Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 128

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Notability

Can others look at this article: Military history of Pakistani Americans. Is it sufficiently notable to warrant a stand-alone article?--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:57, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

We appear to have a host of these American "Minority military history" articles which mainly appears to be a collection of what would normally be non-notable individuals. I cant see that any of them are any more notable than all the other members of the american armed forces. MilborneOne (talk) 21:59, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
Me, neither. Are there sources that discuss them as such groups? - Sitush (talk) 22:05, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
I agree. In the Pakistani article, the highest award mentioned is the bronze star. I don't think that's notable. Lying in wait, imho, are all those articles about guys who were members of the Band of Brothers but who didn't actually do anything remarkable.--Jim in Georgia Contribs Talk 22:16, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
On that point just found that William S. Evans - one of those who was killed on the flight to the drop on 6 June -wasn't tagged by the project. How should one dispute the notability? GraemeLeggett (talk) 09:56, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
AfD it, Graeme. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:10, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
Done - Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William S. Evans - they seem to have made the process a bit easier. still had a bit of trouble putting my concerns into a coherent argument. GraemeLeggett (talk) 10:28, 15 November 2014 (UTC)
Maybe should be merged into the Pakistani Americans article. Doesn't look like military history to me - or any kind of history really. --Bye for now (PTT) 22:34, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
It is just a list of non-notables, as MilborneOne says. I don't think there is really anything worth merging. Things might be different if there were a unit comprising entirely Pakistani Amercians, for example. - Sitush (talk) 22:37, 14 November 2014 (UTC)
Shouldn't the editors at the target page be given the option of using this, if they decide to, rather than just deleting it?--Bye for now (PTT) 22:57, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

I bring this up as there has been significant coverage about certain minority groups military service including African-Americans, Japanese Americans, and even Filipino Americans (such as this Alexander M. Bielakowski Ph.D. (11 January 2013). Ethnic and Racial Minorities in the U.S. Military: An Encyclopedia [2 volumes]. ABC-CLIO. pp. 157–163. ISBN 978-1-59884-428-3.), however I have not found anything significant regarding Pakistani Americans. While there are some notability Pakistani Americans that meet WP:SOLDIER such as RDMR Ali S. Khan, that does not mean that the subject has received significant coverage itself.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 22:12, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

AfD created see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Military history of Pakistani Americans.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:50, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

WWI event in Dublin

Perhaps of interest to some - Wikimedia Ireland have organised a editathon on Ireland and the Irish in WWI. 6 December, National Museum of Ireland, Collins Barracks, Dublin. Andrew Gray (talk) 09:49, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

Mars (mythology)

Re: Mars (mythology)

I propose the above article in its current state is classed as "GA-class" to be reviewed. There are several places that have no inline citations. Adamdaley (talk) 03:21, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

G'day, Adam, the process for having a GA reviewed is outlined here: Wikipedia:Good article reassessment. There are two options, either an individual re-assessment or a community re-assessment. If you are comfortable interpreting the GA criteria, you can use an individual one and re-assess it yourself. If you would prefer others to have input, then my advice is to go with the community re-assessment. Hope this helps. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 05:03, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
In my honest opinion, I don't think it deserves a "GA-class". I've seen several articles from GA-class and below articles missing citations. I know my article Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher, I did went through a hell of a lot and it was very time consuming. Just don't want undeserving articles taking up valuable space. Adamdaley (talk) 05:29, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

I wouldn't pass it as MH B-class now. I suggest WP:GAR. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:28, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

2014 "Attacks"

There is currently discussion at Talk:2014 Jerusalem synagogue massacre about what noun to use in the title to describe the attack or massacre or whatever. The word "attack" is used in the title of some other recent events, but I think it would be useful if anyone here who knows how more broadly historical sources describe similar, older events were to comment about what names "history books" give such events. John Carter (talk) 01:04, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Please help an article achieve GA status

The article Russo-Georgian War is currently undergoing a GA review. Any editors that can help address the concerns of the reviewer should go to that article and help out. Thanks! RGloucester — ☎ 17:24, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Expert attention

This is a notice about The West Tennessee Raids, which might be of interest to your WikiProject. Can someone take a look to see if it can be knocked into shape? Bikeroo (talk) 14:56, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Infobox flag icons

Is it OK for country flag icons to be used in the infoboxes of military units? Both WP:INFOBOXFLAG and WP:MILMOS#FLAGS say that such usage is generally not recommended. Although some articles do not use icons, I've noticed that many others, particularly American military units, do use icons. I'm not proposing either a mass removal or a mass addition of icons per se; I am just wondering is somebody is able to clarify the meaning of "generally" as it applies to these particular articles. Thanks in advance. -Marchjuly (talk) 00:53, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Ps: Just to add on to the above, I've noticed some articles using {{flag|United States}} and others using {{flag|United States of America}}. Is it OK to have two different styles? The later links to United States of America which is a redirect to United States. - Marchjuly (talk) 01:01, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

overuse is a serious issue. Some editors want to use flagicons in the allegiance, unit AND commander fields, among others. This would clearly be overkill. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:25, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
I quite like the idea of extinguishing them from infoboxes. Keith-264 (talk) 11:17, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Thanks Peacemaker67 and Keith-264 for the replies. Not looking to "exterminate", "exterminate", "exterminate" anything. Just was curious. They seem to be being slowly phased out in other articles, but I wonder if they are being added/kept in military-related articles for patriotic reasons. Anyway, opinions on the "United States" vs. "United States of America" for the country name of US military units. - Marchjuly (talk) 12:14, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Personally, I would think that "United States" would be enough. Who is going to think it is intended to be the "United States of Tara"? Eh? Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 12:18, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Perhaps in a multi-national unit, there might be use as a short hand for identifying a commander's origin. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:18, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
(edit conflict) I started dropping flag icons from my Australian military bios and unit histories a year or two ago and the world didn't end... I think you'll find that simply "United States" and "US" is the preferred/common term on WP, rather than "United States of America" or "USA". Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:21, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Yes. Where it is, in fact, a multi-national unit or formation, not a national formation contained a few non-national units. The current "British Empire" "dealio" used widely in WWI articles is a farce, and doesn't reflect the legislative or real basis of the command and control of dominion and colonial formations of the so-called "British Empire". All I can see with this stuff is a predominance of British Empire POV, contemporary or current. Fortunately, I don't really give a rat's proverbial, but those who care will carry on with their arrant nonsense nonetheless. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 12:27, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

I'm wondering if WP:COMMONNAME should take precedence over WP:NOTBROKEN with respect to "United States of America". On the other hand, there may be some who argue "COMMONNANE" only applies to article titles. Maybe WP:NOTUSA could be extended to not "United States of America" since using "U.S. of A." is not recommended. - Marchjuly (talk) 12:55, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

What's a dealio?Keith-264 (talk) 19:12, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
  • Comment I'm inclined to believe that they are not needed in the infobox and that they serve no useful encyclopedic purpose. I would be in favor of exterminating them in the infoboxes and then updating MOS:FLAG to reflect this change.--JOJ Hutton 20:48, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
  • That page largely says to that in the "Avoid flag icons in infoboxes" section (WP:INFOBOXFLAG) now. -Fnlayson (talk) 22:05, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
    • Yes, yes it does. But enforcement of this guideline has been very difficult over the years. Especially in certain sports info boxes. I've never been in favor of them in the info box at any level. I don't really see the encyclopedic value in them. JOJ Hutton 22:47, 20 November 2014 (UTC)
Using {{flag|United States of America}} is more than a matter of taste. It also creates an unnecessary redirect, so unless there is a reason the use "United States of America", it shouldn't be used. As for exterminating the flags, I'd guess that "generally" in the directions may reflect the lack of consensus. Seems to me that those editing US articles favor them, while those in the UK. et al. disfavor them. --Lineagegeek (talk) 23:25, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
What's a dealio?Keith-264 (talk) 08:41, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
schema. Just me engaging in an offtopic rant... Forget it. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 08:57, 22 November 2014 (UTC)
Rant away, I was enjoying it. ;O)Keith-264 (talk) 10:00, 22 November 2014 (UTC)

WP:INFOBOXFLAG clearly state that flag icons aren't to be used in Template:Infobox Weapon, but I've been finding them in dozens of articles. (Most of the discussion above is about their use in bio article, which is more ambiguous.) Can someone set up a bot or something to go through the articles using Infobox Weapon and remove the flags? I've been doing it manually for several weeks as I find them, but it seems to never end. Thanks. - BilCat (talk) 15:12, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

Identification?

One of my personal projects is extracting public-domain images from the Library of Congress's massive archive of pre-1923 newspapers, and last night I found a 1904 newspaper which printed pictures of various ships of the Imperial Russian and Imperial Japanese Navies, along with their specifications ("in view of the almost certain outbreak of hostilities between Russia and Japan in the Orient, some information concerning the naval strength of the two powers will be of interest at this time"). I've uploaded the highest-resolution versions of the images that I was able to extract, and transcribed the specifications, but there's one problem.

This isn't a photograph of a Japanese battleship, but I'm pretty sure it's derived from a photograph; does anyone know what this type of image is called?

Since the source of the images was an American newspaper in 1904, some of the names were translated into English. I figured out that "Thunderer" was Russian cruiser Gromoboi and "Three Saints" was Russian battleship Tri Sviatitelia, but what was the "Japanese Battleship Chin Yen"? (see image) My best guess is the Chinese turret ship Zhenyuan, but the specifications provided don't really match the ones in our article about it... but it's definitely possible that the Tacoma Times was less-than-accurate... but I'm reluctant to be the one who makes that assessment. Anyone? DS (talk) 16:18, 23 November 2014 (UTC)

I am no expert on ships but Commons has what appears to be he original photograph your drawing was taken from identified as "Zhenyuan (aka Chin-yen) ironclad" and it is used on the Japanese and Russian articles for the Zhenyuan. I have reproduced it here - Dumelow (talk) 16:40, 23 November 2014 (UTC)
Yes, that's correct - Zhenyuan was taken into Japanese service following the First Sino-Japanese War as Chin Yen. I'm actually in the process of writing the Dingyuan-class ironclad article (and will be rewriting the individual ship articles as well) and of course would like to have more images with clear copyright statuses. Parsecboy (talk) 14:04, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Mwahahahaha.

That is all. I have two volumes of the Illustrated War News that arrived today. They're amazing - packed with images, at least a third of which will blow any alternative out of the water. -Adam Cuerden (talk) 13:42, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

You're an odd duck, Adam - I can only hope some of my German warships are included ;) Parsecboy (talk) 14:07, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

IP assessments (again)

Hello MILHIST, an IP just assessed Otto I, an article I have recently edited and (hopefully) improved. Checking the IPs history, this review was done in < 1 minute, together with several other MILHIST-related articles. Apparently a user from the same IP-address already had problems with disruptive editing in the past. Could a MILHIST-member please double-check this assessment on the article's talkpage? I am not sure, if such "drive-by" assessments should be accepted - they are probably well-intended, but not really accurate or helpful for article contributors. But of course that's for the project to decide. Thank you for your help. GermanJoe (talk) 20:25, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

    • I agree these partial assessments look like cookie cutter jobs aimed at little more than reducing backlogs. I've assessed it. That some references are missing is apparent. There seem to be unresolved issues on the talk page (like the conversion of Harald Bluetooth) so B-2=no as well. Lineagegeek (talk) 22:48, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
      • Thank you for looking into that. The Danish conversion question is a minor aspect considering the scope of this article. I'll need to work on that section anyway for more references, and will try to find a better solution to present the available information (the current version is by far the more reliable, but needs sourcing and background). A peer review is currently underway, and may provide even more good ideas. GermanJoe (talk) 23:21, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Image notification

Just wanted to let y'all know, in case you're interested, that commons:Category:Photographs by the Korean Ministry of Defense is now available. ☺ · Salvidrim! · ✉ 05:51, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Sinope/Sinop

FYI, I've proposed a rename and reorganization of articles at Talk:Battle of Sinop -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 08:08, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

looks like a lack of understanding of WP:PRIMARYTOPIC to me. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:35, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Along the lines of superfluous statistics...

The Siege of Godesberg had nearly 34000 hits on 11-18-2014, when it was a Featured Article. And in the last 30 days, about 44,0000.  :) auntieruth (talk) 16:58, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Nice work! Nick-D (talk) 23:46, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
Great job, Ruth! Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:37, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

OR and RS issues on Vietnam War articles

Gday. An unregistered user using a range of IPs (including 101.99.7.141 and 113.190.46.134, possibly others) has made a number of edits to various Vietnam War articles comparing reported NVA/VC losses to weapons captured and using that to infer the inaccuracy of US claims (which of course have been widely questioned). The issue though is that whilst references are provided which support the reported losses and the number of weapons captured, the linking of the two in the manner that is occurring is problematic and is unsupported by the reference provided. This appears to me to be WP:OR or possibly WP:SYNTH. Equally, in some edits seemingly unreliable sources are being added such as this [1]. I have posted on the IPs various talk pages here [2] and here [3] and will discuss with them if they are prepared too but I'm logging off now for the next 24 hours so would be grateful for more eyes to look over these articles and help guide them if required. Some of the articles in question are as fols: Battle of Prek Klok II, Operation Union, Operation Medina, Battle of Hill 881, Operation Prairie, Operation Hastings, Operation Buffalo (1967), Operation Swift, Operation Kingfisher, Operation Junction City, First Battle of Quảng Trị and Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21. Thanks. Anotherclown (talk) 12:37, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Finland's Status during world war two

Your opinions would be most welcome regarding a dispute on whether or not Finland should lumped together and listed as a member of the Axis rather than listed as a separate co-belligerent on the World War Two page. See the discussion here Talk:World_War_II#Anti-Finnish_biasXavierGreen (talk) 23:02, 25 November 2014 (UTC)

The Axis was not an informal arrangement--it was a formal treaty relationship that Finland never joined or signed. It had zero ties to Japan & Italy. I have not seen any RS that consider it to be part of the Axis. Rjensen (talk) 01:06, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Rjensen do you think the explanation at Axis powers#Minor co-belligerent state combatants is a good way to present the facts?/ -- Moxy (talk) 01:35, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
yes i think so. It should make clear that Finland never signed any Axis treaty. Rjensen (talk) 01:58, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Finland's status is unique, but no more unique than any other power on the German side. She wasn't a signatory of the Tripartite Pact, but the Tripartite Pact powers were only simultaneously at war with Britian and the United States from December 1941 until September 1944, and were never all at war with the Soviet Union at once. (The Tripartite Pact had nothing to do with how any of its signatories entered the war, so far as I can tell.) Finland was at war with both Britain and the Soviet Union before Bulgaria was at war with anybody. Finland did sign the Anti-Comintern Pact of 1941, the only other non-Axis or non-Axis-occupied countries to sign being Turkey and (non-neutral) Spain. Also, a small Italian naval unit served under Finnish command on Lake Ladoga. Finland allowed the SS to recruit Finns for its Wiking unit, and Hungarian officers were trained at her winter warfare school along with German ones. In 1944 the United States threatened to declare war on her, and Finland "exited the war" the same way and at the same time as Romania and Bulgaria. Thailand was also unequivocally at war with Britain and not a signatory of the Tripartite Pact. Srnec (talk) 03:24, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Quick opinion requested

Hi folks! I'd like someone more knowledgeable than myself to have a quick look at three new creations by Websafe.dk: UC1 Freya, Rocket Madsen Space Lab & UC2 Kraka. I don't know if they need deletion, merge/redirect or if they should be kept and improved; if the articles stay, they need some minor cleanup, categories, talk page banners and the like. Have fun, and thanks! :) ☺ · Salvidrim! · ✉ 10:28, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

You can build your own sea-going submarine in Denmark?! Not as good as the New Zealander who built his own cruise missile (apparently entirely legally), but close. I agree that these articles need much stronger sourcing to be retained. Nick-D (talk) 10:37, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
The articles have also been created, it seems, by Peter Madsen (inventor) himself, according to the unblock-un request of Websafe.dk. ☺ · Salvidrim! · ✉ 20:22, 27 November 2014 (UTC)
Do they need advice about conflict of interest and secondary sourcing. I tagged UC1 Freya as needing independent sourcing. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:25, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Additional link in the bibliography for the page on the 3rd Marines

A friend of mine was in the 3/3 in Vietnam in 1967 and has written a book and compiled lots more information on his and others experiences at http://www.gruntfixer.net/

Would it be ok to add it to the bibliography on this page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3rd_Marine_Division_(United_States)? I think it meets this criterion: Sites that contain neutral and accurate material that is relevant to an encyclopedic understanding of the subject and cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article due to copyright issues.juanTamad 10:40, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

Help with RAF honorary commission in WWII

G'day everyone, I'd appreciate it if editors who know their way around WWII RAF could have a look at Talk:Borivoje Mirković where there is an issue regarding whether or not Mirković was given an honorary commission as an Air Vice Marshal in the RAF. Thanks, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 21:08, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

statistics BOT

What has happened to the statistics BOT? Adamdaley (talk) 06:27, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Gday Adam. I don't know the answer but it does seem that it isn't working at the moment. A few editors are asking similar questions at Wikipedia talk:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index. Hopefully the maintainers will reply there. Anotherclown (talk) 07:12, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Reassessment of 2nd Canadian Infantry Division

In July 2013, the featured article 2nd Canadian Infantry Division was merged into 2nd Canadian Division. Please contribute to the discussion at Wikipedia:Featured article review/2nd Canadian Infantry Division/archive1 to decide whether the combined or original article should retain featured article status. DrKiernan (talk) 09:11, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

Stray articles

While I was having a rest from longish articles, I filled in a lot of red links for the Battle of the Somme and a few stray articles, some of which I stumbled on, which were expanded, merged (or deleted) and then linked in campaignboxes etc. I had a look too at lists - articles missing B-class criteria for e.g., which turned up a few like this Winter operations 1914–1915 and saved accidental duplication. If anyone has seen other western front articles 1914-1917 which have been becalmed for ages, I'd be grateful for a link here User talk:Keith-264 to check if I've got them on my list or suggestions of lists and other places to look. ThanksKeith-264 (talk) 11:00, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

Is the term "Winter operations" used elsewhere? I'd suggest a move to "Western Front in winter 1914-15" or "1914-15 winter on the Western Front" which isn't great, but seems a bit better. Presumably at least something happened during the period outside the region... —Brigade Piron (talk) 10:02, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
There was the South African invasion of German South-West Africa - but it was during the Summer of 1914-15 (see MOS:SEASON) - It was a World War, not limited to only the northern hemisphere. -- Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 10:29, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
I know Dodge but I asked about the Western Front.
  • Piron; I assume that coining phrases comes under OR, hence using the Committee nomenclature. I used Winter Operations because it's in the Nomenclature Committee list ["Phase II Trench Warfare, 1914-1916. Operations. Winter Operations, 1914–15 (November–February)] If you embroider it with "Western Front" the 90% held by the French and Belgians will be left out. I toyed with terms like British Western Front and a modern illiteratism like British-held Western Front but they look horrible and are unwieldy and parochial, since the Germans were there too. We could use Winter operations 1914–1915 as a subtitle in the article and use a different label for the title, BEF–German operations winter 1914–1915, Flanders: BEF–German operations winter 1914–1915 or some such, if you think that the title is misleading but wouldn't it be simpler to explain it in the lead?Keith-264 (talk) 10:57, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
"Winter operations 1914-[19]15" seems fine to me, and we can always add "(Western Front)" if needed to disambiguate (presumably there was some activity on the Russian front in this time as well). I agree that changing the name rather than adding a disambiguation comment is probably undesirable. Andrew Gray (talk) 14:44, 29 November 2014 (UTC)
I'm not sure that (Western Front) is enough, because it's only the short length occupied by the BEF. The same problem occurs with the Great Retreat page, which is the BEF scuttle and the odd cameo by the French.Keith-264 (talk) 15:14, 29 November 2014 (UTC)

I found a chapter in The Times encyclopaedia vol 6, pp 1-41 on French operations, so it won't be impossible to add material for the rest of the W front, if anyone prefers.Keith-264 (talk) 22:55, 30 November 2014 (UTC)

"fighter"

Does "(fighter)" mean a mixed martial artist, or a non-military combatant (ie. militia, armed gangs, etc) We are discussing disambiguation at talk:Ed Herman (mixed martial artist) -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 10:58, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Added section on Latin America and Caribbean to the Krag-Jørgensen rifle

I read about how the Krag was used in the 1937 Parsley Massacre in the DR, and took a glance at the Krag article to see how they got there, to no avail. So I ended up making a new section to briefly decribe how US occupations/interventions introduced that service rifle to the DR, Haiti, and Nicaragua. Anyone want to take a glance and see if my new section can be improved? Any other countries where the rifle was introduced by the US, and achieved some level of formal adoption, that needs to be included? See: Krag-Jørgensen#In_the_Caribbean_and_Latin_America. MatthewVanitas (talk) 20:31, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

Action of 15 October 1917

Could I get some opinions on whether this is actually worthy of an article? If this sort of encounter is all the requirement needed for an article, then surely any event when a vessel is lost in action must also warrant an article given the greater significance of the event (especially as no vessels were lost in this article). Wouldn't it be more typical to see this information in the vessel's articles? Given the state of the article I'm tempted to AFD it. And how on earth does it result in an American victory? Ranger Steve Talk 15:41, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Hmm. I'm no expert on WWI naval history, but I'm not finding many secondary sources mentioning it when I'm carrying out the usual pulls. I'm not convinced its notable myself. Hchc2009 (talk) 15:46, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
AFD as far as I'm concerned. Otherwise every single U-boat/target surface engagement is notable.
Neither combatant sunk nor captured, a single fatality. Were it not for the Medal of Honor given to that sailor (Osmond Ingram), this incident would be very unremarkable. Suggest using any content to build up the vessel articles and the Ingram article if necessary, and AfD the article itself. GraemeLeggett (talk) 19:46, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Definitely not an article in and of itself. Add to article on Ingram, yes, and to the article on the Cassin (if there is one). auntieruth (talk) 20:30, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
And to SM U-61 - it certainly doesn't need an article to itself though. Parsecboy (talk) 20:59, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
Probably worth pointing out Action of 17 November 1917 - created by the same editor (a banned sock, incidentally). Parsecboy (talk) 21:10, 26 November 2014 (UTC)
And Action of 4 May 1917 and Action of 8 May 1918. There are probably others out there created by other socks. Parsecboy (talk) 21:12, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Action of 17 November 1917 claims "The Fanning and Nicholson '​s sinking of U-58 was one of only a few engagements of World War I in which U.S. Navy warships sank an enemy submarine." - if that's true, that one might be worth keeping. It seems a bit better developed than the others as well. But I'm not really an expert on WWI, really. Honestly, I'm kind of learning as I go. Adam Cuerden (talk) 21:59, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

I'm lucky enough to be working on a big First World War at sea project at the moment, and this 'action' falls near to the project area, hence my interest. From the numerous records I've consulted at The National Archives, there were far more significant actions happening all around the globe. Lots of these have more than sufficient published sources to construct articles, but this one appears to have nothing specific on it. Nor for that matter do the rest (that I can find). A much better example of a significant encounter between a U-boat and a ship would be the case of HMS Dunraven which saw 2 VCs and a Blue Max awarded.
I'll put these 4 articles up for AFD then, with a note on the possible significance of 17 November 1917. Ranger Steve Talk 11:46, 27 November 2014 (UTC)

Pity: image for that one is great. But then, could always merge some of these in with their ships/subs/Zeppelins. 17 November, especially, would bulk up a stuon SM U-58 - and, as a bonusx, merging can be done without an AFD. Adam Cuerden (talk) 10:26, 28 November 2014 (UTC)

I had a go at expanding Action of 4 May 1917 as it seems like it probably satisfies the requirements for significant coverage. A couple of sources provide reasonably detailed accounts. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:21, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

new article today - please help categorize maybe? Bataillon d'Infanterie legere d'Outre-Mer (BILOM)

Hi - I created an article today on the French Bataillon d'Infanterie legere d'Outre-Mer (BILOM). I'm not sure if that was the best name to give the article, and I'm also not sure how to make it go into categories that would be appropriate for the subject. I did know how to append the WPMH banner to the Talk page, however! The article is just really started, and obviously there's a lot more material to include ... but yeah, I went ahead and created it, but would welcome a more experienced editor adding the proper categories to the article and/or providing any other immediate feedback, guidance or correction. One thing I wasn't sure how to do is cite different page numbers from the same book w/o repeating the same citation text inline :( so for example in the article there's a quote from the French Justice Minister about why the POWs (who they call political prisoners!) might be motivated to join BILOM, but I didn't know how/where to put the page number when I wrote in the citation using the cite-template feature thingie, since that book was a source for other info taken from different page numbers! sigh. sorry for being so rambling here. Anyway, check it out if you have a chance - it's a very small article w/ only a couple of book sources right now (one of which you can even read via google books for the important chapter (18, iirc)), but it's a fascinating topic. Remember, that's Bataillon d'Infanterie legere d'Outre-Mer (BILOM) ... Cheers. Azx2 05:38, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

@Azx2: I've added a category and included two additional banners for the French and German WikiProjects since the article includes them both. Its a decent start, so you should be proud of the article. TomStar81 (Talk) 05:57, 2 December 2014 (UTC)
Thank you very much, TomStar81!! Azx2 06:01, 2 December 2014 (UTC)
Don't forget to link the English translation of the unit name. I'm not sure that Light Foreign Infantry Battalion (either BILOM or France would be a good parenthetical) might not be a better translation of the unit name. "Outre-Mer" does literally translate as overseas, but it also refers more specifically to the Levant in the time of the Crusades as well. I think "Foreign" is more appropriate here than "Overseas", especially since Germany is not overseas from France. --Lineagegeek (talk) 00:06, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
Hi Lineagegeek the reason I went with the title as it originally appeared above, is because in the English-language sources I've read on this, they used the French name for the unit, and abbreviation, and then referred to it ongoing by the acronym. What is the WPMH policy regarding titling foreign units? where there "foreign name" appears in english-language sources? user:Nick-D has already changed the title once, so I'm not wedded to it - I would just like to be sure that if there is a policy it is followed - but regardless - that whatever title is chosen (if it's rewritten), that it be logical. Azx2 10:32, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
We (generally) use WP:COMMONNAME to determine what to call units from non-English speaking countries, so the best name to use is whatever this unit is most commonly called in English-language sources. It's not uncommon for French unit names to be untranslated. Nick-D (talk) 11:09, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
Unless it has a well-known English language name, and given it's relatively complex name vis-a-vis something like "10th Lancers", I wouldn't create a redirect. GraemeLeggett (talk) 11:26, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks to everyone who's shared insights into the best way to approach this. I noticed while we were discussing it here, user:Brigade_Piron changed the title to the correct French Bataillon d'Infanterie légère d'Outre-Mer as I'd omitted the accents on légère when I was transposing it from the source material. He also reordered the English to The Overseas Light Infantry Battalion, which seems fine to me. I took a second to scan the Forbes book, and he doesn't even refer to the unit w/ an English name, only the correct French, and thereafter as BILOM. I would like to find some more English-language sources, because Forbes describes the origins of the unit slightly differently to what I'd gleaned elsewhere, suggesting that it was always conceived of as an overseas combat unit, intended to see service in the Far East, which would make my description of it as originally intended for colonial policing and occupying to free-up FFL troops erroneous.
Another question to Nick-D: can this discussion here, which has, b/c of my enquiries, evolved to include information possibly pertinent to other future editors of the article (an editor with whom I'm not familiar has already lambasted me on the article's talk page for creating the article w/ a French title, which is why I asked about naming conventions) be transposed/copied over to the article's talk page? I don't want to generate even more useful conversation here that won't be readily apparent to anyone w/ an interest in the topic who finds the article independently of my original request here for a few experienced hands to review it after I'd initially created it.
Thanks again, everyone, and cheers! Azx2 19:32, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
Adding a link to this discussion on the article's talk page would be the simplest way to provide editors with a reference to this discussion, which I agree would be a useful reference in case this comes up again in the future. We do have quite a few articles on French military units which use French-language names. Nick-D (talk) 22:06, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

RFC at Palestinian stone-throwing

Please consider sharing your opinion in the RFC at Talk:Palestinian stone-throwing. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 17:59, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

(I totally did not notice that WT:WP Arab-Israeli conflict redirected here - but hopefully this will still catch the eye of people interested in that conflict specifically.) –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:10, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
Well this is cheerful. —  Cliftonian (talk)  18:38, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Request for comment

I'd appreciate feedback from members of this project on proposals at Talk:Reichskommissariat of Belgium and Northern France to replace a "former country" infobox with a "government agency" one. This potentially would affect all articles concerning occupied territories, not just of WWII, so would be good to get as many opinions on as possible.—Brigade Piron (talk) 21:38, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Template:Navies in Europe

Hi all.

I'm trying to the change the United Kingdom Navy entry from British Navy to Royal Navy in this template but I cannot work it out, does anyone know to change it? Gavbadger (talk) 00:27, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

I got there in the end. bit of confusion as template uses UK for one part of its controls, but GB for another. GraemeLeggett (talk) 07:53, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Military or civilian time?

Is there a stated preference or standard within the Military project for using military time in military-related articles? On one hand, it makes sense -- military time in a military article. On the other hand, most readers are not familiar with military time, which then makes the content harder to understand and potentially much less inviting to read, even negating the value of the hard work put into making military operations accessible to and understandable by a lay audience. I ask this as I am finishing substantially improving Battle of Remagen, in which I chose to use civilian time. Your thoughts? — btphelps (talk to me) (what I've done) 21:49, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

I don't know about the project guidelines, but here's the American military's Style Guide Regarding dates, section 6.1 specifically says "Use the military day-month-year dating system (without punctuation)." — Maile (talk) 22:01, 3 December 2014 (UTC)
Write for the reader unless you need to be precise for a reason. Fortunately day-month and month-day forms of dates are intelligible either way round by most readers. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:59, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
I had an experience while stationed in the US many years ago. I went down to a tourist site in Louisiana with a US Army captain. The guest book was at the end of the page, so I started a new page, putting the date in US military form. He did the same. Then a busload of American tourists arrived. And they all complained about having to fill in the date in that form, but did so. I'm like "what the?" while he was sheepishly embarrassed. Hawkeye7 (talk) 13:15, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
I'd prefer civilian time, myself, unless there's context requiring military time. Military time itself is ambiguous. There's an old joke about a US joint operation in which watches are synchronized at 4 bells for the Navy, 0600 for the Army, and 1300Z for the Air Force. Civilian time can be six o'clock, 6 AM, 6:00, so what Graeme said about writing for the reader. --Lineagegeek (talk) 22:54, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
Lets be clear here, what we are really talking about is 24 hour time, and its hardly ambiguous. Indeed that's the reason it is used by militaries, not to mention many military historians. The 12-hour clock is ambiguous and can be easily confused (for instance there are two "6 o'clocks" in a 24 hour period but there is only one 0600 or 1800 for that matter). Not possible to get that confused in my book. Zulu is just a time zone and isn't even relevant. Anotherclown (talk) 08:24, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
Not to mention the fact that some people seem to have trouble with whether midnight is 12pm or 12am. The time zone is often very useful, as the two sides in battles are often using different zones. (2010 Lima now!) If you ever have to store times on a database, always use Zulu. Always. Trust me on this. Hawkeye7 (talk) 09:12, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Image categorization

Does anyone recognize these photos of (probably) the American military training for a beach head landing in WWII? They are among batches needing categories Commons Media from NARA needing categories as of 19 September 2011, and are all dated ca. 1943. — Maile (talk) 16:14, 3 December 2014 (UTC)

It's somewhat surprising to see that FDR is given as the creator of the images! - I suspect that this is an error in the source database ;) The soldiers in the photos are wearing US uniforms and using standard US equipment, but they could be French... (the Free French army was equipped with US weapons and uniforms from about 1943) Nick-D (talk) 11:58, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
I think what the FDR reference means, is that these were records from his administration. — Maile (talk) 13:25, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
For what it's worth, 195674 has an American destroyer in the background, almost certainly a Fletcher class ship. Don't know if that helps at all. Parsecboy (talk) 13:35, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
It will certainly be difficult to pin these images down - the US military had amphibious warfare training camps all over the world in 1943 (there were several in Australia, for instance, not to mention many others in North Africa, the UK and, of course, the US). Nick-D (talk) 22:09, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
The first of these images has some type of Landing Vehicle Tracked, which was heavily associated with the Pacific - they didn't get used in Europe until late 1944, well after Normandy. So they're probably American... but beyond that, no idea. No visible uniform markings.
Per this, training locations were for the Navy/Marines Camp Elliott & Coronado, near San Diego CA from mid-1943; Solomons Island MD; Little Creek VA; Fort Pierce FL. For the Army, Camp Gordon Johnston FL; Camp Cooke & Camp San Luis Obispo CA; and various places in Hawaii. Of all of these, I'd guess it looks most like California. Andrew Gray (talk) 23:45, 4 December 2014 (UTC)
The landing craft in 195674 is marked "PA 3122" if we have any landing craft spotters around. Our LCVP (United States) shows craft with these "PA" markings and it may refer to USS Monrovia (APA-31) but ships and stuff is not my area. MilborneOne (talk) 20:16, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
I think you've got it. This confirms the numbering is [ship code]-[ship number]-[boat number] - so PA3122 is boat 22 from APA31. And from that article, "Monrovia conducted shakedown and amphibious training exercises in Chesapeake Bay through the winter months of 1943.". Sounds like my California guess was off. Andrew Gray (talk) 23:07, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
I'm thinking of creating a sub category to Commons category Franklin Delano Roosevelt for all these military images. I'm finding many other military images in this batch that seem to be short on identifying information. — Maile (talk) 17:23, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Combined Joint Task Force - Operation Inherent Resolve

I think wikipedia would be served if you all helped improve the CJTF Operational Inherent Resolve page. As US/coalition actions develop in Iraq/Syria, I think this will be of interests.Casprings (talk) 18:46, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

What is the "Chinese war" at the end of List_of_wars_before_1000#999_B.C._.E2.80.94_1_B.C.

I am uncertain if that is an error or typo. There is a date that is separate of the others. Link List_of_wars_before_1000#999_B.C._.E2.80.94_1_B.C. at 34 B.C. Thanks Marasama (talk) 11:22, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Featured Topic Candidate

Hi everyone, if you have a chance, please stop by the Featured Topic nomination for No. 90 (Composite) Wing RAAF and offer your comments on its candidature. Thanks/cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 10:06, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

"fighter"

Hello, WikiProject Military history. You have new messages at WT:BIOG#PROPOSAL: the standard disambiguator for mixed martial arts practioner.
You can remove this notice at any time by removing the {{Talkback}} or {{Tb}} template.

I've proposed that "fighter" is too ambiguous to be the mixed martial artist disambiguator, because of military and other uses, for the RFC on the matter, see WT:BIOG -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 10:31, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

World War I Eastern Front

If anyone has knowledge of the WWI Eastern Front, I could use some help with this. I started a discussion on the talk page, so we'll see. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:28, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Talk:War on Terror#Requested move

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:War on Terror#Requested move. Thanks. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:20, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Also please see Talk:War on Terror#MOS image.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:20, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Battleship Texas

(To use the name of the state historic site) - I went here on a recent holiday, and got a lot of photos. Some of them, I think, are better than what we have. Would you care to have a look? commons:Category:Battleship_Texas_State_Historic_Site Adam Cuerden (talk) 03:55, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Nice work, Adam Cuerden! Those look great. You could add File:Battleship Texas - exterior - DSCN0084.JPG to tripod mast. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 20:19, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
Wow - job well done! — Maile (talk) 21:57, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

William Adlam, Major General (1750–1823)

Comments welcome at WP:Articles for deletion/William Adlam. JohnCD (talk) 22:09, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Unusual request

Hi all,

Just had this message on my talk page from an ip editor who hasn't used the ip address to edit and was wondering if anyone wanted to follow it up. I don't know to add pictures myself and I have never contacted a user via email regarding Wikipedia stuff so I'm rather weary about making contact. Gavbadger (talk) 21:41, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

"My father-in-law was stationed at Danby Beacon and elsewhere supporting radar (particularly GEE) during wwII. He might have persona pictures of staff personnel that you'd want for your collection. If so, please drop me an email and tell me how we can send info to you... or I can send you his email address if you want to email directly. Thanks... ''[email redacted]'' <small class="autosigned">— Preceding [[Wikipedia:Signatures|unsigned]] comment added by [[Special:Contributions/209.151.140.191|209.151.140.191]] ([[User talk:209.151.140.191|talk]]) 20:13, 4 December 2014 (UTC)</small><!-- Template:Unsigned IP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->"

Asked something similar on Commons a few weeks ago (uploading previously unpublished images to commons on behalf of a third party). Its a lot of hoops to jump through: 1) They need to contact OTRS as the copyright holder, (providing among other things their formal identification, the images in question, proof of copyright ownership, and relevant commons-compatible legal declarations) and give permission to upload (wait up to 60 days for approval). 2) You as the uploader need to contact OTRS (providing, among other things, your formal identification, the images in question, relevant commons-compatible legal declarations, and copies of everything in step 1 including the OTRS response) and state your intent to upload (wait up to 60 days for approval). Then you can upload the pictures, and pray to your deity of choice that the backend is all hunky dory, or they'll get deleted anyway.
Easier options for the IP in question may be to join Commons and upload them themselves, or 'publish' them elsewhere (Flickr would be a good choice, but anywhere online with blatant and obvious declarations of commons-compatible licensing) and then ping you or someone else willing with where to find them. -- saberwyn 08:42, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
Gavbadger/Saberwyn: Commons is going a bit ape there, honestly, as they are want to do. Technically speaking, all you have to do is upload it with commons:Template:PD-heirs and identify the creator, e.g. File:USS-Connecticut.jpg. I'm going to ping Adam Cuerden and Crisco 1492 to this discussion, as they should know more. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 20:17, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
My suggestion, in all honesty? If Commons are going to be stupid, upload it here with the {{KeepLocal}} template, and let them sort it out. Might want to do OTRS as well. Adam Cuerden (talk) 22:26, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

Nominations for military history newcomer of the year for 2014 now open!

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Military history newcomer of the year 2014
  • First place
    First place

As we find ourselves fast approaching the end of the year, it is time for us to pause to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. This year, in addition to the annual "Military Historian of the Year" award, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate a promising newcomer that they feel deserves a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months. The award is open to any editor who has become active in military history articles in the last 12 months.

Like the Military Historian of the Year, the nomination process will last until 23:59 (GMT) on 14 December. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of seven days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top editor will be awarded the Gold Wiki; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

Editors are asked to keep their nominations to 10 editors or less and nominations should be made in the following format (20 words max).

  • [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalised. Thanks, and good luck! TomStar81 (Talk) 00:14, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Nominations

  • Catlemur: Active (5K edits) in Milhist since July, after bringing Periscope rifle to B-class. Entered monthly contest several times. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:07, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Cinderella157: active since June 2014, mainly working on a re-draft of the Battle of Buna–Gona article with a view to eventually going live with it. A new editor who is putting in a lot of work to get things right and who will be a great asset to the project. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:00, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Saxum: made considerable contributions in the first year of project participation adding half a dozen GAs. In all honesty they're active in Milhist since late November 2013 - so I'm not quite sure if they apply to the "newcomer" category, but I figured this year's round of nominations were in practice the first where they could be nominated. Cheers--Tomobe03 (talk) 15:53, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Jonas Vinther: joined us in late December 2013. Since then he worked on a number of articles and supported the project by reviewing many articles. MisterBee1966 (talk) 16:18, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • David Ramsey: I nominate Dr Harry Laver of Southeastern Louisiana University. In 4 books published by the university presses of Georgia, Kentucky, and Nebraska, as well as articles in U. S. Army War College Quarterly, Journal of Southern History, and Register of the Kentucky Historical Society, Laver (PhD Kentucky) has demonstrated an eclectic grasp of the influence of Ulysses S. Grant on the field strategy of later generals including Colin Powell. Southeastern is the site of the annual Deep Delta Civil War Symposium. See http://www.southeastern.edu/acad_research/depts/hist_ps/faculty/bio/laver.html AND http://www2.southeastern.edu/NewsEvents/PublicInfoOffice/DeepDelta04.html. Dr Laver is indeed a stunning and deserving, although non-selfpromoting, nominee. Rammer (talk) 20:42, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
    • Hi David, just to clarify, these awards are for the achievements of MilHist editors on Wikipedia. Has Dr Laver an account that he's edited under here? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 10:43, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  • P-123 A tireless and outgoing copy editor whose non-stop editings give other editors energy and motivation for editing. He is skilful at addressing the disputes and leading them toward consensus. Mhhossein (talk) 09:47, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Pendright: a US Navy veteran of World War II who officially joined our project just over a year ago and has shown great dedication since then, taking a brace of articles through GA, A, and finally FA-class reviews. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 10:20, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
I would like to second this nomination, we are losing WWII veterans at an alarming rate, and for one to share what limited time they have with us and improving articles that they may have first hand knowledge of is a call for an award.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:49, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
  • I JethroBT : has helped introduce a number of new Wikipedians to the joys of editing military history articles and helped to improve the following articles John Robinson (aviator), Jason Healey, and William Foley (artist) TeriEmbrey (talk) 22:34, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
    • I see some milhist activity, but I do not see his name on the project's in/active rosters, nor do I see any userboxes associated with our project. Are you sure he is with us? TomStar81 (Talk) 22:49, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
      • @TomStar81: I don't think the editor needs to be a member of Milhist! WP:MHAWARDS says "The Military historian of the year award recognizes the editors who have contributed most to the field of military history on Wikipedia over the course of a given year," and I'm in favor of that loose definition. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 22:57, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Battle of Schliengen/archive1

Guys, this has been at FAC almost a month with only a prose support. Help will be appreciated. - Dank (push to talk) 13:03, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Expert attention

This is a notice about Category:Military history/British military history task force articles needing expert attention, which might be of interest to your WikiProject. It will take a while before the category is populated. Iceblock (talk) 19:56, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

This is a notice about Category:Military history/Middle Eastern military history task force articles needing expert attention, which might be of interest to your WikiProject. It will take a while before the category is populated. Iceblock (talk) 20:51, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

Capitalization and units

Is it common place for military articles to place units (particularly metric units) immediately after numeric values? Which is the preferred version, "155mm howitzer" or "155 mm howitzer"? MOS:NUM#Unit names and symbols says, "Except as shown in the "Specific units" table below, a space appears between a numeric value and a unit name or symbol. In the case of unit symbols,   (or {{nowrap}}‍) should be used to prevent linebreak." Does this also apply the to titles of military articles? The article Indian Field Gun does not have a space between the unit symbol and the numeric value and I was wondering if that title is correct.

Is it also OK to capitalize the first letter of each word of a weapon's name? Both WP:MILMOS#Capitalization and MOS:MILTERMS seem to say that is only necessary for accepted proper names, but it's sometimes hard to tell where the proper name begins and ends. Should "field gun" in "105mm Indian Field Gun", "multi barrel rocket launcher" in Pinaka Multi Barrel Rocket Launcher and "under barrel grenade launcher" in ARDE Under Barrel Grenade Launcher be capitalized or do WP:TITLEFORMAT and MOS:SECTIONCAPS apply? - Thanks in advance. - Marchjuly (talk) 04:26, 11 December 2014 (UTC)

calibre/caliber is normally dealt with via a convert template, which places a space between. BTW, the article named "105mm Indian Field Gun" just needs a space between "105" and "mm", as "Indian Field Gun" appears to be its full proper name. In the sources for the Pinaka MBRL article, it appears that "Pinaka" is the full proper name of the system, but because Pinaka doesn't mean much, it needs to be clarified that it is a MBRL system, so it should be "Pinaka multi barrel rocket launcher". Same for the UBGL. Hope that helps. Regards, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 05:56, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks Peacemaker67 for the reply. So, just to make sure, it should be "105 mm Indian Field Gun", "Pinaka multi barrel rocket launcher" and "ARDE 40 mm under barrel grenade launcher", right? Do you think these moves will be controversial and should be done via WP:RM? - Marchjuly (talk) 06:31, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
Yep. Should be uncontroversial, as they are based on WP:AT. No need for RM, IMO. If you strike resistance, mention it here and I'll weigh in. Regards, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 06:35, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks Peacemaker67. While I was doing some post move cleanup, I came across Ordnance Factory Tiruchirappalli#Products and Ordnance Factory Tiruchirappalli#New products. Should these weapon names be changed to lower case as well? - Marchjuly (talk) 07:30, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
A pleasure. It will vary, depending on the proper name, per the above examples, but I'd say in most cases, yes. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 08:16, 11 December 2014 (UTC)
Sounds good. It looks as if another editor has started cleaning things up a bit on that page, so maybe things will get sorted out. - Marchjuly (talk) 00:48, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Nominations for military historian of the year for 2014 now open!

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Military historian of the year 2014


  • First place
    First place
  • Second place
    Second place
  • Third place
    Third place

As we find ourselves fast approaching the end of the year, it is time for us to pause to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. As part of the first step to determining this year's "Military Historian of the Year" award, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate those that they feel deserve a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months. The nomination process will last until 23:59 (GMT) on 14 December. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of seven days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top three editors will be awarded the Gold, Silver and Bronze Wiki respectively; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

Editors are asked to keep their nominations to 10 editors or less and nominations should be made in the following format (20 words max).

  • [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalised. Thanks, and good luck! TomStar81 (Talk) 00:14, 7 December 2014 (UTC)

Nominations

  • Parsecboy: The (mainly German) ship-building continues apace, with a huge number of GAs this year. Incredible workrate. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Sturmvogel 66: A prolific ship-maker who has contributed hugely to Milhist GAN throughput via reviewing as well (has reviewed 493! GANs). Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Tomobe03: Great work this year, significant contribution to Croatia War of Independence articles/lists (1 × FL, 22 × GA) and lots of GAN reviews. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Anotherclown: massive contribution as a reviewer at GAN and ACR this year, as well as content creation work at B-class and GAN. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Ian Rose: another fantastic year for Ian in terms of content creation, co-ord duties and FAC work. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Peacemaker67: a strong year of content creation in a contentious field and significant contributions to the project through work as a co-ord. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Hawkeye7: made a significant contribution to the project's co-ordination through creation of MilhistBot. Has also continued to produce top quality articles throughout the year. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • MisterBee1966: German military historian. Hawkeye7 (talk) 03:15, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • AustralianRupert: A strong year both as content creator and reviewer. Australian as his name implies. —  Cliftonian (talk)  08:53, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
    • G'day, I really appreciate the nomination, but I would like to politely decline as I have received the award twice now. It looks like we've got quite a few great candidates who are all quite deserving in their own way. Thanks greatly for the nomination, though. Have a great day. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 21:21, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • BoringHistoryGuy Tireless often behind-the-scenes worker, whose name is often the answer when I ask my self, "Who did all this?" Carptrash (talk) 15:36, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Diannaa Copy editor extraordinaire, a tireless work ethic, significant contributions at improving articles, adding cites, removing OR and vandalism edits; great collaborator and reviewer. Kierzek (talk) 21:05, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Diannaa Extremely kind person, always willing to help, awesome collaborator, and highly appreciated copy editor. Jonas Vinther (speak to me!) 01:31, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  • P-123 A tireless and outgoing copy editor whose non-stop editings give other editors energy and motivation for editing. He is skilful at addressing the disputes and leading them toward consensus. Mhhossein (talk) 09:45, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Auntieruth55 - Dedicated hard working editor whose numerous streamlined contributions tend to fly below the radar, but one whom the project definitely relies on to help with the work. TomStar81 (Talk) 19:22, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Keith-264: has dedicated 2014 to improving the project's coverage of World War I, producing a significant body of work in this area. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:37, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
    • Keith is flattered to be listed but desires it to be known that he would prefer not to be a nominee. RegardsKeith-264 (talk) 08:24, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Dank: has had a hand in most A-class and FA-class articles the project has produced this year through involvement in reviewing and copy editing. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:37, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
  • The ed17: A prolific content contributor and coordinator whose work with battleship related articles and the bugle has been praiseworthy. TomStar81 (Talk) 14:19, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
    • Thank you TomStar81, but I'll decline. With steadily growing real-life commitments, I have done few significant things this year that haven't been Signpost-related. :-) Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 20:10, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Hchc2009: sterling work on medieval-themed milhist articles in 2014. Zawed (talk) 00:53, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Mystery frigate

Can anyone shed any light on a frigate named "Leipsic" (Leipzig?) lost off Terschelling, Netherlands before April 1835 please. Needs adding to the relevant list of shipwrecks. Mentioned in The Morning Post of 27 April 1835, quoting the Journal de la Hague of 22 April 1835. Mjroots (talk) 20:31, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Checked the German list of Leipzigs and the oldest entry is from 1875 - must be some other country's frigate. Parsecboy (talk) 20:57, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
Leipzig was in the Kingdom of Saxony in the 1830s, but Prussia is the likeliest candidate IMHO. Mjroots (talk) 21:32, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
More than likely named for the battle, rather than the city, but either way, I'd wager the de.wiki list is complete, so I doubt it's German. I'll check Groener and/or Hildebrand et. al. later to confirm. Parsecboy (talk) 21:39, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
It's not Russian ship of the line Leiptzig (1816), is it? Mjroots (talk) 21:42, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
Unlikely - according to that page she was hulked in 1824 and scrapped in 1832. Parsecboy (talk) 21:50, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
Neither Gröner or Hildebrand et. al. mention a Leipzig older than the ship launched in 1875 - pretty definitively not German. Parsecboy (talk) 22:26, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

I've added Leiptzig to the list of shipwrecks in 1824 and the de-wiki list. Looks like an opportunity for the creation of a couple of articles here. Mjroots (talk) 23:12, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Reliable source for casualties during First Battle of Quảng Trị

Gday. Does anyone have a reliable source for both North Vietnamese and South Vietnamese casualties during the First Battle of Quảng Trị in March - May 1972? Currently the figures are uncited, while an IP has recently been making some changes that I am unsure are accurate (I have asked for discussion but they just continue to make the same change). If anyone has a good source that would probably settle the matter. Thanks in advance. Anotherclown (talk) 22:33, 12 December 2014 (UTC)

Tucker "The Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War", pp. 952 onwards seems like it could be a useful source (only preview available on Google books though which is missing the next few pages unfortunately) [4]. Does anyone have access to this source? Anotherclown (talk) 02:27, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Reference check - anyone have "South Vietnam on Trial" by Fulghum and Maitland?

Hello. I am dubious of this edit [5] at Easter Offensive, which adds "Limited North Vietnamese strategic victory" to the result summary and gives the ref "Fulghum and Maitland, p. 183", however the article already calls it a "North Vietnamese tactical defeat" with the same reference. Does anyone have this source? And if so could you pls check that the source actually supports the information it is being used to reference (i.e. both NVA tactical defeat and strategic victory) or one or the other? Thanks again. Anotherclown (talk) 06:17, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I read the article yesterday for reasons of nostalgia and thought that

result – optional – this parameter may use one of several standard terms: "X victory", "Decisive X victory" or "Inconclusive". The choice of term should reflect what the sources say. In cases where the standard terms do not accurately describe the outcome, a link to the section of the article where the result is discussed in detail (such as "See the 'Aftermath' section") should be used instead of introducing non-standard terms like "marginal" or "tactical" or contradictory statements like "decisive tactical victory but strategic defeat". It is better to omit this parameter altogether than to engage in speculation about which side won or by how much.

might be called for in the infobox. Keith-264 (talk) 09:22, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Gday Keith. Thanks for taking the time to read my post and reply. Yes I agree that could be a solution in cases where there are multiple reliable sources which state opposite outcomes (although the key here is "reliable"). My question though is more specific. As I no longer assume the user that added this material to the article in question to be acting in good faith I'm hoping someone can fact check the source and confirm or deny whether it supports their edit. Thanks in advance. Anotherclown (talk) 10:45, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
FYI for anyone following this I have now removed this information per Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/MiG29VN. That said I'm than happy for an editor to restore it if they are able to confirm that it is supported by the reference provided. Thanks. Anotherclown (talk) 22:34, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Same list different name?

I am not 100% but are List of Allied vessels involved in Operation Neptune and List of Allied warships in the Normandy landings the same thing? --Molestash (talk) 22:38, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

Template:post-Cold War conflicts in the Americas and September 11 attacks

I am unclear on whether September 11 attacks qualifies as a conflict in terms of military or political battles. Thoughts? --George Ho (talk) 06:09, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Medium machine guns and the like

Is the Maxim machine gun a medium or a heavy? Is it just a question of role, or size of caliber, or a blurring of both? And if it's a heavy, does that imply the Vickers is a heavy too.GraemeLeggett (talk) 16:14, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

The Heavy machine gun article says that the classification was made by weight and calibre, but lacks citations to support this. My impression has always been that this is/was a US concept, and the distinction was made by calibre - in World War II, the 0.5 inch M2 Browning was considered a HMG while the also-large (though not as large) M1919 Browning machine gun was a MMG. Nick-D (talk) 21:49, 13 December 2014 (UTC)
Distinction of either heavy, medium, or even light machine guns really varies by nation and time period the weapon was used. Being one of the first machine guns and used by nearly every army along with having calibers as large as 37mm the maxim could be seen as simultaneously a medium and heavy machine gun. --Molestash (talk) 00:32, 14 December 2014 (UTC)
~I suspected it wouldn't be simple. I've been editing on list of machine guns which is divided into types, and the Maxim and the Russian derivative (PM1910) differed from the Vickers and MG/08. GraemeLeggett (talk) 06:52, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Help with a new article about Stolen valor

Hello. I was hoping to get some assistance with polishing an article I am writing, currently in my sandbox here: Military imposter. It is a hot topic over the past decade, even involving two federal laws in the US, and I was very surprised to find no articles about it on wikipedia. I chose to use the more generic title "military imposter" because "stolen valor" appears to be American slang. I attempted to make the article as applicable to the rest of the world as possible, but unfortunately all my sources are in the US. I request help for the following reasons:

  • I have never been a member of any military. I have friends from each of the five branches in the US military, hence my interest, but that is WP:OR and more importantly, hearsay. This is a matter of great concern to real veterans, so don't want to screw it up.
  • I am far from a professional writer. I make mistakes and don't always notice them when I proofread.
  • I was hoping for additional sources and/or views from other countries besides the US. This is an issue that I would think affects any nation.

Thanks! Legitimus (talk) 13:50, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

If you're interested in adding information relating to other countries, masquerading as a military soldier or officer in China (e.g. civilians wearing People's Liberation Army uniforms) is a punishable offence, as it is illegal for a civilian to wrongfully pose as a member of the PLA. There's also something else that's slightly related, a bigger and more common problem in China involves civilians using fake military car license plates illegally (these cars get special privileges, e.g. police cannot give them parking tickets), however this probably has less to do with stolen valor, and more with gaining false benefits for personal gain. Here and here are two relevant articles. --benlisquareT•C•E 16:59, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
@Legitimus: You're off to a good start. I'm confused, though: You list three books as references. That seems sufficient to fill the article with in-line citations about this type of fraud. Globalizing this issue can be done later. Chris Troutman (talk) 18:46, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
In the UK, it used to be illegal to impersonate a Chelsea pensioner - it carried the death penalty for many years I think... Hchc2009 (talk) 19:16, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
G'day, this is an issue in Australia also. Here are a couple of newspaper articles that might be of interest: [6] and [7]. There is also a website run by some people to investigate alleged imposters: [8] I recommend caution though not to breach BLP guidelines. Good luck with taking the article further. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 20:31, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks everyone, those should help. Regarding book references, I don't actually own them, I'm just working from google books preview text and citations from other sites. Once I get that sorted I'll start working in-line citations. Also thanks for reminding me about BLP, that could be an issue with a few "notables" unless they were tried in a court and convicted of imposter-related crimes. Interesting thing to note, Walter K. Carlson and Terry J. Powell appear to be completely non-notable people apart from their crimes. I found them purely by accident trying to find articles about imposters, and they probably should be deleted. Who ever created them might have been trying to use Wikipedia as a "stolen valor shaming site" which is definitely against BLP.Legitimus (talk) 21:01, 5 December 2014 (UTC)

Pritzker Military Museum & Library has book references on Stolen Valor. If you go to your home library and request via interlibrary loan, PMML staff will send the items or make photocopies of sections. If you just need photocopies or a reference check, you can leave a talk message on my talk page.TeriEmbrey (talk) 16:51, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

  • There was an episode of a crime series about stolen valor in the Russian military, it came out about 5 years ago on the Russian Channel 2.Maybe it is somewhere out there on the net.--Catlemur (talk) 18:46, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Widespread sockpuppet issue on Vietnam War and Russian Front (World War Two) articles

Hello all. Apologies for the repeated posts here recently but I think this issue is something the wider MILHIST community at least needs to be aware of. This issue has been ongoing for a while but only came to my attention in the last day or so, and while there have been a few editors that have been tracking this and working through it for us (for which I thank them), I think the only way this will be resolved is with more eyes on these articles. A banned editor has been using a wide range of IPs as sockpuppets to edit a range of Vietnam War and Russian Front related articles for some time now. As socks are discovered and blocked new ones appear, while some seem to have gone undetected for months, resulting in fairly widespread disruption. So far, since March 2014, there have been 8 separate sockpuppet investigations - pls see the details at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet_investigations/MiG29VN.

Some of the articles where these socks have edited include (but there are doubtless others): Battle of Suoi Bong Trang, Battle of Coral–Balmoral, First Battle of Quảng Trị, Second Battle of Quảng Trị, Operation Junction City, Operation Kingfisher, Operation Swift, Operation Buffalo (1967), Operation Hastings, Operation Prairie, Battle of Hill 881, Operation Medina, Operation Union, Operation Union II, Operation Lam Son 719, Operation Starlite, Battle of Trà Bình, Battle of Prek Klok I, Battle of Prek Klok II, Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21, Battle of Khe Sanh, Operation Masher, Operation Cedar Falls, Operation Attleboro, Battle of Long Tan, Battle of Dak To, Battle of Huế, Massacre at Huế, Tet Offensive, Body count, Operation Linebacker I, Operation Linebacker II, Battle of Hòa Bình, Battle of Loc Ninh, Easter Offensive, Operation Rolling Thunder, Battle of Xa Cam My, Operation Delaware, Vietnam War casualties, Battle of Đồng Hới, List of equipment of the Vietnam People's Ground Forces, Equipment losses in World War II, IS tank family, Battle of Stalingrad, Battle of Kursk, Battle of Rostov (1941), Lvov–Sandomierz Offensive, Western Allied invasion of Germany, Second Battle of Kharkov, Ostrogozhsk–Rossosh Offensive, Case Blue, Battle of Smolensk (1941), Battle of Kiev (1941), Battle of Berlin, Battle of the Korsun–Cherkassy Pocket, Dnieper–Carpathian Offensive, Operation Uranus, Battle of Prokhorovka, RPG-7, and 7.62×51mm NATO.

The IPs involved all geolocate to Hanoi and (so far) include the following ranges: 101.XX, 27.XX, 113.XX, 1.55.XX, 42.XX, 58.XX, 117.XX, 118.XX and 183.XX. Of course not all IPs in these ranges are sockpuppets, so care needs to be taken here not to prevent good faith editing. Whilst the latest issue now seems to be resolved I imagine this is only temporary, so if other editors could pls watch these articles to ensure any disruption is detected that would be appreciated. The whole episode has left me fairly concerned about the amount of disruption that has likely occurred that remains undiscovered, so if other editors are willing to review other articles in these topic areas to check they are free of disruption that would also be beneficial. Thanks again for any assistance anyone is willing to volunteer. Kind regards. Anotherclown (talk) 01:07, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

Predictably this issue has recommenced today, this time at Battle of Hòa Bình. I have requested a re-block here and semi-protection here, although no doubt they will just change to yet another account and move on to a different article. Anotherclown (talk) 09:30, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

FAR notice

I have nominated Military career of Hugo Chávez for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 17:35, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

Barney McCall

Hello from the cricket project! This guy was a notable cricketer and Welsh rugby international. But he also had a military career of note and was an MC recipient in WWII. I'm wondering if anybody would be able to complete the currently empty military career section on the article? Thanks, PinchHittingLeggy (talk) 23:34, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

I have had a quick look through the London Gazette archive and have added a few paragraphs on his pre-war and post-war service. With a bit of digging I should be able to find a bit on his WWII service too (hopefully his MC award and promotion to captain at least). Regards - Dumelow (talk) 19:49, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
I have added a little more and tracked down his medal recommendation in the National Archives. If you are willing to pay £3.30 you can download this file which should provide detail about the circumstances of the award, from the limited preview it looks to make interesting reading (if you are near Kew or know somebody who is, you can view the record for free) - Dumelow (talk) 20:05, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
He is in a group photograph at the RASC museum in Camberley, Surrey also - Dumelow (talk) 21:29, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks Dumelow, I believe a member of our project might be subscribed to something relating to the National Archives. Thanks for your work, much appreciated :-) PinchHittingLeggy (talk) 18:06, 16 December 2014 (UTC)

War outcome related article needs expert view

An RFC is here ,the article is about an outcome of a war would request comments from experts in this field Shrikanthv (talk) 11:03, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

Potential project for you guys?

Hi, guys. I'm contacting you to see if your group has interest in taking lead on a potential project to collaborate with the History Channel on information related to the Texas Revolution. In a nutshell, they are going to be running a program called "Texas Rising", which focuses on the battles and events of the Texas Revolution after the Alamo. Horizon Media has contacted us to see if there would be any possibility of the article on Texas Revolution or the one on Santa Anna reaching featured status for TFA on the day the program launches, May 25, 2015 (Memorial Day). They are aware that we are not an advertising platform, but hope to be able to point viewers to the main page article for further information. There is a possibility, if there is interest, that they may be able to get some assistance in developing either article from History Channel historians.

They have been apprised that article development is managed by volunteers, as is the assessment of quality and the coordination of TFAs, and they are very interested in working with a volunteer group who might be interested in exploring this possibility. You guys seemed to me like a natural fit. Is there any interest in taking part in this? Any questions or concerns I should pass along first? --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 19:33, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

@Mdennis (WMF): The only Milhist Texas writer that I know of is Karanacs, who is interested in that exact time period but hasn't been active for some time. Perhaps you could try emailing her? Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 20:23, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
G'day, I believe that Maile66 is currently working on something related to this: the Runaway Scrape, an article which is currently being reviewed at Milhist A-class review. Not sure if they would be interested or not. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 20:43, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
After The World Wars (miniseries), why would anyone interested in history want to work with the History Channel?--Jim in Georgia Contribs Talk 20:54, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
Yes, I'm involved in Texas history. However, I would at least try to get the word out to Karanacs and Kuru who contributed to Texas FAs. Also, WhisperToMe might be interested. And, yes, by the way, the Runaway Scrape is the subject matter. It is a brief of what happened after the Alamo until Santa Anna's surrender.— Maile (talk) 21:43, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks, Maile, for pinging me on this. I have long wanted to get Texas Revolution up to snuff, but I had planned to write about each of the battles first... and then burnt out halfway through. I've barely begun research into the second half of the war - although it looks like Maile has! This is a big undertaking - it would need to be done and nominated for FA by mid-April to have a prayer of passing before Memorial Day. In that time frame, it would take a team of at least 3, I think - 1-2 to finish the research (Goliad campaign, battle of San Jac, aftermath/significance), 1 to pull together the existing research/summarize the FAs already written, 1 to write up the new research. Plus drop-ins from a copyeditor (perhaps Modernist?) and someone who knows something about images. I don't have the amount of time that I used to have to devote, but if we could get a few other volunteers to commit, I'm in for a collaboration. At this point, I'd probably be better suited to doing research and posting my notes and letting someone else write. Then I could help with the FA prep, since I used to do a lot of that. Karanacs (talk) 22:31, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
I would also be interested in doing Sam Houston - I have 3 biographies of him at home just waiting for me to read them. Karanacs (talk) 22:31, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
And thank you for answering. I'm willing, but I realize my limitations. For one thing, I don't have access to nearly enough research material for that part of it. I'm willing to pitch in and do what I can, but I also believe there are writers here at MHProjject who far surpass me on writing skills. The timing of this is ironic. I just happened to run across Runaway Scrape in October, not having seen it before, and decided to make it more understandable. Hope this idea gets volunteers. — Maile (talk) 22:44, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

Hi, guys! In January I may be able to get some archival material from institutions in southeast Texas. Are there particular libraries you have in mind? WhisperToMe (talk) 23:23, 8 December 2014 (UTC)

I'd be thrilled to help with such a project, but that is a real big project. In essence, you'd need to cover the entire Runaway Scrape - the article and it's relevant sub articles. Additional consideration could also be given to the articles Six flags over Texas and History of Texas, since those two articles are also part of the history of Texas, and would be of interest to people checking the series out. TomStar81 (Talk) 02:23, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
PS: Maggie Dennis (WMF), thanks for bringing this up here. I can't vouch for the rest of the editors here, but this new just made my day (or more accurately, my night, since I don't think I've seen the sun in a week :) TomStar81 (Talk) 02:30, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for bringing this here, Maggie -- with Karanacs (welcome back!), WhisperToMe, and TomStar81 expressing interest, it sounds like there might already be the nucleus of a project team. Karan's suggestions for division of labour (sorry, labor...!) make sense to me. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 10:02, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
@Mdennis (WMF):In order to determine where exactly we should concentrate our efforts here can we get some idea of when exactly the series wraps up? The period they are covering could have one of two possible end points: the aftermath of the Battle of San Jacinto, or the Texas annexation of 1845-1846. If its the former, then my original assessment that we would need to work on the Runaway Scrape, but if they are planning on going a little further than that then we would need to expand our horizons a little to adequately cover the series. TomStar81 (Talk) 10:53, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Well, Runaway Scrape needs to have the A-Class review wrapped up. — Maile (talk) 13:59, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
I googled the History Channel production. It claims to be "the story of how the Texas Rangers were created" (which has pretty much zero to do with the Texas Revolution, so keep reminding yourself this is a fictionalized account and people deserve a great article to point out reality). The list of characters is mostly people who played big parts in the Battle of San Jacinto. It may go as far as Lamar's presidency (he formalized the division), but I doubt much further than that. Since most people will google Texas Revolution instead of Runaway Scrape, I don't think we need to focus on the latter article. Karanacs (talk) 23:40, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
Except that it was nominated for A-class review before this other ever came up. I'm just saying I would like that review to progress as normal, whether or not any additional editing happens to it. It was termed "horrible article" on the talk page, and nobody could make sense of it before I completely rewrote it. My purpose with the A-class review was/is to put those talk page doubts to rest. — Maile (talk) 00:13, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

I've started brainstorming at Talk:Texas Revolution. Karanacs (talk) 16:03, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

I'm answering a ping above and on my page. I'd love to help in any way. Anything that keeps Karanacs as an active editor; very excited to see you back. Will check in on the TR talk page and volunteer as needed. Kuru (talk) 02:01, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Hi, guys. I'm sorry for the delay in my response. I've got an inquiry out to them, as I'd like to put them in touch with one of you directly, but they are not speedy correspondents. :/ I will update with more information and hopefully make a direct connection as soon as I can! --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 14:44, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Mdennis (WMF), to the surprise of no one, Karanacs has taken the old Texas bull by its long horns and is gradually putting in place a structure the rest of us can work from. Please see Talk:Texas Revolution. She can answer for herself, but I would suggest putting her out there as the main contact for this project. She's got the experience, know-how and initiative to see this through. — Maile (talk) 16:33, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Thank you, — Maile . :) --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 11:17, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

I will vote for

the first editor who can tell (here or my user page) the date of the uniform Kit Carson is wearing in the lede picture of that article. Einar aka Carptrash (talk) 05:42, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

@Carptrash: Its probably a civil war uniform, likely from his time from the civil war since the insignia on his shoulder appears to be an eagle (rank of Colonel) as opposed to his brevet General rank attained after the war ended. As there is no mention of his Indian war service, TomStar81 (Talk) 07:00, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Ok, after a little more digging I can narrow Carson's uniform down to no early than 1853/54, and no later than 1865/66. According to the article, in 53/54 Carson;s future unit (the department of NM) was formally created, since he held the rank of colonel in that unit his uniform could not have been issued any earlier than that to have been photographed with the eagle insignia. He was recommended for brevet general's rank in 65, so the uniform's insignia would have had a general's star past 65/66. Accordingly then, based on this empirical evidence, I can safely say with a high degree of certainty that this photograph in the lead was taken at some point during the civil war, or the immediately preceding Indian interventions; more probably the former than the latter since the civil war has a better collection of photographs related to commanding officers. TomStar81 (Talk) 07:35, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
One might also suggest that, comparing the photo with that from 1868, Carson is considerably younger in the former - hair fuller and dark, face less lined. Which would point earlier in the 1860s than later.Monstrelet (talk) 16:33, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Winter War

There is an ongoing neutrality dispute in Winter War article. See the discussion here. I have started discussion on NPOV noticeboard and I was advised to turn to you. Can you help to resolve the dispute? --Gwafton (talk) 23:25, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Return of assessing IP

An IP with a history of assessing articles for this project that project members found unsatisfactory has returned: [9], previous discussion here from April 2014. They were blocked back then as a sock of Wild Wolf. I have no idea whether the latest assessments are problematic, but they're doing a lot of articles so the project needs to be aware. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:47, 17 December 2014 (UTC)

The user needs to at least provide an edit summary to justify the change to each article's assessment (rating). A note on this was added to the the IPer's talk page. -Fnlayson (talk) 22:04, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Also, the IPer seems to be mainly copying in the B-class assessment fields, but not checking if each criteria is passed or not ('yes/no' is being left for each field). -Fnlayson (talk) 22:16, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Actually, it's more than one IP involved with the same history. No block log on this one, but they stopped doing the assessments 2 December 2013 and resumed 1 December 2014 and stopped 2 December 2014. The one noted above by Yngvadottir stopped the editing 26 August 2014 and resumed 6 November 2014, stopped 26 November and resumed 4 December. Looking at the times of the edits of both, there surely must be some kind of automation involved. — Maile (talk) 22:22, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
Be amazed at how fast one can copy paste. It looks like a previously banned editors work but it would need more than blanket assessing to get a permanent sock ban. --Molestash (talk) 04:02, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
This one, too. They edit exclusively Nov-Dec, this year and last. Chris Troutman (talk) 15:28, 18 December 2014 (UTC)
Well, they're all located in Kansas, and that last one is the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library.— Maile (talk) 00:07, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

"Royal Army"

The usage of "Royal Army" is under discussion, see talk:Royal Army (disambiguation) -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 04:53, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Voting for the military history newcomer of the year for 2014 now open!

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Military history newcomer of the year 2014
  • First place
    First place

Nominations for this year's "Military Historian of the Year" award have now closed, and it is time to vote for who you think deserves this honour. As with the awards for previous years, the second and third placed editors and all the runners up will also be acknowledged.

The nominees for this award and the statements given in support of these nominations are provided below. Voting can be done by adding a hash sign (#) followed by the four tildes (~~~~)

All editors are welcome to vote, but are asked to vote for a maximum of three candidates. The winner will be the editor who receives the most 'support' votes by the time voting closes at 23:59 (GMT) on 21 December 2014.

Good luck to all the nominees! For the coordinators, TomStar81 (Talk) 00:19, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Nominations

  1. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:02, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Anotherclown (talk) 00:52, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Cuprum17 (talk) 20:12, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Lineagegeek (talk) 20:12, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Cinderella157: active since June 2014, mainly working on a re-draft of the Battle of Buna–Gona article with a view to eventually going live with it. A new editor who is putting in a lot of work to get things right and who will be a great asset to the project. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:00, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. --Molestash (talk) 22:08, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. As nominator. AustralianRupert (talk) 23:20, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Anotherclown (talk) 00:52, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Saxum: made considerable contributions in the first year of project participation adding half a dozen GAs. In all honesty they're active in Milhist since late November 2013 - so I'm not quite sure if they apply to the "newcomer" category, but I figured this year's round of nominations were in practice the first where they could be nominated. Cheers--Tomobe03 (talk) 15:53, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:02, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:07, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:30, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:08, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. Kierzek (talk) 14:10, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Jonas Vinther: joined us in late December 2013. Since then he worked on a number of articles and supported the project by reviewing many articles. MisterBee1966 (talk) 16:18, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Anotherclown (talk) 00:52, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:30, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Cuprum17 (talk) 20:12, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:36, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. Kierzek (talk) 14:10, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  • P-123 A tireless and outgoing copy editor whose non-stop editings give other editors energy and motivation for editing. He is skilful at addressing the disputes and leading them toward consensus. Mhhossein (talk) 09:47, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Yes, Wikipedia needs nice editors who work diplomatically with people. Rammer (talk) 17:59, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:08, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Pendright: a US Navy veteran of World War II who officially joined our project just over a year ago and has shown great dedication since then, taking a brace of articles through GA, A, and finally FA-class reviews. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 10:20, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:02, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Nford24 (PE121 Personnel Request Form) 01:06, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. As nom. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:44, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. RobDuch (talk) 03:30, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 09:53, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  6. —  Cliftonian (talk)  14:27, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  7. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:51, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  8. Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:07, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  9. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:30, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  10. Jehorn (talk) 18:04, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  11. Excellent to have this military historian who has actually been there. Rammer (talk) 17:59, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  12. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  13. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:36, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Especially notable for demonstrated ability to recruit others. Rammer (talk) 17:59, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Hawkeye7 (talk) 12:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. TeriEmbrey TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:06, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Kierzek (talk) 14:10, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Battle of Danny Boy

The Battle of Danny Boy has been in the news this week. Would anyone care to expand the article? -- PBS (talk) 16:49, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Battle of Kosovo, input requested

There is currently a discussion (after an Edit War) in this article concerning how to list the modern day location of this historic battle from the 1300s. Would project members please review the article and comment as to what the norms or standards are in this matter, Talk:Battle_of_Kosovo#LOCATION.3F.21.3F.21. I am trying to stay uninvolved and just facilitate consensus. --Scalhotrod (Talk) ☮ღ☺ 17:22, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Voting for the military historian of the year for 2014 now open!

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Military historian of the year 2014
  • First place
    First place
  • Second place
    Second place
  • Third place
    Third place

Nominations for this year's "Military Historian of the Year" award have now closed, and it is time to vote for who you think deserves this honour. As with the awards for previous years, the second and third placed editors and all the runners up will also be acknowledged.

The nominees for this award and the statements given in support of these nominations are provided below. Voting can be done by adding a hash sign (#) followed by the four tildes (~~~~)

All editors are welcome to vote, but are asked to vote for a maximum of three candidates. The winner will be the editor who receives the most 'support' votes by the time voting closes at 23:59 (GMT) on 21 December 2014.

Good luck to all the nominees! For the coordinators, TomStar81 (Talk) 00:14, 15 December 2014 (UTC)

Nominations

  • Parsecboy: The (mainly German) ship-building continues apace, with a huge number of GAs this year. Incredible workrate. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:01, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:27, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:10, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Sturmvogel 66: A prolific ship-maker who has contributed hugely to Milhist GAN throughput via reviewing as well (has reviewed 493! GANs). Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:01, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Euryalus (talk) 14:05, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. —  Cliftonian (talk)  14:26, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Lots of good reviewing going on during the year. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:53, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. Molestash (talk)
  6. Anotherclown (talk) 00:49, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  7. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:27, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  8. Reviews both for substance and for writing quality. Rammer (talk) 17:52, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  9. Catlemur (talk) 16:59, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  10. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:35, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  11. Nick-D (talk) 21:57, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Tomobe03: Great work this year, significant contribution to Croatia War of Independence articles/lists (1 × FL, 22 × GA) and lots of GAN reviews. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:27, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:01, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Anotherclown: massive contribution as a reviewer at GAN and ACR this year, as well as content creation work at B-class and GAN. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Cuprum17 (talk) 14:34, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. AustralianRupert (talk) 23:19, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Nguyễn Quốc Việt (talk) 19:45, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Zawed (talk) 08:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Ian Rose: another fantastic year for Ian in terms of content creation, co-ord duties and FAC work. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Nford24 (PE121 Personnel Request Form) 01:05, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. AustralianRupert (talk) 23:19, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Zawed (talk) 08:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Arius1998 (talk) 02:38, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:35, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  6. Nick-D (talk) 21:57, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Peacemaker67: a strong year of content creation in a contentious field and significant contributions to the project through work as a co-ord. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. One of our strongest contributors in all facets of the project over the past year. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:52, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. —  Cliftonian (talk)  14:26, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Kierzek (talk) 15:25, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. Anotherclown (talk) 00:49, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:10, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  6. Catlemur (talk) 16:59, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  7. Cuprum17 (talk) 19:19, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  8. Arius1998 (talk) 02:38, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  9. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:35, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Hawkeye7: made a significant contribution to the project's co-ordination through creation of MilhistBot. Has also continued to produce top quality articles throughout the year. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:19, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Nford24 (PE121 Personnel Request Form) 01:05, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. I think I vote for Hawkeye every year but the quality and quantity of his work just doesn't slacken, and he's topped all that off this year with the most useful bots for both ACR and FAC. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:52, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Euryalus (talk) 14:05, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  4. —  Cliftonian (talk)  14:26, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  5. The bots were a stand-out contribution this year. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:53, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  6. AustralianRupert (talk) 23:19, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  7. Anotherclown (talk) 00:49, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  8. Cuprum17 (talk) 14:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  9. Catlemur (talk) 16:59, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
  10. Arius1998 (talk) 02:38, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. A series of great articles on subjects many readers find fascinating, but few editors feel up to tackling. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:01, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Kierzek (talk) 15:25, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Chris Troutman (talk) 01:27, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  • BoringHistoryGuy Tireless often behind-the-scenes worker, whose name is often the answer when I ask my self, "Who did all this?" Carptrash (talk) 15:36, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Must help a person named "Boring"! Rammer (talk) 17:52, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Diannaa Copy editor extraordinaire, a tireless work ethic, significant contributions at improving articles, adding cites, removing OR and vandalism edits; great collaborator and reviewer. / Extremely kind person, always willing to help, awesome collaborator, and highly appreciated copy editor. Kierzek (talk) 21:05, 7 December 2014 (UTC) and Jonas Vinther (speak to me!) 01:31, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Thanks for all your hard work, especially adding cites. TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:19, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. As co-nom. I gladly add my vote for the reasons I state above. Kierzek (talk) 15:25, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. Nick-D (talk) 21:57, 19 December 2014 (UTC)
  • P-123 A tireless and outgoing copy editor whose non-stop editings give other editors energy and motivation for editing. He is skilful at addressing the disputes and leading them toward consensus. Mhhossein (talk) 09:45, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Auntieruth55 - Dedicated hard working editor whose numerous streamlined contributions tend to fly below the radar, but one whom the project definitely relies on to help with the work. TomStar81 (Talk) 19:22, 9 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Agree with everything Tom said. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:53, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Dank: has had a hand in most A-class and FA-class articles the project has produced this year through involvement in reviewing and copy editing. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:37, 10 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Has copyedited every A class abd FAC article I've submitted, which is much appreciated. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:01, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Buistr (talk) 05:25, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. As a copyeditor (and sometimes co-nominator) Dan seems to have had a hand in just about every Milhist article that's gone to ACR and/or FAC, a great record of dedication. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 06:34, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
  • Hchc2009: sterling work on medieval-themed milhist articles in 2014. Zawed (talk) 00:53, 12 December 2014 (UTC)
  1. Another highly productive editor. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:01, 15 December 2014 (UTC)
  2. Suffers from being at the bottom of the ballot. Rammer (talk) 17:52, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
    :) Hchc2009 (talk) 20:55, 16 December 2014 (UTC)
  3. As nominator. Zawed (talk) 08:09, 17 December 2014 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

CSL lakers

How are two lakers within the scope of this project? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Thunder_Bay_(ship,_2013) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Baie_St._Paul_(ship,_2012) Cpfan776 (talk) 22:26, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

This user has been adding the Milhist flag to a lot of pages (Special:Contributions/Ser Amantio di Nicolao).Jim in Georgia Contribs Talk 01:31, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
Sorry about that - don't know how they got in there, but I've retagged them. (I try to winnow stuff out when I'm tagging, but things slip through from time to time.) --Ser Amantio di NicolaoChe dicono a Signa?Lo dicono a Signa. 01:50, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
I appreciate that you correctly flagged two category talk pages I created.--Jim in Georgia Contribs Talk 04:17, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
Happy to be of help. --Ser Amantio di NicolaoChe dicono a Signa?Lo dicono a Signa. 06:06, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

M5 Half-track (APC)

The naming and existence of this article is under discussion, see talk:M5 Half-track (APC) -- 67.70.35.44 (talk) 07:22, 21 December 2014 (UTC)

Quotes

Here is a list of quotes I have gathered. If you wish to use anyone of them in article just ping or message me and I will throw you a link to the source or sources.

"6 June 1941. You can feel that something big is going to happen. For months now trains of troops have been rolling to the East. Why are all these troops being taken to the East? We have a treaty with the Russians. Shouldn't we be fighting England?"

— Diary of a confused private in the Germany Army

"My father, who's a general, told me the French have 40 divisions on the border! We have 15. All the rest are in Poland. 500,000 men against 200,000. They outnumbered us two to one."

— The diary of a German enlisted man who talks about the French and British declaration of war

"In my opinion Russia can never be annihilated. She is defended by her very size—a country so fast that it can never be conquered or held. The Russian chapter is over. We should make peace with Stalin."

— Mussolini in a private conversation to Hitler after Stalingrad

"I have asked our enemies to cease all hostilities. I have taken this decision, painful to the heart of a soldier, because the military situation demands it. "

— Pétain addressing the nation on 17 July 1940

"Yesterday announced a non-aggression pact with Moscow. Great world sensation! London and Paris can't believe it. The Fuhrer has made a clever chess move. Let's see how the world will react to this smokescreen."

— Diary of Goebbels after the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact

"It's unbelievable, but true. At 11:15 Mr. Chamberlain spoke on the radio. He said that his Majesty's government had sent Hitler an ultimatum to withdraw their troops from Poland. There has been no reply and the ultimatum has expired at 11 o'clock. We are now at war with Germany."

— Diary of a woman from London

"In the morning we searched houses. The population here is very afraid of us "barbarians". A women was throwing herself at my knees, employing me not to kill her children! I told her in my broken French that we were only looking for weapons. But she didn't believe me. She just cried, cried and cried."

— Diary of a German private talking about the German occupation of France

"I don't know if you will ever read this words. But I know for sure this is my last letter. A fight is on. A heated, deadly fight. Our tank has been hit, fascists are all around us. The street is filled with corpses. They look like large motionless lizards. It is unbearably hot and I'm thirsty. Your portrait is lying on my knees. I'm looking at it into your light blue eyes. Don't cry. You properly wont come to my grave. Will I have a grave?"

— Letter of a Russian private in the Red Army to his wife

It was never quite clear how they selected the people that were executed. Some of them were known fighters, but most of them were just normal Serbs. Not very nice the whole affair. I was quite surprised to see one old man—why did they shoot him? And also one of the Jews of our town, who was very incident, who hadn't harmed anybody before."

— The diary of an unknown Serbian man who witnessed an execution.

"Dear dad. Never before have I felt so alone. I'm sure that I can't last much longer. We have paid a heavy price. I know I shouldn't write like this, but there is noting else to say. I'm so sick of war that sometimes I feel like I'm loosing my mind. It's been very hard, but the damn thing can't last forever. Not for me it can't. All my friends are gone now. I'm a stranger among battalion. I shall try to do better in the next letter."

— Letter from First Lieutenant Howard Bradford to his father

All the best and Merry Christmas. Jonas Vinther (speak to me!) 15:45, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Requested move: Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher

A "Requested move" has been done on Vilyam Genrikhovich Fisher. I have already opposed to the move. I call on anyone in the WikiProject Military History to participate in this requested move. Also, you will see previous comments on the talkpage which was archived, now placed back to the talkpaged. Is there any way to have them archived like before? Adamdaley (talk) 22:07, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

Just linked to the archived discussion where needed, especially if that is months old or more. -Fnlayson (talk) 22:15, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue CV, December 2014

Full front page of The Bugle
Your Military History Newsletter

The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here.
If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Nick-D (talk) 12:51, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

Ethos

[10] I've been in the habit of putting urls on theses held by Ethos and have just found that the link doesn't always go to the thesis indicated, particularly on articles where more than one thesis is in the References section. I've tinkered around and can only make the link specific by logging in, which seems unwise to disclose on a Wikipedia page. Does Wiki have a corporate membership or something to get round this?Keith-264 (talk) 20:36, 19 December 2014 (UTC)

Keith-264, do you want to link to the PDF of the thesis or the page giving key info about it (eg)? Nev1 (talk) 00:37, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
I've been doing it per the example and finding that the same address has come up on subsequent urls to different theses.Keith-264 (talk) 10:43, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
I'm not very familiar with EThOS URLs, but the odd part there seems to be did=7 - does stripping this out of the URL and just keeping the uin=... part solve the problem? It should be unique, at least in theory. Andrew Gray (talk) 12:45, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

GA nomination of Exhumation of Richard III of England

I've nominated Exhumation of Richard III of England for consideration as a Good Article in advance of his reburial next March, which will attract a huge amount of interest. The article is in good shape and is quite comprehensive, so I'm sure it will be a good GA candidate. I'd be grateful for any help with the GA review. Prioryman (talk) 18:50, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Task Force 1-41

Don Brunett, a member of Task Force 1-41 during the 1991 Gulf War, has written an article on the task force. I have turned it into a redirect to the 41st Infantry Regiment (United States) article for reasons explained on the talk page, but I'm not really an expert on Wikipedia's coverage of such task forces; if they usually are deemed notable, some help would be appreciated. Huon (talk) 19:38, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

On my article I presented two sources supporting what I wrote about Task Force 1-41. Road to Safwan and Jayhawk: 7th Corps in the 1st Gulf War. I was not finished with my work when I mentioned the 1st British Armoured div. We in fact had a brigade from the aforementioned division assigned to us at the Battle of Norfolk. I also provided our Valorous Unit Award Citation which further supported the claims I made and provided a link to the site which the Award is clearly presented along with the other units who also received this award during Desert Storm. Everything I provided was indeed fact that could be supported by both books I listed as references. Huon cited incorrect numbers and his date off by a decade. The U.S. had 23 Abrams tanks damaged or destroyed. We lost five and two of them to enemy fire. Read the first citation on the link I provided below and tell me these were not exceptional men. Thank you. Don Brunett

http://www.history.army.mil/html/forcestruc/vua_citations.html

G'day, I have responded on the article talkpage, and have refactored the above comments into one thread, hope you don't mind. IMO, the most appropriate way to resolve this is to AfD the article, that way a community consensus on its notability can be established. Regards, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 21:33, 25 December 2014 (UTC)

Battle of Waterloo

Just a reminder that June 2015 sees the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. It's currently a GA, but it should be within the reach of FA status, and could feature as TFA on the actual anniversary. Mjroots (talk) 22:53, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

Tomitarō Horii and Draft:Battle of Buna-Gona Japanese strength and order of battle

hi, have been working on Draft:Battle of Buna–Gona and posted following to Talk:Tomitarō Horii

Hi, I am working on a rewrite of the Battle of Buna-Gona. All wiki reliable sources I can access Give Horii's rank as Maj Gen. I believe (from Wiki unreliable sources) that he was promoted posthumously. Was hoping to clear this up. Does anybody have a precise reference to address this 'apparent' discrepancy please? Thanks Cinderella157 (talk) 04:16, 26 November 2014 (UTC)

Thought this might get wider coverage here.

Regarding Draft:Battle of Buna-Gona Japanese strength and order of battle, I have only been able to find relevant images of the dead, wounded or captured. I think this is unfortunate. I was hoping for something more positive if anybody could help. Unfortunately, my revision for the battle Draft:Battle of Buna–Gona (just like the current page) is written from an Allied perspective. I see no way around this except to write an additional article from a Japanese perspective. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 03:46, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

From memory, I think that it was routine for World War II-era Japanese military personnel (or maybe just officers?) to be promoted posthumously. Regarding sources with material on Japanese perspectives, I think that the main works are Bullard's translation of the Japanese official history and Collie and Marutani's book The Path of Infinite Sorrow (best used carefully). Blood and Iron by Lex McAulay apparently also provides good detail on Japanese perspectives (I haven't read it), but might now be a bit dated. Please don't create articles with different perspectives: doing so would violate WP:NPOV, and be confusing to readers. If it comes to it, there are lots of sources you can draw on which explain the limited availability of Japanese perspectives and sources (in short, few of the Japanese personnel involved in the 1942-43 New Guinea battles survived the war, the records of their units were destroyed during the war, and translation problems mean that Japanese perspectives are greatly represented in English language accounts). Nick-D (talk) 03:58, 20 December 2014 (UTC)
Thanks for the feedback. Regarding perspectives, I was mainly acknowledging that most articles are usually written from one perspective (in this case, from the Allies). The main reason is that most of the material available to English readers is written by British or American authors relying on English language sources. In this particular case, Japanese sources are limited (particularly for English only speakers) for some of the reasons you have identified. I would also find it difficult to perceive a good, readable, coherent account interwoven from both perspectives (both sides of the wire). From a purely objective perspective, different things are happening for different reasons. If you then overlay analyses from various sources, it could easily become confusing and disjointed. It would take a very good writer to pull something like that off. On the otherhand, the two perspectives, together, could combine to make a whole. I acknowledge the WP:NPOV. Accounts of most battles are recounted largely from one perspective or vantage point. For the Battle of Buna-Gona, this is from the perspective of the attacker. I perceive that neutrality of 'point of view' and the perspective from which something is seen are somewhat quite different (though the distinction is clearly not black and white).
"To the Bitter End" is the relevent McAuley work here. But regarding sources, I was mainly referring to images. While I appreciate your explanation regarding posthumous promotion, it still leaves the matter of Horii's rank without a reliable source to substantiate it and many sources that would dispute it. Thanks again for the response. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 05:58, 20 December 2014 (UTC)

Found a source for the particular case of Horii's posthumous promotion. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 11:39, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Bronze Star recipient

A reader contacted Wikimedia asking to be added to the list of Bronze Star recipients. I explained that the list included individuals who have an article about them. I do not know whether this person would merit an article; I invited that person to edit here, explain something about themselves if they are interested, so editors can determine whether an article should be written.--S Philbrick(Talk) 22:01, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Thanks SP. I know Bronze Stars are not exactly given out like candy floss, but sadly most recipients aren't notable—for an American serviceman, the Medal of Honour is the only decoration which affords inherent notability by Wikipedia standards. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:29, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
You must not have served at a corps-level command then ;) If you were E-6 or above, you got a Bronze Star as your "I had a pulse while in Iraq" prize - I knew a major who recommended himself for the Bronze Star (and of course he got it). Now, the V device isn't just handed out like candy, but like HJ said, it does not confer automatic notability. Parsecboy (talk) 23:51, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
"A recent review by the Stars and Stripes of the way the Bronze Star was awarded to U.S. personnel involved in the airstrikes on Yugoslavia found that the Air Force awarded 185 of the medals, the vast majority going to officers and top commanders. Only 25 enlisted Air Force troops got the nod. Of all the medals awarded, only one in 10 actually was in the combat zone... Many recipients of the coveted award were based in Italy, Germany and even the United States. They included at least five Air Force officers for their work at Whiteman Air Force Base, Mo., from which B-2 bombers flew long-range missions into Kosovo. One lieutenant colonel received the medal, for example, "for responding to supply requests at a moment’s notice" at Aviano Air Base in Italy. Another senior officer got a Bronze Star for presenting his "bed-down briefing" to top brass, such as then-NATO commander Gen. Wesley K. Clark, on where troops and aircraft were being positioned at Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Others got it for helping to plan strike missions." [11]
I would just like to correct something that was said elsewhere. We presume that the receipt of the highest award of a nation makes someone notable. This does not mean that we regard all such awards as of equal value; it just means that the highest award is almost certain to generate books on the subject and lists of the recipients. Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:33, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Contents boxes

Is there a view as to whether dates should be included like this: 

   3.1 First phase
       3.1.1 Battle of Pilckem Ridge: 31 July – 2 August
       3.1.2 Capture of Westhoek: 10 August
       3.1.3 Battle of Hill 70
       3.1.4 Battle of Langemarck: 16–18 August
       3.1.5 Subsidiary operations: 19–27 August
       3.1.6 Second offensive battle of Verdun
   3.2 Second phase
       3.2.1 German defensive changes
       3.2.2 Battle of the Menin Road Ridge: 20–25 September
       3.2.3 Battle of Polygon Wood: 26 September – 3 October
   3.3 Third phase
       3.3.1 Battle of Broodseinde: 4 October
       3.3.2 German defensive changes
       3.3.3 Battle of Poelcappelle: 9 October
       3.3.4 First Battle of Passchendaele: 12 October
       3.3.5 Battle of Malmaison
       3.3.6 Second Battle of Passchendaele: 26 October – 10 November

thanks.Keith-264 (talk) 13:03, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

As far as I know there isn't a convention for this, but I can see that it might help the reader navigate while it also produces a pretty bulky table of contents. I think if it's going to be done, it needs to be consistent within the article. So why no date for the Battle of Hill 70 for example. As a middle ground, how about giving dates for the three phases and not the battles which make up the headings below? Nev1 (talk) 00:27, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
I think that the contents box looks best when it's rather slim but since it's for a reader, leaving the dates out might be unhelpful. On the other hand if the dates are in the first line of text and not in the box will that be enough? I left dates off Hill 70, Verdun and La Malmaison because they weren't part of the battle/campaign but had reciprocal effects. I wondered if there is a convention since I can't make my mind up. I think now I'd take them out but that would be for aesthetic reasons rather than certainty that a reader wouldn't miss something.Keith-264 (talk) 10:12, 24 December 2014 (UTC)
Reduced the dates to slim the box and added dates to the text to compensate. Keith-264 (talk) 13:14, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Library

What has triggered my interest in this recently was that I took on the task of fixing the citations in the article Peninsular War. It turned out that a lot of copy and past had been done between three articles, Peninsular War, Battle of Corunna and the biography John Moore (British Army officer), but these copies had included short citations but sometimes without the accompanying long citations to go with them. It turned out that many of theses sources are available on the internet, so it was possible to check them, and several of them are detailed accounts of the whole of the Peninsular War (eg. Oman's seven volume, Southey' six volume and Napier's four volume histories).

Many editors are probably not aware of what is freely available, even if they are sorting out the different complete multi volume books avaible on the internet is time consuming, and so many editors probably go through the same time consuming steps. So I propose to start a new sub page: Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Library, the purpose of which will be to coordinate resources that are easily available to editors who work on military history topics and it will be structured along similar lines to the military history topics listed on the Project page, while there is a list of Personal libraries, I think that for many military history topics it would be useful to have a list of books and articles that are available on the internet.

Does anyone else have any thoughts on this. -- PBS (talk) 17:14, 24 December 2014 (UTC)

Hi all. You can email the Pritzker Military Museum & Library with any military history questions you have as the institution is participating in Wikipedia as a GLAM institution. We can double check citations for you, etc. Or you can ping me directly or leave a quick question on my talk page. TeriEmbrey (talk) 15:00, 31 December 2014 (UTC)

Free McFarland milhist e-books available through Wikipedia Library

Hello military history folks, just letting you all know that McFarland & Company has offered free e-book versions of its titles to experienced Wikipedians. The publisher has a large collection of titles on military history. See Wikipedia:McFarland for instructions. Best, The Interior (Talk) 16:42, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Notable award recipient?

Hi, military history editors. Can I get a tentative military personnel notability assessment for Michael Joseph Hayes? This came to WP:CFB as a college football player for article class/subject importance assessment, but the subject is probably non-notable as a college football player. I would have added it to WP:CFB's articles for AfD list, but the subject may satisfy your specific notability guidelines. Please advise. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:32, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Howdy. For him to be notable as a recipient of a military decoration, it would need to be the highest (MoH) or two or more of the second highest (DSC). EricSerge (talk) 18:44, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
Concur, not notable for his military service.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:46, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
Any flexibility there? Is there a case to be made for satisfying the general notability guidelines per WP:GNG? If not, do you WP:MH guys want to nominate the article for AfD? I'm happy to provide a delete !vote and address the CFB notability issues. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 18:58, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
  • WP:GNG still applies. The main point above is that he must have other things than make him notable other than a non-major military award. He played multiple college sports, coached hickey for the Army (head coach or asst?), and served in WWI where he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross. There might be enough there for overall notability; I'm not sure. -Fnlayson (talk) 21:14, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Good articles needing reassessment opinions

G'day all, a couple of Milhist-tagged Good Articles have been nominated for community re-assessment, and a few more opinions are needed to establish consensus. If you have time, please stop by and offer an opinion about whether the articles meet the GA criteria or not. The reassessment pages can be found here: Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Mars (mythology)/1 and Wikipedia:Good article reassessment/Omar Khadr/1. Thank you. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:52, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

63rd (2nd Northumbrian) Division formatting request

Would someone with experience of formatting mind looking at the order of battle section [12] to see if the sections can be levelled please? ThanksKeith-264 (talk) 15:11, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Done (I'd meant to do this when I created the layout but never quite figured out how - the trick is |- valign="top" in each row). I'll update the other divisional articles using this format later.
In general, what do you think of it - is it worth rolling out to other pages? It seems a bit more useful than the long bullet lists we sometimes get. Andrew Gray (talk) 13:06, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
I rather like it, far better than acres of white space to the right. I had a dabble using show preview, then wisely (for once) decided to refer it to someone who knew what they were doing. Thanks ;O)Keith-264 (talk) 13:17, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
Much better layout than a (pages) long list. Hamish59 (talk) 13:27, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
Thanks both. It's currently on 63rd through 66th; 66th Division (United Kingdom) has an extreme case of four OOBs (formation; arrival in France; after reconstitution in 1918; WWII service) and it still takes up only three screens on a laptop! I'll try rolling it out to more divisions. Andrew Gray (talk) 19:48, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

White House

There's a discussion taking place at Talk:White House regarding the infobox image. Any input would be appreciated. Thanks. APK whisper in my ear 00:20, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

Algeria - a colony? Request for comment

Hi all,

Perhaps not quite in Milhist's usual scope, but perhaps of interest to those working on Algerian War and related topics. A user is claiming that Algeria was not a colony and, as such, should not be included in the list of "decolonized" countries in Africa. All comment much appreciated at the discussion in Talk:Decolonization of Africa#Algeria. —Brigade Piron (talk) 22:02, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Arcul de Triumf (1878, 1922 and 1936)

Is anyone here able to help answer the question I asked here at WikiProject Romania about an article on a triumphal/memorial arch? Thanks. Carcharoth (talk) 22:34, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Style of operation names

A recent discussion has occurred regarding this. It is apparent that there is no consistent format for referring to 'Operation XYX'. Common formats are:

Operation XYZ
Operation XYZ
Operation XYZ (less common)

There are also occurrences of single and double quote marks being applied to the full phrase and the codename only. All of these permutations occur in Milhist FAs on operations. In some cases, there is not even consistency within the articles. Few articles use italics at all for the page name but many use the second format within the article (Operation XYZ). Some articles (not necessarily FAs) don't use italics in the first occurrence that is bolded but do elsewhere (see Operation Barbarossa). In List of World War II military operations, the operation names are all in itaics (but the names in the list are not preceded by 'operation').

Complicating matters is the use of 'foreign' language words for operations by both English and non-English speaking 'countries' and the question of whether a name is a foreign word, such as Barbarossa. It might be easier to use the same format regardless of potential variations such as foreign language.

The lack of consistency indicates a need for guidance in the Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Military history. This could be placed at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Military history#Operational codenames, as a suggestion. For discussion. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 10:23, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

That's a good point. In my experience, the first of those three options is the most common one, and the one normally used by modern historians. There's also the issue of whether the second half of operations' names should be all caps (eg Operation OVERLORD), with modern usage generally being to avoid this (it seems to be common in professional military works and older histories). Nick-D (talk) 10:30, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

Notwithstanding that there are a couple of 'foreign named' operations, the FAs on operations use the first two about equally. No, I didn't actually count them but it is not predominantly one or the other, using this sample. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 11:08, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

A further matter to be considered is the formatting/style when the operation name is not cited in this format (Operation XYX) but, for example, as 'the XYZ operation' or 'convoys of XYZ'. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 01:06, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Small caps (after an initial normal cap) is another style common in printed sources. Small caps states:

They are used in running text to prevent capitalized words from appearing too large on the page, and as a method of emphasis or distinctiveness for text alongside or instead of italics, or when boldface is inappropriate.

One perspective is that an operation's name is 'just a code word'. Another is that it is the title of the 'operational plan', as well as referring to the implementation of the plan (if it was implemented). I think it is fair to observe that operation names are universally identified as proper nouns. My own preference is subordinate to the issue of defining a consistent style. Having said that, it is probably unreasonable to expect that a determined format should be imposed retrospectively, notwithstanding that articles should be internally consistent. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 03:40, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

Proposed wording

Two wordings are proposed on the presumption that one of the following will be the preferred style that will be adopted.

Operation Xyz
Operation Xyz

As a suggestion, the proposed wording could be placed as a sub-heading after Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Military history#Operational codenames.

Style of operation names (option one)

References to operations are be in accordance with the following examples, noting the use of capitals in the examples.

The Axis plan, Operation Xyz, was a proposal for the invasion of ...
The Xyz operation called for a combined overland and amphibious ....
Troop movements in preparation for Xyz commenced in ...

Operation Xyz is a compound proper noun and capitalised accordingly. No emphasis such as quote marks or italics are added even in the case of foreign words such as the following. A distinction is made when the correct foreign name or a translation is being offered.

Operation Rimau
Operation Barbarossa (German: Fall Barbarossa, literally "Case Barbarossa")
Operation Wunderland (German: Unternehmen Wunderland)

Boldface is used to highlight the first occurrence of the title word in accordance with Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#Format of the first sentence or when the operation name is a redirect to a page about the associated battle or an alternative name for the operation as follows.

The Normandy landings (codenamed Operation Neptune) were the landing operations on 6 June 1944 ...
Operation Torch (initially called Operation Gymnast) was the ...

While pages should apply a consistent style within themselves this amendment to the Manual of Style/Military history does not mandate compliance by pages created before [insert date of adoption].

Style of operation names (option two)

References to operations are be in accordance with the following examples, noting the use of capitals in the examples.

The Axis plan, Operation Xyz, was a proposal for the invasion of ...
The Xyz operation called for a combined overland and amphibious ....
Troop movements in preparation for Xyz commenced in ...

'Operation Xyz' is a compound proper noun and capitalised accordingly. No variations in emphasis such as quote marks are added even in the case of foreign words such as the following. A distinction is made when the correct foreign name or a translation is being offered.

Operation Rimau
Operation Barbarossa (German: Fall Barbarossa, literally "Case Barbarossa")
Operation Wunderland (German: Unternehmen Wunderland)

Italics are omitted from a page title as in the following example.

Operation Overlord

Boldface is used to highlight the first occurrence of the title word in accordance with Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#Format of the first sentence or when the operation name is a redirect to a page about the associated battle or an alternative name for the operation as follows. In this case, the italics is omitted.

The Normandy landings (codenamed Operation Neptune) were the landing operations on 6 June 1944 ...
Operation Torch (initially called Operation Gymnast) was the ...

While pages should apply a consistent style within themselves this amendment to the Manual of Style/Military history does not mandate compliance by pages created before [insert date of adoption].

[Editorial note: not using italics in the page title or in the first (bolded) occurrence is suggested to avoid some complexities that might otherwise arise. This second option could be readily adapted to any variation other than the first option.]

Invitation to comment

Hi all, in the spirit of getting a consensus I invite comment on my suggestions.

  1. What style do you think should be adopted?
  2. How should this be worded / what ammendments would you make to the proposed wording?

Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 11:47, 4 January 2015 (UTC)

I just found a reference that may carry some weight.

Military operations. The names of military operations are capitalized and italicized (Operation Just Cause). After first reference, the name can be used alone (without the word operation). (National Defense University Press Publication Submission Guidelines and Style Sheet http://ndupress.ndu.edu/Portals/68/Documents/jfq/style-guidelines.pdf)

Cinderella157 (talk) 09:26, 5 January 2015 (UTC)

Not sure how much that helps on en WP when different English-speaking countries use quite different formats. Australian, Indian, Canadian and UK forces use plain text all caps for operation names, per this, this, this and this, ie Operation CATALYST. I think plain text lower case (ie Operation Catalyst) is a good compromise between the major English speaking armed forces, taking into account the WP MOS. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:06, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
South African ops are usually also in caps. OPS PROTEA, OPS SMOKESHELL etc. I don't think it's practical to have a standard between different countries. Possibly though a solution might be to create a template for ops names similar to the one for ships for example SAS President Kruger so that formatting can be re-done in one foul swoop if/when required? BoonDock (talk) 11:34, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
My apologies for not including South Africa. All Commonwealth and former Commonwealth countries probably use a similar pattern, Zawed might know the Kiwi approach. I am an Aussie and ex-military, but my view is that neither the all caps or italics approaches are really in the letter or spirit of the WP MOS as it stands, so we should adopt an approach that stays within the WP MOS guidance re: italics and caps. This is why I am advocating the plain text title-case version. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 12:05, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
No apologies needed :-). One of the reasons I used the SAS Template as an example is the particular convention that ship's names are in italics, but not the SAS/HMS/etc part which makes for complicated wiki-code especially if WikiLinking it. I thought that something like {{OPS|PROTEA}} could work well because then case and formatting could be decided in the template script and if the consensus changed, then the formatting could be changed, irrespective of what that change is. It might be a good idea to add a country option to the template so that there is one template but each country could maintain their list of ops etc. Something similar to the Post-nominals template. BoonDock (talk) 12:14, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
The preceding discussion noted the uses outside Wiki, including all caps and small caps which are used in the US histories. There is also a reference to small caps being used to add emphasis in a similar way to italics. What appears apparent to me is that the 'codeword' does usually have some sort of 'emphasis' (caps, small caps, inverted commas, italics etc) attached to it. My observation would be that an adopted style should be in keeping with having some sort of emphasis and this is not in keeping with option one. Secondly, an option based on caps or small caps is not generally in keeping with Wiki style. My third observation is that the conventional use of italics for operations in campaign boxes supports the wider use of italics. I would not suggest different national styles. The aim is to establish one consistent style. While it is good to look ahead to implementation, I think we need to come up with something to implement first. It was not my intent that this should cause a mad scurry of change. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:54, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
Try this. {{Ops|Protea}} Only the simplest functionality, but maybe something to work on? BoonDock (talk) 14:54, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
I think we should avoid templating operation names - it adds very little benefit while making our articles more complicated to edit and maintain. (I've never been convinced the ship templates are worth the effort, either). I don't see us changing our mind on how to handle these six months down the line, so preparing for future change isn't really an issue. Andrew Gray (talk) 21:46, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
  • Option One. I'll look at the wording over the next few days and see if I have any suggestions. Up-front, I don't agree with a "not mandatory before" date, as with other WP guidelines, when they are implemented, all articles should be brought into line with them as the opportunity arises. Doesn't mean they are going to be put up for re-assessment because they have a different text formatting for operation names, just that they can be brought into line with the guidelines without starting an edit war. Regards, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 12:04, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
  • Option 1 seems more natural to me (in keeping with a general trend of avoiding special formatting emphasis unless needed). However, there seems to be a well-established practice to italicise operations in campaign navboxes (eg {{Campaignbox Normandy}}, to distinguish them from battle names, and I think this is reasonable - perhaps worth mentioning it as an exception? Andrew Gray (talk) 13:30, 4 January 2015 (UTC) @Andrew Gray
  • Option 1. But, I'd note that the MOS discourages bolding links, so rather than either Operation Neptune, the Normandy landings or The Normandy landings, Operation Overlord, I'd prefer Operation Neptune, the invasion of Normandy or The Normandy landings, Operation Overlord. Lineagegeek (talk) 23:17, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
  • Option 1 is what I would prefer, but I would point out that U.S. Military style guides circa Vietnam War used all caps for operations in all instances. An example would be OPERATION MARKET TIME mentioned on several pages of this U.S. Navy monthly summary of operations for June 1968. It is also notable that individual last names of sailors mentioned in the same report are all caps, as well as ship names. Personally, I believe this to be a bit much to the readers eye and would much prefer Operation Market Time or USCGC Point Marone (WPB-82331) over OPERATION MARKET TIME or USCGC POINT MARONE (WPB-82331). Wikipedia style guides currently specify the style for ships names and I believe that Option 1 comes the closest to conforming to that same style for operation names. Andrew Gray's suggestion about campaign navboxes should be given serious consideration as an exception to the option as it eliminates some confusion for the reader. Cuprum17 (talk) 14:31, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
Just an observation that the example you give is typed and with a standard typewriter, there are very few options to give emphasis to text - all caps is one and it does not change the rate of typing like underline. Cinderella157 (talk) 14:54, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
Good call, however, I don't believe that emphasis was needed in the first place. Thanks for the comment. Cuprum17 (talk) 15:18, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
I agree. I don't see the need for emphasis. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 06:23, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
  • G'day, I think Option 1 is probably best (e.g. Operation Coburg) as it is consistent with what is at WP:MILTERMS: "operations and so forth are capitalized (Spanish Civil War... Operation Sea Lion)..." Thanks for your work on this. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:39, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Camp Long page hyperlink to Camp Eagle points to the wrong base

The Camp Eagle mentioned on this page : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Long is the wrong Camp Eagle. The two Camps, Eagle and Long, were only a couple of miles apart. The Camp Eagle which the hyperlink directs you to is in Bosnia, not South Korea. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.89.231.228 (talk) 08:16, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

Where exactly is the mention Camp Eagle in Bosnia. I could not find it mentioned at Camp Long or the web pages in the Ext. links section. -Fnlayson (talk) 16:01, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
G'day, it was in the Base closure section. I've tweaked the link with this edit: [13], but now it is a redlink as per Camp Eagle (disambiguation). I hope this helps. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:48, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

Help Wanted: RMS Lusitania 100th Anniversary

On May 7th of this year we will observe the 100th anniversary of one of the most consequential events in maritime history. May I suggest a full court press to get this article up to FA status in time for the anniversary? -Ad Orientem (talk) 04:39, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I can probably get SM U-20 (Germany) up to GA at least by that time. Parsecboy (talk) 16:05, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
I should be able to at least get a featured picture or two on it. Adam Cuerden (talk) 12:42, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

The Illustrated War News - first images

Captions are available on their description pages. The first image has a very obvious usage, and has been put there; I could use some expert help with the second, which is currently unused.

This is an amazing source, by the way. It's basically several hundred pages of photographs and other illustrations. It includes Tsing-Tso, it includes Serbian actions, it includes Russian actions. It features Garhwal, Canadian, and Turkish troops. It includes bathing Japanese soldiers (no, really). It has the SMS Emden and Scharnhorst. It's going to be very valuable, but it also includes no index, and no organizational scheme. It also has very little text that isn't a caption.

A frustrating, but fascinating source. I can't go past 1915 with it, but if there's any requests, I'll do what I can. I have volumes 1 and 2, and will have 3. These are the landscape orientation original series volumes; they should not be confused with the portrait-orientation volumes from the new series, which are available at the Internet Archive. These, apparently, aren't available anywhere online as yet. Adam Cuerden (talk) 20:09, 28 December 2014 (UTC)

I of course am eager to see the Emden and Scharnhorst photos :) Parsecboy (talk) 23:51, 28 December 2014 (UTC)
Interesting. I wasn't aware of this publication (though I do have the bound volumes of The War Illustrated). GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:29, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
That looks like a great image resource, Adam. If you still need help with the second image, ask me and I'll see if I can help. Category:Images from the Illustrated War News is the central repository and File:Illustrated War News, Jan. 13, 1915, page 11 - Siege of Przemysl.jpg is another image added recently (today). What is the reason you can't go past 1915 with these images? Carcharoth (talk) 22:37, 5 January 2015 (UTC)
Because each volume is only 4-6 months, and I only have the first three volumes. (I may well get more in the future.) As for the second image, I've researched a bit and added it to one page, if you see any other relevant pages, feel free to use it. Adam Cuerden (talk) 00:08, 6 January 2015 (UTC)
Probably going to concentrate on early February for a moment, as I'm giving a talk on Illustrating History for Wikipedia at that time. Adam Cuerden (talk) 00:18, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

WikiCup 2015

Hi there; this is just a quick note to let you all know that the 2015 WikiCup will begin on January 1st. The WikiCup is an annual competition to encourage high-quality contributions to Wikipedia by adding a little friendly competition to editing. At the time of writing, more than fifty users have signed up to take part in the competition; interested parties, no matter their level of experience or their editing interests, are warmly invited to sign up. Questions are welcome on the WikiCup talk page. Thanks! Miyagawa (talk) 21:45, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Just to note - you may want to have a look at WT:Wikicup before doing so: a lot of problems with this year's Wikicup have sprung up. Adam Cuerden (talk) 21:47, 6 January 2015 (UTC)

German submarine U-573 and Spanish submarine G-7

Over two years ago a discussion was spawned whether the two articles should be merged. Participation was rather low and I would say the outcome was rather inconclusive. Since then, none of the two articles progressed much and both more or less tell the same story. In similar instances (see USS Ringgold (DD-500), later German Zerstörer 2 (D171), or Greek Kimon (D42)) we only have one article for the entire service career. Does it make sense to revisit this discussion? MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:25, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

I have restored the merger notice tags that User: Xyl 54 removed from G-7 in October 2012 as "unexplained" ‎and User: Wtshymanski removed from U-573 in February 2013, apparently believing that both careers of the boat were significant. I think notability is the issue here, and there is no consensus on that issue yet and "An article about a ship that changed name or nationality should be placed at the best-known name, with a redirect from the other name" would still apply, not the exception to it. Neither editor that removed a merger tag appears to have participated in the merger discussion. --Lineagegeek (talk) 15:08, 26 December 2014 (UTC)
Just to clarify this: The reason I described the merge as "unexplained" was (presumably) because at the time I couldn't find an explanation, and probably assumed from the edit summary it was just another hit-and-run merge tagging. And when I found the discussion I did "participate in the merger discussion", here.
And it is not correct that “neither article has progressed much” (when the tag was added the G7 article looked like this; after Darius and I had added some stuff it looked like this) or that they “both more or less tell the same story” (of a 10Kb and a 5 Kb article resp. they have only a couple of sentences in common).
I've commented further at the merge discussion. Xyl 54 (talk) 13:56, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
I think it is common practice to leave a merge discussion open for 30 days. So far we have 5 editors supporting the merge with one editor opposing the merge. The 30 days referendum expires on 26 January 2015. The current votes indicate that we are heading for consensus in favor of merging. MisterBee1966 (talk) 15:50, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
  • Yes, merge discussions should not go on indefinitely. -Fnlayson (talk) 16:56, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

The Merge discussion there has been closed. 'Merge' was the consensus. -Fnlayson (talk) 19:34, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

Red Gate

I have suggested that this article be renamed, and the background material split off into a general article on Russian memorial gates. For the two separate discussions, see Talk:Red Gate (These ate two separate discussions, neither of which depend on the result of the other, if participating in both discussions, please leave the appropriate opinion in the appropriate section) -- 65.94.40.137 (talk) 06:22, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Proof readers needed on the Texas Revolution project

In regards to the above-mentioned Texas Revolution project first mentioned by Mdennis (WMF) on December 8, 2014, we are trying to get existing supporting articles in decent shape and could use some proof readers. You don't have to do a rework of an article, just look for the obvious. Many articles out there have been tagged, have been the object of hanky-panky, and sometimes erroneously edited by good editors. Please help if you have time, and Category:Texas Revolution is a good place to start.— Maile (talk) 15:41, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Aside from the article improvement angle, I have fond memories of several visits to Texas, so happy to stop by and look over a few. For now, I did a little formatting in Texas Revolution, and also went over Alamo Mission in San Antonio, leaving a modified structure and several fact tags in my wake, if someone would like to take a look (see talk page as well)... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 00:18, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

Category:World War II images and Category:Images by war

Category:World War II images and Category:Images by war have been nominated for deletion -- 65.94.40.137 (talk) 04:43, 10 January 2015 (UTC)

Help for a new user

Corjan de Wit (talk · contribs) has contributed some new articles on WWII US military trucks to this Wikipedia. These are obscure to me, being not the average load carrier but specialist vehicles for signals or engineering uses. And probably an area overlooked in favour of the actual combat vehicles. Eg the "AUTOCAR MODEL U8144T, COE" which was used for hauling pontoons (though I may have that wrong as the US Army TM cited uses the word "Ponton") or the K-31 truck for mobile radar.

I think my editing of the Autocar truck article (among other things - removing a gallery of images taken from the tech manual) may have come across as heavy-handed and have coloured their opinion. It might be better if I stayed away from this editor's contributions rather than put them off, but could someone else look over the articles - some of which did need new article review - and add the Milhist template to talk page as necessary/appropriate? Thank you. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:34, 1 January 2015 (UTC)

Don't bother I have already deleted my contribution and will not contribute again. It is a waste of time and effort to see my contributions deleted as with the TD-18 article that was not even mine!Corjan de Wit (talk) 13:33, 2 January 2015 (UTC)

PS when do you start creating your own article? As far as I see you are only commenting? Corjan de Wit (talk) 02:58, 3 January 2015 (UTC)

On a not-unrelated note, I see that List of U.S. Signal Corps vehicles has a number of redlinks (and some blue) of the form K-3 cart, K-61 truck, K-80 trailer, K-35 trailer. Is the proposed naming of these articles right? Some redirect to articles on the general truck body eg K-51 truck to Chevrolet G506 trucks. GraemeLeggett (talk) 11:29, 2 January 2015 (UTC)
I have tagged the ones I saw for MILHIST and made a few WP:MOS style changes. I'm no expert on the content though. Anotherclown (talk) 05:04, 3 January 2015 (UTC)
The signal core seems to be using their own K body style numbers. On the convoy picture K-33 is a Chev 7123 (G506) COE with stake body. K-34 looks like an Autocar 7144T (G510) tractor, K30 and 31 are Autocar 8144 (G511) with different van bodies. Sammy D III (talk) 18:39, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
See List of U.S. Signal Corps vehicles re K designation use by Signal Corps. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 22:39, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
@User:GraemeLeggett, wow! Nice job at driving a new user away from the project. Sad to see because this not the way we do things around here. Caden cool 17:54, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
I'm somewhat confused over your comment, Caden - as far as I can tell, Corjan has not quit editing (to the contrary, he has since created several other articles), and I don't read Graeme's comment here (or elsewhere) as particularly hostile. Parsecboy (talk) 18:09, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Roll of Honour sections in military unit articles

As a result of discussions at Talk:2 Squadron SAAF, User:BoonDock and I would like to raise for discussion the relevance of Roll of Honour sections within military unit articles. It would be helpful to clarify whether these sections are seen as a legitimate part of military unit articles. Some would say that they are as much part of the unit's history as the list of commanding officers, and thus should be included. On the other hand, WP:NOTMEMORIAL would seem to strongly discourage them. Could we get a policy determination please? Kind regards to all, Buckshot06 (talk) 00:28, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

From memory, the consensus of previous discussions has been that WP:NOTMEMORIAL means that rolls of honour should not be included in articles, and they're uncommon. There may be some worthwhile differences between nations/conflicts to consider, but I'd personally discourage them. In many, many cases they're simply impractical as the force concerned has suffered a large number of fatalities (for instance, many infantry battalions of World War I and Bomber Command flying squadrons of World War II typically lost their entire complement several time over). Nick-D (talk) 01:13, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I agree that WP:NOTMEMORIAL strongly discourages them, and there are places offwiki for these types of lists. If we had one in the 10th Battalion (Australia) article, there would be 1,010 names listed just for WWI. What the encyclopedic value of that would be eludes me, given that only the commanding officers, the VC recipients and a few others would actually be notable in their own right. The fact that someone made the ultimate sacrifice does not mean their name should be mentioned in an encyclopedia. I also believe RoH would make the article "overdetailed", and mean that it did not meet the "Focus" criteria at GA. Slightly off-topic, but I would suggest members of a unit receiving their nation's highest decoration should be placed in a template at the bottom (this is done with Knight's Cross recipients). Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 01:34, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
In the case of South Africa, units formed since, say, 1960, have memorial rolls that are possible to include in articles, as they can be only 100-200 long. Nick, do you believe that this might be an acceptable 'worthwhile difference between nation/conflict'? Buckshot06 (talk) 02:44, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I can't say to be honest: I'm not all that familiar with the historiography on South African military units. I'd say 'no' for Australian units of this era though (for instance, Australian Army battalions or No. 77 Squadron RAAF). Nick-D (talk) 04:27, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I agree with Nick re: contemporary Australian units, and for consistency across MILHIST, I wouldn't support their inclusion in South African articles either. Regards, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 04:39, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
If you do it for the little ones, people are going to try and do it for the big ones. Look at the recurring battles over ribbon bars in non-US personnel articles. There would be no harm in adding an external link to an offwiki entity providing an honour roll. -- saberwyn 05:14, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
To add another opinion from an Australian editor (because there doesn't seem to be many of them around at the moment...): I also don't think they should be included per the reasoning given by Nick, Peacemaker67 and Saberwyn above. I would go so far as to say that this should apply regardless of era (or nationality). Including only post-1960 casualties because it would be a manageable list would seem to be WP:RECENTISM and would be inconsistent (and therefore WP:UNDUE IMO). That said if someone who was notable or in someway prominent (i.e. a VC equivalent, senior officer, notable soldier due to being highly decorated or involved in a notable incident, or otherwise notable for something else outside of the military - e.g. sportsman etc) was one of that unit's casualties then they should probably be mentioned in text of the article. Anotherclown (talk) 05:48, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
Ok, as the person who is probably most responsible for starting this, let me make a few points. 1. WP:NOTMEMORIAL does NOT reflect this. My reading of the relevant section is that it is aimed primarily at people creating articles for people as memorials. If the consensus is something different, then I would like to suggest that that policy should be updated to reflect that, if not, then it should also be changed to reflect the opposite. 2. Understanding the points made above, how does that effect other things? Is a list of commanding officers more notable than a list of people who were killed in action? What is appropriate in terms of WP policy? If you look at Durban Light Infantry a huge chunk of the article is a list of past commanding officers. How is that different from the Roll of Honour? Should that list of past OCs be hauled out into a seperate article as a list, deleted from the article or left as it is? Whatever the decision on past OCs, shouldn't that same decision be applied to ROH entries? If not, why not? The ROH entry for the article that started this discussion has a limited ROH as the bulk of entries on that list happened during the Korean War. This is a fairly short list and is integral to the history of the unit. 8 South African Infantry Battalion is another one where there is a limited ROH. This is referred to slightly better in the paragraph preceding it. 3. On this same topic, the issue of WP:GNG, there seems to me to be uneven application. For example any General Officer seems to fly under the radar in terms of notability requirements, irrespective of their actual accomplishments, whereas a Colonel has a much higher bar to avoid deletion tagging. The ROH vs OC that we are debating right now seem, in my opinion, to fall into the same strange limbo. BoonDock (talk) 07:10, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I'm personally no fan of lists of commanding officers either, especially for units commanded by people below the rank of general or who usually don't go on to achieve notability for other reasons. This is for pretty much the same reason that I don't support the inclusion of rolls of honour: most of these people are not notable, and the information is not useful to readers. Nick-D (talk) 07:40, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
BoonDock - I agree that there are many examples of policies being applied unevenly across Wikipedia, but that is probably due to the nature of the fact that it is usually not the same people applying it every time and the different interpretations individual editors have of that policy. Re WP:GNG - notability really boils down to just one thing IMO and that is whether there is "significant coverage" of a subject in reliable sources. If there is, regardless of rank, then the individual is notable for our purposes. If there isn't significant coverage, again regardless of rank, they are not. WP:SOLDIER is also often misunderstood as being policy—which it is not—it is an essay which suggests that certain topics are likely to be notable - not that they actually are (they still need to meet the threshold of having significant coverage and if proven otherwise will be deleted). All that aside I think the intent of WP:NOTMEMORIAL would preclude casualty lists as being a list of non-notable individuals whose name is being recorded purely for memorial purposes. Re CO's - such lists serve a wholly different purpose (i.e. they are not listed for memorial purposes), whilst some CO's can be individually notable (certainly the case in small militaries such as Australia, where an officer that commands a unit during a significant operation is likely to be covered in numerous books in some detail and is also fairly likely to advance through the ranks and hold senior positions within the defence organisation later in their career). Ultimately, military history often focuses on commanders, rather than the rank and file, so such lists are fairly common perhaps as a result of this. Anotherclown (talk) 08:26, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. That's reasonable. Problematic though. I don't want this discussion to lose focus, but the GNG is a problem when the topic is one that is not covered by media or a wide number of books. I have a feeling (i.e. a non-substantiated suspicion) that GNG has become an over-riding consideration when the nature of an encyclopedia is often to find authoritative articles on things that are NOT covered in the general media. One example of that in this context is that a lot of the operations of the SADF were both secret and/or deliberately lied about in the media. I have personal memories of being in Angola and listening to radio reports where the then Prime Minister of South Africa announced to the international press that there were NO South African military in Angola. Even more so were the exploits of Special Forces which were highly secret. In spite of this my article on André Diedericks got deleted. On topic again, I agree that lists OCs are different from ROHs. The point I was making though is that the argument about WP:MEMORIAL is wrongly quoted as justification in the way it is currently stated. I suspect that if the names were included in the text there would be a lot less of a problem. Something along the lines of "During operation XXX, so and so were killed by enemy fire and Joe Blogs died later of wounds" rather than a list?BoonDock (talk) 08:38, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
Coming to this slightly late, but my views on it are generally similar to Nick-D and Anotherclown's. Hchc2009 (talk) 08:54, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I'll leave Diedericks and the paucity of sources about these ops alone. In the example you gave at the end of your comment, IMO the issue would then probably be about the article being overly detailed for an encyclopedia article. ie why would we name them if they aren't notable? If the 10th Battalion took 100 casualties in one battle, we wouldn't mention them by name, that would be ridiculous. If the CO and a bloke that had been awarded the VC were killed, we'd mention that, because they're probably both going to meet WP:GNG. I also agree with the WP:RECENTISM comment above. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 09:02, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
Regarding the example at the end of BoonDock's post, I actually think that would be fine for engagements where there were small numbers of casualties. The Australian official histories of the world wars were often written at this level of detail. I'd do this sparingly though due to the issues around excessive detail noted by Peacemaker. Nick-D (talk) 09:15, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I think the "included in the text" point is a natural break-point, here. If the article is written in such a way that (say) half or more of the people involved are named explicitly in the prose, then it would seem entirely reasonable to have a comprehensive list at the end (be that participants or casualties). But if it's not already written to that detail, or if it's discussing an event too large for this to be practical, then a list won't be appropriate. Andrew Gray (talk) 22:32, 12 January 2015 (UTC)

Cross of Sacrifice

There is a good discussion going on at Talk:Cross of Sacrifice about the level of context needed in an article. The design of a war memorial is covered, and the article contains a good amount of text about the context in which this development occurred. But just how much of this has to be in the main article (Commonwealth War Graves Commission) and how much should be mentioned at the war memorial page (Cross of Sacrifice)? No one wants to content-fork. But too little context on the war memorial page forces the reader to go to other pages too much. Only two individuals so far are discussing this of "how much context is needed and what is too much", and input from folks here at the Military History project is sorely needed. Any weighing in is appreciated! - Tim1965 (talk) 17:32, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Battle of Thermopylae (267)

Hello all. Have you ever heard of this battle? I have read a lot about the Erulian-Gothic ("Scythian") invasions of late 260s AD but I never saw a single reference to this episode. Plus that it doesn't make sense to me that Heruls went through Thermopylae (it is located far to the north of Athens) before attacking Athens: we know that it was a seaborn invasion. Fiction?--Dipa1965 (talk) 19:19, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Here's a (German language) source mentioning the invasion in a brief English summary at the start [14]. Not sure, if a hoax would be possible on such a site - I am not an expert. But the text appears to be legit. The source is mentioned and used at de:Heruler (added by an IP editor in 2014). GermanJoe (talk) 21:39, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I don't think the issue is a hoax - it is mentioned in passing as one of the battles at Thermopylae (the fourth battle of six)in various places. But evidence for it is weak and not all descriptions of the invasion mention it. Ideally, we could use a proper academic source which mentions it. Certainly, almost everything turned up in an online search is mirroring the wiki article so we need to fix the detail if we are not to be responsible for spreading a myth. Monstrelet (talk) 08:23, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
Here is an English language commentary on the palimpsest refered to in the German article referenced above, providing an English language translation of the text. https://www.academia.edu/8041238/The_New_Dexippos_2nd_revision_ (thanks to DH for this). This gives some detail of the action at Thermopylae and even the names of some key participants. So not fiction. However, there does seem some academic concern as to the date of the battle, which mave have taken place during the invasion of Cniva (or Kniva) in 250, rather than 276.Monstrelet (talk) 18:55, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
I have added both links to the article (as further reading for now) to help interested editors with further research. If you know about more sources, it would be good to add them to the article as well. GermanJoe (talk) 18:20, 13 January 2015 (UTC)
Good stuff. I've asked a few folks to look out for more sources but the palimpsest we have referred to seems to be the current focus of scholarly effort for this battle.Monstrelet (talk) 18:52, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Many thanks to both of you. So it seems that there is an alternative view for the course of the invasion. As if the history of that decade wasn't already complicated by itself...--Dipa1965 (talk) 21:25, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Thomas J. Hirschfeld

Dear armed forces experts: Is this old AfC submission about a notable topic? Should the page be kept instead of being deleted as a stale draft? —Anne Delong (talk) 23:12, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Highest civilian award from US Army Dept?

Can anyone here help with my enquiry at Talk:William Wiswesser (about an award he was given in 1970)? PamD 22:14, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Department of the Army Decoration for Exceptional Civilian Service says it's the highest award. Department of the Army Meritorious Civilian Service Award is a possibility. I like this article from the Reading Eagle dated May 3, 1970 and this one from the Morning Call dated December 19, 1989.--Jim in Georgia Contribs Talk 23:13, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

Wiktionary linking

How do I link to a word in Wiktionary pleaseKeith-264 (talk) 00:46, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

See WP:INTER. All you have to use is a piped link, in this manner. Chris Troutman (talk) 00:55, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

One article, or two?

Looking for some opinions...

In 1963 McNamara cancelled Nike Zeus in favor of ongoing research as part of the Nike-X umbrella effort. Through development, the various groups (ARPA, Bell, Army) study a variety of cheaper options. Increasing pressure due to the "ABM gap" forced McNamara's hand, and he selected one of these sub-studies, I-67, to become Sentinel.

So, two articles or one? Nike-X and Sentinel, or just Sentinel? Sentinel existed for about 18 months, Nike-X for four years. Sentinel was a "thin" system made up mostly of Spartan missiles. Nike-X was a "heavy" system made up mostly of Sprint. Different radars, different deployments, etc.

What say you all?

Maury Markowitz (talk) 17:58, 13 January 2015 (UTC)

I guess that it boils down to the availability of sources to support separate articles and, rather importantly, the preference of whoever wants to write articles on this topic ;) Starting with a single article isn't a problem as a separate article can always be split out if sources/interest allows. Nick-D (talk) 10:56, 14 January 2015 (UTC)
Nike-X it is! Maury Markowitz (talk) 12:29, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

WikiProject X is live!

Hello everyone!

You may have received a message from me earlier asking you to comment on my WikiProject X proposal. The good news is that WikiProject X is now live! In our first phase, we are focusing on research. At this time, we are looking for people to share their experiences with WikiProjects: good, bad, or neutral. We are also looking for WikiProjects that may be interested in trying out new tools and layouts that will make participating easier and projects easier to maintain. If you or your WikiProject are interested, check us out! Note that this is an opt-in program; no WikiProject will be required to change anything against its wishes. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you!

Note: To receive additional notifications about WikiProject X on this talk page, please add this page to Wikipedia:WikiProject X/Newsletter. Otherwise, this will be the last notification sent about WikiProject X.

Harej (talk) 16:57, 14 January 2015 (UTC)

Homeless veterans in the United States

Just came across this article, Homeless veterans in the United States, it is in some desperate need of some work. Just thought I'd bring it to the communities attention.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 06:28, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

A-Class Reviews needing attention

G'day all, 4th Army (Kingdom of Yugoslavia) (open since 4 November), and Siege of Kehl (1796–97) (open since 15 November) both have two supports and need attention from additional reviewers. The two older noms Ulysses S. Grant and The Utility of Force both appear to be awaiting responses from the nominator and/or reviewers. If you can spare some time to do a ACR, please have a look at the open nominations. Thanks, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:51, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Featured article nomination of Exhumation of Richard III

I've nominated Exhumation of Richard III of England for consideration as a featured article candidate, in advance of Richard's reburial on 26 March 2015. If anyone would like to contribute to the review, please feel free to do so at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Exhumation of Richard III of England/archive1. Prioryman (talk) 13:10, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Reliability of 1914-1918.net "The Long, Long Trail"

G'day all, I am not that familiar with British WWI sources, and in the process of reviewing a British division article at GAN, am wondering what the consensus is regarding this website as a reliable source. The author appears to be a professional battlefield guide and researcher with an MA in British WWI Studies who has published one WWI book through Pen and Sword. Obviously a serious enthusiast, but seems pretty marginal to me in terms of reliability (ie no editorial board etc). I don't want to set an article up for major rewrite at ACR if the sources aren't good enough. I'd like to get some MILHIST community views. Thanks, Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 10:10, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

Gday - I'm by no means an expert on WP:RS but I'd lean towards it being considered as such, although I guess it probably would depend on what it was being used to reference. Would WP:USERGENERATED apply here? Specifically I note it says: "Self-published material may sometimes be acceptable when its author is an established expert whose work in the relevant field has been published by reliable third-party publications." Given that the author is identifiable, has a relevant tertiary qualification in WWI history and has recently book published on the topic by a fairly reputable publisher (AFAIK at least - certainly they have published a range of quite notable authors) I think it might fit the bill and would be inclined to AGF. Particularly so if its being used to reference something that is uncontroversial. That said if the information it was being used to reference is contentious then it might be best to support the ref with additional cites from other sources. Anyway that's my thoughts from a very brief review of the website in question. Anotherclown (talk) 10:31, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
One of those cases were the author seems to know what he's doing, and is doing it well, but it's not easy to definitively prove that. GraemeLeggett (talk) 10:34, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
It seems OK to me but I do try to replace it with citations from printed sources where I've got them and refer to it as an External link. Mostly it looks like the site info comes from the OH OOB volumes. I've been dabbling with the divisional pages while I'm having another breather from longer articles and think it would be a good idea for us to reduce the articles' dependence on 14-18 net where it can be done, because we do that with web sources in general. Pity someone doesn't have the OOB volumes of the OH because I think it would just involve the substitution of the citations.Keith-264 (talk) 10:36, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I tend to agree with Graeme. The author of the website has written a professionally published book on a battle in the war, which goes a long way towards establishing this as a RS. However, it was published by Pen & Sword who don't have the highest editorial standards... (though they aren't unreliable by any means). A search of Google books also shows that the website has been used as a reference in a significant number of professionally-published works [15], but again they generally appear to be second-tier books. Overall, it should be a RS, but I agree with Keith that other sources are probably preferable when available. Nick-D (talk) 10:39, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
@Keith-264 I have the OOB volumes of the OH. As far as I can tell, www.1914-1918.net seems a fairly accurate reflection of them. Hamish59 (talk) 20:32, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
Thought soKeith-264 (talk) 21:04, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
thanks everyone. Peacemaker67 (crack... thump) 22:32, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Urgent: Request locking of Battle of the Somme and dispute resolution

Resolved

Please would one of the Coordinators lock the article temporarily until a dispute resolution/arbitration can be arranged.Keith-264 (talk) 20:40, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

This requires someone with wikimagic higher than mine. I suggest that you stop warring until a resolution can be arranged. This will give the page some stability. Your opponent will be less aggravated (and so will you). Please. Thank you. auntieruth (talk) 21:18, 15 January 2015 (UTC)
There is no real dispute – we have an obstreperous editor Keith-264 Who fights with and reverts every other editor and is unable to clearly express his own views of the battle of Somme. He thinks that when people get involved who know little about that battle, his debate position will be improved. Rjensen (talk) 21:23, 15 January 2015 (UTC)
I suggest that the previous comment demonstrates the necessity of intervention.Keith-264 (talk) 22:18, 15 January 2015 (UTC)
I've protected the page as an alternative to blocking an editor. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 22:33, 15 January 2015 (UTC)

Naval Historical and Heritage Command website (U.S. Navy)

Shortly after the first of this year the website for the Naval Historical and Heritage Command overhauled their site and changed web addresses for everything on the website. This action has caused dead links for every article on Wikipedia that used the NHHC site for referencing. One of the articles that I have authored uses 16 different references that originate on that website, which in turn are cited on 33 separate occasions in the same article. Several other articles that I have authored about Vietnam War naval subjects also have been affected by this site overhaul, but to a lesser extent. I am at a loss as what to do about this situation. I have attempted to start trying to locate the new addresses for each citation that is affected, but some of the material is either missing or in places that I can no longer find at the present time. I can remove the dead links, but that essentially guts a Good Article. I was about to put the article in question up for an A Class Review; I guess it is fortunate that I hadn't done that yet. Any suggestions? Cuprum17 (talk) 16:22, 16 January 2015 (UTC)

Check the thread here at WP:SHIPS - we're currently trying to address this issue now. It doesn't look like a task that can be done with a bot, so we'll need all the hands we can get. Parsecboy (talk) 16:38, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
I am already aware of that thread, but I don't see any solutions as of yet. Cuprum17 (talk) 17:23, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
Sweeping DoD related website changes (navy.mil is not the only one) has caused headaches beyond Wikipedia, in fact many tens of thousands of previously sourced images on Commons have been affected and some have been in danger of accidental deletion. Refer to c:Commons:Bots/Work_requests#Fixing_US_Navy_VIRIN_links. The suggested solution there is to create a wrapping template for military URLs, so that image source links based on VIRIN identity can be changed globally by a bot sniffing out broken links. I am unsure whether this possible approach for images might be a worthwhile thing to consider for article citations. If anyone researches the mappings needed, I suggest they are shared between projects even if the templates might not be. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 16:41, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
Hello gents. One possible solution, especially for websites where you cannot find the updated address, may be to use the archived version at the Wayback Machine. Pls see the link here [16]. This would still require you to update the links manually though. Anotherclown (talk) 21:14, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
Similar changes have affected the Air Force Historical Research Agency and Office of Air Force History pages for USAF articles. A few years ago, they moved their entire websites. These early pages are not, unfortunately, archived on the Wayback Machine and include the basic works on units by Maurer and Ravenstein. Those works were moved forward to the new site, but a number of pages for inactive units were not. More recently, they removed all factsheets for Air Divisions entirely (these are archived, but most air division articles, unfortunately use earlier URLs that are not archived). --Lineagegeek (talk) 23:17, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
I've emailed someone at the NHHC about this. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 23:57, 16 January 2015 (UTC)
Perhaps the solution then is to design a bot to locate and switch our cited links in reference tabs over to the wayback machine when such pages are so that when these things occur it is not a disaster because an archive link can be obtained to the page is question. As to the immediate issue, perhaps we can throw in with WP:SHIPS and see about organizing a massive drive to locate and address the issues in the articles individually. TomStar81 (Talk) 02:25, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

WP:MILMOS change requested

Following discussion at WT:SHIPS#City of Adelaide (1864), I made a small change to WP:SHE4SHIPS, which Kablammo reverted. The notice at the top of the page says to ensure that any edits to the page reflect consensus. I contend that my edit did reflect consensus per the discussion at WP:SHIPS. Also, Kablammo comments that the Mil Hist project should not dictate conventions for articles outside its scope. I contend that SHE4SHIPS is not "owned" by WP:MILHIST, but shared between WP:MILHIST and WP:SHIPS. The aim of my edit was to preclude the claim that the style guide does not apply to merchant vessels. There has been much discussion about the use of the feminine pronoun for ships, and the current consensus is that it is fine to do so, or not to do so, but neither style should be forced on the other. This leaves those who write articles to use the style that they are happiest with. Most, like myself, use "she". Mjroots (talk) 09:07, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

While I don't necessarily have a problem with the change, I do think Kablammo has a valid point insofar as MILMOS is meant to deal with military-related topics, and I'm not sure that anyone would expect guidelines about merchant ships to be found there. Perhaps it might be better to add the guidance on merchant ships to Wikipedia:WikiProject Ships/Guidelines instead? Kirill [talk] 12:54, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
I believe these edits by saberwyn put the matter to rest. Since the Ships project already has such a guideline no purpose is served by the proposed change here. Obviously, there should be agreement in articles within the ambit of two projects, but where that overlap is absent, it is an unwise practice for the one project to extend its reach into another on a subject not within the scope of the first project. Kablammo (talk) 14:55, 11 January 2015 (UTC)
OK, but as there are two shortcuts to the section of MILMOS, maybe we could retarget SHE4SHIPS to WP:NC-S? Mjroots (talk) 12:53, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
I believe it would be sensible to redirect the redirect (heh) and make sure that the two link to each other. Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 14:50, 12 January 2015 (UTC)
I've retargeted SHE4SHIPS to NC-S, and hatnoted both to each other. Mjroots (talk) 22:19, 17 January 2015 (UTC)

HMS Barbados

What would the the correct wikilink for HMS Barbados, a sloop in service during the 1750s? Mjroots (talk) 21:06, 18 January 2015 (UTC)

Think I've got it, see HMS Barbados. Please add any vessels I've missed. Mjroots (talk) 22:14, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
@Mjroots: Yep, you got it. Sorry, I'd have done this myself, but I caught up in a big project elsewhere and am just barely getting to this are to check in on it. Well done though, as far as I can tell its set up exactly the way it should be. TomStar81 (Talk) 00:52, 19 January 2015 (UTC)
I've got a feeling that there may have been others. Mjroots (talk) 18:42, 19 January 2015 (UTC)

What to do, what to do...

The LIM-49 Nike Zeus article is coming along nicely, and I'm getting ready to submit it to FAC. It currently contains a largish section in the middle about all of the problems the RSIG and WSEG found about Zeus and ABMs in general. This is all well referenced and makes for scary reading (half the population dies in a counterforce attack!). However, that section alone makes for a reasonably long article all by itself, and the same problems apply to any ABM system. That suggests I separate it out into its own article...

Ok, but what would that article be? "Problems with ABM systems" isn't really an encyclopedic article by itself.

Any suggestions?

Maury Markowitz (talk) 20:21, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

I think that the introduction to the section provides some resolution. "This section covers the details raised by the PSAC and similar studies in more depth. Some of these problems are common to any terminal-defense interceptor system, while others are specific to the Zeus itself." [my emphasis] If moved, there would still need to be a summary and a discussion of the Zeus specific problems with supporting material. Would this be substantially smaller or would there be a significant amount of duplicated material shared between the two pages? Would you need to retain a large amount of material to make sense of the Zeus specific problems? Without considering the issue of size, could this general material be added to the Anti-ballistic missile article? If the answer is yes, then there is a rational apart from the arbitrary one of size to create a daughter page. Would this be an improvement over linking at say Anti-ballistic missile#American Nike-X of 1960s and plans of Sentinel to this section in the article as it stands. If other rationale support an overall improvement to WP then the decision to daughter (or not) should be clearer - except perhaps for the name (sorry). How about Terminal-defense interceptor systems? The daughtered material would then be a (substantial) part of a broader article. It could also possibly deal with some of the specific Zeus problems in a supporting context, thus making development of a summary section in the original article potentially less problematic. Hope this helps Cinderella157 (talk) 23:25, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

Lloyd's List 1741 - 1826

I've recently discovere that copies of LLoyd's List for 1741 - 1826 are available online. There's a wealth of material available that will be of use in detailing the history of British warships in service during that period. Link available at WP:SHIPS/R. Mjroots (talk) 08:53, 22 January 2015 (UTC)

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