The idea behind the 1908 pattern British sword and the 1913 pattern US sword was overwhelmingly to make a weapon for thrusting. The official specification called for a "cut and thrust" blade, but in the event, the sword was purely optimized for thrusting. This isn't to say that you couldn't cut with it. You could. But it really didn't cut well, and wasn't meant to. Cutting ability was purely secondary, and a great deal of utility in cutting was sacrificed to make a blade dedicated to the thrust. Really, this is the way it always works. Swords that cut best have broad, curved blades which are relatively thin in cross section, which allows then to flex a good deal to withstand the shock of cutting. The British 1796 pattern light cavalry sword is almost the perfect example. The best thrusting swords are less broad, but thicker in cross section, making them much stiffer and more rigid so as to resist buckling in the thrust, and straight, with very acute, stabbing points. The British 1908 pattern cavalry sword is, again, almost the perfect example. In the space of a century, the British cavalry went from one extreme to the other. They had a stop in the middle with a compromise design, in the 1821 pattern sword that didn't cut nearly as well as the 1796 sword, or thrust as well as the 1908 sword, but was more versatile than either.
With the 1908 sword, they abandoned the compromise design and made a purpose-built thrusting sword. The blade was very narrow, but had a thick "T" cross-section, to give it more stiffness for the thrust. The large, sheet metal bowl guard gave considerable protection to the hand, but combined with the slenderness and lightness of the blade, and the weight of the pommel, shifted the balance back well toward the hilt, which is undesirable for a cutting sword, where you want to retain some mass over the center of impact. The semi-pistol grip configuration, was angled so as to cause the blade to naturally align with the arm when the arm was extended, in position for a charge using the point. A checkered thumb rest was indented on top of the grip, just behind the guard, and with the thumb placed upon it, and the arm extended at full length, the sword will make a continuous line with the straight arm. This was a weapon meant to be extended forward almost like a lance during the charge.
The configuration and balance of the sword actually mitigate against effective cutting. The light, narrow, stiff, straight blade lacks either the slicing action of a curved saber, or the concussive mass of a hacking broadsword. The concussive force would be still further compromised by the hilt-biased balance. And finally, the pistol grip with specialized thumb placement, while perfectly ideal for thrusting, was awkward for the cut.
One could still cut with the sword. Regulations called for it to be sharpened along its entire length for that purpose. Nevertheless, cutting ability was very much a secondary consideration in the design of this sword, and the sword didn't do it even remotely well compared to most other swords. Really this generation of cavalry swords are perfect demonstrations of what happens with specialization, and why there never will be a perfect sword in general. The more you optimize a sword for one purpose, the more you take away from its overall versatility. The more you optimize a blade for the thrust, the more you detract from its ability to cut, and vice versa. Or you can build a sword that will be pretty good at both jobs, but not as good at either as specialized swords optimized for either purpose. Every design is a compromise, and what you get depends on what trade offs you want to make.
However, I had a number of swords before picking up my first M1907, and right from the beginning I realized these were something very different. I don't have a "Patton" or a Brit 1908, but I did get a chance to handle both recently and found them to be in the same class as the M1907. I like them.
