Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Peer review/Lince (tank)

Lince (tank)

I have just finished what I consider to be a rough draft, and I'm looking for input on how to improve the grammar (since it was written while looking at various sources and I just wanted to get the ideas down) and how to improve the, admittedly, short article. Thank you. JonCatalan (talk) 01:06, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Leithp

1. A comparison table to contemporary MBTs would be useful. How does it compare to the Leopard 2 that they eventually adopted or the French, British and US tanks they could have gone for? Pretty much what you provided on the Verdeja article would do the trick.
2. Unit conversions: Speeds, mass, power etc
3. Vickers offered the Valiant? Are you sure they didn't offer the Challenger? I'd only heard of the Valiant WW2 tank, so that stuck out.
4. "Coproduction" or "Co-production"?
5. How successful was the testing? The article covers the procurement process extensively, but is light on manufacture and testing. Was it a match for competing tanks? Was that part of the reason the programme was canceled?
6. Perhaps not actionable, but I'm curious that Spain started off with a domestic future tank programme and ended up by adopting last-generation cast-offs from the US. Were there Army cut-backs? What was the reason for the indecision? A change of government? There might be something more to say about that.
7. The infobox gives two figures for length.
8. You mention that the Lince "was almost entirely based on the Leopard 2A4". What is the difference between it and the licence built Leopards that they eventually adopted?

The article looks quite good so far, though.

Leithp 07:03, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

First of all, thank you for your extensive help in both this article and the Verdeja; there are few editors willing to do so much copyediting to transform a relatively poorly written article, into a well written article. Now, on to your points!

1. I added a table with the Lince, Leopard 2A4, Leclerc and M1A1 Abrams. I did not add the Italian MK3, because AFAIK this never entered production either (or did as the Ariete), and the Vickers Valiant since I don't have a good literary source on the vehicle.
2. I converted all the units in the infobox and will convert most of those in the text when I start to clarify the article, and perhaps add some more information (not much more I could find, admittedly).
3. I actually had a problem finding information on the Vickers Valiant, as well, although the referenced article in El País specifically mentions it as the Valiant. I remembered that Vickers presented what was called the Vickers Mark 7/2 to the Chieftain Replacement Program in 1987, but any text I have does not refer to it as the Valiant. So, I did a google search and apparently the Vickers 7 is the Valiant.
4. Changed coproduction to co-production!
5. No prototypes were ever built. I need to clarify in the article that it was mostly a procurement program, leaning heavily on the German offer. For example, had Spain opted to manufacture the Leclerc it would have still be named Lince. I was going to add that the Leopard 2E's battle management system is called the LINCE, but I'm not 100% sure that the acronym was made to 'transfer' part of the 1980s program to the Leopard 2 program.
6. From conversations on Tank-Net the Spanish Ministry of Defense was running out of funding, and as said in the article Krauss-Maffei was not particularly happy about the waste of funds due to the indecision. Apparently, the Spanish Army preferred the Lince but the government did not (in the end, the Leopard 2E was really the better choice, though), as it would cost much more to produce than the Leopard 2. According to those on Tank-Net, this was a similar issue which befell the Italian government when it decided to put the Ariete into production - it could only procure a limited series due to production costs. I believe that with the issues in avoiding a specific contract, pressure from the French government and the availability of cheaper tanks to replace ageing M47s and M48s the Spanish government simply decided to scratch the program and opt for the M60, and later succumbed to pressure from the Army to begin negotiating for the Leopard 2.
7. Oops; thanks. I specified its length gun forward.
8. That's a good idea. When I begin to clarify the article and whatnot I will also add some information on the differences between the two.

Again, thank you! JonCatalan (talk) 10:49, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Ham

(WP:VG collaborator)

• Article name and lead sentence: Is the Lince a "tank" or a "tank program"? This needs to be established clearly so that there is consistency in how the subject is approached. If the Lince is a tank, as the article name suggests, it should be called a tank in the lead sentence. If the Lince was a tank development/acquisition program, without any actual resulting tank, you might consider changing the article name to Lince tank program or similar. In any case, if no Lince tank was actually built, the article needs to be clear that this tank only exists on paper.
• Image captions: these need to be clearer in stating that the pictures are of other tanks, and not Linces. (This goes back to the first point, is there an actual Lince to have a photo of?)
• Second sentence: "received offers" for what?
• General issue throughout article: Try to reduce the alphabet soup wherever feasible. If the difference between an AMX-30E1 and AMX-30E2 isn't relevant to the context of the Lince, just refer to them all as, e.g. "upgraded AMX-30E". To a general audience it appears redundant to continually list minor variations of tank designs and makes the prose harder to follow.
• History section
  • First paragraph might be a little too detailed with the production numbers for previous tanks. I don't think there is a point that the number of existing tanks was a factor for the need to build the Lince, so production details for these other tanks are not necessary and distract from the main issues. It should suffice to say which tanks the army was using at the time and what their deficiencies were.
  • These sentences: By the end of production of the first batch of AMX-30Es in 1979, the Spanish Army were already aware of the mechanical deficiencies of the new tank. As early as 1979 the Spanish Army and the manufacturer, Empresa Nacional Santa Bárbara (now Santa Bárbara Sistemas), began a research program to upgrade the AMX-30 in the areas of mechanical reliability, modernization of the fire control system and an increase in armor protection.[5]
    • can be rephrased as something like In 1979, nearing completion of the first batch of AMX-30Es, the Spanish Army and the tank's manufacturer, Empresa Nacional Santa Bárbara (now Santa Bárbara Sistemas), had already begun a research program to address deficiencies in the new tank such as mechanical reliability, the fire control system and armor protection.[5]
  • I'm not sure what the word "realized" is supposed to mean in the last sentence of the first paragraph. It could be interpreted as "fulfilled" or "recognized".
• Third paragraph: Again perhaps a little too much detail with regard to production numbers of aircraft and the contract history between the countries. The paragraph teases at who gets the contract but doesn't explicitly say who.
• Missing chunk of time. The article jumps from "who is going to get the contract?" to "decline of the program", without describing pertinent events that happen in between, such as how the design of the Lince progressed, etc. Specifically, how did the tank arrive at the specifications listed in the comparison table?
• Decline of the program section
  • Again, a lot of seemingly needless detail regarding numbers of other tanks produced or upgraded.

I hope you'll find some of that helpful. Keep up the good work. Ham Pastrami (talk) 05:09, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, this was very helpful! I will respond, as usual, point by point!

1. This is a tank program. If I move the article do I need to do anything to this peer review, in terms of renaming it? I added a few sentences to mention that no prototype was ever built, but perhaps I could find a way to integrate the sentences better.
2. There is no photograph of the Lince. I was going to lineart an image of what KMW's entry was supposed to look like, but it came out pretty badly. I tried to make sure the images were clearer on what the image is about.
3. Changed it to received bids for the tank program.
4. I tried to take the variant numbers where I thought it was proper. For example, I thought it was proper to keep M60A1/M60A3, because they need to be distinguished in order for the sentence after to make sense. Otherwise, I reverted M47EXX and M48EXXs back to just M47s and M48s where I saw them. The other second has been refrased as suggested. And 'realized' changed to 'recognized'.
5. Production numbers are taken out for those aircraft. The issue is that the Spanish government teased, as well! But, you're right, it should probably be clearer. Neither of the two really got the contract; it was just recognized that KMW had the greater chance at scoring the final production contract.
6. The specifications listed in the table are the same specifications that were given by Krauss Maffei/Santa Bárbara in 1984. They were theoritical specifications for the vehicle, as no vehicle was ever produced. But since this would have been the most likely contract scored, it seems the best to put under 'Lince'. The French offer later became the Leclerc.
7. I changed that section a bit.

I hope it looks better. Thank you! JonCatalan (talk) 10:15, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Izno

"VG editor who saw this posted on WT:VG" - I'm (only) going to "tear apart" the lead, as I don't really have the time to go over the entire article (nor indeed, do I feel it would be effective for one editor to attack the entire thing). I ended up doing most of this before Ham's comments, so if it's duplicated, I'd probably go with what he said. This is my first review, so bear with me (if it seems too harsh, it is not meant to be). =)After writing most of this up, it started sounding like a copyedit may be needed in general, but these specifics should give you an idea of how much improvement can/should be made in that direction:

The first sentence reads a little awkwardly; I suggest that you rephrase it thusly: "The Lince was a tank development program initiated by Spain during the late 1980s and early 1990s." I removed "main" and "battle": the former isn't really necessary in my opinion, and the latter is presumed from the link to tank.

The second sentence introduces a broken general rule my 6th grade teacher taught: "No two sentences in any one paragraph (should) start with the same word" - Keep it in mind for future writings. Obviously the second sentence starts with "the" also; this may be an unintended result of writing in the active voice, but I feel following the rule diversifies the text, even so. My suggestion in this case would be to remove the countries these companies are originating in (this may be unwanted eliminations, so take this into consideration), and to rephrase like so: "GIAT, Genderal Dynamics, Vickers, and Krauss-Maffei Wegmann submitted offers to the Spanish MoD to develop the line." A question which stems from this is "Who won the bid to develop the Lince?" if there was a winner; if there wasn't a winner, the article should state that.

And then you jump right into the reason to develop the tank line without a change in paragraph. Either this is a result of bad organization or simply that you forgot to indent. ;) I'm guessing the former, tbh, which may reflect on the article as a whole, so have a look at how the article is presented.

The next sentence ("During the 1980s...") in general reads haltingly. Another lesson learned: Read the text out loud to yourself. I would suggest these tweaks to the sentence: "In the 1980s the Spanish Army was equipped with a large number of M47 and M48 Patton tanks, and was manufacturing the French AMX-30E indigenously." Another comment I would make if I were certain on it is that the sentence seems to be mixing tenses... Might just be me, however. Should definitely wikilink "indigenous".

The next sentence, and the one after, again begin with "the", but I'm not sure how to replace it in the first without going into the passive voice. You can have a look at it. In the second, I'm not sure if it's the AMX that was in production?... It is a little confusing to say the least. Rephrasing that without the "the" as well as to clear up confusion would be a good idea.

I love the next two sentences, though you're definitely mixing tenses in the first case. Either the whole paragraph should be in the style of "was to put" or it should be "put"; not both. ;)

The next paragraph begins shakily. I would simply edit it to: "In the late 1980s, the Lince program was threatened by the decision to upgrade the Spanish AMX-30Es to the standard of the AMX-30EM1 and AMX-30EM2 models." I'm not quite sure if that endings how I like would like it... but I find it to flow better within the sentence. The next sentence is essentially a runon, however, but I'm not sure how to break it up.

Again, I can't speak for the rest of the article, but I'm guessing it is in the same vain as the Lead: Needs a copy edit, probably a little clarification here and there. Nice work for a rough draft. =) --Izno (talk) 06:19, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Now, to confirm the changes -

1. Apparently, someone reverted it tank back to 'main battle tank'. So, I am confused on which one is preferred.
2. I reworded the sentence (after the edits made for Ham) and changed the beginning of the second sentence to, To gain the contract for the development program the... and I added this, The program ended without a prototype being manufactured and without a clear choice in who would gain the contract...
3. Tbh, it seemed like the sentence was misplaced, so I moved it so that it seemed more relevant to an introduction to the Lince.
4. I just got rid of the sentence altogether!
5. Changed to - At the time the AMX-30E was being manufactured for the Spanish Army, and the Lince was planned to serve along with the AMX-30.
6. I'm not sure how 'was put' would make sense,
7. As per the previous edit, the sentence is changed to, In the late 1980s, the Lince program was threatened by the decision to upgrade Spanish AMX-30Es.

And yes, the rest of the article probably needs to be edited extensively as well. :( But, I will get on that! JonCatalan (talk) 10:31, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Krator

From WP:VG

• The lead image in the infobox is not about the actual tank itself, and doesn't allow for a lot of identification. It may be hard to provide a good image here, but as a suggestion, perhaps the Spanish government has released some images in the public domain during the development and procurement process.
• The first part of the lead concerning the goal of the program to replace tanks through a military assistance programme is much more informative than the first paragraph of the history section on the same topic. The history section itself starts very abruptly: some general introductory statements about tanks in Spain in that period, with appropriate links, would be very informative, instead of starting with an acronym and a patent in a sentence without context.
• The history section reads like proseline; four consecutive paragraphs start with "In (year), ...". This doesn't read really nicely, see the linked article.
• What is 120 bil pesetas in a current currency, at current value? How much is that compared to similar programmes of the time? Just the number doesn't really tell me much.
• the last paragraph of the history section doesn't flow well, use some linking words.
• The paragraph break between the first and the section paragraph of the Decline section would be more appropriate after "...upgraded to the equivalent of the M60." (one sentence later than the current break). Then, you also see that the proseline (see above) continues here, as the new paragraph would again start with a year.
• "While the Lince prioritized firepower..." - at the very end of the article. This would be something to also write much earlier on, when discussing the specifications of the tank.
• On the references, #25 needs additional information, such as author, date and accessdate. Also, the format of the References section could be more succinct if it used Harvard references, where you do not need to use the whole title of the book cited, but just the author, year and page.

User:Krator (t c) 10:38, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to review! As per my style, I will respond point by point with confirmation/information -

1. Unfortunately, the only image I have of the Lince is a drawing. I haven't seen any official schematics published, and currently government archives are not online and are 'difficult' to access (I still have to get my 'historian liscence' to access the military achives at Ávila). As I said above, I tried to draw it and failed misreably! The only bid which was all-new (as in, different from existing tanks of today) was KMW's and this resembled the Leopard 2A4 the most. The information on the infobox also belongs to KMW's bid.
2. I added a bit to the first paragraph of the history section, which I hope makes it a bit more interesting.
3. I reworded and moved some dates around to make it seem less like proseline.
4. Currency converted. The Spanish peseta was pegged at 166.386€ and so, I will convert to € manually and then use a currency convertor to convert to $.
5. Reworded the last paragraph in the history section a tad.
6. Moved the sentence and took out the date.
7. I will expand on this!
8. Gave access date, which is the only thing I could give (no author stated).

JonCatalan (talk) 12:02, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Giggy

For the record, I'm a VG guy.

• It's weird to have an infobox image not of the Lince... you don't have a pic of it?
• Some cases in the lead where stuff other than "The Lince..." would work better... eg. at "To achieve these goals, the Lince adopted..." (...it adopted...)
• "However, the first M47 tanks were delivered in 1954 and their service life was already extended to thirty years" - maybe it's just me, but the meaning of this sentence felt slightly lost (especially the however)... I dunno, read it yourself and see if it's just me confused.
• "The French government proposed a cooperative tank design between the two countries, stating that the resulting tank would be completely new, while the German-Spanish proposition was based on technology developed during the 1970s. On the other hand, the French government admitted that there would be restrictions placed on Empresa Nacional Santa Bárbara when it came to exporting the tank." - Not sure what the purpose of the "on the other hand" is here...
• What, for the unacquainted, is indigenous production?
• "As a consequence, by late 1985 only the German offer, French offer and a similar Italian offer for co-production of a future tank, known then as the MK3, were considered." - the commas here are rather confusing.
• "although this time also offered the more lucrative term of joint export." - reword... perhaps "this time offering the more lucrative term of joint export."
• The footnotes at the bottom of the Comparison to Leopard 2A4, Leclerc and M1 Abrams table are awkwardly placed... dunno, can put them somewhere else, they aren't pretty at the moment, if you get my drift.
• Ref 25 needs formatting (publisher, access date, etc... {{cite web}} is useful if you like)

Overall, though, it's pretty close to GA quality at least (I'd say). I hope these comments help! Cheers, giggy _(:O) 10:47, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

By the way, I edit conflicted with Krator, so I might have repeated some stuff he (or others) have said. If so, sorry about that. I wish I got 5 reviewers on some of my VG peer reviews... :) giggy _(:O) 10:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Like above, point by point. :P

1. Unfortunately, no.
2. Took out some 'Linces'.
3. Reworded.
4. When the program is done inside the country and the production, as well [indigenous program/indigenous production]. It's normally a huge boost to the national industry and gives the country the expertise to design its own weapons of the same type at a later date. I changed some of those to 'local', instead of 'indigenous'.
5. Reworded the sentence to get rid of some of those commas.
6. Reworded!
7. Instead of at the bottom, they are after their respective tank - now.
8. Done!

Thank you for the comments. I'll put the article up for GA review, as the peer review continues (similar to what I did for the Verdeja article). JonCatalan (talk) 12:24, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

• Looking a lot better now, good luck at GAN! (Obligatory WP:VG/PR spam goes here.) giggy _(:O) 08:47, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Jappalang

Based on this version, I think there should be clarifications on the following:

• Which event truly marked the death of the Lince, the acquisition of the M60s or the procurement of the Leopard 2s?
• Is "Lince" the name for the government programme or the name from the German-Spanish bid?
• Was the 120mm cannon and composite armor a requirement from the Spanish Army? If not, I presume they are from the German-Spanish bid. Why are these specs used as the standards even if the government did not award the project to them?
• Were the AMX-30Es built in the 1979s to address the concerns raised by the research program, or was the program still ongoing to analyze the defiencies of the AMX-30Es as well?

The Czech fansite ([1]) provides an image of the Lince. From what I can make out of Google's translation, it states that the picture is either of a prototype or a scaled model. Perhaps you can get in touch with the site's owner (contact address is on the site) and ask him for his sources. Jappalang (talk) 02:58, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Responses one by one!

1. I don't know how to clarify the text any further; in the decline of the program it says, The Lince program was finally officially canceled in 1989. In the introduction it says, The arrival of M60 tanks, starting in 1992, marked the official end of the Lince program. If anything it's contradictory, but I can't find anything which suggests that the Leopard 2 might have been the end of the program. I edited the introduction's sentence.
2. The Lince was the name of the government program, as it's mentioned in the introduction. I use the specs of the German-Spanish bid because it was the most likely to win the contract, and the French bid was the Leclerc, while the Italian bid became the Ariete. It's also used because it was the only bid which had defined specs, at the time.
3. All the bids had a 120mm cannon and composite armor.
4. I edited that sentence to clarify it a bit.

Thanks for peer reviewing this article. It has truly gone through remarkable change. JonCatalan (talk) 09:45, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

And, unfortunately, that email no longer exists. :( It looks to be like a wooden mock-up, and it looks like the drawing I have. JonCatalan (talk) 10:53, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, that is a shame but I think you can still use that image or your drawing instead of the Leopard 2. I hope you do not mind my copyedits. Feel free to revert them if you think I mistook the gist or caused the flow to be worse. Jappalang (talk) 13:23, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

My major issue is that some of the facts got reworded and their meaning changed completely, making them untrue statements. For example, aid did not begin at the beginning of the Cold War and was specifically from the United States. Deficiencies in the AMX-30E were not corrected in the second batch, they were corrected in the modernization program of the late 1980s. I will go through the article and try to find these and fix these. JonCatalan (talk) 14:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Kariteh

I copyedited the article a bit and have two comments to make:

• The article has only two incoming links, meaning it's orphaned. More links should be made.
• MTU in the infobox needs to be disambiguated.

--Kariteh (talk) 09:58, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the copy edit. MTU has been disambiguated, and once I finish the Leopard 2E article (currently in my sandbox) it will link to the Lince, and then I'll edit the Leopard 2 article to upgrade its entry on the Leopard 2E. JonCatalan (talk) 10:27, 8 June 2008 (UTC)