Martial Arts Studies

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Though martial arts--including bayonet and sword thrusts and unarmed close combat techniques--have been employed by members of the U.S. Marine Corps since its inception during the Revolutionary War period, a new era began in 2000, with the creation of the U.S. Marine Corps Martial Arts Program (MCMAP). In the aftermath of the Persian Gulf War and the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, the U.S. military--specifically the Army and the Marine Corps--began to concentrate on training its special operations soldiers in techniques that could be used in international peacekeeping missions and other military operations other than war (MOOTW), where close combat would be necessary but force was not required to be lethal.

Shortly after General James L. Jones, commandant of the Marine Corps, took office in the summer of 1999, he ordered a study done on the possibility of having all Marines train in a martial art such as Aikido or Taekwondo. During his service in the Vietnam War, Jones had seen Korean Marines practicing Taekwondo, and thought that martial arts could be useful in operations other than war. Jones idea was a martial arts system that that could be used in any environment, terrain or situation. He also wanted to combine combat training with rigorous physical conditioning, mental discipline and character-building.

After the study ran in the spring of 2000 at Camp Pendleton, California, the MCMAP was established, with its headquarters at the Marine Corps base in Quantico, Virginia. According to Marine Corps Order 1500.54, which established the MCMAP, the program was a synergy of mental, character, and physical disciplines with application across the full spectrum of violence. Its first director, Lieutenant Colonel George Bristol--an experienced fighter with black belts in Judo, Jujitsu and Karate--gave the program its motto, One Mind, Any Weapon.

As part of their training, MCMAP fighters are required to study history's great warrior cultures--the Spartans, the Apaches and the Zulus. Though the MCMAP system combines aspects of many different martial arts, it focuses less on the traditional movements and more on techniques designed to work in actual close-combat situations. The moves are adjusted necessarily to better suit the fighters: soldiers clad in helmets, armed with M-16s, bayonets, and knives, and carrying heavy packs and flak jackets. Specific techniques learned in training include bayonet and knife thrusts, choke holds, eye gouges, and leg sweeps. MCMAP fighters proceed through a belt system, beginning with tan and advancing through grey, green, brown, and on to six different levels of black.

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