Its all about San Kata (The moose out front should have told you)

  I try to look at the original intent of the movement.  I watch a lot of Tomiki, and Senta Yamada, and Ohba.  The movements seem to be related to moving to a safe, more favorable position, while maintaining a good posture while maintaining contact with the opponent. There seems to be a lot of hand change/sword cutting movements. 

I have found that the very act of doing all these things together seem to put the other guy in a weak spot to where the techniques seem to work.  We worry so damn much about not applying strength.  But really, aikido is about finding the best position to apply strength where you get the most yield. 

There are instances where we can do techniques to where strength isnt the what makes a technique work.  That's where the kito ryu/aiki stuff comes in.  Its great when it works, but to think that you are going to always going to find the "kito" spot in every transaction is just plain stupid.  And if you think a guy who wants to kick your ass is going to wisp around, while you patty cake his arm and do little Tim Conway steps, like an uke who drank the Kool Aid  then you deserve to get your ass kicked. 

A lot of folks have been looking at the kihon style of Aikido training where you do the 17 without a balance break.  You step off line, keep maai, and then manipulate a guys joints and posture into a technique.  I think their is merit in this kind of understanding, if you look at Tomiki in his films thats what he's doing.  I've heard it said that the sporting folks assume that a guys balance is never going to be broken or its going to be broken over his dead body.  So thats why they do it. 

Thats where the  tomiki stiff arm comes from.  Its just a posture that facilitates the practice of the kihon.  It's not an attack.  My feeling is that you attack first, or move offline and then let'er rip.  The foundation of aikido is disarming a weapon or keeping from being disarmed. that usually means jumping out of the damned way first.   The moose out in front of San Kata should have told you. 

The first three steps in the walking kata are the foundation for everything.  If you look at the Tomiki film with the harpsicord music.  You actually see him do the unsoku steps dodging a sword.  That's what they are period. You get offline, grab a guy by something, and then if you are lucky he'll kito his own ass into a sling. 

Here lately I have had a problem with the number three release.  Truthfully, I have never liked it. And i'm about to quit doing it the way "im supposed to" because after 500 hours of aikido it should work and life is too short for training dumb shit for 500 hours.  What I found is if you actually do a side step unsoku and do it like Tomiki in sotai dosa, (*thats opposite hand/foot) it actually works pretty good, and leads into a whole lot of other things. 

I have never liked the tomiki stiff arm offbalance we do.  It works like a charm against someone who doesnt really want to hurt you and they attack you like Frankenstein .  But it aint worth shit against any body who decides to actually hit you with his fist.  The stiff arm attack was just to facilitate the kihon.(you have position, and contact points so now what can you do?, what can you do if he decides he doesnt like what you want to do?)  Yet we added an offbalance to a very artificial attack.  It doesnt even rank up there with shomen uchi, yokomenuchi, and tsuki which are simulations of weapon attacks without the weapon.