Talk:Schneider CA1

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Any reason why Great War is used instead of World War I'? •Jim62sch•^dissera! 18:24, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Well, it's a concept contemporary to the tank itself. The lead section is about to be rewritten, and I'll then add the term First World War.--MWAK (talk) 05:32, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Some matters of dispute

There are some points User John and I have disagreed on. I'll give my interpretation of each issue:

1. "Cancelled" versus "annulled": I still think the latter term is to be preferred from a purely legal point of view, even though there is a strong association with the annulment of a marriage. However, "cancelled" is acceptable. But the "hereby" is necessary: the later order replaced the older one. Perhaps we can agree on "was hereby replaced" or "this replaced the original order".
2. "the War Ministry ordered the secret production" versus "the War Ministry secretly ordered the production": well, indeed the production too was as far as possible to be kept a secret, but one of the means of assuring this was to keep the order itself a secret. Only gradually it was divulged to other cabinet members and selected members of parliament.
3. "and Schneider chose the shorter design" versus "afterwards a choice was made for the shorter type designed by Schneider": the point is here that, although Schneider could in principle have made a choice of its own accord, a consensus was reached to produce the shorter Schneider design.
4. "Estienne's decisive rôle in getting the Schneider vehicle produced in mass has earned him a traditional position in history as the creator of the first French tank, although there had been a long prior development phase with the Schneider company; in January 1916 the project was entrusted to a ministerial bureau headed by General Léon Augustin Jean Marie Mourret, director of the Army automobile service. Mourret did not closely cooperate with Estienne, who was excluded from decisions of a technical nature." versus "Estienne's decisive rôle in getting the Schneider vehicle produced in mass has earned him a traditional position in history as the creator of the first French tank, but his actual involvement in its technical design was limited for not only had there been a long prior development phase with the Schneider company, already in January 1916 the actual completion was entrusted to a ministerial bureau headed by General Léon Augustin Jean Marie Mourret, director of the Army automobile service. Mourret did not closely cooperate with Estienne, who was basically excluded from decisions of a technical nature.": the source emphasises that the technical involvement of Estienne has been limited, that this was caused by his essentially (not formally) losing control of the actual design of the prototype as early as January 1916, and that this puts into perspective the importance traditionally assigned to him. My sentence is awkward but tried to express these causal relations. Perhaps we can replace it by "Although there had been a long prior development phase with the Schneider company, Estienne's decisive rôle in getting the Schneider vehicle produced in mass has earned him a traditional position in history as the creator of the first French tank. This is put into perspective by his limited involvement in its technical design; as early as January 1916 the actual completion was entrusted to a ministerial bureau headed by General Léon Augustin Jean Marie Mourret, director of the Army automobile service. Mourret did not closely cooperate with Estienne, who was essentially excluded from decisions of a technical nature."--MWAK (talk) 13:51, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Historical research has recently be published, of sufficient importance to lead to some changes and additions to this article, as it happens mainly to the chapter under dispute. In view of this I propose to adopt for the time being my two suggestions; the other two points will in all likelihood be made irrelevant by the new information.--MWAK (talk) 13:52, 28 July 2013 (UTC)

Bit of a snag.

Something that occurs to me is that the Schneider isn't actually, by the definition in Wikipedia and elsewhere, a tank. It's somewhere between an armoured fighting vehicle and a self-propelled gun. Come to that, the same applies to the Saint-Chamond, the A7V, . . . and all the British "tanks" of 1916-18. What should we do about that? Hengistmate (talk) 09:19, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Nothing, the sources all call them tanks.GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:27, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Hello, Mr. Leggett. Funnily enough, just as your contribution arrived I was looking at one of your edits from a while back, in the article about the Mk V tank, and wondering about it. Anyway, you raise an interesting point. As you say, almost all sources in English call them tanks. (Well, I do recall one author saying that both the Schneider and Saint-Chamond were, strictly speaking, self-propelled guns, but I can't recall who, and, anyway, it might not count as a significant minority view.) But sources can be misleading, incomplete, or outdated, something you know as well as anyone. On the other hand, the French don't call them tanks; they call them "chars," and even though the article is in English, it's about a French thing. I realise we don't necessarily use French terms in an article in English, but that does illustrate something. Both the British and the French invented something (you'll remember the discussion we had about whether it was fair to say that, which ended, after a bit of a struggle, in consensus that it was, as the sources pointed out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Tank/Archive_6#Country_of_Origin.) and gave it a name - "tank" or "char." The invention subsequently changed in nature - it adopted a turret - but the name continued to be applied to it. So the names that Colonels Swinton and Estienne gave it were transferred to something that was different in a crucial way. It's probably a bit like the way "automitrailleuse" changed its meaning during WWI. That was surprisingly difficult to explain, but we got there https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Renault_FT#Nomenclature and everyone eventually grasped it. So now we have a new definition of what a tank is, but for the moment it doesn't exclude what are now non-tanks, because there's nowhere for them to go. But then comes the rise of the self-propelled gun, and the first, non-turreted, "tanks" are reclassified, retrospectively. The turret is a sine qua non. All tanks and SPGs are AFVs, though not all AFVs are tanks or SPGs. The problem is that someone reading the Wikipedia definition of a tank ("Modern tanks are strong mobile land weapons platforms, mounting a large-calibre cannon in a rotating gun turret") might wonder why Wikipedia is describing as a tank something that doesn't meet its own definition, and might make an issue of it. There are some people who will do that. It will do no harm, at the very least, to anticipate and answer any such objections. (In fact, thinking back, I believe it was I who inserted the word "modern" into the definition, for that very reason. IIRC it was reverted, but one expects that, and it is now, I believe, a useful qualification.)

One of Wikipedia's purposes, theoretically, is to provide comprehensive, accurate information for those in search of knowledge, and I think that the addition of this small clarification furthers that end. I shall add something to that effect, explaining that, although not a tank by today's definition, the CA is generally included in the category, something that, as you so speedily pointed out, is confirmed by many reliable sources. Hengistmate (talk) 11:00, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Revising the description of the CA1 to reflect modern prejudices is completely the wrong way to go about it. You start by establishing your base fact ie stating that the first tanks were indeed tanks (anything else is ridiculous) and then you check subsequent references to "tank" and correct them to reflect this base fact if they disagree. What you do not do is assume that an incorrect definition in the present is correct and then change the history to fit it. --Chanelek (talk) 20:09, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

Well, definitions are conventional and change through time. They cannot be "correct" or "incorrect", they can only be "current" or "incurrent". As an encyclopedia, we can't decide what definitions are reasonable, we can only reflect how they were applied at some time. Several sources make the point that the Schneider CA isn't a tank in the modern sense so we have to report that. It is also true that it is generally called the first French tank, so we report that too. Of course, there can be legitimate differences in emphasis between which to choose. If we first simply call it "the first French tank" and then explain that it is an assault gun by modern standards but for historical reasons has kept the status of tank, would that be acceptable to you?--MWAK (talk) 21:18, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

And yet......Stridsvagn 103 is a tank.... DMorpheus2 (talk) 21:25, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

MWAK - Your belief that definitions should change over time is at the heart of this and it is clear you have a bias for current views revising how we describe the past. In some cases this may be appropriate and I'm not totally against that but in the case of tanks we have an absolute baseline of what tanks are (I'm including the first British tanks and the CA1 in this), those were the first tanks and they were tanks, they are the baseline from which all other tanks follow and how we describe them should not and need not be revised in any way because of any subsequent developments or subsequent categorisation of similar AFVs. It strikes me that you are very keen on the revisionist approach to this and should really have to justify that more than you have. That said, what I am looking for is an opening paragraph that simply states that early tank baseline eg. ...early tank... WW1..1st French tank. Then somewhere down the text (not in the opening paragraph) it can reference that it would likely be categorised as an assault gun by modern standards - I actually see that as a valid point of interest. I do not like your "for historical reasons has kept its status as a tank" as this emphasises the modern view over that historical baseline ie. it keeps its status as a tank because it was a tank. --Chanelek (talk) 22:52, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

That definitions change is not something I propagate; it's a simple fact :o). But you are right that applying a modern concept would always be anachronistic in some respect and that it might be inappropriate to highlight it in the lead. Furthermore, as DMorpheus2 pointed out, there are in fact two modern definitions, one based on the construction of the tank, whether it has a turret or not, the other on its tactical function, whether a tracked vehicle is the main direct fire weapon system within its organisation. In view of that ambiguity, I'll make an attempt to adjust both lead and main text.--MWAK (talk) 05:59, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

All fair. Thanks for your time and flexibility. This does raise a flag for me re something that might need further scrutiny; ie the various modern definitions of what a tank is. One thing I am certain of is that any definition of "tank" that does not embrace all AFVs that we know to be tanks prior its drafting is wrong or at least incomplete. --Chanelek (talk) 17:38, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Boirault's 1917 Experiments.

I think that Touzin is either wrong or misquoted here. Schneider and Renault declined to support Boirault and would not participate in or supply vehicles for his trials. Boirault's drawings show a completely new tank, designed by FAMH (Saint-Chamond) with double tracks and what appear to be 75s in turrets. His idea was for an amphisbaenic vehicle with a central power plant and tanks coupled at either end. When costs became prohibitive, he drew up an alternative using three existing or modified Saint-Chamonds. Malmassari covers it in some detail, and has made scale models of both designs. Hengistmate (talk) 11:45, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

I can't recall this. Where exactly has Malmassari written about it?--MWAK (talk) 12:53, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Les chars de la grande guerre, Steelmasters 37, GBM 106, et al. Hengistmate (talk) 13:50, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Good catch! I'll update the article immediately.--MWAK (talk) 15:16, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Rôle

@MWAK: I found no evidence that "rôle" is British English. It's an alternative spelling of "role" (OED entry "rôle"), and plainer is better per WP:MOS. Paradoctor (talk) 20:28, 17 August 2016 (UTC)

The matter is of little importance; but the MOS seems to have no such rule regarding the spelling of words.--MWAK (talk) 05:32, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

"Plain English works best. Avoid [...] jargon"

My impression from a cursory web search is that the French spelling is on the way out even where it is still permissible. Usage certainly bears that out, at a ratio of ~1:600. Neither Macmillan nor the Cambridge British English dictionaries even list the French spelling. Paradoctor (talk) 15:08, 18 August 2016 (UTC)

@MWAK: In the meantime, I noticed that several other contributors prefer "role".[1][2][3][4] If you don't continue the discussion, I'll take that as a sign that you concede that the rough consensus is for "role". Paradoctor (talk) 23:08, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

I admit it has probably become too old-fashioned...I must emphasise though, that it has nothing to do with "plain English" or "jargon" in the sense of the MOS.--MWAK (talk) 13:08, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Then changing it to "role" is ok with you? Paradoctor (talk) 17:15, 25 August 2016 (UTC)

Well, I won't revert it ;o). Thank you for your civilised handling of the issue!--MWAK (talk) 06:04, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

Same to you. :) Paradoctor (talk) 12:43, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

Tanks or not.

This is a bit of a rerun of Section 3 above, but it's been raised again by the exchange of edits on June 2nd & 3rd. It is true that the definition of "tank" on Wikipedia is a vehicle with, amongst other things, a revolving turret, caterpillar tracks, and a large gun. At the same time, many Wikipedia articles describe as "tanks" vehicles that are missing one or more of those components, including almost all First World War "tanks". That contradiction requires clarification. IMO an explanation such as MWAK's should be a footnote in all articles about "tanks" that are outside the modern definition. Otherwise, Wikipedia would be contradicting itself, and that would never do. Hengistmate (talk) 22:30, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

Well, apart from Wikipedia's coherence ;o), it is simply a point many books make and a relevant aspect. But perhaps there are good reasons not to mention this aspect. I invite user Chanelek to discuss them here so that we can reach consensus.--MWAK (talk) 06:53, 4 June 2017 (UTC)

I think subsequent events show that we can now safely assume this person has no object other than trollery. Hengistmate (talk) 16:05, 4 June 2017 (UTC)

He might a Frenchman who feels offended that the first French tank is demoted to a mere AFV :o). Quite possibly he isn't even aware of the talk page or the 3R rule. I'll invite him more directly.--MWAK (talk) 20:00, 4 June 2017 (UTC)

You are pushing a revisionist view which attempts to reclassify historical things (in this case AFVs) according to modern prejudices. To consider/describe an early tank (the first French tank) as anything other than a tank based upon a modern, revised aspect of what a tank should be based on a comparison with modern AFVs is bogus. An a entirely incorrect way of viewing this historical entity and rewriting history to a degree. It is OK and even useful to refer to your comparison with modern AFVs somewhere down the text but the opening paragraph should state clearly what the CA1 was ie. The Schneider CA 1 (originally named the Schneider CA) was a tank developed in France during the First World War and was the first tank developed by France (how is that clear, concise opening paragraph "trollery" ?).

Your comment re demoting the tank to an AFV is telling as it assumes that reclassifying such things is reasonable and within your remit whereas I am receiving some criticism from those here for insisting on its correct status of tank remaining unchanged. It should be your revisionist doctrine that is in question here rather than mine. I have also added a comment to section 3 above regarding what I believe to be the correct methodology. --Chanelek (talk) 20:10, 12 June 2017 (UTC)

No Consensus Here.

Time for some BRD and to explain again why this distinction is necessary. What isn't necessary is to discuss it in two or three different places.

First of all, this is nothing to do with revisionism, prejudice, doctrine, demotion, or any other hysterical term. Nothing is prejudged, and history has already done its own revision, which is what we are reporting here.

The term "tank" was adopted in 1915, as a security measure, to describe whatever was going to emerge from Foster's workshops in Lincoln, which turned out to be "Mother". It was subsequently applied by English-speakers (and by some French- and German-speakers) to a great many vehicles that had broadly the same purpose as Mother. The distinction between "tanks" and "armoured cars", incidentally, was established at this point.

By 1918 dozens of types of "tank" had been built or planned. Then from the 1920s, as tracked military vehicles became more specialised, more specific names were applied to them: self-propelled gun, tankette, armoured personnel carrier, tank destroyer, and so on. The classification "tank" became confined to the definition given by Wikipedia: "an armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat, with heavy firepower, strong armour, and tracks . . . mounting a large-calibre cannon in a rotating gun turret, supplemented by mounted machine guns or other weapons."

That distinction was made decades ago. Now, someone consulting Wikipedia as if it were a real encyclopaedia might well be surprised to see that many vehicles that Wikipedia calls tanks, such as the Schneider CA1, don't conform to Wikipedia's own definition of tanks, missing at least one of the criteria. One of them hasn't even got tracks. Fortunately, it's a simple matter to incorporate a short footnote to explain the contradiction. To paraphrase: "This wouldn't be called a tank nowadays, because the definition has changed over the years, but it is generally referred to as a tank, and we shall, therefore, do so for the purposes of this article."

All tanks are AFVs, but not all AFVs are tanks. Is the Mark IX tank a tank? Or is it an AFV? Or is it an armoured personnel carrier? According to Wikipedia it is all three. What do you think? And the argument isn't that definitions should change over time; it's that they have changed. This is no different from reporting that Elton John's real name is Reginald Kenneth Dwight but then going on to refer to him in the article as Elton John.

There is nothing Orwellian about this. It's just an attempt to improve Wikipedia's credibility. On this occasion, no one is rewriting history, although Wikipedia does plenty of that.

BTW, the same applies to the Stridsvagn 103, which someone always brings up in a mildly triumphant way. "It is not a tank by the present-day definition, but is generally described as such." In other words, what it already says in the article.

By Wikipedia's definition, which reflects popular understanding, the "first French tank" would be the FCM 1A, unless you count the FCM A and the 1030 variant of the Schneider CA3, which were never built.

If I get the time, I shall apply this principle to all the early "tanks" that don't meet Wikipedia's criteria. That would be Little Willie, "Mother", the Mk I, Mk II, Mk III, Mk IV, Mk V, Mk V*, Mk V**, Mk V & VI mock-ups, Mk VII, Mk VIII, Mk IX, Medium Mk A, B, C, & D, the Levavasseur Project, the CA, most of the CA3 projects, the various Saint-Chamonds, the Renault FT (unless you count the 37mm as a "large cannon") & BS, the Peugeot, the A7V and A7Vu, K-Wagen, LKI & II, all the U.S. prototypes and the M1917, plus, I'm sure, several more that slip my mind at the moment. I'm afraid the FCM 1A will have only the Fiat 2000 for company.

So, Chanelek, you're telling the wrong people. We're reporting what happened. It's the people who changed the definition you need to speak to. I'm restoring the explanation, but am happy to take it to a content dispute. Hengistmate (talk) 13:24, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

The Schneider was certainly a tank; it was known as such at the time. Whether wikipedia defines the term 'tank' to include AFVs such as the Schneider or Strv 103 is irrelevant since wikipedia is not an RS. Likewise, the FT is often mentioned as the first tank with a turret, i.e., not the first tank, just the first one with a turret. Let's not get hung up on 'turreted' or not; to me to key feature is the intended tactical role.

The Schneider is included in any history of early tanks. There is no need for anything less than a bold statement with no caveats here.

Perhaps the tank article is what needs to be changed, but, that's an issue for a different talk page isn't it?

Regards, DMorpheus2 (talk) 13:34, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Hengistmate let's discuss without repeated personal attacks please. Thank you. DMorpheus2 (talk) 13:59, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

The distinction, in itself a valuable one, is now mentioned two paragraphs further-on in the lead. As most sources refer to the Schneider as the "first French tank", it's perfectly acceptable to say so in the first sentence. This is a reasonable compromise and by this we have satisfied the Wikipedia assignment to reach consensus.--MWAK (talk) 19:04, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

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