a good choice?

[Riposte1]

Far be it from me to tell folks what to carry. It is an intensely personal decision and, needless to say, a matter of life and death...yours!

But I do suggest folks give it more than a passing thought. Recently, on a public forum, a gentleman owned up to the fact that he was robbed at gunpoint and decided, "litterally under the gun" that his Kel Tec .380, located in his pocket was certainly not adequate to get him out of this situation. Long story short, the robber got not only his money but his gun and was quite aggitated. Though the man lived through this, it was none of his own doing - one thing I know from 30 years of L.E. work...you cannot predict what a criminal will do...most especially in these days!

It took my wife, of all people, to distill this down to its basic point when she said the man was "unarmed". I asked her to explain. She said "Having a gun does not make you armed. Having a gun and the will to use it makes you armed"...truer words were never spoken.

I hasten to point out that this is not a criticism. It took a lot of guts to publish that on the public forum and I think it was done in the interest of educating.

I might also point out that I have had 4 acquaintences who were on one end or another of a .380 during a fight (actually 5 since I interviewed both participants of one shoot out - who had become the best of friends, weird story). In no case did the .380 get the job done, and in two cases it probably would have been better had the party not had it at all.

By no means do I think it will fail every time, it is probably just coincidence that it has failed in 100% of the cases I have some connection with. But I do know that, if that was all I had, there would be very few cases in which I would be tempted to use it...based on those experiences.

Carry on!
Riposte