It is not attack speed , that is a function of minimum delay {the stat just before Skeleton compensation factor in melee} which is how many 1/10s of a second pass between each attack animation cycle {as I understand it} .
When playing around with it in RTW {a lot} , I never saw it {Skeleton compensation factor in melee , the last number in the stat_pri line} alter the speed of actual attacks . What it did do however was effect how likely a successful attack was to kill . Lowering it to 0.1 {lowest viable setting I believe} resulted in the same rate of attacks as 1 {highest valid value in RTW , but not in MTWII apparantly , Peasants have 1.8 !} and most soldiers being able to get up after a successful hit .

The Skeleton compensation factor in melee seems rather to effect how likely a successful hit is to actuall kill , rather than knock down {RTW , don't see it happen in MTWII yet} or simply rock the target {whom then shakes it off and keeps fighting} .