Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 88

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A-Class review for 7th Infantry Division (United States) now open

The A-Class review for 7th Infantry Division (United States) is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Abraham, B.S. (talk) 04:41, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong with this picture?

File:Macedonian battle formation.gif

Does any one know? Any one...? (hint-hope you find the RIGHT answer:)--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) (talk) 08:16, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

The Hypaspists were a form of infantry not cavalry. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 08:26, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
Right on! And quick too! You get a medal! And someone should inform the US Military Academy:)--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) (talk) 09:58, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
Looking at the Permissions it appears that the then-Cartographer at the U.S.M.A. couldn't use a spellchecker either. Is the image still used on the U.S.M.A. website? --Simon Harley (talk | library | book reviews) 16:39, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Template:WPMILHIST Announcements/Full

I just noticed this, but Template:WPMILHIST Announcements/Full has exceeded its template include size. I don't think too many people use it anyways, but it should be fixed for those who do? Comments are appreciated, --Patar knight - chat/contributions 02:52, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

There's no real way to fix it, though, given that the task force templates grow and shrink unpredictably. Given that it's not really used—anyone interested in the task force lists just goes to the task force page anyways—I'd suggest simply getting rid of it.
The alternative, I suppose, would be to change the lists from transclusions to simple links; then, we could bring them back into the main template rather than having a separate one. I'm not convinced it's worthwhile doing this, though, since, as I've said, I don't think anyone really gets to the lists this way to begin with. Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:58, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
So, any thoughts on which approach would be more useful? Kirill [talk] [pf] 04:48, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
I think the template is redundant really - as you say, the TF list page duplicates the additional information, and that page is well-linked from the navbox and various other places. EyeSerenetalk 07:32, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Okay, fair enough; I've deprecated the full version and redirected its component templates back to the main announcement box. Kirill [talk] [pf] 17:50, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Disambiguators for military biography articles

User:Pdfpdf recently proposed that John Wilton (Australian Army officer)‎ be moved to John Wilton (general), largely because most other articles in category:Australian generals use that form of disamiguation when it is required. I, and User:Skinny87, opposed on the basis that the current form is more informative, and better describes what makes him notable (as I see it, Wilton and most others of a simialr status are ntoable army officers, because they've reached 2 star rank, rather than being notable generals which seems to me to imply someone more on the Wellington, Napoleon, <insert top national general of choice> etc). Pdfpdf coutners taht outside articles related to British generals where this has become pretty much the standard format, most other articles on generals use simply (general) as the disambiguator, and finds the alternative rather cumbersome. Curiously even in Australian military bios, for those from other services (RAAF officer) and (RAN officer) do seem to have become more or elss standard, rather than (air officer) and (admiral) which would be the equivalents to (general).

Does the prject as a whole have a view on which is preferable? Does it matter if these disambiguators are not uniform? David Underdown (talk) 13:23, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

I can see the point at the moment there is only one John Wilton (general) what about John Wilton (Australian general) which would join both proposals ? Jim Sweeney (talk) 13:30, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
(First, I must say that I think David has summarised the situation quite well. In general, I agree with his summary. But not necessarily the conclusions he draws from it.) Pdfpdf (talk) 14:05, 15 June 2009 (UTC)
Mmmm. Yes. But what about ALL of the other articles "xxx (general)"? Please inform me if I've missed something, but my understanding is the the "(general)" is there to disambiguate. To date, this has "done the job". Where it hasn't "done the job", it has been augmented. "(Australian general)" is the one of the alternatives that have been used, but only when "(general)" was not ambiguous. For example, as I said at Talk:John Wilton (Australian Army officer),
"6) (general) is usually an adequate disambiguation. If not, (Australian general) seems to work if/when needed. The only exception so far is John Raymond Broadbent (1893-1972) and John Raymond Broadbent (1914-2006); "Australian Army officer" would NOT have helped that one!"
So yes, "John Wilton (Australian general)" will do the job. But so will "John Wilton (general)". In my (no doubt biassed) opinion, it just seems to be adding yet another level of complexity.
(I also have other objections, but they are even more subjective ... )
If you've managed to get here, thanks for your indulgence. Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 14:05, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Just to further muddy the waters, why not use "John Gordon Noel Wilton" as the article title, and avoid the need for a clumsy disambiguator? Leithp 15:12, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Because that doesn't seem to be the approach suggested by Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people). David Underdown (talk) 15:19, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

The (unofficial) standard for British Army officers is to disambiguate as (British Army officer), no matter what rank the officer reached. See Category:British Army generals. A high level of consistency has been reached with these articles, and in my opinion this is an extremely good thing and should be extended to all countries. After all, the officer's profession was Army officer, not general, which is merely the rank he reached. To me, disambiguating by rank seems very odd - John Smith (lieutenant), John Smith (captain), John Smith (major), or whatever seem strange, so I see no reason for generals to be a special case. Added to which, "general" actually covers three or four (depending on the country) separate ranks. As to disambiguating by full name, this has already been discussed a number of times and the general conclusion has been that articles should consistently use the name by which the individual was known. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:36, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that "standard" is unofficial, but more relevantly, it is (so far) limited to British pages. (I don't really want to copy the discussion at Talk:John Wilton (Australian Army officer) to here, so I'll refer you to that page.)
Yes, I have heard that point of view expressed by other British WP military historians; I don't share it, and I don't agree with the argument. (Again, refer to the Wilton talk page.)
Your reasoning is coherent, but (in my pov) irellevant, and your examples are red herrings (in my pov).
"general" actually covers three or four ... ranks. - Yes! In my pov, that's its advantage! "Fred Nerk (general)" is a very concise way of saying "Fred Nerk (very senior army officer)".
In my mind, the more logical extension of your argument is to use "Fred Nerk (soldier)".
As I said on the Wilton talk page, the point of the suffix is to disambiguate; "(general)" is a more concise and more effective disambiguator - there could be numerous "(soldier)"s or "(officer)"s with that name, meaning that, as a dismabiguator, it is neither particularly useful, nor particularly effective. And it is excessively verbose.
But most of all, if you look at the statistics/data on Talk:John Wilton (Australian Army officer), you'll see that almost ALL soldiers bios on WP (with the exception of UK) do NOT use the UK convention. In particular, Wilton is the ONLY Oz general NOT called "(general)".
I could go on, but that's probably enough for one session. Pdfpdf (talk) 15:20, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
Does anyone else (co-ords?) have a view on this? David Underdown (talk) 15:08, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
I would think that John Wilton (Army officer) or John Wilton (Australian Army officer) would be better than using the rank unless we have more than one John Wilton in the Australian Army! Alternate would be to use dates John Wilton (1910) no need to argue then if it was a profession or rank. MilborneOne (talk) 15:32, 19 June 2009 (UTC)
Not all officers are notable for what they did in their most senior ranks, especially those that were further promoted in peacetime. It would be odd to refer to someone chiefly notable for, say, galantry as a lieutenant as (general), just because he reached taht rank twenty years later. My article Alexander Cavalié Mercer would be a case in point if anyone else of the same name happens along (admitedly unlikely: he was known for his action as a captain at Waterloo, and he is known as "Captain Mercer", but became a general just before he retired in the 1860s. If we called him Captain, what of individuals who are notable as they cross several ranks? Come to think of it, as David Underdown pointed out above, I may need to rename the article in the light of Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people) - I should drop the first name, as he was known as Cavalié Mercer. I'm sure I've seen other military biographies that don't adhere to the convention, eg Allan Henry Shafto Adair and Jean De Dieu Soult. Cyclopaedic (talk) 17:12, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I heard an interview this morning on the ABC where the Oz Prime Minister was interviewed. He said a lot. And he repeated it. (At least twice.) And NONE of it bore ANY relationship to the questions that the ABC interviewer was trying to ask him.
The above lack-of-discussion of any of the relevant points raised reminds me of that interview. Pdfpdf (talk) 14:37, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

I would like to chime in on this as well. I work a lot with Medal of Honor recipients and there seems to be a wide variance in how those pages where created as well. Here are some examples (John Smith, John J. Smith, John John Smith, John Smith (soldier), John Smith (U.S. soldier), John Smith (Medal of Honor recipient), etc). John Smith is a bad example because its such a common name but in many cases the names are not common and they still have a long disambiguation title that I believe is unnecessary and in some cases I have moved the article or if the article needs to be created I will change the link (usually on a list page) to something less descriptive if the name isn't already taken.--Kumioko (talk) 19:04, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
The equivalent for UK/Commonwealth personnel would be VC and GC winners, and here (VC) and (GC) seems to eb well established (of course the fact that these are well-established postnominals, which is not something the US uses helps). Since in most of these cases the person's notability rests on the fact that they received thier nation's highest available decoration, this form seems appropriate (they are a handful of VC recipients-and I don't know if any of these would actually need disambiguation anway-whose subsequent career would make them notable as an army or naval officer even if they hadn't won the VC, but most people would probably still be trying to look them up because of their VC anyway). David Underdown (talk) 09:45, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Charles Lindbergh

I wanted to let you know that I submitted the Charles Lindbergh article for peer review. Any comments or suggestions you have are greatly appreciated. --Kumioko (talk) 16:55, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

We are still solicting reviewers for the Charles Lindbergh article so anyone who wishes to review and comment would be greatly appreciated.--Kumioko (talk) 18:57, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Proposal: Cold War task force (c. 1945–c. 1989)

There's been some discussion on my talk page about a new task force covering the Cold War (say 1945 to about 1989). This has been raised several times in the past but has not attracted much support. Is there sufficient support for this now? Normally, we'd be looking for a minimum of six editors to sponsor it. If you're interested, please say so below.  Roger Davies talk 23:30, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

I think we have more than enough support now; assuming nobody comes up with any serious objections by then, I'll create the infrastrucute for the new task force tomorrow morning. Kirill [talk] [pf] 22:57, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
The task force has now been created at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Cold War task force. One minor issue to keep in mind is that, due to naming, some of the categories are being shared between the new task force and the (inactive?) Cold War history WikiProject. Once the task force becomes fully active, we may want to propose merging the standalone project into it to eliminate this redundancy. Kirill [talk] [pf] 17:43, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
Support
  1. JayLeno175 (talk) 2:13, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  2. Ian Rose (talk) 06:12, 22 June 2009 (UTC) - can't see any obvious reason not to, seems conspicuous by its absence now someone mentions it...
  3. D'accord--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) (talk) 08:12, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  4. BillClinton1000 (talk) 16:28, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  5. Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:27, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  6. TomStar81 (Talk) 18:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC) - We should inform Wikipedia:WikiProject Cold War of this development though; I am sure some of their project members would appreciate a heads up from us if we do this. TomStar81 (Talk) 18:50, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  7. -MBK004 20:59, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
  8. Abraham, B.S. (talk) 23:11, 22 June 2009 (UTC) - an obvious taskforce to establish.
  9. YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 02:03, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
  10. Skinny87 (talk) 19:40, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Scope?

What would the scope of this task force be? Any war-related thing that happened in the Cold War...? —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 06:16, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps something like:
This task force covers the period of global military tension that existed between the end of World War II in 1945 until about 1989. The scope includes not only the main confrontation – between the USA/NATO and the USSR/Warsaw Pact countries – but also operations in other theatres, such as South East Asia, and Central and South America, as the superpower protagonists sought to extend their spheres of influence.
 Roger Davies talk 10:17, 22 June 2009 (UTC)
Prehaps replace 'operations in other theatres' with something that mentions proxy wars?--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 23:18, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

I have a Q at the Cold War notice board. At the moment the entire Cold War project seems to be a subset of the MILHIST one, according to the stats, even if directly tagged, meaning that things like anti/pro-communist summits/laws/referndums to ban communist parties etc will be in there. YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 04:19, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Date unlinking bot proposal

The community RFC about a proposal for a bot to unlink dates is now open. Please see Wikipedia:Full-date unlinking bot and comment here. --Apoc2400 (talk) 11:58, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Not this topic again!!--Kumioko (talk) 18:55, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

List of Axis military operations on the Eastern Front of World War II

User Mrg3105, though operating under the hat User:Shattered Wikiglass, has just removed all the Soviet operations from this page, removed a merger suggestion with an extensive list of Soviet operations, and changed the name to make the article a list of Axis operations only. Should we be aiming at a single list of all operations on the Eastern Front, Axis and Soviet, or separating them? What do people think? Buckshot06(prof) 17:53, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Oh god, not him. I'm staying out of this this time... Skinny87 (talk) 18:02, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
The Axis-only list is fairly lengthy so I'm not sure that they should be merged. Especially if you were to list all of the forgotten offensives from Glantz's self-published books, of which I only have volume I. I'm more bothered by his pedantic remarks about the Soviet lack of an "Eastern Front" and his bad grammar. Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 21:09, 23 June 2009 (UTC)
Honestly, I think having the German and Soviet terminology separate isn’t all that bad an idea. Certainly, the German list should lose all the advertising for Glantz. The key for the Soviet list is to correlate the Russian nomenclature with the (often rough) equivalent for the German operations. The reason I say this is that the German names are far better known among English-speakers than the Russian. It looks like someone has made an attempt at this, but it needs better clarification. An alternative approach might be to employ a vertical timeline table correlating the one with the other. This would remedy mrg3105’s wholesale translation of the original article structure to a Glantz-inspired Soviet one; however, it wouldn’t be easy to do in Wikipedia, I’m afraid. Askari Mark (Talk) 02:35, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
I also think seperating them is a good idea. Although I believe he should have got some comments or something from other editors prior to removing large chunks of the list. --Kumioko (talk) 03:36, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
I've just reverted the move. Nick-D (talk) 08:55, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

It's probably worth reminding everyone that discretionary sanctions may be imposed by any uninvolved administrator on an editor behaving disruptively in articles which relate to Eastern Europe, broadly interpreted. User:mrg3105 was subject to these restrictions.  Roger Davies talk 09:40, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Thank you! I only wish you could have gotten around to dealing with him sooner. I hold mrg3105 responsible for ruining La Grande Armee. All the list cruft and section moving he did played a major role in turning it from A-list to start class. He is further proof that not everyone can, nor should, be allowed to edit articles.--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) (talk) 23:09, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

"Eastern Front"?

I've been reading about the August 1945 Soviet invasion of Manchuria. When I look at WP articles about the "Eastern Front" and "Soviet Operations", they don't seem to pay much attention to the fact that WWII continued east of Europe after 9 May 1945.
I supposed I'm a bit surprised by this. What do others think? Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 09:51, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Are you talking about the patchy fighting which lasted for a few days after the German surrender, or the Manchurian campaign? The Soviet operation in Manchuria is normally considered to be totally separate to the war against Germany. Nick-D (talk) 09:57, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
"Are you ... " - As I said, the August 1945 Soviet invasion of Manchuria.
"The Soviet operation ... " - I'm puzzled. Why would anyone think that the August 1945 Soviet invasion of Manchuria had anything to do with the war against Germany? I'm afraid I don't understand you.
Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 18:26, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
I think what Nick is trying to point out is that by traditional usage the "Eastern Front" was limited to the western USSR; the Manchurian invasion is generally included in the Pacific/East Asian theatre. Askari Mark (Talk) 22:14, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
Yes indeed; that's the point I was alluding to. Who's "tradition"? Writers in English? European writers? Other writers?
I can't read Russian, Chinese or Japanese; Does anyone know what the Russian, Chinese and Japanese refer to these two fronts as?
And for that matter, what do writers of English refer to the Manchurian front as?
Cheers, Pdfpdf (talk) 10:06, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
Use of the term "Eastern Front" is a Western tradition, drawn from the German usage, "Ostfront". Less frequently employed terms include the "Russo-German War", "German-Soviet War", "Soviet-German War", and "Axis-Soviet War". The reason for the predominance of "Eastern Front" is due to parallelism with similar usage for WWI and because German sources being chiefly the only ones available in the West until specialists like John Erickson and David Glantz began obtaining deeper access to Soviet sources. The Soviets called the conflict in this area the "Great Patriotic War" or "Anti-Fascist War"; the term "Great Patriotic War" is mostly used to refer to the USSR’s western theatre, but can also be used to include operations against Japan in the east.
The "Soviet invasion of Manchuria", which has been the term most used in Western sources, is known to the Russians as the "Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation". Again, thanks primarily to Glantz, it has also recently become popular to refer to it as by its codename, "Operation August Storm".
As to what the Japanese and Chinese call these, I have to confess that I do not know. Askari Mark (Talk) 16:23, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
From what I recall, the Chinese refer to the Western and Eastern fronts as "Western European Battlefield" and "Eastern European battlefied", and the entire theatre as the "European battlefield." For the Pacific War, it's referred to as the "Pacific Ocean battlefield". The war against the Japanese is often called the "Anti-Japanese war" or the "Eight years of resistance war" (i.e. 1937-1945). The Soviet invasion of Manchuria is commonly referred to as the "Soviet invasion of the North east." However, my Chinese isn't the best, and all the translations are quite literal. --Patar knight - chat/contributions 17:33, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
Well thank you! A very comprehensive answer. (I had wondered where "Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation" came from.) I've recently got hold of the so-called "Japanese Monographs"; it will be interesting to see what they have (had?) to say.
Glantz seems prolific on the topic, as you say, from the soviet side. Did Erickson write anything about the Manchurian campaign? I saw one of the Eagle Rock "Battlefield"s about Manchuria, (can't remember the title - guess it must have been series 4 #3), but I don't recall Erickson's name, and John Erickson (historian) seems to only mention European-related campaigns ... Cheers (and thanks), Pdfpdf (talk) 17:21, 27 June 2009 (UTC)
Erickson was the trailblazer in getting access to Soviet archives because they respected his balance, honesty and respectful treatment of Soviet contributions. He really only treated the German-Soviet front as far as I can recall. Glantz benefitted greatly from this opening up and initially focused on the Eastern Front as well. He’s only one of a very few Westerners to have delved deeply into Soviet operations in the Far East. Askari Mark (Talk) 19:50, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Definition of 'officer' in categories

Should categories such as Category:Royal Navy officers, and their sub-cats, be restricted to only commissioned officers? On a literal interpretation, no, but in the military/naval world the distinction between having a commission and not is crucial. I was a little surprised by this edit [1] - the subject of the article was still only a midshipman when WWI ended - but I haven't found any discussion of the matter, let alone consensus. Philip Trueman (talk) 10:29, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

I was working on the basis that Midshipman at the time was a commissioned officer. If that was not the case then my edit was incorrect and should be reverted Kernel Saunters (talk) 11:11, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
Definately agree that should be restricted to only commissioned officers or there is no point in the category Kernel Saunters (talk) 11:12, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
Technically middies were subordinate officers rather than actually having a commission, that said, for categorisation purposes here on Wikiepdia it seems most sensible to include them in the officer category, in general they were treated as such, and by the period we're talking about were virtually guaranteed to be commissioned. David Underdown (talk) 13:45, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
I would also include Warrant Officers in the officers category or else create a seperate category for them. Either one is ok with me. Regarding the midshipman thing we could create a category for midshipment and cadets who never got commissioned and went on to be notible for something.--Kumioko (talk) 14:31, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
Warrant Officers are classed as other ranks in the British/Commonwealth and would probably be insulated if categorised with officers! MilborneOne (talk) 14:38, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
Our own article on Other Ranks says warrnat officers are sometime excluded from that description. However, I don't generally think they should be included in the officer category though, although you might make a case for a different category for some of the early 19th century naval warrant officers, such as Master, Surgeon and Purser to be included in, they had the privilege of the wardroom along with the connissioned officers sensu strictu, and their modern-day equivalents are commissioned, whether there are enough of them who were notable to actually create a category I don't know. David Underdown (talk) 14:47, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) From the "Explanation of terms" section in the King's Regulations and Admiralty Instructions, 1913 Volume I. Page ix. "OFFICER—Commissioned, warrant, and subordinate officers, but not to extend to petty and non-commissioned officers except when the words "Superior officer" are used." --Simon Harley (talk | library | book reviews) 15:28, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Based on that, and what it say at Warrant Officer#The demise of the Royal Naval warrants, perhaps there is actually a case for including pre-1949 Warrant Offficers in the officer category (but no other warrant officers). David Underdown (talk) 15:55, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
If this is to clarify the officer issue for British related military articles thats fine but the US classifies it differently so I would recommend leaving the US categories of XXX officers be. --Kumioko (talk) 15:59, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

I have a major problem with including Warrant officers in the "Officers" categories concerning British services. My opinion, as a Brit, would be to only have commissioned officers, Midshipmen and officer cadets (Because they become commissioned Officers), in those categories. If you want to place Warrant Officers anywhere, perhaps we should make a specific category for them. NCOs are never referred to as Officers and to do so would cause great offence, and therefore should not be added to an Officer category. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk | Sign 18:27, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

I think that's correct - there's a significant distinction between being awarded your rank by the sovereign and being awarded it by the service. I agree that the distinctions blur for naval WOs, but that might be an argument for splitting the categories more meaningfully into commissioned/non-commissioned officers. EyeSerenetalk 18:56, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
I would say commissioned, noncommissioned and warrant officers because there is also a big difference between a WO and an NCO. --Kumioko (talk) 19:00, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
The original point of this thread concerned a question by Philip Trueman, essentially asking whether a move by Kernel Saunters of Jack Broome from Category:Royal Navy personnel of World War I to Category:Royal Navy officers of World War I was valid. Strictly speaking it was correct. Now, had an officer been a Warrant Officer, being placed in that category would have been correct as well because at that time a Warrant Officer in the Royal Navy counted as an officer. You can create whatever categories you want for other services at other times, but in this instance it's correct. --Simon Harley (talk | library | book reviews) 19:12, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
Indeed; perhaps Kumioko's suggestion for three categories would be the best way of providing a 'one size fits all' solution. EyeSerenetalk 19:33, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
While I suspect only the fairly knowlegable will even notice, I do have a concern over noncoms being listed as "officers", since the general public (even smart people) don't consider them "officers". Cat 'em as such may generate confusion better avoided. (I also suspect the confusion will be pretty limited in #, too...) My C$0.02. TREKphiler hit me ♠ 00:27, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
I concur with Kumioko. There should be a split into commissioned, noncommissioned and warrant officers. This has long been the tradition, albeit the use of warrant officers seems to be slipping away. Askari Mark (Talk) 19:58, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

James Mouat

Copyvio tagged on a VC winner. Kernel Saunters (talk) 15:46, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Discussion here: Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2009 June 23 --Pdfpdf (talk) 18:41, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

Template help

We're having serious problems with the Infobox Military Conflict template (see Talk:Yugoslav wars). Its a really unique situation. Here's the problem: we've got one war, the Bosnian War, which was three-sided at first, and then became two-sided as two of the three factions allied against the third. The Infobox Military Conflict has three columns for the first phase, but we've been trying to find a way to depict a three-sided war turning into a two-sided one. Possibly by merging two of the three columns after a horizontal line divides the phases of the conflict? Its really been a long standing innacuracy, and we all know people only really look at the infobox :P. Could someone help, or point us towards someone who could cook up a custom template? --DIREKTOR (TALK) 18:26, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

I think I've produced the effect you're looking for using the secondary row fields in the template. The syntax is a little limited at the moment—only the first two columns can be merged, not the last two—but it's enough for what you need. You'll probably want to add some sort of internal date header to clarify when the sides change; see War of the League of Cambrai for an example. Kirill [talk] [pf] 18:42, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Superb, thanks so much. xP --DIREKTOR (TALK) 18:45, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Lord's Resistance Army insurgency at FAR

I have nominated Lord's Resistance Army insurgency 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 "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here.Cirt (talk) 00:48, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the notice Cirt. Have commented. —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 03:27, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Cool3's administrator candidacy

A member of the project, Cool3, is currently a candidate to receive access to administrative tools. Project members who have worked with the candidate and have an opinion of Cool3's fitness to receive these tools are cordially invited to comment.  Roger Davies talk 05:55, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for History of the United Kingdom during World War I needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for History of the United Kingdom during World War I; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! TomStar81 (Talk) 18:34, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

Call for American Civil War buffs

American Civil War buffs, please ping me via email. Have uncovered something else along the lines of the MILHIST project history entry where the Library of Congress updated their records because of an image restoration. The new finding isn't vetted yet, so keeping this offsite to avoid OR territory. It has something to do with the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. If that's your area of interest, please contact me. DurovaCharge! 06:38, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism

Is it possable to block 203.97.220.19 all of his edits have been vandalism mainly in MILHIST ben (talk) 07:24, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

No, not now, I'm afraid. It's an IP address (and therefore perhaps used by different people) and the last vandalism was days ago. For the quickest response, the best place to report vandalism, while it's happening, is it at WP:AIV.  Roger Davies talk 08:32, 28 June 2009 (UTC)
I've watch listed their talk page and will block them if they get further warnings, but as Roger says it's too late to implement a block now and WP:AIV is the best way to get a quick response. Nick-D (talk) 09:50, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

Comments needed on structure of firearm articles

I need some assistance at the MP5 and SG 550 articles - these articles contain extremely long, rambling "design details" sections with no subheaders, and are prohibitively confusing and unapproachable for the average reader. I have been attempting to implement subsections for better organization of these pages but a single user seems to have determined that adding subsections ruins the article and makes it disorganized and he is reverting my edits.

I have been struggling to get feedback and support for article changes but not getting any responses on either side. Please look at those pages and their talk pages (discussion at the bottom). You can view sandbox versions of the articles in which I've implemented the structure I feel is appropriate at User:Some guy/MP5 and User:Some guy/SG 550. Thank you. Some guy (talk) 21:40, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

As a casual reader of such articles I'd say you're definitely right to make the changes to them that you are making. There is way to much detail to wade through and not enough breaking up into easy manageable chunks. I know a little bit about guns and I find it hard work, I can't imagine how difficult the articles would be for someone with absolutely no idea about them. The infobox for MP5 is so big as to be unreadable! Isnm't there anyway to break that down a bit as well? Ranger Steve (talk) 09:35, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
I agree with Ranger Steve on this. I have a limited understanding of the way in which weapons work and practical experience with technical aspects from using weapons in the army, however, I also had trouble understanding the MP5 article before it was tweaked by Some guy. I believe that the edits that Some guy made to it were helpful and improved the article (I haven't looked at SG 550 yet). I think in writing weapons articles the audience has to be kept in mind. Without having anything to back this up, I'd hazard to guess that the majority of people reading Wikipedia weapons articles have no or only very limited practical knowledge of most of the weapons systems discussed. Agree also on the point about the infobox. Perhaps the solution might be a specifications table in the article itself, where all the variants are listed with their various charactistics, and keeping only limited information in the infobox on the side. Just a suggestion (and one that hasn't been fully thought through). It would probably need consensus to have this added. — AustralianRupert (talk) 01:53, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
Thank you very much for your feedback! I am unfortunately facing an editing crisis where two different users are reverting my attempts to structure many articles, with little-to-no discussion and using weak justification such as "muddying the waters" and "arbitrary". Please look at Steyr AUG, which has one of the worst design details sections, and M1 Garand which has a disasterously long history section. Your opinions at Talk:Heckler & Koch MP5 and Talk:SIG SG 550 are needed and would be greatly appreciated. Some guy (talk) 04:03, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

????

What does it mean when a bot adds   after a link? ben (talk) 04:09, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

  • & n b s p ; is a code for non-breaking spaces; essentially, the bot is keeping a phrase togather by adding this between to words so that the computer servers will treat the phrase as one word and not break part the phrase on the basis of lines. 75.31.185.160 (talk) 05:03, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Fall of Saigon: What is a belligerent?

One user is trying to quote some legal stuff to say that the US was a belligerent. Personally, I do not consider an evacuation by an army that is not doing the shooting/bombing to be combat/belligerence. Opinions please YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 07:55, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I just reverted its inclusion and commented on the article's talk page. Nick-D (talk) 09:05, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
I don't think the U.S during the Fall of Saigon was a belligerent. By then the U.S was more concentrated in evacuating the remaining soldiers and personnel out of South Vietnam than actually protect a city that is being overrun by enemy soldiers.--Coffeekid (talk) 23:28, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
He reverted again. That's 4-1 now YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 00:58, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
WP:AN/3RR beckons! ;-) Kirill [talk] [pf] 01:05, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
No need to go there; I just blocked the account for 24 hours. He's been edit-warring for several days now and has so far refused to discuss anything except by edit-summary. That is totally inexcusable behavior, especially for a user who's been around since Sept. 2008. Hopefully this will give him the wake-up call he sorely needs. Parsecboy (talk) 01:31, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Double Images

I've copied this discussion here because I haven't had a single response at the village pump, and seeing as it's military someone here might be able to advise. I've noticed there a 2 versions of the same image floating around. One is here and the other here. From the research I'm doing I'm fairly sure the second (ie. British caption) image is correct, and this would seem to back it up. Unfortunately the first (ie. Polish) version is linked to a few pages. Is there an appropriate forum to discuss this sort of issue, or is it a case of bringing it up on all the article's talk pages? And how do you go about getting a pic deleted?

Cheers in advance for any advice, Ranger Steve (talk) 09:07, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the photo's record on the Imperial War Museum's database is pretty conclusive. This should be discussed on the talk pages of the article's where its claimed that they're Polish troops, however. As both images are on WikiCommons you should seek the 'Polish' photo's deletion there (or possibly a redirection to the correctly captioned, and higher quality, photo if Commons does that) via the 'nominate for deletion' link on the left of the image's record there. Nick-D (talk) 10:02, 29 June 2009 (UTC)
A reply within the hour - much quicker than the pump! Cheers Nick, I'll get onto it. Ranger Steve (talk) 10:20, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Operation Badr (1973) now open

The peer review for Operation Badr (1973) is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:42, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for First Battle of Charleston Harbor now open

The peer review for First Battle of Charleston Harbor is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:12, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for Kaiser class battleship now open

The A-Class review for Kaiser class battleship is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:13, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Belligerents

Hi folks. I hope I'm in the best place to ask this question. I figured this place would be setting the standard for military articles so it seemed a good start. If not please redirect me. I have a query about an inclusion in the infobox at the Battle of Arnhem; its the Dutch Waffen SS in Belligerents. I added it to the infobox as I think it follows the guidelines on the Template:Infobox Military Conflict page - that is:

This is most commonly the countries whose forces took part in the conflict; however, larger groups (such as alliances or international organizations) or smaller ones (such as particular units, formations, or groups) may be indicated if doing so improves reader understanding.

However, I realise that it's probably gonna attract some interest, hence my raising it here sooner rather than later. My thought is that this is a genuinely interesting example of Dutch nationals resisting the Allies in their own country, and a reminder that Nazi Germany wasn't a belligerent made up entirely of German nationals. It's a little bit more than the usual attached nationalities that would be found in a large conflict too. For instance, there was a 12 man Dutch commando unit attached to the British forces at the battle, but that seems too small a unit to list - in the Axis example both Dutch formations were battalions - fairly sizeable units. I do realise though that technically the 2 units were allied to Germany's armed forces and most of the high level officers will have been Germans, but one was not officially part of the Waffen SS and may not have technically been part of the Wehrmacht either. I'm not really sure what their official legal status would have been, but they don't seem to fit into the nationality listed directly above them (that link takes you here, where the map doesn't include the Netherlands).

So, that's my quandary. I'm happy to take it out if there's a consensus not to include it but I thought this might be a question worth posing to some people who have probably seen it all in infoboxes!

I've just finished the bulk of the article itself as well and I'd welcome any comments on how to improve it further. Cheers, Ranger Steve (talk) 13:46, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

In my experience we don't normally include minor combatants in the infobox unless they play a significant part in the battle. For example, even though Soult's Polish lancers pretty much destroyed a British brigade at the Battle of Albuera, they don't appear in the infobox; on the other hand, the Polish defence of Hill 262 during the battle of the Falaise pocket was significant to the battle's outcome and merits an infobox mention. As far as I'm aware the Dutch Waffen SS didn't play any significant part at Arnhem, so I'm not sure they should be in the infobox (though obviously there's always room for debate!) EyeSerenetalk 19:39, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
That's an interesting example Eyeserene, thanks. The Dutch contribution to the battle obviously wasn't as great as the German input. One battalion (which had 6 companies I believe) was heavily engaged at an LZ and severely disrupted the arrival of the 4th Parachute Brigade before being routed themselves. The other battalion was involved in the blocking line established south of the river to prevent the Poles reaching the Arnhem road bridge. They became engaged from 21-25 September. One might make an argument that the engagement at 4th Brigade's landing was important, but I accept it might be a bit tenuous.
That being said though, their contribution to the battle was definitely greater than the Canadians (not that I'm saying their contribution wasn't important, but they were only involved for one night of the final day), who I included based on the infobox and talkpage at Operation Market Garden. You could probably argue against the Dutch Resistance's inclusion there as well...
At the risk of ruffling a few feathers, I'd say I can see arguments for the Poles being included in the Battle of Albuera infobox, but based on the reader understanding side rather than quality/quantity of contribution. I'd have thought the fact the Poles were involved could be neatly summarised in the infobox rather than trawling the article - especially seeing as there is one in the image, but no indication of his loyalty in the belligerents. (I do accept the Marshal disarming him is listed in the commanders box, but that just seems a bit... murkier if you take my meaning. It's not quite as clear as if the nation was listed.) Just my 2 pence. Ranger Steve (talk) 10:01, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
We open lots of cans of worms as soon as we start recognising minor contributions, especially of national contingents within national or multi-national armies. It quickly gets ourt of proportion and over-emphasises the minority contribution. Hardly an army through history has not had contingents from other countries, integrated to greater or lesser degrees. Often the soldiers' nationalities don't match the nationality of the unit to which they belong. The fact that there were Polish lancers in the French army doesn't mean it is no longer a French army in the ordinary sense of the term - and many of them would not have been Polish. A case in point is Peninsular war where someone has regularly been adding a Polish flag icon and a Polish officer who was no more than a brigade commander in the infobox. Cyclopaedic (talk) 14:18, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
I think this is a very important point: I've always taken the belligerents section of the infobox to be a place to describe the nations that contested the engagement: i.e. the national interests that were represented by their soldiers, rather than the point of origin of the soldiers themselves. Another example is the presence of Gurkha soldiers in British Army that fought in the Falklands War, yet I don't think that anyone would seriously suggest that Nepal be included as a belligerent in that infobox. However at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle the Indian forces engaged were not part of the British Army but part of the British Indian Army and thus represented a different government that should be included in the infobox in that instance. In this particular case, the Dutch SS soldiers were (please correct me if I am wrong) in the employ of the German government and thus were representing German interests, not Dutch national ones, while the Poles in Normandy were representing their government in exile and should be included seperately in that particular infobox.--Jackyd101 (talk) 17:05, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
I don't think there is an easy or right answer, except to fall back on WP principles of general usage and treatment in academic writing. The Indian Army example illustrates the difficulty: it was officered entirely by British officers, was completely integrated in the British chain of command, and Indian Army officers could be promoted to higher ranks in the British army. British units would form part of nominally Indian divisions, and an army including Indian divisions would still have been regarded at the time as a British army. It was not commanded by an Indian government, but came directly under British command. that is not to diminsh the huge contributions and sacrifices of Indian soldiers, but it was not a separate power. But then nor were the Poles in Normandy or at Arnhem - they were Polish nationals organised into separate units of the British army. I don't know the answer - there must come a point at which it woud be churlish and offensive not to recognise the contribution of a particular nation, but it has to stop somewhere. Otherwise for Waterloo we would have flag icons for a dozen German states in Wellington's army alone - and would Brunswick count, but not the King's German Legion who were part of the British army? I have noticed a WP tendency for British armies of WW1 and WW2 to be renamed as "Empire" or "Commonwealth" for similar reasons, in defiance of both contemporary nomenclature and common usage. I think at least an element of independent command and freedom of action is required before national commanders and armies are recognised in infobox summaries. It is much easier to give a balanced picture in the text with appropraite weighting. Cyclopaedic (talk) 20:24, 26 June 2009 (UTC)
I agree with your summary at the end, but I don't think you are correct in your comments about the Indian or Polish forces - although both were integrated within the command structure of the British Army neither was actually part of the British Army, any more than the First Australian Imperial Force or Canadian Expeditionary Force were.--Jackyd101 (talk) 10:59, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree there probably isn't an easy answer to this, sorry for raising it! I do like Cyclopaedic's summary as well, although I fear that might mean that it would be neccesary to remove the Canadians from the Allied side. They were attached to XXX Corps and fully under their command when they made their contribution. Jackyd also has a point, but I've got to admit (with the greatest of respect) I prefer to think of nations as the nationality of the people, not necessarily the ideal they subscribe to. There might be the danger that national interests, rather than nations, could see a return to the idea of Commonwealth rather than individual commonwealth countries. I seem to recall various talkpage discussions a few years ago about that and I have no desire to open that can of worms again! But on reflection, there is a subtle difference. Commonwealth countries had independent governments, but the Dutch didn't (I believe they were governed by an occupying party or something along those lines, but I admit to not knowing a huge amount about this).

Saying that I've noticed that Template:Infobox Military Conflict now refers to combatants rather than belligerents. This might change things! Ranger Steve (talk) 18:43, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

I know it's conflict on a slightly different scale, but how about something along the lines of the Albanians in the infobox here? There are a few links to Dutch contribution to the Axis that could be used. I'd like to get a consensus, mainly because there are a load of articles I'd like to start on in time about the fighting on this front that involved Dutch SS regiments more significantly than German ones (as far as I can tell at the moment). I just think its fair to recognise the contribution of a body of men (almost as numerous in number as the Polish at Arnhem) I guess. Maybe a dedicated article on the Dutch Axis participation would help? Ranger Steve (talk) 18:00, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
That doesn't seem unreasonable, although I really do think we need to be careful about opening the door wider for endless edit-warring over every minor contribution (which, let's face it, is an old and ongoing problem in some areas). The infobox is meant to be nothing more than an at-a-glance overview; the detail should be in the article text. However, if you really feel you can justify its inclusion, be bold ;) EyeSerenetalk 18:43, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Imperial War Museum Images

Could someone tell me exactly how to upload an image with this tag? I've gotta confess I can't see how to do it, despite some serious searching and a request at Media Copyright Questions, and I don't wanna get it deleted. All I see on the upload screen is US Gov tags and nothing else that lets me attach this. See here for an idea of what I wanna achieve. Cheers Ranger Steve (talk) 18:22, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I got confused the first time. Select the 'Other' option at the Upload screen, add the PDBritishGov tag in the 'Permissions' section and add the relevent photographer etc info in the other fields, then upload it. Skinny87 (talk) 18:41, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
Sweet! Thank-you Skinny Ranger Steve (talk) 19:11, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Talk:USS Goldsborough (DDG-20)

Fine, here's you're clear up, since you couldn't simply click the link in the banner to take you to the correct section called "Other media". After all, it's the only one with my signature, isn't it? Crash Underride 15:08, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

That's not a very helpful attitude to take, Underride. I've already commented as believing it isn't needed for the article. Skinny87 (talk) 15:29, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
User:Skinny87, I didn't put it there for you. It's for User:Nick-D. See my talk page as to why. Besides, you're one person out of two projects I brought it up with. Crash Underride 16:29, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Are subsections in firearms articles okay?

I have been advised to create a new section for this and keep it as short and sweet as possible. Is it okay to put subsections in firearms articles? For example breaking up large history or design sections with subsections. Is consensus needed for this? Some guy (talk) 23:10, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I don't see why not. Adding subsections is a routine editorial decision—lengthy sections should be subdivided if doing so makes the article more readable—and there's no reason why this would apply to articles on firearms any less than it does to articles on any other topic. Kirill [talk] [pf] 01:29, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
I really have to object on principle here. Isn't there already a topic above? Why are you starting the same topic again on the same talk page? --Nukes4Tots (talk) 16:42, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
As I said, [2] someone suggested it. Please stop criticising me and focus on the relevant discussion. Some guy (talk) 16:59, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Look, I have no dog in this particular fight, but you can't just go and make sweeping changes to article layouts without first announcing your intention to do so on the talk page (and, if it's an Important Article, here as well) and then leaving it there for a week or two to give people a chance to comment or make suggestions. Especially when you're not a "recognised", regular WP:MILHIST editor, and even for the "regulars", it's still considered a good idea to let everyone know what you're planning to do, to avoid revert wars and general unpleasantness. Commander Zulu (talk) 01:11, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Where does it say I can't do that? I have never in my years of editing been faced with a battle over inserting subsections. I have never before this situation heard the suggestion that project-wide consensus is necessary to add a few subsections to anything. I can't even remember any time I've ever added a subsection and had it reverted; there are basic things you are allowed to do on Wikipedia, as Kirill said it's routine and there's no reason it should apply differently here. Nobody owns the articles. I am not going to continue this discussion here as we have already had that discussion as far as it would go, which is nowhere, so we are currently establishing a new consensus, and we hope you will participate in the process. Some guy (talk) 01:31, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Guys, I think we've just about exhausted the possibilities of this particular approach. How about everyone agrees to forgive and forget any unpleasantries that have already occurred, and all of us focus on the substantive discussion above? Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:14, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Loads of PD-1923 Civil War images

Turns out there are lots of high quality Civil War images that are definitely published before 1923 at Archives.org, definite {{PD-US}}.

Enjoy! Jappalang (talk) 13:03, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Byzantine civil war of 1341–1347 now open

The peer review for Byzantine civil war of 1341–1347 is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 14:01, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Tucker class destroyer turbines

Hello

I am translating some GA from en to pl.wiki and have problem with turbine of Tucker class destroyers. When i was translating USS Porter (DD-59) i was asked USER:Bellhalla about turbines in that class: in infobox it was information that he has only 2 turbines, and in text it was information that he has 2 turbines for full speed and 1 for cruise speed (something like COSOS :) ). I was ask Bellhalla, and he change information about that turbine - but only in Porter. I am now translating Conyngham and i want also take others of this series of 7 GA.

I was ask another time Bellhalla, but it was 1,5 week ago and he don`t write anything (he do lots of edits and even aserw to somebody else in his discussion so he ignored me/don`t see me). So - anyone knows that rest of this destroyers has 2 or 3 turbines ? Because the same error is in so many GA i think is problem.

PMG (talk) 16:19, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

According to Conway's All The World's Fighting Ships 1906-1921, DD57-57 and 61-62 had a single cruising turbine clutched to one shaft, together with 2-shaft Curtiss turbines with four Yarrow boilers as main engines. DD-60 had a geared turbine installation, presumably without the cruising engine.Nigel Ish (talk) 16:29, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

FAR for A. E. J. Collins

I have nominated A. E. J. Collins 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 "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here.Cirt (talk) 13:59, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

General, Admiral, etc.

I just checked out General and Admiral. It really struck me that both articles were about the formal rank, not about the job of being a general or admiral -- which I, at least, would find a much more interesting topic.Steve Dufour (talk) 18:15, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Same ship, different names - one article or two?

I proposed that USS Langley (CVL-27) be merged with La Fayette (R96), since both articles are about the same ship, under two different navies, under different names. The Segelschlachtschiff Horst Wessel does not have its own article, but is covered in the USCGC Eagle (WIX-327) article. The same is true with respect to SS France (1961)/SS Norway (I know this is a civilian ship) and USCGC Staten Island (WAGB-278)/USS Staten Island (AGB-5). I have seen other examples, but can't find them at the moment. --rogerd (talk) 22:19, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Discussion at WP:SHIPS would be more appropriate, and they have discussed this very issue many times before, but the general rule is that each name gets its own article if the ship served under that name for a certain amount of time, what the arbitrary number is escapes me at the moment. -MBK004 22:33, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Neil Armstrong GAR notice

Neil Armstrong has been nominated for a good article reassessment. Please leave your comments and help us to return the article to good article quality. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status will be removed from the article. Reviewers' concerns are here.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 03:58, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

GA reassessment of Dixie Mission

I have conducted a reassessment of this article and found several unreferenced statements which need addressing. Details at Talk:Dixie Mission/GA1. The reassessment is on hold for seven days after which it may be delisted if it does not meet the GA criteria. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 16:51, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

U.S. 7th Infantry Division Good Topic Candidate - Feedback request

Hi, it would be good to get more opinions at the U.S. 7th Infantry Division good topic candidacy. This nomination has been open for over a month, but with only 2 (conflicting) votes, I do not feel there are enough opinions yet. Thanks - rst20xx (talk) 22:41, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

FAR

I have nominated Algerian Civil War 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 "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here.YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 02:46, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

IJA maps posted online

Tohoku University has posted about 6,000 old Imperial Japanese Army topographic maps of east and south Asia on line here. I thought that pre-WWII images in Japan were public domain, but the site states that the University retains the copyrights. The university says, however, that the maps may be used for educational purposes. I'm not sure if these are of use in Wikipedia, but wanted to bring it to the project's attention just in case. I'll also try to post notice of this at Commons. Cla68 (talk) 08:34, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

That's excellent. I'm a bit surprised that the university is claiming copyright though - it may be worth raising this on one the the appropriate help pages here or at Commons. From my skimming, it looks like a lot of the maps of the Netherlands East Indies are Japanese reproductions of Dutch maps... Nick-D (talk) 08:53, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
If the disclaimer prohibits commercial use, then the images can't be uploaded here, I think, since the GDFL permits any use, including commercially. I doubt the maps would qualify for fair use either. I will say that the claims from the university that it holds the copyrights smacks of copyfraud to me. Parsecboy (talk) 22:51, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Battle of Bosworth Field at FAC

Bastards! Murder! Incest! Betrayal!!! All at Battle of Bosworth Field (well... in varying degrees). Come take a read and put down your suggestions and criticisms, or best, your support, at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Battle of Bosworth Field/archive1. Thank you in advance. Jappalang (talk) 08:46, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Alaska Lt. Gov.

I just wanted to bring your attention to Craig Campbell, a lieutenant general in the Alaska National Guard and a major general in the U.S. National Guard, who will become the lieutenant governor of Alaska on July 26. Is there a precedent in modern U.S. history? JKBrooks85 (talk) 10:08, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Rather large good faith copyvio problem

As a byproduct of looking at the activities of a now blocked user, I discovered that most of The Rough Wooing is copyvio. I removed some of the copyvio material, stopping when I discovered that the editor who had added it was the author of the copyrighted works, Raymond Campbell Paterson. I was able to contact Paterson by email. He clearly had not realised the implications of his edits and regrets any problems he has caused, but he says that he cannot release the copyright. This leaves a pretty daunting task of both removing the copyright material and rescuing the articles involved. Paterson created 27 articles, 3 of which are redirects [3] and worked on a number of other articles.

Books and an article by Paterson can be found here: [4] and searchable versions of them all are on Amazon [5].

We need to do this systematically, dividing up the work in some way. Some of these are covered by other projects, eg Scotland in the Late Middle Ages is covered by the projects Medieval Scotland, Scotland and Middle Ages. I am hoping that there are people here who can assist (I noticed a couple of names on his talk page I recognised) and/or point me elsewhere. Although this isn't my field, since I'm the one who opened this can of worms I'll try to do my share of the work of course. Thanks. Dougweller (talk) 17:19, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Do you know if he is the actual owner of the copyright(s) or if they belong to someone else? If he is the owner, then I believe he has inadvertently released his work under the older GNU documentation license and therefore it wouldn't be a copyvio any longer, right?
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 17:38, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, I think that would depend on if the work he put on Wikipedia was published elsewhere first (which would then have established a copyright that couldn't be overwritten by posting the text here). If it was previously unpublished, then it is most definitely in the GDFL. Parsecboy (talk) 17:52, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Definitely previously published at least for some, but in any case the copyright says no reproduction without the permission of the publishers. Dougweller (talk) 18:22, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
The things that were already published before they were published here definitely need to go. Those of which we are unsure should probably go as well, to be on the safe side, unless Mr. Paterson confirms that they were unpublished before he posted them here. Unfortunately for Mr. Paterson, if any of his work was unpublished when he added it here, he has inadvertently relinquished control of it. Parsecboy (talk) 18:27, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Looking at the dates on the Amazon link I added above, they were all published before he edited. Dougweller (talk) 18:50, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

←Just wanted to add that Paterson's communication (which can't be reproduced for privacy & legal reasons) makes clear that his publishers have an interest in the copyright that he is not in position to release. I make use of a program provided by User:Dcoetzee that simplifies contribution checks by a contributor by clustering them under articles, prioritized by contribution size. I think I should run this program and generate a list to help us see how extensive an issue this may be. You guys were a great help with User:GrahamBould; I'm sorry to see your project hit up by extensive issues again. :/ --Moonriddengirl (talk) 11:57, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Project prepared; need to generate an approach

Okay. The contributions have been gathered as immediately above and are listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Copyright Cleanup/Rcpaterson, with fourteen subsections. Earlier subsections are smaller as contributions are more extensive. Experience tells me this works best if contributors to the cleanup of this choose sections and take responsibility for evaluating and addressing concerns as necessary. The question: what's necessary? Are we to remove all contributions by Rcpaterson that are taken from his own publications? What about those that use other sources or no sources at all? If the contribution is brief, should we turn it into a quotation per WP:NFC? Once we determine an approach, I'll construct a "template" to go on the talk pages of articles that have material removed. We won't want to embarrass Mr. Paterson, but we will want to guard against future contributors restoring this text. What say you, good people? How should we proceed? :) (Please, please pitch in if you can. The more who help out, the quicker we can address this and move on.) --Moonriddengirl (talk) 13:14, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Please pitch in. :) We need a good approach for handling this. Some of the articles listed are not related to your project, but most of them are. Obviously, we would like to address the matter with as little collateral damage to the articles as possible. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 15:53, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Just to update, the work on this is ongoing, as Berean Hunter has already put an impressive dent in this! There are linked searchable versions of the books. Instructions are at the subpage. I've not yet crafted a "template" for the talk page (and don't have time right now, alas), but so far nothing has had to be removed. More contributors to the cleanup task very welcome! --Moonriddengirl (talk) 21:13, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Disruptive behaviour with respect to Indian military capabilities.

Probably for an informed admin to review. There is ongoing bickering between User:Chanakyathegreat and User:By78 about Indian military capability. I have a view about positioning here but it's going on for a hel of a long time, over a wide range of articles and is probably more disruptive than productive.

ALR (talk) 18:22, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Please provide some diff's (or at least some article titles) for us to review. Thanx. --Richard (talk) 18:34, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Well there is HAL HJT-36 , Submarine-launched ballistic missile, Passive electronically scanned array, Guided missile destroyer, Vertical launching system, Car Nicobar class fast attack craft for starters. Some of these individually are getting close to 3RR - taken together they definately seem to be edit warring.Nigel Ish (talk) 19:12, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Best bet is to look through their contrib histories, it's pretty clear from there.
ALR (talk) 19:29, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
I'd get involved and assist with the dispute, but I'm off to Europe in 22 hours so I won't be able to stick around and see it through to the end. Cam (Chat) 20:45, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
  • By78 blocked for 24 hours (first EW offence); Chanakyathegreat blocked for 6 months as a long-term edit-warrior with an enviable history (it wasn't indef only because I'm feeling charitable). Hope this helps. EyeSerenetalk 21:24, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
That seems the most appropriate response. fwiw I've had issues with Chanakyathegreat POV pushing in a number of articles before.
ALR (talk) 09:05, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Indeed. We may need to be vigilant for socking given the length of the block, but I hope that a low-tolerance approach to disruption will eventually encourage more editors to get involved in the Indian/Pakistani milhist area. EyeSerenetalk 13:02, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Notable Royal Navy Officers of the Napoleonic Wars

I'd like to get some feedback on the advisability or otherwise of this new (list?) article - Notable Royal Navy Officers of the Napoleonic Wars. Created by User:DAFMM, who's grasp of wiki policy can be shaky at times, but who has a genuine interest in the subject. My understanding is that categories are preferred for this type of grouping of personnel by conflict (and we have categories for RN personnel of the Napoleonic wars). There's a whole lot of cleaning up to be done if it is kept, but I'm reluctant to take it on because if there's an underlying understanding that these lists are best kept off wikipedia, it should be taken to afd instead. Benea (talk) 20:47, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not really sure, to be honest. The list has a value over and above a category, because it attempts to summarise why the officers listed are notable, but the content is unsourced. The inclusion criteria are specific and limited (and if sources were included, perhaps "notable" would be justified). My personal feeling is that it's doing no harm and has some value, but I don't know what others think? EyeSerenetalk 17:05, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
I'd value a little more 'so what' info to be honest, otherwise it does feel rather more like a category/list. But yes, generally useful. Hchc2009 (talk) 18:45, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Would it help if the article specifically stated in its title that it's a list? EyeSerenetalk 18:58, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Partner peer review for Computer Bismarck now open

The peer review for Computer Bismarck, an article within the scope of the Video games WikiProject, is now open. The Video games WikiProject is currently partnering with our project to share peer reviews, so all editors are cordially invited to participate, and any input there would be very appreciated! Thanks! (Guyinblack25 talk 21:08, 7 July 2009 (UTC))

PS- I, unfortunately, have not played the game. I'm hoping an editor here might have, and maybe even has the instruction manual. :-D Here's hoping. (Guyinblack25 talk 21:08, 7 July 2009 (UTC))

General/Admiral Stars rank articles

I need some help, I've got a persistent editor who does not understand that there needs to be discussion before making massive changes to these articles. He claims that he does not need consensus since the articles are so blatantly wrong and US-centric. It appears as though this editor is composing his own article and is redirecting established articles into his new one without preserving the content of the existing articles or even discussing it with the editors of the established articles. I'm getting to the point where 3RR and or blocking will be necessary, and since I'm involved, there is a problem. See this: User_talk:Mesoso2#General.27s_Stars and this: Special:Contributions/Mesoso2. Generals' Stars is the new article, and he is trying to redirect 5 star rank, 4 star rank, 3 star rank, 2 star rank, 1 star rank, and other articles. -MBK004 21:34, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I'd have an article that covered the whole topic of stars for rank before thinking about having several individual articles. His target article though is very badly named. As you pointed out on his talk page turning an article into a redirect is implicitly not allowed - which may be part of the problem, that and the user being bold. GraemeLeggett (talk) 22:37, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
I was under the impression that the rank articles were not generated as one big list so that we could explicitly expand upon the roles of the officers in there respective countries - obviously, a general and an admrial will do more or less the same thing regardless of which country they are in, but I felt and continue to feel that the individual articles allow us to go in to more detail for the ranks as they pertain to there countries of origin. TomStar81 (Talk) 23:23, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Addendum: Apparently the user in question create his or her current account after being unable to access the original account, Mesoso (talk · contribs). According to the content of the talk page messages there this users seems to have made a few iffy edits in the past, but what got my attention was an edit concerning possible sockpuppeting. I am not saying that our current users is abusing accounts, but perhaps we need a more thorough investigation here of the edit activity of both to determine if anything odd is going on. TomStar81 (Talk) 23:28, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
This is a bit embarrassing but i forgot the password to my first account. That is the reason for the change. Given that i stated this was the same user and that i gave the second account a nearly identical name, i don't see any problem. Anyway i am happy with any investigation of sockpuppeting, if you are concerned, there has been no problem with that. Mesoso2 (talk) 11:18, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
I have no problems with articles on individual ranks and on rank detail for individual nations/services. The 5 star rank article at the moment is more of a half-hearted attempt at a list of 5 star ranks with pictures listing only UK, Australia, US and India.GraemeLeggett (talk) 08:14, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

He is not restricting his opinions to Generals. Since 21 June 2009:

These have subsequently been reverted by other editors:

These were changed because i believed there to be no sources. That was legitimate editing. As soon as another editor pointed out the sources in a revert, i did not pursue the matter. So i am happy with the edits (except my unfortunately not seeing the sources in the first place, which was a silly mistake on my part.) Mesoso2 (talk) 11:21, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

These probably should be reverted:

These should be examined by somebody with knowledge of the subject matter:

Pdfpdf (talk) 07:52, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

His contribution to British Armed Forces was adding a newline break. His work on infantry is fine. GraemeLeggett (talk) 08:14, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

←An additional look from uninvolved editors might be warranted, it seems as though User:Mesoso2 is going down the same road that those of us who are aware of the fiasco with User:Middim13. -MBK004 18:10, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

As far as i can see, you are referring to a sock puppet editor. This is an irritating allegation so i would like it investigated. A sock puppet is an alternative account used for fraudulent, disruptive, or otherwise deceptive purposes that violate or circumvent enforcement of Wikipedia policies. Please be explicit in what you are suggesting i have done. Mesoso2 (talk) 11:26, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
While admittedly I haven't investigated this too much, having articles on each rank individually seems far preferable for me. That way, we can better expand on the specific things about each rank in different countries. Having one article for general officers with a summary linking to sub-articles on the ranks seems fine, but those should be full-fledged articles, not just redirects. Joe N's alt account 22:25, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

North Vietnamese/Vietnamese formations

We currently have no articles on these, though VietWiki has some. Thus we've got Seventh Division (South Vietnam) for the South Vietnamese, but have the problem that the country name changed for the N VN units. Yet the army name didn't: People's Army of Vietnam. Thus I propose to go with 308th Division (PAVN) and suchlike. Any comments/disagreement? Buckshot06(prof) 17:57, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

That's fine with me. We are desperately short of anything on Vietnamese military history, despite the raw numbers. Nothing decent on the armies/units, apart from RM Gillespie's marvellous A class articles, most are about military politics, and apart from VN War, very weak. YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 05:20, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
That also looks good to me. I agree that the lack of articles on Vietnamese military history is a problem - I was amazed to see articles on the ARVN divisions which fought during the Vietnam War in the list of new military history articles only a few weeks ago! (though it is great that they've been created). Nick-D (talk) 09:03, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
I just created them out of a map in a VN War Encyclopedia. Again, most books only say what the Americans did except to bag the usual corrupt ARVN generals while ignoring the good ones like Ngo Quang Truong, especially as most writers are obsessed with the politics of the war. I guess reprocessing stuff from RM gillespie's articles is the most efficient way to get started at the moment. There is a 1500 page bilingual book on the ARVn Marine Corps, but, as nobody was interested in them, it was written by the ARVN MC officers themselves, and it is more like a celebratory yearbook than a proper book so it isn't really usable. The most shocking thing is that the ARVN MILHIST pages tower far above the other SE Asian MILHIST articles and Vietnam has the strongest superpower wiki-armed forces, so to speak, among A/SE Asia. The subcontinental ones are just appalling and mostly nationalist soapbozes... YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 13:24, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
OK. Change of title. I'm now going to go for 308 Division (Vietnam) etc, as ordinal -ths etc never seem to be added in period references. Buckshot06(prof) 14:49, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
OK (II). 308's created. Help with 304 Division (Vietnam) can be volunteered here! Buckshot06(prof) 18:47, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Service history for battleships

At USS Wisconsin (BB-64) a "service history" header has been added, but I was under the impression that since the FAC people had commented that the entire article was essentially service history our standard practice was to remove these headers from the article altogether. None of the Iowa class battleship articles, nor Texas, Nevada, or Connecticut have these. Has something changed? TomStar81 (Talk) 21:04, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Nope, I would still go with not including it in an article, the same way I remove "biography" section headers in articles about people. As you say, the article is service history. This is personal opinion though and I don't think it is codified anywhere. Regards, Woody (talk) 21:26, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Welcome back Woody! :) As to the headers, I also agree they should not be there, but it seems that they have been added in many of the U.S. battleship articles (Connecticut and Nevada didn't have them because I reverted/removed...) —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 21:40, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
I find it extremely disingenuous and extremely difficult to assume good faith for Magus732 (talk · contribs) to add the header to all the US battleship articles and then claim that it belongs when reverted because it is extant in all of them. Also Tom, he did it to Texas as well as all US battleships except for the ones that have been reverted (Wisconsin, Nevada, and Connecticut). I agree with all of you that the articles do not require this header. We need to revert the addition on all US BBs and Magnus needs to learn to propose major changes that affect 70+ articles either here or at WP:SHIPS first before implementation. -MBK004 01:17, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
Okay, you want my reason for putting the service history under a separate header, here it is; the service history marks the beginning of the ship's use by the Navy, and is therefore an important event in the ship's life. Important campaigns, battles, accidents, and other such events are posted under separate headers, but for some reason, the beginning of the service history is not. It should be explicitly stated that the ship's Navy service started at a specific point, to separate it from the construction/shakedown phase of its career and to provide a chronological order that can be seen from near the top of the page, without a user unfamiliar with the ship's overall history having to scroll through the whole article searching for something. Because those unfamiliar with a specific ship make not known when its service started, it may lead them to assume that the ship went straight from construction to service, which is only partly true on account of the shakedown period prior to actual service. Magus732 (talk) 16:42, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
That why each ship article has a table, so people can see the commissioning and decommissioning dates which mark the start and end of a ships service with any given group. TomStar81 (Talk) 16:47, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
And to me "Service history" doesn't really seem a very good name for that anyway, as even if you don't include stuff after the ship was formally decommisioned, "serivce history" then covers the entire rest of the ship's naval career, which doesn't make a lot of sense when there'll be other headers after that, legally the ship is in service at tleast from when it's commissioned anywya, surely. If there's consensus that such a division is useful, and normally I wouldn't have thought that there's enough information about sea trials and so on that would make taht a long enough section to make any sense "Operational readiness", or "Beginning active operations" or soemthing like that would better get across the sense taht you seem to mean. David Underdown (talk) 16:52, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, I suppose that makes sense... it just seems like there should be something to tell people when a ship's service actually starts, rather than it being implied... Magus732 (talk) 17:03, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Article request - the "British Columbia Navy" - Subs CC1 & CC2

I'll cross-post this request to WP:Ships, but it may be more usefully done by a MILHIST naval specialist; CC1 and CC2 were Canada's first two submarines, and their first 48 hours in Canadian waters were as what has been dubbed as the "British Columbia Navy"; because BC constitutionally could not operate a military or itself own military vessels, ownership was transferred to the Royal Canadian Navy quickly; they went through a broker from their purchase at dockside in Seattle due to the US' neutrality....anyway here is one source and here is a google with other material; somewhere in the google may be an article a few years ago in one of the Vancouver papers, though it would probably reprise the Vancouver Maritime Museum article as I think it was writen by James Delgado, then curator of the museum.Skookum1 (talk) 18:03, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

And just to note one reason for the proposed title is that CC1 and CC2 would have much reason to exist as separate articles; not that I know of anyway.Skookum1 (talk) 18:04, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
Oh, they already exist as HMCS CC1 and HMCS CC2; I found this out by looking up HMCS Shearwater, which was their tender vessel; I still don't quite see a reason for their separate existence unless there are dimensional/technical differences; the HMCS CC2 article is an unref'd stub by the way, though CC1 is pretty meaty; there's more about the episode concerning hteir acquisition in various of the googled items. I'll redirect British Columbia Navy to HMCS CC1 as it's the more thorough of the two articles.Skookum1 (talk) 19:47, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Could someone review 2008 South Ossetia war?

Could someone please review 2008 South Ossetia war? Although some aspects (such as naming and POV) have been extensively debated, for other things it is almost impossible to get improvement suggestions on the article talk page. I'd be especially interested in hearing your opinions about the following points:

  • Is the article's structure clear or is it confusing?
  • Is the article written in a readable and interesting way?
  • Which chapters do you think should be shortened?
  • Are there some aspects of the war you would like to know more about?

Any opinions and improvement suggestions you could give would be useful. We could also use more editors, especially those who can write better English. Offliner (talk) 21:00, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

It might be worth submitting it to milhist's peer review, since that basically seems to be what you're asking for ;) Instructions are at the link. EyeSerenetalk 19:42, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Featured article candidacy for Edgar Towner now open

The featured article candidacy for Edgar Towner is now open. Comments from reviewers are needed to help determine whether the article meets the criteria for featured articles; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Abraham, B.S. (talk) 00:16, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Assessment and tagging backlogs

We currently have small backlogs at:

and a huge backlog at:

Any input from enthusiastic Wiki-Gnomes would be greatly appreciated.  Roger Davies talk 06:42, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I try to keep the cat for the no task force down to zero, but the incomplete B-Class checklist grows as much as I try to chip it down. I fear that only a coordinated effort (i.e. another assessment drive) will eliminate that backlog. -MBK004 14:43, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Pacific War infobox

There is currently a great deal of discussion over the contents of the infobox used in the Pacific War article. Editors who would like to comment on this are invited to do so at: Talk:Pacific War. Nick-D (talk) 08:33, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for Indian Air Force now open

The A-Class review for Indian Air Force is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Nick-D (talk) 01:42, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Neil Armstrong needs help

As we near the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11, the article on Neil Armstrong could use just a little work.

  1. Someone has tagged a few sentences "citation needed" - it would be great to get those cleaned-up.
  2. There seems to be a small discrepancy between Apollo 11 and Neil Armstrong concerning how much fuel the lunar lander had for landing.

Thanks for your help, JMG (talk) 07:34, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

Changes to popular pages lists

There are a few important changes to the popular pages system. A quick summary:

  • The "importance" ranking (for projects that use it) will be included in the lists along with assessment.
  • The default list size has been lowered to 500 entries (from 1000)
  • I've set up a project on the Toolserver for the popular pages - tools:~alexz/pop/.
    • This includes a page to view the results for projects, including the in-progress results from the current month. Currently this can only show the results from a single project in one month. Features to see multiple projects or multiple months may be added later.
    • This includes a new interface for making requests to add a new project to the list.
    • There is also a form to request a change to the configuration for a project. Currently the configurable options are the size of the on-wiki list and the project subpage used for the list.
  • The on-wiki list should be generated and posted in a more timely and consistent manner than before.
  • The data is now retained indefinitely.
  • The script used to generate the pages has changed. The output should be the same. Please report any apparent inconsistencies (see below).
  • Bugs and feature requests should be reported using the Toolserver's bug tracker for "alexz's tools" - [6]

-- Mr.Z-man 00:15, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Military career of L. Ron Hubbard

Military career of L. Ron Hubbard has recently achieved good article status and is now being considered for featured article status. Input from editors would be very welcome. The discussion is at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Military career of L. Ron Hubbard/archive1. -- ChrisO (talk) 00:56, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Military history of Australia during the Vietnam War now open

The peer review for Military history of Australia during the Vietnam War is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 03:46, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

Template needed

What is the code for the tag '[Not in citation given], anyone? Buckshot06(prof) 05:57, 11 July 2009 (UTC)

You want Template:Failed verification. Other templates concerning references are in Category:Citation and verifiability maintenance templates. JMG (talk) 07:39, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for that cat link! I didn't know about it, either. JKBrooks85 (talk) 11:21, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

The use of "Nazis"

I've come across a few articles - (not in the WPMilHist domain), that refers to military history with indiscriminate use of the term "Nazi". In this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tver#Later_history 30,000 Nazi soldiers and officers are eliminated. In the previous paragraph, 6000 polish soldiers are eliminated, not by the communists, as one would expect, but by the NKVD. This is just an example. The article on Smolensk does the same. The city is captured by "Nazis" - and liberated by nondescript persons or groups. I have a problem indiscriminately referring to all german troops as Nazis, just as you rarely see the Soviet troops or "Red Army" referred to as, "Communists" or "Commies". Wouldn't it me more correct to refer to the German army as exactly that - or "Wehrmacht" rather than Nazis (which is both incorrect and prejorative) just as we refer to the soviet troops as "The Red Army", as was it's name, or Soviet troops, (or in some cases Russian troops). While I'm sure, there were Nazis within the Wehrmacht, and lots of them, the German army was not a simple tool of the party. Just because a country has a certain political "color", doesn't mean that the armed forces are in agreement with said "color". The British troops aren't referred to as the "Imperialits" or "Tories", just because Churchill and most of the cabinet was just that, or the americans the "Capitalists" or "Liberals", just because FDR was a Democrat. Not unless you have an agenda.

What I'm trying to say is, is there any WPMilHist policy on these matters?--Nwinther (talk) 22:45, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the closest we have at the moment is WP:MILMOS#PRECISE; I vaguely recall this particular question brought up before, and I think that we were eventually moving towards having a guideline under WP:WWII concerning the use of "Nazi" specifically, but I don't think one was ever written. Kirill [talk] [pf] 23:22, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
Generally, I agree with the above that more precision is better when discussing German troops. Use of the word "Nazi" should really be limited to just the political party. I would caution against, however, believing that the majority of German troops were not politically motivated—read Hitler's Army by Omer Bartov, it's a good book on how the Wehrmacht quickly became highly politicized on the Eastern front. Parsecboy (talk) 23:26, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
Would'nt something like WP:NPOV be the article to look at?--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 23:29, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
You could probably make an argument about the term on "undue weight" grounds, but I think that would be over-complicating the issue. While it may be true that using the term is a violation of NPOV in some way, I think it's more immediately apparent that using the term is also a disservice to the reader due to the lack of precision. If that's agreed upon, I don't think there's any benefit to going down the path of arguing the neutrality aspect; we can simply use the more precise terminology. Kirill [talk] [pf] 23:35, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
Good point Kirill. — Preceding unsigned comment added by EnigmaMcmxc (talk • contribs) 23:45, 12 July 2009

U-boat campaign/Battle of Atlantic

There is currently a dispute over the naming of U-boat_Campaign_(World_War_I) which involves the articles name as well as its scope. Input at Talk:U-boat Campaign (World War I)#Article naming and scope would be most appreciated. Note there is some background reading at Talk:Battle of the Atlantic (1914–1918) which relates to this old version of the Battle of the Atlantic (1914–1918) which is now a redirect. Thanks and regards, Woody (talk) 08:59, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Other featured lists

I saw the news letter and I thought I would let you know that there where several other lists that also got featured late last month or early this month (Which will presumably be on the next newsletter).

  1. List of Jewish Medal of Honor recipients June 28
  2. List of African American Medal of Honor recipients July 1
  3. Commandant of the Marine Corps June 20
  4. Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps July 1

In addition to these Assistant Commandant of the Marine Corps is in review now and List of Medal of Honor recipients for World War I should be back in review in the next week or two. --Kumioko (talk) 00:17, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

I've updated the next issue of The Bugle accordingly. Thanks for mentioning it.  Roger Davies talk 05:52, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Incidentally, you can always update The Bugle yourself, using the "issue in production" link.  Roger Davies talk 06:07, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for letting me know I will make sure to do that as they get to featured status. --Kumioko (talk) 23:25, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

New articles page

The update from AlexNewArtBot for the 2009 new Milhist articles appears to have stopped and/or been removed. Can someone with expertise look into this? Regards Buckshot06(prof) 11:21, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Stanisław Koniecpolski FAR

I have nominated Stanisław Koniecpolski 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 "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not wikidrama) 14:54, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for John Lerew now open

The A-Class review for John Lerew is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Ian Rose (talk) 23:44, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Platine War now open

The peer review for Platine War is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:59, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Featured article candidacy for Adrian Cole (RAAF officer) now open

The featured article candidacy for Adrian Cole (RAAF officer) is now open. Comments from reviewers are needed to help determine whether the article meets the criteria for featured articles; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Ian Rose (talk) 04:40, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

FAR

I have nominated Triumph of the Will 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 "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 15:14, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Armed Forces of the Empire of Brazil now open

The peer review for Armed Forces of the Empire of Brazil is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 01:21, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Pigeons in aerial photography / Bavarian Pigeon Corps

Pigeons in aerial photography is a new article combining history of photography, military history and history of aviation. Members of this project might be interested in improving the second aspect, which is very important for the article but still quite sketchy:

  • In WW1 there were German experiments with aerial reconnaissance using pigeon cameras at Verdun. But we only have the inventor's word for this, plus some not too reliable more recent sources that give either no details at all or misunderstood details that properly refer to messenger pigeons.
  • Before WW2 the Germans seem to have developed the technique further, possibly at Munich (Bavaria). Again, almost no details are known, although we have two photos.
  • Before WW2 the French seem to have adopted the technique and developed it further. They claimed a technique for making trained dogs carry pigeons behind enemy lines and release them.
  • We don't know if this was just propaganda, or if pigeon photography was actually used in WW2.
  • A widely reported (in the US) "Bavarian Pigeon Corps" is virtually unknown in Germany. We don't know its German name. All the details attributed to it (dates, photographs) either refer to the early years of Julius Neubronner's invention when he still tried to interest the military, or are obvious nonsense. Best example so far: "Although balloons and kites were used during the Bavarian war in 1903, cameras were attached to pigeons." [7] It seems that the remote-sensing community really likes to make up history on the fly, including fictional wars. Nevertheless, it still seems possible to me that the relevant troops in WW1 were Bavarian, or that the term refers to some pre-WW2/WW2 unit. In the first case it would have been part of the Bavarian Army (although Neubronner was from Prussia).

Please help if you can, or just come over for an entertaining read. Hans Adler 11:48, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I got access to the libraries in Munich if you can pinpoint me to any works that contain information I'm glad to help. Wandalstouring (talk) 16:42, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
Great. Unfortunately I don't have a specific pointer to a book that's available in Munich. But perhaps you can ask your librarian if there is an archive of the Münchener Allgemeine Zeitung anywhere. A 1910 issue of this newspaper contains the only German article I know that talks about military applications, and the only one I know that is from Bavaria: Oesele (1910-09-10), "Militärluftschiffahrt und Brieftaubenphotographie", Münchener Allgemeine Zeitung (37): 699. [8]
Generally, the article's "Further reading" section currently consists exclusively of the most promising works that I can't access. I have listed many more under Talk:Pigeons in aerial photography#How you can help. If you go through this list with your library catalogue you might be able to get one or two sources, which would be a solid step forward.
If you have access to a searchable archive of any Munich newspaper from the 1930s (or earlier) that should also help. Look at the three Popular Mechanics / Popular Mechanix articles. My guess is that at least the last one is based on an article in a Munich paper (that does not necessarily talk about Munich).Hans Adler 19:06, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
Tangmere museum in SE England [9] has a "pigeon camera", cited as being from WWII, in its collection. I have no idea if its 100% genuine or not though! Hchc2009 (talk) 16:40, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
That's interesting. Have you seen it? I would like to know if it's similar to any of the other known models. So far I am aware of those depicted in the article, and another one in the CIA museum. Hans Adler 19:56, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
I saw it earlier in the year, but I didn't take a photo - I remembered it mainly because I was quite surprised to see such a thing! The guys who run the museum are really good though, and might well be able to send a photograph or something if you emailed them. Hchc2009 (talk) 17:44, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

1st Infantry Division (South Africa) during WW2

As I am fairly new at this, some advice would be appreciated! I have now completed writing an overview on the 1st Infantry Division (South Africa) and I would like to submit the article for review. I have written this because the history of this division (as with the 2nd South African Division) has never been well documented (as far as I know) as it was essentially an "unhappy division" which often attracted negative comment from its Allied Commanders and from those opposing the war in South Africa! The same applied to the 2nd South African Division which was captured at the surrender of Tobruk. As I would like to document the 2nd Division as well - I would prefer a review of this article before I start on anything new! Thanks. Farawayman (talk) 11:15, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

On the whole its a comprehensive article. There are a few stylistic issues which I have had a stab at addressing by example with my own edits. Nothing irreversible if opinion differs. GraemeLeggett (talk) 14:09, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

AustralianRupert's comments
Hi. Good effort so far. I found the article very interesting as I've not read much about South Africa's involvement in the Second World War. Well done. By the way, you can list the article for peer review by going to WP:MHPR and following the instructions there. I have had a bit of a look and done some basic Manual of Style work on the article (not finished). I have the following points:

    • You use XXhXX (e.g. 16h00) to denote 24 hours system of telling time, is this correct? I've never seen this used before, but of course this doesn't mean it is not correct. In the Australian Army we use XXXXh (e.g. 1600h). I changed one because I thought it was a typo, but then I saw others. I have left them as such, but I feel you should look into this and use whatever system is the more common one.  Done Used hhmm throughout. Farawayman (talk) 11:37, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
    • some dates use 'th' and others don't, I think MOS prefers not (e.g. 26th September or 26 September) Done Fixed by some wonderful automated bot!!! Farawayman (talk) 22:18, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
    • some bare internal links which appear as a large number, e.g. in Gazala section — it is a bare internal link to the wikipedia Gazala article. I think that the best way to link is to do so in text, not with a bare link. If you are using it as a citation, then it is not considered a 'reliable source' and shouldn't be used as a citation (perhaps perverse, but we don't consider Wikipedia a reliable source). E.g Erwin Rommel or [10]. The first one is preferred.
    • straight apostrophes instead of stylised ones
    • use of hyphens, should be replaced with either spaced endashes and unspaced emdashes (I prefer emdashes, but as the article already uses some space endashes I've tried to add where they are needed. I haven't got all of them yet, though). e.g. - should be either – or —;
    • citations should go outside punctuation, that is after a full stop or a comma.

Anyway that is all I have so far. Its looking good. I'd say it could have the legs to be a GA if you want to put the time in to it. Well done. — AustralianRupert (talk) 01:34, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Doublecheck your reference to 9th Armoured Division. As far as I know, this formation never went overseas. You may mean 1st or 10th Armoured Divisions. Cheers Buckshot06(prof) 10:02, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
Well spotted Buckshot06! It was a typo on my part - I checked the Playfair reference again, it was the 9th Arm Bde not the 9th Arm Div! Corrected the article accordingly. Farawayman (talk) 10:42, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
I thought of that a couple of hours ago - 9th Armd Bde got reduced from 120 or so to 25 tanks supporting 2 NZ Div. Please check the 2nd Division (New Zealand) article and insert any quick tie in sentences you see fit, because 9th Armd was supporting both divisions, it seems. Buckshot06(prof) 17:40, 16 July 2009 (UTC) Done In fact, for the latter part of Op Lightfoot, the 9th Armd Bde was under command of the NZ Div! Farawayman (talk) 22:05, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks Farawayman. Please take a look at the changes I've just made; you appear to have accidentally conflated the First and Second Battles of El Alamein as far as the destruction of 4 NZ Bde was concerned (at Rundwesat) and you may like to inspect how I've rewritten it. Cheers and thanks Buckshot06(prof) 23:05, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
I noticed that the paragraph / information looked rather odd - thats why I added a comment to the Talk page, to try to clarify. But your edit has recified it. Farawayman (talk) 07:02, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
I've tweaked a few things to try and bring section headers and quotes in line with style guidance-generallyyou should avoid using "the" or "a", particualrly at the beginning of headers, and likewise you should avoid overusing "Division", peopel will assume that the heders relate to the division unless it's clearly set out that they don't, see WP:MOSHEAD. Quotations should simply be in quote marks fo inline quotes - italics should only be used if they are present in the source, or used for additional emphasis. Block quotes, such as where you applied {{quotation}} should have neither quote marks, nor italics (again itlaics may be used if present in the source, or to highlight a particular part of the quote if necessary), see WP:MOSQUOTE. David Underdown (talk) 11:26, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
Just a minor issue, as far as i am awar British Commonwealth countries use the term Second World War over World War Two; i am not sure if this applies to South Africa, if it does shouldnt it be used over the "American spelling"?--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 17:01, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
As a Kiwi interested in the war, I've never noticed any preference for either usage - until I read of this on Wikipedia I've been completely oblivious that this was an issue - and I've been looking at the war for circa 20 years. I do not think it matters. Buckshot06(prof) 19:04, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
It is really the same as spelling colour and color - its a regional thing; i just think that we should be specific when it comes regional spelling to be as accurate as possible. For example the New Zealands also seem to have a preference for Second World War: New Zealand Official History].--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 21:22, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Notable members on articles

I don't think I have seen this asked before on the Special Boat Service and other articles, (some added by myself) there is a list of Notable members. My question is what makes a notable member ? Just because Tommy Atkins served in a unit, does not make him notable but General T Atkins would I presume qualify. User:Blackshod has added a number of names as they had Obituaries in the Daily Telegraph. So I think what I'm asking is.. Does having an obituary bestow notability. --Jim Sweeney (talk) 16:07, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Having one does not 'bestow notability', but it may be an indication of notability, i.e. reading it may tell you weather or not they were notable or lead to further sources. --Nate1481 16:20, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Two Russian Battleships with an uncanny similarity

These two images claim to be of different vessels but look somewhat similar (um, identical?). I figured this would be the best place to find someone who could tell me which ship it actually is...

File:Sevastopol.png
File:Gangut battleship.jpg
If anyone knows this stuff better than I do or has other source material which can be used to confirm the vessel it would be appreciated.

Usrnme h8er (talk · contribs) 18:42, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

Similar/Identical would be due in part to the fact that they are both from the same class of battleship. That said, I think they may in fact be the exact same battleship. As to which one is which, my guess is that they are both Sevestopol since it appears that Sevestopol had the most service history for any of the four ships. TomStar81 (Talk • Some say ¥€$, I say NO) 18:51, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
It certainly does appear to be the same ship, although the photo that purports to show the Sevastopol has been cleaned up; note the removal of the clouds and the darkening of some of the lines, especially evident on the aft gun turret. I'd bet that it is actually Gangut, seeing as the photo has an actual source, and it appears the image was scanned in from a book (click the link on the image description page for the original version). Note that the original has a second Gangut-class battleship in line astern. I wonder if anyone here who's skilled with images could fix up the original version and upload that. It seems there was a significant amount of detail lost when it was uploaded (for example, just left of the ship, there's a black smudge that appears to be distant land. In the original, it's revealed to be several ships in the distance). Any takers? Parsecboy (talk) 18:53, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I guess it's hard to rule out that the Sevastopol photo was taken by the same person, from the same position as the two ships filed past. That would make the Sevastopol the ship behind the Gangut in this picture. It would explain the similarities being so large. Usrnme h8er (talk · contribs) 22:50, 13 July 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Parsecboy. The ships look almost identical except it seems that "Gangut"- class battleship seems to be like photoshoped or changed by another program, there seems to be a white smudge left of the smaller mast and there are 3 little dots in the right had upper corner.--Coffeekid (talk) 23:21, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
This is quite an interesting puzzle. There are a few differences that I can see, that would be an odd thing for a photoshopper to amend. The water seems different in both pics, and the land on the horizon just behind the ships bows is ever so slightly different. The quantity of stuff on deck at the front is different too, and the figure under the flag at the prow is in a slightly different pose. Flag is flapping differently too. Different pics, but can't be sure it isn't the same ship.... Although there are some differences in the cranes that might make it a different vessel of the same class. The crane left of the smaller mast seems to have a hook on it in the Sevastapol pic, absent in the Gangut. Now if Sevastapol had been lightened I'd expect it to be the opposite. Ranger Steve (talk) 18:57, 18 July 2009 (UTC)
They aren't identical pictures and one isn't a photoshop of the other, they are at slightly different angles and as you said the background is different. I would guess that h8er is right. The biggest difference is there are significantly more crew members on the deck of the Sevastopol picture. EDIT: Then again it could still be the same ship with the crew moved around. Other than that the ships in the individual pictures do appear absolutely identical. Some guy (talk) 19:36, 18 July 2009 (UTC)
Looking more closely I note that the Gangut version didn't come from the source picture either. The flag is totally different, as is the line of crew on deck. At a rough guess I'd say these 2 pics are showing 2 different ships, taken by the same person as they passed their position, as h8er says. The source image on the Gangut page is another different image that might have been taken from a different position altogether, explaining the crew differences. Saying that, I'm sure the source image is Gangut (same stuff on the prow deck), and given that the gun elevations are noticeably identical on the following vessel, it could be possible that it is Sevastapol. Ranger Steve (talk) 19:44, 18 July 2009 (UTC)
I also suspect the 'crane' behind the smaller mast might be a flag... Oops! Ranger Steve (talk) 19:54, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

The photograph File:Sevastopol.png appears as the 1st photo on All ships of the Black Sea Fleet: Линейный корабль "Севастополь" ("Парижская коммуна") Battleship "Sevastopol" ( "Paris commune")--Toddy1 (talk) 21:32, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for SMS Blücher now open

The A-Class review for SMS Blücher is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 16:28, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

Fun new contest!

Sign up at: Military history Academy content drive
  • WikiChevrons for 1 article
    WikiChevrons for 1 article
  • Helping Hand Barnstar for 2 articles
    Helping Hand Barnstar for 2 articles
  • Guidance Barnstar for 3-4 articles
    Guidance Barnstar for 3-4 articles
  • Tireless contributor for 5 articles
    Tireless contributor for 5 articles
  • Working man for 6-7 articles
    Working man for 6-7 articles
  • Special Barnstar for 8-9 articles
    Special Barnstar for 8-9 articles
  • Writers Barnstar for 10 articles
    Writers Barnstar for 10 articles
  • Motivation Barnstar for 11-15 articles
    Motivation Barnstar for 11-15 articles
  • All Around Amazing Barnstar for 15+ articles
    All Around Amazing Barnstar for 15+ articles
  • Third place overall
    Third place overall
  • Second place overall
    Second place overall
  • First place overall
    First place overall


If you've got some spare time, here's a fun new way to help the project!

As you will recall, a few months ago, we set up the Military history Academy to help editors of all levels broaden their range of article-building skills. We need a much broader range of articles to make this truly effective.

If you can help by contributing "how to" content, your input will be greatly appreciated. We're looking for articles of four to six paragraphs in length (roughly 350 to 600 words), describing and explaining various Wikipedian tasks. These can cover anything. Some ideas might include: best practice in creating stubs; how to upload a file; which categories to use; the difference between copyright and plagiarism; basic copy-editing; how to assess an article for B-class.

To add an element of friendly competition, this will be a contest, running from 1 July through 31 October, with barnstars galore for participants.

For complete information, see the content drive page. Thanks in advance for your assistance,  Roger Davies talk 06:01, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Confused

I've been working on filling the gaps in {{Campaignbox Burma}}, and I'm confused by several things about it. There's Taukkyan Roadblock—a very peculiar, completely unsourced article, and I've got no idea where it belongs because the dating supplied makes no sense at all and the location given seems to be Sri Lanka rather than Burma. Am I being dumb, or does that article need to be somewhere else completely?

Then there's the mention of a Battle of Pegu. From where it fits in the campaignbox, it seems to follow Battle of Sittang Bridge and precede the Battle of Yunnan-Burma Road, but Slim (1956) doesn't even mention it. I can only presume it's a Chinese/Japanese battle, early in the Battle of Yunnan-Burma Road; but I can't find any sources whatsoever (and I've got a pretty reasonable bookshelf for this). There was certainly a Battle of Pegu but it wasn't in World War II...

I'm minded to chop the campaign box around quite a bit, but before I do I just wanted to see if anyone from here could shed any light on it.—S Marshall Talk/Cont 22:35, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm - as far as I can tell, Taukkyan Roadblock belongs at AfD - it appears to be complete nonsense see also Battle of Prome (1942).Nigel Ish (talk) 22:48, 19 July 2009 (UTC)
The editor who created them, User:Grey Furb, has had several articles deleted for being hoaxes. As these articles are also clearly hoaxes I've speedy deleted them per CSD A7 and blocked the editor for a week. Thanks for spotting these articles and raising them! Nick-D (talk) 08:37, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
According to Operation Dracula it was a small battle during the liberation of Rangoon. It's not cited though. Nick-D (talk) 10:18, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Dracula did exist; it is mentioned several times in 'Defeat into Victory' by William Slim, something about a seaborne and parachute operation to capture Rangoon. pp. 506-507 hint the operation was small scale - only 1 para brigade - and faced little resistance. 30 Japanese resisted the airborne attack from the looks of it and Slim states only one surived the encounter with the Gurhkas.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 13:31, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
The RAF have "Battle of Pegu Yomas" mentioned as part of the Burma 44-45 battle honour[11]GraemeLeggett (talk) 11:05, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Hmm. Its place in the template suggests a battle in 1942, though (and Slim does mention Pegu Yomas in 1942).

Okay, thanks all—I've decided there's no identifiable battle of Pegu or Pegu Yomas in 1942, so the {{Campaignbox Burma}} needs some editing and a bit later today, I'm going to change it around so it looks how I think it should look.  :)—S Marshall Talk/Cont 11:41, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, there's not much point having red links to obscure (even if genuine) battles in infobox. Nick-D (talk) 11:51, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Battle Honours of the British and Commonwealth Armies gives "Pegu 1942", 6-7th March 1942. It's an honour held by the 7th Hussars, the West Yorkshire Regiment, and the Cameronians; Indian regiments honoured are (I think - it's a bit oddly noted) the 1/4th Bombay Grenadiers and the 1/7th Rajput Regiment. Shimgray | talk | 11:54, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
...and per this, it seems to be a force from 17th Indian Division. Note the presence of 1st/West Yorkshire Regiment, as well as 7th Armoured Brigade with the 7th Queen's Own Hussars & the 1st/Cameronians. On re-reading the book, I'm inclined to think the notation actually indicates 1st/4th and 1st/7th Gurkhas, both of which were present in 48 Indian Infantry Brigade. Shimgray | talk | 12:00, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Yes, it's accepted that there was a Pegu (Pegu Yonas) force in 1942. The question is whether they fought anything Wikipedia would call a "battle". If they did, I can't find any mention of it.

    References to a "Battle of Pegu" online seem to refer to a nineteenth-century conflict, or to the fight in 1945.—S Marshall Talk/Cont 13:36, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

There are two battle honours for Pegu: Pegu awarded to the 7th Hussars for the 6th-7th March 1942 resisting the Japanases invasion of Burma and Pegu 1942 awarded to 6 British regiments (The Cameronians (Scottish Rifles), West Yorskshire Regiment (Prince of Wales Own), 7th Gurkha Rifles, 1st battalion 4th Gurkha Rifles, 4th bn The Frontier Force REgiment (Burma unit?) and the 2nd bn The FRontier Force Rgt) for the same dates and for the same reason.(Rodgers, p. 343: Battle honours of the British empire)--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 13:42, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
A Battle Honour was also given out to The Gloucestershore Rgt and the 2nd and 4th bn The FRontier force Regiment for Taukyan. The book doesnt say what this event was other than it was for resisting the Japanese invasion of Burma on the 7th-8th March 1942 (same page and book as above).--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 13:43, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
It does seem a bit unlikely there was a battle honour with no battle, but I agree with you it's proving elusive to find. Some possibly helpful links: There's a contemporary report mentioning it here - the dates match for 6th-7th. "The Japanese advance had been delayed by the need to bring up heavy equipment to provide an adequate crossing over the Sittang. Despite heavy fighting around Pegu on 6 and 7 March, the Japanese succeeded in moving through the gap between the defenders of Pegu and 1st Burma Division" [12]. This talks of "counterattacks to relieve Pegu". This gives some detail of a rearguard action at Pegu, which seems to have been in about brigade strength. This is a promising footnote - "The original roadblocks at Pegu and Taukkyan were laid to protect the flanks of the 33rd Division...", which suggests they were Japanese roadblocks, then withdrawn, and possibly reoccupied by British forces?
I'm not feeling confident enough to start writing something, but there definitely seems to have been an engagement in about brigade strength there, covering (or preceding?) the evacuation of Rangoon. It could well be that the title was given by the Battle Nomenclature Committee, but then it was just treated as part of general operations by everyone else. Shimgray | talk | 14:03, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Oh, that's a helpful bit of sleuthing. Well done!

    Peculiar that Slim doesn't mention that. I can understand Liddell Hart ignoring it (he took his information directly from Smyth, who'd been cashiered by the time of Pegu), but I'd have expected Slim to give us at least a one-liner.

    Still, that's pretty solid evidence that there was a clash at that point. (It also shows that Taukkyan Roadblock was a real fight, and didn't involve any Americans in Sri Lanka.)

    Let's leave Pegu in there, but drop Taukkyan Roadblock, on the grounds that the two battles seem to have been essentially the same fight? But I don't have the sources to write anything.

    Is there a decent Japanese history covering Burma 1942 from their point of view?—S Marshall Talk/Cont 14:20, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I think they're separate events, though both done as part of the same overall strategic plan. Taukkyan was the next day (7th/8th), involved only the Gloucestershire Regiment (not apparently part of the 17th Division), and was perhaps twenty miles distant. If we had a 1940-era map, before the names were modernised, this'd help a lot! Shimgray | talk | 14:37, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
It would appear the reason why Slim doesnt cover these actions is because he really picks his story up in Mid-March, the pages before that talk of him still being puzzeled to why he had been called out to Burma etc.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:41, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
In regards to locations: based off a map in Slims book (Japanese Invasion Routes Burma 1942) Pegu is northeast of Rangoon - looks about 50 miles (i dont have a ruler just my fingers lol), id say at least 100-150 miles roughly SSW of Toungoo and the same distance from Prome, which is to the NNW. Pege is between the Sittang and Irrawaddy. But there doesnt appear to be any signs of Taukkyan. Ill keep scanning the maps for the latter.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:44, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Link to said map from Silm's book on the website about the 7th Armoured Division: map
The Taukkyan War Cemetery article states the place is "about 25 km north of Yangon on Pyay Road".
This webpage gives details on the engagement.
This page states the place is 21 miles north of Rangoon. So no where near Pegu i would say.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:53, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
Here's a 1950s set of maps. NE-47-13 shows Rangoon; note Taukkyan is just north of it. NE-47-9 is the Pegu map; it shows Taukkyan in the bottom right. So, it looks like Pegu is the main roadblock; Taukkyan is where you come to when the Pegu road meets the main road north (to Prome?) from Rangoon. Shimgray | talk | 14:51, 20 July 2009 (UTC)
  • ←That's probably enough information to write a stub, there. If nobody else beats me to it, I'll start it a bit later tonight.

    I'm quite impressed with this Wikiproject. Thank you.—S Marshall Talk/Cont 15:17, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Have the matching set :-) Shimgray | talk | 01:15, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Good article review Michael P. Murphy

The article for Michael P. Murphy the Navy Seal and Medal of Honor recipent is awaiting good article review. --Kumioko (talk) 23:17, 19 July 2009 (UTC)

New Public Domain attribution template: {{ACMH}} for the US Army Center of Military History

Hello,

Following a couple of false positives from User:CorenSearchBot, there is a new attribution template, {{ACMH}} which you can use for all articles which incorporate text from the United States Army Center of Military History. This covers of course Medal of Honor citations but can extend, as needed, to other CMH content. Please note that this does of course not supercede the need to use proper citation and attribution practices per WP:CITE.

If you would prefer the template to be renamed to {{USCMH}} or similar, feel free to move it accordingly, I lack personal expertise to make the correct informed choice (note that {{CMH}} is already in use for different purposes).

Recommended usage is on articles (not their talk pages), right below the References title, before the reflist itself.

Please note that the maintainer of the bot is very busy at present and you may still get some false CSB tags for a few more days. Best from WP:COPYCLEAN, MLauba (talk) 16:25, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

I updated the template to use a few parameters such as article, url, author, accessdate and I updated the documentation. --Kumioko (talk) 17:21, 20 July 2009 (UTC)

Normandy breakout campaign

I've run across a 'new' editor who created Normandy breakout campaign (now a redirect) and the related category (now deleted), and changed the cats in many Overlord articles to point to the new cat (now rolled back). This is fairly sophisticated editing for a newbie and the Normandy breakout campaign was a pretty blatant POV piece (see history for previous version), so it may be worth keeping an eye on things. I don't recognise the editing pattern, but if we've had a similar situation in the past perhaps others might. EyeSerenetalk 07:59, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Btw he has removed your redirect, i added it back in again for you but he has also removed it.
Looking over the article it is compeletly unbalanced - ignores mountains of evidence to the contary of some of the points he has made - and i have never seen mention of the campaign he speaks of in any of my sources.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 11:02, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
The prominent use of "strategic offensive" seems a bit of a giveaway as to who this editor is. David Underdown (talk) 11:09, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the assistance. Roger's now blocked him as another Mrg3105 sock. I've been fortunate enough not to have encountered this editor before, though it looks like David has! Anyhow, although their article was complete bollocks it didn't stay around for long, and their POV is obvious enough that we'll hopefully spot them pretty quickly in future. It's worth noting that they've promised they won't be prevented from editing, so be on the lookout for more socking. EyeSerenetalk 13:23, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
(Also posted on the article's talk page) Although this is not an endorsement of the article in its current state, it does raise very important points that deserve full treatment. Yes, it's a bit POV-ish, but the other Normandy articles are as well - they simply have a different POV. An article on the strategic controversies of this campaign deserves to be written. The existence and controversy over this article is simply evidence of that. Personal attacks need not enter into this discussion. Regards, DMorpheus (talk) 13:32, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
I agree that something has to be written somewhere about the controversy of the campaign strategy however this was not the why to go; simpley stating one side of the coin as fact. Prehaps a section could be placed within the Overlord article?--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 13:37, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
I recall DMorpheus raised this before and we agreed it would be a very good idea, though I'm guessing no-one's had the time to do much about it. I'd actually like to see an overarching article (or possibly two, if we treat the Axis separately) dealing with the various controversies, as long as it can be written without running into WP:SYNTH or WP:OR issues. The potential problem as I see it is finding sources like the one Keith (I think?) dug up for Operation Epsom that actually analyse the controversy and historiography itself. I firmly believe it's worth a try though. EyeSerenetalk 17:02, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Mrg3105 in conversation with me raised another issue I've never heard of. Can anyone provide details of Operation Aberdeen in North Africa? Maybe we can unstub the redirect or add content to a related or campaign article? Buckshot06(prof) 15:47, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

According to this website: link it was a counter attack conducted during the Battle of Gazala. The counterattack started of 5 June. Ill see what the OH states.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 16:01, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
According to the Official History this is the battle of the Cauldron, which is already covered in the Gazla article: [Battle of Gazala#Panzer Army Afrika retains the initiative in "the Cauldron"]
His comments are pretty much unjustified as Kirrages has been throwing in all sorts of details from the OH to this article and others. For example the article currently states "32nd Army Tank Brigade ... lost 50 of 70 tanks involved." and "22nd Armoured Brigade ... lost 60 of its 156 tanks". Not the huge loss he was banging on about on your talkpage. While the OH doesnt provide detailed figures for the entire battle of Gazala and the loss of Tobruk it does currently state the overall loss of 540 allied tanks and 98,000 men. So it is not like there is a major gap in the North African campaign articles to have the allied campaign look in a more favourable light.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 16:20, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
For a similar situation, see the new article Soviet offensive plans controversy. The background to this article was similar: there were very frequent edits to a controversial section of the Operation Barbarossa article. Yet the content was not central to that article, and it made for a constantly-changing article. By shunting most of the controversy to a separate article, the main article could be stabilized and the controversy focused on the correct place. The new article is still a rough work in progress but the concept seems sound; several editors are working on it.
I believe the Normandy campaign deserves similar treatment. There's simply no question that controversy exists about major issues in the campaign, and it is better to acknowledge that than to pretend all issues are settled. At the same time we don't want to encourage edit-warring in the base articles. Focusing the 'controversy' aspects into a single article could accomplish both goals. Regards, DMorpheus (talk) 16:03, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
Thank you both of you. Appreciate the information. Might we suggest we cautiously move ahead on reexamining the Normandy breakout overall if historiographical discussion is found? Basically, as always, another trip to the library will be required. Absent that, I do not think such a controversial article is worth revisiting. Cheers Buckshot06(prof) 09:17, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

military attacks on civilian-populated areas

There is a conversation going on at Talk:terror bombing#I'm getting what you guys are getting at about creating a new article, called "'military attacks on civilian-populated areas' or 'military attacks on civilian-populated areas' or some such, where the international law and the various ambiguously 'terrorist or non-terrorist' attacks and 'collateral damage' could be surveyed." Some more input on this proposal would be useful. --PBS (talk) 10:19, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for HMS Endeavour now open

The A-Class review for HMS Endeavour is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 11:05, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Blocked talk pages

Why are talk pages blocked? Ex: Talk:Drone attacks in Pakistan Both the article and talk are blocked. Now, no one can even make a comment or suggestion?172.165.240.132 (talk) 22:03, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Apparently to keep an editor from hitting the pages. Given that the pages are semi-protected, I am guessing that the editors account is either less than four days old or that the editors is an anon. TomStar81 (Talk • Some say ¥€$, I say NO) 22:10, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Basically hundreds of subcontinent pages have been sprotected to lock out the banned Pakistani POV/vandal/sockmaster Nangparbat (talk · contribs) who has a very dynamic range that covers thousands of users in the UK. Basically all Ind-Pak war/terrorism religious riot type articles have been sprotected, more or less. Sometimes the also banned Hkelkar follows him around. YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 01:29, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject rankings

Last year Kirill made a list of WikiProjects by # of FAs and posted it here. Does anyone remember where it is? I can't find it off the top of my head. YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 01:29, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

You're thinking of Wikipedia:Version 1.0 Editorial Team/Index/Comparison, presumably? Or a different list? Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:46, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
That's the one. Thanks YellowMonkey (cricket calendar poll!) paid editing=POV 02:58, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Battle of normandy and Battle of Normandy

I noticed that these redirect to different pages, as is lamented at Talk:Normandy Campaign. This isn't my specialty so I'm hoping you guys can figure out the proper resolution. Thanks. Agradman talk/contribs 14:27, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Both now redirect to Normandy Campaign, readers can choose where to go from there. TomStar81 (Talk • Some say ¥€$, I say NO) 16:22, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Featured article candidacy for Kaiser class battleship now open

The featured article candidacy for Kaiser class battleship is now open. Comments from reviewers are needed to help determine whether the article meets the criteria for featured articles; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! -MBK004 19:43, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Louis H. Carpenter now open

The peer review for Louis H. Carpenter is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:30, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Battle of Grand Port now open

The peer review for Battle of Grand Port is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:30, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

"Nazi" vs. "German"

Hi all.

The other day - sadly, I forget where - I spotted another instance of the interminable debate about whether WWII German forces should be referred to as "Germans" or "Nazis". I was going to point them to the style guide on this... but to my surprise, we didn't seem to have a mention of it there, or on the more general case of "ideology vs nationality". Would it be worth pulling something together, and if so, can someone summarise what consensus on this actually was? Shimgray | talk | 14:48, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

The thread is archived here. There wasn't a large debate, but those that commented seemed to agree with Kirill's advice that WP:MILMOS#PRECISE applies. In summary, use the actual unit designations where possible, and as a general NPOV term "Germans" is preferred (unless I assume specifically referring to a group of members of the Nazi party). Perhaps something would be worthwhile writing up for the style guide. EyeSerenetalk 16:10, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
Mmm. It's interesting that it rarely occurs elsewhere - we don't usually have to worry about WWII Eastern Front articles talking about "Communist forces". for example. Shimgray | talk | 16:39, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
What do you mean? Don't the articles talk about "communist forces", or doesn't anybody complain in this case? – In any case, if you want to add a motivating example to the guideline you might want to consider Wolfgang Borchert. I think Germans whose grandfather was such a case can be excused to be a bit touchy about the lack of precision. And a lot of grandfathers claimed to have been such a case. Hans Adler 16:54, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
I think to some extent "Nazis" has passed into the language as a synonym for "Germans during WWII" - inaccurate and sloppy though that is - in a way that "Communists" hasn't (perhaps because many countries have a history of post-war communist political activism but understandably not National Socialist activism). We have a duty to be more precise here though, and neither "Nazis" or "Communists" is suitable as a blanket term, any more than it would be to refer to the Western Allies as "Capitalists". EyeSerenetalk 17:01, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
What I mean is, we see people using phrases like "The British 17th Division launched an attack the next morning, but failed to make any headway against strong Nazi defences" - but it's less common to see "The German 183rd Division was destroyed near Kiev by a Communist offensive". Most people would switch that to Soviet (or sometimes the slightly misleading Russian) because it reads better, but they'd be more likely to leave "Nazi". Articles relating to WWII Germany seem to have a much higher incidence of people using the political term for the nationality than we get anywhere else, for one reason or another.
I agree with you that the problem of attributing (or implying) political affiliation of individuals is one of the major problems here! Shimgray | talk | 17:05, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
I understood your point - I was idly musing on why that might be the case ;) However, I'd certainly support the removal of "Nazis" in contexts like the one you've described for a more meaningful term ("German" in that case, if no better precision can be achieved). EyeSerenetalk 17:09, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
I think the explanation is probably as simple as length in a headline: Nazi, Soviet, US or GI are the shortest ways to refer to the respective troops. Similarly, the Warsaw Treaty became a "pact" ("a written agreement between two states or sovereigns "). Hans Adler 15:08, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Help requested for major deletions in military history articles

Could some experts take a look at the following articles: USS Maine (ACR-1), F-104 Starfighter and Erich Hartmann which have been subject to major deletions, based on an editor's interpretation of relevance. FWiW Bzuk (talk) 19:09, 25 July 2009 (UTC).

Discussion at WW2 Casualties

Please review my post at Talk:World War II casualties#Civilian Casualties in Asia. I would appreciate the opinions of others before I make any changes--Woogie10w (talk) 21:12, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for Convoy GP55 now open

The A-Class review for Convoy GP55 is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Nick-D (talk) 03:46, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Robert Cain

Hi folks, I was going to mention this a few days ago, but my time is not my own at the moment and I wasn't able to sit down to do some editing. In true sods law things have changed since then! I've been working on all things Arnhem lately and was looking through the bio of Major Robert Henry Cain when I noticed that the bulk of the article seems to have been directly lifted from this site. Here is a diff of the wiki page as it was 3 days ago and it appears to be identical to the external website. Since then, User:Woody has done some good reworking (and much improved it in my opinion), but a lot of the original page still exists. Is this a copy violation? Has Woody done enough to improve it? Just though I should flag it. Cheers, Ranger Steve (talk) 19:46, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

I did wonder about that; he's on my list of Airborne VCs to get to FA. I'd suggest asking user:Moonriddengirl, who's the resident copyright expert, although I believe she might be unavailable atm. Skinny87 (talk) 19:57, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Contacted Moonridden girl. I'd been looking at some of the VC winners of Arnhem myself, but can barely find the time to eat dinner at the moment! That said, I might be able to help with info if you need it. Ranger Steve (talk) 20:04, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
It might also be worth contacting webmaster@extraplan.demon.co.uk with the possibility that he/she would be prepared to go through the Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials process - see also Wikipedia:Requesting copyright permission. It might also be worth bringing Woody into the discussion (and I've now alerted Woody); from a study of ten or fifteen sentences, it looks as though she/he has been diligent in changing sentences to new wording, and also in amending somewhat the structure; but is is equally clear that the article still rests heavily on the (properly referenced) pegasusarchive article. --Tagishsimon (talk) 20:14, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for the notification. When I was redoing it I realised the vast majority was ripped off that website, which incidentally has no copyright statement. I have referenced it to the other page but I suspect it is still guilty of plagiarism for the details of his second world war service. Moonriddengirl would be the person to ask as to whether it is enough. Regards, Woody (talk) 20:42, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Note: oldid of page before my edit, after my attempt at removal. Woody (talk) 20:47, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
I've emailed the PegasusArchive contact email addy, pointing them at this discussion and urging them to provide an opinion, notably on the plagiarism aspect. Many thanks to Woody for the work done so far to remedy the situation. --Tagishsimon (talk) 20:53, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Hi. Complicating this, our use on Wikipedia dates back to January 2005. All evidence would suggest it was copied from somewhere. It came in one big clump of text. But the page on the Pegasusarchive only dates back to December 2007, and the whole Pegasusarchive site goes back only to September 2006. This would ordinarily suggest that the Wikipedia text came first. A possible good faith explanation might be that the IP that placed the text here was Mark Hickman, who runs the site. Does anyone know if the Pegasusarchive used to be hosted elsewhere? I note that our article was subtly modified away from the other article here and here. Ordinarily I would take this as strong evidence that he had it first, but the nearly three year difference in his date versus ours is pretty confusing. I usually give Wayback latitude of a few months, but a few years is a stretch.
Ignoring that complication and presuming copyvio, I think further revision will be needed. While User:Woody is certainly to be commended for a great start, some of this text remains very close to the other page. "Robert Cain was born of Manx parents in Shanghai, China, on the 2 January 1909." is identical to the source. The source's "worked for Shell in Thailand, and later Malaya, until the war began when, in 1940, he was commissioned into the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers" is also retained almost verbatim in the article, with "He worked for Shell in Thailand, and later Malaya, until the Second World War began when, in 1940, he was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant into the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers." Only a few words have been added. Spot-checking throughout the article, I can see some other remaining text of concern. Our article's "After this bitter experience, Cain appeared to have developed an intense loathing of tanks." remains too close to the other article's "Cain appeared to have developed an intense loathing of tanks after the bitter experiences...", though language has been rearranged. Our article's "B Company were involved in vicious fighting around in a dell near St. Elizabeth Hospital" remains a very close paraphrase of the putative source's "when they were involved in vicious fighting in a dell around the area of the St. Elizabeth Hospital." Likewise, the external site's "Cain fired at the second tank, but the bomb was faulty and exploded directly in front of him. It blew him off his feet and left him blind with metal fragments in his blackened face. As his men dragged him off, Cain recalls yelling like a hooligan and calling for somebody to get hold of the PIAT and deal with the tank." is still almost duplicated from the source's, "Cain fired at the second tank, but the bomb was faulty and detonated directly in front of him. It blew him off his feet and left him blind with metal fragments in his blackened face. As he was being dragged away by his men, he recalls yelling for somebody to use the PIAT to deal with the tank." I think we need to blank this one to allow further clean-up in the temporary space the template provides, although the discrepancy in dating here might mean this one turns out okay. Hopefully if Hickman did author the text, and it was not duplicated by both from some PD source, he'll be willing to donate it. --Moonriddengirl (talk) 21:51, 23 July 2009 (UTC)
Just wanted to note that I've blanked and left a note at the article's talk. I'm not sure how far up the page the copied text goes. If it doesn't start until the "early life" section, please, somebody move it down. :) Revising in this way is an utter pain. :P It can be very hard to do it line by line, as even if you change the language enough, the structure is also a copyrighted element. I find it easier to distill facts from larger chunks and find my own order to present them...which is easier said than done, when the natural order is chronological. :) I'll be happy to help with analyzing and rewriting when I have more on-Wiki time, hopefully tomorrow. Unless, of course, your project manages to finish it by then, as your project is extremely good at dealing with copyvios. :D --Moonriddengirl (talk) 21:58, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks everyone, and sorry Woody for (hopefully temporarily) nullifying your work! I can have a go at writing a new article from scratch, I have enough references and source material, but it may take a short while. Ranger Steve (talk) 17:54, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Don't worry about it. I have had a go with Talk:Robert Henry Cain/Temp which should tide us over until we have more sources. Regards, Woody (talk) 18:01, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
Looks good. Do you mind if I edit the page? I can see a few things I can ref now if that helps. Ranger Steve (talk) 18:06, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
Please, by all means go ahead, I will move it over once we are sure it is clear of any potential copyright issues. Regards, Woody (talk) 18:12, 25 July 2009 (UTC)
As a note, all clear now, article being developed back in article space. All help welcome. Thanks, Woody (talk) 09:33, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Alpha Company 230th BSB

We have this new article, A Company, 230th Brigade Support Battalion, which is a part of 30th Heavy Brigade Combat Team, North Carolina National Guard. It is my understanding that we consider at the moment separate companies are noteworthy, but companies that are part of battalions are not, which means this should be upmerged to an article about the 230th Brigade Support Battalion. Am I correct in this? Buckshot06(prof) 05:54, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the rule of thumb is that units which are capable of independent action are possibly notable while sub-units of such units are rarely notable. That said, they need to meet the relevant notability guideline WP:ORG first, and the level at which units are notable does tend to differ between countries (eg, at least one detailed book-length unit history has been published for almost all Australian combat battalions which fought in the world wars while the same is unlikely to be the case for battalions in the Red Army of World War II). Nick-D (talk) 07:16, 26 July 2009 (UTC)
OK, will upmerge. For the Red Army, rifle battalions would not be 'separate' as it were, so the level of notability might be the regimental level. Buckshot06(prof) 08:54, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

Military History - GLAM Wiki Challenge

As many of you are aware Wikimedia-au is running a Challenge as part of the up coming GLAM Wiki in Canberra at the Australian War Memorial on the 6-7 th August, the AWM has just provided WM-au with further prizes to hand out as part of the Challenge.

Since we are nearing the end of the challenge 31st July, we'll extend the challenge until 5 August to get these prizes preference will be given to an article that has a connection with AWM collection Gnangarra 06:26, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Otranto Raid

Hi everybody. I came across this recently created article, which seems to want to be a sub-article for Battle of the Strait of Otranto (1917), but it really just duplicate part of the contents of the older article. I left a note on the talk page of the creator, but s/he ignored it. Does anyone else see any merit to the sub-article? The older one is only a dozen kbs, so it's not necessary to split anything off. I'd argue the best case here is to just redirect it. Parsecboy (talk) 21:48, 26 July 2009 (UTC)

It looks to me like they both cover the same battle, and the new article should be merged into Battle of the Strait of Otranto (1917) Nick-D (talk) 10:55, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I agree; there doesn't seem to be enough of a distinction between the two events to separate them into two articles. EyeSerenetalk 16:41, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Spam link?

An isp editor keeps readding this link as an "addition resource" If I remember correctly we do not allow forums here, but before reverting the edit for the third time I want to make sure of this fact so that the next time it reappears I can either block the isp address for vandalism of semi protect the page. TomStar81 (Talk • Some say ¥€$, I say NO) 02:51, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

Heh, my at-work browser certainly thinks so; the server filter's blocked the site as "usenet news"... It looks like vanity spamming to me. EyeSerenetalk 07:26, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
Rechecked at home; the link adds no value I can see. The spam blacklist might be worth keeping in mind as a last resort if blocking doesn't solve the problem. EyeSerenetalk 21:14, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

can I get a little advice on starting a task force?

Hi,

Over at Wikipedia:WikiProject_Council/Guide/Task_forces, your Wikiproject is listed as a role model, so I'm wondering if you could give me some advice. Right now I'm a participant in WP:LAW, as well as WP:SCOTUS (i.e. "US Supreme Court Cases"). You can see from the "Related WikiProjects" section at WP:LAW that WP:SCOTUS is one of many law-related WikiProjects.

I have been thinking of starting a task force for the law school curriculum -- "JD Curriculum" -- attached to WP:LAW. When I mentioned to someone at Wikiproject Council, the response was: "Frankly, I'm not sure why SCOTUS isn't a task force of LAW to begin with, but that's just me."

So I made a post at WP:SCOTUS, asking if they'd be willing to merge and become a task force of WP:LAW.

The response was, "WikiProject SCOTUS is a daughter project of WikiProject Law. Is there any importance to the "task force versus wikiproject" distinction whatsoever?"

So my question is, how do I answer this editor's question?

Feel free to post your responses here or at the thread of the WP:SCOTUS talk page, here.

Thanks. Agradman talk/contribs 22:21, 27 July 2009 (UTC)

By definition a task force differs from a project in two big ways: first, a task force is focused on a more specific area of the general project (for example, our WWII task force focuses on all aspects of military history pertaining to WWII) which makes a TF's scope more narrow, and task forces are usually dependent on their parent project for infrastructure support (assessment ranks, perr reviews, A-class reviews in our project's case, etc). In this case, the major distinction is that the SCOTUS task force would be a more narrowly focused aspect of WP:LAW and would have to rely on WP:LAW for peer reviews, outreach support, MoS issues (specific to the Law community), assessments, and other higher matters dealt with at the project level. TomStar81 (Talk • Some say ¥€$, I say NO) 23:52, 27 July 2009 (UTC)
I've responded at WT:SCOTUS as well. Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:25, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Peer review for Battle of Dunkirk now open

The peer review for Battle of Dunkirk is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:34, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

A-Class review for Byzantine civil war of 1341–1347 now open

The A-Class review for Byzantine civil war of 1341–1347 is now open; all editors are invited to participate, and any input there would be appreciated! Thanks! Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:35, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Good article review Michael A. Monsoor

I just submitted Michael A. Monsoor for GA review. Any reviews and or comments are gladly appreciated.--Kumioko (talk) 04:04, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Annnd the spotlight falls on ... USS Massachusetts (BB-59)!

Hi all. An article within the scope of our project, USS Massachusetts (BB-59), has been selected to receive the recently-reactivated Spotlight during the week of 1 August. Any help that could be offered would be greatly appreciated! Some sources availiable for use in expanding the article can be found here. Cheers, —Ed (Talk • Contribs) 04:58, 28 July 2009 (UTC)

Proposed modification of Firearm article structure

An RFC to help gain consensus for a new structure for the Firearm article. (I am adding this supplementary description because all the lines before the signature was TL;DR for the bot). —harej (talk) (cool!) 02:41, 12 July 2009 (UTC)

I am having trouble with a couple of users reverting my attempts to restructure and organize existing firearms articles with additional subsections, as this is apparently considered "muddying the waters" (please see discussion above). Many firearm articles such as M1 Garand (history section) and Steyr AUG (design details section) have incredibly long sections (over 1000 words easily) with no subsections. This is unacceptable for readability purposes; it will be far too difficult for an average, non-firearms expert reader to navigate and understand these articles. Please look at WP:MTAA and Help:Section size policies.

Therefore I am just throwing in some ideas for subsections I feel are appropriate when the article text calls for them. Please comment on these and suggest improvements or modifications. Most of these subsections should be considered "if applicable."

The article can be structured along these lines:

  1. History
    1. Development
    2. Operational use/Service use/whatever
    3. Postwar, (if applicable to a firearm that is inherently associated with a specific war, such as the M1 Garand or Thompson M1)
    4. Evolution (if there is a lot of text about how this firearm evolved or was incorporated into new firearms)
  2. Design and details (I feel it is important to place more accessible elements of the article higher up, as suggested in WP:MTAA
    1. Features (the features that the user of the firearm interacts with, such as sights, magazine, fire selector, etc)
    2. Accessories
    3. Ballistics
    4. Engineering (details about the manufacture of the weapon if they do not belong in the history section)
    5. Operating mechanism (description of what happens mechanically when the gun is fired (this should be clearly marked as most readers will want to skip it)
  1. Variants.
    1. Subsection for each clearly distinguisable/distinct variants (so MP5A2 and MP5A3 might not be given separate sections, but MP5SD is)
    2. Civillian variants
  2. Civilian use. A general description of the use of the weapon by non-military, non-government, and legally entitled groups.
  3. Cultural impact, if any. A general summary of the weapon's impact on culture, complying with the guidelines on popular culture.

I also strongly feel that organizing an article to suit its specific contents is far more important than maintaining the same organization across all firearms articles. There seems to be a lot of difference in the structure of the different featured firearms articles. Thank you for your time and input. Some guy (talk) 05:24, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Added a note about this discussion to the Weaponry TF talk page. EyeSerenetalk 08:06, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Added a note about this discussion to the Firearms talk page.⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 13:07, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Might want to consider that you also have variants that are considered their own weapons and come up with ideas on how to deal with that (FN FAL -> British L1A1 SLR, FN MiniMi -> M249 SAW) --Narson ~ Talk • 12:12, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
I would say these could be given separate subsections for each variant, as already more or less seen at the M249 article. Do you have any comment on the rest of the suggestions? Would you support implentation of these subsections? Some guy (talk) 20:36, 30 June 2009 (UTC)
I think this could be a good idea for a lot of firearms that currently have quite messy and overly technical layouts. I'd prefer to see a clearer distinction between development and evolution though (purely from an editors point of view - what goes where?) I guess development could include background and the creation of the gun and evolution would cover marks (SMLE Mk III, Rifle no4 etc..). I imagine that was probably your intention anyway? Its nitpicking, but I'd also prefer attachments over accessories (which just sound toy like and plasticy to me!). Why don't you knock up a sandbox version of MP5 (which I notice really needs it) to see how it looks? On a final note, I'd say this wouldn't necessarily work for all firearms, mainly the ones with a lot of history to them (but I'm happy to be proved wrong). But at least its a good template to start an article from. Ranger Steve (talk) 16:24, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Steve, in your 'attachments' over 'accessories' preference, where would items issued with the weapon go (like cleaning kits, cases, etc.)?
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 16:37, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
User:Some guy has started a dozen separate discussions on varous talk pages, article edit wars, requests for comment, etc. to try to browbeat his notions through. If there is going to be a meaningful discussion HERE, may I suggest, Some guy, that you cease the other discussions, cease edit warring, cease your disruptive behavior and martyrdom, and engage in THIS discussion only? --Nukes4Tots (talk) 16:27, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Agree to having the discussion only HERE.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 16:37, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
That's a good point Berean, I knew there would probably be something that wouldn't fit the category (I should have thought of something as obvious as cleaning kits!). Just musing on that point... would it be worth having two sections - 1 for accessories that come with a weapon as standard (cleaning kits, bayonets as standard), and another for optional extras (needs a better name) like the M203 grenade launcher or non standard bayonets? Or is that too much detail? Might be.... Ranger Steve (talk) 16:45, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
You could be right about that. One 'optional extra' that fits into the latter case for the MP5 article would be the the coveted briefcase (video). I'm surprised that this hasn't been added to the article especially since H&K made it. Not sure what to call that..an attachment? ..an accessory?
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 20:27, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Again I think accessories is a good subsection or seperate section name that would normally cover all attachments/accessories/add-ons/etc appropriately, and if necessary we could always create an article-tailored subsection regarding a specific type of accessory/whatever. I forgot to say that as far as history vs. evolution, for evolution I was thinking about how later firearms that weren't exactly variants benefited from this design; a good example is the AK-47 article could have a short evolution section discussing the weapon's... evolution into the AKM and AK-74. Some guy (talk) 21:10, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
I'd say that's too much and lumping everything into accessories is the best option. Any comments on my changes at the MP5 article? Some guy (talk) 17:00, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
I have been trying to explain to Nukes4Tots here and his friend that personal attacks directed at the editor rather than the edits are not very persuasive or appropriate but that has not gone well. I have actually started discussions on four pages - I started out with the MP5 article and then the SG 550 article because they needed the work and I believe in approaching articles individually, but Nukes and Kaolorka have been reverting my edits due to "no consensus" so unfortunately we are forced to discuss the situation here just to add subsections. They were demanding I go to WP:GUNS, and I did, but that page gets no traffic and I realized that firearms structure isn't even covered there and moved here. Of course I agree to have the discussion here and I will not accept "blame" or any kind of absurdity for having the discussion be split up; it was a confusing situation that they forced me to escalate to project-wide consensus at the wrong project, of course I started dicussions in the wrong places. I did file RfCs to actually try to get the consensus they are demanding.
As far as sandboxing the edits, I already did that, and then due to complete lack of discussion inserted the changes myself (you can see a version here: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Heckler_%26_Koch_MP5&oldid=299756648 ) and got general agreement with the changes before I was reverted. Obviously I feel subsections are critical.
Nukes, I'm impressed you actually participated in a discussion that wasn't directed entirely at me. I hope you can take the next step and acknowledge everyone else's opinions. Some guy (talk) 16:41, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Talk about narcisism, NONE of this was directed at you... it's directed at your EDITS. Until you can separate the two things, you're going to have a hard time accepting any consensus. Stop taking this personal. Show me one comment I've made that has been directed at YOU? --Nukes4Tots (talk) 16:46, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Your behavior is clear for others to see. Some guy (talk) 16:53, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

(unindent)One point that's being missed here is that Firearms are not strictly covered by WP:MILHIST. They are also covered by WP:GUNS. Any consensus here should not subvert the ability for civilian guns or firearms used by Military, Police, and Civilian alike to also fit within the structure of the consensus. --Nukes4Tots (talk) 16:51, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

I am not sure I see any problem with that. I don't know how this structure would not apply to any specific group; as I said subsections should be considered "if applicable". Some guy (talk) 16:56, 2 July 2009 (UTC)
Broadly speaking, I would imagine that both military and civilian firearms would have reasonably similar article layouts. Some sections might be broken down differently (e.g. military guns might break down the history around particular wars, whereas civilian guns wouldn't have such a reference point); but most topics are going to appear whether the firearm is military or civilian.
(From a logistical standpoint, WP:GUNS has traditionally adopted the relevant sections of WP:MILMOS for general use even if the discussion behind them happened to take place here. Is there a desire among members of WP:GUNS to maintain separate guidelines for military and civilian firearms?) Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:12, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
I think he's just trying to make the process more difficult (withdrawn, edit conflict before I could change it; apologies). Some guy (talk) 02:19, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Please refrain from any more comments about other editors here. The point of this discussion is to consider article structure, and any personal differences you may have with others involved are rather off-topic; if you really wish to pursue personal grievances, there are appropriate channels, but I would suggest forgetting the whole thing and focusing on improving the articles instead. Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:23, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
I tried to get this in but you edit conflicted me so now it's broken up. Sorry. Anyway, There's no reason to distinguish between civilian and military firearms for structure guideline purposes; in fact this would only create needless conflict and edit wars about whether a particular firearm was considered "military" or "civilian" (or police or government or...). Many military arms including rifles and submachineguns have civilian variants. Pistols in particular will have a lot of overlap between military and civilian use. Some guy (talk) 02:19, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, ignoring for the moment the question of whether there are to be two guidelines or only one, do we want to suggest different structures depending on whether a firearm is (primarily) military or (primarily) civilian? In your original proposal, we have:
  1. Operational use/Service use/whatever
  2. Postwar
1 is really only relevant for firearms which have seen official service (whether with military, law enforcement, or otherwise), although it might be extended to cover any use. 2 is only relevant for firearms which have seen military use (whether as formal service weapons, or as weapons informally adopted by a military force). Effectively, we seem to have three different potential structure types:
  • Military firearms used in combat (include both #1 and #2)
  • Non-military service firearms, and peacetime military firearms (include #1, but not #2)
  • Non-service firearms (include neither #1 nor #2)
Is this at all close to what you had in mind? Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:35, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
My feeling is there is no need for specific guidelines about this type of circumstance because it is most appropriate to specifically tailor the article to suit its own contents; but in a broader sense, I don't think there is a big need to distinguish between civilian and military weapons here. I didn't name those subsection proposals entirely appropriately; I'm sorry. I am trying to do a lot, making most of the suggestions myself, and I sometimes get caught in phrasing traps unintentionally. I don't want to make the section guidelines nearly that complicated. As I said before sections should be considered "if applicable" and obviously postwar doesn't apply to guns that aren't inherently associated with a specific war. Operational use/service use/whatever doesn't have a specific name because I wasn't sure what the best name was and I would appreciate it if someone could help me come up with something that doesn't connote military or non-military usage. Some guy (talk) 02:45, 3 July 2009 (UTC)
I have been searching the project archives and found what appears to be the basis for the current structure guideline. Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military_history/Weaponry task force/Archive 4#Firearms article structure guideline request. I think this might be valuable for reference. It appears to be substantially the same now as it was two and a half years ago. I notice that there were suggestions it be used as a "recommended article structure" and "not a hard one-size-fits-all rule that articles must follow". Some guy (talk) 04:37, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

(Undent) If I might make a few observations: Firstly, I'd suggest the "Evolution" section be either dropped completely or moved to the end of the article. It's contentious and very debatable- I mean, did the M-16 evolve into the M-4 carbine? Did the AK-74 evolve into the AKSU-74? Is the Jungle Carbine an evolution of the Lee-Enfield No. 4? I'd also lose the "Postwar" section for military firearms, as it's not really relevant and anything in the "Postwar" section should be covered by "Civilian/Police Use" IMHO. I would also suggest avoiding an "Operating Mechanism" section unless it's either very unusual (Such as the Straight-Pull action on the Ross Rifle) or the gun in question is part of the action's namesake (eg the Martini Falling Block action used in the Martini-Henry rifle). Anything else should be covered by a wikilink to Bolt-action, Semi-automatic, Lever-action, etc; e.g. "The Winchester Model 1873 is a lever-action rifle manufactured by the Winchester Repeating Arms Company in the late 19th century... (and so on)". The idea of an "Accessories" section bothers me too, as I can just see it turning into a "List Of Aftermarket 'Tactical' Accessories for [Gun]". Obviously, things like the M203 Grenade Launcher for the M-16 rifle would be an exception to this, but again, I think that can be covered in a single sentence with a link elsewhere in the article. Ballistics, as I understand it, is more a function of ammunition than the gun itself (a .303 rifle, for example, will have different ballistic data when fired with a Mk VI cartridge than the standard Mk VIIz cartridge, which is different again from the Mk 8z cartridge). The thing to bear in mind is that we're not The Complete Guide To Everything You Could Ever Want To Know About Guns; if we start getting too technical we're going to "turn off" casual readers, which is somewhat counter to the whole "making information accessible" thing that Wiki is all about, IMHO... Commander Zulu (talk) 04:19, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

As for evolution, you can have circumstances where the article discusses new firearms that were developed from the technology used in the firearm covered by the article. This would only be necessary in articles with very long history sections. How exactly is postwar not relevant? See Thompson M1 which would be associated primarily with WW2 but there are several paragraphs at the end of the history section about Korea and Vietnam, which is not civilian use. Operating mechanism needs to sectioned because it is beyond most reader's interest or comprehension; see SG 550 and MP5 for articles with overly long descriptions of the mechanical firing process which need to be subsectioned.
We can have standards about what is included in the accessories section. There is no reason to assume it will turn into a list of aftermarket acessories, and they could easily be removed. Many firearms articles (MP5, SG 550, Steyr Aug) have multiple paragraphs about accessories. Ballistics appears in the AK-47 article but I don't think it's essential. I think you may be missing the point of adding subsections, which is that articles such as the those I mentioned in the previous paragraph are clearly striving to be in "The Complete Guide to Everything You Could Ever Want to Know". The articles are already too technical. Subsections make the text far more accessible and understandable for the average reader; just read the responses of every user besides Nukes4Tots and Koalorka at this page and the talk pages at MP5 and SG 550. Some guy (talk) 07:30, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
The problem with "evolution" sections is that they're basically an open invitation to Original Research. Pretty much every bolt-action rifle in existence except the Lee-Enfield and the Mosin-Nagant is based on the Mauser action, but I'd hardly say it's reasonable to state the the Mauser Gew. 98 "evolved" into the Weatherby Mk V, for example. My earlier comments on "Postwar" use stand; just have the article divided into "Military" and "Civilian/Police" use. World War II was a long time ago and I think it's beginning to lose its usefulness as a "Historical Measuring Stick". I mean, so what if the M1A1 Thompson was still being used after WWII? Why not just have in the Military Use section "The M1A1 Thompson remained in service with the US Military until the end of the Vietnam War."
Also, I think you're overlooking another big issue: We're dicking about here arguing over the layout of the firearm articles when we should be trying to get them up to FA or A class standard. There are very, very few FA- and A- class firearm articles and I for one would rather see more effort made into upgrading some of the more important ones we have than worrying about minutiae such as whether the Tommy Gun article should have a "Postwar Use" section in. Commander Zulu (talk) 09:01, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
I, for one, am not dicking about anything. I think the article structure needs to be improved in order to have good articles. I hope you are not suggesting we delete most of the Thompson's history section and replace it with that vague sentence. I don't think "WW2 was a long time ago" is acceptable to trivialize its importance; it was a World War. If you don't want to debate specific articles here, would you concede that article structure should be tailored on a case-by-case basis? I don't think there should ever be a structure guideline that every article has to adhere to exactly. Some guy (talk) 09:49, 4 July 2009 (UTC)


(Undent) Considering that the current structure guidelines section already says "The structures suggested in this section are intended to serve as a starting point for writing a good article; they are not meant to enforce a single, binding structure on all articles, nor to limit the topics a fully developed article will discuss" I think it is most appropriate to bypass this process that will make the structure guidelines too complicated, and just add a little note saying that subsections are acceptable and may be tailored to suit specific article contents. I think we can allow editors to be rational and add subsections as they deem appropriate and these can be honed in each article through the evolution of the article, same as any other element of any article on Wikipedia. However I am willing to continue this discussion if that is desired. Some guy (talk) 11:48, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

You're missing my point. I've been around the WP:MILHIST project for several years and have both an FA and a number of A-class articles (all firearm related) under my belt. I'm not saying we should dismiss a World War as unimportant. The point I'm making is that we shouldn't pick an arbitrary war (why not World War I? Vietnam? The Falklands War?) and then declare anything after that to be "Post-War" and worthy of its own section in the article. Or, I could just agree with Koalorka and Nukes4Tots and say there's nothing wrong with the current arrangement and I don't think it needs to be changed at all. But I don't think you want to hear that, somehow. Commander Zulu (talk) 12:17, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
Actually, he hasn't missed the point...he has just made it. The fundamental crux of why all of this has been taking place is surmised in Some guy's statement which is worth repeating.."I think it is most appropriate to bypass this process that will make the structure guidelines too complicated, and just add a little note saying that subsections are acceptable and may be tailored to suit specific article contents. I think we can allow editors to be rational and add subsections as they deem appropriate and these can be honed in each article through the evolution of the article, same as any other element of any article on Wikipedia."
This freedom to all Wikipedians is the central issue. Projects can set guidelines but do not have authority or dominion over the articles. There has been an effort on the part of a couple of editors to enforce the rigidity of article conformance issues based on a loose quasi-consensus of a WP project group; so rigid that it is stifling to creative liberty. In practical use, it has amounted to what appears to be article ownership, being accounted for with the paraphrased response "what we say over in this project is what goes!". This notion is incorrect and needs to be pointed out. The Wiki community trumps that; the larger community mandates to the smaller group, not the other way around. Hopefully this will help prevent problems in the future.
I agree with Someguy's suggestion.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 15:21, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
Well, if all we want is a statement that the recommended structure is not binding, then that's already present—it's quite explicitly stated in the passage Some guy quoted above.
However, I think that there's still value to holding a discussion along these lines, even if we decide not to write an amended structure into the style guide. Our main objective, after all, is not to produce a dogmatic rule that people can run around with and use as a club in debates on particular articles; rather, we want to see if we can't come up with some sort of "best practice" approach to organizing such articles. The sharing of ideas that's taking place has value in and of itself, in other words.
Aside from that, there are some valuable points being made that don't relate directly to the question of subsections, but rather point to notes we may want to make about the content of the existing, top-level sections (e.g. Commander Zulu's comments about excessive lists of accessories). Kirill [talk] [pf] 15:45, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
The existing guideline doesn't specifically mention subsections so we would need to add the little "subsections are acceptable and should be tailored to the specific article" or however we would phrase that. Considering "accessories" is already in the guidelines and there hasn't been any trouble, I strongly think we should leave it in. Many of the firearms articles I've already cited have two or three paragraphs about scopes, laser sights, rangefinders, grenade launches, bayonets, etc. I don't think there is any reason to assume anyone would add arbitrary lists of every accessory you can buy, and again if this became a problem it could be addressed on the article's talk page or the text just outright removed as part of the normal editing process. Some guy (talk) 20:01, 4 July 2009 (UTC)
If I can be honest here, I think a lot of the resistance to your suggestions is coming from the fact you're not "known" to WP:MILHIST or WP:GUNS. No-one likes "strangers" coming in and telling them what to do, and from what I've seen, most of your edits have been largely focused on the Sig 550 and H&K MP5 articles, with one or two forays into things like M1 Garand. It's not a criticism, just an observation. The point is, you can jump up and down about how Wikipedia should work (ie, anyone can edit anything), but without the support of the projects maintaining the articles, you're going to be in constant revert wars. Also- and this isn't a comment or criticism on you personally, but a general observation- the edits made to firearm articles by people not "known" to the Project are, IMHO, generally useless, vandalistic, or otherwise flawed in some way. So, rather than trying to force your ideas on the Projects and getting annoyed when people say things you don't want to hear, why not spend a bit of time helping to improve articles by finding cites for articles lacking them, expanding "stub" articles, or generally improving them without getting too hung up on the presence/absence (or number) of subsections? We can use all the help we can get, and we'd really rather work with you than be arguing with you, believe me. Commander Zulu (talk) 08:51, 5 July 2009 (UTC)
CZ, your comment "the edits made to firearm articles by people not "known" to the Project are, IMHO, generally useless, vandalistic, or otherwise flawed in some way." seems to be at the core of the problem. The other two who took this attitude are now sitting out with one week blocks each. They don't exactly make you or this project look good when they act that clannish and you defend them. This group/project has no authority. You need to understand that and so should they. This would go a long way towards problem prevention.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 00:20, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, who are you? Oh, right, someone else with no connection to the project appearing out of thin air to back up the guy (also with no real connection to the project) getting upset that no-one agrees with him. Look, the various MILHIST related topics need a lot of specialist expertise and the members here have put a lot of work into it to bring up the quality of the articles. Now, if new users come in and say "Hi, I'm new user and I've got some suggestions" then we're all going to say "Hello, welcome, let's hear your new suggestions!" and provided they're not silly, we're likely to say "sure, go ahead". But when a "New Guy" comes in, makes changes, and, instead of proving he has anything valuable to contribute, throws a wobbly and starts canvassing half of Wikipedia to find someone who agrees with him, and starts trying to force and established project to adopt changes that no-one else supports. I think we're perfectly entitled to say "Go away and stop being a nuisance." And so what if we are being Elitist? I think, in this project's case, it's more than a little justified. Commander Zulu (talk) 00:38, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
Guys, can we please not start arguing over how much people have contributed again? Some guy and Berean may not be well-known editors here, true; but let's focus on the substance of the suggestions they've made, not on any personal matters. Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:44, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
One mistake that I'd like to correct - the group I was speaking of is the one from whence the problems arise, WP:Firearms and not WP:MILHIST...but if those attitudes prevail in any WP Project I will disagree with them. I'm not trying to pick nits...I happen to see this as fundamentally wrong and non-conducive to the editing environment. Nothing personal intended.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 01:28, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
If I were to summarise your last comment, I think it would come out "You are new here, we don't open up to new people, and we are more important and influential than you". That may not be your point but it reads that way. That type of attitude is nearly elitist behavior (not to mention ownership again), which is not what Wikipedia is about. Obviously those with detailed knowledge of a subject should have an influence and their (presumably) superior knowledge should help them maintain article quality and weed out misinformed or otherwise incorrect information, etc etc. My "experience" with editing the firearms articles, while rather irrelevant, has been limited by ridiculously extensive attempts to suppress my organizational changes through reversion and personal attacks. If I didn't have to go through this whole beuracratic process, I would have already improved the organization of ten, twenty, maybe thirty articles. I am clearly not adding factually inaccurate text to any article, nor am I removing any text. My objective is to make these articles more organized and accessible per manual of style and general readability concerns. If subsections and organization are not a concern of the project members, that is all the more reason to let me take care of these issues myself. Considering all of the non-project members who have chimed in with their opinions that the subsections improve article approachability and readability, I think it is important to consider this question: who are you concerning yourself about, the members of the project or Wikipedia readers on whole? EDIT: This discussion is off-topic and I would like to stop. (talk) 10:51, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

(undent) Should we take a vote on the structural changes or something? I think the actual discussion on changing article structure is nearly dead and this is so convoluted that we are not likely to get any more outside opinion. I would like to request that "development" be specifically listed as a history subsection even if we don't list any other subsections. Some guy

To be quite honest, I don't see the urgency here. This discussion has been open for less than a week; and while I think it's fair to say that nobody is arguing against the basic proposal (that additional subsections are allowed), I don't think we've exhausted the possibilities of the discussion on any specific subsections we may want to recommend. Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:44, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
All right, perfectly fine with me. Do you have any more opinions or suggestions? When I was trying to organize the incredibly bloated Steyr Aug article I came up with "adaptability" as a subsection (maybe "modularity" would be better) but I don't know how many articles that would apply to, so that's probably a Steyr Aug-specific section. The M1 Garand article has a "Effects in the Field" section which discusses the weapon's influence in the war; I think this is a good section idea, especially for articles with mammoth history sections (like the Garand article).
I notice that the M1918 Browning Automatic Rifle uses the "history" section of the article to cover development and testing, while a separate "deployment" section covers usage in the military and beyond. This contrasts with the Thompson M1 article which has "history and service" in one extremely long section. Either way I think this clearly illustrates the need for separate development and service sections. I think "development" ("and trials" if applicable) is more appropriate that "history" for such cases, but I can't decide between "service", "deployment", "operational history", or whatever (nor whether we need to decide on specific uniform names) or whether it is more appropriate to use subsections under "History" or separate sections. Some guy (talk) 06:26, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm going to Oppose the currently proposed changes as I feel they're entirely too... prestrictive, for want of a better term. Rather, I think each article should be taken on a case-by-case basis regarding the number, type, and nature of subsections that may (or may not be) required. Commander Zulu (talk) 07:15, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

That essentially agrees with what I've been saying recently, doesn't it? I'm kind of in a toss-up about whether suggesting specific subsections is necessary, but it shouldn't hurt. I just had a thought - I think we should give guidelines on appropriate section lengths, as seen in Wikipedia:Section#Section size policies. It should be abundantly clear that sections of over 1000 words are not acceptable. I think that 80 words is too short, considering individual paragraphs will easily run over 150 words, but something around 500 words should generally be the upper limit before a section or subsection break appears. Some guy (talk) 08:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
You can't keep changing the goalposts. Firstly it's a "proposed article structure", which even you are saying you disagree with (at least, that's how it reads), and then it's "No, wait, actually, I meant we should have word length guidelines." To which I say: No. You yourself say that Wiki has too many rules and too much bureaucracy, and you want to create more? You must know that as as soon as we establish any sort of "guidelines" regarding wordcounts or whatever, people are going to start using them as The Final Word On The Subject and cause even more fights over whatever the issue in question is. Out of curiosity, do you really want to be a contributing member of the project? I mean, so far, you haven't joined either the MILHIST or GUNS projects and you've successfully managed to get two prominent editors blocked for a week for (essentially) disagreeing with you. That's not what I'd call "helpful", or "constructive", you understand. Commander Zulu (talk) 09:38, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Yes, first it was a proposed modification to the article structure guidelines, with the intention of adding subsections to complement the broad sections. Considering my original comment "I also strongly feel that organizing an article to suit its specific contents is far more important than maintaining the same organization across all firearms articles", I do not feel it is appropriate to label my suggestions as thought they were intended to be rigid. I have since been thinking it is more appropriate to just add a note to the existing guideline saying subsections are acceptable. I never said "no, wait, actually" anything, I just had the idea to amend word length guidelines to the existing structure guideline, not replace them. Do not put words in my mouth. Guidelines are guidelines and as with everything else I have proposed they are not "hard and fast" rules of rigid universal application. Word count guidelines would help to supplement the use of subsections (not to mention it would be basically restating existing MOS policy); if you have a reason as to how this would negatively impact article quality, please focus on that. No, I do not wish to be a member of the project, I wish to edit and contribute independently on my own merit. Both of those editors were reviewed and blocked by independent administrators due to personal attacks. If you wish to discuss that off-topic matter further, feel free to contact me on my user talk page. Some guy (talk) 10:20, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
If you are not prepared to join the project, then I respectfully suggest you apologise for your impertinence and wasting of our time and remove your proposal forthwith. Do you seriously think we're going to adopt your suggestions and value you "on your own merits" when you've basically said "Oh, I'm too good to join you" after thinking you can tell us how we should be doing things and having prominent editors blocked? It's related to the very heart of the discussion. Why should we listen to you? Commander Zulu (talk) 10:36, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
That is exactly the type of behavior I do not wish to involve myself with. I will wait for others to comment on your words. Some guy (talk) 10:39, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
The proposals made by SomeGuy seem fairly reasonable, and the fact he ahs modified his position slightly during the discussions seems to show that he's committed to the goal of consensus. Does it really matter if he hasn't "officially" signed up for this project. All editors are equal. David Underdown (talk) 10:43, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
I think another relevant point is this is Wikiproject Military History and the structure policy falls under Manual of Style and I'm not sure how Wikiproject Firearms members would be able to assume ownership and control of the structure guidelines. Some guy (talk) 11:05, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
The idea of having a general guideline on section size strikes me as more useful, at this point, than a specific guideline on the subsections in the article, given that people are pointing out that the section layout can be, and is, interpreted in significantly different ways in different articles. We don't want to end up in a situation where we over-specify how an article should be written, even if we do put up disclaimers that we're not trying to do so.
Is a thousand words a reasonable upper limit for sections in general? I don't think we should have any articles that would violate it, but someone might want to do a quick scan through the showcase and see if that's consistent with how articles are being organized in practice.
Other than the mention at Help:Section, is section (rather than article) size mentioned anywhere in the MoS? Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
Not that I've found. Help:Section isn't MOS is it? Sorry for the mistake. I think 1000 words is still far too much, honestly, again I think the upper limit should be somewhere around five hundred. If you look at the design details section (excluding the accessories section) at MP5 right now, it is a little over 1100 words, for comparison. I can't imagine any situation where a section that long without subsections would be appropriate. Some guy (talk) 20:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Support, with the understanding that the proposed structure is open to adaptation as appropriate to the size and other circumstances of the articles. (I'm coming here from a RfC on Talk:SIG 550. I've not signed up for any project, and am not sure that I want to after reading the very strange comment by Commander Zulu above, but I've written some stubs about early Swiss rifles.)  Sandstein  10:56, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I should mention I'm not saying "How dare people not join!", I'm saying "How dare someone not join, try and make sweeping changes to article structures, get editors who disagree blocked, try and trawl round several different wikiprojects to get support, throw a wobbly when that doesn't materialise, try and force a major project to change its article structures, change his mind on what they actually want, and still insist they're too good to take a few seconds to add their name to the list of project members and generally prove they want to help instead of being a nuisance." Ironically I'm not involved with the SIG 550 article, FWIW. Commander Zulu (talk) 11:04, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
You are attacking me as an editor instead of the substance of my edits. Why does adding subsections and structure guidelines hurt the project? How does it negatively impact article quality? Since you clearly take issue with me personally I invite you to discuss this at my user talk. Otherwise, if you are criticizing me (and your perception of my behavior) instead of the quality of the changes I am suggesting, it does not strengthen your position. EDIT: And besides that, you said you were asking "out of curiousity". Some guy (talk) 11:10, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
I will reiterate, yet again, my request that people not focus on personal differences here. Please, let's keep this discussion limited to firearms articles, not firearms editors. Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
That's what I want to do. Some guy (talk) 20:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

OK, having had a decent night's sleep a a nice cup of coffee, I'll look at this in a new(er) light and say that I might have been a little... heated yesterday, and I apologise for that. However, seeing as the topic is a now a meandering, convoluted mess and the original proposal has been amended, changed, lost, found, lost again, found again, subjected to public enquiry, and finally buried in soft peat for thee months, I'm going to suggest that a new, Definitive Proposal be drawn up that clearly and concisely outlines the full extent of the proposed changes, and is left available for viewing, comment, and discussion for an extended period of time- say, three months or so. It might look like it's only "adding a few subsections" but for the people actually doing the work (ie maintaining the articles) it's quite a bit more complex than that, and I think it needs some serious comment and discussion from a much wider editor base than it currently has. Especially because it's not an Urgent change- it doesn't need to happen right now. If it's going to happen, I think it should happen for the right reasons, and not because someone suddenly has a bee in their bonnet. Commander Zulu (talk) 22:25, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Where did you get lost in a soft peat for three months? I must have missed those three months. We can't have a definitive proposal because we are still discussing what changes we'd like. I agree that feedback is important, perhaps starting the RfC process at this discussion and some of the relevant firearms articles would be a good way to get more outside opinion. How exactly is it "quite a bit more complex than that"? Again, we need to place the average reader's ability to read and comprehend the article at the top of these concerns. It is not imminently urgent but waiting three months is absurd; in the meantime, many readers who looks at the article might think "this is a horrible wall of text" and move on, thus not benefiting at all from the article's contents. We are trying to do this for all the right reasons - manual of style, WP:MTAA, the section sizing policy, and of course general readability concerns. I invite anyone to comment on my sandbox edits at User:Some guy/SG 550 (though personally I like this version [13] a lot better) and User:Some guy/MP5. These are not perfect (I think a more appropriate name than "firing mechanics" could be chosen) but I think they are good starts and this is Wikipedia so anyone could always make them better. For the time being please feel free to comment here or at the sandbox article talk pages, or edit the sandbox articles to try improving them. Some guy (talk) 23:50, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
How about (seriously) No Changes Needed, Formalising The Subsections Will Only Lead To Wikilawyering, Arguments, And Disharmony. That's my view on the subject. I've got no problem at all with additional subsections in articles. My problem is having an expanded Prescribed List of subsections that should appear in articles. I feel each article should be taken on a case-by-case basis via discussion on its talk page. Commander Zulu (talk) 00:07, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
Wow. That is completely opposite from what the two guys from your group told Someguy! See Talk:Heckler & Koch MP5#Request for Comment: Article Accessiblity.

"Stop playing the field. Please take this to the WP:GUNS talk page and ask for a review of the consensus on article organization. You are attempting to ask the same WRONG question multiple times. Asking to change each article individually rather than changing the general consensus is wrong. --Nukes4Tots (talk) 14:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)"

...and Koa told him to make his proposal in this way on Talk:SIG_SG_550#Request for Comment: Article Accessiblity...

I do not object to the idea of subsections, just your methods of trying to implement your own interpretation of the MOS. Devise a universal guide on how to use the new subsections, work out the nomenclature, bring it up on the project page and we'll discuss the merits of the idea. You like to hide behind Wiki-policies and refer to them selectively, when they work in your favour. We're going to make you abide by these same procedures. Consensus-building, it can take some time. Hopefully, you'll lose interest and move on to troll 50 Cent by that time. Koalorka (talk) 01:04, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

They practically kicked him off the talk pages telling him that he had to go to a project to get a consensus. Now, you are backpedaling...do you guys at WP:Firearms know what you are doing? Looks very unprofessional especially in light of your post to Some guy's talk page which seems the epitome of bad faith. You seem to also be hinting that the consensus here in MILHIST might not be good enough...
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 01:06, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
I believe we agreed that we were going to discuss articles, not editors? If you have a personal conflict with another editor, please take it to dispute resolution. This project has no control over anything you might have been told at some other project, in any case.
In the meantime, I will reiterate my opinion that a guideline on section size and general subsectioning would be more useful at this point than a list of possible subsections. I don't think (and please correct me if I'm wrong) there's really anyone objecting to the idea that we should try to avoid overly long sections; and the existing guidelines already state that the list of areas is not meant to be a binding set of sections anyways. Kirill [talk] [pf] 02:06, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm pointing out that they are double-talking...it isn't a problem with an editor, rather it is pointing out the flaws in their logic. CZ has made his point and I am making a counterpoint using what Some guy was told by CZ's projectmates. It is a contradiction, yes? I would like to know how they reconcile this. I'm not aiming anything personal at any editors here.
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 02:16, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
It isn't double-talk when you've got different people doing the talking. What we have here is purely a difference of opinions as one must expect when you have multiple people expressing their opinions, period. I would be lying if I tried to say all members of the project are of the same opinion, because we are rather diverse in beliefs, likes, and dislikes which leads to different opinions on the same subject.--LWF (talk) 02:31, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
It may be important to educate some users that their individual opinions do not necessarily represent the project as a whole. Based on the current discussion, can I be reasonably assured that if I add subsections to some articles, the subsections will not be removed because they are changing the structure of the article? I will again reiterate that I believe the policy should specifically state that subsections are acceptable and that we should have section word count guidelines to avoid exactly the type of situation that led to all of this. Having clearer policy gives us better standards and can reduce arbitrary arguments and disharmony. Look at all the disharmony that has occured already. Would anyone else like to give their opinions or suggestions on word count guidelines? Some guy (talk) 07:37, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
User:Koalorka used an anonymous IP address to add subsections similar to what I doing at the SG 550 article. Some guy (talk) 00:14, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
No-one disagrees with the idea of subsections. Most articles have them in them. The disagreement is with the idea of having a formalised list of Approved Or Suggested Subsections And Word Limits Thereof. And I think it should be noticed that the "disharmony" has only occurred because someone suggested changes be made and has been rather insistent about it. There's no rush on this- and I still really don't think it's something that needs formalised guidelines anyway. Commander Zulu (talk) 00:32, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
STOP. Your continually twisting of my words is inappropriate. I will not continue to reexplain myself, you know perfectly well how many times I've said they are if-applicable suggestions that are not rigid. I have repeatedly stated I am currently more interested in adding "subsections are appropriate and should be tailored to suit the contents of the article" and that I believe we should give guidelines on section word length - you are the only person so far who has expressed disagreement with word limits. I do not like that you capitalize your phrases that are supposed to reflect my ideas as if I am imposing them as mandates. Please remain on topic. Some guy (talk) 01:14, 9 July 2009 (UTC)
My above comment was in relation your your (now deleted) remark from the post I was responding to: I would assume this reflects general agreement with the idea of including subsections. The comment was there when I started composing my reply, and I did not receive an "Edit Conflict" notification to inform me it had been removed when I posted it. Commander Zulu (talk) 01:25, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Options for moving forward

From my reading of the discussion so far, I think we have three somewhat distinct changes proposed:

  1. Specify that, in general, subsections within the areas specified in the article structure recommendations may be created at the discretion of each article's editors.
  2. Specify that, in general, sections should be no longer than some particular length (e.g. 500 words, 1000 words, etc.), and that subsections should be introduced in overly lengthy ones.
  3. Specify a particular set of recommended subsections specifically for firearms articles.

Did I miss anything? (Obviously, we could adopt more than one of these changes, or make no change at all and leave the guidelines as they currently are.)

What do people think about each of these proposals? Are any of them worth proceeding with, or do we need to go back to the drawing board? Kirill [talk] [pf] 05:26, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I think we should go with one and two. If I am unable to continue participating in the discussion from this point I vote for one and two, or whatever. Some guy (talk) 05:29, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
Any other thoughts? Kirill [talk] [pf] 01:36, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
I'm happy with Option One and Part II of Option Two. So, Subsections can be created at the discretion of each article's editors, and subsections should be introduced in overly lengthy sections. I'm not in favour of prescribing a particular word limit- suggested or otherwise- on section sizes, nor am I in favour of Option Three. Commander Zulu (talk) 03:13, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
I think that leaving things open to discretion with no specific guidelines creates the kind of problem that led to this proposal in the first place, and that we need to give guidelines. How do you propose that a debate over section length in a specific article would be settled without a guideline? Some guy (talk) 04:02, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
I honestly think we were managing fine before, at least in that regard. Common sense says that when you've got a huge Wall O'Text it's a good idea to break it up with sub-sections, but if we start introducing word limits (even suggested ones) all we're doing is creating more work. If we establish word limits, my concern is we're going to have people going though the articles and going "Right, that's 500 words, time for a subsection". And even with the best intentions in the world, there are still other aspects of firearm articles that really do need attention with a higher priority than the exact size of article subsections. By removing the suggested word limits but giving the thumbs-up to subsections in large sections, I think we're getting the best of both worlds and reaching a fair compromise on the issue. Commander Zulu (talk) 05:01, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
I mostly understand what you mean, but why is it more work? And what's wrong with having people go through the articles and think to add a subsection? Most users won't even be aware of the guideline anyway, so I doubt we'd get some sort of mad subsectioning rush. The existing section size guidelines at Help:Section#Section size guidelines say 80-250 words per section in "hard" knowledge articles but I don't see any problem with people running around brandishing those guidelines - the MilHist ones will be even less well known. My two cents, anyway. Some guy (talk) 09:49, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
It's more work because, simply, someone has to change the articles. And the work that someone is doing really needs (IMHO) to be applied elsewhere, especially as we're now running out of of "established" editors (Nukes has been blocked for a month, Koalorka has quit, as has Yaf, LWF has had enough, and I'm not entirely sure how "involved" I feel like being in the future), and there's been a curious silence from many of the other "regulars". Rather than trying to shoehorn subsections in, I'd rather see a concerted effort made to reference articles or get pictures or expand stub articles before we worry about fiddling with the larger articles. Again, just my thoughts. Commander Zulu (talk) 23:49, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
Nobody has to change anything, but I'll do the subsections myself. I'll do all of them on every firearm article that needs them if I have to, it's not that big of a deal. Most of the articles I've looked at already have too many pictures. I got the impression that some of those editors were mostly doing reversions anyway. Some guy (talk) 03:02, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Let's not get ahead of ourselves- I don't want to get involved in a "Too many images" argument as well, especially seeing as we still haven't got this issue resolved yet. And I'd still like some input from other MILHIST or GUNS editors, as their lack of input so far troubles me. Is it some sort of holiday period in the US? Commander Zulu (talk) 03:25, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
I am not trying to have a "too many images" argument. It's summer, but that shouldn't stop everyone from contributing. Some guy (talk) 06:00, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Ah, that explains it. People may be on holiday or away from university/work/wherever they usually edit Wikipedia from. Just seems unusually quiet here, that's all. Commander Zulu (talk) 06:19, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Indeed, that's probably it, particularly if a high proportion of the editors are university students; many in that group tend to spend much of the summer offline. Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:21, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
(comment) Also, rather sadly, there are also quite a number of folk who are out of work, forced to move and sell belongings or having their lives turned upside down. Contributing at the Wiki might be low on the totem pole to those people at the moment. I know quite a few in real life who are scrambling to make ends meet.
(observation) I don't think there are too many images in the articles..quite the opposite since I'm trying to take a few good shots to add.
(2nd observation) The two of you are closer to agreeing than you may think. Are there any more examples of firearm articles with sections that someone would say are currently too long? Heckler & Koch MP5#Design details is 1106 words long. Limitations in guidelines can be tricky. The word length for the Heckler & Koch MP5#Users section is longer with 1169 words. What affect would such a limit have on the Users section? (Actually, my recommendation there would be to make the Users a subpage of the main article with a hatnote.)
⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 12:11, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
The "Users" section is a somewhat unusual case, since that's essentially a bulleted list rather than normal prose. I'm not sure that word count would be the best way to measure how readable something like that would be, particularly since we would need to consider if the same point applies to pure list articles. Perhaps we ought to consider coming up with a general approach to handling list sections in articles, but I'm not quite sure what a good one might be. Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:26, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
I don't think there is any need to subsection the Users section. As per problem articles, besides MP5, there is Steyr Aug (design details), Thompson submachine gun (history and service), M1 Garand (history), Heckler & Koch G36 (design details), FN Minimi (design details), FN F2000 (design details) and I think quite a few others. Koalorka fixed SG 550. Some guy (talk) 19:40, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Given the responses so far—I think we've reached some agreement on basic principles, if not necessarily the specific details—I would suggest the following things for the near term:
  1. Add a clause to WP:MILMOS#STRUCTURE: "The recommended structures may be further broken down into subsections if judged appropriate by each article's editors." This should really go without saying, but there's no harm that I can see in making it explicit.
  2. Add a clause under "Usage and style" as WP:MILMOS#SECTLEN: "Overly lengthy continuous blocks of text should be avoided; sections which are so long as to impede reader understanding should be broken down into subsections. There remains some disagreement regarding the precise point at which a section becomes too long, however, so editors are encouraged to use their own judgment." We can continue the discussion here to see if we can come up with some rule-of-thumb numbers for section length; but I think it's generally accepted, both within the project and throughout Wikipedia, that there is some point at which a section becomes too long.
  3. Table the proposal to recommend explicit firearms sections for the time being.
Comments? Would this be acceptable to everyone in the short term? Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:21, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Agree ⋙–Berean–Hunter—► ((⊕)) 12:28, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Comment, since there are some basic guidlines at Help:Section#Section size guidelines it probably makes sense to link to those. David Underdown (talk) 12:48, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Mostly Agree - I strongly think we should modify the phrase "each article's editors" because that potentially creates ownership problems. I think it would be better to say "if judged appropriate for the article's content". As David Underdown said, we should link to the section size guidelines if we don't make our own suggestions. Some guy (talk) 19:40, 15 July 2009 (UTC)
Fair point on linking to something if we don't have our own. As far as the wording is concerned, it's fairly standard throughout our various guidelines, and is used to indicate that changes need only article-level consensus, not project-level or anything of that sort. Is there some other wording that you'd prefer which would capture the same point? Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:49, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
Er... "if judged appropriate for the article's content"? Some guy (talk) 04:45, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Just throwing this out here - Would it help if we considered splitting overly long sections out into new main articles for those subtopics? Article namespace is cheap; hyper/wikilinks are cheap; eyestrain due to overly long articles is expensive... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:32, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

That's only a good idea if the split section can be made to stand on its own, I think. We don't want to wind up with articles that forever remain sub-par because their topics were overly narrow facets of some other article. Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:49, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
I think for the most part we wouldn't help anything by splitting articles, but in some cases it might be more appropriate to have a seperate general article for how something works mechanically - for example links to closed bolt and roller-delayed blowback seem a lot more appropriate than having four paragraphs about the inner mechanical workings of the MP5. I'm pretty sure the Honda Accord and Toyota Corolla don't have identical engines but the articles don't delve unnecessarily into the inner mechanical differences. Features and specs are more useful and memorable to the average reader. Some guy (talk) 04:45, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Does anyone else have any comments, or should we go ahead with the minimalist approach above? Kirill [talk] [pf] 00:42, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm still wondering about that "if judged appropriate for the article's content" bit. Some guy (talk) 08:52, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
That's fine, I think, although it's clearer as "if judged appropriate for each article's content". Kirill [talk] [pf] 10:57, 22 July 2009 (UTC)
Sounds good. Some guy (talk) 20:12, 23 July 2009 (UTC)

As there haven't been any objections to the last set of proposals, I've gone ahead and added the two general notes (on the permissibility of subsections and excessive section length). If anyone would like to continue discussing a more precise threshold for section length, we can do that at this point; otherwise, we can leave it for a later discussion.

Any other comments or suggestions are, of course, very welcome. Kirill [talk] [pf] 03:10, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Military_history/Archive_88&oldid=1153966950"