Talk:Lend-Lease Sherman tanks

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Contents 1 Article name and first photograph 2 Grizzlied veteran 3 Ram 4 Lend Lease to Canada? 5 Soviet Usage 6 Fixed Glaring (Blinding) Errors 7 New Zealand 4th Armoured Brigade 8 Combat Performance Section

[edit] Article name and first photograph

Is it really a good idea to show a Canadian Sherman in an article on Lend-Lease. Canada didn't receive Lend-Lease aid in World War Two.--Ggbroad 11:56, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Reading further, I understand that the article wants to be clear about Allied variants of the Sherman, but surely it's confusing to include, for instance, Canadian Grizzlies - as these were, once again, not received under Lend-Lease. --Ggbroad 12:05, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Hello. You could change the article name to "Allied Shermans" but someone could complain that the United States is not covered here even though it was an Ally. Canada not being an official, direct recipient of Lend-Lease does not address the issue of Canada's use or non-use of Lend-Lease tanks so it would be nice if we had documents or sources for the claim that Canadian troops never used a single Lend-Lease Sherman. Thank you.Wikist 20:28, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, the title is just not right. Canada was a major Lend-Lease provider of Valentine tanks and universal carriers, but I don't know if any Canadian Shermans were shipped out.

How about moving this to Sherman tanks in foreign service during World War II? —Michael Z. 2006-11-22 18:04 Z

A Britisher would consider the US Army as "foreign service." Non-US WWII Sherman tanks might be OK with the current title (a good search phrase) as a redirect.

However, Canada did not give "Lend Lease" but if you count Canada's mutual aid program to Britain as "lend lease" then you understand how someone might call (and search for) US mutual aid to Canada as "lend lease" (i.e. technically a different program but in the spirit of Lend Lease's loose definition). Moreover, as I mentioned earlier, I am hesitant to repeat the common claim that Canada never used any Lend Lease because I have no confirmation that Canadian units did not receive actual Lend Lease Shermans from British depots or British units as a result of UK-Canadian mutual aid (US to UK to Canada).Wikist 18:50, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Note: The Grizzly was not a Lend-Lease tank, and should not be listed as such. They were built entirely in Canada, and no Grizzlies were subject to Lend-Lease. In fact, only four (4) M4 medium tanks were supplied to Canada by the U.S. under Lend-Lease during the entire war!

14thArmored 1000 Hours, 26 November 2006

Could I get a source with a page reference for the claim that Canada received four tanks under the auspices of Lend-Lease? I can't find it in the Official History of the Canadian Armoured Corps or any other Canadian source. I believe you, but I'd like to examine the documents myself.--Ggbroad 22:15, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Per your request, the source is now cited in the article. It is not one of the official U.S. Army histories, known as the Green Books, and published by the U.S. Army Center of Military History. It is one of the sources from which certain material in the Green Books is derived. There are, I think, almost 100 volumes in the series, including special studies and reports. I have most of them, but not all.

I had just come to the decision that you were a reasonable person with whom I could have an effective and productive dialogue about substantive matters when I noticed that you were voicing support for those plotting to have me banned. Please remember there are always two sides to every situation. 14thArmored 2220 Hours, 20 December 2006

Thanks for the citation. Given that nearly 50,000 Shermans were manufactured, the fate of 4 is probably not worth much investigation. But it is an odd case, given that Canada is usually described as not having received any Ledn-Lease.--Ggbroad 00:51, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

A little page flipping revealed a fair number of what I call "drips and drabs" of lend-lease equipment and supplies "charged" to Canada. I suspect there is more here than meets the eye, and it is possible that the source is actually listing Mutual Aid items in error or there was an obscure mechanism for Lend-Lease that I am missing. (There is very little explanatory text, mostly just tabulations.) Maybe it is as simple as Roosevelt saying "ship it" and the items fell under Lend-Lease for that reason. 14thArmored 2220 Hours, 20 December 2006

Under the terms of the Hyde Park agreement a significant quantity of military equipment built in Canada for the UK was charged to the UK's Lend-Lease account. In effect, the US gov't was paying for the British to buy things from Canada. This was a very magnanimous gesture on the part of the US gov't (the White House, really) to relieve all kinds of fears the Canadian gov't had about balance-of-trade, and about losing British war-orders to US suppliers. It may be that the Lend-Lease items in question - those "dribs and drabs" you speak of, were manufactured in Canada and then, for whatever reason, taken by the Canadian armed forces - for evaluation purposes or whatnot. I dunno. Like I said, it's a curious case even if not very important. It's curious because I just can't think of a reason why the Canadian Army would say, "damn…we're four tanks short and Lend-Lease is the only way we can get them." Another possibility is that in early 1943 the Canadian army conducted a series of trials evaluating Rams vs Shermans, it may be that the four Shermans they got were skimmed off the top of Britain's Lend-Lease orders for those trials. I know that it wasn't uncommon for production from Detroit to be shipped by rail through Canada to Halifax.--Ggbroad 13:14, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

I think you are on to something with the suggestion that selected items may have been provided to Canada for the purpose of comparative testing and evaluation. It is also possible that some things were sent in small quantities to serve as examples of items to be manufactured in Canada. For example, I came aross a very small number of 20mm gun mounts that were charged to Canada. The number is just too small to be of any military value, and in light of your thought, they may have been sent to serve as production models. As you said, four tanks are not very important, but how they came to be charged to Canada under Lend-Lease is interesting. Please let me know if you come up with anything concrete or otherwise, and I will do the same. 14thArmored 1000 Hours, 21 December 2006

Hello. We know the Grizzly was not Lend Lease and the article does not list Grizzly as a Lend Lease tank. See Ggbroad's posts above, see the article's first paragraph, and see the article's Canada section. The article is designed like many other Wikipedia articles (e.g. the M7 is in 3-inch M1918 gun even though the M7 is not an M1918) but we are entertaining new title suggestions. Thank you.Wikist 13:22, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

The title of the article includes the words "Lend-Lease." For this rather obvious reason, the Grizzly should not be mentioned in the article. The four Shermans I mentioned above should be referenced. Source: "Lend-Lease Shipments of WWII", War Department. 14thArmored 0900 Hours, 29 November 2006

Hello to everyone on the team. It’s worth noting that Hunnicutt’s Sherman: A History of the American Medium Tank includes M2s, M3 Lees, Grizzlies, Rams, Canadian tanks, tank destroyers, personnel carriers, and self-propelled guns—but including all those non-“Sherman,” non-“American,” and non-“tank” vehicles in a more semantically accurate book title would be a mouthful. Likewise, the Wikipedia T-34 article would be a similar mouthful if its article title had to itemize every non-“T-34” listed in the article (or most Wikipedia vehicle articles will have to append “and related vehicles” to their titles). However, if most editors think that a change is necessary, I still have no objections to a broader title as Michael and I were discussing. Thank you.Wikist 16:13, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Grizzlied veteran

Maybe I'm being fussy, but I changed Grizzlies to Grizzlys. They aren't bears, so the "-ys" is correct. Trekphiler 15:27, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

That's just a misspelling. The plural of grizzly is grizzlies, capitalized or not.

I suppose you are one of those who refers to more than one computer mouse as "mouses" for some reason. —Michael Z. 2006-11-22 17:53 Z

I expect that usage experts can argue but "ys" would be used for a proper noun (usually a name of an individual) but here we have a class name so "ies" might be better (just as "Grizzly" for the bear is a class name, not the name of an individual bear). A rule of thumb is "ies" for plural if using "the" before the singular noun makes sense ("the Grizzly was a Canadian Sherman" but you would not say "the Sally was a Canadian soldier"). If an individual Grizzly was named "Sally," you might refer to hypothetical "Sallys" (plural of a proper noun, whether or not Sally was a bear or a tank).Wikist 19:10, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Why do you think that a noun made proper loses its normal pluralization and has some new awkward form fabricated for it? Is there a reference supporting this?

The Sally argument is a red herring. Words are pluralized they way they are pluralized, and that's all there is to it: Hawker Furies, Brewster Buffaloes, Chrysler Town and Countries. —Michael Z. 2006-11-23 17:20 Z

Hello. The reference is The Chicago Manual of Style, 15th ed., p. 150 so I understood the editor's reasoning for "ys" even if I think there is a weaker case for applying "ys" to a class name. Thank you.Wikist 04:49, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't have access to a copy. What does it say?

If it's suggesting how to form the plurals of proper names, then that has nothing to do with this. The dictionary already tells us that the plural is grizzlies. Capitalizing it doesn't turn it into some new unrelated word. —Michael Z. 2006-11-26 18:37 Z

R.P. Hunnicutt uses the term "Grizzlies." This is consistent with correct usage according to the dictionary. It is a little perplexing to read that someone might think the "Grizzly" is a "class" of tank. It is not. It is merely a Canadian variant of the M4A1 medium tank meant to replace the Ram II. 14thArmored 1000 Hours, 26 November 2006

"The Chicago Manual of Style," Section 6.7 states: "Plurals of nouns ending in "y" preceded by a consonant are formed by replacing the "y" with "ies." 14thArmored 1000 Hours, 28 November 2006

Section 6.7 is about brackets according to the 15th ed. (p. 242). Section 5.18 says to use "ys" for plural proper nouns (15th ed., p. 150), Trekphiler's point was that the dictionary gives the plural for bears but not vehicles, and NATO uses "Grizzlys" for plural vehicles ( http://www.nato.int/sfor/indexinf/114/p07a/t0107a.htm ) so Trekphiler wasn't completely crazy. Thank you.Wikist 13:22, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I am using the 14th edition of "The Chicago Manual of Style," but I will bet you dollars to dougnuts that the 15th edition says exactly the same thing. No offense, but I think this is another case of your misunderstanding a source, willfully or otherwise, just like your use of Zaloga's comments about the 75mm gun (HE) on the Sherman Talk page. See "plural anomolies" in "A Dictionary of Modern English Usage" by H.W. Fowler, pp. 456-457 or for that matter, almost any freshman (college) text on English grammar. 14thArmored 0900 Hours, 29 November 2006

I see this is more controversial than I dreamed. I've seen "-ys" as the preferred form somewhere, but I can't cite a source. It's because it's a proper noun, & more accurately a name, that I use it. It's not "Kennedies" or "Kerries", but "Kennedys", after all. Trekphiler 03:43, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

BTW, Michael, thanks for the tip on Fury & T&C. I changed them, too (with a link back here so anybody who's as nutty about this as us ;) can complain here, where we're well underway...). Trekphiler 14:33, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't want to open this old can o'worms, but I finally got 'round to checking, and the Official History of the Royal Canadian Armoured Corps calls them Grizzlies, and so does the Official History of the Department of Munitions and Supply. It seems to me that the argument over grammatical correctness is moot - what matters is what the people who built, owned, and used them named them, and they named the Grizzlies. It may not be grammatically correct, but it's historically correct.--Ggbroad 19:31, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Hello. I still have no problem with "Grizzlies" since I gave 2 reasons in favor of it on 11/22/06. Lengthy debate of the "ys" rule could be done on a grammar or style page since it has global ramifications. Thank you.Wikist 20:11, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ram

I should point out as well that the Grizzlies were not intended to replace the Ram per se - the Sherman was intended to replace the Ram; the Grizzly I was a very short (less than 250) production run of Canadian Sherman M4A1s with a few very slight mods made quite late in the war.--Ggbroad 22:54, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

R.P. Hunnicutt, "Sherman: A History of the American Medium Tank," p. 131 states that the Grizzly I was "intended to replace the Ram II...." and that specifications were issued for the production of this tank in September 1943. He goes on to say that 188 Grizzlies were produced by the end of production in December 1943. 14thArmored 1000 Hours, 28 November 2006

Yeah, I know, fair enough. In fact, the decision to replace the RAM with American-built Shermans was made well before then. I quote: "As early as August 1942, however, AGL McNaughton, commander of the First Canadian Army, had decided that standardization of tank forces and production on a North American basis should be acheived as quickly as possible, and that the American M-4 Sherman, by then rolling off American assembly lines in huge numbers, would be the tank of choice" from Graham Broad, "The Ram and Canadian Tank Production" journal of Canadian Military History, Volume 11, No. 1, Winter 2002, p 24-36. Disclaimer: I wrote this article but my research (on that issue, anyway) was solid. By the time specs were issued for the Grizzly, trials testing the Ram against the Sherman had been made, Ram production had stopped, and the Canadian army was already beginning to receive M4s.--Ggbroad 17:11, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Lend Lease to Canada?

One person says Canada had no Lend Lease Shermans and another person says that Canada did have Lend Lease Shermans. Can we please get verifiable sources with specific page references for these claims? Thank you.Wikist 13:22, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I suspcect there's some confusion over what "Lend Lease" means in context. M4s (among other equipments) were provided to Canada under what (I think) was a separate deal akin to "Lend Lease", not the main program, nor as part of the British alotment, nor transferred from Britain. They thus didn't technically fall under "Lend Lease", but could be (tho I'm not sure docs ever did) referred to as "Lend Lease" equipment. (Don't ask me to cite a source; I'd have to check at least three dozen books to find it...) Trekphiler 03:49, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

To my knowledge, the four Shermans in question (which I believe were used in a series of tests to compare the Sherman to the performance of the Ram), are the extent of Lend-Lease that Canada received, but I could be mistaken. The Canadian government did not request Lend-Lease aid during WWII. Unlike the UK, Canada was not broke in WWII and Canadian industry was in many cases able to oversupply the armed forces - the great majority of Canadian war materiel in WWII was exported, mostly to the UK under the auspices of Canada's own version of the Lend-Lease program, Mutual Aid. Why these four Shermans were supplied to Canada under Lend-Lease I do not know, and I'd never heard of it before a week or two ago. The person who added this info has the US official histories, so I trust that he is correct. --Ggbroad 13:53, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

The GM locomotive plant in London, ON, actually built tanks and armoured vehicles. 64.26.148.218 00:15, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

There was no GM locomotive plant in London Ont during WWII.--Ggbroad 04:04, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Soviet Usage

Virtually every source I have, including Russian ones, show only M4A2s sent to the USSR via Lend-Lease. The number is just over 4,000, as cited in Zaloga and others over and over. The recent edit showing an additional 1000 M4, M4A1, M4A5 (Rams? Canadian Lend-Lease to the USSR?) and M4A4 is unusual when compared to most sources. If there is some source documenting this new info, let's see it so we can improve the article with this newly-discovered information. Every single Soviet Sherman photo I've seen has clearly been an M4A2. If the other variants were sent, this is truly interesting. DMorpheus 22:54, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Boy howdy. It's really tough responding to your question especially since you and Wikist never answer mine. Tell you what. You try being honest about answering questions put to you, and I'll see what I can do. 14thArmored 23:16, 18 December 2006

Zaloga, huh? Here's a rule of thumb for you. If the book is long on pictures, and really short on pages, it is probably not too thorough, and therefore not very dependable. PS This is really fun. 14thArmored 23:16, 18 December 2006

May I please once again urge you to follow wikipedia policies on WP:civil, WP:assume good faith, and especially WP:NPA. Your contributions are much more likely to be accepted and discussed productively if you can be a bit more civil about expressing them, and refrain from attacking other editors. Wikipedia works best by teamwork; when you got your account, you agreed to allow others to edit your work.

Zaloga is a perfectly legitimate source. No source is foolproof, but this one cannot be dismissed merely by assertion. Show a specific source proving him wrong and we'll have the issue resolved nicely. Since you are attempting to overturn a rather widely-published piece of content, you have the burden to show where it is in error. For example, a single photo of an M4-series vehicle in Soviet service that is *not* an M4A2 would support your edit.

Specifically on the Rams, you have dropped that part of your edit. Do you have evidence of Canadian Lend-lease shipments of Rams to the Red Army? Or is that portion of your edit a non-issue now?

Here's hoping for a productive and civil exchange. DMorpheus 15:20, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree that a tad more civility on the part of that editor would be appreciated. As for the Ram, I know for 100% certain that none were exported from Canada to the Soviet Union (Canada sent the Soviet Union Valentine tanks), and in case, if we're talking specifically about Lend-Lease, it doesn't really apply Canada had its own aid program - called Mutual Aid, although I don't believe that the Valentines were sent under those auspices.--Ggbroad 15:31, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

If Zaloga is a "perfectly legitimate source" please prove it by providing a positive review of his Sherman books by an academic military historian. I can't find one. If the professionals do not bother with performing a review, chances are the work is not a "legitimate source" of information. Sometimes the pros review books and conclude they are useful only to novices and are best suited for consumption by the general public. That means the books are not "legitimate sources." You are operating at the noviciate level, and that severely hinders what you know, and what you understand.

You would do well to remember, or learn if you do not know, that Great Britain served as a re-distributor for U.S. Lend-Lease. When you do, you will understand how the USSR received more M4 medium tanks, with gasoline engines, than is usually seen in the works written for the "general public."

Do you guys know the relationship between Lend-Lease Agreements and Mutual Aid Agreements? Did you know that virtually all of the United Nations signed Mutual Aid Agreements, not just Canada?

And what about Reverse Lend-Lease? 14thArmored 23:16, 19 December 2006

Hi. We're just trying to produce a better article. There's no reason to insult people. As a point of logic, a book's legitimacy is not contingent upon whether or not it has been reviewed in an academic journal. The journals can only review a fraction of what is published. I say this as an academic historian who has reviewed many books. I can't speak to other mutual aid programs, but Canadian Mutual Aid refers to a very specific program of the Canadian government, chaired by Canada's Minister of Munitions and Supply, that operated from May 1943 to the end of the war. I'm not aware of a formal relationship between it and other mutual aid programs. I do know that no Rams or Canadian-built Shermans were supplied to the Soviet Union under is auspices.--Ggbroad 18:30, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Let's see. You claim to be an academic historian, yet you are defending a little book (Zaloga) written for the mass market. How very odd. And you do not think it strange that none of Zaloga's many books written for consumption by the general public has been reviewed by an academician? Very odd indeed, especially in light of the prolific number of reviews published in the JMH over the years. This is all most disconcerting, and does not fit the profile of any professional historian I know. Your other comments make me wonder if you have read Dziuban's "Military Relations Between the United States and Canada, 1939-1945?"

Actually I didn't say a word in defense of Zaloga's book specifically. I simply pointed out that the mere fact that a book has not been reviewed in the academic press does not make it an unreliable book. And I haven't met an academic historian yet who reflexively dismisses everything written for the mass market. Why would they? Many historians write for both academic and popular audiences. Moreover, I repeat, academic journals can only review a small percentage of everything that's published. Anyway, by far the most rigorous fact-checking an article of mine has ever been subjected to was by a mass-market, nonacademic history magazine. As for Dziuban's fifty-year old book, it's an entry in the extensive Official History of the United States Army in the Second World War (which runs to several dozen volumes) and, no, I've never read it, although I think I've consulted it on a couple of things a few years back. The Official Histories are good for reference (that's what they were written for in the first place) - but they're not really all that readable, in my opinion. Certainly I can't imagine sitting down to read one cover-to-cover. Perhaps you have more patience than I do. Anyway, is there some point about the article that's in contention here? --Ggbroad 00:30, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

See User:14thArmored for an additional warning about that user's continuing violations of Wikipedia policy. Thank you.Wikist 03:03, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Said "warning" has been deleted as it is simpley harrassment by Wikist. 14thArmored 02:46, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

US Army Ordnance branch Statistical Work Sheets show distributions and inventories as of 1 Sep 1945. The USSR line is as follows:

M4: 0

M4A1: 0

M4A2 (75mm): 1990

M4A2 (76mm): 2073

M4A3 (75mm): 0

M4A3 (76mm): 0

M4A3E2: 0

M4A4: 2

M4A6: 0

M4/M4A3 (105mm): 0

You must cite your source here. Otherwise, we will think you made it up. Thank you? 14thArmored 03:56, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Please see WP:assume good faith. I agree that citing sources is a good idea - and there are dozens of claims in this article that should be cited before, for instance, the claim that a well-known brigade-level unit fought in an extended campaign. But there's no reason to state that "we" are going to think that people who don't cite claims made them up. Thank you. --Ggbroad 14:41, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Zaloga and Grandsen (1984) show very close figures, though not exactly the same:

M4A2 (75mm): 2007

M4A2 (76mm): 2095

Zaloga's figures are based on shipments, not receipts, and notes 417 "US medium tanks" lost in shipment. There is no way to reconcile the numbers since the loss figure would include M3 Lees.

DMorpheus 03:59, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

That's OK. We should stick with the official War Department report on Lend-Lease. After all, how accurate can a 40 something page picture book like Zaloga's be anyway? 14thArmored 02:49, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Accuracy is not a product of length.--Ggbroad 14:41, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Here's a third source. "Tanki Lend-Liza", M. Kolomiets and I. Moshchanskii, Exprint, 2000. They list only M4A2. The total shown (receipts, not shipments) is 3,664. Given over 400 "US medium tanks" lost en route, it is possible that this figure corresponds closely to the figures cited above. DMorpheus 18:44, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

It may be that the source of the discrepancy (about 4,000 M4A2 in most sources vs. over 5,000 of several types in the current article revision) is the total number of US medium tanks shipped to the USSR, not the total number of M4-series tanks. The total shipments of M3 and M4 series medium tanks is indeed over 5,000.

Zaloga's figures are taken from "U.S. Department of State Report on War Aid" Nov 28, 1945. DMorpheus 18:44, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

The correct total number of M4 Medium tanks sent to the USSR under Lend-Lease is 4,102 according to my previously cited source. I simply mis-typed the total, and was too arrogant, which I hate, to go back to the article to see what all the fuss was about. My mistake also led to the calculation of an incorrect percentage. I have corrected both errors. I am profoundly sorry for the errors, and for the additional trouble they, and I, caused the other editors here. I extend my personal apology to DMorpheus for treating him so unfairly on this issue. Regardless of my errors, I still hold severe reservations about the overall dependability of Zaloga, and urge everyone here to look past the smaller, mass media publications to the benchmark works on which they are based. 14thArmored 00:45, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Mistakes happen. No big deal. One good thing about Wikipedia is that they can be caught and corrected in short order. I certainly agree that all concerned should treat mass-market, unfootnoted coffee-table type publications with care, but I wouldn't be totally dismissive of them, either. For instance, Williamson Murray - admittedly, an academic historian - wrote a truly excellent book called Luftwaffe: Strategy for Defeat, which appears to be a coffee-table book, but which actually advances a highly sophisticated argument for the downfall of the Reich's air force and is well worth reading. --Ggbroad 00:54, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Hello. None of us are perfect, although the possibility of one person (any of us) misreading an unpublished document is why we all leave our original research at the door and put on our reporter hat to report what others have published (whether the green books or Zaloga) Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not. Some sources such as Hunnicutt list Shermans other than the A2 "assigned to" the USSR but allocations were pooled and reshuffled around the world so differing figures don't surprise me. Thank you.Wikist 01:23, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Fixed Glaring (Blinding) Errors

At least well-informed people will not laugh when they see the page now. 14thArmored 1200 Hours 20 December 2006

Deleted harrasment by Wikist. 14thArmored 03:58, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Correcting your errors is not an act of incivility. It is called "editing." 14thArmored 02:39, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New Zealand 4th Armoured Brigade

The 4th Armoured Brigade formed part of the 2nd New Zealand Div and arrived in Italy Oct 22, 1943. See for example Jeff Plowman and Malcom Thomas, "4th New Zealand Armoured Brigade in Italy" in Kiwi Armour, 2000. Composition was three tank battalions (18th, 19th, and 20th NZ Tank Regiments) and one mechanized Infantry Bn ("Motor Battalion" in British usage), 22nd NZ Motor Battalion. This brigade was formed from the old 4th Infantry Brigade. DMorpheus 20:21, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Good for you. Then be my guest and put in the citation. 14thArmored 20:21, 22 December 2006

DMorpheus, please stop removing ^{[citation needed]} requests from the article. It would be much more helpful if you would be good, and add the requested information. Thank you. 14thArmored 02:42, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

The back-and-forthing on this issue is not productive for anyone. The article is about Lend-Lease Shermans, not about the composition of the New Zealand Army; this is at best a peripheral issue. Frankly it is a trivial point. Please refrain from commenting on editors. DMorpheus 15:03, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Combat Performance Section

This section is rather short here. I wonder what we can do to improve it without making it redundant to other such discussions on Wikipedia. Perhaps it's a question of stating what Lend-Lease recipients of the tank found.

I'm aware that the subject of the Sherman's operational performance is much debated on another page, but I thought I'd make a few notes here since there is a subheading about it. And I should also like to note that I'm not that kind of historian - I don't know very much about the nuts n' bolts of tanks and whatnot. What I do know is that Terry Copp is considered to be my country's foremost military historian and his recent work on Normandy has earned him an international reputation. Anyway, Terry had a close look at the 21st Army Group's Operational Research papers and here he reports what *they* found about the Sherman in British service. Don't yell at me about this, please.

"The ORSs attached to the Armoured Fighting Vehicle School at Lulworth…had established that the Sherman 75 was unlike to destroy any German armor at ranges beyond 500 yards, and that even at shorter ranges no penetration of the frontal armour of anything except a Mark IV was likely. They had also established that the 17-pounder's effective range was limited to about 1,000 yards" (discusses research conducted on hulls of destroyed Shermans and German tanks). "Most of the damage (to Shermans), 77 percent, was done by 75mm guns, just 18 percent by 88s. Almost every shot that hit a Sherman penetrated the armour, and 73 percent caught fire…the contrast to German tanks was striking…only 38 percent of the hits from Sherman 75s or 6-pound antitank guns penetrated German armour, and both the Panther and Tiger often survived one or two penetrations…the sloping front armour of the enemy's Panthers and self-propelled guns survived 75 percent of all direct hits" quoted from Copp, Fields of Fire: the Canadians in Normandy (University of Toronto Press, 2003), 128-129. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Ggbroad (talk • contribs) 14:30, 23 December 2006 (UTC).

Hello. Interesting, the numbers certainly can be added as non-US combat results analyzed and published by a professional author with proper citation (except "striking" is POV). Unfortunately, the numbers aren't all directly comparable but that's why we have Wikipedia policy to gradually improve text or add counter-balancing published sources rather than delete appropriate content and dismantle an article.

In that regard, there is not much reason to try to factor out any Canadian non-Lend-Lease Sherman performance or Grizzly performance from reports such as the one above, so I urge editors to follow Wikipedia:Consensus policy and work with the trend of consensus at the top of this page, which was to broaden the article title rather than make widespread deletions of content. Thank you.Wikist 15:24, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

"Striking" may be POV (at a certain point Wikipedians are going to have to own up to the fact that the moment you open your mouth to speak or begin to type, it's POV) but surely we're not expected to remove POV comments from direct quotations! (Not that I would use a direct quotation in this case anyway.)--Ggbroad 16:37, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

As I understand it, it could stay if inside quotes, if one wants to write that Copp thought it was "striking." I agree with you about pure neutrality but WP:NPOV instructs to let the facts speak for themselves. Thank you.Wikist 17:08, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Interesting indeed. The word "striking" does not necessarily represent a point of view in this context. Just so you will know, a historican's description of historical events might be factually accurate, but his/her analysis is, as Ggbroad says, a point of view. The point is quite simple. There are precious few "facts" to speak for themselves, and putting them into perspective is the job of the editors. Blindly editing out all point of view will inevitably make the articles worse, not better. Editors themselves are not bound by a search for consensus. Consensus inhibits the ability of an article to reach its full potential. This certainly appears to be the case when you argue in favor of more content for an article regardless of the quality or appropriateness of said content. See WP:IGNORE for when and why the consensus approach should be ignored for the sake of improvement. Also try and remember that shorter is often better than longer when writing about almost any subject. Just for the record, you have seriously misinterpreted both the content and intent of WP:NPOV. I urge you to read (re-read?)WP:NPOV with an open mind. It should prove most instructive. 14thArmored 14:10, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

It is noted that the works of Zaloga are too short, too poorly researched, and too unacademic to be depended upon without corroboration, even if they are all a particular editor might have. It defies logic to suggest that Zaloga's work represent "the facts." Even Zaloga refers his readers to Hunnicutt for more information. Clearly Zaloga himself doesn't think he is the last word on the subject either. In turn, Hunnicutt refers his readers who want more in depth information to the very works I've been citing both here and on the Sherman page. Go figure. 14thArmored 02:56, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

The question is how to expand and improve that section. Since the article is about Lend-Lease, I assume that it might include some discussion how Lend-Lease recipients themselves perceived the combat performance of the tank. For instance - how did the Red Army like it? I wonder, too, when did they receive their Shermans? The statistical majority of Lend-Lease arrived pretty late in the war. --Ggbroad 03:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Quite so. There is for example, a very good book by Dmitriy Loza entitled "How Soviets Fought in U.S. Shermans," that might provide some useful information on the subject. A very nice excerpt was published in Armor some years ago. 14thArmored 13:51, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Terry Copp. Copp's description and analysis of the penetration of the 75mm, 76mm, and 17 pdr provided by Ggbroad, above, are fully consistent with the battlefield tests reported by First Army and 12th Army Group, as well as the battlefield experience of U.S. tankers with the 75mm and 76mm guns. An attempt to dismiss this information based on some imagined lack of comparability of figures is merely an effort to stick with a preferred source, Zaloga in this case, to the exclusion of everything else. That my friend, is seriously "Point of View." I understand that it is perhaps the most widely available source, but it is neither only source nor is it the best one. 14thArmored 14:24, 24 December 2006 (UTC)