Perhaps...

What we should stop doing in the wake of any attack from anyone is listening to the "talking" points of academics, politicians, or psychologists who have no real world experience in most anything let alone contending with dangerous armed men bent of committing evil. And instead listen to dangerous, armed men who are committed to preserving society.

Gear Review: CRKT Otanashi Noh Ken

Life often involves more adapting to it than getting what you want out of it. Travel the world in any small capacity and you learn this somewhat rather quickly. Back when the Afghanistan and Iraq military campaigns were going on strong and Blackwater held a very significant presence there was a common misconception that if you were in the private contractor trade and could pay enough graff that you could travel large portions of the world armed. In some cases it was and is true but by large margin it was not.

When I first started in the executive protection game two decades ago it was surprising how often that work would not involve carrying a gun of any kind. Back then (and still now) in many parts the globe and the U.S. as well conceal carry laws were fewer and reciprocity was essentially unheard of.

The common and predominate thought becomes "How do you bodyguard without a gun?". You just do, liking it has no part in the equation if you are going to go about it. Professionals do it all over the world everyday. For me in these days of late not all work travel is protection. There have been critical extractions, K&Rs negotiations, and intelligence gathering operations for any number of reasons and clients.

On a somewhat now infamous job Central America I had to surrender a Beretta Bobcat for various reasons and was left with being armed with a knife and a collapsible baton. In the ensuing days and nights having a gun of any caliber would have been nice but as the man once said, "wish in one hand...."

Sometime after that I was preparing to go overseas into Pakistan, then India carrying a gun was almost possible right up until it was not. CRKT had just come out with the Hissatsu, this being the original fixed blade model. For me and at that time, it was exactly the knife I needed and wanted. It was slim, trim and a straight up fighting knife and not am over sized wilderness survival knife. The only caveat I had with the knife is that I've never been crazy about the sheath for it. Someday someone will have to explain to me how knife makers can come up with brilliant knife designs, be willing to charge a premium, then do such an incredibly  bad job at sheath design when it comes to either practical carry or for that matter discreet carry.

Eventually I was able to work it out a couple of solid carry methods with for it. One being inverted under my shirt, carried under my arm pit via what essentially was a paracord shoulder cord rig. This worked well for riding in a vehicle for hours at a stretch. The other was an in-the-waistband cross draw, another hung inverted down the small of my back.

The knife did in fact prove invaluable on the job in thwarting an attack along a road side. A large bladed knife transcends any language barrier. But, on the thirty-five hour flight home after carrying the large fixed blade for a month I began working out what I liked and did not like about it.

What I did not like was the difficulty in concealing the knife on my person, and there is also the risk of it not being well received by customs or the local law enforcement should such a knife be discovered. You can expect much in the way of inquiry into your person. Having been there and done that with the questions from across the desk and not being in the land of the free and the home of the brave, I can assure you even when the conversation ends up "okay" you don't care to revisit it anywhere. The Buck Nighthawk that I carried into Central America was confiscated in England thanks to their draconian knife laws. In my experience most countries pay no attention to a fixed bladed knife in a checked bag but as the world gets smaller and tighter they will and knives weird the sheep out.

So upon return home the interest turned towards finding a tactical folder that followed the same lines at the Hissatsu fixed blade. I didn't have to look or wait long because about a month later the Hissatsu Folder came out. I ordered one immediately.

When I finally got it I actually hated it. Quite a bit.

This was partially due to the AUTOLAWKS system on the knife. It was counter-intuitive to anything I had been dealing with at that time of three decades of knife handling. To me it was half lawyer switch/ half boy scout safety knife system. I despised it. When I ordered it I thought it was an optional thing I could use, if desired. Instead it was the button safety on a lever gun. Ugly and I hated it.

Mind you, it had nothing to do with whether or not it worked. It wasn't optional and therefore hated.

Over the next few days the knife started to grow on me and I grew less interested in sending it back, but the AUTOLAWKS system had to go and it did. In somewhat of unglorious fashion with a hex headed driver of appropriate size I stood at the work bench and happily voided any warranty the knife had, but once back together and in fine working order I liked the knife far better.

It did not really see active duty in the everyday carry sense for any period of time. Instead it became relegated to what I referred to "gym" duty and wore it in my waist band as I worked out. Around that time I decided to begin hitting the lap pool at the gym again and two nights a week, there clipped to the waistband of my swim-trunks lap after lap was the Hissatsu folder.

I did have to be mindful about the edge getting rust on it but, not paranoid and it has continued to thrive in water environments onward.

I also liked that the knife also has this element of classic switchblade to it, while not being as delicate, and after a rocky start it found it's way into my everyday carry rotation.

But much like the first season of a television show, sometimes it takes a while to work out the kinks. The overall idea being sound but, the details could use improvement.Eventually James Williams and CRKT found their shui in my opinion with the Otanashi Noh Ken.Whatever first impressions the Hissatsu Folder gave me, the Noh Ken was a complete 180. I liked it from the start and have been carrying it everywhere ever since.

The short description I would give you is, through all of my years running a protection detail or working in unfriendly realms this was the knife I was waiting for. I promise you that is not solicited bullshit.

Mind you there are a lot of wonderful tactical folders out there. I've owned many of them, and I will own more. That's just knife life and there is no sense in apologizing for it.

So why the the Otanashi Nok Ken?

As much as I hate working, consulting, problem solving or however you title the work I do; some of the cities, regions and environs that I traverse to are not gun friendly. Some you who read this corner of the web on occasion work in far far less friendly areas and do so in true black. Many of you also work everyday in gun unfriendly office spaces. But most of us can either carry or smuggle a knife in one way or another if need be. In this vein we are talking about it in a personal defensive role. When folded into it's handle it is both flat and thin. It's very rectangular shape allows for a certain level of camouflaging when placed in a gear bag, shaving kit, or IT equipment pack, if you are of that ilk.

One of the problems in carrying the larger tactical folders is that they are not just big, but they can also be obnoxiously big, rough handled, thick handled and thick bladed. From a durability standpoint these things all sound good because they tend to be tough as hell. But much like the .22 in the hand is better than the .45 at home mantra the same can be true of the behemoth folders. If you don't have it with you it's not going to do you any good.

They also tend to be hard on the liners of pockets and aren't necessarily good at doing sometimes simple tasks. Like slicing something other than an attacker.

If you ever have picked up a filet knife and thought "this would make a good defensive knife if it was sturdier and had a thicker blade" that is kind of what you are getting with the Otanashi Noh Ken.

The blade comes in at 4 and a half inches which can be an issue for carrying some places. That said...the blade is four and a half inches which translates to being very effective against an attacker.

When we talk about knife defense work we have to be very honest about it, because a knife does up close what the bullet does from distance. And sometimes it does more so.

With it's longish blade the capability to deflate a lung, cause rapid blood loss from strikes to the the right and left carotid arteries the trachea, or getting very successful deep wound penetration on areas of the shoulder and biceps is most certainly there.

While that may make you cringe, or read it with some offense it's worth noting that, if you found yourself being shoved into a van, or on your back onto the pavement of some dark parking lot and are armed only with a knife....

This is what you want to be doing, And you want to be doing it with a strong insistence towards repetition.

Regarding the LAWKs system on the knife, either mine is broke or they finally got smart and made it optional where you can engage it or disengage it at will.  While the knife experts like to drone on and on about steel, whether or not is AT593f'd or something. Here is my thought process towards it. It maintains an edge very well, along with a fierce point and is readily touched up or resharped as needed. Knives lose their edges and you have to re-sharpen them. That's life. Much like that green light you see tomorrow will eventually turn red. Deal with both and move on along.

Opening is easy enough via the thumbstud mounted onto the blade. It's also very easy to open via good old fashion inertia. Something that should be encouraged in it's practice.

Large bladed aside, it's size and length are also advantageous as to it's grip length, not only because it will fit a wide array of hands but in colder climates and months the knife is easy to manipulate with gloves, in all fashions.

Lastly, upon the knife itself. They got the clip right on the Noh Ken where they got it wrong on the Hissatsu folder. While I get that the clip is part and parcel to the modern knife industry here is why I am pointing this out specifically.

In cold weather I commonly wear a button up coat or a wool vest. In between buttons, riding vertically, I like to clip a folder to the inside of the garment. While fundamentally functional it is more often than not, not well concealed in this position. Largely this is based upon the fact that of the knives I carry the clip is mounted lower on the knife, which in turn means the knife rides higher....or in this case juts outward.

This is a very accessible angle and position when riding in a vehicle and on the street it allows for primary access to a secondary weapon when my pistol is concealed. The Otanashi Noh Ken's clip is so well placed on the knife that it rides very very deep and is ideal for this type of vertical chest carry. Something not often easily obtained in cold weather defensive carry for any weapon.

Which brings me to my last criticism towards the knife. While the clip on the knife is dark and blends well against all but the lightest backgrounds and it has an Achilles heel with the lettering CRKT running down it. This and the silly Japanese writing and English translation "Otanashi Noh Ken" on one side of the blade and CRKT on the other rob the knife of the sterility that is envisioned behind it's purpose. It also reminds me of the cheap military inspired knives I use to buy on vacation when I was a twelve year old boy. So there maybe some paint remover in the knife's future, just to give it the nod of quiet it is supposed to represent.

Those very minor criticisms aside...

If I were sending a daughter off to college or into her young years of adult life and she was weapon friendly while her locales were not so much but a knife was doable, the Otanashi Noh Ken would be a very good choice as a companion for the subway station or the walks across a dark campus.

Here on the internet everyone is a Tier 1 Delta SEAL Recon sniper agent. I get that. But there is also the reality of the world where there are in fact any number of men and women who work in the intelligence game around the world, with and without the benefit of the diplomatic passport. Some of them come off "the farm" some of them don't and while every regular joe thinks these folks are well trained and well equipped you'd be surprised by how little they operate with. In my experience, they tend not to think about anything that wasn't provided to them by the government (you think I am joking). If they are fortunate enough to carry a gun, it's because they checked it out from someone's armory however, most of them work their careers unarmed. That does not however mean that they don't put their lives on the line in the process.

Faced with the prospect of not having any type of significant weapon at my disposal while working anywhere overseas for a couple of years or longer before coming home and wanted an edged insurance policy that was both readily capable of handling one of more attackers in a close up fight but required it to be discreetly carried, I would be hard pressed to not choose it.

Flight Risk

Prior to 9/11 a person could fly with a pocket knife. In most airport arenas this constituted a blade of 4 inches or less, and it was generally recognized that airport security went with their respective State's blade length law.

At that time I, like hundreds of thousands, if not millions of travelers carried a knife when they flew. In the early to mid 90s I carried a then standard Spyderco Endura as an everyday carry. That is until the day I went to depart from Atlanta airport. A private uniformed security guard informed me that I would not be able to fly with the knife and that he would have to confiscate it. When I inquired as to why, as the blade length was not prohibited he stated that it was deemed to have an "aggressive edge" (read: it was serrated). A knife is a knife there is no such thing as an "aggressive edge" no matter what century you live in but, the confiscation was going to happen regardless. He apologized for the rules but suddenly seemed irritated when I opened the blade, stuck it under the heel of my boot and snapped the blade off.

Upon returning home I decided to circumnavigate the "rules and regulations" of flying with a knife and purchased a Spyderco Native with a plain edge (along with another Endura). From 1996 to 2001 the Native became my "flying" knife. 

Then of course we all know what happened in September of 2001 and the course of domestic airline security made sweeping changes, but only in the bureaucratic sense.

Going on fourteen years later and countless number of flights we are not safer. Our pre-flight security is not handled by professional armed counter-terrorist profilers greeting you on the walk through to your plane. Instead we have gross inefficiency that rivals what we had before 9/11 only under the federal banner.

To be frank. I should be allowed to fly with my knife. So should my 60-something Vietnam veteran Father-in-law who recently had his dull as butter, tip broken, small Trapper taken from him because he left it in his pants pocket. And so should anyone else.

But if we wanted to have a set of rules for flying with a knife then we would have to look no farther than the wallet. Because if a person can produce a conceal carry permit or a Federal Firearms License then why shouldn't they be allowed to carry a knife. Because gun owners, unlike every other American, has been routinely subjected to background checks and fingerprinting that goes through state and federal records that deem them "okay."

I shouldn't need to go through a TSA background check so I can get permission to keep my boots and belt on. I've already done my background work. As a matter of fact I've done it several times in a couple of states. In essence my ccw says "trustworthy".

Instead we are regulated to being continually treated like cattle, children, and criminal suspects all lumped into one line for the stupidity of political correctness. Instead of well paid, and well healed effectiveness.

Because while you can not, under any circumstance, legally fly with a pocket knife you can however hand them your credit card and proceed to get drunk, potentially belligerent, or mood alternated to the point you go for the emergency exit door handle at thirty-five thousand feet.

But granddad's Case trapper knife is a problem.

I want my knife back, my pants belted, my boots on and everyone's dignity in place when they travel. Why we have allowed ourselves to be victimized by this idiocracy continues to astound me.

The Scout Rifle Study

I like practical rifles and for years the scout concept has appealed to me. A decade or more ago I toyed with the idea of a custom build (those old Brockman sights just looked great for starters), and honestly that was really the way you obtained one if you didn't pony up for the Steyr Scout. Eventually the idea just lost traction for a number of reasons, cost being one, the other being that I owned two .30-06s what did I need with a .308 (talk about dumb reasons to not buy a new rifle).

Yet in the last few years since Savage started running a line on Scouts then Ruger picked up the ball, maybe especially since Ruger, I've yearned to fulfill the void.

The Scout Rifle, the Patrol Rifle and all of their kin in between as been a sound concept in my opinion, because despite the AR's popularity and overall general usability, the Scout rifle can travel anywhere you can take a rifle be it into the less free states here in the U.S. or hunting abroad. In my line of work, where I do travel with a work rifle on a semi-regular basis being able to stay within the legal parameters is paramount. And in the possible scenario of having to deploy a rifle for defensive work I'd be massively surprised if a complete reload would be required of any repeating rifle. Note I didn't say not to have reloads readily available, I said required.

I see you apocalypse-man with your finger in the air and your mouth opened.

All things aside noted gun-writer Richard Mann is conducting what is probably the first in depth investigation and study into the Scout Rifle concept over at his blog  empty-cases, since Jeff Cooper went on to Valhalla and preach the gospel of the modern technique. You know, the one all of these neat kids on the internets keep re-inventing all the time.

What has always intrigued me about the Scout-general-purpose-utility-rifle concept is the idea of if you were limited to one rifle, whether for a limited period of time until you expanded your personal collection, or were somewhat bound by finacial constraints to own only one, why this concept works not only as a hunting arm, but a defensive and recreational one as well. Because proficiency comes from owning a gun you enjoy shooting and want others to shoot as well.

If I may offer some advice....

I get inundated with "security advice" questions all the time in life. Riot breaks out somewhere, the emails and phone calls come in. Spree shooter sets about murdering as many people as he possibly can, the emails and phone calls come in. A bad guy goes an...well you get the picture.

There's always this string of questions. What caliber? What plan? What tactic? What bag should I EDC (every day carry) and what gear should I EDC in my EDC bag?

Questions, questions, questions.

Allow me to answer in brevity that is devoid of any sarcasm and is the most sincerest answer I know to give.

When the wolf comes to kill don't worry about the sheep, don't worry what kind of dog you may be or may not be. Don't worry about getting killed, don't worry about the aftermath, don't worry...about anything.

DO.

Make a decision to stop the wolf and then go stop him.

Stop him where he stands by whatever means necessary and don't do it with kindness, don't do it with anger, do it with sincere an solid intent that he will never stand again.

We live in a very modern age but the bad men of the world are very old in their ways and desire. And for old problems new answers are rarely the solution.

You stop a bad man by making a decision. That decision is all that will matter until the future of everything being over arrives. Give no yield, no quarter, no pause. Do nothing less than be victorious. There is no shortage of bad men in the world and there will never be a shortage of such men. But they, the creatures that go bump in the night, the wolves at the door, are thwarted by decision and decisive action.

It's not caliber, capacity, polymer nor steel that overcomes the evil of this world but rather bravery.

Be brave. Be Brave. Be Brave.



Oregon school shooting stopped by teacher Todd Rispler

Taking Stock

As part of the general M.O. here I generally don't do the hyper-link-go-see-this-website but, I thought this was actually worth it. Your mileage may vary of course depending on your nutritional needs....needs...not wants.

Remember something like this can work for the SHTF as much as it can being without work for a long time and needing to feed your family, or even yourself. I say that because my first year of self-employment (back in 2002), this would have been worth doing.

How to create a food storage supply for five dollars a week

Everything you need...

 

I've loved a lot of guns over the years. More than I've owned. And there have been some regrets of guns not bought. A rack full of pre-64 Winchester Model 94s for $250 back at the start of the century (I was flat broke at the time), an UZI Carbine that came in a suitcase with a .45 ACP conversion, three 9mm mags and three .45 ACP mags.....for $550.00 about year before the '94 Assault Weapons Ban that was going to solve that pesky crime problem.

I passed on a Ruger No. 1 Tropical in .375 H&H. I don't remember the price but, I remember having enough cash in my pocket to buy it. The problem was, that despite my lust and desire it never met my litmus test for a gun. What was I going to do with a .375 H&H at twenty-five years old in the mid-west.

The Gun, atleast for me, have always had to fall within a certain level of working class, so to speak, to me. They have to be able to serve me or atleast be reasonable pressed into service.

Yet despite this, my small collection of firearms is surprisingly not very "tactical", especially given my line of work one could surmise.

For a while my work rifle was a Ruger Mini 14. I liked it. I didn't love it. My plan was always to ship it down to Clark's Custom guns and get a new barrel on it and do a scout mount. It never happened and I eventually sold it (and it's four 30 round steel mags). There is something of a juxtaposition about that rifle. I don't regret selling it. I regret never paying for the custom work I wanted done to it which would have ended up with me keeping the gun I don't regret selling.

Yet the .223 and, the 5.56 have, much like the 9mm, left me very indifferent towards them. I've owned them. Liked them alright but none of them didn't do anything I essentially didn't have another gun capable or more capable of doing just fine. Mind you, I'm not talking about what does or doesn't work for anyone else but me so don't go getting the vapors.

Interestingly enough, when you live and work with your guns on a daily basis you don't put too much thought into them NOT being effective.

After coming off the rifle range last weekend and forced to contend with boxes of spent brass it was time to get back on the loading bench. After a pot of coffee, and a few hours of silent pondering while de-capping round after round (I run a single stage press) I looked at the green and grey RCBS boxes and the gumball red Lee cylinders and realized that the most "modern" cartridge I load for, the .243 Winchester, was invented in 1955, the next most modern, the .357 coming about in the 1930s. Beyond that everything else is over a hundred years old. From the turn of the last century with the .38 Special and .45 ACP to the Indian wars with the .44 WCF, the .45 Colt and the .45-70.

Yet if you read it in that context one would think that they are simply nostalgic "fun" cartridges that do not serve purpose.

I would concede that the .44-40 is most likely the only round that would readily fall into the ranks of entertainment only if it weren't for the fact that I have in fact pressed both the revolver and rifle chambered for this round into service at different times.

When the Ferguson riots broke out in St. Louis over the summer the self-loading rifle I keep lay in pieces on my bench. There were no qualms here keeping a lever gun in the truck and in the house, along with a Remington 870. Dismiss the round that started it all if you want but, but I keep a couple of boxes of factory jacketed soft points solely for defense work.

Light cowboy loads they are not. Out of the rifle they run over 1200 fps with a 200 grain bullet and there are fifteen of them in the magazine tube.

The revolver chambered for the old .44 cartridge, itself was carried more than a few times during my corporate bodyguard career, albeit at Client barbeques and more "relaxed" scenarios but, to claim I was "unarmed" with six 200 grain .44 caliber bullets in a wheel gun at the ready is stupid. I know because a gentleman in similar employ at the time and also in attendance at one of these casual soirees openly mocked me about it.

He himself was carrying a .32 Seacamp.

Atleast one of us was well armed at the party.

My rifle of rifles remains the .30-06.

I've spent too much time on the range and the field in the almost two decades we've been together and have shot my plentiful share of Missouri Whitetails with it.

Since 1906 there have been a mind numbing number of .thirty caliber rifles to come along. Some of them long forgotten, others having marked their place in the queen of weapons ranks. If I were starting out today looking for a bolt gun to do a lot of work from defense to hunting the .308 could quite easily get the nod. I certainly have a liking for the Ruger Scout Rifle and there have been a couple of long barreled sniper rifles that have sung their sirens song to me. But when shove comes to push what does it do that I can't do already and frankly it does it very well.

When the rifle range beckons, or my head gets too fogged up with the world and I need to make calm it's not the lever gun, nor the pistol that I reach for in my quest for zen. It's the 30-06 in a bolt action.

A few, well several years back after being involved in some social situations where more than feelings got hurt I pondered for a few days that maybe I needed to go "talk to someone". Instead I spent fours hours on a rifle range gingerly working my way through a box of hand-loaded 180 grain Matchkings. There was no talking, no dialogue, no "how does that make you feel". My co-pay was primers, powder and thirty caliber copper. And they solved my issued more than a PhD ever could.

Of all center-fire cartridges I run the .243 Winchester holds more merit than I would have really ever thought. It was the rifle I cut my teeth on and in many ways encouraged me to dig into the world of the rifle and find out what makes a rifle tick and what makes it accurate and inaccurate. After a few years of pie plate patterns I still recall the sweet joy of seeing my first MOA group after I sanded the stock down on the Remington 788 so that it's barrel was free floated. A whole new world emerged.

With it's mild recoil and solid velocities it can do everything a .223 or .5.56 can do only better. Yet in the tactical/war fighter community it is laughable to even think of such a notion. After one of my best friend's son received a .243 single shot a few years ago the rifle round came back on my radar (and from it's tucked away corner in the gun safe).

Clearly it's never going to have place of significance in the tactical community, but if you are of the belief that it can not work because it's not on the list of "approved" tactical calibers then you are naive at best and a fool at worst. People with such notions, in my experience, lack any.

Interestingly enough, during the First and Second Ammo droughts of the twenty-first century when the shelves were bare I could always find .243 Winchester. I have no idea why but during those times I was in several states and there it was on the shelves.

If I lived in a gun restrictive area, or was wanting to put together a budget friendly political correct looking bolt action patrol rifle (or both), I'd give it a hard close look.The unforeseen advantage in the .243 is that you get a little thicker barrel because there is less of a hole in what would otherwise be a standard .308 barrel.

Something to think about.

Only a fool would dismiss the .45-70 as not having a solid purpose in this day and age. It has literally become a phoenix rising from the ashes. If you read gun and shooting articles from the 1960s and 70s it was all but written off as dead with some folks with Springfield Trapdoors and Marlin keeping it alive, eeking out sales for the purest of hearts.

That is until someone whacked the barrel off and called it a guide gun and Jeff Cooper declared it holy to the faithful. It's sales have been strong for the last two decades. If you were to have only a few rifles to your name the .45-70 lever gun would not be a mistake. It's a fight stopper against man or beast. On any continent.

And while most "tactically proficient" men of the twenty-first century fall into fits of rage when someone mentions a gun fight from two centuries earlier, a gun fight, dear reader is still a fight and unless I missed something the human has not changed much in any anatomical sense in the last millennium. In 1887 Commodore Perry Owens, the Sheriff of the 21,000 square mile Apache County, Arizona got crossways (literally) while serving a warrant. Perry, on his own with no backup, killed four armed attackers in short order with a .45-70 from what we call "pistol" distance. Perry had not so much as a scratch.

Unlike a vast majority of American shooters who grew up with guns I did not grow up with the .30-30 Winchester. At that time my dad kept a couple of shotguns, a Sears & Roebuck .22 lever action (hammerless....yep), a .22 High Standard revolver and a Smith Model 19 .357. The only two centerfire rifles were a Parker Hale .30-06 and the aforementioned .243.

But I yearned for a "thirty-thirty" for years. When I finally picked up a model 94 for a whopping $275 I didn't regret it. If you've read me very long here on this blog, you'll know that this is the rifle I rely on for work most often or a Marlin in .three fifty seven magnum.

The old .30 WCF (Winchester Center Fire) maybe one of the finest medium powered cartridges we have, especially in this day and age. For the reloader the potential is there to handle everything from squirrels and rabbits to deer more the efficiently and in some of the heavy factory loads, such as from Buffalo Bore, you can hunt North America.

It's not a wonder kid nor a "tactically" fancy round. And door kickers, both real and wannabe, won't be clinging hard to the rifle nor the round ever but, it was in the man stopping business long before anyone ever heard of the .223 or the 7.62x39. I won't keep house without one and it's almost always the most recommended first rifle for anyone who wants an uncomplicated long gun to serve a variety of roles from game getter to home defender, when I am asked.

There has been so much historical content written on the .45 ACP and the 1911 that I refuse to address it. If you don't know and you can't figure out how to find out, you're SOL as the old Man use to say.

No other cartridge has been so near and dear to me in my life nor seen me safely home. It's been in my hand under the gravest of circumstances, been on most every trip where a gun was permissible, or doable. It has ridden in a shoulder rig in the Atlantic, on my hip on the Continental Divide, and delivered the coup de grace on the side of the highway to a back broken doe, when a stranger in a $40,000 truck with thousands of dollars worth of hunting gear wouldn't "waist" the dollar on a bullet and decided to cut her throat until she nailed him with her hooves and he got fish belly white.

Reloading the old war horse, I don't do fancy. I like standard pressures for the rounds in question. I get better accuracy and less wear and tear on my firearms in the process. You can have the hot rodding and the +P. I like one thing and one thing only in the .45 ACP. 230 grains.

Save the preaching. It works just fine for me.

The .45 Colt, came to me late, as in this year. A dual celebration of seeing my first paid article published (it was nice to get a check from the NRA instead of sending one) and my fortieth year on God's favorite blue marble; I purchased a used Ruger flattop in Uncle Sam's old Indian fighter round.

Again, I don't chase the magic bullet. The old timers who came before worked out much of it and there are plenty of others who can push the limits for me to learn on. I'm always amazed at alarmist and neo-shots who have come to the conclusion that six rounds in a single action leave a man essentially unarmed because of the dreaded reload.

Lots of bullets in bad circumstances are a handy thing to have, no doubt, and the citizenry should have all the access desired to thirty round magazines and self-loading whisper quiet rifles. I firmly believe that. But I also believe in a gun fight, regardless of the century, solid center mass hits from a big bore revolver, stop fights. Your junk science and your worst case scenarios be damned. Hits matter.

Yes I know, I know. The caliber debate is over thanks to new and modern ammunition. Except there is one not-so-slight issue with the "Caliber debate". It's not. It is a cartridge debate. It's always the 9mm vs the .45ACP, or the .40 S&W, or any other auto pistol round. It's never the 9mm vs the .45 Colt, or the .44 Magnum. You know why? Because those are two big sons of bitches and the 9mm is not. And a hit from either is far FAR more significant in stopping a fight, not to mention two or three.

If I can not put a B-i-Q (badguy-in-question) down with three .45 Colt rounds to the chest, I'll be shooting him in the hip thank you very much, because he can rage all over the damn ground.

Broke bone don't work.

I know. You're irate. I've angered the 9mm cult with my brazen big bore speech, damn me.

I'm not anti-9mm. Never have been, never will be. I think it's a fine self-defense round and have carried it and depended on it enough to have some semblance of opinion on it. So don't lose your head.

The problem of late is that the emerging shooters (not necessarily fighters) are ageists toward not only men who came before them but cartridges and guns as well. If a rifle doesn't self load or hold more than thirty rounds at the push of a release mag, it is outdated and it's owner a mentally distant.

Part of the reason I have had an on again off again relationship with the 9mm Luger is owed in large part to the .38 Special and .357 Magnums I own. Make no mistake, my favorite platforms for launching the old European bean are the SiG P226 and the Browning Hi-Power. I've routinely told folks who are looking for their first pistol or who are going to be one gun households to look no further than the Glock 19 or the 9mm in general. It's widely available, and easy to shoot.

If you are looking to buy your first gun, or perhaps your only handgun and deeply desire an auto-pistol so the entire family can learn on it and shoot it confidently. The 9mm would be wise and well received.

Yet, here in lies the rub, most post-9/11 shooters, who came to the gun world around the time the Assault Weapons Ban finally died in it's 2004 sunset on a national level fail to realize that the AWB brought a critical eye to the 9mm, which had thrived through the 80s and early 90s in the wondernine era. Suddenly there was this sincere question put forth of bore diameter and that bigger has it's place for reasons. If you were left with ten .35 caliber bullets or eight .45 caliber ones which would you really rather have?

Again that is not to inflame the cartridge debate, that is simply pointing out what happened.

Which bring us to the last of it.

If you were to count the spent brass in boxes on my bench you would see that the lead goes to the .38 Special, followed by the .357 Magnum in close second. There are reasons for this. They are solid and backed up by decades of man fighting, game getting and trophy winning history, for the both of them.

In my small opinion, there is no gun as versatile as one chambered for the .357 Magnum. A bold statement to be sure, and certainly it has a 1960s gun rag ring to it. The moment the chamber is reamed to accept the old 1/10 of an inch longer, 1935 creation the shooter is in possession of a dual caliber gun, if that shooter happens to be a re-loader, then multiplicity occurs. This is because a lightly handloaded .38 Special will do anything a .22 LR or .22 Magnum can do, only better, and since it can do this the shooter/reloader gets, for his trouble, a superior ".22", a .38 Special and a .357 Magnum.

No handgun cartridge has been more reloaded than the .38 Special and the .357 Magnum remains the king of fight stoppers. I understand. For you the modern shooter I sound as if I am lecturing from a rocking chair. Grandad muttering in the corner to himself. Yet this is large part because of an obsession with guns that weigh ounces and not pounds. I've run the cylinders of .357 Magnums in 12 ounce guns and narrow sights. I'll keep my all stainless steel 2 1/2 inch, Smith model 66, weighing in at a couple of pounds and it's big glorious adjustable sights. The ones that the neo-shot will assure you, rips the clothes from your body as you draw only to snag, getting you killed.

The 158 grain bullet in both rounds works tremendously well for most things from targets, to men, to attacking four legged mammalia. Ah yes. The Grizzly Bear dilemma. You see I don't live in Grizzly country. I won't encounter one this deer season nor while taking out the trash this week.

Being in possession of both revolvers and rifle that will shoot these cartridges covers anything I might need to resolve. Want to teach a new shooter how to hit? How to focus on a front sight? How to have a remarkably easy day on the range. Try the lever action rifle in .357 Magnum loaded with .38s or .357s.

If the politics of this country ever went south to the point we were forced to live with a limited number of guns for me the .357 chambered gun would be at the #1 must have spot.

Don't fall trap to this all being a bit of nostalgia or that these are "the only" cartridges I own. They are not. They simply are the ones that I reload for, but and this is the important part that I want to express.

If.....they were the only ones I had. If circumstances changed tomorrow and I had to dwindle the room in the safe down for one reason or another these eight cartridges and the guns chambered for them would remain above all others.

They will do anything that needs done in a shooting environment from self-defense, to hunting game of all sizes, to target and even competitive shooting, or defending a home and family in a city that has suddenly appeared on the international scene for it's rioting as of late.

Our culture, the gun culture, here in the century, has become somewhat obsessed with fashion that is passed off as must-have-tactical-needs. So much so that it has driven an entire market to panic buy and horde more than a couple of times. I can only wonder how many ARs were bought in November of 2008 and never fired.

So in our quest to survive the apocalypse with "the right gun" I pass along a piece of advice the late Bill Jordan (and not the damn camo maker) gave and Jim Wilson graciously passed on to us.

Mr. Jordan, upon being asked what kind of rifle he would "stash" away in case of the feces-hitting-the-empeller replied that he would keep a Model 19 Smith & Wesson in .357 Magnum and a box of ammunition. The man who asked him became a bit perplexed, since he asked specifically "what rifle". To which Jordan expounded further:

"If serious trouble starts and you can shoot at all, you can get whatever kind of little machine gun you’d want to carry. You could even get a little Jeep to drive and maybe even a nice looking uniform to wear… if you can shoot!” (go read the whole thing here).

As for me. One look at my reloading bench tells me I have everything I need and nothing I don't.