Home Defense Rifle

WHY DO I NEED A HOME DEFENSE RIFLE?

Before we get into what to buy, we need to look at why we need to buy it in the first place. Our mandate on why you need a home defense rifle is simple: to engage medium range threats that occur outside the home. Wait – are you suggesting that we shoot from inside the home at threats that occur outside the home?

In a word, yes. We are not looking for a home defense rifle that you will use to shoot at intruders within the home – that’s what your home defense pistol is for. We don’t like rifles for interior use because:

• Your average rifle round tends to over penetrate. This means that you could shoot at an attacker, have the round go right through him, and still possess enough energy to injure a family member or pass though a wall.
• Rifles are harder to use in close quarters work than handguns; they are longer and bulkier.
• You are more likely to have a handgun ready in a holster or nightstand, while your rifle is most likely sitting unloaded in the safe.

Okay, fair enough. In that case, what situations might we decide to use a home defense rifle in? What would prompt us to holster that pistol and yank the rifle out of its safe? Here are some scenarios:

• You need to engage an attacker or intruder who is on your property or attempting to gain access to the property line.
• You need to engage an attacker or intruder who is in a vehicle on your street.
• You need to engage multiple intruders who are on your property but not yet in your house.

While these sound like questionable and even illegal scenarios, we are not necessarily considering having to do any of these things while society is up and running; currently, there are police for that sort of thing. Still, even while society is up and running, you may find that some scenarios might play out today – for example, if you own a remote acreage and see a strange car pull up to your gate with four males in it who look hostile, you will most likely want to grab a rifle, even if you don’t actually discharge it. The mere sight of a rifle might totally deter a crime.

The key to the usage of your home defense rifle will range, in this case, medium range. We want a rifle that is good from about 40 yards – about the realistic range of a handgun – to about 300 yards, the point at which you would switch to a rifle with a scope. Our ideal home defense rifle is one that hits hard within this range, a rifle that owns that protective zone of space around your house.