In previous articles we discussed the benefits of an AK for home defense and we dispelled some of the myths and misconceptions associated with them as well as with the use rifles in general for home defense. We would now like to highlight a few ammo choices to make that .30 caliber AK or SKS (or Mini-30 or 7.62×39 AR….) as effective as it can be. Of course, any ammunition that functions reliably in your firearm can be useful for defense, but it’s a good idea to carefully choose the best ammunition if our lives or the lives of loved ones might depend on it. It is also true that plain, vanilla ball rifle ammo will beat out the very best pistol ammo in terminal effect. That said, choosing full metal jacket ammunition in 7.62x39mm leaves a lot of potential on the table and FMJ can penetrate much more deeply than is normally desired for defense.

It wasn’t too long ago that your options for defense ammunition in 7.62x39mm were limited to either plain ball, cheap Russian hollow points that mostly behaved just like FMJ, or cheap Russian soft points that mostly performed as they should. So most people who chose 7.62x39mm for defense mostly chose the latter, mostly content with the probably decent performance most of the time. Today, there are several very good choices available from domestic manufacturers that offer excellent terminal ballistics and the quality control we expect from American ammunition makers.