Talk:Mitrailleuse

Newer Content
There has been a lot of new stuff put into this article since I last read it, which is good, but it currently does not have a properly encyclopedic tone, and is overly concerned with the Reffye mitrailleuse. Possibly the Reffye mitrailleuse information needs to be spun off into an article of it's own, but even if not the references to it need to be clearly shown to be reffering to the Reffye mitrailleuse and not mitrailleuse in genereral, as there were design and usage differences between the different types that are not currently addressed. There is also a fair degree of NPOV language that I presume has carried over from the source material that needs to be rewritten in a more encyclopaedic fashion.Jmackaerospace (talk) 18:42, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Incorrect info
Not an error, but an omission: upon reading this article, it seems pretty clear that a good deal of information is derived from my article (http://debellum.org/mitrailleuse.asp). I completely endorse Wikipedia's mission, but I do believe my work--even if it is published on the web--deserves a citation, just as a print source. Thanks. Dr. Marder.

Who keeps writing that the mitrailleuse's poor performance led to a long-standing bias against machine guns in Europe? That's total rubbish! Please stop putting that in! Rusty2005 12:00, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Rubbish? Are you kidding..it was decades before we got into machine guns again. Ve3 16:35, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * That's not true at all!! What about the Maxim, Browning, etc? They were developed in the late 19th century. And in the meantime they turned to Gatling guns. Please stop putting that in, it's not true. Rusty2005 17:07, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * I don't have much opinion on the factual issue here, but contested facts that are not cited can be removed by an editor at any time, and this is OK. So, if a reputable source says it lead to this bias, we can put this in the article (with a citation) without having to personally agree or disagree.  Friday (talk) 17:19, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * If you need a reliable source, please see the relevant pages of Richard Holmes' "The Road to Sedan", which I have listed on the article page under "Sources". This book is still the pre-eminent work on technology in the Franco-Prussian War and its aftermath. Rusty2005 17:24, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * "What about the Maxim, Browning, etc? They were developed in the late 19th century." Those were all later in the century, and they are not related to adoption. Adoption of those did not really pick up until the 1890s and 1900s. The contetion is supported by the large section on the mitrailleuse and its impact on MG adoption in Machine guns : an illustrated history of their impact by James H. Willbanks. Ve3 17:30, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Well if there is a academic disagreement over this in sources, we can put both. Ve3 17:32, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Holmes' "The Road to Sedan" and his article of June 1986 in "Military History" supports the argument that the mitrailleuse did not put European armies off machine guns, it simply prompted them to use better ones. This is evident in the fact that the armies of many European nations purchased Gatling guns from the United States during and after the Franco-Prussian War, and retained them in service until they were replaced by Maxim guns, etc in the 1890's. European armies fighting colonial wars during the 1870's and 1880's employed Gatling guns, eg during the Anglo-Zulu War, the French occupation of Algeria, and the Italian invasion of Abyssinia in 1895. Rusty2005 17:36, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * It's worth noting that the French apparently used a number of Gatlings during the F-P war, but it took until 1897 and the Hotchkiss gun for them to adopt machine guns generally. -- ChrisO 20:33, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes that is true, Leon Gambetta purchased several Gatling guns from the United States, machines that had been left over from your Civil War. The machines were largely useless though, as the Armies of National Defence rarely entered conventional battlefield conditions, and when they did, battlefield conditions did not allow for the deployment of Gatling guns. Rusty2005 02:35, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
 * It is a interesting counter-point, but the evidence for the reverse is also quite convincing. Most of the examples you are talking about are later and there are other issues. Either way the adoption of manual machine guns in late 1800s is quite complicated so its not suprising there are disagreements over this. Ve3 17:57, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

I've added a new section, can we compromise on that? Rusty2005 17:43, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Yes that is fine, but I will make a note of it farther up in the article. Ve3 17:57, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

Ok fair enough. But this has brought up a more valid point - why does colonial war direct to one particular war waged by the Portugese? We should do something about that Rusty2005 02:10, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Agreed, I don't know why that (link) is there. Also, I further trimmed the upper link, but added some more data about the Hotchkiss to the lower section. Ve3 05:29, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

Rewrite & expansion
I've had a productive trawl of the library today for mitrailleuse-related info. Having found a lot of useful material, I decided that it would be best to overhaul the article and also reduce some of the redundancy and duplication that's crept in. Hopefully it's a bit more concise and coherent now!

There are a number of factual assertions in the article which aren't referenced - I'm sure they're right but we need to cite them properly (as per WP:CITE). Could whoever added them (I'm guessing Rusty2005) please make sure that they're properly referenced in the same style as the rest? -- ChrisO 22:41, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

All assertions that I have made in the article are based on the relevant sections of the two books I have listed under "Sources", is it necessary to cite every single fact? Rusty2005 22:51, 29 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Not every single fact, but it's usually a good idea with regard to key sections. I've marked the points I think we need to cite. -- ChrisO 23:41, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

1910 photo in airplane
Here's a photo of a Voisin aircraft shown at the Paris Air Show in 1910, the vehicle sporting a mitrailleuse. This design apparently did not result in production orders... my guess is that it would not have flown well with that much weight forward, overloading the 50 horsepower engine. If the photo is at all useful to this article, feel free to incorporate it. Binksternet (talk) 00:45, 6 October 2010 (UTC)


 * that may or may not be a "real" mitrailleuse as the name later became synonymous with machine gunJmackaerospace (talk) 18:16, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

Metal Storm
The Metal Storm is very much like a modern version of this weapon. Perhaps somebody should include that in the article.

New page patrol: Brightman anti aircraft machine gun: Merge proposal.
I proposed that the small amount of content at Brightman anti aircraft machine gun be merged here. If you have a better idea for where that should go, be my guest, but I don't think that it really merits its own article. StevenJ81 (talk) 18:31, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
 * No action for a long time on this one. A better place might be Volley gun as it at least already acknowledges 20th century guns of this type; note that the current introduction to the Brightman anti aircraft machine gun describes it as a "mitrailleuse-type volley gun". Given how long this has been 'on the books' I'll boldly merge there. Klbrain (talk) 14:45, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I have undone this merge. I can see no evidence that this gun was ever in service, or even built.  There is only a patent coming up from online searches.  It is therefore not really on topic for the volley gun article.  A see also at most, but should probably be deleted if no other sources are available.  There are numerous patents issued all the time, but not all of them are notable, and by themselves are not reliable sources.  In the vast majority of cases they don't even rate a mention in an article.  Next time I respectfully suggest that merge templates are placed on the articles affected (source and destination) with links to the discussion. SpinningSpark 15:45, 15 September 2016 (UTC)
 * I agree with many of your comments. It would nice to get this sorted out given that some action has been proposed for more than 3 years. I'll post the merge templates and start a new discussion on the proposed target page. Klbrain (talk) 16:50, 15 September 2016 (UTC)

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