Combatives is an umbrella term for all the modern combat systems that emerged in the early 20th century. They treated combat as a unified phenomenon, without splitting it into unarmed and armed fighting. This assumption became the foundation of later training systems.
The name Defendu is the title of a book written by Fairbairn. It is a compound of the English words defend you. Interestingly, the author himself did not use this name widely. He used the names "Dirty fighting" or "Scientific self-defense" instead.
The system was created for the needs of the Shanghai Municipal Police and was developed before and during World War II. The need to create an effective police training system at that time arose from the high rate of officers being killed and the unchecked spread of lawlessness. The training and combat system was based on observations of natural human behavior in extreme situations and their application in the teaching process.
A melting pot of lawlessness at the time, its streets claiming the lives of officers and citizens alike. Drawing on their skills and observations, Fairbairn and Sykes created a system that: allowed an officer to be trained quickly, placed no restrictions on natural reflexes, relied on instinctive reactions, was effective in confrontation, tipped the scales of victory in favor of law enforcement, and a few years later helped the Allied forces win World War II.
Through its creators and advocates, the system was adopted as the basis for training in the newly formed special units of the Allied forces in Great Britain, Canada and the USA. It was also taught to the Polish Cichociemni (elite paratroopers). Although the instructors later went their separate ways, their experience laid the foundation for units such as the OSS, CIA, SAS and others. From Shanghai, the system also spread to China, and similar shooting methods were developed in the countries of the former Soviet Union.
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