Just to add my two pennorth, for what it's worth,.....
If you are pre-disposed to "having a go" then run into the lions den and take your chances......given that you probably don't know who, how many or what (if anything) they may be armed with I'd suggest that this is probably best avoided.
If you wake to find you are being burgled, make some noise, switch some lights on and scare them off......99% of burglars will aviod confrontation if possible.At the end of the day, you may lose your life trying to teach a scumbag a lesson and protect your insured contents......not worth the chance in my book and I'm speaking from experience.
Ideally, we would all love to give a burglar a good hiding (at the very least) but the potential downside of doing that is just far too great to make it an option IMO.I don't want my young kids visiting my grave, with their mum telling them how brave daddy was when he got stabbed with his own kithen knife by a no-mark scumbag to whom a 12 year prison sentence means squat.
BB