The Land Ironclads - Wikipedia
"The Land Ironclads" is a short story by British writer H. G. Wells, which originally appeared in the December 1903 issue of the Strand Magazine.[1] It features tank-like "land ironclads," 80-to-100-foot-long (24 to 30 m) armoured fighting vehicles that carry riflemen, engineers, and a captain, and are armed with semi-automatic rifles. The story opens with an unnamed war correspondent and a young lieutenant surveying the calm of the battlefield. They reflect philosophically on the war between two unidentified armies. The time appears to be 1903 and the opponents are dug into trenches, each waiting for the other to attack, of the sort then common and being reported on daily from the Boer War. The men on the war correspondent's side are confident they will prevail, because they are all strong outdoor-types – men who know how to use a rifle and fight – while their enemies are townspeople, "a crowd of devitalised townsmen . . . They're clerks, they're factory hands, they're students, they'
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