Topic: Tradition
The Bayonet—Spirit Weapon
We all know that the bayonet is seldom used to kill an enemy.* Combat experiences of World Wars I and II have pointed up this fact. It is difficult to find a man who has actually killed with cold steel. Bullets are better; no soldier in his right senses will engage in a bayonet duel while he still has a loaded rifle. Bullets are surer, easier.
[US Army] Infantry School Quarterly, Vol 37, No 2, October, 1950
By Major Schiller F. Shore, Infantry
Editor's Note: This article represents the opinion of the writer, not necessarily that of The Infantry School.
We all know that the bayonet is seldom used to kill an enemy.* Combat experiences of World Wars I and II have pointed up this fact. It is difficult to find a man who has actually killed with cold steel. Bullets are better; no soldier in his right senses will engage in a bayonet duel while he still has a loaded rifle. Bullets are surer, easier.
For these reasons the bayonet and bayonet training have fallen into a period of what is known as "deemphasis." This is a long and nebulous word for "forget it; you won't need it."
It is easy to see the logic behind "deemphasis" of the bayonet. If we're not going to use it, let's cut out the hours spent on bayonet training and put them to use on training we do need.
This has been done. The hoarse-voiced bayonet instructors have disappeared. And bayonet training is now con sidered as merely the excellent physical conditioner that it is.
The writer maintains that this is excellent logic but poor psychology.
We have already discussed the logic of deemphasis, and few of us will find fault with it. But let us now look at the psychology of it.
Our infantrymen are taught to "close with and capture or destroy the enemy." This is the ultimate goal of all training. In the final phase of an assault our infantrymen come within--for want of a better word--spitting distance of the enemy. Or, if you prefer, close combat.
Well, what weapon in all our armament is symbolic of close combat?
I think it is the bayonet and what goes with it--the spirit of the bayonet, offensive-mindedness, and the will to kill.
All these things are tied in, in some intangible way, with the bayonet on the end of the rifle. I believe it belongs there, that it looks good there, that even though it seldom explores an enemy gut (bullets being better), the sight of cold steel brings fear to the defender and an extra bit of courage and confidence to the man who knows how to use it if he has to.
By "deemphasizing" the bayonet and the spirit of the bayonet as we used to teach it, this writer believes that we subtract in some measure from the spirit of the offensive and the will to close with the enemy. We strip ourselves of a "spirit" weapon that cannot be replaced by a pistol, a knife, a flamethrower, or any other lethal device. The bayonet is a tradition that we should not discard. Let us "reemphasize" the bayonet. Bring back the old time bayonet sergeants (though modifying their enthusiastic opinion that the bayonet is the only weapon). Let us reinstate cold steel as the symbol of final assault, even though bullets rightly do most of the killing.
*NOTE: A recent and notable exception is the case of Major John Cook, late of The Infantry School in the Korean War. Surrounded by infiltrating Communists, Cook emptied his pistol into the charging Reds, picked up a rifle, shot several of the enemy, and then, his ammunition gone, used his bayonet for a final kill before he himself was killed. He was awarded the DSC.
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