Part 2
J-Frame, thanks for the support. I had a few fiasco s to handle at work last night, so the kind words are much appreciated. On the plus side, I think I found someone who can cover one of my shifts, so I can attend the knife training in January. I'll let y'all know how that goes. (Its the InSights Folding Knife course, hopefully I'll see some of you there. And hopefully I'll stop hijacking this thread......)
Anyways.....
Once again, if this sounds condescending, or you feel like I'm talking to you like you're a little kid, I'm not, its just the lack of tone, and the lack of sleep (hurray for a 50+ hour work week!)
I've been thinking about the NAA Mini-Revolver vs Knife again...
I have a hard time imagining a scenario where carry of an NAA would be feasible when carry of at least a reasonably-small and serviceable handgun wouldn't.
I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, but by "reasonably small and serviceable," I'm assuming you're referring to something along the lines of an LCP, TCP, P238 or similar .380 pistol. The last time I had to wear a suit, I carried my LCP in a pocket holster, front pants pocket. Worked really well as I was walking, but it left me with one question: How do you draw from a pocket holster while your sitting in your car?
I tried putting it in my inside jacket pocket, because at that time, I usually carried a J-Frame in my inside jacket pocket.... for the jacket that I normally wear. The sport-coat pockets where considerably shallower, and the gun didn't really fit very well, which I'm using as a euphemism for "fell out while I was running trying to catch the ferry."
The gun I'm aware of, that would have fit in that pocket well, is an NAA Mini. That's not the only gun I'd carry; there would be an LCP or a J-Frame somewhere, maybe even a 9mm in a messenger bag, but in that pocket, the one that works like a shoulder holster, the one I can draw from while sitting down with my seat belt on, I think a Mini would fit the bill. Could I have clipped a knife in that pocket? Absolutely. But I'm not used to reaching there for a knife. I'm used to going for the top of my pocket where it is clipped in. And I'm not sure how well I'd be able to use a knife while sitting in my car. Unless the BadGuy is leaning in my window, its hard for me to think of a way to use it that doesn't involve dangling my out my window, which in my humble opinion, is not a very effective, or safe position to fight from.
Now, part of this plays into tactics and mindset. Some may argue that if you're in your car, and the BadGuy is outside your car, you don't need to fight, at least not right away, because you're in your car, and therefore you are safe. I disagree, because I don't see a car as being safe. I don't see a car as cover. I see it as partial concealment, that may provide a barrier between you and an attacker, but the attacker can overcome the barrier by either breaking a window, opening the door, or shooting at you. I only consider the engine block to be cover, and maybe behind the axle/wheel. Otherwise, I'm not a big fan of fighting from a car. If its moving, if you can get it in gear, that's one thing. But if it isn't moving, your strapped down (at least initially) in a position that hinders any weapon that relies on your physical strength, in a confined space, with blind spots, and when you get shot at, the bullet may be bringing parts of the car in the form of shrapnel with it. In that situation, I'd take just about any gun, before I choose a knife.
But that's just me.
I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people reading this are wondering how much experience I have with a Mini. None, never fired one. But I do have an old, old Whitneyville Armory .22 that my great grandfather carried as his backup gun when he was a cop in San Francisco. The gun is not in working condition, but I've dry fired it, and let me tell you, pulling that hammer back is a pain. You have to pull it back farther than it feels like you should, and its a heavy pull, but even so, I think I could do it if I had too. At the risk of sounding abrasive, I don't care what you think I can and can not do, but if you think that YOU can not do it, then maybe you're right, and maybe the Mini is not the gun that you should be carrying. There's any easy way to find out: Go mountain biking, take a Wilderness First Responder Class, do some force-on-force training, go for a drive in the snow, trail running at night, or something that activates the flight-or-fight response, and see how well you can perform tasks under pressure. You might surprise yourself. Or you may decide that I give absolutely terrible suggestions, YMMV.
One of the complaints I'm seeing against the Mini is that when you shoot your one cylinder, you're done. Obviously, all guns go empty eventually (does not apply to Mr. Cruise, Mr. Connery, Mr. Willis, or Mr. Ford.) but I agree, the Mini looks like a real pain to reload. I mean, I guess you could use some glue or tape to secure cartridges in a spare cylinder and carry that. Yea, you'd be sacrificing a cylinder, but you're gaining a reload, and it might be worth it. Its possible that even then, a reload is not feasible, which I agree is almost never a good thing... but then people are complaining about not being able to hit people with it once its empty, and since knives never go empty, knives are therefore better. There's a logic to that, and there's a definitely a difference between a mini and a Hi-Point .45 in terms of impact weapon effectiveness.
One of the concepts that we have to work with a lot is compromise; power vs recoil, capacity vs caliber, small and concealable vs large and better performance. Here, the compromise is a gun that's harder to use, and can't be used as an impact weapon, but is easier to conceal than just about anything on the market that I'm aware of.
If we go back to the Hierarchy (Mindset-Skillset-Toolset) then the ability for the gun to double as an impact weapon (toolset) isn't as important as our mindset. In this case, my mindset would be something to the effect of: If the gun is empty, its less effective than a knife or my hands. So if the gun goes empty, instead of trying to hit the BadGuy with it, I'm going to re-holster, and either draw my knife, or my mini-maglight, or use my hands.
Again, that's just me.
Like many things, there is no one right answer. Which is better? If you're strapped into the drivers seat, probably the Mini. If you're on the ground, with a furry four legged critter crushing your arm in its jaws, well, I don't know about you guys, but I think it would be too easy to accidentally hit my own hand, especially with a mini where, shot placement being critical, would require a head shot, which is the part of the animal where your hand is. In that case, yea, I'll take a knife over a mini. At an active shooter situation, well, either way you brought the wrong tool for the job.
I would carry both.
Another consideration is the physical ability of the user. I have mostly slow twitch muscle fibers, which is a fancy way of saying that my muscles can't move that fast, but I have a lot of endurance. I'm not like those quick guys who can reach out and catch a ball in the blink of an eye. For me, I feel like I can't use a knife quickly enough to make it very effective at 1 to 5 feet, and I'd rather rely on a gun, which uses that same drawing motion, that same trigger pull, that I've done hundreds, if not thousands of times. At contact distance, where he can barely see my hands and can't really block them very well, I think a knife would be a fantastic tool.
At the end of the day, no one wants to leak, and I just want to get home in one piece. A carrier criminal who has been shot at before may not be too impressed with your NAA mini. The same could be said for someone who's been stabbed. I don't think that means they want to leak, just that they feel they can get you before you get them. If you're holding a knife, they may think they can overpower you. If you point a Mini at them, they may think they can overpower you. They may think, either way, that you may not be willing to fight back. If you shoot them with a mini, they know you will fight back. My life isn't just worth fighting for, its worth fighting dirty for. If that means using a gun to engage the BadGuy before they close the distance, then that's what I'm going to do.
The knife is a multipurpose tool, and excels at many things, but shooting isn't one of them. Remember, the pro's of one are not necessarily cons of the other. The extended range of a revolver doesn't make the knife any less effective. No matter how much faith you may put in a knife, or how much range time you have into your mini, neither are good reasons to carry just one.
If you normally carry a knife and a .38Special, is there any reason why if you couldn't carry the .38, you'd carry just a knife instead of a knife and a .22?
Have a good one guys,
Chris "the Kayak-Man" Johnson
