Talk:Submarine

The article claims: "The first submarines were the U-boats of Nazi Germany, used to great effect against the merchant ships of the United Kingdom during World War II." But this is false. It's pretty hard to say what the first submarine was. The first modern submarines, that's an easier question, but still up for considerable debate. Perhaps John Holland's Great Fenian Ram fits this bill? I'm not sure, but I am sure that WWII submarines were most assuredly not the first submarines.

I've seen the Turtle listed as first (1776). Not sure about this but I think it deserves at least a mention in the entry. Nice article at :http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/4870/DrGeorgePCPage9Turtle

The Fenian Ram and other subs from John Holland late 1800s.

Nice page at http://www.clarelibrary.ie/eolas/coclare/people/holland.htm

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"A submarine is a specialized ship that travels under water for military purposes."

As far as I can tell, "military purpose" is not inherent in the definition of "submarine". Civilian submarines may not currently exist, but if built would not require a separate name.

see for example http://www.bartleby.com/61/50/S0845000

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Civilian submarines most certainly do exist. Consider Alvin, or any number of other research submarines. -- Paul Drye

The article seems to say they must be called "submersibles".

According to dictionary.com, submarine and submersible are pretty much exact synonyms. There is no restriction of the term "submarine" to military vessels. I would suggest the major contents of this article be shifted to "military submarine" and a general article mentioning things like the Turtle, the Alvin, robot and human-crewed research subs, and so on.

In my dictionary, submarine (noun) is a warship while various other terms (submersible, bathysphere, etc) are used for scientific craft. In casual usage, all are called submarines, though, so perhaps this should become the main article that links to the various types. --- hajhouse

As I'd use the terms (and I'm no authority on usage), a submarine is bigger than a submersible. Research craft are too small for me to call them a submarine. But there is no reason why civil craft couldn't be submarines... it just happens to be in practice that there aren't any, although we could build them, because it is not worth it to do so -- SJK

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There are some civilian 40-50 passenger tourist submarines. They certainly deserve the name submarine, not submersible. --rmhermen

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"The first military submarines to see effective use..." I'm certain that the German's used submarines extensively in WWI - the Lusitania sinking in 1915(?) comes to mind.

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Rewrote Battle of the Atlantic. The Germans came no where close to an effective blockade.