Over at Kellene’s Women of Caliber blog, “Jim p” comments on Kellene’s opinion regarding the selecting of a handgun.

Earlier today, “Jim p” made similar comments on my blog regarding my preference for 9 mm.

I started to reply to “Jim p” on Kellene’s blog, but the reply was getting long enough that I thought it warranted a better venue for the reply. Jim wrote:

I saw in your blog something that did bother me about selection of a firearm for a woman,it listed everything other than caliber,then it went on to say it really dosent matter if its 9mm etc as long as your the last one standing,thats a nice thought,But in all reality very hopefull and foolish,Generaly if some drug crazed rapist is coming after you say in a parking garage,A 9mm will not do,thats why most police ,military use a 40 cal or more,Surviveing multiple 9mm gunshots is very common as long as a major organ is not destroyed,then it depends on the organ,Chances are unless you hit a critical area with a 9mm round as this drug crazed guy is running at you and your struggleing to arm yourself and shoot him is going to be very hard,so if you do get off one or two rounds that happen to strike this creep ,you want him to stop and drop,Not continue on,a 9mm may allow you to wound him and get enough time to get away ,but in many instances since the criminal is hyped up on a stimulant etc he will keep coming after you and over power you ,Id sugguest at least a 40 caliber if not a compact 45 caliber handgun and plenty of pratice useing it,get a heavy barrel model if you can like my S&W model 65,357 magnum has ,if you can find one as that will also help tame the recoil and muzzle jump so you can nail that SOB with one shot one kill.when your life depends on something dont go cheap,and get the best thing to do the job regaurdless of cost ,or you may not be around after the attack.

Jim, are you trying to say that shot placement matters with a 9 but not a .40 or a .45? So I could shoot a drug-crazed rapist in the foot with a .45 and he’ll stop? If that sounds asinine, it’s supposed to, but I’m just following the implications of what you wrote. Perhaps you need to clarify?

As I replied to you previously, all handgun calibers are weak and they all suck equally. Yes caliber matters somewhat, but ultimately it’s about shot placement. Take a look at this FBI report. NB: it contains autopsy photos and is graphic, may not be for the weak-of-stomach, but it’s a very important lesson. Some things to note:

• 107 rounds of .40 S&W and .223 TAP were fired
• the criminal was hit 17 times 
• incident lasted 3.5 minutes

While we might dream of one-shot-stops, it’s just that – a dream. Great if it comes true, but you shouldn’t bank on it. Your comments imply that you need at least a caliber that starts with a “4”, and as a result you’ll get the uber stopping power. Well, that police shootout seemed to fire a lot of .40 S&W and even after 17 hits the guy didn’t go down. Why? If you look at the X-rays and photos you’ll see there were no shots into vital areas. Shot placement is key.  Note as well that 107 rounds fired, 17 found their home: 16% hit ratio, from trained cops. Apparently this guy was hiding under a car, so I can expect misses, but even your LAPD with their high rate of training doesn’t hit 100%. Trying to bank on 1-shot-one-kill is a dream; a great mentality for training, yes, but reality doesn’t always lend to that. This is one reason I like capacity, and 9mm tends to give you more capacity. Then consider that bad guys rarely travel alone, and the math increases exponentially. Note, you can have low capacity with a 9 (e.g. a compact Kahr) and you can have good capacity with a .45 (e.g. XD-45 full-sized); but if all other things about the gun are equal, the simple fact that a 9 case is smaller than a .45 case means you’ll fit more 9’s into the same space than you would a .45.

You also must realize that Kellene’s blog is oriented towards women. Women can certainly shoot big calibers and hard kicking guns, but a lot of women prefer not to. Or we can just look at the biological, anatomical, and evolutionary differences that there tends to be between men and women and gosh but if women just aren’t generally as strong and sturdy as men are. I’ve been through enough classes introducing beginners — including women — to shooting, and not a one of them cares for the snappy kick of a .40 S&W. Most prefer 9mm and many do quite well with a good .45 (such as a full-sized 1911, which is great too because it can be customized to get exact gun fit for smaller hands). But the reality is if shot placement matters, if you’re going to have to shoot the attacker more than once, then recoil management matters and the faster you can get back on the sights and get another well-placed shot off the better. 

So as I said before, if you can handle .40 S&W the best, then go for it. If you can take an ultralight snubby and fire .357 magnum loads from it and dump all 5-6 rounds into a paper-plate-sized target at 10 yards in 2 seconds, great. There is no one recipe for all people and all situations. If there was, then we’d only have one gun and one caliber, but we don’t and there’s good reason for that. If you can carry and proficiently shoot a .45, great, do that. But not everyone can, wants to, or even some are willing to say that yes I can shoot that great, but I can shoot something else even better.

Of course, I bet if you can handle those calibers with more recoil, I’ll bet you could do better with a round with less recoil. Ah caliber wars…. the thing the Internet was made for. 🙂

In the end, I think we’re ultimately in agreement: don’t go cheap, get the best thing for the job. If the best you can shoot is a .22 LR, then get that (maybe you’re eldery, arthritic, weak, and damnit that .22 revolver is the best you can do). If the best you can shoot is a .50 AE, I guess go for it. But don’t stop at just the gun, make sure you get training on how to use it well and practice!

Updated: Because we all like numbers, here’s some performance data on 9mm Parabellum and .45 ACP. Just looking at the numbers, .45 ACP may have a tiny edge. But how does tiny edge on paper translate into real world performance? And I’m not talking about how the round performs in a bad guy vs. ballistics gel, I’m talking tactics. If you can get more and faster hits from a 9, that’s arguably better tactics than fewer slower hits.