Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Weaponry categories

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This Military history WikiProject page is an archive, log collection, or currently inactive page; it is kept primarily for historical interest.

The following are guidelines for the categorization of weapons.

Note that proposals may be listed here in yellow boxes pending consensus on the talk pages for adoption.

Text in this kind of yellow box denotes a proposal. See Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Weaponry/Categories for discussion regarding this proposal.

Contents

[edit] Categorization by country

Weapons-related categories by country should follow the same policy set forward by Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories)#Categorization by country. In particular, weapons, like other military equipment, should be generally in the 'X of Country' format (ex. Category:Guided missiles of Russia).

[edit] Categorization of guided missiles

[edit] General guidelines

Guided missiles are categorized in broad ways:

  1. By type: Type is the general type of missile: Category:Anti-tank missiles, Category:Surface-to-air missiles. Types may be sub-sets of other types: Category:Nuclear cruise missiles is a sub-set of Category:Nuclear missiles and Category:Cruise missiles.
  2. By country: Listed in accordance with Wikipedia:Naming conventions (categories) by country of origin.
  3. By operator: Operator categories list missiles known to be operated by a particular entity: Royal Air Force guided missiles and United States Navy guided missiles. Each article is categorized in all appropriate categories.
  4. By conflict: Conflicts include actual wars and other identifiable events in which guided missiles were used: Category:Vietnam War guided missiles and Category:Cold War guided missiles

[edit] Type categorization

The following is a basic tree of missile types:

[edit] Country categorization

See the naming conventions for country-related categories as a baseline. All country-based guided missile articles should be categorized under Category:Guided missiles by country and pipe-sorted by the country name. Sub-categories within a country may be by type or conflict. For type categories, replace 'guided missiles' and replace with the type, for example: Category:Anti-tank missiles of Germany. For conflict-related categories, simply prefix the name with the conflict name, for example: Cold War guided missiles of India. These can be combined as in the example: Category:Cold War surface-to-air missiles of the Soviet Union, and these should be sub-sets of both type and conflict categories. Thus Category:Cold War anti-tank missiles of the Soviet Union would be under Category:Cold War anti-tank missiles, Category:Cold War guided missiles of the Soviet Union, and Category:Anti-tank missiles of the Soviet Union. Ideally, templates should allow stardard use of this breakdown.

[edit] Conflict categorization

For missiles which have been used in combat or otherwise had a notable relationship with a conflict, it is useful to categorize them as such. This is subjective and it is not necessary, nor even desirable to list the missile under every conflict which happened during its career. Indeed, only conflicts where the missile was used, or at least deployed by a combatant in the theatre, are likely good candidates. Even if a missile was in service with one of the combatants, but was never deployed to the conflict theatre, or did nothave any relation to the events of the conflict, then it is not a good idea to list it. For example, the LGM-118A Peacekeeper ICBM was in service with the United States Air Force during the Gulf War, but since the war certainly did not involve the missile, it is pointless to list it as a Gulf War missile. On the other hand, it would be well listed as a Cold War missile, because even though it only served in the last few years, and obviously never was fired in anger, it still played a notable role in the history of that conflict.

The following conflicts are good candidates for having missiles listed:

[edit] Operator categorization

Categorization by operator is also discretionary, but missiles should be linked with each known operator of the missile. Category names are in the format of the proper name of the operator (United States Army, Royal Air Force) followed by the type: Category:Luftwaffe guided missiles, Category:Soviet Air Force nuclear missiles. Only as much sub-categorization as necessary to keep the size limited is needed.

Operator categories are sub-sets of the 'by country' category as appropriate to the operator, as well as the type, for example: Category:Royal Air Force air-to-air missiles would be a sub-set of Category:Royal Air Force guided missiles and Category:Air-to-air missiles by operator