Wesley Brown's V5 Aviators H2H Program

This post includes the tutorial movie, the book, and a transcript...the total package...

US Navy V-5 Aviator Cadet Wing

USN Pre-Flight V5 Aviators Program Training Film - Defensive Hand-to-Hand Combat - Pts 1 thru 3

Lieutenant Commander Wesley Brown Jr. was a true innovator in the hand-to-hand combat field. During WWII, he worked in the Navy's Pre-Flight V5 Aviators program toughing up new pilots with practical and effective close combat training. Developed by LCDR Brown the H2H, or rough and tumble section of the V5 program was and specifically based upon straightforward, highly effectual, and easy to learn/retain methodologies. After the war in 1951, he wrote his classic Self-Defense for police agencies and the average citizenry, the contents of which is essentially, what he taught the flight cadets during WWII.

Lt. Commander Wesley Brown Jr. who authored the manual and another book, Self -Defense. Lt. Commander Brown's civilian career included:

• Police Officer in Evanston, IL
• Wrestling coach at Northwestern university
• Assistant Director of Training at Northwestern University Traffic Institute where he taught advanced physical fitness and self-defense courses for police
• Assistant Professor of Public Administration at the University of Southern California
• Chief of Police in Redlands, California

Whereas ground forces and specialty fighting groups, such as Seals, are on the ground and facing the enemy in combat situations on a daily basis, pilots are usually flying combat missions high off the ground and performing administrative duties while on the ground. They are not normally facing the enemy in combat. However, when shot down, naval pilots are on their own in enemy territory and must fend for themselves. They must depend on their own training and abilities to survive, evade the enemy, fight the enemy, escape from capture, and make their way back to friendly territory. Whereas ground forces face the enemy daily, they are usually a part of large groups with support. A downed pilot had nothing but his or own wits upon which to rely.

These videos make an excellent companion to the book Self-Defense by Brown, that is available at ICCF's 4Shared account here:

  

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Here is a transcript of the movie also available at ICCF's 4Shared account:

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This was originally published in In Quartata (at the time it may of still been called The Duelist)....

World War Two V-Five U.S. Navy Combatives

- MIDN Dan Trembula ‘03

In May 1942, the U.S. Navy implemented "the most effective and productive training program ever devised in the world history of military aviation." Known as "V-Five", this pre-flight program was the brainchild of Rear Admiral (then Commander) Thomas Hamilton, USN.

The goal was to produce combat pilots to wage war in the Atlantic and Pacific theaters. However, its greatest side effect was the most thorough and complete Unarmed Combatives training the Department of the Navy has ever seen.

Hamilton and other top Naval officers realized that efficient and effective close quarters fighting skills were needed by all Naval personnel, not just high speed, low drag units like the Scouts and Raiders or the fledgling UDT units. Surface sailors, submariners, rear echelon supply types, and perhaps most of all, aviators who risked being shot down over enemy territory were just as needy and deserving of quality close quarters training.

Ignoring the stripped down, simplistic Jiu-Jitsu / Judo based approach offered by Britain's famed Fairbairn and Sykes, Hamilton elected to go with a traditional "American" approach to close quarters combat. Lieutenant Commander Wesley Brown Jr, USNR, a former Northwestern University wrestling team captain, and detective with the Evansville Indiana Police Department was tasked with developing the Navy's new Hand-to-Hand Combat curriculum.

The result was anything but the college wrestling we know today. Absent were the double leg takedowns and foolhardy pinning techniques. It was Catch-as-Catch Can Wrestling in its most no-holds barred sense, incorporating every dirty trick, illegal hold, and bone-breaking technique LCDR Brown and his assistant Joe Begala believed workable on the battlefield or the street.

Unlike other famous Second World War Hand-to-Hand Combat programs, the V-Five system was a thorough and complete method of close quarters fighting. From their years on the wrestling mats and real life encounters, the creators knew that a dumbed down system of just a handful of techniques would work some of the time, but not against a crafty, skilled, or determined opponent.

The V-Five Pre-Flight training was dedicated to hardening the Aviation Cadets physically. Through sports, the men were indoctrinated with the group loyalty and psychological mindset required in combat. The core of this program was physical contact, "controlled" violence: Hand-to-Hand Combat and football. The former taught them to kill; the latter developed the teamwork used by V-Five graduates to amass considerably more air-to-air combat victories than pilots from other commissioning programs.

Every sport or athletic activity at the V-Five training centers was altered in some form or fashion to better simulate combat. Boxing emphasized aggressiveness and a hard corps fighting spirit. Wrestling practices resembled the Hand-to-Hand Combat classes more than the National Collegiate Athletic Association's idea of the sport. Gymnastics, track, manual labor, and obstacle courses developed agility and stamina. Basketball and soccer operated under modified rules essentially allowing fouls and full body checks. The Cadets were made painfully aware that they were being prepared for combat.

Every physical activity during the twelve weeks of the Pre-Flight program reinforced or supplemented the Hand-to-Hand Combat training the Cadets received. The Naval Institute published manuals illustrating every technique and clearly defining the program. The curriculum itself was divided into three phases: Pre-Flight, Flight Training, and Advance. Each phase had ten lessons and the material was continually reviewed and reinforced as the trainees progressed through the system. Later, the V-Five program was lengthened to twenty-six weeks allowing even more depth in training.

The Hand-to-Hand Combat portion of the program covered eight major areas: Vulnerable Areas, Fundamentals (individual techniques), Frontal Attack, Kicking Maneuvers, Rear Attack, Prisoner Searching and Control, Disarming, and the coyly titled "Offensive Methods of Liquidating an Enemy." Each of these is subdivided into various categories, for example Frontal Attack addresses counters to rushing, pushing and striking, grasping, strangling, and body-locking attacks.

The V-Five program has a number of aspects absent from other "World War Two" systems. These include the widespread use of the knee drop, a technique famous in archipelago systems like Silat; and the use of leg locking techniques to control a downed adversary while finishing the job of "Liquidating" him or to allow the officer to search him. It is also the only military system, past or present to point out to trainees that modern semi-automatic pistols (in this case, the .38 and .45 Colt Automatics, and the German Luger) will not fire out of battery. While it would be near suicide to use this to prevent someone from shooting you, it is vital knowledge to have in any close quarters encounter involving firearms. This is a perfect example of just why the V-Five program has been called the best of its kind and why it is deserving of more thought and research.

Hamilton wanted each graduate to be a fighting officer that "will be a hard-bitten gentleman, extremely dangerous to the enemy and with the greatest chance of survival under all conditions that any fighting man could have."

He succeeded.

Ensign Daniel Allen Trembula, 25, taught Close Quarters Combat at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis MD. He died of Ewing's sarcoma in November of 2005.