Adding Army Information to Wikipedia

Yesterday I went to a monthly open workshop on how to contribute to Wikipedia.  The organizer of the workshop is Mary Mark Ockerbloom, the Wikipedian-In-Residence at Chemical Heritage Foundation, the place where I used to work.

This month, with Mary's help, I contributed to three Army-related pages.  My first question was whether I could add all the information I compiled in spreadsheet about all the tanks in service around the world.  I got the info from a Wikipedia page, my spreadsheet just made it possible to sort it and get totals.  As it turns out, it is not possible to add spreadsheets to a Wikipedia page, but I could add a one-paragraph summary of the data with a link to my blog post offering the spreadsheet to anyone who wants it.

And I did just that.  Here's the page listing all of the main battle tanks by country.  Scroll to the end of table and just after tanks in the Army of Zimbabwe is the paragraph summary I added.

By the way, I just love the data on that page.  Particularly that Mali has just one tank, a 50-year-old Soviet-built T-55 tank.  Imagine the pressure on the guy in charge of that one tank.

Mary also helped me to add the video I did comparing C-Rations and MREs to the Wikipedia pages on C-Rations and MREs.

I'll be going back next month to learn more about adding photos to the Wiki Commons.

Blog Milestone: 250,000 Page Views

Milestone

Yesterday, Blogger told me this blog went over 250,000 page views, or about 35,000 per year.

Still the most popular post ever is about the trailers we lived in at Camp Adder with 2,750 views

With CSM Kepner a close second at 2,650.

Recently, the most popular post is about the new Russian T-14 Armata tank.

And for the past several months, I have had more page views of posts about the Cold War than about my recent service in the Army.  I will keep writing about the Cold War after my enlistment ends.  I will also be writing about things I could not write about as a soldier.  On May 4th I will be a civilian, not a retiree.  So I will be free to talk about the Army as I see it.

Let me know what you think.

Nearly 100,000 Tanks in Service Around the World--Most are Russian

Recently, I wrote an article about the new Russian T-14 tank as a real innovation in a world that is moving away from armored forces.  While writing the article I found a Wikipedia page listing all the tanks in service around the world by country.  While the page is useful, it can't be sorted.

So I made a spreadsheet with all the tanks by country so I could sort it and add up numbers.

The first number is the total of all tanks in service or in reserve for all armies in the world:

99,534 tanks

Wow!  The world is not building a lot of new tanks, but there are a lot in service. 

Wikipedia lists 142 countries with armies.  Of those, 28 have no tanks, leaving 114 countries with armored forces.  From Afghanistan with 771 tanks to Zimbabwe with 77 tanks, it is clear that Russian-made tanks are the backbone of the world's armored united.  Of those 99,534 tanks in service around the world, Russia made 54,853.  

Of the 114 countries with tanks, 49 have Russian-made T-55 tanks for a total of 13,776 tanks.  Fewer countries have the T-72 tank, but including Russian reserves, there are 20,478 T-72s in service.  These are by far the tanks in widest use around the world.

By comparison, the world's number two tank maker is the United States with 15, 538 tanks in more than 20 countries.  About a third of American-built tanks in world service are M48/M60 variants, mostly M60A3s.  The rest are the M1 Abrams in its various forms.  

M1A1 Abrams

The next biggest tank maker is China with 10,902 tanks in service in fewer than 20 countries.  But the Chinese tanks owe a lot to Russian design.  

Chinese Type 69 owes a lot to Russian design

Germany is the number four supplier of tanks with 4,395 Leopards in many variants in service in more than a dozen countries.  

In yet another example of the 80/20 rule dominating all of life, the top four tank-making countries made more than 95,000 of the 99,000 tanks in service in the world.  France and Great Britain are the next leading suppliers with a dozen other countries making tanks for their own use including Israel, Taiwan, Japan and Thailand.  

The two countries that have the most serious on-going development of tanks are Russia and Israel.  The T-14 Armata and the latest Israeli Merkava show these two countries as the most committed to the future of armored warfare. 

Israeli Merkava

The smallest armored force in the world is Malawi with one T-55 tank.  The largest is Russia with almost 22,000, or about one in five of all the tanks in the world.  

One reason countries keep tanks is that they have no scrap value. Armor costs more to melt than the value of the recovered metal.  When I was a tank commander in the 70s and 80s, we used old M47 tanks as targets.

I cannot post a spreadsheet on blogger, but if you want a copy I would be happy to send it.  Email me at ngussman@yahoo.com if you want a copy.

Many Tanks...

Мой первый блог Сообщение на русском языке (My first blog post in Russian)

I just finished my fourth semester of Russian language at Franklin and Marshall College.  The final project was a 600-word article.  My general topic was politics, so I wrote about the new T-14 Armata Russian Tank and its political dimension.

If you read Russian, here it is.  If you don't read Russian, most of the content is in English in this previous post.

Редакционная статья

Новый Русский Танк Угроза Соседям

Сержант Нил Гуссман, Армия  CША

В прошлом году русская армия показала миру совершенно новый танк на параде победы России во Второй мировой войне.

Новый танк, Армата Т-14, представляет собой настоящий прорыв в технологии танка.  В течении следующих  пяти лет Россия  будет строить более двух тысяч  новых танков для своей армии.

Когда Россия производит новые танки она говорит  миру что танки становятся центральным стратегическм  оружием для будущих сражений. США и другие западные армии медленно удаляют танки из своих военных планов.

С 1976 по 1979 год, когда я был командиром танка в армии США в Европе, мы тренировались бороться  против вторжения советских войск. Советская Армия имела больше людей, больше танков, больше самолетов.  Война никогда не произошла, но мы считали что это произойдет. И мы готовились к отчаянной борьбе. 

Наши танки были лучше, но у Советского Союза было гораздо больше танков. Почти все что мы знали о советских танках мы узнали из отчетов 1973 года арабо-израильской войны или войны Судного дня.

Один из этих докладов дал  статистику по травматизму  в зависимости  от места нахождения в танке:

•          Командующий 60%

•          Канонир 25%

•          Погрузчик 10%

•          Водитель 5%

Другой способ проанализировать эти цифры: 95% ранений происходит в башне, 5% в корпусе.

В  Т-14 членов экипажа в башне нет. Трое членов экипажа сидят в корпусе танка.  Т-14 первый танк с дистанционным управлением башни.  Конструкция Т-14 обеспечивает защиту экипажа намного больше, чем у других танках.

Две основные причины использования танков в современной войне:

1. Борьба с другими танками.

2. Прорваться через линию фронта чтобы атаковать линии снабжения.

Создавая новые и лучшие танки, Россия заявляет, что будет бороться   танками.

Русская армия планировает сражаться в таких местах где  легко можно транспортировать большое количество танков. Это означает вдоль своих границ или в соседних странах. Отправлять танки через океан медленно и дорого. Россия рассчитывает бороться в местах где грузовики и поезда могут  транспортировать танки.

Я считаю, что строительство 2000 новых танков говорит что Россия не собирается  вести войну с Америкой, но собирается воевать со  своими соседями. США планирует вести войну с террористами. Большая современная танковая армия может атаковать соседние страны или защищать Россию от Китая.

Т-14 сравнивается с другими передовыми танками в статье  Regnum.ru веб-сайта. Они опубликовали большую статью  Сергея Кузьмичева о Т-14 .Он говорит что Германия и Франция планируют построить современный танк, но он не будет готов в течение многих лет. США не имеет никаких планов для  строительства нового танка. Китай разрабатывает новый танк, но его новый танк похож на западны танки  20 лет назад. Только у Израиля есть танк который соответствует Т-14.

Т-14 далеко впереди других крупных стран в области технологий. Почему бы Россия тратит так много денег чтобы сделать лучший танк в мире? Потому что Россия может продать танки в страны, которые покупают российские танки. Россия делает танки, которые находятся в армиях во всем мире.

Россия делает танки чтобы иметь сильную армию. Россия также делает танки чтобы продавать в другие страны. Википедия перечисляет танки всех армий мира. Список включает в себя тип  и страну, в которой были построены танки.

Почти во всех странах есть танки и большинство стран имеет танки сделанные в России. Потому что Россия имеет так много "клиентов", новый Т-14 также  является оружием маркетинга. Россия делает новейшие поколения танков. Наций которые покупают российские танки покупают новейший танк с новейшей технологией.

Лучший танк в мире российский танк Т-14. Это также принесет  Россие большой доход от стран мира которые покупают Т-14.

Chapel Service During My Last Drill

At 0800 hours on most drill weekends, there is a Chapel service in the Aviation Armory at Fort Indiantown Gap.

Chaplain Knepp is new to the unit.  Most of those who attend, including the Brigade Commander, are veterans who have been with the unit a long time.

SSG Mike Pavasco played at Chapel serves throughout the unit's deployment in 2009 and still plays on many Sundays now.

Done!!! 3 May 2016

Today I was talking to a guy who asked if I could be recalled if (when) there was another war.  I smiled and said, "I am so done!"

And really, I am about five miles past all done.

I am not retiring because I do not have 20 years of service.  I have 19 years of service and 17 for retirement because it is counted differently, so I cannot be recalled as a retiree.

Even if I was a retiree, I am three years past the recall age for enlisted retirees.

In fact, I am now too old to be recalled as an officer.  The upper limit for them is 63 years old.

In addition I served during the Viet Nam War.  I served in the Iraq War.

So they would be recalling 59 year-old veterans from the Gulf War before they get to me.

I am so done.

Volunteering to Enforce the Rules--So Much Fun!

No Coffee in this Theater!

Even if You Just Paid Seven Dollars for That Latte!

With less than three weeks to go in my final enlistment, I had a chance to be the sergeant at the door at the final plenary session of the engineering conference I am attending.

A young woman on the event staff was posted at the door of the 1000-seat theater and told to keep people from from bringing food and drinks in the auditorium.  

It was the only meeting in the the three-day event that barred food and drink, but the theater at the Houston Convention Center has a horrendous cleaning fee, so the rule was absolute.  And the bright, positive young woman assigned to keep drinks out did not want to tell people to throw away their drinks.

I was happy to help.  If sergeants do nothing else, they enforce the rules.  If the rules are arbitrary, so what, it's the rules.  About 100 people walked to the meeting with drinks.  Most tossed their cups and cans.  Two groups of people who wanted to finish their drinks formed on either side of the door. The young woman stuck with enforcing the rules backed away and let me take over.  

Only one guy started to walk past me.  He said, "I can stand in the doorway." I said, "After you finish your drink."  We had an eye-to-eye moment and he threw his drink away.

By the way, Lattes really were $7.  The Starbucks in the conference hotel charged almost $2 more per drink than other Starbucks.