Talk:Rhodesian Light Infantry

Untitled
Just a little correction. Chinese provided a Type 56 assault rifles, not AK-47. Type 56 is basically a inferior copy of AK-47. Generally speaking Soviet manufactured arms very superior, German and Czechoslovakian guns coming as close second. I think its safe to say that Romanian version of AK was the worse of them all, even worse than Chinese. SPD-7554eK (talk) 21:42, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

Apart from manned almost purely anglo foreigners, is it possible that a number of other European nationalities served RLI ? --Rabapone 09:44, 22 October 2005 (UTC) I'm not sure - were there any Portuguese involved as was the case with 32 Battalion (South Africa) in SA? Pjones (talk) 11:51, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Brilliant--but we need citations!
I would love to thank all former troopies who have contributed to this article. You've really put in a lot of work and done a lot to add information. However, we need citations so if you have books or online journal articles or anything of the sort that can back up what you're saying, I would LOVE to see those added. I feel such nostalgia reading and improving this article. I just wish I could have been there with you guys. Cheers. JRDarby 03:38, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. I'll see if I can get to work on improving the sections on Fireforce operations when I get time. Pjones (talk) 03:13, 24 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Why thank them? This is a bunch of whitewashed nonsense from people who were largely recruited among Wehrmacht veterans. It's a crock of propaganda. 91.116.33.157 (talk) 15:38, 3 November 2023 (UTC)

Piffle-Noyt, let's talk
You have a tendency to delete outright any amendments that I submit, without providing any reasons. I have made changes to this page in good faith, and have given up a substantial amount of my time to do so. I'm sure that you come from the same school of thought. If you disagree with any specific entry then please let us be reasonable and discuss it. As a former serving member of the RLI, I consider it my duty to ensure accuracy and I am amenable to debating any issues with you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Major Catastrophe (talk • contribs) 09:39, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

NPOV?
This is a very well written article and has a lot of useful information about the RLI, but I wonder if its tone might stray away from the neutrality wikipedia strives for? Certain areas, such as discussing the firepower of the FN FAL are contradictory to other areas of the encyclopedia. The discussion of training could be construed as sounding like a recruiting advertisement, and the summary perhaps sounds a little triumphalist. Once again, this is a very informative article, but perhaps some changes to the language might make it fit a bit better with other articles on historically significant military units. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.147.220.6 (talk) 21:34, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Since it does contain a lot of useful information, all that is needed is for someone to do some copy edit for neutrality. Sf46 (talk) 21:42, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Of course NPOV
I wrote the vast majority of the article. Then in October last year a person eventually calling himself 'Major Catastrophe' mangled the article and added some rubbish. After fighting this person off twice I gave up and walked away from the thing in despair. After several months not looking at it I have come back and read your comments. Bearing in mind that I consider the present article to be flawed in the truth and inferior to the one existing last October, reading it just now I am painfully aware that the vast majority of the article is still my words and that your comments are apt. Thank you for saying that is well written. I was in the RLI for the last three years of the war so therefore am of course somewhat NPOV (as you say). I did try and write it with scrupulous regard to the truth. I understand your comments for example regarding training but what I wrote was true as I felt it (and still do). Of course there were many bad things that happened during these times (and several sentences/whole sections over the years that hinted at this have been removed by others, which I let stand). All the way to October '08, I was extremely happy at how this Wikipedia process worked and am very grateful to others who helped in improving the article. I was especially heartened by Darby's comments. As to your remarks about the about the technical aspects of rifles and such, I think they are very important and should stay. These things are of the utmost value to soldiering. Cheers all, and thanks.

(slight edit to this) I've just checked and it seems the work that did me in occurred in late Sept '08. Early Oct must have been when I decided to leave it.

Most definitely NPOV!
Lovely article, even if it does read more like a regimental history than it should for this medium. Perhaps the original author wastes his time writing here when he should publish a book length treatment instead, replete with interviews, photos, and fold out maps. I'd certainly subscribe to that.

However, given it's inclusion in Wikipedia, I find the cited praise a bit effusive, and the inclusion of "anti-terrorist" labels quite unbalanced, if one does not equally effect to shed light on the larger political ramifications of the time. I doubt many native Zimbabweans would today consider the actions of this regiment to be "anti-terrorist". After all, you don't find the American founding fathers described in the articles that cite their activities as "terrorists" despite the fact that George III and his ministers likely considered them so.

In deference to British contribution, which certainly punches above its weight in the contribution of content to this most important global resource we know as Wikipedia, I'd have made the above an English anecdote, but citing William the Conqueror's subjugation of the Saxon populace seemed reaching too far back. Boudicca, perhaps?

Thus I do not necessarily argue for their removal, but the establishment of a more neutral point of view vis-a-vis the inclusion of contrasting viewpoints.

Gentleman, your comments, please. 73.36.62.119 (talk) 18:57, 1 February 2021 (UTC)

Zimbabwean sources
I'm noticing a distinct lack of sources and information from the Zimbabwean perspective. Books like Zimbabwe: Struggles within the Struggle and Peasant Consciousness and Guerrilla War in Zimbabwe paint a much less rosy picture of the actions of the Rhodesian authorities and military. While I'm sure the Zimbabwean sources are themselves also biased I find it very hard to believe that a commando unit operating independently in what was, to be fair, a war to maintain racial segregation against guerrilla forces has had *no* criticism levelled against it at all by the indigenous population. 14.2.35.138 (talk) 05:34, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Criticism section?
Shouldn't this page have at least something about how the Rhodesian troops were some of the most notorious war criminals in the region? They were basically death squads (and even the article skirts around it by offering peripheral clues such as night patrols and low casualties which is textbook for death squads) and yet this article reads like some sort of normal military unit. 91.116.33.157 (talk) 15:33, 3 November 2023 (UTC)