I'm a day late on this one but I'll throw a question out there regarding hand-to-hand. The Army's new combatives training emphasizes going to the ground with your opponent. While I find this to be an interesting exercise in PT gear on a matted gym floor, I wonder why we are teaching the techniques when, in reality, most of the hand-to-hand combat actions are going to take place with a soldier wearing full body armor, helmet and assorted other gear to weigh him down. So you want me to train soldiers to go to the ground with their opponent when, in reality, your opponent most likely will have little to no extra weight on his person, and quite capable of maneuvering away from our poor, heavily weighed down turtle?

Am I off base here or is the purpose of this new combatives program to teach our soldiers no kidding, useful hand-to-hand skills or to make them feel better about themselves and learn just enough to get their asses kicked in a bar fight?