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Aquatic Combat Tactics: Evasion

Become An Aquatic Warrior

Let’s take the concept of “Running the Gauntlet” as covered previously and apply it to aquatic environments. Any serious reading of the historical record (ancient or modern) will leave one hard-pressed to find examples of warrior cultures ignoring the ability of their warriors to maneuver in the water.

I’m not talking about naval action, whether it be a ship-of-the-line under full sail or small SEAL teams operating in a Zodiac boat. I am talking about the ability of individual warriors to maneuver, attack, and survive in the water itself on a solo basis.

The solitary warrior’s ability to swim — both on the surface and beneath the water — and to do so with stealth or evasive action under the load of carrying or towing weapons, to efficiently assault beaches, to wisely and efficiently abandon a sinking craft, to be able to resort to hand-to-hand/close-quarter battles in a water-treading environment…That is what I’m talking about.

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Aquatic Combat In History

All of these skills and tactics have been and are valued by warrior cultures around the world. From today’s Navy SEALs to the Navy Frogmen of yesteryear, in Ramses II’s rout of the Hittites on the Orontes River, the Franconians crossing the Rhine on their shields, and various tales of Algonquin tribes making stealth assaults via rivers during the bloody French and Indian Wars, we have tales of great warriors who valued aquatic ability in their warriors and possessed this ability themselves; Warriors such as Charlemagne, Barbarossa, Carl the Great, Otto II, and my Viking forebear, Olaf Trygvesson.

We know the value of individual water tactics in a martial sense from the Sagas of the Northlanders and from the accounts of ancient Persian warriors who were expected to swim strong and well with weapons held aloft. The Spartans considered good watermanship a must and the Romans trained legionnaires to swim both with and without armor.

Stories such as these abound regarding martial aquatic prowess, and yet today we see the esteem for water warriorship reduced to “Oh, the SEALs are good swimmers” with nary hide nor hair of other contemporary schools of thought which embrace the practice in a warrior’s sense.

Why Aquatic Combat Training?

Admittedly, most of us will not be storming the beaches at Guadalcanal or be expected to cross the Danube in full armor, but many of us do train for other unlikely eventualities, so why is it that this one is given such short shrift?

Any of us could be expected to survive a car plunging from a bridge into a river. Many of us might experience the necessity of fording or surviving our new era of storm surge and flooding where we can even see landlocked Texans needing some aquatic ability.

Increasing our confidence in the water by improving our aquatic survival skills and adding aquatic training to our conditioning is simply one more wise feather to add to our training cap, not to mention a refreshing and invigorating way to capture another aspect of our historical warrior forebears.

With all of this in mind I offer the following drill/training exercise/conditioning challenge (one of many from our upcoming series on Water Warriorship).

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The Challenge

Get yourself to the body of water of your choice (open water is ideal, but you can still follow along if a pool is all you have available to you) and do the following:

  • Warm up with 5-minutes of treading water. Extra credit if you hold one hand aloft as if holding a weapon. Extra, extra credit if you hold a mock weapon aloft for the 5-minutes.
  • Next, choose a distance or time that is comfortable for your swimming ability and begin a long swim. It is ideal if you use stealth strokes as splashing alerts the enemy and signals sharks there is injured prey in the water.
  • Approximately every 10 strokes (or you can have a partner call “Down!”), surface dive or bob beneath the water and swim for 5-strokes before emerging. We are attempting to evade/obscure strafing fire from shore or the air.
  • Continue the drill for your designated distance or time. To move beneath the surface, feel free to use a tuck dive, pike-dive, or sculled bob. Extra credit if you execute a 90 degree turn once beneath the surface.

Final Thoughts

If you are hitting this with intent, anaerobic demand kicks in fast. If we add to it the emotional color of fully envisioning pros with rifle or bows in hand, or one of the Divine Emperor’s Zeroes strafing from above, we get an extra charge out of the practice. So, what are you waiting for? Get to it.

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76 thoughts on “Aquatic Combat Tactics: Evasion”

  3. Interested,sixty one year old former frog,currently disabled but retained ability to swim pretty much efficiently and without any trouble

    Reply

  6. Hi

    My husband laughed at this one and said it was made for me. I find it almost impossible to sink. We live by the sea so we are all good swimmers, I must I have always thought for our son. My hubby says if we were in a shipwreck he would go with me overboard and use me as a floating safety thing as I don’t sink. I have been known to be able to sit in the Med as though sitting in a chair reading a book. A friend once said if I went to the Dead Sea I could probably walk across it. Your treading water for 5 minutes,. Piece of cake. Sounds Intetesting to try. Thanks Jean.

    Reply

  9. I KNOW NO FEAR….CAME FROM A LARGE FAMILY….6 BROTHERS AND 3 SISTERS….BECAUSE IN MY YOUTH I STUTTERED TERRIBLY, I HAVE TO FIGHT MY WAY IN MY NEIGHBORHOOD. APPARENTLY THE OTHERS MY AGE THOUGHT STUTTERING WAS A WEAKNESS…SO INSTEAD OF ARGUING MY WAY, I FOUGHT MY WAY THROUGH ANY DISAGREEMENT. BERNI

    Reply

  14. Cool idea. I need to get my boys more proficient in water, and this seems like a good way to start. Thx for sharing ur expertise.

    Reply

  16. Your exercise above is a good start but may I suggest something additional.Forty-Five years ago six other Petty Officers and myself started what is now the U.S. Navy Rescue Swimmer program and we were putting trained swimmers out of helicopters 14 years before the Coast Guard. The first thing we instructed our students who made it past the first week, which was about 50% or less, was Life saving. We had combined the techniques from the Red Cross and the YMCA to provide our students with the best initial water combat they needed. My suggestion is to take a Life Saving course even if your not going to be a life guard. You will become more confident in the water and who knows…You May Save A Life some day.

    Reply

  17. I like Mark’s tips, this one is a good reminder that there is evasion even when swimming, yes I mostly breast stroke.
    Only had to swim past a gator once but going quietly and smoothly makes you look less like prey, the extra 1/2 mph from a crawl merely draws attention you don’t want.
    From above or below.

    Reply

  20. I simply love this company , what wont you guys do to keep us loyal ,lol enough already we love you ,naw just kidding keep up the great insghts, info , and gear ,The Great Seal

    Reply

  23. Being a former high school swimmer, I can appreciate your post. Knowing how to swim is one thing, being stealty is another. Thank You for the information.

    Reply

  25. These Aquatic styles of combat and evasive techniques are crucial for everyone to know. I am extremely interested in this and all survival techniques.what if (God forbid) a nuclear war happens, and people do not have the luxury of going to the shop/store for groceries or depending on the police to protect them?. People will need to know how to survive in case of the worse case scenario.

    Reply

  26. I think every thing yall put out there is great. I’m a disabled good ol country boy that was brought up by a man that put the old in old school. Every day I carry at least 4 knives that I’ve gotten from yall. I also carry a 357 magnum and a S&W MP40.
    I thank all of your people that have served in our armed forces. You have my upmost respect. Keep the good info coming I really appreciate it.

    Reply

  28. Wonderful! Nobody thinks of these skills untill it’s to late then what?? Great advice nike” mikey” just learn to do it ! It may save your life or a loved one? Dugh ?!¿ thanx and “Merry Christmas ” my beautiful Americans! Victor Martinez

    Reply

  29. Interesting essay on the full spectrum of emergency/combat/survival skills to include water-born activities involving wading/treading/swimming and the potential “at home” training scenarios to develop the required stamina/skills to do so.

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  31. Very ggood training tip as we often forget about our need to have water based skills if needed and of course is an excellent way to maintain fitness without the stress normal land training puts on the joints

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  32. interesting. never considered incorporating aquatic training in my routine before but it feels like a great cross training idea

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  37. When I was in the U. S. Marines, we do beach landing, and that was with was full combat gear. It was not an easy task.We were part of a beach landing force. Was hard training.

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  38. Thankyou for the reminder that tool in my box is rusty,I live in michigan the great lakes surround me so I should be meantaly an physically water aware,thankyou for a valuable wakeup call

    Reply

  41. Thank you for making me aware of the need for this skill set. It is something I had not been thinking about and it is now obvious to me the wisdom of including these skills and the needed training to be able to add this important advantage to the portfolio of any survival training.
    Thanks again.
    Mike

    Reply

  43. Thank you for this article. I appreciate and agree with it very much. The skills and abilities you outlined are not just valuable in military combat; they are valuable in countless civilian emergency situations involving water, several of which I have personally experienced and would not have survived otherwise. Please keep up the good work!

    Reply

  45. This type of training is a great reminder that 3/4 of our planet is water. How would warriors fare without
    effective education ? I would be hard pressed to come up with a waterborne situation, let alone what
    equipment would be required for terror on or in the water. Thanks for shaking-up my thoughts.

    Reply

  48. The ability to maneuver oneself or another person underwater is also a lifesaving skill taught whenever approaching a swimmer in distress. Diving down in order to approach them from the rear, then gaining control from that vantage point can keep them from drowning you as well. I can see where in aquatic combat this practice might give you an advantage when attempting to subdue an adversary

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  49. Thanks for the info.
    Never tried holding something above water while swimming, I’m sure it isn’t easy while attempting to be stealthy!

    Reply

  50. Excellent article pointing to a skill that has been forgotten by most. Very good drills that is a great add-on to one’s arsenal for survival.
    Thank you Mr Hatfield for taking the time and making the effort to write and educate.

    Reply