CQB (Close Quarters Battle): A Guide to Unarmed Combat and Close Quarter Shooting

Rating:
Summary: Need supplement
Review: In depth study of individual CQB skills. Good info and training on firearms, but not detailed enough on CQB movements and searching skills .Best to be read with another STTU books in hand.

Rating:
Summary: Covers many topics but not detail enough
Review: My disappointment may be caused by I expecting too many. The unarmed combat sessions covers only kid karate class. The mentioned "key strike points" are not secret in Chinese martial art, it is a basic knowledge. I learned Chinese martial art for several years, and I do believe my teacher teached me more than this book in the first year.

For the armed section, it is much better, but discussion is not deep enough. I expect more!

Rating:
Summary: Unrealistic and vague
Review: The best thing in this book is the paper it is printed on; it's semi-glossy and heavy, giving some expectation of quality. The second best thing is that there is surprisingly little text, because some 1/3 of the pages are filled with photos. The fact that this is good news, tells something about the quality of the text.

To start with, the entire idea of presenting the "fighting secrets" of special operations forces in a 200-page book is somewhat absurd, especially considering that the author assumes that the reader does not know virtually nothing about the subject. The techniques presented here are unrealistic in the real world, to a large extent. And finally, the author speaks way too vaguely of the issues he presents, so that you really don't have a chance to learn anything.

The main part of the book concentrates on close combat. Significant amount of these pages is devoted to series of photographs. The photos are supposed to present several unarmed and armed close combat techniques, but they are so small and unclear that you are hard-pressed to figure out what they are depicting. But that's good, because you don't want to learn these techniques, anyway. One amusing thing caught my eye: The author stresses that it is imperative to train in full gear, and carry all the equipment you would be carrying in a real situatoin (that is true, but it is also self-evident). But in about half of the pictures, the guys are wearing karate uniforms!

The reason I bought this book was that I expected to find something on close-quarters shooting. Granted, about the last third of the book is devoted to the subject, but there really is not anything, exept for a total beginner. And for a beginner, there are far better books around.

One thing that especially annoyed me was that the author uses military jargon, apparently to get some credibility. That is the only justification for most of the jargon, as the book is filled with examples like "Any operation in the continental United States (CONUS), that ends in a shooting...", that being the only use of term CONUS in the text. The reason people use abbrevations is to save time and space with frequently used terms, which is not the case with examples like these.

I would recommend this book to a pre-adolescent boy, who wants to impress his pals by how much he knows about guns and real-life combat. If that description does not fit you, stay away from this book.