“From a martial art standpoint, this is a major strategic blunder!”
In this video, Stanley Pranin describes a major error commonly seen in the application of aikido’s kotegaeshi, a wrist turn throw. This strategic mistake can be seen everywhere across the spectrum in modern aikido. This clip applies “The Zone Theory of Aikido” to analyzing this problem area in kotegaeshi techniques.
Basically, the first task of nage (defender) prior to applying kotegaeshi is to avoid the attack, and unbalance uke (attacker). But then as nage sets up to execute kotegaeshi, he spins uke around for the throw. Here, uke ends up facing nage square on. At this point, nage becomes vulnerable to uke’s counterattack and is only spared an unpleasant outcome by the cooperative nature of his interaction with uke. From a martial art standpoint, this is a major strategic blunder. Other problem areas exist in today’s aikido and should be addressed.