"If Sambo was easy it would be called Jiu Jitsu." Shirt that was made famous by Russian MMA Fighter, Khabib Nurmagomedov, during his UFC Weigh In. Sambo (Russian: самбо) is a Russian martial art and combat sport. The word "Sambo" is an acronym for SAMooborona Bez Oruzhiya (Russian: самбо; САМооборона Без Оружия), which literally translates as "self-defense without weapons". Sambo is relatively modern since its development began in the early 1920s by the Soviet Red Army to improve their hand to hand combat abilities. Intended to be a merger of the most effective techniques of other martial arts, Sambo has roots in Japanese Judo plus traditional folk styles of wrestling such as: Armenian Kokh, Georgian Chidaoba, Moldavian Trîntǎ, Tatar Köräş, Uzbek Kurash, Mongolian Khapsagay and Azerbaijani Gulesh.