Short version at the bottom. :lol:
... it sucks balls when you are point blank to an alien with no ammo left or you have heavy weapons that will kill you if you do use them at point blank...
We got some simple, relatively effective training in using our rifles as less-lethal close-quarters battle weapons in basic training. Butt-stroke (upward), barrel-thrust (that barrel isn't going to bend, folks), downward strike, and a quarterstaff-like hold on the weapon that lets you whap the foe with the butt or the barrel end while still guarding your body. And we're not Marines, either.
So what am I saying? All-out melee combat might not be necessary, but the ability for any weapon to be used in close combat for an amount of stun damage (like the stun rod, perhaps a bit less damage than a knife, but stun damage category?) would cover all the bases: It gives a last-ditch attack, is accurate to military training, requires less animation than all-out kung-fu stuff (just a simple thrusting the weapon out in front of the character would work), and a weapon is a hard metal/blunt instrument instead of a "mere" human body. (After all, one of the big memes of this game is technological artifacts wielded by people, not technological techniques wielded by people.)
The only reason I want hand to hand is because knives are kinda stupid, who the **** uses a six inch blade rather than a Katana or Longsword in a fight?
Um, just about everyone. You're not going to find very many soldiers trained militarily in the employment of those kind of weapons. Those who
are trained in them, you will not find carrying those weapons on the battlefield (with extremely rare exceptions, the only one I can think of immediately are IJA/IJN officers and pilots in WWII). And again, melee combat is not a core meme to this game. It just doesn't really fit; the melee weapons included seem to be obligatory--you would have knives, and aliens need something scary and nasty to do those cow autopsies with.
Short Version: Melee combat isn't really an important meme to this game, but a melee strike with ranged weapons in close combat for minimal (combat-knife level or so) stun damage would appear, at first SWAG, to be a relatively reasonable compromise.