It is upon these 'angels-on-a-pinhead disagreements' that policy is formed and well-argued.
Remember the original premise of this thread: Antigunners use this Nuke Possession strawman to try to knock down the reasonable possession of long arms and handguns. The purpose of the original article is to defuse that strawman argument.
Was Bernhard Goetz justified in shooting at his four assailants on the NY subway car? If he had had something less discriminating (hand grenade), would he have been justified in using that?