Well, back in those days, boxing was part of the training, even for pilots who would never see hand-to-hand combat. My colleague found that pilots who had their EEG scans after a boxing class were far more likely to show epileptiform brain activity.
Saber fencing especially is pretty quick. Which is probably what they’d like—at least, I don’t think the Air Force would like to promote a mentality of taking a few hits and slugging through.
(also my understanding of the curve, based on our national level hospital statistics, is that a substantial fraction of the really bad wrecks happen to people with under 500 hours)
My wife's a horse trainer. I could go down a long list of injuries of various severity that she's suffered over the years. There's at least one concussion (that I know of!) in there and a solid whack to the face that drew lots of blood but no other noticeable injury.
And that reminds me of the software developer I used to work with who was also previously a horse trainer but switched to software after being run over and breaking five ribs.
Unfortunately, this stuff is considered expected and accepted [shrug].
Then again, I knew someone whose wife did intake at a nearby ER and pretty much all of their equine-related injuries came from the same trail riding outfit nearby!
https://library.olympics.com/Default/doc/SYRACUSE/37431/trai...
(I have heard that WWI era air bases had signs "no spurs in the cockpit" but am not sure that these aren't just modern retconned "collectibles")
I think the Air Force would prefer epée (full court press: first mistake loses).
But I’m very unlucky with concussions. I once got one in a swim meet for running head first into the wall. So ymmv.
Back when I trained, I remember going home with headaches because as senior student, my job was basically to stand in front of a line of junior students who took turns whacking me in the head :-)