Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2015 December 2

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December 2

Interwar American Tank theories

I am looking for sources regarding the writings of Adna Chaffee, Eisenhower, Patton for the American viewpoint, DeGaulle for some info on the French theories. Also General Lesley J. McNair for the tank destroyer doctrine.108.214.168.93 (talk) 01:15, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

In terms of Charles de Gaulle, his 1938 book Vers l'armée de métier ("Towards a Professional Army") is where he expounds on the need to integrate battle tanks into French strategic thinking. --Xuxl (talk) 10:47, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

A good way to search for books by a particular person is to type inauthor:"Adna R. Chaffee" (for example) into the Books tab on google. You can then use the Search Tools tab to specify books that are readable online, or just take the results to your library. For McNair, for example, Course in Tactical Principles and Decisions can be bought (I think, maybe its free if you have one of those google accounts) or requested at your library.184.147.121.46 (talk) 18:41, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

For the US perspective, try Camp Colt to Desert Storm: The History of U.S. Armored Forces edited by George F. Hofmann, Donn A. Starry, which has a preview on Google Books. Alansplodge (talk) 11:30, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

The British were rather ahead of the game with their 1927 Experimental Mechanised Force but fell behind because of lack of cash and conflicts over tactical doctrine. The arguments of the two main armour pundits can be found in Studies in British Military Thought: Debates with Fuller and Liddell Hart by Brian Holden Reid. Of course, the book that really made its mark was Achtung Panzer! by Heinz Guderian, published in 1937 before de Gualle's effort which came rather late in the day. Alansplodge (talk) 13:12, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

how fast is a knot=mph at sea by perception

Hi, interested in cannibalism at sea, via the story of the movie and Moby Dick etc, I read the article Essex (whaleship) & found details of the whale which smashed the ship by travelling at 24 knots (44kph). This doesn't seem to be overly fast on land. While the equivalent is given for a low land speed, I'm curious to know why this would be considered fast at sea. Is it just perception? or is it to do with the conditions of that speed being achieved. Thanks in advance, Manytexts (talk) 05:19, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

That's pretty fast for something as massive as a whale, such that it will do considerable damage to whatever it hits. (While your car being hit by another car going that fast might not be deadly, imagine being hit by a tank going that fast, which would smash right through your car.) 05:30, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

Or a locomotive. Basically anything big enough it could crush a smaller object like an eggshell. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:59, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

Blue Riband shows that a passenger liner capable of 24 knots didn't exist until 1907. So that would've been a God speed in 1820. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 06:37, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

• 44 km/h is as fast as a galloping horse, and in 1820 there wasn't really anything on land faster than that (Stephenson's Rocket, the first locomotive to reach those sorts of speeds, wasn't built until 1829). Cars have ruined our speed perception – 30 mph, which feels intolerably slow to a lot of suburban drivers, is galloping horse speed. As for perception, there's not really anything to use as a fixed point in the open sea (waves and clouds move, and land and other ships are usually too far away to provide parallax). All you can feel is the wind in your face, and a 24 knot wind (high wind/moderate gale) will feel pretty damn fast. Smurrayinchester 08:45, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

• Yes, if you have ever been in an open-cabined fishing boat going 30mph, it's pretty damn fast. μηδείς (talk) 21:26, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

I've only been at 10 knots, wasn't 60 feet up, had to stand 2 meters behind the bow and didn't stick my arms out so it seems plausible.

• • Only 21 knots is fast enough to feel like you're flying if the movie Titanic is to be believed (they forgot to even put a fan in front of the bluescreen or something so take that as a sign of their reliability). Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 22:17, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

HMS Victory, still in commission in 1820, "Speed: 8 to 9 knots (15 to 17 km/h) maximum" according to our article. Alansplodge (talk) 11:23, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Thank you all so much! Huge differences involved. So many things I didn't take into account that I can now. Will wind down car windows at slow k's now... Manytexts (talk) 08:49, 5 December 2015 (UTC)

I think the key here is just that air resistance or even dragged-over-the-pavement resistance is practically nothing compared to water resistance. A ship sticks meters down into the water, and that water isn't going to move if something starts pushing the ship sideways. There must be a way that this is quantified in engineering terms, if we have some naval buffs around... Wnt (talk) 14:20, 7 December 2015 (UTC)

Related question about the speed of early steam trains

I tried to find the (possibly apocryphal) story of the British doctor who pronounced that the human body would be unable to survive travelling at more than 30 mph in the first steam trains. Can anybody pin it down for me? Alansplodge (talk) 14:29, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

I can't find the quote but [1]. Which seems ridiculous as the difference between speed and acceleration should've been known since at least Newton and people survived hurricanes and didn't die from the wind and jockeys never reported feeling they would die if the horse could go faster (jockeys go far over 30mph anyway). By what mechanism were they proposing death by 30 mph to happen? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:08, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

I found several similar claims on the web and remember being told the same at school. However, a kind and anonymous poster left the details on my talk page:

'According to L.T.C. Rolt's biography of Isambard Kingdom Brunel (page 113 of the 1970 Pelican edition as reprinted in 1986, ISBN 0-14-007986-6), when the bill to authorize construction of the Great Western Railway was proposed, those looking for reasons to oppose the railway used the gradient in the Box Hill Tunnel as one of them. Rolt writes:

"To those impassioned pleas the egregious Doctor Dionysius Lardner, one of the mainstays of the opposition, added all the ponderous weight of that pseudo-science of which he was one of the first and greatest masters. He had proved by elaborate calculation that if the brakes were to fail as a train entered the tunnel on the falling gradient it would emerge at the other end at a speed of 120 m.p.h., a speed, he added, at which no passenger would be able to breathe. At this Brunel pointed out drily that the factors of friction and air resistance must evidently have become lost in the Doctor's calculations because owing to their combined effect the speed would be 56 miles per hour and not 120. It would appear, however, that the eminent Doctor ... floated through life on an impermeable balloon of self-esteem. So far from accepting his defeat, he returned to the charge on several subsequent occasions though invariably with the same result." (My ellipsis.)'

So there you have it; what I thought was general knowledge turns out to be exaggeration at best. Many thanks to User:76.69.45.64 whoever you are. Alansplodge (talk) 16:28, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Use of military in law enforcement

Why is it that increasingly many developed countries are trying to avoid the use of military for supporting law enforcement, and instead training police to similar levels? Is this more a political move Than anything else? 2A02:C7D:B901:CC00:31BB:E320:9A30:A02C (talk) 22:04, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

It's a human resource issue, among others. If you bring in a bunch of a soldiers to do police work, that's a bunch of police out of jobs and a bunch of soldiers who aren't available for soldiering. Ugrading police training and equipment to military levels creates jobs for trainers and equippers, whom the already-stacked militaries don't need anymore. InedibleHulk (talk) 23:38, 2 December 2015 (UTC)

"Why" questions are difficult to produce direct answers to, unless you're going to go with the "make shit up and provide no references" tactic used by Inedible Hulk above. If you want to read more about the different approaches to policing and the military and crossovers thereof, you can read articles at Wikipedia like Posse Comitatus Act (for the U.S. legal background), Gendarmerie (for the general practice of using military personnel for civilian policing), and Militarization of police for the movement in the other direction (the use by police of military tactics and equipment). We aren't really here to provide you with rationales for your opinions, it's beyond the scope of what this desk is charged with. But we can provide you with reading on subjects you're interested in. If you want to inform yourself on the issues involved, I suggest the three articles I linked to, each of which themselves contain further links to a plethora of reading both within and outside of Wikipedia; certainly enough to keep you busy for some time. --Jayron32 00:34, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

I've turned some of that shit blue. We can't all be Jayron. InedibleHulk (talk) 17:45, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

The OP may also find Military aid to the civil power useful. Tevildo (talk) 08:53, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Some of the problems with having the military provide policing:

1) The military isn't trained at de-escalating a crisis, they are trained to kill. That might work in some cases, but in a hostage crisis which could have been resolved peacefully, going in with guns blazing may not be the best option.

2) If civilians have complaints about the actions of the military, they may have no recourse.

3) Much of the military weapon's training (hand grenades, automatic weapons, tanks, etc.) isn't appropriate for civilian use.

4) The military may be loyal to a particular General, not to the civilian government. Thus, they might do the bidding of that General, like killing off his opposition.

Some of these problems can be fixed, like training the military in peaceful conflict resolution, but eventually you would just end up with a police force that's the military in name only. StuRat (talk) 02:04, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Also, random statements from nowhere without references. I'd be shocked if you weren't so predictable, Stu... --Jayron32 02:08, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

The most obvious reason would be that the police are more familiar with a given local environment. As with today's situation in San Bernardino. Also, as per United States Army, the Army deals with wars, not with normal police business. And I get the drift from Article One of the United States Constitution that the Army in general does not deal with state problems, although it is involved in training the NG. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 02:28, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

The unpleasant experience of the British Army in The Troubles stands as a warning of the difficulties of soldiers trying to be police [2]. Alansplodge (talk) 14:33, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

Similarly, the Ådalen shootings in 1931 led to a long-time taboo against using Swedish military for police duties. Sjö (talk) 15:05, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

It should also be noted that the kind of skills and training necessary for community policing are very different than the skills and training necessary to win battles and secure territory, which may be why governments find it better to use different groups of people for those two different tasks. --Jayron32 17:21, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

If you can't beat 'em, join 'em Contact Basemetal here 17:25, 3 December 2015 (UTC)

• Who objected when StuRat earlier said essentially what Jayron says here? —Tamfang (talk) 05:46, 4 December 2015 (UTC)

Is it still the case that migrants entering a country need to learn major points about the culture of their adopted country to help them settle? For example that, in Australia for instance, the police are not the military. (Even though the uniforms here are combat-style.) Seems to make a distinction for the trust of the community in some way. Can't find a reference though.Manytexts (talk) 08:57, 5 December 2015 (UTC)