Talk:Gate Pā

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[edit] Problems

I have several problems with this article. First is the overall tone: it seems written to glorify the Maori effort as much as possible, and denigrate the British. For just one of several examples:

They had 1,700 men and were opposed by a mere 230 Māori.

"Mere"? A ratio of 7:1 is not particularly long odds; unless the attacker has some other advantage, 3:1 is usually the considered the minimum for attacking a well prepared defensive position. Furthermore, we are told that the assault was mounted by only 300 troops ; what were the other 1,400 doing? If these were artillerymen and support troops for the allegedly very large artillery contingent, then the actual odds in the assault was only 1.3:1, well below the 3:1 minimum. (According to [1], at least some of the 1,700 troops were not actually at the battle at all.) Other problems:

One historian calculated that Gate Pā absorbed in eight hours a greater weight of explosive per square metre than did the German trenches in the week long bombardment leading up to the Battle of the Somme in World War I. If true...

We definitely need a cite for this. It is rather unlikely, since in 1864 high explosive shells had not actually been invented yet. There was such a thing as "common shell" (cast iron spheres filled with black powder, with a fuze timed to burst them in the air above the enemy), but they were mainly effective against troop concentrations in the open; against covered fortifications, they were less effective than solid shot. Another one: the casualty list claims for the Maori "~25 dead or wounded" and for the British "75 dead, 127 wounded". Yet our only reference to describe Maori casualties ([2]), actually says the Maori had 25 dead and an unknown number of wounded, while the total British casualties were 111, which seems to rather rule out 127 wounded. It looks, in other words, as if someone has their thumb on the scales.

The worst problem though is this:

To contemporaries Gate Pā was seen as a shattering defeat. Indeed it was.

I cannot see how you can possibly justify this nonsense. The British objective was to capture the pa; they succeeded. The Maori defenders were forced to flee in the night. True, British casualties were higher than Maori casualties, but this is quite expected for assaulting a prepared fortification armed with musketry. Under any reasonable interpretation this was a straightforward British victory. If it was considered a "shattering defeat" at the time, we should give some explanation as to why; while our thoroughly biased "Indeed it was" must go. -- Securiger (talk) 22:29, 29 May 2008 (UTC)