Talk:Midshipman/Archive 1

Table
I seriously disagree with the appending of the table of British commissioned officer ranks to every article discussing military officer ranks. This seems to be entirely unnecessary duplication that could be better served by maintaining the table in a central location (perhaps Commissioned officer?) and inserting links in these articles. Ray Trygstad 23:31, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC) Naval ROTC also has Midshipman Captains. I'd make the edit, but the graphics needs to be updated as well. I'm really curious to know what NROTC Unit has a Midshipman Captain. The Brigade Commander at the Naval Academy commands 4000 midshpmen; I'm certainly not aware of any brigade-sized NROTC units. This is just another example of unnecessary rank inflation that makes ranks mean less. If someone can document this, I'll be glad to change the graphic. And I still think the British Officer ranks belong in one central location. If I change this am I going to get into a pissing contest with someone? Ray Trygstad 21:11, 26 May 2005 (UTC) Every NROTC Unit has a MIDN Captain, no matter how large the unit is. That's not true; several units have MIDN Commanders as Battalion Commander. But I see some now do have MIDN Captains so I will change the graphic to reflect this. Ray Trygstad 06:52, 14 December 2005 (UTC) Some NROTC units have MIDN Captains. I can tell you mine does. The whole American section needs to be expanded upon with lay terminology, I couldn't follow it at all.
 * Indeed, i couldnt follow the whole discussion in the american section regarding the Midshipman Ensign to Captain - a brief discription of what they are/what they do might be in order here. I might be a little too accustomed to having just the one rank of midshipman with several year-grades, but (i hope?) i'm not the only one to not understand. 58.7.171.182 05:22, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

The Marine Corps is under-represented. I am not entirely sure of the accuracy of the statement that OC is an appropriate "rank" in the Royal Navy. The way this document is worded implies that OC has seniority over ratings which they do not, and also implies that they hold it as a substantive rank which they do not. Officer cadets in the Royal Navy are appointed as either Midshipmen S/Lt or occasionally Lt, but are reffered to as OC until they have completed IST. They are paid pro-rata according to their rank seniority ie S/Lt 1 yr. Also When an OC leaves BRNC to attend courses on other bases (notable exception of IST) they tend to hold the rank they are appointed with its priveledges.

stuff lacking
this article is pretty useless for anyone not already familiar with the military. what people become midshipman? what do they do? when was the rank first established and why? what do non-English speaking nations have instead? -- Akb4 08:11, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Separating Articles
Why arent cant the Midshipmen of the U.S. and Midshipmen of the U.K. have seperate articles? It seems like it would be much more functional and make more sense to people. If no one objects I might do that is a couple weeks, let me know how everyone feels about it.--Joebengo 19:21, 19 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I think it makes more sense to keep them together: the article is brief, the navies are historically related, and their ranks coordinated by NATO conventions. Both US and UK sections seem to need fact checking and referencing.  Also, I'm not sure what the "worldwide view" tag is about, if, as appears to be the case, midshipman is a rank in the US and UK navies, but not, say, China or France.  Some discussion of Australia, Canada, etc. is needed. MayerG 05:40, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

updating background information
I added some more background information, and I have the research on Jobengo's questions about who, and what, I should have that added soon. I don't know the real answer to when, but I'll look in the Oxford Dictionary and include the date with a reference. MayerG, the worldview is 'what do other countries call them instead', which I don't know the answer. I'll work on that question after I finish. --Kirk (talk) 18:18, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Good resource
I'm going to try to get via ILL "Young Gentlemen" by CF Walker (1938) and add any thing useful. Kirk (talk) 21:59, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Redo
Added a bunch of stuff about other countries, as well as redid the US Naval academy section. Kirk (talk) 20:16, 22 December 2008 (UTC)

Expanded USN Midshipman Section
Added more on USN Midshipman with proper references and removed references to USN Midshipmen as "Officer Cadets"--because they are not. Midshipman is a naval rank in the U.S. Navy just as it is in the Royal Navy and USN Midshipmen are appointed officers of the line ranking just below Chief Warrant Officers. I have been both a Midshipman, USN and an Assistant Professor of Naval Science in a Navy ROTC Unit and while Midshipmen ARE students in officer accession programs, they hold a REAL naval rank, are eligible to assume command, and are not "cadets". If a Midshipman and a Rear Admiral in the Civil Engineering Corps are in a rowboat, the Midshipman is in command because he or she is a line officer and the Admiral is not. Ray Trygstad (talk) 08:45, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Officer Cadets Comments
Future naval officers in Canada have the rank "Officer Cadet", they did away with the rank Midshipmen after they consolidated their armed forces. Officer cadets in the United States Naval Academy have the rank Midshipman. If you look in a dictionary, cadet will have a reference to midshipman. I'll check the capitalization to make sure we keep Officer Cadet and officer cadet distinct. I'm not certain why using the term 'officer cadet' would insinuate you are not eligible to assume command or are not a real rank. In any case, Midshipmen in the USN are clearly both cadet and subordinate officers. The subordinate officer article could use some information about the USN.

The last comment is interesting if you can source that with a citation. Thanks! Kirk (talk) 15:31, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Royal Australian Navy - ADFA
I've added the sentence about some midshipmen in the RAN also attending ADFA. I do not yet have a source for this, but know that it is true (I've seen them there). I understand that Wiki's policy is no original research, so I will try to find a source and add to it, however, I cannot lay my hands on one just yet. If anyone else can help in this regard I would appreciate it. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 00:42, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

GA Peer Review
Talk:Midshipman/GA1

Adelborst help
I can't find any authoritative references about this rank in the Dutch Navy, if you know Dutch and can help, I'd appreciate it! Kirk (talk) 18:58, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Other Languages section
I'm adding my own thoughts here in case anyone has any good information on the following. Links would be helpful. This is all original research and I'll need to refernce everything before putting in the article.

Some countries have the university education portion in 3 years (France, Netherlands, Germany) instead of 4 (U.S., Spain). A third class are the ones based on the British educational system, where you spend a gap year in training, then spend a normal 3 years in school, in some cases its at a university (Australia, New Zealand) and in the UK it might be just more training, not university. Only after the first year do they actually get their rank of Midshipman (or Sub-lieutenant). I assume this is all based on their respective school systems.

In the U.S., Midshipman have some apocryphal links in the petty officer rank structure, its hard to find where exactly they rank, but they are considered officers. In the U.K./Australia/New Zealand/South Africa, Midshipman are now commissioned (but not exactly) officers. As the article mentions, in the past Midshipman were warrant officers not commissioned officers. This seems to have gone away rather recently, I think post world war II. The term 'subordinate officer' is used in Canada for Officer/Naval cadets, and used to be used for the warrant board-versions of Midshipman and Sub-lieutenant, but not any longer.

In France, it appears you start École_navale as a élève officier, then in your second year you get promoted to Aspirant, and your third year, Enseigne_de_vaisseau_de_deuxième_classe, but only the second is what would translates to 'Midshipman' in a french to english dictionary, and even then the literal meanings are, 'Officer Candidate', 'Officer Cadet' and 'Ensign Second class' respectively. I would say all three are equivalent to a U.S. 'Midshipman', its kind of confusing and hard to maintain the interwiki links. Considered officers.

In some countries there seem be this distinction that Midshipman-equivalents were not officers, and not warrant officers but petty officers. In the Netherlands, Adelborst have different insignia based on their class year, matching the NCO insignias for Seaman, Corporal, and Sergeant. In Germany there's Seekadett OR-5, then Fähnrich zur See OR-6 and finally Oberfähnrich zur See (OR-7). There's also a rank called Gefreiter(corporal) which is OR-2 and has an officer candidate version. Also the Seekadett is similar to the NCO Maat (Mate), which seems to indicate some similarity between the Passed Midshipman/Master's Mate/Mate/Sub-lieutenant in the Germany Navy, considering when the navy was created probably they copied the Royal Navy. All explicitly not officers (other ranks) in the Nato ranking structure and rank similar to NCOs.

In Spain, you start as an Aspirante, then in your 3rd year get promoted to Guardiamarina. In Portugal you stay as a Aspirante, after graduation you become a Guardia-marinha (I have to guess on Portuguese, so I'm probably wrong). In Italy, you start as a Aspirante-guardiamarina, then after graduation promoted to Guardiamarina. In Brazil, I can't tell if you are like portugal, Spain, or simply Guardia-marinha throughout school. This is also very confusing and hard to interwiki.

Scandinavian Countries (Norway/Denmark/Sweden) appear to have Naval cadets, similar to U.S. Midshipman, then they get promoted to Ensign (Fenrik).

Russia appears to Midshipman a warrant officer, whatever that means in their navy. Not sure about Poland or Ukraine, both have a link in the article.

Feel free to comment! Kirk (talk) 20:10, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

More Midshipman Countries
I recently found out that most countries in the Commonwealth use the rank of 'Midshipman'. India and Pakistan probably should be in the article, English is used officially and they have navies at least as big as South Africa. Singapore, Sri Lanka, and Kenya all appear to use midshipman, but don't have very large navies. Kirk (talk) 12:57, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Orphaned references in Midshipman
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Midshipman's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "PN": From Pakistan Naval Academy: Pakistan Navy Website From Pakistan Navy: Anon. (14 April,2007) Pakistan Navy. Pakistan Navy website. 

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 13:39, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

UK Section out of date
The RN's use of the rank of Midshipman has changed slightly and I think this needs to be reflected in the article. Today, once a Midshipman has completed fleet board he or she becomes a commissioned officer the same as any other. It is true that this leaves a grey area where pre fleet board and post fleet board midshipman are indestinguishable, but I think this still needs changing in the article because it is no longer accurate that Midshipman is not a commisioned rank. In effect, the system has come in line with the other armed forces of the UK. Once officer training is complete, the officer gets his commission. The only difference being a RN Midshipman is let loose on the world before this is the case. --Noofworm (talk) 12:52, 16 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I updated the UK section...I think its better now. Kirk (talk) 14:17, 17 June 2009 (UTC)