Get Tough [Paperback]

W.E. Fairbairn (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 1996

The father of modern hand-to-hand combat, Capt. W. E. Fairbairn, taught the famed British Commandos from this classic, long-out-of-print manual on unarmed combat. Known for his "get tough" attitude, Fairbairn designed these practical methods after years of training troops and watching ruffians, thugs, bandits and bullies. Now you can profit from his experience.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

W.E. Fairbairn taught unarmed combat to the famed British Commandos and the U.S. armed forces during World War II. Before the war he served as assistant commissioner of the Shanghai Police Force. He was the inventor of the Fairbairn Commando Knife and the author of the classics Get Tough and Shooting to Live.

Product Details

• Paperback: 120 pages
• Publisher: Paladin Press (December 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0873640020
• ISBN-13: 978-0873640022
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.5 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #138,718 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

90 of 92 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good, but have been improved, March 9, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Get Tough (Paperback)

This is a classic, there are no doubts about that. It is the result of one of the first scientific studies of violence in a violent environment by someone who knew what he was doing. What is remarkable about the book is not what is says, but what it do not say. While the book is good in itself, there are much that needs to be known in order to use the contents in an effective manner that is not said in this book. I will try to give a brief summary of this "other" materiel, and some hints to other useful pices of information.

The techniques described herein are based on Faribairn's experiences in the service of the Shanghai Municipal Police in the first decades of the 20th century. By this time Shanghai was one of the most violent and nasty places on earth, ever. These techniques were developed, refined and used by men who regularly fought for their lives with very violent and vicious criminals; there is no fancy dojo "what-ifs" involved here.

The book demonstrates some simple and efficient techniques for maiming and killing the enemy, and encourages the reader to choose A FEW OF THEM and learn them thoroughly. Unfortunately Fairbairn does not devote much time and space to explain the rationale behind this, but in order to perform a technique automatically -- to encode it as a reflex, which is amust for an effective response -- it has to be trained over and over again. Some authorities claim that 5,000 repetitions is required, with three additional correct ones for every flawed execution. Do the math yourself. This is the reason behind the, for some, staggering simplicity of the techniques -- at least compared to those taught in more traditional martial arts etc. If they are to be learnt as instictively as is necessary, they have to be simple. The techniques do not look "fancy". They are not supposed to, they are supposed to kill.

However, the contents of this book has been much improved upon since, and most notably by the author himself and his coworkers during WWII when they incorporated the results from actual experience in the field into the curriculum. That is, allied agents who fought axis soldiers and agents wrote field reports and communicated their experiences to the men responsible for CQ-training, most notable within the SOE. The results of this maiming and killing can be found in the so called "Silent Killing Syllabus" of 1944, basically Fairbairns lecture notes.

This curriculum can be found in the book "SOE Syllabus: Lessons in Ungentlemanly Warfare" (ISBN 190336518X), which is also available from Amazon. The focus in that curriculum is even less on "grappling" than in Get Tough! and almost exclusively on open hand strikes with the odd kick to the lower legs; apart from shooting and/or stabbing the opponent. That is, the techniques in the 1944 curriculum are even simpler and more direct, and more brutal, than in Get Tough!.

The focus is not on "self defence" but on combat, in fact Farirbairn has stated -- I do not remember exactly where -- that if two men of equal ability fight, the one with the advantage of surprise will win. The nature of the game is to strike first, strike hard and keep on striking until the enemy is either unconcious or, preferably, dead. Beat him to the ground and kick his brains in or jump on him.

Fairbairn & Co. stated, quite emphatically, that you are not supposed to fight with your bare hands, you only do so if you are caught empty handed, and you only fight empty handed so that you can get your hands on a weapon. So to get a complet picture of the Fairbairn's work, be sure to read the book on combat shooting, "Shooting to Live", co-authored with E A Sykes and available from the same publisher. He also developed some interesting techniques for use of the stick, which are found in "Get Tough!", and which he later adapted for use with an umbrella. Also, read the book "Kill Or Get Killed", by his American pupil and colleague Rex Applegate for a similar but slightly different approach; and make sure to get J.J. Styers's "Cold Steel" while you are at it for yet another perspective: Styers advocates the use of the fists more than Fairbairn and Applegate do.

It is only beacause of the missing pieces of the puzzle that I do not give the book more than four stars. Faribairn should have been able to write a much better book, at least when the quality of his "lecture notes" are taken into account. Whether he did not do this because he, as we all do, laboured under constraints of the politically correct I do not know, but the ugly truths about real combat have never been popular with the wider audience, so to speak.

48 of 49 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good book for non-martial artists, too!, November 9, 2003

By 

Joseph M Burtner (Kennesaw, Georgia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Get Tough (Paperback)

If you have never taken a martial-arts or self-defense course in your life, you will be able to learn from this book. The techniques in it are simple and brutal, with many involving a knee to the groing and broken limb. It was originally designed for soldiers during WWII, and you can tell by the illustrations. I think it would be a good reference for military historians because of that. Many military orgs. in the west have apparently still clung to many of Fairbairn's moves, such as the chin jab, throat chop, and scrape-stomp. While not filled to the brim with techniques, the book does offer some little "tricks" that aren't found much these days, like using a matchbox or chair to defend yourself. The book also contains a chart showing how long it takes someone to die from various stab wounds (hmm, wonder how he found that out...) and a chapter on the smatchete, which looks like a cross between a Bowie knife and a meat cleaver. Some of the stuff in here is probably not very usefull to the average guy trying to defend himself, like securing a prisoner to a tree, but for the sake of learning what's in the rest of the book, that stuff can be overlooked. Overall, a good book for anyone interested in defending themselves in a life-or-death situation, and an interesting historical piece.

35 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Practical Tips from a Master, July 6, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Get Tough (Paperback)

This classic WW2 military training manual is simple in approach and very pragmatic. The author writes with authority and the discriptions and illustrations (by 'Hary') are very clear. Some of the advice, such as how to escape the police staight arm bar restraining hold, and how to properly secure a prisoner are hard to find elsewhere. Some reviewers have implied that the material is 'dated' (difficult to -ahem- imagine in a book almost 60 years old) but I did not find this. Many of the techniques are better suited to military or police use than to the street. The only specific problems I found were the advice to hold the thumb straight out when delivering an edge of hand blow (too east for the adversary to grab) and the times to death from varous knife wounds. Minor details. If readers could fight half as well as Captain Fairbairn, they would be tough indeed. A more comprehensive biography of the author would be a welcome addition.