Budo

Aikido for me was a way to expand my previous training in Arnis, American Kickboxing and Kumite Point Fighting into a wider range of classic Budo, including footwork for fighting multiple attackers, and fighting with a walking staff or sword (years before I got into K-1 Rules kickboxing.) This was before Aikido was as watered down and it is now, but my instructor was always clear on a number of points:

1. Aikido is an advanced school of martial arts, Aikidoka historically have and always should have a significant level of martial arts competency before doing Aikido.
2. Aikido randori should be done with increasing intensity, until it reaches the level of sparring.
3. Aikido sacrifices effectiveness in order to show mercy to the opponent: the goal is to harm the opponent as little as possible while still effectively defending yourself.

I have suggested before that Aikido can be saved by embracing its Samurai-flavored stick fighting side (including all of the unarmed techniques that go along with many stick fighting styles.) But after having trained along side a 3rd Degree black belt in Ninjitsu in a stick fighting class, I can see point 3 above has seriously negatively impacted Aikido's ability to fill that niche - because of Aikido's pacifism, it will never be the best way to learn a well rounded set of Samurai fighting skills. When it comes to how effective a technique is in Kata, the Bujinkan techniques are far more convincing than their almost identical techniques found in Aikido by the same name. The Ninja secret? The opponent's safety isn't a primary consideration... buy doing Aikido techniques wrong, the Ninja get the Aikido techniques right.

To see what Aikido IS rather than what we wish it was, we now have to go to the most common sparring form of the art. In Aikido, there is one major branch that embraces sparring, Tomiki Aikido (Shodokan):

But does that fulfill the expectations of 1-3 above? YES: if a BJJ purple belt or collegiate wrestler wanted to learn internal skill in order to pull off some Stephen Segal type of moves, studying Tomiki Aikido would probably do the trick. The study of Sumo-as-a-self-defense-system SHOULD be a big part of Aikido considering how much Sumo was involved in the development of Aikido:

Unlike other types of Aikido, a lot of that Sumo technique is alive and well in Shodokan "Tomiki" Aikido:

So considering that Aikido's specific call to consider the opponent's well being, Tomiki/Shodokan must be seen as the "Real Aikido."

But then where are actual Samurai martial arts to be found? Well, what do you call a Samurai that isn't wearing armor, is using all of the street fighting techniques of the Samurai, and isn't trying to advertise to the world who he is? That is a Ninja. There's this myth that the Ninja came from a secret mountain clan, but the truth is the Ninja were simply Samurai who specialized in stealth, often to carry messages, but sometimes to carry on espionage. In the most common form of Ninjitsu, Bujinkan, they openly recognize that their art comes from 9 different schools of traditional Budo.

And there it is... that continuous bokenjitsu sparring I have pleaded with Aikidoka to pursue... in 2008... fully two years before the founding of Tres Espadas! As with Aikido, the future of Ninjitsu will go to the practitioners who spar:

One other thing I would point out about Ninjitsu, is that situational awareness is built into the martial art, it is a core part of their training. This, strangely enough, was also a part of my Aikido training, but which I haven't heard any martial arts trainers in martial arts schools speak of since the 90's. So if in 2020 you want well rounded Budo, find a sparring intensive Bujinkan school. If you want real Aikido, find a Tomiki Aikido school.