Humans have expressed their warrior spirit through some form of fighting for as long as they have trudged on Earth. When Cain and Abel fought, they probably used dinosaur bones and a few eons later, warring tribes used slings, arrows and catapults. Gunpowder reared its ugly head a few millenniums after that, making fighting a little less personal, which has continued to today, a time when carloads of teenage gangbangers do drive-by shootings with MAC10 machineguns.

We have definitely come a long way in our ability to fight: from exchanging blows with bones to the myriad of sophisticated fighting systems developed in the Orient, to where we are now, with technology so incredible that we can blow entire cities into radioactive dust with the mere poke of a button. In spite of our ability to construct state-of-the-art high-rise buildings, replace worn hearts with stronger ones, and blend chocolate, caramel and steamed cream for the perfect, yet outrageously-priced yuppie coffee, each of us still carries deep inside a warrior spirit, an inherent quality, not far removed from our prehistoric ancestors.

Our personal warrior spirit may be aggressive, intense, easily unleashed, or it may be quiet and rarely show itself. Within some people, it’s buried deeply, the result of profound religious beliefs, psychological factors or other influences. The majority of people, it seems, carry theirs just under the thin veneer of today’s societal graces. These people are soldiers, police officers, martial artists, street thugs, athletes, hunters, barroom brawlers, corporate executives, politicians, mothers and fathers. Some are good people and some are not. Some express their warrior spirit with words, laws and money, while others do it with their fists and weapons.

Most people have learned to control their warrior spirit, drawing upon it only when absolutely necessary. Others, however, freely express theirs, which is why we have police and prisons, and a military with computer-driven missile

As a teenager, I got into three fights that opened my eyes to violence and revealed something inside of me that I didn’t know existed. I was unaware of the warrior spirit then, but I was to learn that fighting brought something to the surface that at once intrigued, frightened, fascinated and repelled me.

Crouching Tiger: Taming the Warrior Within contains some of the occurrences that have helped me to understand my warrior spirit, at least a little. Sometimes I’ve made a mistake and thought I had learned a lesson but then turned right around and made the same one again. Most often, I’m happy to report, I’ve corrected my mistakes and gone on to make new ones.

Within this small volume are anecdotes of times when I was heroic, stupid, fearful, and when my warrior spirit was clearly out of control. I’m proud of some of the experiences that I share in this book and embarrassed by others. I have included the latter because I think it’s important to explore all sides of this tremendous force.

While these are my experiences, it’s my hope that readers will find in some of them, a little or a whole lot of themselves.

SAMPSON

The nighttime dispatcher’s monotone voice crackled over the radio: “All units, there’s a disturbance at 400 Flowers Street with dozens of GI’s and Vietnamese involved. Several are reported to be down and injured.”

Flowers Street was in a busy part of Saigon, a street lined with bars, brothels and sidewalks jammed day and night with servicemen, prostitutes, beggars and thieves. Dispatch didn’t say what had started the disturbance or what all was involved, but at midnight, we assumed it was a drunken argument over a prostitute, maybe a racial clash or a bad drug deal.

What had been an uneventful shift for us suddenly changed as we rounded a corner from a quiet alleyway onto Flowers Street right smack into the middle of a full-scale riot.

At the epicenter was a guy who looked like Victor Mature in that old biblical movie Sampson and Delilah where he uses a jawbone from a mule to club an entire army of Philistines. But this wasn’t a movie and the big guy wasn’t an actor with a plastic jawbone. He was an American serviceman, big as boxcar, wielding a hammer on a crowded Saigon street. Just like Victor Mature, this Sampson was clubbing everyone in sight and, judging by the number of people on the ground, he had been doing it for several minutes before my partner and I, along with several other MPs, pulled into to the scene. The riot wasn’t all about him, though, as there were dozens of others fighting in the street, on the sidewalk and in and out of doorways. My guess was that Sampson and his “jawbone” were responsible for most of those on the ground.

In the next couple of minutes, twenty additional MPs were called. As each unit pulled into the mess, they were instantly thrust into the fray — grabbing people, throwing some to the ground, getting punched and kicked and pursuing people down the streets and sidewalks. From somewhere came a heart-stopping burst from an M-16, scattering some, though in a war-torn city like Saigon, the sound of automatic gunfire had less impact than it would in a crowded street back home.

My partner and I stopped our jeep about fifteen feet behind Sampson. Seeing several bleeding people lying at his feet, I had a fleeting thought about shooting the big guy, but since he was in the midst of dozens of people, a missed shot would continue zinging through the air until someone else stopped it.

I rushed toward him from behind, though not sure what I was going to do when I got there. Sampson decided for me, however, when he cocked back his hammer to clobber a Vietnamese man whose throat he was sqeezing as he dangled him in the air. Without hesitation, I drove my fist into Sampson’s spine.

He didn’t react, and brought the hammer down onto the man’s head with a sickening Gusshh! sound. He flung the limp body aside and then looked right and left for another victim. I punched him again in the spine and a second time in the kidney. I hit him with my most powerful punches, hesitating after each one for the monstrous guy to drop, as have all the others I’ve hit. But Sampson didn’t. He didn’t even acknowledge me hitting him. Instead, he cocked his hand back ready to clobber someone else with his hammer.

I drove in three more punches, but he ignored those, too, as he brought his hammer down on the head of a previous victim lying at his feet. Again I hit him and again and again. Still he ignored me. Then I drove a hard one into the back of his head, an area vulnerable to even mild impact. That got his attention.

He didn’t stagger or fall, but at least he turned around and acknowledged my presence. Just as I was wondering what I was going to do as a follow up, another MP appeared on my right and smashed his pistol into the giant’s forehead.

Like a scene out of a bad horror movie, Sampson shook his head and blinked a few times as if to erase the pain, and then he turned to face the MP. Without pause, the MP used his gun again to slam Sampson in the head, while I simultaneously drove in another reverse punch to the back of his head. This time the big guy staggered. We hit him again and again, the blows eventually wilting him down onto his knees. Another MP came up from somewhere and the three of us dived on him, knocking him onto his belly where he struggled for along time before we got the handcuffs on him.

After I got off shift, I thought about Sampson’s tolerance to pain as I applied ice to my wrist, swollen and sprained from all the ineffectual blows to his thickly muscled back. My pride hurt too, as it’s not just a little ego-deflating to be ignored by someone you are raining your best punches on. Putting all that aside, the experience taught me not to rely on just one punch or kick to end a confrontation. While at times the human body can be quite fragile, there are other times it can tolerate a tremendous amount of punishment. In subsequent physical encounters in my years as a police officer, I found that sometimes a variety of techniques are needed.

It’s not always the best plan to rely on just one way to accomplish a task, even if that way has been successful in the past. It’s better to have a quick follow-up, a Plan B, for those special times when Plan A isn’t enough.

A Plan C is good to have, too.

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