William Ewart Fairbairn (1885-1960) was a soldier, police officer, and exponent of hand-to-hand combat methods for the Shanghai police between the World Wars, and allied special forces in World War II.
He served with the Royal Marine Light Infantry starting in 1901. After joining the Shanghai Municipal Police in 1907, he studied Judo and then Chinese martial arts, developed his own fighting system, and taught it to members of that police force in order to reduce officer fatalities. He described this system as primarily based on his personal experience, which according to police records included some 600 non-training fights, by his retirement at age 55 from the position of Assistant Commissioner in 1940.
He was recruited by the British Secret Service as an Army officer; he trained both U.K., U.S. and Canadian Commando and Ranger forces and those who would train them.
He rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel by the end of World War II, and received the U.S. Legion of Merit at the request of "Wild Bill" Donovan, founder of the U.S. O.S.S.
He is known for designing the Fairbairn-Sykes Fighting Knife which was used by British Special Forces in World War II, and for his textbook Scientific Self-Defence.
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