Talk:T-34

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Featured article star T-34 is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. If you can update or improve it, please do.
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This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on February 5, 2007.
Maintained The following users are actively contributing to this topic and may be able to help with questions about verification and sources:
Michael Z. (talk • contribs • email)
Peer review This page has been selected for Version 0.5 and the release version of Wikipedia. It has been rated FA-Class on the assessment scale. It is in the category History.

Because of their length, the previous discussions on this page have been archived. If further archiving is needed, see Wikipedia:How to archive a talk page.

Previous discussions:

Archive 1 (2003-10-06 to 2005-09-18)
Awesome article · post-war T-34 engagements · Commander as loader · Christie Suspension ? · Contradictory? · Combat Effectiveness · Eh? · Importance? · T-34/85's reduced speed · Units (00 mm, 00mm, 00-mm)
Archive 2 (2005-10-08 and 2006-01-27)
Soviet vs. German war industry · Nomenclature · Firepower · Model 1942 or 1943 · "MDSh smoke canisters on the hull rear" · comments · Best tank Quotes · Some minor corrections · Peer review · Quotations · Production Numbers · Footnotes · Combat service · Importance · Peer review to-do list · Best tank · First sentence is wordy · New article: "T-34 variants" · Radios
Archive 3 (2006-01-28 to 2006-07-31)
T-34s as "liberation from nazism" monuments all around E-C Europe and their defacing in the 80-90s · Used at Lang Vei? · Identify version please · Military Discovery Channel's Ranking · Bedsprings · Importance section · Drive for Featured Article quality · NPOV · Successor · T-34 is a Featured Article · Hitler's intelligence
Archive 4 (08/26/06) to (03/09/07)


Contents

[edit] Lets make sure

Folks while I may have my problems with Wikimachine on some of the things that were done he has a point and lets make sure we are listening? Please scrub the article of "weasel wording" and unsupportable statements. I was working on the F-86 article and it started with the statement that it was "one of the 3 best fighters in U.S. aviation history". I could make enough arugments to say it wasn't in the top 10 or it was the best period. Its unsupportable opinion. To say that the T-34 is the best, revolutionary, ect, is opinion. Stating that 60,000 T-34 were produced with the next closest being the M-4 Sherman at 55,000 and citing a source and footnoting is a fact. I think that is what Wikimachine is trying to get to and I would support that. We are working on a featured article and it should be our best effort. Lets get a other opinions on this before beginning but I am asking all of us to consider what I have said. Tirronan 17:45, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you in principle but let's be careful of the specifics. Removing OR is fine; removing the published, well-supported statements of armor authors makes no sense at all. We can easily find many citations from armor-specialist publications supporting much of what has been wrongly labeled OR in this article. Some of them are already cited here. It is misleading and unproductive to fact-tag every line of the article. DMorpheus 18:52, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes I agree and if you read my comments I think you will understand just how dim a view I take of [citation needed]ing an article to death and then contributing nothing. I think the things that really jar my teeth are things like Revolutionary Design when it fact it was a distillation of what was already there, ie Christy suspension, sloped armour, ect... I have no doubt it was the finest thing out there in 1941 hell it was still pretty good in 1945 but we need to be conservative with statements unless its by a historic figure commenting on what they saw at the time. General Kliest's comment comes to mind quickly, but remember that when we make the statement its entirely something else. What I am suggesting is that we that are actually contributing to the article take a good long hard look at this and see if we can remove some of the more glaring examples in the name of improving the article. Tirronan 21:08, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Don't confuse design with technology (see also design methods). "Revolutionary design" is not a synonym of "new technology", nor necessarily even "up-to-date technology" (i.e., in this case, the T-34 was successful without a state-of-the-art torsion-bar suspension). In fact, a major factor in the success of this design is that it did not incorporate any fragile or untested new technologies, and new technologies were wisely applied to refining production methods during the war. Design means exactly a distillation and configuration of what was there. The whole point is that the T-34 excelled in its design, not in its technology.
This was the first tank design which put a large-calibre gun and shell-proof armour on a highly mobile, medium-weight chassis. This was the first tank built with a good-enough balance of firepower, mobility and protection to serve as a "universal" tank (and exceeding any comparable contemporary tank design in all three): able to serve in the infantry support, antitank and reconnaissance roles, pushing light and heavy tanks into more specialized niches, and leading directly to the widely-admired German Panther and the post-war concept of the main battle tank. It was the first tank designed to be robust, reliable, maintainable, and easily mass-produced, and adaptable enough to remain the spearhead of Soviet forces throughout the entire war, and remain useful in some places for the rest of the twentieth century. Tactically and strategically, it worked better than any tank that came before, and many that followed.
These are all a result of good design, and not of any new technologies. —Michael Z. 2007-03-09 19:46 Z

Thank you all, wonderful points and I withdraw my objection Tirronan 20:44, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Gadfly

As I look at the talk section it is being completely dominated by us justifying every edit at the pleasure of a few. I took some of my time and started checking user pages. Apparently these folks are involved in one controversy after another and in arbitration more than not. Nothing is being accomplished any more except pleasing them in fixing our dreadful article. One of them I have extreme doubts even has English as a primary language. I started noticing that he was missing fine context in replies and that coupled with syntax errors gave it away. I then check another user to find his talk page dominated by his rushing in and trashing verbally multiple articles and [citation needed] ing said article over and over and then waiting to revert with and rv anyone that dared change anything so that it might be readable again. Both of these folks are then hiding under the OR umbrella even if one of them apparently doesn't understand what it really means. Then I find out this individual is part of a debating team so that we are all providing one of his primary forms of entertainment. Neither one of these fine folks really adds anything but let me be clear, if your grasp of the English language isn't all that it should be, or your technical ability is not such as to allow you to edit a specialist type of document you probably should not ever be editing such documents. I always wondered why RHD was so upset at wiki and I suspect this is it.

If you are really contributing to the article by all means, if you question something’s veracity by all means, if you are here to prove a point and make everyone jump to your demands expect a quick revert by me. I am stating now that my days of long replies to the like of these folks are over. I don't mind working on an article, I do mind providing entertainment to them. From this point on any edits by them that are not constructive will be reverted. This article has dozens upon dozens of inline citations, lots of sourcing, and is pretty wonderful. It is unfortunate that it made FA status and got exposed to the jackals of wiki who apparently just can't wait to trash an article verbally and every other way. If anyone wants to talk about bad articles you can start with other ones that really need help, but go help don't [citation needed] mandate and leave. Don't talk about how bad an article is work on it or better yet build concensus on it and do it together! I am sick unto death of the negative life sucking non-productive folks. Tirronan 17:35, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I'm quite sure that there has been only one editor who's been criticizing this article. If you want to talk to me, talk. Don't be a sissy. (Wikimachine 19:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC))
Just in case these were directed at me, let me have a chance to answer them.
  • these folks are involved in one controversy after another and in arbitration more than not Not true. Ahn Eak-tai, T-50 Golden Eagle, Mini 4WD, and ThinkPad are some of my major contributions.
  • One of them I have extreme doubts even has English as a primary language I've heard of foreigners who ace the SAT & do better than the native English speakers. Is this a racist comment or what?
  • Both of these folks are then hiding under the OR umbrella even if one of them apparently doesn't understand what it really means Of course I do. You can't use a mix of sources to shape your own thesis. That includes using primary sources.
  • so that we are all providing one of his primary forms of entertainment So... all debaters are like this?
  • expect a quick revert by me Yay revert wars! Admins are going to be happy about that.
  • jackals of wiki I was born on the year of the Sheep on the Chinese Zodiac & my birth dream was a tiger.

Constructions, constructions, constructions. I've deconstructed them. I'm not sure if you're acting all enlightened here and there, but you don't know anything if you're going to insult debaters because I know that my friends are 10 times more enlightened than you with your narrow mind. Read Fasching. Construction of the ultimate, T Truth allows for calculation dynamics in which "the other" (whom you've constructed) can be oppressed. A classic example right here. (Wikimachine 01:21, 9 March 2007 (UTC))

Once again you are here to argue and I told you how I feel about it. I am not here to argue or debate. Apparently you think that your last paragraph means something in English and again I assure you that it doesn't. You don't know what the concept of OR means or you wouldn't have brought it up when it didn't apply.

I'll say it again, go find something you know and work on that, learn to speak the language before you try to edit it (its not racist its a requirement before you edit) don't wave an OR flag when your one shot was verification and if you ever delete another section out of here I'll see you blocked. I am done responding to you go debate someone else. Tirronan 06:08, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Look, this has degenerated into personal attacks and wikilawyering. As long as its confined to the talk page it is merely annoying. If wikimachine continues with nonsensical edits to the article he will be reported. If he contributes something productive, great. DMorpheus 15:18, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree and that was my last statement to wikimachine, sorry if I ever got personal. Tirronan 15:21, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Why, just because my userpage says I'm Korean I'm fluent in Korean & incoherent in English? I can't speak Korean well, dummy. You can't tell people to edit the "right" Wikipedia? And yeah... "Once again you are here to argue". ultimate punch right there. Doesn't that make rest of my statements irrelevant. I don't care about your squabbling. I'm going to fix this article as I see fit. (Wikimachine 02:11, 10 March 2007 (UTC))

[edit] REFERENCE CITATION

The rules for where and when references should be cited are abundantly clear. You can find them in the Chicago Manual Style, as well as many other similar reference works. So what is the bottom line for this process? When in doubt, cite your reference. If you have multiple citations in a given paragraph, and don't like the clutter, simply group them at the end. 14thArmored 00:33, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

I would hope that everyone understands that by now. Tirronan 07:33, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] LACK OF BALANCE

This article is seriously out of balance. It would benefit greatly from the introduction of additional information about the negative aspects of the T-34. Just for the record, this sort of balance problem is not uncommon when there is an over dependence on the works of a particular author. For example, testing and evaluation of a T-34 by the US Army Ordnance Dept. exposed some very serious problems with the tank. This type of information should be included in the article to bring it back into balance. 14thArmored 16:11, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

You would be speaking of the [[1]] at the bottom of the page? Problem is that engine and transmission problems are pretty serious in the T-34 but worse in most of the German AFV's interleaved road wheels being part of the issue jamming with snow and mud. Soviet production in alot of things didn't compare well to U.S. production. Reviewing the article it claimed the T-34 was using a rejected US tranmission design that at that time was 12 years out of date. Further that the lack of heat treatment of the armour and of the varous cogs were creating havoc. The air cleaner seemed to work as a dirt ingester that was insuffient airflow, and hard to believe friction clutches, ect. How that related in later model tanks though we don't know. I would have hoped that they improved but then we are guessing and needless to say I don't and won't go there. I remember when I was in STANAVFORLANT watching half a fotilla having engineering difficulties in keeping up at with us at 28 knots and my ship was 18 years old at that point. As I recall, been awhile since I looked, the Germans had a terrible time after Operation Cobra with AFV's breaking down when things got fluid. As I recall the Sherman was looking pretty good in comparison. I guess what I am getting to here is that none of the vehicles were looking all that good on the Eastern Front and the T-34 was better than most. The biggest problem with the late model tanks were still lacking in enough radios and as late as 1945 the ave German was 3 times more destructive than his Soviet counterpart according to Mr. Dunigan and "How to make war". I think faulty C&C issues are the least understood but most damning problem in armies. Ask the Prussians at Jena. Tirronan 07:47, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Changes

This turned out better than I thought. I have been exposed to too many trolls of late and expected nothing but the worst. My appologies. I've corrected somethings and added others that haven't been addressed. Comparing gun against gun is a bit weird when its armour penetration versus armour I think. Please be careful if you don't have the source material and you make changes the citation may no longer apply. I've added some [citation needed] to remind me to cite tomorrow. Tirronan 07:31, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

For whatever it is worth, I am in agreement with your most recent edits. They certainly seem to be moving in the direction to place the T-34's contributions solidly within the Soviet sphere of influence regarding post-war tank design. This distinction is important since the Western Cold War powers rejected the Soviet strategy for tank design. With the decisive results seen in Desert Storm and OIF, I don't think anyone would take exception to the idea that the Soviet strategy of fielding large numbers of "cheap" tanks was inferior to the Western strategy of creating smaller numbers of tanks that could achieve and maintain battlefield superiority over their presumptive enemies of the Cold War.
I will do my best not to edit a section in such a way that it nullifies the corresponding citation. If I should fall into this error, I trust that you or DMorpheus will make inform me, and help make the necessary correction. 14thArmored 16:04, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
My appologies for any over reactions on my part. We have been drug through the mud here by a few less than helpful editors. Parts of this article did go over the top something I alluded to in 2 sections up. I strongly doubt that the T-34 affected MBT developement in Western armies beyond recognising high ground pressure and narrow track were to be avoided, sloping armour was already being used in the M3/M4. However one thing that was in the article and it is seen in some of the discussions about western heavy tanks, was that the further a tank column went the more you ended up with a bunch of medium tanks, the heavies were always struggling to keep up or breaking down. More to the point the moblity side of the afv design triangle had to be paid attention to in any sort of extended campaign. There was no more Soviet heavies after the T-10, the US never liked heavies more than to play with prototypes as with Britain. The US was never happy with the M-26/M-47 replacing it with the M-48 as fast as it could be developed. However the direct linage to the T-20 series could be tracked to the M-1 not the M-4. It is interesting to note that the 2nd most produced tank of WWII was the M-4 49,000 to the T-34's 57,000.
Something else that I always found interesting, after the inital shock of contact with the T-34 the much maligned M-4 76mm with HVAP ammo was an exact match in hard factors and much more reliable and workable in soft factors, it eliminated the T-34 as a weapon system in Korea in conjuction with the M-26/M-47. One of the more interesting factors with the M-4 was that it was being fitted with a 90mm gun in Korea and with a 105mm by Isreal. The question arises in my mind... why in God's name would you send our soldiers to die in an underarmed M-4? The high velocity 105mm was available in WWII and so was the 90mm. Either would have been a cold match for a Panther or Tiger. Someone should have been lined up against the wall on that one. Tirronan 17:28, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

No need to apologize. My editorial comments are sometimes more curt or critical than they should be, and this quite naturally elicits a strong reaction.

The problem of ground pressure was well-understood by the US Army Ordnance Dept. during WWII. I find it difficult to identify any direct relationship between the T-34's lower ground pressure, and efforts by the US Army Ordnance Dept. to achieve similar results. In fact, designers of both tanks were simply reacting to the conditions imposed by the European battlefield, and the Russian's worked out the solution while the American's were still getting the M4 ready for battle in the sands of N. Africa.

Keep in mind that the relatively few engagements involving T-34s and M4s were fought mostly at relatively close ranges. This helped mask the penetration problems of the 76mm HVAP (It was only marginally better than the AP shot round.), and led to a generalized misunderstanding of the tank's effectiveness against its Russian counterpart. I have not heard of a 90mm Sherman seeing combat in Korea. In answer to your question about who was responsible for sending us out in undergunned death traps, it was Lt. Gen. Leslie J. McNair. A long time staffer, McNair was a genius at organization, but demonstrated very little understanding of, or for that matter, any willingness to learn about the actual effectiveness of our tanks and tank destroyers on the battlefield. Had he died a year earlier, we would have gone ashore in Europe equipped with 250 T26 tanks and possibly even some 90mm Shermans. It would have made a difference. 14thArmored 00:28, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

It the upgunned M-4 may not have made it to Korea, I read that referrence years ago with looking at upgrades for the M-4. Like most my age, my reliance on my memory far exceeds my capcity LOL. Tirronan 17:19, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Capitalization

Am I missing something here? Why is only the first letter of the first word in the section headings capitalized? It is not the beginning of a sentence, and I have never heard of a grammatical convention that would allow for the primary words of any title, the title of a section in this case, to begin with a lowercase letter. A quick look at "The Chicago Manual of Style" provides not relief in this matter, so is this just a case of bad grammar?

In an effort to stop this revert thing this from WP:MOS

Wording In a heading, capitalize only the first letter of the first word and the first letter of any proper nouns, and leave all of the other letters in lowercase. Example: "Rules and regulations", not "Rules and Regulations". Avoid special characters in headings, such as a slash (/), a plus sign (+), curly braces ({}), or square braces ([]). In place of an ampersand (&) use the word and, unless the ampersand is part of a formal name. Avoid putting links in headings; try to link the first occurrence of the word or phrase in the section text, instead. Keep the heading short: headings more than ten words long may defeat their purpose. Avoid redundancy and unnecessary words in headings, such as articles (a, an, and the), pronouns, and repetition of the title of the whole article. Do not give identical titles to different sections. Doing so tends to confuse the reader, and makes it more difficult for any writer to create a section link to any such section except the first.

Given that this is how they want it I think we need to follow this. Personally I am more comfortable with the other way but I think we need to follow Wiki guidelines on this. Please read the section and the stance on reversion wars over style before doing any more of this please. Tirronan 10:15, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Tironan is quite correct; Wikipedia has its own style and we don't follow the Chicago style in this case. The only time we should not use lower case is for the first word of a sentence/heading and proper names, e.g. Red Army or Nazi Germany. Any articles or sub-headings which don't follow this will be changed in the long run. Grant | Talk 14:37, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wiki Citzenship

Ok things are a bit out of control here and I am going on record as saying I have been among the offenders. Lets get a few things out in the open, 1st and foremost I appologise for any and all comments I have made that were out of line including a few "Moron"s thrown at someone I was frustrated with.

2nd No one "owns" an article here not me and not anyone else. If you don't like a change discuss it here don't get into a revert war and the cursing has got to stop.

3rd We have real vandals fixing our page for us and we need to be able to revert when that arises. Something that 2 of you are in danger of losing right now. WP:CIV

Nothing here is ruled by dicate and perhaps now you understand why. I would prefer that in the future we make proposed changes visable here for comment before going public.

One last thought, getting into online arguements is like winning the Special Olympics, no matter how great you do every still sees a short bus kid...

Lets treat each other like we all are concerned about the quality of the article (I really do think we all are) and with respect. Tirronan 12:58, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Please be aware that personal attack will lead to a quick block by the admins. One of our editors found this out the hard way. Keep tempers in check and any heat directed towards the subject matter and not the person behind it. Tirronan 15:53, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reverts

My two cents for what its worth... the big three should be the three design elements and those are firepower, protection, and mobility. The actual elements should not be up for debate its all over the place. IMHO mechcanical reliability would be part of the mobility side of the triangle. I am asking again don't get into revert wars discuss and reach agreement and lets move on. Tirronan 15:32, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

My apologies. I did not see your comments before making the most recent edit to the article. I have no problem with retaining the "big three" concept. The sentence in question just needs to be written a little better. We should eliminate the words "big three" and replace them with something more descriptive and less simplistic. I like your wording, "...three design elements...firepower, protection, and mobility." Perhaps this could be used to replace "big three" with some additional wording. How about, The three principal design elements ....?" For the record, reliability refers to the entire weapon system, not just how well the tank gets around the battlefield. For example, if the main gun sights don't maintain proper alignment, you can't hit anything. Reliability right? You can have the best tank in the world in terms of battlefield mobility, but if it keeps throwing tracks, it's unreliable. Anyway, a rewrite of the sentence in question will almost certainly solve our problem. 14thArmored 22:14, 20 March 2007 (UTC)


Well big three reminds me of GM, Ford, and Chrylser, and perhaps that is not a turn of phase to use. How about "The three elements of a tank's hard perameters being armor, firepower, and mobility? That might blend in more with that paragraph? As for reliability lets leave that one alone, from what I read the T-34 was no gem in that department and the best way to kill a German panzer column was to make it march a 100 miles. I just flat don't want to get into that. Tirronan 23:00, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

I think you are dead on with the re-write. Now that you mention it, the "big three" was bothering me for the same reason, and I did not realize it until you said something. Now if we can get DMorpheus to sign off on it, I think we will be OK. It seems to me that we have to include the relibility issue somewhere in the article in order to insure balance. Somewhere I have an Ordnance Dept. analysis of a T-34 that they tested. The reliability of the drive train was terrible, with the engine lasting only a few hours before it went kaput. I'll try to find it, but don't bet that I do because I can't seem to find anything anymore.

Actually the one to the Aberdean Proving Grounds is a link on the page. It lists an air filter that was undersized and acted like a dirt ingester, under tempered armor, untempered cogs in the transmission, they thought the suspension was pure shit, and they traced the transmission back to a design that Aberdean had refused to use 12 years before. They also mention friction clutches, like you use on a lawnmower being used in the T-34. The problem being here if that was the case it probably wasn't for very long the damn things would be breaking down every 50 miles and they didn't. How and when they got better is going to take a researcher years to track down. Talk about OR... I had an uncle that served in Patton's 3rd Army. He has passed away but I remember him telling me that after Cobra they were catching up all sorts of German armor that was better than a Sherman but they couldn't keep it running long enough to get it out of the way of the oncoming allied armies. He talked about seeing miles of this... again all hearsay (litterally) but once you open that can of worms every editor in WP will hammer us and it is a position I refuse to put myself in. Tirronan 15:57, 21 March 2007 (UTC)


Hey I am proud of you guys, you worked it out and no cussing either! Tirronan 23:09, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

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