G'day everyone.
My name's Craig and I am webmaster of
www.specialoperationsaustralia.com. I'm currently researching the unarmed combat methods taught to Z and M Special Unit personnel at the Fraser Commando School in Queensland during the war. I've been fairly lucky in that I am quite good friends with a former PTI and assistant UAC instructor at the Commando School and I've learned quite a bit about how the men of the Services Reconnaissance Department were trained for operations. The UAC methodology they used was straight out of Fairbairn's "Get Tough".
Last year I was given a copy of a very deteriorated hour-long colour 16mm film showcasing the training and equipment used at the school. Out of that hour, there is quite a bit on UAC - featuring none other than 1930s Aussie wrestling champ Eddie Scarfe as the UAC Instructor. He was a nasty little man LOL. I was stunned when I first saw it, having read Get Tough years ago and then seeing the techniques in colour on the screen. Of course, the novelty is gone now, after having gone through the whole film frame by frame when I was cleaning it up. If anyone's interested, I donated the rights to an edited DVD version of the film to the Australian Bunker & Military Museum which they are selling. I also send out gratis copies to SRD/AIB Veterans (Z Special "Gold" Edition).
I'll be working on an unarmed combat training section for my website in the near future and although I found Dennis' forum quite by accident, from what I can tell, the amount of knowledge in here is staggering. If no-one objects, I wouldn't mind posting up the first draft of the UAC section of my website here for critique. When I've chopped out the UAC parts of the Fraser Commando School film, I'll upload them to youtube and post a link here. I'd feel bad if I didn't contribute even though my own knowledge of wartime UAC techniques is limited to what I've read.
I look forward to contributing what I can and talking to you all on the forums.
Cheers