Under certain circumstances, I sometimes carry small guns in small calibers, such as .380 ACP or .32 S&W. Upon learning this, people often express surprise and ask me how confident I am in successfully defending myself with a caliber smaller than 9mm. I take them down Memory Lane to 30 to 40 years ago, and tell them a story:
I grew up in a time when everyone “knew” 9mm was weak and the only serious choice for self-defense was a .45 ACP. The gun culture of the ’80s and ’90s treated caliber as gospel: a bigger bullet meant better “stopping power,” and if you weren’t carrying a full-size .45, you weren’t taking self-defense seriously. That conventional wisdom turned out to be … let’s just say not totally true. As our understanding of terminal ballistics has matured, we’ve learned that all service pistol calibers are inherently limited, and effectiveness has more to do with shot placement and penetration than bullet diameter.
I started out as a .45 ACP disciple in my youth (“…because they don’t make a .46”). Like many shooters of my generation, I believed I was better prepared because my pistol held a “serious” caliber. Years of training, experience and study stripped that illusion away. I learned that what matters most is not the size of the hole, but your ability to put that hole in the right place under stress and the ability of the cartridge to propel the bullet deep enough to poke holes in vital structures. This leads to a question: If gun culture was wrong about 9mm back then, perhaps we’re now wrong to dismiss sub-9mm calibers.
The Myth of “Stopping Power”
Much of the old caliber debate was built on misunderstanding. In the ’80s and ’90s, many shooters genuinely believed handgun rounds could “knock a man down” or “stop him in his tracks” with one well-placed shot. Gun rags fed this belief, repeating stories about the .45 ACP’s legendary “man-stopping” power in “two World Wars” and Korea and Vietnam, while dismissing the 9mm as anemic. What few understood then was that all common handgun calibers – 9mm, .40, .45, and even .357 Mag., – are slow-moving projectiles with extremely limited energy compared to rifles or shotguns. Modern research has made this painfully clear. Handgun rounds simply don’t generate the velocity necessary to produce the “hydrostatic shock” that shreds tissue in the temporary cavity, and the idea of a pistol bullet “dumping all its energy” to stop a threat is pure myth.
22 rounds of .380 ACP makes for a very compelling argument.
The mechanism by which handguns affect the target is deceptively simple: handguns poke holes in the target. If those holes reach deep enough into the target to hit vital structures, then blood loss or central nervous system disruption results. This process does not involve dramatic shockwaves or raw power but is actually more akin to picking up a pencil and walking over and poking holes in something manually. Once you accept that, caliber debates start to look less like science and more like tradition and marketing.
The Ballistic Reality
The physics of terminal ballistics is brutally simple: to stop a threat with a handgun, your bullet needs to reach critical structures in the body, and it needs to do so quickly and reliably. That means adequate penetration, not magic bullet diameter or mythical “knockdown power.” A well-placed .380 or .32 can end a fight just as effectively as a .45 if it penetrates deeply enough. This reality is why every modern testing protocol, from FBI standards to police department evaluations, emphasizes penetration first and foremost. The goal is not caliber supremacy, but consistency and repeatability. The good news is that even in the “mouse gun” calibers there’s a surprising amount of ammo that meets the FBI penetration standards surprisingly consistently.
A pistol is always a compromise weapon. It is carried because it’s convenient, not because it’s powerful. That mindset shift allows us to stop chasing ever-larger cartridges and start focusing on what truly matters: accuracy, reliability, and penetration in an accessible firearm.
Why Sub-9mm Calibers Deserve Consideration
If 9mm, once dismissed as underpowered, is now the universal standard (which it is), what does that say about smaller calibers? The .380 ACP, .32 ACP, and even .22 LR are often ridiculed in gun culture, but many of those criticisms are rooted in the same myths that once haunted the 9mm. To be clear, the 9mm is the standard of current service-caliber defensive rounds. If there are no limitations regarding hand size or strength, or issues with concealment, 9mm is still what I recommend to most people for their carry gun.
However, the reality is that some people do have limitations in hand size or strength that affect their carry options. I see a lot of internet commandos telling people with hand/wrist strength issues to hit the gym, but that forgets the reality of people like my late mother who was afflicted by rheumatoid arthritis. Does she not get to defend herself because she’s got strength issues in her hands? Mightn’t she be better off with a .380, .32, or even a .22 she can handle than a 9mm she can’t, or perhaps even no handgun at all?
Additionally, many people are either very slightly built, are required to wear work attire/uniforms that do not allow them to carry and conceal larger firearms or otherwise need to conceal in environments where maximum concealment is a must. I have pretty good grip strength, but the guns that are least fun to shoot in the world are micro-compact handguns loaded in service calibers. For a pocket-sized “mouse gun,” many people will be neither willing nor able to train to proficiency with service calibers in tiny handguns.
The Bottom Line
Today, 9mm is still my preference if all things are equal, but I’m completely comfortable carrying a .380 ACP semi-automatic or a .32 S&W snubby when I need deep concealment or something very light weight. I know exactly what pistols can and cannot do, and my “mouse gun” carry options will do the work if I do my part to place rounds on target where I need to. A handgun is a defensive tool of last resort, not a fight-stopping cannon. What makes you dangerous is your mindset, skill, and willingness to carry every day, not the cartridge you choose.
The old-school belief that anything smaller than a 9mm will get you killed is just as misguided as the belief that 9mm was a “mouse gun” thirty years ago. Handguns are limited tools, and caliber debates often distract shooters from what matters: training, awareness and marksmanship. If you shoot a .380 well and carry it daily, you are far better prepared than someone with a full-size .45 they hate to practice with. If you carry a .22 because it’s all you can manage, that’s still infinitely better than being unarmed. The gun you carry confidently and competently is the right gun, regardless of caliber. The lesson of the last few decades is simple: stop worshiping numbers and start focusing on fundamentals. Skill wins fights, not cartridge diameter.
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