.22/410 you could carry more ammo. I have a .22/410 side by side with hammers that would be good. I also have the m6 scout which would make a good survival gun for the same reason. I need to pick up some 410 slugs for up to a deer size target. The m6 scout could be broke down into smaller pieces for easy concealment.
There's one thing you can do with a .22 rifle that you can't do with a 12-ga shotgun. You can make it shut up. A suppressed .22 is for all intents and purposes a ghost gun. It would be VERY had to spot in the hands of a sniper. Drop the range to 50 yards and head shots get very practical. Show me a guy with a bullet hole in his head and I'll show you a guy that would retreat if he could. You can kill bear and moose with a .22. People have done it. You just don't do it from across the County. A suppressed .22 will not scare off game or tell hungry neighbors that you just bagged lunch. Or alert an enemy patrol. And you can carry a lot of ammo. It's against the Geneva convention, but in wartime if you needed to put some oomph into those teeny little hollow points you could always add a dab of something special. There are quite a few common substances that would only take a pinch.
A suppressed 12 ga. Now that's technology! I'd call it quiet even if it sounds like a hand-clap. It sure doesn't sound like a shotgun!
Nothing quite like the American "Don;t you tell me I caint" spirit to get something fun worked up. Haha. Me, I don't have a problem with a double barrel. I actually prefer them, they just aren't always the right tool for the job. I think the lightest gun I own is 7 something pounds.
"Horse" was originally the European term for cavalry. You had the "Light Horse" for mobility and speed, and the "Heavy Horse" for breaking the lines. The difference was primarily the amount of armor on the horse and rider, and whether a sword or sabre was the primary weapon as opposed to a spear or lance. Heavy horse was best on open ground, but almost helpless in deep forests. Light horse were more vulnerable on the fields, but very effective in the forests. The Light Horse was the bunch that could flank the enemy and start the baggage trains burning while the Heavy Horse kept everybody busy at the front. They were also used to take out archers whenever possible. A horse pistol was a cavalry pistol, pure and simple, and typically a rider would carry as many (holstered on the horse) as he could afford or loot, Four was not uncommon, and some carried six. Most cavalry riders had large sheathe knives for off-hand combat, eating, and cutting stirrups loose when being dragged.
When I was young, and doing Research in Primary Enertetic Materials Science... I loaded 36 Grain Hollow Point .22LR rounds with small amounts of a Mercury Fulminate, and Lead Azide... Added significant Impact Energy to those little Projectiles... And in a surpressed Weapon, They would be very deadly, inside 50 Yds....
12 gauge pump shotgun. It was the last gun I sold when I lost everything and the first one I bought when I got healthy again. It can be used for defense and for taking a wide variety of game and birds.
Same as most everything, the answer depends on what the question is... Without getting into where are they going, those who bug out will have a pistol and a rifle or shotgun. As they will be carrying everything; they won't have a lot. Preppers have food, medicine, water, and shelter. In addition, some will have animals, cultivated fields and more. Others may want to take what they have. YMMV, but defending all you have with one shotgun seems to lack common sense to me. However, if that fixed position is in a remote location where few if any will go, again YMMV.
I've always wanted one of those @stg58. A childhood friend had a .22lr/20ga (may have been a 12ga) and I thought he was the coolest because he could shoot quail or rabbit on the same trip We were made to head shoot rabbits with a .22 by our fathers.
When reading the OP, common sense told me that the line "So if for now you can only buy and support one gun for survival and prepping, what should it be?" was the premise of the thread. It's like I tell people when they point out something seemingly unrealistic in a movie; "It's in the script, go with it".
Could be get stuck with it? Folks invest a lot of time, labor, and money in their preparations which means they have a lot to lose.
It would have to be a pistol. Mainly because that's the one platform I could always have on me. If I understand the original theme correctly, I can only afford one weapon. That being said, I choose the pistol. I will pull a Kobayashi maru here and say that the pistol is a .45ACP 1911A1 series 70 WITH a .22lr conversion slide.
Well as Uncle Morgan said, a .22 can and has killed everything that walks on the earth. The world record Grizzly for a long time was killed by a squaw with a single shot.22 that she shot through the roof of the mouth while it stood over her. One guy who came face to face with a grizzly bear in the mountains as it came down the rail road tracks killed the bear with rocks off the road bed. NOT something I want to try! Elephant have been killed with a .22. Tappan talked about a circus elephant shot through the eye and all elephants have a tiny winkle just behind the front leg which is the ONLY area where a .22 bullet CAN get through the skin. It takes several days to a week for the elephant to die of a lung puncture from it. The problem is I sure don't want to hunt bear or elephant with a .22 LR! For the old timers, "one gun" was almost always a shotgun (read the historical record of the old west and gun fighting). HOWEVER, I always have the pistol with me when I need it. Jumped by thugs in town? I might not have a shotgun/rifle with me, or it is slinged, but a handgun is always handy.
If it's just one gun. It's a shotgun. it's even Crazy Uncle Joe Biden approved. but I'd go with a pump Remington. From squirrel to deer/bear and Dove to goose. It'll have me covered.
Crazy Uncle Joe Stalin,...er... Biden! I meant to say Biden!! Yeah there IS a reason Remington has sold some 8 or 9 MILLION 870 shotguns, leaving everything else in third and fourth place!
I'm sure it doesn't hurt, that there are more than 32 versions, and it is a pump, not a sideXside. Biden says go out doors and fire off both barrels in the air. (I've heard him say it) that leaves you UNARMED, VULNERABLE , AND ILLEGAL. How flippin'stupid can you be, Biden? A pump (870 or the 500 ) have more shots available, stay loaded, and can be reloaded while still lethal. A sideXSide can not.
