Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Peer review/Dreadnought

Dreadnought

This article was first forked from battleship over the summer. I have far from exhausted my to-do list on it but I'm running out of inspiration, hence the peer review. There was a very brief previous peer review since when I have added a whole wodge of technical material (yes, I know, none of it's sourced- that's next on my list). What does everyone reckon? Regards and many thanks, The Land (talk) 18:55, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Mackensen

Well, you've mentioned sourcing, but let me re-iterate that concerning the "super-dreadnought" section. It was always my impression that the first real super-dreadnought was the Queen Elizabeth, because she incorporated 15-inch guns and oil-burning engines. I'm also a little uncomfortable using Robert K. Massie as a source; he's not careful enough in his research. Marder or something like that would be better. Mackensen (talk) 23:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I agree broadly about Massie - I think he's a reasonable source for most thigs but he does drop occasional clangers. I don't have Marder, but I do have the relevant bit of Conway's History of the Ship, which indicates that the Orionss were the first super-dreadnoughts. The Land (talk) 19:37, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Massie is an unreliable source (not much different from a blog). He regurgitates old myths. His books are inadequately footnoted, so it is impossible to know the source of his statements.--Toddy1 18:29, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

The 13.5in and 14in ships were described as super-dreadnoughts.--Toddy1 18:29, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

Kirill Lokshin

As you've pointed out, sourcing is probably the biggest concern at the moment; there are large chunks of the article with very sparse citation, if any. Aside from that, a few other points to look at:

• The image placement needs to be reworked; the multiple images stacked along a single margin near section headers produce all sorts of bizarre floating effects on some browsers.
• The prose is somewhat choppy overall, with many short and even one-sentence paragraphs. I'd try to condense things a bit.
• Some of the sectioning is questionable. Why is the single paragraph on Japan in its own section? I'd actually go so far as to suggest that the "Dreadnought building" section contain only two sub-sections, one for the UK and Germany and one for everyone else.
• The section headings could use a bit of work. "Development of the all-big-gun battleship" is rather too long—why not just "Development"—and leading articles should be omitted.

Hope that helps! Kirill 03:16, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

MBK004

As has been mentioned before, keep working on the sourcing. Other than that, I've uncovered a few things that could use (at least for me) some clarification:

• In the lead: --> The product of British technical superiority and the willpower of Admiral Jackie Fisher, Dreadnought was no bolt from the blue.
  • No bolt from the blue? - What does this mean, perhaps better wording is in order?
• Shouldn't World War I and World War II be wikilinked in the lead?
• Is it really necessary to link to a page multiple times within the article? Isn't one link at the first mention of the term appropriate?
• Long-Range Gunnery section:
  • Wikilinks to Russo-Japanese War, and Naval War College? Could not find any occurrence of these being linked at all in the article.
• The choppy prose and questionable sectioning mentioned by Kirill above is also something I agree with.
• Image placement is also as mentioned above an issue that needs to be resolved.
  • This image: Image:British Grand Fleet 2.jpg needs a proper license tag. Proper image licenses (Fair-Use, PD, etc.) are part of the GA requirements. This is something that was brought up in the GA review of USS Texas (BB-35).

Overall, this is a promising article that I look forward to seeing Featured! -MBK₀₀₄ 07:41, 27 December 2007 (UTC)