and dissipation cannot always be reversed or overcome. Quite often "ONE'S LIFE STYLE IS SIMPLY HAZARDOUS TO ONE'S HEALTH'!

"TIMETABLE OF DEATH"

This month's issue of TACTICAL KNIVES, November issue, has an article entitled(on the front cover) FAIRBAIRN'S 'TIMETABLE OF DEATH' Debunked! which should be read by all style sof knife fighting and bladed arts since it illustrates the difference between 'technocrats' and 'WARRIORS'. GENTLEMEN: set your stop watches! Since the column: STREET SMARTS on page 8 in this issue talks about blood loss: facts and fiction, and since the late W.E. FAIRBAIRN and his collegue SYKES are dead and the late Col Rex Applegate is not around and alot of WWII Vets have passed away, I have decided to express my views on this subject which may not meet with anyone's or everyone's opinions but I really don't care. d Of course, I recognize that certain data about this topic can be most pertinent if collected and analyzed correctly,etc. it seems to me that for those for whom these tables were constructed could care less as most of us would, if inflicting cuts and blade attacks continue such until the foe was dead. Whether or not he has five seconds, ten seconds, or 65 seconds or more to live does not matter to anyone except him. The article also makes the assumption that the types of knives they are using will be the type shown and that a single cut to the carotid artery is all that would be done,at least for the purposes of this article. The article does not mention the femoral artery and other areas and relies,unless I am mistaken, on data obtained from doctors, med centers, and a few other records. The writer/author does not mention that this timetable was constructed back in the early days and designed to give confidence about certain methods to men ready to engage in war and possibly to lose their lives. Also, a lot of this stuff was for OSS people who went behind the lines. I would almost guarantee that if the neck is struck and slashed with a very heavy,sharp blade, the number of seconds remaining for the person would be moot. As I have suggested elsewhere, to test cutting methods try pigs and otehr animals for slaughter and actually cut and let blood flow. I am sure that when the Japs tested their head chopping methods on Chinese and American and Korean and Filipino prisoners they did not count the seconds but merely the strokes, the ideal being a single stroke of the Japanese sword, 'samurai' or not! This reminds me of the type of mentality that certain Nazis had when they kept track of the number of 'groin-grinds' with jackboots it took to kill a Jewish prisoner. The sheer delight of both the Krauts and Nips as captured on photos of such interesting 'experiments' with prisoners would,no doubt, be of prime importance to the technocrats. To carry these time-tables to the other extreme, just note the various DIM MAK,DIAN TSUHE,ETC. tables that require memorization of times and hours,etc. to be 'effective' etc. If people think they are going to die from such wounds chances are they will and there heart rates will certainly be pounding in many instances. Whenever you have TRAUMA of any kind, there is always the risk of death. You can die from a wound that does not seem serious and from which most quickly recover if you think it will kill you or that you are going to die. THE POWER OF SUGGESTION is strong and think 'death-touch' and 'poison hand'etc. Anyway, the nice thing/think about this article is it might provoke some serious discussion. Maybe I'll have time some day to do a bit more on this.