The review department of the Military history WikiProject is the project's main forum for conducting detailed reviews—both formal and informal—of particular articles and other content within its scope. Requests for B-Class assessment, which any reviewer may assign, can be made here.
The department hosts two forms of review internal to the project:
Peer review (an informal review meant to provide ideas for further improvement)
You may wish to fix your citations for locations; as an offering, I have done this for you (feel free to revert). In particular: No state locations for international cities, "England" => "United Kingdom" problem, contraction vs no-contraction.
4 ISBNs tested okay.
Spotcheck for plagiarism / copyright on the one available online source tested okay
I can't find any problems, touch my talk page to allow me to note these facts when you hit FAC. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:14, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think the placement of "Parasite aircraft were unusual for aviation." at the end of the first para of "Development" is a bid odd; is there a way to merge this into the paragraph?
Merged into the second para.
Italicise "Arado Flugzeugwerke" – foreign word.
Done.
"External links" should be placed at the very end.
Done.
"The Mark II was very similar to the Mark I besides having a larger overall size and smaller fins." Can there be an explanation telling the reader about the longer moment arm necessitates a smaller fin?
I don't understand what you mean myself :), so I don't think I'm the one to explain.
Naturally, a reader would think that, if the a/c is bigger, then the fins should accordingly be enlarged. This is not the case - a longer aircraft only requires a smaller fin; it's to do with aerodynamics, which is not my field of expertise. I recommend Bobrayner as the go-to man. Sp33dyphilVote!08:24, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"There were three proposed designs for the plane, each being slightly different from each other." Consider "There were three proposed designs for the plane, each being slightly different from the other."
"launched from an Arado Ar 234 carrier aircraft to attack Allied aircraft." Consider "launched from an Arado Ar 234 carrier aircraft to attack Allied bombers."
Development
I think "...placing the pilot in the prone position, which increased the sustainable g-force limit." needs a citation;
Consider deleting "...Parasite aircraft were unusual for aviation.[3]" Unless we can explain why they were unusual to the typical "non-aircraft" type reader;
Last sentence: "This is because the aircraft was cancelled, due to a lack of funds, mother aircraft Ar 234s and a lack of interest by the Ministry of Aviation" - what was the issue with mother aircraft Ar 234s? Shortage or they did not yet exist?
Arado E.381/I
"The pilot would lie in a prone position in the very cramped cockpit behind a removable 140-millimeter (5.5 in) bullet-resistant glass screen mounted in front of the pilot" - think you can remove the second reference to "the pilot;"
"The aircraft's straight wings had a blister for a single MK 108 30 mm (1.2 in) cannon and..." If the wings had "blisters" there would have been two of them, implying two cannon. If there was only one "blister" then is would have been on one wing only or center aligned between the wings. Think this needs explaining.
The text related to the different variants reads as if they were actually built - contrary to the text in the design section. Perhaps the text in the variants section must indicate that these were design variations and not actual prototypes which differed from one-another.
Specifications
Is the text "Data from Aircraft of the Luftwaffe 1935–1945: An Illustrated History[6] for the Arado E.381/I" needed? Surely a simple cite will suffice?
General
"External Links" section is duplicated.
The "Science, Technology, and National Socialism" source can be referenced on-line here [1], pp103-105
I fiddled with the lead section again, let me know if that doesn't work for you.
"All these proposals exploited the Luftwaffe's concept of "gaining a tactical advantage by placing excessive stress on the man in the cockpit".": Why did the Luftwaffe think it gave them an advantage to put excessive stress on their own pilots? Or was the stress on the Allied pilots, and if so, what was the stress?
I have added Notes explaining the intentions of the Outcome column. It seems hard to explain the difference between Tactical and Strategic results, moreso to those who are looking to glorify or tarnish Wellington without any real understanding of how battles are studied. I am worried that without clearly explaining the columns content the table will become an easy target for people who get involved in edit wars because their interpretations of historical data opposes that of the article. If anyone has any suggestions as how I could rephrase the Notes better, it would be appreciated. I realise that the discussion page is always available for people to dispute the entries in detail, but for unregistered readers this is likely to be ignored and edits made regardless.
Where is the source, preferably high quality, which establishes the notability of this topic? You suggest "An important question often asked by historians of the Napoleonic Wars...", cite someone.
While this is a list format encyclopaedia entry, and we should be slightly more forgiving regarding SYNTHESIS by collation if notability is established, you do not give inline citations for a large number of the battles.
Your webcitations need to be improved to MILMOS standards. Authors, publishers, works (ie "Wellesley") in other works (ie "Fred's Big Book of UK Commanders Online") etc... Fifelfoo (talk) 02:53, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The name "Duke of Wellington" would appear to give this notability, given his importance in British and European history - though I fail to understand why I would need a high quality source or to cite someone for a nomination - what significance is that to the article itself? Google for "Wellington's battles" you get a range of questions about his military career and various aspects of it that are nor answered clearly anywhere. If you need a name.. me.. I'm interested in how many battle he fought, lost and won. Anyone who studies history is a historian, they don't need to be a scholar or author to qualify.
"SYNTHESIS by collation" - means? A lot of the battles listed have their own articles, which in turn include detailed accounts and references. Do encyclopaedias not cross-reference? I have invested a great deal of effort citing a lot of the battles that are lesser known, than say Waterloo - I'm not sure why it would be necessary to duplicate references further? Again, if you could explain.
Your MILMOS comment was again too brief to be clear. Sounds like you're refering to secondary sources based on primary sources.. which is basically citing a source from the bibliography of a source to be cited on Wiki?
No worries. The notability of the topic of "Battle Record of Wellington" needs to be separately established regardless of the notability of "Wellington" himself. (The trivial example is "Blue" is notable, whereas "List of Blue Things" is not inherently notable). If historians have debated the number of battles he participated in, then you ought to cite this debate as the cause of the notability of the topic. I believe you when you say that it has been debated by scholars and is therefore notable, but this needs to be cited in the article. Add this point to the article, and cite a number of historians in the debate, and the topic is notable beyond any criticism.
This is a list type article. For a normal type article the collation of events not mentioned in conjunction in HQRS would be synthetic original research. However, this is a list (and it justifiably and rightly) takes most battles from a major source, and then adds minor battles from other sources. Because Wikipedia is not read hypertextually, we cannot rely on other articles's citations to support this article. Each article must cite its points of fact on that article itself. The solution to this is easy, for currently uncited battles, find a scholarly hqrs from that article mentioning that Wellington was there, and cite it in your article. (I see no reason this couldn't be a Featured List btw).
" "The Duke of Wellington". Retrieved 28 April 2011." ought to be cited as Jane Wellesley (2004) "[# The Duke of Wellington]" Articles United Kingdom: Association of Friends of the Waterloo Committee. Retrieved 28 April 2011.; Websites need to be fully cited, with authors, titles, works that item is contained in (ie: "The Duke of Wellington" in Articles) publishers, publisher location where available, year. When, and only when, elements of this are unavailable should they be left out. Many readers use the citations to determine the quality of the article, and they resent having to extract the citation data from dead weblinks. It is also a requirement of MILHIST B and A class articles that we cite correctly (and I see no reason why this couldn't climb the ladder to greatness). Fifelfoo (talk) 04:45, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I tried making the table sortable several times in my Sandbox, but date ranges (eg 4–10 April 1808 or 25 May–3 June 1810) will not sort correctly and cause the table to produce unusual results. I have tried to find a way round this without success. Not sure if there even is a fix. It has been suggested that it is not possible to sort date ranges. Some of the other details are sortable, although most of the entries are in an order already, ie Wars and Ranks.
Interesting article; good work so far. I have the following suggestions for possible improvement:
the lead needs a little work for clarity and flow. For instance "although not originally appointed as the British or Allied commander..." - this assumes in the lead that people already know who Wellesley was, when that might not necessarily be the case. It probably needs to be stated briefly who he was and what he was notable for (a sentence or two at the most); Done
do we know what units Wellesley commanded in those battles? If possible, it might be an idea to add this to the table;
citations needed: in the Military career section, the entire first paragraph is uncited, while the second half of the second paragraph also appears uncited - for B class and beyond and especially if aiming for FA or FL, I suggest adding more citations there and also possibly in the table; Done
I suggest wikilinking the ranks in the table (but only on first mention), as this will give casual readers a better understanding; Done
formatting: some of the citations appear to be in short form (e.g. "Jaques, p. 212") but then others are in long (e.g. "Fletcher, Ian; Younghusband, Tony (1997). Salamanca, 1812") is there are a reason for this? It would probably be best if they were all in short in the References section and then in long format in the Sources section; Done
per above, I suggest moving the full bibliographic details of the Fletcher & Younghusband, Riley, Ayrton and the two Napier works to the Sources section for consistency of style; Done
if possible author, publisher and accessdate information should be added to the web citations. AustralianRupert (talk)
Thanks for the feedback. Initial mention of each rank has been wikilinked.
Will be looking to add further external sources in the near future, when I get time to focus on it, and find good refs per battle.
With regards Jaques - his book was used so much I used short form entry in the References heading, and gave the full details of that book in the Sources section below - something I noted has been done extensively on the main article about Wellington due to repeated use of sources such as Holmes and Longford, seems like a practised method so I used it. Any book only used once has the long form.
Not sure if we know what units Wellesley commanded, though it may be recorded - in most cases on the table he would be overall commander, leading the whole army, if we were to add a column just to indicate what he commanded in his first few battles, the rest of the column would be blank and might look out of place. As the article develops I feel it might me better to create a separate section/s detailing any notable points of his participation for those battles, rather than a few simplified entries in the table. It could also allow more room for expansion of this and other articles.
Will be coming back to this article soon, its on short hold for the moment whilst I work on a few articles that the summer allows me, and to receive ample feedback and suggestions from this nomination to help push it further along.
You might want to provide a citation for the claim that Waterloo "left him traumatized", as it seems more opinion at this point and not supported by outside citations.
The flow in the first section is also a little off. You might also consider revising some of the "would remain" constructions to "remained" to give it better tone.Intothatdarkness (talk) 21:57, 17 May 2011 (UTC) Done[reply]
I read the "trauma" remark on another site and it also sounds a little opinionated there, and as its on a free tripod-hosted site not a dedicated source I'm a little hesitatnt to cite it. But I will try to find out if it was true, and have ordered Richard Holmes "The Iron Duke" book just now, which appears to be the best biog available on Wellington, and might allow me to reference that with more confidence. Although I have no doubt, personally, that any battle with 50,000 casualties lying around could break the will of even a man like Wellington I hope to shed some light on it. Ever see the end of "Waterloo" with Chris Plummer riding through the piles of bodies, reliving emotional moments of the battle, using the famous "hardest thing to a battle lost, is a battle won" quote? It is a poignant moment which may have some truth in it. Thanks for the feedback. Looking into it further as soon as possible.
Thanks. I agree with your analysis of the impact of Waterloo on Wellington, but if you're going to put that in there it's probably best to have a citation to back it up.Intothatdarkness (talk) 13:33, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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Old nomination (from March 2010) here. Time to try this again!
This was the first GA I wrote from scratch and it's one of only a small number of high-quality articles to which I added almost all the content, so it holds some sentimental value and, for some reason, I find the bloke fascinating. Anyway, the first ACR failed on comprehensiveness just over a year ago and I barely touched it since until a few weeks ago. I've re-written parts and hugely expanded the material on his service in Kosovo and early service in Iraq, which is where much of the criticism was directed last time. I think it's ready for A-class now and I'm pondering the prospect of taking it to FAC, so I'd appreciate comments in that general direction. Thanks for reviewing! HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 02:02, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply] Comments
"His first tour was in Germany, with the British Army of the Rhine in 1971," --> West Germany, as Germany wasn't reunited then.
I'm leaning to support, but was wondering about one or two things:
do we know where he lived when young, or which school he went to;
No idea. It's not even in Who's Who, which is the usual source for such things
"In early 2003, he was appointed the British representative ... following the invasion, and one of three deputies to American Lieutenant General Jay Garner." really needs a citation;
Ref'd before I saw your comment (a legacy from it being taken to pieces in my sandbox)
the two refs immediately before that are in the wrong order;
Fixed already
is the weighting on his religion fair? I'd be tempted to cut about a sentence off that, or add one (if one exists) that gives the reader some handle on how it affected his command;
I only make a big thing of the religion because he does—one doesn't appear on a series called Belief or on the Christian Broadcasting Network if one doesn't want to talk about it. I think I've mentioned how it affected his career, but there's another good quote or two I could find
has he received any special mentions/awards when a soldier?;
A CBE, but nothing else. The highly decorated officers usually come from combat units
"married" is mispelled in the lead;
No it's not
I'd cut "Having always wanted to be a soldier, Cross applied to join the army at the age of fourteen, but was rejected due to his age." from the lead, doesn't seem to warrant inclusion;
Snipped
in the early part of the "high command" section, are these part of UN, NATO, or merely Army operations, might that be worth a mention.
I added that they were NATO operations, but if I keep saying it, it gets a bit repetative, and it is in the first senstence of IFOR, SFOR and Kosovo Force.
None of that alone warrant opposition, but given the article's previous failings it might be worth addressing some – I would support once progress had been made. Grandiose(me, talk, contribs) 14:32, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sure. I didn't expect the list to be so long. I now support accordingly. (Not wishing to make a mountain out a molehill, but "married" was misspelled, and you corrected it. So it's dealt with. Grandiose(me, talk, contribs) 16:45, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support -- Another succinct and well-written article, little to copyedit as far as I'm concerned. Prose, content, structure, references and image look fine. As I suggested in a previous ACR, if you could find one or two free "contextual" images (not necessarily of him but representing actions in which he was closely involved) it'd be great, but nothing stopping this being promoted IMO. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:14, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks a lot. I see you fixed a few typos, so thanks for having a sharper eye than me (despite the three times I read the whole article just before I nominated it and the two since)! I've struggled to find any images that are at all relevant and freely licensed. I've sent an email requesting permission for another image of him on the Cranfield University website, but I think almost every educational establishment in England is off for the next week, so any response could take a while. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:30, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support - only a few minor comments:
Probably should be careful here. "Following his retirement, Cross attacked US foreign policy on Iraq, calling the plans "fatally flawed"..." Do the sources say he was attacking US foreign policy, or is this wording editorialising? If this is what the sources say then thats fine, however to me this sounds more like a criticism of operational planning than strategy.
Well he's criticised Donald Rumsfeld (then-US Defense Secretary) personally and almost all of the planning was done by the American departments of State and Defense, so I think it's probably fair.
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I am nominating this article for A-Class review because of the similarities to the List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross recipients (A), which is currently under A-Class review as well. The layout and structure is derived from the Oak Leaves lists, the majority of which are featured lists. Thanks for the feedback! MisterBee1966 (talk) 16:52, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support: looks pretty good to me and not much stands out to me. I have the following comments:
according to the Featured article tools there are no dab links and all the ext links appear to work (no action required);
the Earwig tool reports no copyright violations: [5] (no action required);
there is a possible mix of English variation. For instance, "authorised" (British Commonwealth English) v. "motorized" (typically US English);
this seems a little awkward: "Heer members received 51 of the medals...". Possibly just say "Heer members received 51 medals..." or "Fifty-one medals were awarded to members of the Heer...";
the images lack alt text. It is not a requirement, but you might consider adding it in (suggestion only);
you might consider adding some citations to the works listed in the Further reading section in order to expand the reference base, however, as the article content appears to represent the body of the literature available on the topic, it is probably not required (suggestion only). AustralianRupert (talk) 09:03, 11 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Prose looks good and I support on other grounds, but I'd question the way that the first paragraph has been referenced. It uses a single citation, Fellgiebel 2000, pp. 113–460, 483, 485–487, 499, 501, 503, 509. While I'm sure that Fellgiebel does state the information contained in the paragraph, I don't think its helpful to cite 353 pages of a book this way without breaking the reference up amongst the separate sentences. In purely practical terms, if I wanted to confirm that "The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross was awarded for a wide range of reasons and across all ranks, from a senior commander for skilled leadership of his troops in battle to a low ranking soldier for a single act of extreme gallantry," I'm being asked to read all of those 353 pages looking for that piece of information, which might take a while, when I suspect it is really just stated on one or two of those pages... End of paragraph references can usually work well, but in this case I really think it needs tweaking. I'd be very happy to support if this could be fixed. Hchc2009 (talk) 07:26, 26 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Trying to get back into the swing of content improvement and article promotion since the birth of my first child. I'd like to ultimately take this article to FAC but figured this might be a good intermediate step. Granted McCreary is better known as a politician than a military figure, but his military service does seem to have been an asset in his early politicial races, and was certainly an issue in his first run for governor. I welcome your comments and hope to respond in a timely manner, but I ask your indulgence if I don't get back promptly. Such is the way of things with a seven-month-old to attend to. Thanks. Acdixon(talk • contribs • count)14:22, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Use the same style for citations in Further Reading as you do in your Bibliography
Done.
No publisher location? Johnson, E. Polk (1912). I am aware works from 1912 may not have listed publisher locations, but double check
The book's title page listed both Chicago and New York. I'm guessing Chicago is more likely for this book.
"Biographical Directory of the United States Congress" may be worth formally citing in full to take it to FAC
Wonder why we don't just modify {{CongBio}} to match {{cite web}}? Seems to defeat the purpose of consistency.
Excellent encyclopaedia citation: Harrison, Lowell H. (1992).
Thanks!
" Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky. " either always cite UPoK with location, or never cite with location?
Copied and pasted these cites way too many times. Eventually, I'll remember to check this.
"Burckel, Nicholas C. (October 1978)." page run for the entire article within issue 76 for the bibliography? Page runs for contained chapters generally in the bibliography? Some Wikipedians believe this is optional for style due to table of contents in issues and collected works. You may believe this too, but if you haven't thought about it, have a quick think and consider your position.
My position would be to provide it if folks think it's helpful, I guess. I've done so here.
Support - not my area of expertise but I have reviewed due to the lack of other comments to date:
The citation check tool reveals no errors (no action required).
No dabs and external links check out (no action required).
File:James B Mccreary.jpg lacks alt text (although its not a requirement - you might consider adding it though).
I usually do, but I worked on this infobox so long ago I must have forgotten. Added.
The Earwig tool reveals no copyright vio issues (see [7]).
Missing word here I think: "where he remained prisoner through", possibly "where he remained a prisoner through".
Fixed.
Grammar here "future elections if the bill were not passed in the session", should this be "future elections if the bill was not passed in the session"?
I'm no grammarian, but I think this is an example of the English subjunctive. I'm open to correction on that, though.
Not sure either, might be the difference b/n American English and Australian English. Not a war stopper though. Happy to leave it as is. Anotherclown (talk) 03:25, 11 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Grammar again "Following these defeat, he resumed", should be "Following these defeats" I think.
Support: Looks fine to me, but I am also not an expert. I have a couple of minor comments, but nothing to hold up promotion in my opinion:
in the lead, I'm not sure whether this is an example of how US English differs from Australian English or not, but to me it seems like there are some missing words here: "Shortly after graduating law school, McCreary was chosen major of the..." (specifically perhaps this might be smoother: "Shortly after graduating from law school, McCreay was chosen as a major in the..." ). Additionally, the choice of words here depends upon whether or not "major" in this context is a rank or an appointment. For instance, "Smith was a major", or "Rupert became brigade major of the 11th Brigade". As such, the question to ask is, were there multiple majors in the 11th Kentucky, or just one?;
I believe "Shortly after graduating law school," is acceptable in US English, but I'm not opposed to adding the "from" if you think it helps. As for "McCreary was chosen major of the", I believe each unit had one colonel, lieutenant colonel, major, and one other rank which escapes me at the moment that formed its leadership. Since I primarily do politician articles, I can't be sure about that, though. I also believe it reflects the wording in the sources, but I'll have to double-check that too.
"Democratic party" and "Democratic Party" - inconsistent capitalisation;
All the missing second commas I see fit the pattern of "July 4, 1863" or "Richmond, Kentucky", both of which need commas at the end. Checking just the first two sections, there are 3 missing in Early life and 3 in Early political career. - Dank (push to talk) 14:19, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Not many A-class articles on British generals. Many are deserving of high-quality articles. But Boy Browning would probably not be the first to come to mind.
Did you know that he:
Claimed to have been born in the piano department of Harrods?
Well, there may be better-known British generals but few more interesting to write about I think, so don't blame you for taking it on...
Prose/content-wise, generally looks good although there were a fair few typos and writing was a little bit choppy and samey, plus I was left wanting more context in places; performed usual copyedit but a few points:
I don't think his status as a guards officer and bobsleigher really belongs in the first line. I'd suggest simply "...was a senior commander in the British Army" or something similar, then launch into your current second sentence re. "father of the British airborne forces", etc.
Done. A little queasy about putting his being an Olympian further down. He is unusual in that his wife is more famous than he is, but he is not famous as "Mr du Maurier". Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:29, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
At least you still have it in the first para... ;-) I think it reads really well now, improving on the wording I suggested. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:07, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Like to see the field narrowed a bit re. the "some" who saw him as "a ruthless and manipulative empire builder who brooked no opposition". Don't need names if it was no-one famous but were they subordinates, peers, politicans or who?
Added a bit from Gavin, naming some prominent generals, although this gets split from the initial comments to keep things in chronological order. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:29, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, reckon if it's prominent people they may as well be named. I think we've lost the original comment/quote though, which even if it were an historian would still serve as a useful intro to the generals' quotes. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:07, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Restored quote from William F. Buckingham. He wrote his PhD on the airborne forces, but is not famous enough to have his own article. Hawkeye7 (talk) 11:16, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think we're left hanging re. Torch; after he agitated so strongly to get his his troops involved, how did they go in the end?
"On 16 April 1944 he officially became commander of I Airborne Corps, a title he had already assumed" -- I don't think the last clause works unless you can put a date to his unofficial assumption.
Again in Market Garden, I think we need a bit more context/detail, say a few more sentences between his famous warning and the bit about his teddy bears -- what about him overriding intel warnings of German tanks at Arnhem for instance, and/or some other tidbits from the planning stage?
Added a bit on the intel and drop zones. Not sure about the teddy bears. I think it had something to do with his three children, but cannot find a source to explain it. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:57, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"His use of 38 aircraft to move his corps headquarters on the first lift has been criticised" -- I don't doubt it but why exactly and by whom (i.e. contemporary observers or historians or both)?
Images are good and nice to see some colour in an article mainly focussed on WWII. Licensing generally appears appropriate but the one of the shoulder flash appears contradictory to me -- product of the British government yet being released by a user as his own work...
Yes, there is a common belief that the war was fought in black and white. I also have a colour print of the main photograph (right), Boy Browning but decided not to use it because it i smaller. Annoyingly, although both prints come from the IWM, they have different dates. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:36, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've seen that with AWM images too. I do like the colour one but not sure how good it would be at the infobox's larger size. At least you have colour elsewhere -- I think the only bios I've done with even one colour image are Dicky Williams and George Jones so you're doing well with this one... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:07, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
As the Early Life section is only one para, you could afford to combine it with First World War.
You could afford to, but much as I hate to disagree with Ian, I think the article looks tidier with the section as it is. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts?
I'm not a fan of Honours and Awards sections and this one seems especially unnecessary given it pretty well repeats the list in the infobox, while the dates and citations are already in the main body, as they should be.
Reckon the last section could stand to be called Legacy rather than Media, especially since the current title isn't really appropriate for the barracks and museum. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:29, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, happy to support now that all comments on text have been addressed. Re. the shoulder flash, while it may not be an image you uploaded, I think you should still look at resolving this apparent contradiction in the licensing as I'd expect it to come up again at FAC. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 05:37, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm working my way through here and will post any thoughts as they come to me. I have to say, I'm looking forward to this one—it's not often I get to review an article on a British general. Also, worth pointing out that this will be (as far as I can see) the only A-class British general biography when it passes (and we only have two FAs on British generals, so it's a pleasure to see more). HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:27, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Institutions like Harrods and Eton are likely to be alien to readers from outside the Empire Commonwealth. ;) Perhaps a little explanation might be worthwhile?
I'll try... I had a vague feeling that to a British reader "Harrods", "Eton" and "the Guards" conjures an image of a certain kind of officer... Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:58, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Why do we have a redlink to Henry Streatfield? Did he make Major General later or is he notable for something other than his eventual rank? Since the bloke doesn't have an article, a very concise explanation of why he's notable would be nice.
Any idea if he met Churchill or had any particular interaction with him? Might make for an interesting titbit if it's documented somewhere. And if Churchill was a major, wouldn't he be the company commander, and so Browning would have served under him rather than alongside him?
Did he serve in theatre with any of the people from that list? It's quite a long list and I'm not 100% sold on the encyclopaedic value of a list of his notable friends.
He served under O'Connor and Dempsey in NW Europe and worked with Dempsey in SE Asia. I mentioned Chink because he appears later. People interested in military prospography always like those bits. Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:58, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Can you think of a way to gently introduce the reader to the sport stuff? The article seems to move quite abruptly from his military career to his sport.
Support. Apologies for the delay in getting back to this, but having read through the rest of the article, I don't see any issues that should prevent promotion to A-class. Hopefully you'll take it to FAC when this is wrapped up. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 17:38, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support - only a few minor comments:
No dabs, external links check out and the citation check tool reveals no errors (no action required).
The Earwig tool (here [9]) reveals no copyvio issues or close paraphrasing (no action required).
Some of the images have alt text and others do not, so you might consider adding it for consistency (not required though of course).
Images seem appropriately licenced where required, although [[File:Sosabowski Browning.jpg]] seems to lack author and source details etc. Can these be added if available?
There were a couple of dashs that needed to be fixed (done now so no action required).
References look good to me other than some minor inconsistency in the presentation of ISBNs. Particularly sometimes you use hypthens and in other instances you do not.
Tense here I think: "There is no satisfactory explanation for why he did it, but a ramp has to be provided for the horse to return..." should this be "but a ramp had to be"...?
Ooops. Misunderstanding here. I wanted it to say that Browning needed no ramp in order to emphasise what a feat of horsemanship it was. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:28, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Missing word or grammer here: "the newly formed division as it underwent a prolonged of expansion and intensive training..." probably "a prolonged period of expansion"?
Overlinking of Brigadier-GeneralJames M. Gavin (i.e. " Brigadier-General James M. Gavin recalled" and "Brigadier-General James M. Gavin, the US 82nd Airborne Division's commander"). Should only be linked once and at second instance should only use his surname (i.e. just Gavin) per WP:SURNAME.
Some inconsistency in the presentation of ranks. By and large you hyphenate but here you don't "Browning had an American deputy, Major General Horace H. Fuller".
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Support: nothing much sticks out to me. Good work as usual. I have a couple of minor observations:
no dab links, ext links all work (no action required);
"and its variants were the highest award" - should this be: "and its variants were the highest awards" (varients meaning that there are multiple, thus requiring a plural "awards")?
some of the language in the Notes is a bit awkward; I'm not sure what the FL standard is, but before taking it there you might consider trying to smooth them out a little bit;
SupportComments - looking pretty good, just some minor comments:
In my current browser (Chrome, 15" monitor) the table goes far enough to the left that I need to scroll to see part of the notes column and all of the image column. Not sure if there is a way to change this. Not a huge deal, just a little annoying.
Note #22, "and decided: Knight's Cross yes, 9 May 1945." Perhaps reword this to "and decided to award the Knight's Cross, retroactively effective 9 May 1945." or something similar.
It is disappointing that there aren't images of more of the men, but I suppose there's not much you can do about it.
The German Archives keep releasing more images. But these are all those released to the public domain that I know of. I am open for ideas. MisterBee1966 (talk) 10:24, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Not really any ideas, other than to keep adding them in as the GA releases them.
Lead, "and its last hand out on 17 June 1945." "hand out" seems rather informal - any way to reword this?
Recipients, "Oberkommando der Wehrmacht" Perhaps give a translation of this? From my (admittedly limited) German, I would think this was something like High Commander of the Armed Forces, but a solid translation in the article would be appreciated.
Is there a possibility of adding to the Recipients text section a sentence summarizing how many of these men were later awarded higher grades of this award? I see that this is listed in the notes column, but it would be nice to have a sentence like "later, 8 of these men (or however many it is) were awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves".
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
After a lengthy hiatus to write about Japanese battleships, I have at long last returned my attention to Operation Overlord, beginning with the Canadian Sector of the Normandy Landing Zones. This marks the single largest (and most research-intensive) article I have ever written; it passed GA several weeks ago, and I believe that it meets the A-Class Criteria, and thus I respectfully submit it for ACR. Cam(Chat)(Prof)20:18, 16 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments:
there are no dab links, ext links work (no action required);
the images lack alt text. You might consider adding it in, but it is not a requirement (suggestion only);
"File:Canadian Soldiers Juno Beach Town.jpg" - if possible the description, permission and author information on the image description page should probably be translated into English (currently only in French);
otherwise images appear correctly licenced (no action required);
in the lead I think that there is a tense switch. For example: "Juno Beach is the code name" (present) and "the beach is situated" (present), then "The sector spanned" (past);
it might be possible to reduce the amount of whitespace between the lead and the Background section by placing a table of contents limit in the article, see Template:TOC limit (suggestion only);
I suggest wikilinking terms like "battalion" and "brigade" on first mention (and other military unit terminology) so that casual readers can learn more;
be careful of overlink. I found a few terms, e.g. "Benard Montgomery" and "Erwin Rommel" were linked a few times in the body, there might be others (per recent FAC advice, its probably best to limit linking to just in the lead and once in the body);
Its not really a major issue for me, but I removed one myself. I think if you want to take this to FAC, you will need to cast a keen eye over it for overlink. This issue has been raised a few times in recent FACs. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:35, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
in The Invasion of Normandy section, I suggest adding a citation at the end of this sentence: "After delays of both logistical planning and weather, the D-Day of Overlord was scheduled for 6 June 1944. Eisenhower and Bernard Montgomery aimed to capture Caen within the first day, and liberate Paris by D+90" (as it appears uncited);
in "Landing: 7th Brigade" section, I suggest adding a citation at the end of this sentence: "On the far right, C Company of the Canadian Scottish Regiment landed with little opposition, and discovered that their objective — a 75mm gun emplacement — had been destroyed by naval gunfire" (as it appears uncited);
in the "Initial attacks" section, I'm not sure that this is correctly capitalised: "while the eastern Companies of the" and also "from the Winnipeg Companies" (shouldn't it just be "companies"?);
"The aerial bombardment of Juno's defences the night before are considered to have " --> "The aerial bombardment of Juno's defences the night before is considered to have"?
Fixed. I'm not sure how sleep-deprived I must have been when I wrote that the first time. Cam(Chat)(Prof)
"Zuehlke (2004)" in the Citations is in a different format to the others which aren't presented with dates;
further to the above, in the Bibliography you provide "Zuehlke, Mark (2005)" - should this be 2004 or 2005?
Ah. Same problem. I originally had three Zuehlke books when I started out, so I used Zuehlke (2004) intending to use the other books. I never did end up doing so. Given that I have so many Zuehlke refs and will probably be adding 2001 ones in the near future, I'm keeping them for ease of editing (hope that's ok). Cam(Chat)(Prof)06:11, 1 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You still need to include the full bibliographic details for Zuehlke 2004 in the Bibliography. Currently you only have the 2005 book. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:35, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
in the citations "Wilmost, p. 276" - should this be "Wilmot"?
inconsistent style, compare: "Zuehlke, pp. 242-3" v "Copp, pp. 55-56" (one uses abbreviated range, the other full range numbers);
Generally if it's double-digit page #s I tried to spell it out in full, but only use abbreviated for triple-digits. I know that's inconsistent. I've gone through to see which ones I can find. Cam(Chat)(Prof)06:11, 1 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
some of the References have publisher locations and others don't. If possible they should all have them for consistency (its not a drama, though, if you can't find them all);
Provisional support: most of my comments have been addressed, however my review is not a full review. I support the suggestions/comments made by Fifelfoo and Nick-D, so I would like to see these addressed before the review is completed. As I will be heading out field next week, I might not be back (not sure) before the review is due to be closed. As such I offer provisional support for promotion to A-class, based on the proviso that Nick's and Fifelfoo's comments are satisfactorily addressed. Sorry for any inconvenience that my absence may cause. Keep up the good work. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:44, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sources and Citations Generally of a high scholarly standard; want to hear the lead editor has exhaustively checked journal articles, other than that fixits. This may need a close paraphrase check due to the manner in which the citations run in sequence; I would suggest a second editor checking against Saunders (2004) which is a google book (not an accusation, of course). Fifelfoo (talk) 04:19, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. I actually used the copy located here, since I can't stand using online books (something about reading on the screen drives me to distraction). That being said it's a fair precaution to take on your part. Cam(Chat)(Prof)05:55, 20 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bibliography
Publisher locations: All or none (Compare Barris 2004 to Copp 2003)
Scholarly journal articles? I couldn't find any, but have you exhaustively searched?
I couldn't find anything of significant quality. What I did find did not stand up to the books I used (and in some cases largely relied on the same sources I did), so I've stuck to published books.
OCLCs pass
Citations
Zuehlke (2004) in citations, no Zueklke (2004) in bibliography
n-dashes "–" for page ranges ie "Granatstein, pp. 13-14" ==> "Granatstein, pp. 13–14"
Comment:
The question on the talk page needs addressing Elements of the the 51st Highland Division landed on the beach in the afternoon: appears all mention of the division has been removed from the article Jim Sweeney (talk) 15:30, 21 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Only one or two of the sources that I used even mention the presence of the 51st Highland Division, and none go into any great detail concerning the division's actions on the beach on D-Day (Van Der Vat simply mentions that they were part of the overall assault organization of Juno). From what I've managed to find on the 51st in general they did not actually land on Juno until 7 June, at which point it did begin to support the 3rd CID. Cam(Chat)(Prof)01:28, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments This is a pretty good article, but I think that it needs more work to reach A class:
"while rough weather forced the first wave to be delayed by ten minutes — the first wave touched down at 07:35" - this is a bit repetitive
"With Churchill's "soft underbelly of Europe" proving too slow an advance to take significant pressure off the Eastern Front, Western Allied planners returned to the plans to invade Northern France, now postponed into 1944" - this isn't at all accurate; the Western Allies were committed to landing in France in 1944 before the invasion of Italy began. This wording implies that the western Allies intended the Italian Campaign to be a substitute for landing in France.
More generally, the background section seems inappropriate; there's no need to give a potted history of the events which lead to the start of the Normandy Campaign - as we've got an article for that. Rather, it should be focused on topics such as how Juno Beach was selected as a landing site and the planning process for the landing (was the Canadian 3rd Division responsible for planning this operation?). The command structure for the Allied landing force should also be explained.
I'm of the mindset that it's important to give some background into both. Someone coming to this article for the first time - and with no background whatsoever - isn't necessarily going to go to the grander article. I think I've given the information regarding the Normandy operations that is necessary to the uninformed reader. I think I've also dealt adequately with the 3rd CID stuff in both the background and "planning and preparation" sections. Cam(Chat)(Prof)06:06, 8 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bernard Montgomery is linked twice, and his position is explained on the second occasion
I don't think that Monty was "commander of group forces" - he was the commander of the 21st Army Group and commander of the landing forces. Nick-D (talk) 08:02, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
What's the relevance of the statement that the German Army included "superb armoured divisions"?
changed the wording slightly. I think it's worth noting that SS Panzer divisions were not your standard armoured divisions. I'm not sure how to remove reference altogether and maintain the flow. Cam(Chat)(Prof)06:06, 8 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think that changing the wording to "it remained a powerful fighting force with a strong cadre of junior officers and elite divisions." isn't an improvement - this implies that 'elite divisions' were the norm, when they most certainly were not and is still irrelevant to this article (the Canadians faced a third rate division at Juno). Nick-D (talk) 08:02, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Alright. Removed the reference, though I do think that mentioning that the German Army was still a strong force works as a lead-in. If you can think of a better way to phrase this without the mention, feel free to fix it. Cam(Chat)(Prof)05:47, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
How good was a "better-than-average static division"? My understanding is that the quality of these formations was generally quite low as they had men and equipment deemed unsuitable for the mobile units.
You're correct that they generally lacked the mechanized capacity present in German front-line divisions. I'm going to interpret "better than average" to mean that their infantry were generally of a higher quality than those of other static divisions, though that may be extrapolating from the source too much on my part. Cam(Chat)(Prof)06:06, 8 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
You could also note that these divisions only had six infantry battalions, versus nine in Allied infantry divisions. Nick-D (talk) 08:02, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"Rommel also deployed the 21st Panzer Division southeast of Caen to act as a counterattack against landings on what would be Sword and Juno" - this reads a bit awkwardly
"Air attacks on Normandy's coastal defences began in earnest on 5 June at 23:30, with RAF Bomber Command giving the order for bombers to target the chief coastal batteries" - this is a bit confusing - RAF Bomber Command's role in the landings was planned months in advance, so it's unclear what it gave an order to do
Clarified somewhat. They basically reverted from blanket-bombing tactics to specifically targeting coastal guns, and also did so with much more intensity than before. Cam(Chat)(Prof)23:40, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
A map of the beach showing the different sectors would be very useful
"Hitler had freed up the veteran Panzer Lehr Division and the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend, both of which now prepared to head north to form the I SS Panzer Corps" - Hitler 'released' rather than 'freed up' these divisions, and I suspect that they were already units of the I SS Panzer Corps before the landing
Should the Panzer divisions which faced the British and Canadians really be labeled 'elite'?
The three Panzer Divisions of the I SS Panzer Korps basically held back the entire British Second Army for six weeks despite overwhelming numerical and air superiority on the part of the Brits. In my mind that definitely makes them "elite". Cam(Chat)(Prof)23:40, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The article is very Canadian-centric - can more be said about the experiences of the Germans who faced the Allied landing in the Juno sector?
I genuinely wish it could, but the simple reality is that there is virtually nothing written (in English) on those experiences. The only book I have that even touches on the German experience on D-Day (Army in the West) is a collection of communications between the division/corps and army level. To my knowledge, there is no reliable English source material on German soldier experiences on Juno Beach. Cam(Chat)(Prof)06:06, 8 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"most of the German divisions ... were either new recruits or rebuilding veterans": A division isn't a recruit, and what's a "rebuilding veteran"?
Rebuilding veterans - units that were badly mauled in Russia and were retraining and resting in France. The recruits were the composition. I've fixed this. Cam(Chat)(Prof)04:38, 27 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"manned by several platoons and mortar positions": nonparallel
"the most significant were the Amphibious Duplex Drive Tanks (DD Tanks) and the use of artillery to bombard the beaches while still on their landing craft.": nonparallel, and what is the last phrase modifying?
Continuing. "Several soldiers from B Company succeeded in outflanking the main pillbox and killing its gunners with grenades and small arms. One LCA's rudder from B Company had jammed, and thus deployed a platoon far to the left of the rest of B Company, enabling them to easily outflank and destroy the gun emplacements.": Are these two sentences talking about the same group of soldiers?
"The 50mm gun knocked out four of the Squadron's tanks, while the North Shore's machine-gun platoon flanked the position.": whereas, or at the same time as?
In future articles, consider rewording "in terms of", "meaning that", and sometimes "regarding". There's generally a more precise way of getting the point across.
I'm not really in a position to decide what the A-class prose criteria are, particularly for English other than American English. I can try to get a sense of FAC criteria (on average ... standards differ among reviewers of course), I can try to point at things that seem "wrong" in some sense, and I can point out spots where the meaning doesn't seem clear to me. If we can get some help here, it would be best if someone would either help Cam fix the text, or make an argument that the article either is or isn't good enough for A-class, given the points I made above. - Dank (push to talk) 12:41, 27 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've fixed the nonparallels you brought up. I'm also planning a full self-copyedit once I find make the time to do so. Cam(Chat)(Prof)04:50, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. To be clear for whoever's closing this, I don't have as much time as I used to. Someone else will have to make the call on prose, or not. - Dank (push to talk) 11:20, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Really minor stuff: Citations 143 and 150 are the same page; ditto for 8 and 10; and 118 and 125. For most citations you do not have the publication date, but you do for many of Zuehike (2004) while some of Zuehike do not have the date. Thomas R. Fasulo (talk) 00:57, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
CommentsSupport
The citation check tool reveals a large number of refs which need to be consolidated:
Granatstein, p. 18 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Copp, p. 47 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Saunders, p. 137 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Saunders, p. 138 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Stacey, p. 114 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Copp, p. 61 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Keegan, p. 141 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Copp, p. 52 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Van der Vat, p. 120 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Copp, p. 57 (Multiple references contain the same content);
Copp, pp. 55–56 (Multiple references contain the same content);
copp47 (Multiple references are using the same name); and
stacey93 (Multiple references are using the same name).
The Earwig tool reveals no issues with copyright violation or close paraphrasing (see here) (no action required);
Not sure about the tense in the lead here: "Juno Beach is the code name for one of", would past tense be more appropriate? For instance "Juno Beach was the code name for one of"?;
I've debated this one back and forth. Originally it was past tense, but then we changed it to present given that it's still known as Juno Beach. The code-name hasn't changed since then (indeed, the name stuck). Cam(Chat)(Prof)
"The landings initially encountered heavy resistance". From whom? The Germans of course, so it might pay to include them in the sentence. Perhaps "The landings initially encountered heavy resistance from German troops" or something similar?;
"In August 1942 Anglo-Canadian forces attempted an abortive landing—Operation Jubilee—at the Calais port-town of Dieppe." Why? I think half a sentence to explain its aim or objectives might be required.
This doesn't quite work for me: "Within 24 hours the operational plan also called for the 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade and the Sherbrooke Fusiliers to be deployed to Juno as reinforcements." Perhaps reword to something like "The operational plan also required the 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade and the Sherbrooke Fusiliers to be deployed to Juno as reinforcements within 24 hours.";
This is repeatitive for mine: "As the bombing runs continued to saturate Juno Beach with ordnance, the destroyers and landing craft moved towards the beach and began saturation bombardment." (saturation used twice);
There is some inconsistency in how you label the Canadian sub-units, for instance you use "A" Company and A Company (and "B" Company and B Company as just two examples). Either is correct AFAIK but they should be consistently treated throughout. I started to change this myself but then realised the issue is quite widespread so I leave it up to you to decide which format you want to use and to apply it;
"A", "B" it is. Fixed them all, as well as Squadron references.
I assume that Major-General Rodney Keller was GOC 3rd CID but this doesn not appear to be explictly stated (as far as I can see). Might be best to spell this out (perhaps in the "Juno Beach" section where you first mention 3rd CID);
"taking heavy infantry casualties but clearing the positions.", perhaps better as "taking heavy casualties among the infantry but clearing the positions.";
Repetitive here: "While the D-Day landings in all five sectors managed to establish footholds in Normandy, many D-Day objectives were not met." (D-Day used twice in same sentence unecessarily);
In the references: Zuehlke, Mark (18 May 2006), Van Der Vat, Dan (2003), Goddard, Lance (2004), Fowler T. Robert (1994) and Hallion, Richard (1994) all lack place of publishing;
Fixed Zuehlke (didn't use source, removed) and Van Der Vat. Will look for Goddard and Fowler (I'm not the one who added those references, so I don't have their data)
Inconsistency with treatment of isbns, sometimes you use hyphens and sometimes you do not.
Overall, this is a very good article IMO. I will be happy to add my support once the above points have been dealt with/discussed. Well done. Anotherclown (talk) 05:59, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I am nominating this article for A-Class review because I have been working on it for about two years now and I think it is ready for review. Thanks, Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 09:40, 16 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
On the formatting side, it needs to have the citations put into a consistent format. At the moment the style varies from:
Stow, John, Generale Chronicle of England, quoted in Masson, Rosaline, ed (1912). In Praise of Edinburgh, an Anthology in Prose and Verse.
Harris, Stuart (2002). Place Names of Edinburgh. London: Steve Savage. p. 11. ISBN9781904246060.
Potter, p.12
- it really needs to be consistent.
Referencing points:
There are a few gaps in the bibliography - e.g. Oldrieve, W. T. (1914). "Account of the recent discovery of the Remains of David's Tower at Edinburgh Castle". Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 48: 230–270; Accounts of the Lord High Treasurer of Scotland. X. 1913. pp. lxxv–lxxvi, 367; Grant, James. Old and New Edinburgh. I. Cassell and Co. p. 15. etc.
Second half of "Early Middle Ages" paragraph is uncited.
First section of "Description" is probably under cited (first paragraph has no reference at all).
Second half of "National War Museum of Scotland" paragraph doesn't have any citations.
Most of "Tourist attraction" paragraph is uncited.
Last sentence of "Symbol of Edinburgh" paragraph is uncited.
Content:
There's probably more you could say about the castle's role in manufacturing military equipment - there are some references to this in Castles in Great Britain and Ireland which might be useful.
Many thanks Hchc, thats useful. I've gone through the refs and I think they are now consistent. I will need to look for some additional refs - but I'm not sure all the areas you highlight need them? For example, "Second half of "Early Middle Ages" paragraph", just describes what happens in the poem; and First section of "Description", is just a basic description of the castle - do these need detailed refs? I'll have a look at the refs on Castles in Great Britain and Ireland you mention. Thanks again, Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 14:46, 21 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I tend to be a bit OTT myself in terms of referencing absolutely everything to ensure an audit trail; my personal advice would always be to cite (even if just citing the standard guidebook to explain where the layout description comes from), but you've a perfectly valid counterpoint that the material may not be contentious enough to require a reference. 16:00, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I've had this article on my watchlist for a long time and have watched it develop with interest. I kept meaning to ask Jonathan Oldenbuck what plans he had for the article as it was clearly in good shape, but never got round to it. I guess this answers the question I never got round to asking.
Lead
It seems to summarise the article well, mirroring the content of the article. The only thing that stands out is the statement that "From the later 17th century the castle became a military base with a large garrison". Wasn't it a military base before then? I think this may need a little rephrasing.
"But just as its location has rendered the castle all but impregnable": might want to tweak this slightly as the lead already stated that there had been some successful sieges. Maybe make it clear that the location make it difficult to assault? Otherwise, I feel much better informed about Castle Rock after reading this section.
Is there any particular reason for presenting the earliest written mention of habitation at Castle Rock before the archaeological evidence?
Initially, no, because that was the way it was written before I came to the article. But having thought about it, I think its useful as it means the inaccurate legends can be dealt with before the more reliable archaeology. Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 20:58, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It's interesting to find out that an early name for the castle was a variant of Maiden Castle; you might want to add Edinburgh to the Maiden Castle dab page.
I'll consider this.
Early Middle Ages
"in the brythonic epic Y Gododdin, we find a reference to Din Eidyn": this could probably be changed to "in the brythonic epic Y Gododdin is a reference to Din Eidyn". I don't know which part of MOS is relevant here, but "we" is probably frowned upon somewhere.
In the lead "Castle Rock" appears without the definite article, but elsewhere it is "the Castle Rock". If Castle Rock can be referred to without "the" it might be simpler to drop the word, but at the moment it's a little inconsistent. Nev1 (talk) 19:17, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Its usually given the definite article, at least in speech. I've checked through and its consistent now - in the lead its "the volcanic Castle Rock". Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 20:58, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Many thanks for your comments Nev. Hchc, I've added some more on artillery manufacture. Sorry i've taken a while to respond - the 'real world' keeps getting in the way just now. Thanks, Jonathan Oldenbuck (talk) 20:58, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Coordinator note: this review has been open for about 32 days now. The usual ACR period is 28 days. As such, it needs to be closed shortly (probably in the next 48 hours). Currently the article does not have the required three explicit "supports" needed for promotion. In the interests of possibly achieving a successful outcome I believe that it should be left open a bit longer and I will leave a message on the main talk page asking for more reviewers. I will list it on the co-ords page for consideration after 48 hours (I won't be available then, though, as I have to work Sunday (Australian time)). Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:34, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments It's great to see a high quality article on this important topic. I'm close to supporting, but have the following comments:
"During the reign of Malcolm III, Dunfermline rather than Edinburgh was the primary royal residence. This began to change though during the reign of his youngest son, King David I (ruled 1124–1153)." needs a citation
"Grange's unpopularity with the townsfolk was further increased after his men made a sortie to set fires, burning 100 houses in the town, and then firing on anyone attempting to put out the flames." reads a bit awkwardly
Much of the first two paras in the 'Description' section needs to be referenced
"Below it are the Western Defences, where a postern gate gives access to the western slope of the rock." needs a ref
Ditto "and gives access to the Argyle Tower. The eastern end of the Upper Ward is occupied by the Forewall and Half Moon Batteries, with Crown Square to the south." and "The square is formed by the Royal Palace to the east, the Great Hall to the south, the Queen Anne Building to the west, and the National War Memorial to the north", "The museum later moved to the Middle Ward, and the building now houses a function suite and an education centre." and the para which begins with "The most significant section, added to the remodelled North Barrack Block"
"As of 2006, the current District Gunner, the 27th man to fill the post, is Sergeant Jamie Shannon, nicknamed "Shannon The Cannon" - can this be updated? Nick-D (talk) 01:00, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment The article looks good and I am almost ready to support. However, the last sentence at the ends of a few paragraphs are uncited now (like Nick-D mentioned). Also, an uncited paragraph was recently added to the "Scottish National War Memorial" section. Try to to cite some or all of that if possible. Or it could just be removed. Thanks. -Fnlayson (talk) 17:04, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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This article covers the voyage of two Japanese battleships and their escorts between Singapore and Japan in early 1945. The notable features of this operation were that a) the Japanese evaded no less than 26 submarines as well as dozens of aircraft b) all the warships, and especially the battleships, were heavily loaded with drums of oil and other supplies and c) the six warships were among the last Japanese warships to safely reach port from the South West Pacific.
The article was assessed as being a GA a few weeks ago and I've since improved it. As such, I think that it might meet the A class criteria and would appreciate other editors' comments on this. I'm considering taking this to FA standard, so any comments on how the article could be further improved would also be appreciated. Nick-D (talk) 07:45, 14 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support a clearly written article, with some detailed suggestions below.
General points:
If the sources have them, it would be good to have the Japanese commanders' names in the article. Only having the Allied names gives a sense in places that the article is focusing on the allied response to Operation Kita, rather than the Japanese operation itself.
I've looked for that, but haven't been able to find out who commanded the force.
Yes, it's frustrating. The amazing thing is that no-one ever seems to have written a comprehensive English-language history of the IJN. The histories which do exist tend to cover the period after Leyte Gulf in a short chapter, and provide little detail about the structure of the navy and its leadership in this period. I'll keep searching as this will be something FA reviewers look for. Nick-D (talk) 07:11, 15 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Lead:
"to return both Ise-class hybrid battleship-aircraft carriers and their escorts from" - it's minor, but the "both" could mean either two carriers, or both the carriers and the escorts. If you said "two", the meaning would be precise.
Replaced with "the two" as suggested
Background:
"the reserve of oil" - "reserves"?
Done
"attempted to increase oil imports through loading drums of it on freighters" - what was the alternative to oil drums?
The infobox should probably have the number of aircraft. The body is pretty specific about the USAAF strike forces, so it shouldn't be a problem to come up with a good estimate (or range).
Done - the best I can do is 'more than 88' (the force employed on 13 February)
(belated) Thanks for that. None of the sources provides the exact locations, and the map I used to develop 'my' map in Clair Blair's book appears to be an approximation of the route. Nick-D (talk) 10:28, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Do any of the sources mention why no surface ships were sent to engage the IJN convoy? I know that the Allies were focused on Iwo Jima and the Philippines at the time, but this doesn't really preclude a couple of ships being spared.
That's a really good question. Samuel E. Morison's official history of the USN says that there were four US battleships in Phillipino waters until 14 February, but these were used solely for defensive purposes. From some further digging through DANFS histories, it seems that these had all sailed from the Lingayen Gulf area by 10 February, bound for Hawaii and other locations (and so were well out of the area). I think I know where I can reference this from, though it will take until the weekend.
The miss rate on the torpedos seems high (100% of 17 fired) seems high, even for WWII standards. Is this expanded upon at all in the refs?
Not explicitly. The reason seems to be that none of the submarines got very close to the Japanese force, meaning that the torpedoes were fired from long range, and that the Japanese ships were sailing fast through bad weather, but none of the sources pulls these threads together unfortunately.
That's a shame, because we can't very well add SYNTH, but perhaps you could mention the distance when discussing the engagements, so the reader can draw his or her own conclusion. bahamut0013wordsdeeds14:11, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The "Aftermath" section only has one sentance about the impact to the Japanese war economy, and it's pretty general. I'd like to see something specific to this mission's success, i.e. it allowed some kind of other mission to happen or a new ship to be completed, if possible.
None of the sources say more than what's in the article (eg, that the supplies contributed to an improvement to Japan's stockpiles). There doesn't seem to have been any special purpose for the mission other than to return the battleships to Japan while taking advantage of their deck space to carry cargo.
Hm. I kind of got the impression that the mission was dreamed up as much to allow safe cargo transport as it was to recover the ships, with the mention on how transports were getting sunk/intercepted. Maybe tweaking that a tad to clarify would be in order, if my impression was wrong. bahamut0013wordsdeeds14:11, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The "Aftermath" section suggests that there were other convoys of warships carrying supplies. Were any of them organized in an operation like Kita, and shouldn't there be mention of them (or at least redlinks) if there were?
I'll dig through CombinedFleet.com and see what I can find. English language information on Japanese convoys is extremely limited, which is a shame as lots of them were really interesting.
Support on citations, bibliography, sourcing OCLC tested. Gill (1968) has a corporate author (Australian War Memorial) listed as a second author in the OCLC record. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:26, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My hard copy lists him as being the only author. The AWM published the official history series, and had relatively little to do with writing it (as some trivia for you, they actually kicked the official history team out of the AWM's main building, forcing them to work out of a temporary building in what's now the grounds of the Australian National University). Thanks for your review and comments. Nick-D (talk) 08:43, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No worries, bloody amateur librarians at OCLC, hard copy always trumps adhocery. Oh for truly professional information professionals, there is nothing like a good librarian, archivist, curator or records manager. Poor Official Historians, what year did they get the boot to ANU? Fifelfoo (talk) 02:34, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I can't remember the year, but it wasn't very long after they started work (so probably the late 1940s/very early 1950s). At the time the ANU was a paddock with a creek running through it ;) Nick-D (talk) 10:28, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support - I reviewed this at GA and after the improvements that have been made I am satisified that it now meets the A class criteria as well. Well done. Anotherclown (talk) 10:30, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
For the commanders, it appears that Rear Admiral Chiaki Matsuda was commander of the Fourth Carrier Division until March 1945, so I think you could list him as a commander and use the Ise TROM at CombinedFleet.com as the source. Also, it appears that the group was under the overall command of Vice Admiral Kiyohide Shima while assigned to the Fifth Fleet in the southwest Pacific area, again using the TROM as the source, but then moved into the 10th Fleet on 5 February under Shigeru Fukudome. For the Allied commanders, perhaps you could list James Fife, Jr. and whoever his boss was (I assume the Southwest Pacific area had a naval force commander).
Thanks for that - I'll double check the sources and add it in.
The Completion Force's speed appears to have been an important factor in their being able to avoid damaging torpedo attacks from the submarines. So, the question is, how fast were they going? If the sources don't say, I guess we'll have to table that for now.
None of the sources provide a speed, though the shortness of the voyage (Singapore to Korea in about 8 days) speaks for itself.
You appear to have used all the sources available in the West that have information on this event. The only other source I can think of with perhaps more information is the Senshi Sōsho. If I can ever get up there to the MoD War History Office I'll see if it's feasible to get photocopies of the pages dealing with this operation. Of course, I assume they would still need to be translated into English so we could mine them for more information. Also, there are probably some mooks out in Japan on Ise and Hyuga for modellers and other interested parties that may have information and I'll keep a look out for those.
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The article deals with the controversial leader of one of the largest-scale Byzantine civil wars. It was just promoted to GA without particular problems, and I think it qualifies for A-class status. I would also like to raise again the questions originally posed in the rather unsuccessful peer review. I definitively aim to take this to FAC, so please be as thorough as possible. Constantine ✍ 17:18, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support A1 A2 A3 Source check, highly impressed. This is how to do it. Appropriate HQRS, appropriately cited. Please note I don't do biography, and I don't do pre Moderns; but, I'm jumping in because nobody else has. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:30, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Lemerle, Paul (1965). is a book in series, not a Journal, correct? Does it have a series title, or is each book merely Series title, 1 etc.?
No journal articles on Thom? A possible source of content. From scholar (excuse the poor quality of the citation, I don't have the time to render at the standard high quality, because scholar is a bit silly in presenting data to paste):
Olster "The Byzantine Revival, 780-842." Speculum, 1990 - JSTOR
Cite 42 Bury, pp. 90, 92–93. Lacks Bury's date per your style. Citation link to bibliography broken (probably due to date missing) Fifelfoo (talk) 03:30, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hello, and thanks for the review. On Lemerle, the Travaux et mémoires series includes collections of articles by various authors. The volumes of the series are numbered 1, 2, etc. Olster's article is a review of Treadgold, while useful in correcting some of Treadgold's faults, it does not really impact on the narrative, on which Treadgold is practically the only detailed recent account. The main scholarly examination of the issues surrounding Thomas and his revolt, on which modern scholars are based, is that by Lemerle. Fixed citation #42, thanks :). Any comments as to prose style, readability etc? Constantine ✍ 08:08, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bugger about the lack of journal articles, you seem to have command of the literature. Sadly, I find prose reviews extremely difficult and extremely time consuming, I've discovered I can do footnotes and sourcing in an achievable human time. Fifelfoo (talk) 09:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
SupportComments: this looks very good in my opinion. It is well referenced and illustrated, and I believe the prose to be of a good standard. Only a few minor comments/suggestions from me:
according to the Featured article tools, the ext links all work (no action required);
images appear to be correctly licenced (no action required);
the Featured article tools report one disambig link: [14]. Please see if you can fix this;
images lack alt text. It is not a requirement currently, but you might consider adding it in: [15] (suggestion only)
in the lead, "from the Pontus (now north-eastern Turkey) who" (should this perhaps be: "from the Pontus region (now north-eastern Turkey) who")?
in the Early life and career section, "a view accepted by a few other scholars" - perhaps it would be best to list a couple of these scholars here?
inconsistent capitalisation: "Iconoclasm" (in the lead) and "iconoclasm" (in the Background and motives section);
"had his young son Theophilos led a procession" (probably should be "lead a procession");
"He departed the rebel camp headed west and sent a" (I think this sentence requires a comma - "He departed the rebel camp, headed west and sent");
"some 40 km west of Constantinople". You might consider using the {{convert}} template here to help readers who prefer miles;
in the Aftermath, "Some scholars, however, have disputed this". Again, I think it might be a good idea to list an example of a scholar here;
in the References you have "Kaegi 1982", but in the Sources the date of publication is shown as "1981". This should probably be made consistent. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:16, 12 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"whose troops caused severe casualties to Thomas's army": after Thomas's troops ran away, or was this the battle before that? - Dank (push to talk) 03:08, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Coordinator note: with a reference and two prose reviews in, I'd be comfortable promoting this, but would you like the opportunity to find another reviewer or two first (so you get more reviews now rather than at FAC?) Ed[talk][majestic titan]04:24, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm no expert in this area but have completed a review due to the current lack of reviewers at ACR at the moment. Overall this article looks good to me with only a few minor issues which I have listed below.
The citation error checking tool reveals 3 errors with the consolidation of citations: "{{harvnb|Bury|1912|p=84}}" (Multiple references contain the same content), "{{harvnb|Treadgold|1988|p=233}}" (Multiple references contain the same content), and "Bury84" (Multiple references are using the same name);
grammar here: "where he remained there for 25 years before...", "there" seems superfluous as you already say "where", perhaps reword to "where he remained for 25 years before...;
"like J.B. Bury or Alexander Kazhdan", should this be "like J.B. Bury and Alexander Kazhdan"?
Over linking of patrician (in "Early life and career" and again in "Outbreak and spread of the revolt in Asia Minor" sections);
I really like this aticle a lot; all the same, there are some small things that could be possibly changed, wanting (I won't express myself on the language as while seems fine to me I'm not very good in dealing with prose issues).
Starting with the sources, let me say that their selection is absolutely excellent: they are all of high academic quality and include even Lemerle's article, especially relevant here. In the future it could be useful to use also the first volume of the PBE, as the entry to Thomas is quite extensive and covers all viewpoints.
Regarding the notes, I wonder if it isn't better to keep one ref note for every single source, as I've seen done generally in the articles that are FAC; but apart that this isn't a FAC review, I'd call it quite a minor thing that can be lefte to the preferences of the main editor.
Concerning the ODB refs, maybe you could add that p. 2079 is the entry for Thomas: in other words instead of "Kazhdan 1991, p. 2079.", it could be "Kazhdan 1991, s. v. Thomas the Slav, p. 2079." Also, in the bibliography it may be OK to add the authors of the specific entry used.
Going to the lead, it states: "After the murder of Leo and usurpation of the throne by Michael the Syrian, Thomas rose in revolt, claiming the throne for himself." Now, as you clearly explain in the main text of the article and as the ODB does too it would seem to be a more complicated issue than that; and why I'd personally tend to agree on a suspicious stink of official propaganda, it may be well to mention in the lead also the idea that it was possibly a revolt against Leo V. This mostly because while Bury is quite an old authority Kazhdan is more recent.
Always regarding the lead, there's a possibly ambiguous passage, at least for me: "he pretended to be Emperor Constantine VI (r. 780–797), but the validity of this claim is questionable." Maybe it could be made clearer that questionable isn't that he was Constantine VI, but that Thomas ever pretended to be Constantine VI.
This is really a tiny thing, always in the lead: for better precision instead of saying "According to the Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium", one could put it "According to Anthony Cutler and Paul Hollingsworth in the ODB"
Going to the main text, I'm a bit weary of the regular use of a word like "most" regarding scholarship: unless a scholar explicitly states that his is the major perspective I think it would be better to mention clearly in the text which scholars support said poistion: so in the first section you say: "The French Byzantinist Paul Lemerle and other modern scholars however consider it an unreliable later tradition." "The more recent Byzantinists Paul Lemerle and Warren Treadgold however consider it an unreliable later tradition" (not great English, I admit).
Similar issue with before in the same section with "a view accepted by a few other scholars like Alexander Vasiliev and Romilly James Heald Jenkins"; "few" is another word in my opinion to treat with care: maybe shorter is better, say "a view accepted by scholars Alexander Vasiliev and Romilly James Heald Jenkins".
Going to the second section, first subsection, the phrasing: "Most recent studies follow him and prefer the account of Symeon Logothetes", as before, it makes me a bit uncomfortable; the ODB cautiously just puts "others follow" and maybe putting "other scholars like Treadgold and Klapidou follow him and prefer the account of Symeon Logothetes" would be more simple, as among very recent works the ODB doesn't take sides and only two studies can be mentioned for "most".
Regarding Constantine VI "Most modern scholars follow Paul Lemerle, who dismissed this too as yet another later fabrication". This is OK as Klapidou clearly puts it as the majority interpretation; but maybe a mention could be made that an alternative possibility is that it was just "an informal rumour".
"In reality, this exaggerated account was yet another piece of hostile propaganda." OK, I know I'm waaaayy too fastdious but maybe it should be put clear that this is Lemerle, so "According to Lemerle this exaggerated account was in reality yet another piece of hostile propaganda." could be also possible.
"In exchange, Thomas is said to have promised to cede certain unspecified territories, and to become a tributary vassal of the Caliph, but it is impossible to say how much of this reflects the true terms or later propaganda" This passage tends to follow to closely Lemerle, I believe: the ODB accepts as fact that territories were given to the Caliph and Treadgold tends to agree on a tribute, so it should be made clear that it's Lemerle postition alone that "it is impossible to say how much of this reflects the true terms", and countered by the other scholars.
A small note: I've given a look at the PBE at it openly states that Thomas was crushed by the Bulghars and that the fleet surrendered as a result of that. Just to observe that maybe some more caution on who won the battle could be better.
I've really done my best to find a pretence of fault elsewhere, but honesltly the pieces on the siege and on Thomas death seem just perfect to me. Only the very last concluding sentence leaves me a bit weary: "More recent scholarship, however, has disputed this, citing other reasons for the Byzantines' military failures during these years." First, it should be observed that only one scholar seems available for the claim; second, Treadgold is pretty cautious, as even he doesn't at all exclude that the events involving Thomas may have had an impact, only he disagrees it was decisive.
Well, that's all. As I said previously, a really fantastic work. Hope I've given something useful, but there wasn't much to mend in the first place. Bye, Aldux (talk) 00:30, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks a lot for the review! I've addressed your concerns point for point: on 1) & 13), I have the CD version of the PBE, but I have to say that I am not thrilled by it. Unlike the Prosopographie der mittelbyzantinischen Zeit for instance, it merely reports the primary sources and has little in the way scholarly opinion and analysis on them. Thus, when it says that "in the ensuing battle Thomas 7 was completely defeated and his forces scattered", it merely summarizes the primary source. Given that the prevailing opinion tends to follow Lemerle's well-founded scepticism (see for instance the newest English edition of Skylitzes), I've sided with that. I'll re-check it and see if there's anything that can be added, but the primary narrative is already given pretty well by Bury and Treadgold. On 2) it depends (if I understood our question correctly), I myself use both patterns. There isn't really a guideline, but especially in cases where several sources are used, I think that it simply looks better to bundle them in one reference rather than append them singly at the end. 3) & 6) I've changed the reference for the ODB. I usually don't put in the authors because I quote several entries from it, but here that isn't the case. I've also rewritten the part in the lead to read "According to his entry in the ODB...". 4) & 5) have been addressed, I think. 7) Well, as I said above, the impression I get from Kiapidou, but also from the other recent books that treat Thomas and his rebellion in a more general fashion is that Lemerle's reconstruction of the events is pretty much standard, and Treadgold follows that consensus. So I feel that it would be wrong to explicitly limit the opinion to Lemerle and Treadgold. 8) similar to the previous, along with Kazhdan, some general histories on Byzantium still follow the older tradition that Thomas did indeed flee to the Arabs. I cannot now enumerate them, but it would be inaccurate to imply that only Kazhdan and Jenkins support this view. 9) changed to "some". On 10) Lemerle absolutely refutes the claim that he presented himself as Constantine. The "rumours" that he considers as possible are only that he was pro-iconophile. That aspect is treated below. 11) rephrased acc. to your suggestion, and 12) likewise rephrased. I tend to agree that Thomas most likely made concessions, but Lemerle has a point too. I hope the new phrasing is satisfactory. On 13), I've rephrased it a bit, and intend to work on this passage before FAC. I'll draw on Ostrogorsky to support Kiapidou on the negative impact of Thomas's revolt, but most recent works I've come across seem to refrain from explicitly linking the loss of Crete and Sicily to the rebellion, and prefer terms like "the disaster was followed/compounded/etc by the loss of Crete" etc. Constantine ✍ 11:56, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I get your point regarding the PBE, there's not much critical analysis. You've well adressed all the other points and explained very well why not to give undue weight to outdated views; I believe it's in the right shape to pass without great difficulties the FAC process. Ciao, Aldux (talk) 14:42, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
I am nominating this article for A-Class review because I feel it's ready for A-Class. This is the first article I've submitted for A-Class review, and I believe it meets all five criteria. This article on a battle between Egyptian and Israeli forces during the final days of the Arab-Israeli War of 1973, is my first nomination for an A-Class review. It has recently passed GA and I hope to get it up to FA status eventually, so I'd really appreciate any additional constructive comments and suggestions. Thanks in advance for your input! Sherif9282 (talk) 15:01, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support A1, A2, A3Oppose on completeness of research other wise A1 A2 and A3 are Supportable: Structure is good, neutrality is good, citations style is good, citations used are good. Sourcing is incomplete: Journal Articles. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC) Fifelfoo (talk) 12:17, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Authors do not take titles as part of their names, "Gawrych, Dr. George W."
Fixed
No journal articles? Check scholar and other indexes, for example:
Mason "'The decisive volley': The battle of Ismailia and the decline of British influence in Egypt, January-July, 1952" The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 1991. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I couldn't find any journals that deal with the topic. The journal you cited is of another battle; the article being nominated is on a battle that took place in 1973, not 1952, and involved the Israelis not the British. --Sherif9282 (talk) 12:10, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think the referencing should be a little more thorough. Whilst the one-ref/paragraph is met, there are paragraphs with three different references at the end, some covering up to four pages in a given ref, and so tracking down exactly what cites what is difficult. A couple of other small things: I think "Operation Abiray-Lev" should be linked in the lead, and Ismailia described as a city there as well, it's not clear whether we're talking about a small or large settlement, or even something more different, like an area of some kind. I also think "One of them has the Soviet-made RPG-7 by his side, normally used by the Egyptians." needs citing. Other than that, looks good. Grandiose(me, talk, contribs) 18:13, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your input. I'll see what I can do with those refs. Unfortunately no article exists so far for said operation; it'll only be a red link in the leade. I'll also perform the other edits very soon. --Sherif9282 (talk) 06:20, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Good idea. I've done that. I've also removed that part of the image caption since I can't find a ref for that specific claim. I've looked over the refs. Mostly, refs grouped at the end of a paragraph are reference for all or most of what is in the paragraph. In the background section, I'm using the ordinary, detailed accounts to provide a summary of the war's timeline, which is why refs in that section have a lot of pages in them. I'll try to replace them with pages or sources that provide short summaries instead, when I find them. --Sherif9282 (talk) 15:08, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
BritEng or AmEng would be fine, but I'm not sure which this is; "reorganizing", "armor" and treating "battalion" as singular suggests it's AmEng. - Dank (push to talk) 20:02, 20 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There are some hyphens that MOS says should be dashes, but I'm not touching them until the hyphen and dash rules have been clarified as a result of the current Arbcom case, which will take a month or two.
"Several measures decided upon were not implemented however.": Vague. I'd remove this and move the contents of the note to the main text. - Dank (push to talk) 00:08, 21 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've quickly skimmed over the edits and they look fine, might need some tweaking. I'll be giving a more comprehensive answer as soon as I'm free. --Sherif9282 (talk) 06:20, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
So I've done some changes, the rest of the edits are good. Will you be continuing on the article from where you stopped? --Sherif9282 (talk) 15:08, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"The village was then occupied by a company of the 73rd Sa'iqa battalion, and the defenders received a platoon of reinforcements to compensate losses" is that an Egyptian brigade?
Yes. The prelude section describes the unit, and points out that they are Egyptian.
"Sharon only sent five tanks, and the attack by Raviv's brigade failed with heavy losses. Gonen and Bar-Lev were joined by Lieutenant General David Elazar, and ordered Sharon to renew the attack, this time transferring Reshef's brigade. Sharon opposed this however, and argued that if he succeeded in his mission, the Egyptian Second Army would collapse, thereby eliminating any Egyptian threat to the Israeli corridor and bridgehead. He claimed he could have already encircled Ismailia had it not been for Southern Command's hesitation. When his superiors remained adamant, Sharon bypassed the chain of command and contacted the Minister of Defense, Moshe Dayan, who called off any further attacks on the east bank. As a result, Sharon would be able to concentrate his attention and the efforts of his three brigades in the final push to capture Ismailia." - Raviv? Reshef? Who? "He claimed ... hesitation" did he claim this at the time or after the war?
I've removed any mention of Raviv (not being important to the article). Reshef had been mentioned several times before so the reader should be aware who he is by the time he reaches that section. I thought it was self-evident he made that claim during his conversation with Southern Command. I've tweaked it nevertheless, and do improve on it if you can. --Sherif9282 (talk) 21:32, 1 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I haven't found another source to that story at all, not even a passing mention, but the book used is a reliable one for sure. --Sherif9282 (talk) 21:32, 1 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Co-ord comment: this ACR has been open for 41 days now. This well past the 28 day limit that is normally applied. As such, I intend to close this review in the next 48 hours. Currently there are only two clear supports. Unless there is another clear support, it will need to be closed as unsuccessful (per the guidance at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Academy/Closing an A-Class review a minimum of three clear supports is required for promotion). In the interests of achieving a successful outcome, I will wait 48 hours and will post a request on the main talk page asking for more input. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 08:40, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have closed this review as successful because it has achieved the minimum three supports and is past the 28 day review period. If there are further comments on the article (as indicated below), please add them to the article's talk page. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:17, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support – no obvious reason for otherwise, although I can spot a few minor imperfections here and there. Does the nominator want to know what they are? Sp33dyphilReady • to • Rumble09:43, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Another in the series on the commanders in the South West Pacific Area during World War II. Also another medal of honor winner. Kenneth Walker remains a controversial figure for his advocacy of strategic bombing. Hawkeye7 (talk) 09:28, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
This site is quoted in 453 Wikipedia articles. It is a non-profit organisation supporting people whose hobby is locating wrecks in the bush. When writing the article on Howard K. Ramey I encountered trouble with news reports that his plane had been located when it had not. This site proved reliable. It is sourced only for stating that the wreck has not yet been found, as of April 2011. If I used Byrd, it would be as of ten years ago. Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:16, 13 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
RS's aren't my thing, but I think the usual question runs like this: under "references" on that page, it says: "Thanks to Douglas Walker, David Lindley, Steve Birdsall, Brian Bennett, Richard Dunn and Larry Hickey for additional information." Do we know which person this information came from? If not, then is anyone acting as a factchecker? If not, what makes these 6 people reliable sources? - Dank (push to talk) 03:19, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Douglas Walker is the general's son. Steve Birdsall is a well-known aviation historian. Again, the source is only used for the stement that the aircraft wreck is yet to be located. Hawkeye7 (talk) 03:51, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Since that is all its sourcing, that will do, but please note for the future that "used in 453 other articles" is not a valid rationale :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:47, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Be consistent in whether you provide publisher locations or not
Added locations
Air University or Air University Press?
Standardised on Air University
Be consistent in what is wikilinked when in references
Why include state for the Maxwell but not the Bolling base?
I was not sure about whether Americans do this for an airbase which not located in any state. I am assured that they do, so added. Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:16, 13 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I do have a few minor quibbles, but nothing worthy of an opposeAll quibbles addressed. 14:38, 15 May 2011 (UTC). All in all, an engaging and interesting article on a man with a distinguished career. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 15:56, 12 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Is there a reason for not mentioning his rank in the lead?
I could not find the relevant section in the MOS. Somebody else may know. It could be a British thing, as many British people are known only by their titles
'regular Army' means different things in different countries, so an explanation is required
Surely the reason for the MoH is worth mentioning in the lead?
To tell the truth, I came to the article writing up the generals of the Southwest Pacific rather than Medal of Honor winners (another editor is doing that). But you're right; it should be mentioned. Hawkeye7 (talk) 05:34, 14 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
What does he added combat observer to his command pilot rating in 1922 mean?
I'm confused: He received his Aircrew Badge in November 1918 and was commissioned as a temporary second lieutenant in the United States Army Air Service on 2 November 1918, but then it says received a commission in the regular Army as a first lieutenant on 1 July 1920 but was reduced in rank to second lieutenant on 15 December 1922
Support - I would suggest moving the inline citation that is currently in the lede (since the lead just summerizes the information in the article there usually is no need for a citation in the lead. The lead also seems a bit long. Other than those 2 minor things I didn't see anything else. --Kumioko (talk) 01:42, 17 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
File:Genwalker.jpg - is there a date available for this image?
It could only have been after he was promoted to brigadier general in June 1942 and before he was killed in January 1943. Hawkeye7 (talk) 23:40, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
File:03_walker_macarthur.jpg: two issues with this. First, if it was taken in Papua New Guinea why does the copyright status in Australia matter? Second, per the template instructions, "please provide information of where the image was first published and who created it."
The picture was privately held. A great deal is known about circumstances surrounding the the picture, as it is from MacArthur's visit to Port Moresby in October 1942. It is part of a series of photographs taken by C. Bottomley, an official photographer. Papua was an Australia territory at the time. Because it was taken before 1955, it is in the public domain in Australia.
File:Ken_Walker_at_his_headquarters.jpg: if this is "in the field", how could it be "created in Australia"? What is "OWI-979-ZC"? In what year was this picture taken?
File:Knwalker-gravesite-photo-august-2006.jpg: since the stone is 3D, the photo has a copyright distinct from that of the stone. Which - the stone or the photo - is covered by the existing licensing tag, and what is the status of whichever is not thus licensed?
The copyright notice refers to the stone, which is a work of the US government. It was taken by Russell C. Jacobs in August 2006. I don't know what the American rules are for copyright over a photograph of something that is in the public domain. I have removed it from the article for now. Hawkeye7 (talk) 23:40, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
File:COMMAND_PILOT_WINGS.png has insufficient source information
Yes, but a) the description doesn't say that, only the file history does, and b) presumably the Wikipedian in question didn't design the original medal but copied it from a (PD-US Army?) design, in which case he/she would not be the sole copyright holder. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:22, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm pretty sure The_Ed17 has answered this question before actually, I'll ask him to look. Sorry, I'm pretty useless with copyright questions, I can't seem to stop my eyes from glazing over ... - Dank (push to talk) 02:44, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It's okay. The pic was taken before 1957, hence crown copyright has expired and it is in the public domain in the United Kingdom. The disclaimer on the site is photographs taken more recently. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:58, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) Crown copyright means that all photographs taken by the government before 1957 are in the public domain. The IWM's site (sorry, there's no direct link) says that this photograph is an "official photograph", which leads me to believe that this is the case. As for the "need" for a license, the IWM doesn't particularly like people using their images without permission even if they are in the public domain, that's all. Ed[talk][majestic titan]03:07, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Was it actually under crown copyright, though? I would argue that terming it an "official photograph" is not sufficient proof that it was taken by the UK government. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:22, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments
Please reduce wiki links. Here is a problematic excerpt:
The family moved to Denver, Colorado, where Kenneth attended the Maria Mitchell School from 1905 to 1908, the Columbian School in Omaha, Nebraska, from 1908 to 1912, and Central High School in Kansas City, Missouri.
If any reader is interested in more information about Kansas City they'll find it with Central High School etc. Overall I see wikilinked terms done multiple times throughout the article. How many links are required for Army ranks and the AAC or common terms like "single-mother"? Brad (talk) 14:47, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok now. I just went through the article with a shotgun. Repetitive linking removed as well as more common terms like headstone and reprimand. Brad (talk) 00:58, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Spotchecks - I realize that there are only so many ways to word certain things, but it's important to avoid overly close paraphrasing. Here are some examples:
"Walker returned to the United States in February 1925 and became a member of the Air Service Board at Langley Field. He stayed at Langley until 1928, serving as adjutant of the 59th Service Squadron, commander of the 11th Bombardment Squadron, and operations officer of the 2nd Bomb Group. He graduated from the Air Corps Tactical School at Langley Field in June 1929." vs "He returned to the United States in February 1925 as a member of the Air Service Board at Langley Field, Va. He stayed at Langley until 1928, having been adjutant of the 59th Service Squadron, commander of the 11th Bomb Squadron, and operations officer for the 2nd Bomb Group. He graduated from the Air Corps Tactical School at Langley Field in June 1929."
"Walker and his colleagues presented arguments to support a separate air organization, not subordinate to other military branches" vs "He and his colleagues presented arguments to support a separate air organization, not subordinate to other military branches."
"Walker and five other Air Corps Tactical School instructors were invited to testify on the military aspects of aviation before the Howell Commission" vs "Walker and five other Air Corps Tactical School instructors were invited to testify on the military aspects of aviation before the Howell Commission"
I only checked one source and found enough close paraphrasing to concern me. I would strongly recommend that the article be carefully checked from top to bottom to ensure that overly close paraphrasing is avoided. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:38, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The original article was a cut-and-paste of the Air Force bio. I rewrote it from top to bottom but left the original in place so people could still read the article. I have gone over all the refs to the bio and double-checked and verified that there is no close paraphrasing, re-wording some bits as appropriate. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:21, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Considering the current image issues (see WT:FAC) I suggest that all commentary about the images (see above) should be included on the image file. A careful close paraphrasing check is still needed, and Hawkeye, I have frequently had to remove excess links from your noms-- stop doing that :) :) :) SandyGeorgia (Talk) 16:39, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Been adding commentary about the images as we've gone along. Really should learn how to do it before nominating, but still learning stuff about American copyright law. Hawkeye7 (talk) 11:17, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Queried some image issues above; those left unqueried can be considered resolved. I did the original one-source check, haven't rechecked or looked at other sources - I can if need be, but the article might benefit more from fresh eyes there. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:22, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Two outstanding issues from a policy standpoint - the queries related to File:Heinkel_He_111_during_the_Battle_of_Britain.jpg and File:COMMAND_PILOT_WINGS.png. The other issue remaining above is less vital. Nikkimaria (talk) 18:23, 20 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In the case of the first one, the Crown asserts that it held the copyright on the photograph, and therefore that it is now in the public domain since it was taken before 1957. In the case of the second, it is a Wikipedian's free image of an object that is in the public domain, being created by the US Army. I cannot see any line of reasoning that leads to a conclusion that it is not in the public domain. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:56, 20 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
For the second, it likely is in the public domain - but you actually need to say that, and include the appropriate template, on the image page. For the first, where does the Crown assert that? "Official photograph" is not a sufficient assertion, as it doesn't say "official government photograph", the author is unknown, etc. Sorry to harp on this, but it needs to be dealt with. Nikkimaria (talk) 22:53, 20 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
They don't say "official government " in the United Kingdom; that would be a tautology, because official literally means government. As for the wings, I have added a template. Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:48, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. There are still a few prose issues that need to be sorted out:
Lead
"This set resulted in a doctrinal clash ...". What set?
Early life and World War I
"His father left when Kenneth was young, and Emma raised him as a single mother." She didn't raise him as a single mother, she was the single mother.
Between the wars
"In 1937 Walker was involved in yet another accident occurred in 1937 ...".
Air War Plans Division
"Brigadier General Carl Andrew Spaatz was head of the division and two of his assistants were Lieutenant Colonels Olds and Muir S. Fairchild ...". Run-on sentence.
"Walker was also promoted to temporary lieutenant colonel on 15 July 1941." Why "also"?
... and joined Air War Plans Division ... to replace Spaatz as head of the Air War Plans Division". Why "the" in one instance but not the other?
"The Air War Plans Division was tasked with developing a production requirements plan for President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who wanted an answer by 10 September 1941." An answer to what? What was the question?
"Together they created AWPD-1 plan". Who is "together" referring to? The previous sentence speaks of the Air War Plans Division, so who were they working with?
Papuan Campaign
"... the bombers were generally based in the Townsville area and staged through Port Moresby in order to minimise their chance of loss or damage on the ground." The article generally seems to be using American English spelling, so shouldn't this be "minimize"? Why "in order to" rather than just "to"? That "so" should probably be "therefore" or similar.
Close paraphrasing issues still found. Some examples:
"Walker was one of six Air Corps Tactical School instructors invited to testify on the military aspects of aviation before the Howell Commission on Federal Aviation" vs "Walker and four other ACTS instructors were invited to testify on the military aspects of aviation before the Presidents Commission on Federal Aviation" - also, seems to be a number discrepancy here
"Walker and his colleagues presented arguments to support an independent air force, not subordinate to the Army or Navy" vs "He and his colleagues presented arguments to support a separate air organization, not subordinate to other military branches"
"Together they created AWPD-1 plan, a blueprint for the imminent air war against Germany" vs "Walker and his team created AWPD-1 plan, the blueprint for the upcoming war against Germany". Nikkimaria (talk) 21:51, 22 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
They now read:
"In November 1934, Walker, now a student at the Command and General Staff School at Fort Leavenworth, testified on the military aspects of aviation before the Howell Commission on Federal Aviation, along with Robert Olds, Claire Chennault, Donald Wilson, Harold George and Robert Webster. All were current or former instructors at the Air Corps Tactical School, and except Chennault were part of the Bomber Mafia."
"They argued for an independent air force, but were unable to persuade the Commission, although it did agree that the Air Corps should be granted an unprecedented degree of autonomy within the Army."
"In just nine days in August 1941, George, Olds, Faichild, Walker, Kuter and Hansell drafted the AWPD-1 plan for a war against Germany."
"Walker was born in Los Cerrillos, New Mexico, on 17 July 1898 to Wallace Walker and his wife Emma née Overturf." Possibly move comma from before "on" to before "to"?
I've been asking non-Americans for feedback on this and not getting much. I don't know what other style guides say, but all the influential American style guides require a comma after New Mexico; I have a list of some of them at WT:Checklist. - Dank (push to talk)
"The family moved to Denver, Colorado, where Kenneth attended the Maria Mitchell School from 1905 to 1908, the Columbian School in Omaha, Nebraska, from 1908 to 1912, and Central High School in Kansas City, Missouri." Theme presented inconsistently in this list. Did they move from Denver to Omaha to Kansas City, too, or did they stay in Denver and send him to board?
"Walker became one of many officers holding wartime commissions to receive a commission in the Regular Army as a first lieutenant on 1 July 1920,"—an awful lot received that commission on 1 July that year?
"Walker became part of a small clique of Air Corps Tactical School instructors that became known as the "Bomber Mafia", whose members also included Haywood Hansell, Donald Wilson, Harold L. George, and Robert M. Webster, which argued that bombardment was the most important form of airpower."—Consider "... Mafia; its members included ...".
"He felt that it was flawed because it failed to drive home what he saw as the most important fact, namely that ...". A comma rather than the semicolon that follows this might be smoother.
Suggestion to reduce the "thats": "two fundamental principles: bombardment should take the form of daylight precision bombing; and that it should be directed against critical industrial targets."
I thought a "that" was needed in one place in another article. Carol Saller (who does Chicago's monthly Q&A) mentions in The Subversive Copyeditor that, apparently to save space, American newspapers are removing "that" too aggressively in her view. I agree with Tony here; I like this sentence better without the "that". - Dank (push to talk) 14:38, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I removed it. I just wanted to avoid being asked to put it back in again. The Australian Style Guide calls for aggressive removal, so to me it seems more like reverting back to standard English. Hawkeye7 (talk) 20:48, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
This sentence seems not to flow in its paragraph: "They argued for an independent air force, but were unable to persuade the Commission, although it did agree that the Air Corps should be granted an unprecedented degree of autonomy within the Army.[16]" It's a major major point—in fact, this guy had a significant impact on US military practice, especially the emphasis on air attack, right?
Hawkeye, thanks for fixing, but there's the rest of the article too, which I don't have time to scrutinise. Is there an independent copy-editor around? I must say, the amount of time this has been on the nom list is a concern: it suggests the nom should have been better prepared. Tony(talk)09:48, 26 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
This article focusses on a country boy who became a World War II bomber pilot, eventually commanding No. 467 Squadron RAAF. He managed to get out of all manner of scrapes in the air war over Europe, survive the conflict, and play a part in the post-war RAAF, but still died quite young. Recently passed GA and MilHist A-Class reviews -- any and all comments welcome. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 06:28, 24 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've had the opposite suggested to me as well in the past but I prefer normal caps myself so no prob with that. Thanks for reviewing. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 13:49, 24 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I didn't make it back to the A-class review because my laptop's buggered, but I looked at the article in some detail then and didn't see any issues. It's a high-quality, engaging article with an interesting story to tell and worthy of FA status. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 11:06, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Images - File:SUK11562BrillPortrait1943.jpg: since this photo includes a painting, you also need to indicate the copyright/licensing status of that painting. Nikkimaria (talk) 17:54, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure why this question arises. If you check the source file, it's marked as public domain by the Australian War Memorial, an Australian Government agency, so I don't know how that proclamation could be leaving out the painting. It's not my interpetation of Australian copyright, it's the Government (which would incidentally have owned copyright on painting and photo if copyright was still in force). Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:00, 28 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I hate to be the spanenr in the works, but I agree with Nikki. We need to know who owns the copyright for the painting and what its copyright status is. I'd be surprised if it was usable, because I think paitings don't enter the public domain until 70 years after the artist has died. Put simply, we have to treat it as two images, thus we need copyright information on the second (the painting). Sorry. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:15, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm inclined to support HJ Mitchell on this one. The picture isn't incidental to the photo (e.g. coincidentally in the background). Its not covered by right of panorama, as its a 2D, not 3D object. The Australian Government can release the copyright on their rights to the photo, but unfortunately that doesn't mean they can release the original artist's rights to the painting. If the Australian Government owned the rights to the painting as well, of course, that would be different - but we'd need to take into account the difference between owning the physical painting, and owning the rights to its reproduction (which can be separate). Hchc2009 (talk) 14:33, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm still curious as to why people are second-guessing the explicit declaration of copyright expiry by the govenment. Why would you assume that the Australian government did not own all rights to a painting sitting in the overseas headquarters of its air force? By the way, HJ, I think you'll find an Australian artistic work enters public domain if the author died before 1955, not 70 years after they died. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 15:00, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If you could argue that UK law didn't apply in this circumstance, then you could perhaps fall back on Australian law, which is partially quite helpful. The relevant bit here in the Australian Copyright Council website notes that "The generally accepted interpretation of the relevant provision in the Copyright Act is that you may photograph a “sculpture or work of artistic craftsmanship” which is publicly displayed “other than temporarily” without permission. There is, however, a technical argument that neither underlying works in such sculptures and craft works nor pre-existing design drawings are covered under that provision, and that permission is still required for the indirect reproduction of these works in a photograph of the sculpture or craft work. We are not aware of any cases in which this argument has been raised in court." UK law, if it covered the headquarters, would differentiate (unhelpfully in this case) between 2D and 3D artwork though.
On the issue of owning copyright and physical paintings, though, the Australian ACC notes the presumption that "You are not usually entitled to make copies of an artwork you have bought, unless copyright in that artwork has expired. A transfer of ownership of copyright must be in writing and signed by the copyright owner. In most cases, an artist who sells a piece of art keeps the copyright, and the purchaser needs the artist’s permission to reproduce the artwork." One could argue that the Australian War Memorial agency will have checked this paperwork themselves before releasing the photograph, but, speaking personally, I'd be very surprised if they had. Hchc2009 (talk) 15:26, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The problem is that the photograph is in the public domain, but there's no statement that the painting's copyright is owned by the Australian Government. There's a statement that it was made by a third party, and that third party died after 1955 (1987 according to the AWM) so, much as I hate to say it, I think we have to assume that the painting is still in copyright. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 15:53, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bit of an anomoly that we accept the AWM as a reliable source as far as its text goes but not its declarations regarding image copyright... ;-) Still, I genuinely appreciate you guys responding to my request for further comment, and in the interests of wrapping this FAC up I'll just substitute a more conventional photo. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 16:28, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I believe that the article is well written, well referenced, comprehensive, is neutral, stable and comprehensive. It is supported with appropriate images and is an appropriate length;
there are no dab links, ext links work and alt text is present;
Lead is solid. from Cryptic C62, a bacon-flavored waffle manufacturer.
"a member of the Australian Militia" I find this linking format to be somewhat odd. How about "a member of the Australian Militia" instead?
"Following a spell as an instructor" This language is too informal. I suggest replacing "spell" with a word that is not "spell".
"Brill's leadership and determination to always press home his attacks despite damage to his aircraft—on one occasion inflicted by another Lancaster's bombs from above..." The purpose of the lead is to given an informative summary of subject, not to declare how amazing he is and why we should all go back in time to give him a high-five. I suggest dropping the intriguing but largely irrelevant anecdote and rewriting as follows: "Brill's leadership and ability to consistently finish his attacks despite damage to his aircraft".
First two points no issue, will do. Re. the last one, I don't think I'm using langauage different in tone to what the sources employ, and this wording has stood GAR and ACR, but will think about how it might be modified without becoming too pedestrian -- FA writing is supposed to be engaging after all... Thanks for reviewing! Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:09, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Modified last-mentioned to replace "always press home his attacks" with "complete his missions" but "determination" seems more appropriate than "ability", and the sortie involving being hit by friendly fire was one of those for which the DSO was awarded so I think it's relevant as well as interesting. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 11:08, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Disagree with Rm2dance, along with all the other reviewers who have responded to the same comment in other reviews. - Dank (push to talk) 13:50, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I reviewed this for GA status and found it to be a compelling read then. Since it's undergone an A-class review and FAC since then, I can only assume the article is in even better shape now. (As a caveat, I have not re-read the article since my GA passage.) WizardmanOperation Big Bear18:50, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
This is my second article I have sent to FAC, and my third experience at FAC (the first article was declined once). I think I have found everything I can on Sevastopol. It's passed a MilHist AcR and a GA review. This article means more to me than others because this is the first article I created, albeit in my userspace. I await your comments. Buggie111 (talk) 13:27, 21 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Source review - spotchecks not done
Be consistent in whether you provide states for publisher locations, and if so whether those states are abbreviated. Also, is it necessary to include "United Kingdom" for London? Conventionally one would not
The MilHist ACR stated that UK had to be listed there. I've generailized the states. Neither the ISBN or location is available for the two books you lsited, and this has been discussed in the AcR.Buggie111 (talk) 02:53, 22 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Conversions of measurement need work. In converting metric measurements there currently is a variety of conversions used here such as nautical miles, miles and fathoms. Some measurements have no conversions at all. Remember that when converting a nautical measurement you need the metric and US equivalents. Brad (talk) 02:05, 23 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Firstly, I think I've got the conversions done, could you please say if there are any mistakes. OK, now for your question. Nothing. It just sat there. Buggie111 (talk) 13:10, 23 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In what manner are your sources giving you measurements? If they give a nautical measurement convert it to metric and US. If they give you metric measurement convert it to US. In the last paragraph of the article there is a conversion of metric to nautical, in this case fathoms. What was the reasoning behind that? Brad (talk) 05:30, 24 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I made some corrections and added a cn tag where a conversion is missing. Don't wikilink common measurements like meters, foot, kph, mph etc. Think about adding a sentence or two to explain the missing 3 years while the ship just sat around. Brad (talk) 00:52, 25 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Knots, nautical miles, etc. are not common units and should be linked. We know what they are because we use them all the time. The average person doesn't have a clue how they differ from ordinary units.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:50, 25 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Some of the reference books listed have OCLC numbers and some don't. All books listed should either have the OCLC number or none at all. The exception being books published prior to use of ISBN's. Brad (talk) 12:24, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It says "instruments measured higher speed and horsepower". The quantity measured is called 'power'.
The title "Service history" is displaced to the right on my screen. That may be due to the placement of images.
The 'General characteristics' has some primary units in full '47-millimeter' and some abbreviated/symbolic e.g. '4,000 nmi'. It might be worth checking if this issue applies to many of these tables in ship articles. In a summary table, I think it's fine to use abbreviations/symbols for all.
The large amount of vertical whitespace in the Construction section looks weird if you read this article on a < 1080p screen/browser. Presumably it's there due to problems with image flow (running into the next section heading)? Tijfo098 (talk) 11:40, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Lead comment: The material that is presented in the lead is sufficiently well-written, but as a whole the lead is not yet complete. There needs to be material to summarize the Design and Construction sections. At the very least, the lead should answer the question "How big was this thing?" --Cryptic C62 · Talk19:49, 22 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments - leaning support:
Lead -
this sentence has too much going on and is difficult to follow: "After she was slightly damaged during the surprise attack on Port Arthur in early February, she participated in several attempts to break out from the port, most notably the Battle of the Yellow Sea, where she was damaged by several shells but managed to make it back to port." Should be split or rewritten
The Battle of the Yellow Sea should be mentioned in the lead
Characteristics -
LT or long tons? Both are used.
First paragraph, second sentence about the crew doesn't seem to fit. Can it reorganized somehow?
First it says Ekaterina II has six guns, then it says she had seven guns. Is this a mistake or are they different types of gun?
This sentence needs clarification: " During a three-hour test on 11 July 1900, several instruments measured higher speed and power than in her sister ships. It turned out to be a flaw in one of the mechanisms, as it read the same measurements on both the Poltava and Petropavlosk, while other instruments read normally for each of the ships" - was the problem fixed?
Wartime service -
A few minutes later / several minutes later. Can these be reworded - it's a bit repetitive
Make sure all instances of Sevastapol are in italics
This sentence would be better if it were recast: "During three weeks of attacks in which 80 torpedoes were launched, four hit"
This is an interesting article and quite easy to read. Nothing major to be fixed. I'll do some spot-checks and be back to in a few days. TK(talk)00:42, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Source spot-check: These sentences below from the "Wartime service" section are all cited to page 52-53 of Forczyk. I know it's only snippit view, but using keyword search phrases from the text, I'm not finding any results on those pages. However some results are showing up on page 43, [19]. Is this a page numbering error?
A few minutes later, Mikasa was hit by two 12-inch (305 mm) shells and one 6-inch (152 mm) shell from Retvizan and Sevastopol, which caused 40 casualties. Several minutes after that, when it seemed that the Russians would be able to escape to Vladivostok, two 12-inch shells from Asashi penetrated the conning tower of the Russian flagship Tsesarevich, killing Vitgeft and the helmsman, severely wounding the captain, and causing the ship to come to a dead stop after executing a sharp turn. Thinking that this was a maneuver planned by Vitgeft, the Russian line started to execute the same turn, causing all of the ships directly behind Tsesarevich, including Sevastopol, to maneuver wildly to avoid hitting the stationary flagship. Prince Pavel Ukhtomski, second in command of the squadron, who was on the Peresvyet, proceeded to signal the other Russian ships via semaphore to steam back to Port Arthur, although the signals were only gradually recognized by Pobeda, Poltava, Pallada and Sevastopol.
Comments:
After an initial read, two sentences struck me as containing factual errors, or at least being unclear.
From the "Design" section: "Some characteristics were also copied from the French battleship Brennus and the American Indiana-class battleships, such as the flush-deck hull and high freeboard."
The Indiana-class ships were notable for having a low freeboard (they were designed to be coast-defense battleships), so it seems odd that they would be mentioned as providing a model to the Sevastopol in this regard. If the high freeboard claim is solely in reference to the Brennus, this sentence should be clarified.
From the "Characteristics" section: "Mounting a main battery of four 12-inch (305 mm) guns in two twin turrets, Sevastopol's armament was only eclipsed by the Ekaterina II-class battleships, which were a decade older, mounting six of the same type of gun."
Sevastopol's guns were not of the same type as the Ekaterina II class -- she mounted 12"/40 caliber Pattern 1895 guns, in comparison to her predecessor's 12"/30 caliber Pattern 1877s. The Pattern 1895s were very different from the 1877s, using smokeless powder, among other things. They were also significantly more powerful. Finally, the reference to Sevastopol in the sentence shoud be in italics.
Image review: First three images are clearly pre-Russian revolution, so PD tag is appropriate. On the fourth, while a year on the publication of "Records of Naval Battles in Meiji 37th, 38th vol. 2" may be helpful, it clearly looks to be PD for Japan. WizardmanOperation Big Bear16:23, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
I am nominating this for featured article because it has come a long way in recent months and I feel it meets the featured article critera. It was recently promoted as a good article, has been peer reviewed and had copy edit. In my opinion it is well referenced and covers the history of the station well. Harrison49 (talk) 21:59, 18 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support - it's not perfect, but it's much improved, and I now feel it meets the FA criteria. Nikkimaria (talk) 16:43, 26 May 2011 (UTC) Comments - issues adequately addressed to remove opposition. I'll try to offer further comments later. Nikkimaria (talk) 16:25, 11 May 2011 (UTC)Oppose at this time[reply]
"Runway 26/08 had been extended in February that year to accommodate the larger transport aircraft required by the Command" - source?
"As a result, Northolt has been extensively redeveloped with new facilities for these operations." - source?
Avoid using one-sentence paragraphs and other choppy constructions
WP:OVERLINK - don't link common terms like Europe, don't repeat links (especially in close proximity) (rechecked 18:20, 4 May 2011 (UTC), not fixed)
I delinked everything I could come up with a reason to delink. Let me know if it's not good enough, Nikki, it's not what I usually do. - Dank (push to talk) 22:14, 4 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
WP:MOS edits needed - don't use single quotation marks except within larger quotes, check hyphen/dash use, etc (Rechecked 18:20, 4 May 2011 (UTC), remaining issues include linkrot)
Not something I usually check, but I've run the link checker at the top right of this page, and that's the only dead link. Anyone have a substitute? - Dank (push to talk) 18:59, 4 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It was a PDF, so I have linked to the page the PDF is linked to from. It appears that when the file is linked to from elsewhere, it displays as being unavailable. Harrison49 (talk) 21:34, 4 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think more copy-editing is needed - for example, "during the First World War I" (rechecked 18:20, 4 May 2011 (UTC), issues remain - for example "an annual maximum of 7,000 a year")
Amazing ... how did you find the only one so quickly? I just went through the article again, and found no other redundancies (within a sentence at least), with the arguable exception of two "alls", which I've removed. - Dank (push to talk) 18:59, 4 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Referencing needs to be checked - missing bibliographic details for Birtles 2010 and Bader 2004, books sources need page numbers, referencing format is overall rather inconsistent
Thank you for your suggestions. So far, references have been added for the first two points, several repeated links have been removed, the copy edit mistake you have highlighted has been fixed and the source you have drawn attention to has been replaced with a book source. The other references given to books withot bibliographic details should be on the way as these were added by another user who I have asked to add them in. Harrison49 (talk) 11:54, 19 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
A new copy edit has been completed and the referencing has been harmonised. I am in the process of getting the page numbers for the Bristow source. Harrison49 (talk) 10:40, 20 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I will remove the extra links, however, what is inconsistent in the referencing format? I have removed the author details where individual names were not available and the names of the organisations responsible had been used in their place. Harrison49 (talk) 15:41, 21 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Some examples: in ref 17 the author is listed first name first, whereas in most other refs the author appears last name first; ref 12 repeats "Royal Air Force" for both author and publisher while ref 2 does not; "Hansard" is not an author but the name of a publication. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:35, 22 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"with services transferring from other stations" seems quite vague, even for the lead. I would just omit it completely
Agreed, I removed it because it was implied by the first half of the sentence, but I wouldn't object if someone wants to add more detail (probably not in the lead). - Dank (push to talk) 15:58, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Use of "whilst" is considered to be somewhat deprecated
I will gleefully replace "whilst" whenever I see it at FAC, but only if we can get a stronger consensus than we've been able to get so far. - Dank (push to talk) 15:45, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"They then sought an aerodrome" - are "they" the aviation pioneers or the British Army?
"led to the need for" -> "necessitated"? Check for other instances of excessive wordiness
If I may, Nikki, I'd like to pull in both directions here. I encourage anyone bringing something to A-class or FAC to read it through slowly thinking about "tightness". This isn't just a fussy copy-editor preference; if a "tighter" way to put something occurs to you, it will usually be clearer and easier to read, and sometimes it fixes problems you didn't even know were there. OTOH, don't force it; the time spent obsessing over word choice or grammar might be better spent writing another article, especially if you're not that comfortable with word choice and grammar. Others can help with the polishing. - Dank (push to talk) 15:45, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"Glebe Farm in Ickenham, Hundred Acres Farm and Down Barnes Farm" - are these all in Ickenham? If so, reorder, if not, where are they?
Agreed that knowing where the farms are would help, and if you don't know, maybe some more general description (what county, near what city) would be better. - Dank (push to talk)
I've added that these were in Ruislip.
Is "British Government" a proper noun (ie. is that the official name)?
I've lowercased all 3 instances of "government"; anyone have a problem with that? - Dank (push to talk)
Additional hyphens needed, for example "fifteen month period" -> "fifteen-month period
What is a "day fighter base"? By "civilian flights" do you mean commercial flights or recreational flights?
A day fighter base was where fighter aircraft optimised for daytime operations flew from. I've changed this to read "a base for daytime fighter operations".
"the crew's lack of understanding of English and military air traffic control procedures had contributed significantly" - the procedures themselves or the crew's lack of understanding of them contributed to the crash?
Seems clear; does it seem implausible? - Dank (push to talk)
I've added "both" to make it clear that the crew struggled with both points.
Most reviewers prefer to see consistency on "First World War" vs. "World War I". We tend to prefer "First World War" in BritEng and "World War I" in AmEng, but I don't think it matters. - Dank (push to talk) 16:44, 20 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There are too many one-sentence paragraphs. See if you can either do without them or find a way to work them into the narrative.
Thank you for your help Dank. The GOCE copy edit replaced most links for the First and Second World Wars to read World War I or II, per their article names. I have changed all mentions so that this is the same throughout. The reference 61 now has a supporting line and I have expanded the single sentence paragraphs. Harrison49 (talk) 20:41, 20 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support on prose and MOS per standard disclaimer. I checked the things Nikki mentions above; I got most of them the first time through, and I've combined the one-sentence paragraph with another paragraph. - Dank (push to talk) 15:01, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments -- Taken first pass at the article, making various trims and tweaks. While it looks quite comprehensive, I'm not entirely sure about the way it jumps about in time, though I appreciate this is to try and keep related information together. Will have another look from top to bottom tomorrow, when I review references and other aspects. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 15:32, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Had another look, further comments:
Structure/flow: I still think the jumping back and forth in time, even if it's to try and keep related info together, perhaps does the article more harm than good. This sort of thing is fine when done sparingly but it seems a bit wearing here. For instance in "Battle of Britain and Second World War" we go from 1939 to 1937 to 1943 to 1940 to 2008 to 1940 to 2010, all within the first four paragraphs. I think generally (not necessarily exclusively) keeping to a more conventional chronological narrative will work better.
Referencing: The "Bibliography" looks like it should be labelled "Further reading" -- I can't see any citations to those books. The citations themselves are heavy going too, be better to create a "References" section where you list your full book titles once, and then cite them in short form, e.g. "Birtles 2010, p. 22" or something similar.
I've changed the reference style and changed most of the history section to run in chronological order. I've kept the paragraph in the later civil and military use about accidental landings together as the stories of the two 707s fit quite nicely. How does this look? Harrison49 (talk) 20:08, 7 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for all your efforts responding to these comments. Reckon it flows better now. I've made a few minor mods and also alternated the images to mix things up a bit and reduce stacking on wider screens -- let me know if I've mucked up anything. Last thing I want to check is the references themselves and if they look okay to me I'll be happy to support. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 01:53, 8 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for taking a look at the article. I've removed the full stops you've mentioned. The inclusion of the Royal Air Force ensign in the infobox is in line with other RAF articles to aid identification, and similar practice is carried out in US Air Force base articles as an example. I'm unsure if a free alternative of the 1917 aerial photograph does exist but if one is available, I'd be pleased to see it included. Harrison49 (talk) 22:20, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, I'm not an image expert, but isn't it possible that this image (the 1917 aerial photograph) is actually in the public domain? The description page says that it is subject to Crown Copyright, which implies to me that it is British government photograph. Wouldn't it then be more appropriate to tag it with {{PD-BritishGov}}, which states that images which are created by the UK government before 1 June 1957 are in the public domain? Given that it appears to have been taken in 1917, would that not mean that this actually is a public domain image? I'm not sure of this, though, so please correct me if I'm wrong. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 10:42, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
in the Later civil and military use section, this doesn't seem correct to me: "Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) aircrew killed during the Battle of Britain" - during the Second World War, Australian and New Zealand aircrew that participated in the Battle of Britain would have either been in the RAF, RAAF or RNZAF. The Australian and New Zealand Army Corps was a First World War formation, the abbreviation of which has later been used colloquially to generically describe military personnel from those nations. Using it in this way is probably confusing to readers, particularly if they click on the link. I would suggest just saying "British, Polish, Australian and New Zealand aircrew..." (and leave off the ANZAC);
ANZAC was how this was presented in the A History of Royal Air Force Northolt book, though I agree it was confusing so I'll make the change. The aerial photograph is from the same book which is covered under Crown copyright so I played it safe with the image and uploaded it under the same licence. A specific photo credit is not given in the book so it is to be presumed it was created by the British government and can be tagged as being in the public domain. If this would definitely be the correct licence then I'll be more than happy to change that too. Also, I'm sorry for the oversight on the Further reading section. Thank you to everyone for your reviews and suggestions. Harrison49 (talk) 19:11, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Update on the image: I asked at the Media Copyrights page and was told the {{PD-BritishGov}} was the correct licence to use. I have replaced the non-free licences for the image with that one. Harrison49 (talk) 13:09, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
in the first sentence of the Battle of Britain section, I suggest adding a clause "during the Second World War" to introduce the reason why RAF and Polish squadrons were defending the UK;
this sentence seems like it is missing something: "The aircraft used to fly him to meetings with other Allied leaders". -- "was used" ??
I'm not sure what this sentence means. Is it missing something? "The much larger civilian airport at Heathrow though its operations became constrained by its proximity to the new facility". AustralianRupert (talk) 00:45, 12 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Lead is solid. from Cryptic C62, the prognosticating octopus:
"Northolt pre-dates the establishment of the Royal Air Force by almost three years." This is indeed a fun factoid, but it is sadly uninformative without giving the actual years that are relevant here.
I don't understand why the second paragraph of the lead is not written in chronological order.
Is there a difference between "civilian flights" and "civil flights"?
"RAF squadrons including No. 32 (The Royal) Squadron RAF are based at RAF Northolt whilst its location close to the A40 road link with central London has made the station popular with business people and politicians." This is what happens when you take two completely unrelated facts and try to bash them together into a sentence. I suggest dropping the "whilst" and splitting this into two sentences.
I don't have a strong opinion on whether or not there should be an In popular culture section, but if you are going to include it, it should be mentioned in the lead.
Question that should be answered in the lead: how big is this place? I would be happy with either a measure of area or the mileage of runway.
Thank you for your review. I've added in the date the aerodrome opened and a mention of film productions. I've also changed the paragraph to read in date order, replaced mentions of "civil" with "civilian" and made a change to the sentence you mention. The length of the runway is in the infobox but I'm not sure if it would fit in the lead. Harrison49 (talk) 20:36, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
How about putting it at the end of the first paragraph? That paragraph seems to be dedicated to numerical / bare-bones facts. --Cryptic C62 · Talk21:26, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Image question. Above, Jarry1250 says: "use of the insignia in the infobox seems decorative and therefore fails the NFCC". Harrison replies: "The inclusion of the Royal Air Force ensign in the infobox is in line with other RAF articles to aid identification, and similar practice is carried out in US Air Force base articles as an example." Could we get a couple of outside opinions on this NFCC issue please? - Dank (push to talk) 20:40, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
(Drive-by reply after noticing Dan's appeal at WT:MILHIST) I would say that meets the NFCC, becuase it's being used for identification purposes, which we allow without question in articles on companies and organisations, for example. However, File:Northolt-600.jpg is too big to comply with NFCC 3b and should be reduced and tagged with {{non-free reduced}} so the old version can be deleted. I assume that's the one at issue, since the RAF flag itself appears to be user-made and properly licensed. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:11, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
" the station houses No. 32 (The Royal) Squadron RAF, No. 600 Squadron (Royal Auxiliary Air Force), 621 EOD Squadron RLC (part of 11 Explosive Ordnance Disposal Regiment) and the Royal Logistic Corps.[2]" - ref 2 supports The Royal Squadron but not the rest of this sentence
"Civilian flights ceased when the central area at Heathrow opened in 1954 with Northolt reverting to sole military use in May that year" - don't see this in the cited source
"Thirty Allied airmen including servicemen from Belgium, Canada, Czechoslovakia, New Zealand, Poland and the United Kingdom were killed flying from RAF Northolt during the Battle of Britain, of whom ten were Polish." - first part not in source, source gives only 5 Polish airmen from Northolt KIA
"By 1952 the airfield was the busiest in Europe, with a total of 50,000 air movements per annum" vs "during 1952, Northolt was the busiest airfield in Europe, handling an annual total of 50,000 air movements" in source
Considering that Nikkimaria found issues of close paraphrasing and text unsupported by citations on a spotcheck, I would like additional review for same. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 22:16, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I checked another 6 or 7 sources. I didn't find any issues with close paraphrasing, but The headquarters of the London and South East Region (LaSER) of the Air Training Corps is also located at RAF Northolt doesn't appear to be in the given source. I don't have time to check all the web sources atm. I might be able to in the week if you think it's necessary, Sandy. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:52, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the helpful feedback, HJ; since you also found info not supported by the cited source, more checking might be in order. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:59, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you HJ Mitchell. To make it clearer, I've replaced "London and South East Region (LaSER)" with "14F (Northolt) Squadron". Harrison49 (talk) 12:27, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Following the relocation of the British Forces Post Office and Defence Courier Service from Mill Hill,—source doens't mention Defence Courier Service
First paragraph of RAF Northolt#Project MoDEL redevelopment: only Bentley Priory and the Air Historical Branch are mentioned in source. Redevelopment (last sentence of the paragraph) checks out.
Other airlines including Aer Lingus, Alitalia, Scandinavian Airlines System and Swissair used the airfield for scheduled services across Europe doesn't seem to be in the source (add: Aer Lingus is supported in the next online ref)
He became regarded as an ace of the sky and earned the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) after downing six German aircraft, before being shot down and killed on September 27, 1940 over Borough Green in Kent. (source) Paszkiewicz became a flying ace and received the Distinguished Flying Cross after shooting down six aircraft, before he himself was shot down and killed on 27 September 1940, over Borough Green in Kent. (article) That's almost verbatim.
Thank you for checking it through. I'm sorry about the mistake with references and have replaced some and added others. What happened was I included several facts in a paragraph or sentence with a reference only covering one or two. Hopefully these problems have now been addressed. I have also rewritten the sentences on Ludwik Witold Paszkiewicz, hopefully this is an improvment. Harrison49 (talk) 16:11, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
One of the most memorable events of the Byzantine-Arab Wars, and one with major religious consequences. The article passed thorough GA and MILHIST A-class reviews with positive comments. I added a few more details since then, and believe that it is ready for FA. Constantine ✍ 19:14, 3 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Image review
Captions that are complete sentences should end in periods
Anatolic or Anatolian? Be consistent between captions and article text
Point 1 done, I've elaborated the captions a bit. On point 2, they are two completely different things: "Anatolian" refers to Anatolia, aka Asia Minor, while "Anatolic" refers to the Anatolic Theme, a province in central Anatolia. I have added "(Anatolia)" next to Asia Minor in a few places to try and make this clear to readers unfamiliar with the geographical context. Constantine ✍ 21:06, 3 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Source review
Is Whittow 1997 or 1996?
When using citation templates, make sure you're consistent in which type you use - you're currently mixing "citation" and "cite book", and it's causing some formatting inconsistencies
Be consistent in providing or not providing publisher location
Done, I standardized citation format and content, and corrected Whittow's date. I'll try to find some time to do the citation bundling. On comprehensiveness, Bury and Treadgold are the only relatively detailed accounts of the period in English. There's also Alexander Vasiliev in French, but he too is dated and largely tells the same story as Bury (the primary sources, Byzantine or Arab, are the same after all). Treadgold is virtually the only detailed recent synthesis. The other sources have been used for corroboration and for specific details or for showing the wider picture. Constantine ✍ 09:54, 9 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Theophilos reportedly fell ill upon learning of the humiliating disaster, and his death three years later before the age of thirty was attributed by Byzantine writers to his sorrow over the city's loss. This sentence is not awesome, especiallythree years later before the age of thirty - how about a year and a number? Also I understand you've cited two historians and they like to use weasel words like Byzantine writers but its not appropriate for an encyclopedia; honestly, I'd leave out everything after the comma!
If I can butt in ... it's not true that "Byzantine writers" is always bad; many history FAs are full of things like "according to chroniclers of the time" and "authorities were divided"; the alternative would be to list all the writers and what they said ... and really, for ancient history, almost no one cares for this level of detail, readers just want to get an accurate sense of what was said at the time. - Dank (push to talk) 20:06, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hmm...this is a FA criteria 1d concern; citation 36 actually reviewed some 'Byzantine sources', described the story, then says explicitly it was probably a legend; Constantine reworded that to "Byzantine writers" which I assumed he didn't review, cites the secondary source(s) and leaves out the legend part. Another way to resolve this is to transform the sentence into a note: "A Byzantine legend says shortly after the battle Theophilos fell ill and ultimately died of sorrow in 841 over the loss of the city." leaving the mysterious 'writers/sources' out of it and giving the reader some clue to the veracity of this story but then we just have a probably false story mixed in with a bunch of facts. I was just giving my opinion I don't see the point of including it at all.
I included it as an example of how the Byzantines themselves viewed the impact o the city's fall, or at least how they felt it should have been received. Later interpolations by historians are always indicative of the way an event is viewed by them. and the importance later generations attach to it. A military defeat due to which the emperor falls ill and dies is indicative of its influence in later minds. Constantine ✍ 21:05, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm switching to oppose on this point; its simply not factual the emperor died of sorrow as an impact of the battle. Kirk (talk) 19:39, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I really am at a loss here: I rephrased the relevant passage to make explicit that this is a later tradition, and not a factual account. I have yet again rephrased it, please re-check it. Constantine ✍ 21:16, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My preference is you delete both sentences but if you really want this in your article you have to make it clear its not true. A better beginning to me is 'A Byzantine legend says Theophilos' etc. Kirk (talk) 13:54, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The sentences stay, per my reasoning above, and because Theophilos' health most likely did suffer from the psychological impact (see poor Samuel of Bulgaria for instance). At least Treadgold agrees with this. I have yet again rewritten it and added an explicit reference to his death being "most likely" a legend. I really cannot make anything else here, the statement "Byzantine historians attribute his death" is factual. Constantine ✍ 15:22, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It still bothers me your sources put a trivia item without any facts or analysis, but its at least better. I don't get the Samuel of Bulgaria comparison; these kinds of trivia or rumors don't really fly with modern historical writing. Anyways, if some other uninvolved editors think the current wording is ok I'll strike my oppose. Kirk (talk) 23:49, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Another potentially troubling section was the second paragraph of the Impact section - its just the opinion of one historian, and without his opinions you really don't have much evidence the battle had anything to do with iconoclasm vs. iconolatry. I assumed he was a reliable source and it doesn't sound like a legend or fringe theory to me so i didn't say anything. But I think you could wikilink iconolatry/iconophiles and maybe define the two since neither are exactly everyday words. Kirk (talk) 22:10, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Treadgold is in this case used to summarize the prevailing scholarly opinion on this issue. I could likewise add Bury or other writers as refs, but IMO Treadgold is more than adequately established as a scholarly authority in the field. If it is felt necessary, I will add more sources. I have linked the relevant terms, and tried to give a short explanation on iconoclasm per Ealdgyth's advice below. Constantine ✍ 21:05, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
BTW, Whittow too makes the connection between Amorium and iconoclasm, since he is available online, you can check this easily. Constantine ✍ 16:02, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Also, I second toning down the opinion and aim for WP:NPOV (i.e.:brutal sack made me chuckle...see below).
You need to work on describing the strength and casualties in the infobox with more detail; the numbers don't match up to the numbers in the text and it doesn't make sense to the average reader that an army of 30,000 could lose 70,000 men. There are additional parameters (casualties3) which are occasionally used for civilian casualties.Kirk (talk) 20:01, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
On this issue, I clarified that the casualty numbers refer to a total count, including civilians. AFAIK, there is no separate estimate between military and civilian casualties, so separating them doesn't seem a good idea. I'll respond on the concerns above tomorrow. Constantine ✍ 22:15, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Its at least less confusing now; weren't there 6,000 captured and sent into slavery?
What's a Khurramite? Needs at least a link but since Emperor T over-relied on them I think it needs a little description.
I think the instances of Sack of X is ok but I would suggest eliminating as many instances of sack as you can; use some synonyms.
The city was thoroughly plundered, with the spoils and the surviving population divided among the army, except for the city's military and civic leaders, who were reserved for the Caliph. - what does surviving population divided among the (Army/Caliph) mean? Slavery? Kirk (talk) 13:36, 13 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Explained the Khurramites a little without going into too much detail, and clarified the issue of the captive population (they indeed became slaves). On their numbers, Mu'tasim executed some 6,000, others (unknown how many) escaped, still others (again of unknown number) were carried with the Arab army into captivity. Because of this, and since there is AFAIK no even an estimate on their number, I have therefore refrained from mentioning a total number of captives. Constantine ✍ 21:05, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
This section still needs some work I think:
The city was completely sacked and thoroughly plundered... I don't think the adjectives help here - what would an incomplete sack or a sloppy plundering look like? Just describe the extent the plundering and sacking & you don't need this sentence. Kirk (talk) 19:39, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
...except for the city's military and civic leaders, who were reserved for the Caliph. Reserved isn't the best verb maybe enslaved? Active voice with Caliph as the subject?
On the first, I replaced both with thoroughly, on the second, I rephrased it slightly, but IMO there isn't any apparent problem. Treadgold uses almost the same phrasing. Constantine ✍ 21:16, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not a fan of Treadgold's writing; you work with the sources in English you have I guess. Did they take any treasure as plunder before destroying the city or were the slaves the plunder? Kirk (talk) 13:54, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The Arabs took everything they could from the city, which is why I have retained "thoroughly plundered". I've rephrased the sentence combining "spoils and slaves" to make it clearer. Constantine ✍ 15:22, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Words like 'sack', 'plunder', 'spoils' with nice adjectives attached sound good but I think you could just delete the lead sentence, describe what happened and let the reader decide if this was a thorough plundering of spoils or not. Your sources substitute POV terms for facts so I don't know if you should use them as role models & maybe that's just the way Byzantine historians all write. Kirk (talk) 23:49, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I really don't understand where you see the problem. "thoroughly sacked and plundered" isn't POV as far as I can tell, neither the words themselves nor the phrase as a whole. This is not a subjective statement, but a description of fact, a summary of the paragraph. How is this statement biased, or how do I mislead the reader towards a wrong or one-sided conclusion here? I could substitute a direct quote, but I'd rather avoid it if possible. Anyhow, as I suggested, in your talk page, if it is a phrasing issue, by all means please propose an alternative that makes the same point in a more neutral fashion. Other than this instance, do you have any other objections? Especially re the issue of the legend surrounding Theophilos' death. Regards, Constantine ✍ 16:38, 6 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Plunder, sack & spoil are all subjective terms which make it more interesting to read but don't really have a meaning without describing what happened; without the description they are POV; now they are just unnecessary fluff. Since it appears there's a consensus for promotion, I'll just get out of your hair; good luck!Kirk (talk) 22:16, 6 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support—My concerns were addressed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RJHall (talk • contribs) 16:21, May 6, 2011
Comments
The opinions about the size of the armies seem dubious: an "exceptionally large" army of 80,000; "huge army" of 70,000; "vast army" of 80,000. These seem like fairly typical numbers to me. It should be sufficient to just list the size of the army and let the reader decide. Alternatively, comparisons can be used showing the typical manpower of the time.
I was struck by the considerable amount of strong opinion expressed in this article; sometimes bordering on hyperbole. Per WP:NPV, I question whether the tone is sufficiently impartial and ask whether a quoted source shouldn't be provided for the more excessive remarks. (Alternatively, comparisons could be used to clarify why these are so.) Examples:
"reinstated harsh suppression of the iconophiles"; "outraged by the brazenness and brutality of the raids"; "city was subjected to a brutal sack"; "sack of Amorium was one of the most devastating events"; "humiliating disaster"; "disaster of this magnitude"; "brutal sack"; "major military disaster"; "traumatic event"; "heavy personal blow"
"Looting and devastating the countryside": how does one devastate the countryside after one has looted it?
How can this event be termed "devastating" and a "major military disaster" if there so little impact?
I have tried to answer the first concern with a footnote. I have tried to tone down the article, although frankly, a sack where 30-70,000 people are killed qualifies as "brutal" in my book. On the third concern, I tried to convey not only the plundering, but also active destruction, i.e. setting fire to fields etc. However, since looting does contain that, I removed "and devastating". On the last issue, the impact was ideological: it put an end to Theophilos' pretensions of an iconoclast revival, and directly contributed to its abandonment. Given the importance of religion especially in the Middle Ages, I wouldn't say that it had "little impact". Constantine ✍ 21:05, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
As a general note on the tone issue, the "hyperbolic" language is very much the language used by the secondary sources. As an example, I inserted a verbatim quote of Whittow's (generally much less given to hyperbole or accepting inflated accounts than Bury or Treadgold) at the end of the article. It should give a good idea why terms like "humiliating", "devastating" and "disaster" are present in the text. Constantine ✍ 16:02, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry I can't support this. I'm going to abstain from further judgment and let others decide. Thank you for the reply.—RJH(talk) 17:41, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Could you perhaps explain why you won't support? Is it the tone alone or are your other concerns unaddressed as well? The object of the review is first and foremost to improve the article, after all. Constantine ✍ 18:36, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My apologies, you just caught me on a particularly bad day. I read the article again and it looks much improved. Thank you for the updates. :-) Regards, RJH (talk) 16:16, 6 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ouch. "The Sack of Amorium by the Abbasids in mid-August 838 represents one of the major events in the long history of the Byzantine–Arab Wars." "represents one of the major events"... while I"m not a passive voice Nazi, this is a bit much. Perhaps "The Sack of Amorium by the Abbasids in mid-August 838 was a major/definitive/turning point in the long Byzantine-Arab Wars. Also, can we state where Amorium is and who the Abbasids are?
Why "exceptionally large"? And "eager to avenge"?
"The city fell after a short siege, probably by treason, and a large part of its inhabitants were slaughtered, with the remainder driven off as slaves." Do not like the construction of "probably by treason" here, it's awkward in my reading. Perhaps "After a short siege, the city fell - probably due to treason - and ..."?
Background -
you need to explain iconoclast and iconophile more than just links.
"...some 14,000 Khurramite refugees under Nasr..." Should we know who Nasr is? I see you link his baptised name, but a short explication about why Nasr was in charge of 14,000 folks might be good...
"His successes in these years were not spectacular..." Theophobos/Nasr or Theophilos? Context isn't clear here.
"In this spirit, he issued a new follis..." should explain briefly this is a coin. Yes, you've linked it, but you lose readers when you force them to click to something else to gain a basic understanding of things.
Who's army gathered at Tarsus? I THINK it's the Caliphates, since they are the ones who sacked Amorium, but the previous paragraph is all about Byzantine forces, so I'm not sure. Needs clarification. And WHEN did it gather?
Opening stages:
"His army included the men from the Anatolian and possibly..." this sounds like ALL the men in the theme went, which is surely not the case...
"The Byzantines expected the Arab army to advance through the Cilician Gates and then to Ancyra, but it was also possible that the Arabs would march directly onto Amorium." I'm unclear what the second part of this sentence has to do with anything..
Honestly, "...the surviving population divided among the army, except for the city's military and civic leaders, who were reserved for the Caliph." sounds like it came from a Victorian-era history - I'm assuming you mean that the survivors were made slaves by the army except for the leaders, who were prisoners of the Caliph, but this sort of phrasing isn't usual in historical writing any more. Better to make it clear.
Aftermath -
"al-Abbas ibn al-Ma'mun" linkage for him?
"..and offering to ransom the high-ranking prisoners for 20,000 pounds of gold and to release all his Arab captives." The "his Arab captives" is somewhat ambigous here, as the last "him" mentioned was Basil, the one before is the Caliph, and Theophilos is at two person's remove here - suggest "to release all Arab captives of the Byzantines."
"...and is thought to have executed Aetios in retaliation." Is thought? Surely there is some controversy over this, which needs explication.
General -
Definitely a few too many "weasel" words "brutal sack" "throughly plundered" "vast army" "major campaign". Some of these may indeed be justified, but you need to state more conclusively why they are justified, rather than just using them.
"6 March 845" but "July 22" and "August 1"... pick one and stick with it.
Images appear to be correctly licensed and tagged.
Earwig's tool showed no copyright issues.
I have some concerns about prose and with jargon/not giving enough context for those not familiar with the subject, but it's close to gaining my support. Ealdgyth - Talk19:18, 15 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry about my absence during the past few days, but things have been hectic in RL and my own laptop picked the most inopportune time to have a disk malfunction... I'll be taking care of the voiced concerns gradually over the next few days. Thanks a lot for the input from everyone. Constantine ✍ 18:24, 17 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
@Ealdgyth. I think that I have corrected most of the issues you raised. Again, for the adjectives qualifying the opposing armies, see the comment on army sizes. On Aetios, I'll check my sources tomorrow to see how this can be clarified. Constantine ✍ 21:05, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment
It says "20,000 pounds of gold". Many readers have no idea what that amount is and will benefit from a kg value. It may be worth going back to the sources to check if it is avoirdupois, troy, roman, or other pound.
It says "impact" in more than one place. I think this would be better as 'effect'. Not a big deal.
I see now that it says "20,000 pounds of gold (about 9,000 kg)".
If it is avoirdupois, it would be better formatted as 'about 20,000 pounds (9,000 kg) of gold'
If it is troy, it would be better formatted as 'about 20,000 troy pounds (7,500 kg) of gold'
If it is roman, it would be better formatted as 'about 20,000 roman pounds (6,500 kg) of gold'
There are other pounds in use. It may well be that the source meant troy or roman pounds. Can this be resolved from the source? Lightmouse (talk) 18:20, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Done. You are right, I forgot to take into account that the Byzantines used a different pound measurement for gold. It derived from, but was not identical to the Roman pound. Constantine ✍ 15:22, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. I made a slight adjustment, hope it works for you. If not, just change it. I also went and added your definition of Byzantine litra to the 'pound' article. Please take a look and amend it as you think best. All my comments resolved now. Good luck. Regards. Lightmouse (talk) 18:45, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment
I notice that some of the books in the Sources section include external links to Google books when no view of the actual text is allowed. When adding references I do not include this type of link (although I can see some advantages in doing so) and wonder whether there is a Wikipedia guideline. Also, Bury (1912) is not viewable from London on Google books – but the same book is viewable on the Internet Archive. Would this be a better link? Aa77zz (talk) 11:44, 4 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hello! I am not aware of any guideline, but I find it useful to link books to Google Books: some of the books that are currently not viewable sometimes become preview-able (or a preview-able edition is uploaded), and generally, I find Google Books as a good starting point for searching for related reference works. You are right on Bury however, the Internet Archive link is better. I have replaced it. Constantine ✍ 19:36, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Lead looks good. After a quick review of the article's lead, the details of which have been moved to the FAC talk page, I am happy with the lead. --23:37, 13 May 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Cryptic C62 (talk • contribs)
Support comments - beginning a read-through now - I will post queries below. Please revert any copyediting I do which inadvertently changes the meaning. Casliber (talk·contribs) 03:58, 20 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In 829, when the young emperor Theophilos ascended the Byzantine throne, the Byzantines and Arabs had been fighting on and off for almost two centuries - not thrilled with this - I do think "By" is a better preposition than "In" to start with as it relates to how long the Byzantines and Arabs had been fighting up to that date (the ascent is a subordinate clause).
Arab attacks continued unabated both in the East, where Caliph al-Ma'mun (r. 813–833) launched several large-scale raids, and in the West, where the Muslim conquest of Sicily was making headway - I think the tense would be better thus: " Arab attacks were continuing unabated both in the East, where Caliph al-Ma'mun (r. 813–833) had launched several large-scale raids, and in the West, where the Muslim conquest of Sicily had been making headway"
link "siege engines"
I think that some form of image in the infobox would be good. I hadn't a clue where Amorium is, so maybe a map with the paths of the relevant armies? I can do a map if I have an image of the original schematics to work on if you want.
Made the suggested changes, and reverted only one of your copyedits, where the emphasis was changed. I have already been working on a campaign map based on the one already in the article, expect it in a couple of days. Constantine ✍ 07:59, 20 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
SupportComments - leaning support - this is an interesting article, but I need to do another read through. For now, I'll start adding comments and more will be on the way.
Lead: "The Abbasids penetrated deep into Byzantine-held Asia Minor" > it's not clear that one part of the split army were the Abbasids - perhaps say that the Caliph split the army into the Abbasids and whatever the second portion was called.
I see the point, but I went with a minimal change: and -> while. I think that will divide them into 2 mutually exclusive piles for most readers, with a mimimum of words. - Dank (push to talk)
This sentence is too long and roundabout - needs to be split or shortened somehow: "An ambitious man and a convinced adherent of Byzantine Iconoclasm, which prohibited the depiction of divine figures and the veneration of icons, Theophilos sought to bolster his regime and support his religious policies by military success against the Abbasid Caliphate, the Empire's major antagonist"
Broken up.
In the "Siege and fall of Amorium" section some repetition: the wall was "badly damaged as a result of heavy rainfall" & the next sentence begins with "As a result"
as a result of -> by
In the "Impact" section more repetition of poor health occurring in close proximity
shortened
Why a legend that Theophilos died because of his reaction to these events? According to whom? Perhaps mention or attribute that sentence to a scholar or historian.
It says "Later Byzantine historians attribute ...". Most of Milhist's writers don't say "he said this, this other historian said that", although a few do.
Same sentence > "sorrow felt" should be reworded somehow
Ack, if I missed that, I suck. Fixed.
Last sentence in the same paragraph, I think "other side of the hill" is idiomatic and should be reworded
Okay, I know I didn't see that :) rewritten.
Last paragraph > brackets not necessary for ellipses. See MOS:ELLIPSIS for formatting.
Fixed.
I want to re-read the lead - it feels a little heavy to me. I was quite confused at the first reading, though less confused after reading through the article.
Okay, it looks like you copyedited this.
I also want to re-read the sections regarding iconoclasm. It seems iconoclasm was at the heart of this series of events and if that's true then I think the controversy about iconoclasm and schism it caused needs more clarification for the lay reader.
Regarding iconoclasm, this sentence: "Seeking divine favour, and responding to iconophile plots against him, Theophilos reinstated active suppression of the iconophiles and other perceived "heretics" in June 833, including mass arrests and exiles, beatings and confiscations of property" I think needs clarification to explain why Theophilos believed he would receive divine favor by moving against the iconophiles. I think a smallish paragraph explaining iconoclasm and Theophilos' philosophy regarding the schism is necessary. I think that would create a better context for the events.
The prose is a bit stiff in a few places but nothing overwhelming. Do you mind if a make a few copyedits?
Hello and thanks for taking the time to review! You can copyedit as you see fit, if you change the meaning too much, I'll just correct it myself. I'll go through the text clarifying the issues raised later today. Constantine ✍ 07:39, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Just a note ... Sandy's time is going to be limited for the next few weeks, and I know she's going through seeing what she can promote tonight. It would be nice if we could get this one finished. Truthkeeper, I've reviewed your edits ... great work. I'm going through now trying to respond to your questions. On the question of adding a paragraph about iconoclasm ... iconoclasm is linked in the lead, and at some point in the copyediting process, I start to think that if that link was good enough for the first 10 copyeditors (many of whom were exceedingly thorough), then it's probably good enough. I'm not an expert, but IMO a discussion of the significance of iconoclasm could lead us far afield, and invite NPOV edits ... better to have those fights in the iconoclasm article than here. - Dank (push to talk) 21:18, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I know that this has been sitting here for a long time and that Sandy will be promoting tonight so there's a reason to get it wrapped up. I wouldn't have bothered to review if I'd been more careful and realized there were already four supports. That said, I do think that a short blurb about iconoclasm is important. Given the manner in which the article is written, it suggests that iconoclasm was the cause for Theophilos' first campaign and the retaliatory campaign against Amorium. Any dogma that causes such a loss of life and destruction deserves a bit of description. As it happens I do know a bit about iconoloclasm and unfortunately was the last person to land here. Anyway, I think it's a nice page and the absence of the explanation won't keep me from supporting. Thanks for making the suggested fixes. TK(88)21:46, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Dank for your edits, you handled the issues better than I would have... On the Iconoclasm issue, in short, like most state-supported religions/ideologies it relied on military success for legitimization, particularly since it was always a sort of imperial pet-project and in the Roman-Byzantine culture the main secular aspect of the emperor is that of a triumphant general. Iconoclasm by itself was neither more nor less militant than other forms of Christianity, but it had become associated with military success during the time of Leo III and Constantine V who beat back the Arabs and Bulgars. The essential points of this argument are I think already mentioned in the article. However it would be wrong to say that Iconoclasm was the cause of these campaigns. The Byzantine-Arab wars were older than Iconoclasm, and Iconoclasm did not produce a perceptible change in their pattern. Even if Iconoclasm had been a non-issue, Theophilos as a Byzantine ruler would still have acted in pretty much the same way for the usual raisons d'État. The main difference is that Theophilos was more eager to up the stakes and risk a full-blown military confrontation than his predecessors. The 837 raid was almost unprecedented in size and geographical scope since Constantine V and a clear provocation to the Caliph to respond. On the other hand it is hard to tell in which measure Theophilos's actions were dictated by the need to prop up Iconoclasm or by his own rather extravagant character and apparent over-confidence. I could elaborate on the lines of this, but it enters the realm of historical speculation and it would derail the subject, which is first and foremost a description of the events of 838. Whatever Theophilos's set of motivations, it was Iconoclasm that was state doctrine, Iconoclasm that promised divine assistance and victory and Iconoclasm that suffered due to the emperor's failure. I am prepared to add more detail in the background section, but I won't have time today. Truthkeeper, could you tell me what exactly you'd like to see covered in more detail? Constantine ✍ 08:50, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The problem is that the relevant articles that could provide more details are rather superficial. Byzantine Iconoclasm for instance focuses mostly on the religious aspects and events and completely ignores the socio-political aspects that first raised and later doomed Iconoclasm. Anyhow, my thanks for a thorough review. Constantine ✍ 21:58, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've given up trying to keep up with MOS; WP:BOLDTITLE has been edited to distraction and is no longer clear. It used to say we shouldn't include links in the bold title-- now I can't tell what it's trying to say, so ... anyway, fine article, but I don't see a spot check for WP:V or close paraphrasing or accurate representation of sources. Has that been done? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 05:18, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Bury 1912: are you using the original pagination or that applied by the host site?
Ref 12: note 3 seems to be about the position of Theognostos, not about the size of the Arab army
Spotchecked a few of the other Bury refs, and none of them seem to support the material they're citing. I'm not sure whether this is a pagination issue, but this needs to be checked
The Bury references refer to the original book page numbers, not the versions of the Internet Archive, which for some reason are truncated. The actual book has some 550 pages, not 297... I included the Internet Archive link at the suggestion of another reviewer, because Google has apparently taken its version entirely off. Constantine ✍ 14:50, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Done, I'd read it in the Greek edition and found its English-language equivalent on Google Books, which did not include an ISBN. Also corrected the date, volume 2 was published in 1993. Constantine ✍ 00:18, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.
The article was removed by Dana boomer 16:22, 28 July 2011 [22].
I am nominating this featured article for review because It was promoted in 2005 and have not kept up to standards, specially in regards to sourcing. The issue was raised on the talk page in December 2009, but since then not much has happened. This is a low traffic article, but it covers a very important phase in Swedish military history. The article is overall well written, and the major problem is just sourcing. P. S. Burton (talk)11:09, 18 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sort of inactive but I might have time to fix this since it's mainly just a matter of adding more citations. Just give me a week and a few days or so since next week is exam week... – Elisson • T • C • 15:25, 27 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delist No effort at all has been made to address the listed issues. Other than two edits I made on 18 May of this year the article hasn't been touched since August of 2010. Brad (talk) 06:24, 16 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
The following is an archived discussion of a featured article review. Please do not modify it. Further comments should be made on the article's talk page or at Wikipedia talk:Featured article review. No further edits should be made to this page.
The article was kept by Dana boomer 23:52, 18 November 2011 [23].
The article is horribly overlinked. For a moment I thought my browser had accidentally changed my font color to blue.
There are 25 photographs in the article. This is not an article; it's a photo gallery. Did not check all the licenses but there is at least one fair use without a fair use rational.
Footnotes 2, 4, 9, 80 & 116 are underused, as they form the scholarly basis of the article in English. 27, 31 seem to have some scholarly merit, in languages I unfortunately do not have. There's Synthesis from primary sources going on to a massive scale. I first became aware of the Synthesis issue from a badly presented citation of the Black Book, which was obviously a result of Google Books deep searching (the citation was apt, but indicated a lack of familiarity with the text, authors, and academic conventions such as authored chapters in edited collections). The article could do with having all of its primaries purged and the material sourced from HQRS scholarly works. It could also probably do with its structure, weight and emphasis following scholarly works. Some of this may be as simple as resourcing, but someone with access and capacity needs to check for broad level synthesis because the sourcing basis here reads like an original essay rather than the recapitulation of the scholarly knowledge. Fifelfoo (talk) 17:02, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
@Fifelfoo - Can you point to which primary sources are you referring to and which synthesis you have in mind? I see some reference to primary sources in the text but it looks like that text is usually sourced to secondary sources which are discussing the primary sources, which is how it should be done. Maybe I'm missing it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 02:51, 29 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Volunteer Marek! Thanks for the questions. I've responded in relation to the first fifty citations immediately below to illustrate my point. (Given our past relationships, you ought to know I listed this for article improvement only, not to defeature it. Our article should be of the highest quality on this topic, and truthfully record the Soviet government's illegal and abhorrent actions, and the historical controversy surrounding their public denials, and the historic post 1989 reactions. I'm only noting this to avoid any questions regarding my motivations. My motivation about source quality is connected to the high HQRS expectations I have of such an important article.) This article can be great, but my reading of the sourcing is that it currently repeatedly returns to primary sources to substantiate facts which are either not encyclopaedic (ie: not reported in scholarly HQRS as significant to the narrative), or which are encyclopaedic and are found in the HQRS narrative by scholars. I'm also accepting that post 1989 reactions are rightly sourced to news magazines and newspapers due to how recent the reactions are. Fifelfoo (talk) 08:53, 29 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"Data combined from Alexander Shelepin's letter to Khrushchev..." is the sole source for a statement
"Excerpt from protocol No. 13 of the Politburo of the Central Committee meeting, shooting order of 5 March 1940..." supports three statements without secondaries
"Text of the original TASS communiqué released on April 14, 1990..." is miscited and improperly used to support a claim (it is the primary for the claim, it doesn't further illustrate the claim through quotation).
In both cases this ref is backed up by 1 or 2 others. I don't see a cause for concern here, particularly, how is it miscited? Are you suggesting we should simply cite it? The problem is that it is in Russian, and not translated, so we cannot simply cite it in the article. What I'd do is I'd convert this from a reference to a proper footnote (and I'll do it shortly). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 17:56, 7 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"IPN numbers quoted by Expatica.com article "Polish experts lower nation's WWII death toll", 30 August 2009..." is an inappropriate tertiary
Not sure if it was inappropriate, but I added another one, and the correct secondary source (original publication). While I don't have the book, I found the excerpt reproducing part of it online. Seeing as the numbers are consistent with the other tertiary source (which in fact is an interview with the director of the IPN), the numbers seem reliable (would be nice to add the exact page number from the book but it does not appear to be online in any shape or form, sadly). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 18:25, 7 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"Записка председателя КГБ при СМ СССР..." is on both instances solely cited without secondaries
[I can't check the polish sources properly due to language, they may be some source books or biographies cited]
"various authors (2003). Zdzisław Peszkowski, Stanisław Zdrojewski. ed. Kozielsk w Dołach Katynia - Dzienniki Kozielskie. Pelplin: Bernardinum." is reliant on diary information; it is also cited over two other sources (if they're secondaries) and it doesn't illustrate by quotation
"Goebbels, Joseph. ..." on the second occasion it is cited is cited for fact, not illustration, by quotation. (The first use is an appropriate illustrative citation)
Ok, thanks, I'll look through those. Give me a little time.Response to small print in small print. No problem! Relisting FAs is a good thing as it keeps article quality up. I have never had any concerns about your motivations.
I disagree pretty strongly with this. There's nothing in WP:NONENG which prohibits use of non-English language sources and AFAIK this has never been any kind of standard at FA. In fact, there are lots of articles which should rely on foreign language sources, as that where the in depth, academic, and more than superficial coverage's going to be. Of course, if there's any controversy, editors are free to request translations.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:09, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Disagree all you may, the WP:V policy states: "Because this is the English Wikipedia, English-language sources are preferred over non-English ones, where English sources of equal quality and relevance are available." Are you saying that English-language academic books on the topic, like that of George Sanford are superficial, and we need to resort to WP:PRIMARY foreign-language sources to learn the WP:TRUTH? Because that's exactly what WP:SYN is designed to prevent... Tijfo098 (talk) 18:16, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There's no reason that both Sanford and relevant non-En sources cannot be used in the article. If it's in Sanford (or other En source) then yes, we should prefer it and use that to cite the text, but if it's not, it's fine to use non-En sources, per WP:V - it depends on a specific piece of text (so thanks for providing specific examples below). So to answer your (perhaps rhetorical?) question, no I am not saying that at all. Neither am I disagreeing with policy.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:47, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Also English-language books like Sanford's are cited without page numbers. Further, I'm not a stickler for über-uniform ref formatting, but the citations are a giant medeley of styles. Tijfo098 (talk) 03:49, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Also bad writing throughout. E.g. there is a section called "discovery" (which one can fathom what it's about from its title), but yet another one called "revelations", which starts with the cryptic phrase: "From the late 1980s, pressure was put not only on the Polish government, but on the Soviet one as well." Pressure by whom? Tijfo098 (talk) 04:03, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Nobody in the English-speaking world figured out the claim from the Russian source, or do they perhaps disagree with it? Tijfo098 (talk) 18:26, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Also one of the sites linked there [24] (presumably just to give us the text of that letter) seems to have anti-Semitic overtones in its sidebar. The other one, fpp.co.uk, is the site of David Irving. Tijfo098 (talk) 19:34, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Further, it's not clear at all on which of these sources the previous sentences in that paragraph are based on (up to "In a note of 29 November 1954 he recanted his confession...") Tijfo098 (talk) 18:52, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In this particular case, also, it seems that the original wording was "Contrary to claims on several "revisionist" sites" - so those sources were given as examples of such claims with a refutation. That's actually not all that good of a sentence/sourcing either, but it does explain how those sources wound up in there in the first place. So the article did accumulate some cruft and nonsense through a series of many small pov edits. Will try to fix that too.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:57, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
(edit conflict) I've added a couple of secondary sources for the well-known stuff (Sikorski etc.) but the info about Arno Diere seems exceedingly hard to source reliably. Hopefully the Russian source is more reliable than the various letters that appeared in Western newspapers and were then cherry picked by the revisionist sites; I can't find any serious Western historical/academic source covering that issue. Tijfo098 (talk) 20:58, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
He is mentioned in this French book. I have no idea if it is reliable or not. This is the only hit I get in GBooks, no hits in GScholar. Considering the sparsity of references, I am open to further discussion on whether this should stay or not (perhaps on talk of the article)? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 16:04, 7 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Burdenko Commission's forgeries and plan to deceive, which was the basis of 50 years of denials by Soviets, needs to covered at more depth. Both the 2001 Russian book (just in the paragraph before they cover Diere) and also [25][26][27] describe these, including Burdenko's deathbed admission. Tijfo098 (talk) 23:06, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Also chapter 1 of this 2008 book (pp. 1-14) chronicles with excerpts from the Soviet archives the level of knowledge and cover-up in the post-Stalin years, up to Gorbatchev, included. Tijfo098 (talk) 23:21, 1 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Just to be clear on that one: I was trying to figure out if it's reliable, because it's already used in the article. I'm not asking for it to be used any further than possible within the limitations of Wikipedia's policies (which prefers English-language sources if the material can be found in those, but there's one interesting passage which apparently cannot be found elsewhere), nor am I asking that editors suddenly become expert Russian readers or something like that. :-) Tijfo098 (talk) 11:09, 2 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment- It looks like quite a bit of work has happened on this article, but there have been no comments here in the past week. Do the nominator and other editors believe this can be kept without a FARC (if a bit more time is needed it can stay in this section)? Dana boomer (talk) 13:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep in Review for another fortnight. Problems outlined above still exist, but I hope work is progressing. We have an "Original documents section" which is reliant solely on primaries (and of questionable use). We're still solely citing primaries for facts (Correspondence between the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidents of the USA and the Prime Ministers of Great Britain during the Great Patriotic War of 1941 - 1945, document №. 151, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1953, USSR) which leads to synthesis. I still hold out hope that this doesn't need to go to removal candidates. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:06, 16 May 2011 (UTC) [I'm planning on reviewing progress shortly, this is a stand in. My hope is this would be better left in review longer rather than moving to being a removal candidate. Fifelfoo (talk) 13:50, 11 May 2011 (UTC)][reply]
Someone should at least go over the references footnotes and make sure the book citations have page numbers; also some English text should be added next to the foreign sources. I have no idea what "Катынь. Пленники необъявленной войны. сб.док. М., МФ "Демократия": 1999, сс.20–21, 208–210." is for instance. It appears to be a book in Russian. Maybe consistently adding ISBNs for books would help too. Tijfo098 (talk) 14:02, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Also, not much has happened with the "Recent developments" section. Very choppy prose there jumping from one topic to another. Perhaps a minimal effort should be made to group items by topic e.g. declassification and transmission of documents, Russian political statements etc. It's unclear to me what the ECHR case is about from the brief sentence there. Perhaps find someone with good copyediting skills... Tijfo098 (talk) 14:17, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding the Russian sources, perhaps you could ask for help in translating/verifying them at Russian Noticeboard? Note that I've rewritten the RD section for logic a while ago. The prose can use improvements, I'll ask a copyeditor I know if he can help. But perhaps you or others could ask somebody else as well. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 15:20, 12 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Continuing citation concerns, I unfortunately note there are a large number of citations which don't (and can't) meet FA standards, largely because of lack of page references. This probably means that it needs to go to FARC on this basis alone, due to the research quality impacts. I still believe there's serious weighting problems, and that the article shows signs of being cobbled together instead of following HQRS. Additionally, the citation formats are widely variant and not in the least consistent. Example list from the first 40 footnotes of footnotes with no page range / place evidence found in text, but page range / place found in text required (Fischer (1999–2000), Sanford (2000), Departmental Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation (2004), Dziennik Ustaw (1938), Jawodny (1962), Молотов на V сессии Верховного (undated), Polska 1939–1945 (2009), Kowalski (2009), Яжборовская (2009), Peszkowski (2007), various authors (2003)). Fifelfoo (talk) 04:47, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fisher is a journal article, as far as I know, we don't add pages to those (or at not required to). Same for Dziennik Ustaw and Peszkowski. Fixed refs to Sanford. Departmental Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation is a one page news release, hardly possible to add pages to. Zawodny refs fixed. Polska 1939–1945 is a reliable source, but I can only access online introduction, which doesn't have page numbers (it is linked in the ref and it is the source of information cited). Kowalski ref replaced with one I can verify. various authors (2003) removed, wasn't needed. I also removed "Молотов на V сессии Верховного" (with no prejudice to anybody restoring it after proper translation and verification). Яжборовская (2009) seems to be a similar case to Dzieje (part of the work reproduced online and linked); and anyway all info from the para it is used in can be vefiried with Fisher (so if somebody really dislikes it, it can be removed). I will see about transforming some other refs to cite books. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 16:49, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
FARC commentary
Since not much has happened on this in the past couple of weeks, I'm moving it to FARC in the hopes that the move will spur more work and comments on the article. Comments in the review section focused mainly on sourcing, although images and MOS compliance were also brought up. Dana boomer (talk) 16:48, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comments Issues still open from original comments.
Read MOS:Images and its associated pages very carefully, slowly and attentively. No image crowding, place pics only where relevant, photo galleries are discouraged, no text sandwiching. Photos need alt text.
1c There are still inline cleanup tags in the article.
3File:KatynPL-mogily.jpg and File:KatynPL-grobyBS.jpg have a questionable copyright status. If they were released by the Smolensk Memoryal into the public domain the permission must be on file. The editor who uploaded the pic cannot just claim to have had permission. File:Les mrtvych v Katyne.jpg does not have a free use rationale for inclusion in the article but with all of the free images available for this article there isn't any justification to use a non-free image. Brad (talk) 17:51, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The article is not meeting MOS:Images; again, read the guidelines. The two photos with questionable copyright should be removed from the article. I'm challenging the use of a non-free photograph in an article that has plenty of free-use images available. See Wikipedia:Non-free content criteria. Brad (talk) 19:54, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Be my guest and nominate the pics for deletion, maybe that'll spur the uploader into action. The fair use poster has a unique value as an example of Katyn-related propaganda. Find me a free version of it, and we can replace it. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 20:40, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Two images you complained about are now under discussion and will likely be deleted in the near future, and removed from the article (unless somebody follows my suggestions and obtains permission for them); either way your concerns about them will be addressed over the next few days. For the fair use image, I've provided rationale inside the article and here, which you seem to be ignoring. PS. Alt text added. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 16:21, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Since this conversation took place the MOS Image trouble has mysteriously been corrected. Striking delist based on this issue only. Brad (talk) 18:14, 22 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Until now no one has asked for help with copyright and MOS. All I was seeing were excuses and the problems not being directly addressed. I notice that the two pics with the questionable copyright have been removed from the article; that is good; two problems now gone. The fair use File:Les mrtvych v Katyne.jpg needs more investigation. At the source for the photo it says in part: Many are taken from photographs made by Dr. Robert D. Brooks at the German Federal Archives. If you wander over to the GFA you will find two upper and lower photos of the same poster. I'm not familiar enough with German copyright law but in the US a simple photograph of an out of copyright work can also be considered in the public domain. So is this poster at the GFA in the public domain? Find out and it can be determined whether it's free use or fair use. Free use is always preferable over fair use. Brad (talk) 13:05, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It is, but my understanding of this situation (based on past discussion) is that the poster is copyrighted by "someone". It is not a matter of copyright of the photo, because if the original work was PD, so would be the photo (per Template:PD-art), but rather, that the original work is not PD. I think a rule of 70 years may apply here, so if we could identify the exact year, at the end of +70 it could be PD, but I admit I am not certain this would be the case. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 17:15, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok then. I was only hoping for a better license. Since you and Volunteer Marek feel the photo is of importance I won't make that an issue any longer. What do you not understand about MOS Images? Brad (talk) 22:30, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Photo relevancy: Photos must be relevant to the section they're placed in. For example the Nuremberg trials section has two pics that have little to do with the subject of the section they're in.
Image crowding: Too many pics in a small area that could sandwich text between them. I see much crowding in the discovery section and a lot of text sandwiching.
When I first looked at the article there were 25 pics and now it's down to 14. Good improvement but further effort at reducing pics must be done.
No. They're still sandwiching text. There are just too many photos remaining in the article. There isn't room for all of them. The discovery section is only large enough to support 2 pics at most. I fixed the western response section but I cannot decide for you what pics to remove. Brad (talk) 16:47, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Solved the sandwiching but now the article is up to 16 pics from 14. I'm on the verge of giving up on this. What part of "too many pics in the article" do you not understand? Brad (talk) 18:31, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My delist stands and I'll leave it to the FAR admins to determine whether the delist is warranted or not. Otherwise this conversation is going nowhere. The basic elements of Mos Images are not even being followed so you either haven't read them, don't understand them or you're playing games. Brad (talk) 13:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Please mind WP:NPA. I asked you a good faithed question, and you respond in an incivil fashion which is not helpful. I have read and reread MOS:IMAGES, and as far as I can tell, the article confers to all points listed there. The one single item that was not (an image in lead was left aligned) has been fixed (without you or anybody else pointing to that). Items you mentioned previously have been addressed (alt text, sandwitching, relevance, licenses). Most certainly there is nothing in the guideline about maximum number of images allowed ("too many pics in the article"). Unless you point out a specific item from the MOS that is not addressed (please link and quote the relevant part to avoid any confusion), I will have to conclude your argument is based, as VM suggested, on WP:IDON'TLIKEIT, and I'd suggest to the reviewing FAR admin to consider that. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 17:38, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Brad, can you please be a little less belligerent? Your comments are bordering on incivil. And if someone asks you a good faithed question, then you should reply in good faith. Anyway. I looked at some other History FAs for comparison; Gettysburg Address has 11 images. Ming Dynasty has a whopping 34 images. History of Minnesota has 18. Gunpowder plot has 19, plus a couple chunky block quotes that resemble images in terms of spacing. École_Polytechnique_massacre has 8. December 1964 South Vietnamese coup has 5.
Additionally I see nothing in MOS Images concerning the maximum, or optimal, number of images. 14 or 16 seems to be well within the normal range here. My sense of it is that the farther back in time the subject of the article is, the more images, because more are available in the public domain - again, this article falls squarely in that pattern, having more than 5 but less than 34. What exactly is the problem here? Unless you can articulate a proper reason other than IDON'TLIKEIT, this just seems petty.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:49, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Alright, I went through and took down the data on all current History FAs, their size and the number of images in each one of them (I counted images in the infobox, as well as very large tables). The figure below is a scatter plot of article size (number of characters) vs. number of images
Relationship between featured article size and the number of images in it
I included a regression line in the plot. As you can see there's a positive relationship between the number of images and character size, with on average, 1 image for 2000 characters. I also marked this particular article - Katyn massacre - on the scatter plot with the red dot. It's pretty obvious that this article is almost right on the regression line, meaning, that it has almost exactly the number of images one would expect. Actually, this article is below the line. Based on the general relationship one would expect this article to have nineteen images rather than the current fifteen.
Of course, each individual article will deviate from the line of best fit for idiosyncratic reasons and it's not like we should demand that each article be exactly on the line. Only if the article is some kind of crazy outlier should this be an issue.
Additionally, I confess that I just don't get the logic that says that for an article of this size 14 images is ok, but 16 is "way too many".Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:10, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
}}[reply]
Keep. All issues raised above addressed (at least, as I understood them, what is "text sandwitching?"); I hope other editors will be slightly more constructive than Brad, who refuses to engage in discussion (this is a collaborative project, you know... that implies conversation indeed). I am as always happy to address raised issues, but I expect that the reviewers are open to discussing their arguments in the spirit of this project. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 17:28, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. The two images File:KatynPL-mogily.jpg and File:KatynPL-grobyBS.jpg are a subject of discussion elsewhere and really should not have an impact on the FAR of this article. If they're deleted, they will be removed. If not they could stay. Still, in the interest of compromise, I've simply removed them from the article, per Brad's request, though if they are kept I expect they can be put back in. I hope this is end of story as far as this completely unnecessary tangent goes. The issue with File:Les mrtvych v Katyne.jpg this image is a bit more complicated. The image is of unknown copyright status and is used in the article based on a fair-use claim. As far as I can see the fair-use claim is more than satisfied - there are 8 reasons listed to back it up. Additionally, this is a very unique piece of work, it conveys things which cannot be expressed in words and significantly adds to the article. If the law wanted to prevent fair use of images all together, it would just say so. The whole purpose of the fair-use clause is so that images like this CAN be used. If Brad really wants to contest this point then he should articulate specifically why the 8 reasons given for use of the image are not satisfactory. This appears to be some kind of a FAR version of WP:IDON'TLIKEIT - especially when it's presented as some kind of ultimatum along with a stubborn unwillingness to talk about it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:11, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delist. The citations are in a complete mess. Some are inside templates, some are not; some are "Retrieved", some are "Retrieved on"; some have the date/year of publication in the beginning of the cite, some in the end, etc. Also, the prose is repetitive in the section "Recent developments"; 11 of the 17 paragraphs start with "In/On [date]". Eisfbnoretalk21:09, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Valid points, if on rather minor issues. Would anybody be willing to help with this gnomish work? I'll selfishly admit I prefer to write content rather than tweak the obsure details like that, and I'd rather write a new DYK than deal with this... help would be apprecited. For now, I merged some of the short paras in that section, so it looks somewhat less like a list of "On that days". --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 18:47, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I would love to help you with tidying the citations, but you'll have to tell what format you prefer; using templates or not, "Retrieved" or "Retrieved on", etc. It is almost impossible to tell what citation style you/this article prefer(s) as there is nearly a 50/50 mishmash of two styles. Eisfbnoretalk10:40, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Hm, the article is certainly moving in the right direction, but it needs much more work. There are still a few cites which lack significant information and many which are not using templates. Also, some have their author(s) listed as "last, first" and some as "first last". The "Recent developments" section is looking much better now, but the section below ("Memorials") suffers from many of the same issues I pointed out above for the RD section. No less than six of the seven paras start with "In [place]". --Eisfbnoretalk19:01, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The para in that section were split by country, but I merged them into larger groupings, to make it look better. I'll look at fixing the first/last names, but I'd really appreciate it if somebody could help with the addition of the cite web templates (all books now use cite books). --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 20:00, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Update? How is work progressing here? Is further editing needed? Note that if editors feel the concerns raised by the delists have been addressed, those reviewers can be pinged to re-review. Nikkimaria (talk) 21:55, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'd like to see an update too. It looks to me like all concerns have been addressed. The possible exception concerns the number of images in the article, but as my analysis/graph above indicates, this does not appear to have been a substantiated point.Volunteer Marek (talk) 22:03, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My concern above has not been addressed properly. The citations are still using different formats, and many of them are incomplete. I have marked six citations with {{full}}, resulting in no action. I did a light cleanup of the FR book sources, but much more is needed in the rest of the article, and regrettably I cannot see any willingness by the editors of this page to do some of this work (check the hist). My delist !vote therefore stays. --Eisfbnoretalk22:19, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough. Since I hate dealing with citation formatting I think I constructed the impression that this was being dealt with by someone else. Anyway, I've expanded two of your tagged citations, and replaced one of the sources for a a better one. I think I can fix all the ones you indicated, with the exception of the ones which are in Russian.Volunteer Marek (talk) 23:27, 4 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Remove I've started looking at this fascinating article and found too many problems, just in the lead. Some I fixed myself. Other specific issues appear below. --Dweller (talk) 13:44, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"the most commonly cited number being 21,768" the source provided is merely one source that uses that figure: it doesn't support the assertion that it's the most commonly cited number. --Dweller (talk) 13:44, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"ca." is an unnecessarily opaque abbreviation. "Approximately" works just fine.
Why spell kilometre in full, but abbreviation miles to "mi"?
This appears to be a problem intrinsic to the {convert} template. If you can point me to how it should be done I'll go through and fix'em.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:10, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Oh I agree but I do think it explains why the strange full/abbreviated format popped up in there. Also right now I've changed it to x kilometers/y miles, but that seems a bit clumsy to me stylistically. Wouldn't it be better to go with just one of them, say, kilometers? If a reader really cares that much it's not like it's all that difficult to make the conversion yourself.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:26, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Was the prisoner of war camp in the forest? Article implies it was, but I suspect it's an error.
"The term "Katyn massacre" originally referred specifically to the massacre at Katyn Forest, near the villages of Katyn and Gnezdovo (approximately 19 kilometers/12 miles west of Smolensk, Russia), of Polish military officers in the Kozelsk prisoner-of-war camp." It's that "in the" that does it - it implies they were massacred in that camp, which therefore implies the camp is in the forest. Try "from the"? --Dweller (talk) 17:19, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Shouldn't geographically distant be hyphenated?
Hmmm, ok, but on this one, remind me; did the dash win the big recent battle or did the hyphen? Or was it a cease fire? Don't want to have to do this twice.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:12, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My knowledge of Soviet history is very weak. At that time, were "Belarus and Western Ukraine" part of the Soviet regime? If so, some tautology with end of previous sentence.
Hmmm, this one's tricky. Before 1939 "Belarus and Western Ukraine" were part of Poland. After Soviet/Nazi invasion of 1939 they were occupied by Soviet Union which incorporated them into their state. So the answer is, "depends who you ask". So it's not a tautology though I'm sure there are people who would claim it's redundant. I think the present wording is the best way to handle this situation, without having to go into unnecessary geo-political explanations.Volunteer Marek (talk) 16:16, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
"Katyn lists of Polish prisoners" What's a "Katyn list"?
Katyn Committee and the Federation of Katyn Families are either notable and should be links (whether red or blue) or aren't notable, in which case, their opinions should be excluded.
Comment "politicians, commentators and Communist party members continue to deny"... "Continue" is present tense, but cites are outdated. Please either find fresh sources, or change the grammar of the sentence (the former is of course preferred).
In a related area, the very first sentence of the "Recent developments" needs to be followed by two or more sentences describing current Russian and Polish positions on the issue. Russia seems divided/conflicted (?). Fresh cites please. And.. I hate one-sentence paragraphs. There's another one lower down in that section.
You're right. I'll look around for fresh sources. In the meantime I removed that second 1-sentence paragraph as it was a quote pulled out of context that didn't have much to do with the text around it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 17:27, 22 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Can we please get an update here? It looks like there are still multiple outstanding delists/removes, although many of those editors' comments appear (?) to have been addressed. If the interested editors could ping those reviewers to see if they have additional comments or are interested in changing their opinion, it would be much appreciated. Thanks, Dana boomer (talk) 16:16, 28 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Since Fifelfoo went on break and won't be commenting I looked over his concerns about google books and synthesis and agree there is a problem with that type of sourcing and it's still prevalent throughout the article. Brad (talk) 08:15, 3 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Once again, can you be specific? Particularly in light of your previous arbitrary comments about the number of images, you'll have to forgive me if I'm a little skeptical.
Although some work has been done, my concern above has yet not been adressed. I am still seeing a mix of templated and untemplated citations and use of non-reliable sources (Flickr for example). Regrettably the problems won't be solved by pretending they're not there. Eisfbnore• talk15:48, 3 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fifelfoo was very detailed and specific about, paraphrasing: "google book searching and cherry picking references." Has anyone bothered to sit down and read books about the article's subject or did they just go picking through google books to find a reference for text that already existed? Brad (talk) 15:59, 5 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Fifelfoo's specific concerns were specifically addressed. And yes, FYI, I have bothered to read a book (or a half-dozen) about the article's subject. Dweller's comments below on the other hand have some substance.Volunteer Marek (talk) 21:39, 5 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I still have worries about the copy. It needs a thorough go-through from an uninvolved copyeditor. I only looked through the Lead, found lots of issues and great you've fixed them, but the rest of it has problems too. Here's some examples from the next few lines:
"Nazi Germany, along with a small Slovak contingent" strange imbalance. A country and a contingent. Presumably, the former should be something like "xxx divisions of the Wehrmacht" or something similar
But fundamentally, why are you trying to summarise the early days of World War II? The first paragraph is irrelevant. Your interest is in the Soviet invasion (very briefly) leading to the repression
Are you calling it "Nazi Germany" or "Germany"?
Tautology about the little support offered to Poland
the placement of citing around the Polish prisoner numbers makes the sentence very difficult to read
"run by NKVD" or "run by the NKVD". I'd be looking for the latter. You use the latter 17 times in the article - why not here?
unnecessary repetition in "Out of those, 42,400 soldiers, mostly soldiers"
"Thousands of Polish intelligentsia" In BrEng that would need to be members of the Polish intelligentsia. No idea about USEng
"imprisoned, arrested for" the word "arrested" should precede "imprisoned" (logically, chronologically), but it's just redundant as implied or irrelevant as by far the lesser evil
I don't understand the logical conclusion that since conscription was compulsory for nearly all college graduates they were all therefore arrested. Are you saying that all soldiers were arrested? You've already hinted that about 300,000 soldiers escaped or were released very swiftly
IPN - define acronyms the first time, unless they're so well known that it's pointless
"perished under Soviet rule" - does that include people dying of natural causes? The words imply it does, but the context implies it doesn't.
And that's just on the next 16 or so lines. Oh... and two of my points above are yet to be addressed.
So, sorry, it's a really good article on an important topic, but I cannot at this time support it remaining a Featured article as it is too laden with problems. --Dweller (talk) 14:26, 5 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Getting a good copyeditor on Wikipedia is not easy, I exhausted my contacts. We will fix the issues you pointed above, and any others you'll note, but I doubt we will get another copyeditor. Btw, for many items you note above, I wonder if it wouldn't take you less time to fix such issues then to report them here? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 15:42, 5 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My point is that it's not just that these specific issues need fixing - they exemplify that the whole article needs fixing. I couldn't make that point by fixing the article. Believe me, I am comfortable with my record of helping articles close to FA quality to cross the line over the past five years. --Dweller (talk) 15:54, 5 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
With all due respect, seeing how we are addressing all specific issues raised, I really feel that saying generalities is not helpful. I can also say that overall, I think this is a well written article up to FA standards. If you disagree, please list more specific problems, which we will fix. Thank you, --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 21:25, 10 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Well, in regard to these specific objections: Most of them are of substance and I will fix them. Some of them are just due to history of the article (for example I think the mentioning of the Slovak thing is some remnant from a long forgotten edit war).
Some of the other stuff I think could go either way. I think the first paragraph in the Background section is necessary because this is a World War II article so at some point you have to say "World War II started" (though not in those words). Jumping ahead to the Soviet invasion might leave the reader confused. And the paragraph is not overtly long and as general as can be. I did remove the stuff about Slovak participation and the operations in the Saarland which were indeed not necessary.
Germany vs. Nazi Germany. Obviously, in a precise sense it was "Nazi Germany". But once the context is well established I think it's fine to use "Germany" as a shorthand since the "Nazi" is implied (I've been told this many many times in various other discussions).
"Perished under Soviet rule" - it's hard to put that in any other words without going into much detail. It is what it says. A particular difficulty here is defining what exactly "natural causes" would mean in the context of a Soviet Gulag. There were no gas chambers but obviously the conditions were very rough; starvation, disease and malnutrition were rampant etc. Basically, explaining this accurately would involve another unnecessary detour. I'm going to change "perished" to "died" though.
Regarding the rest of the article, I'll do a thorough copy edit tonight and tomorrow. I don't think the issues are that serious - there is some sloppy prose in several places but overall the article's well written.Volunteer Marek (talk) 00:00, 6 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I did a copy edit of most of the article, except for the last sections "Recent developments", "In art and literature" and "Memorials" which I will leave for later (getting a headache here). I think most of the strictly grammatical concerns have been taken care of but of course there's always some issue of style (or things like US Eng vs. Brit Eng as you point out above) - in regard to that I wouldn't mind if somebody went over the prose one more time just to make sure. Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:32, 6 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Is it really too much to ask for commentators to respond in a timely manner?
Seriously. Last reviewer/commentator post was on August 8, 12 days ago or almost two weeks. This has been a running theme throughout this so called "review". Somebody comes in here, makes some comments, some of which are legitimate some of which are frankly nothing but evidence that a person has not actually read the article or is unfamiliar with FA standards, within a day or two the editors who are actually interested and have worked very hard on the article respond and address the issues raised, then two weeks pass and we get another comment along the lines of "you dotted the i, but you haven't crossed every single t". Then the t gets crossed and it's another freaking two weeks or so just to hear about the fact that the curve on the "g" is not curvy enough or something.
Let me make it clear that I very much appreciate constructive criticisms (and some of the above does indeed fall into that category) but a lot of the above is pretty much equivalent to the practice of 'drive-by tagging; show up to the article, take a cursory glance, decide there's something not to one's liking in it, leave some tough sounding comments and then disappear for a month or two. I'm sorry but the editors who actually write the articles do have a bit of pride at the end of the day and hence, limited patience. A review is a collaborative process, so please collaborate.Volunteer Marek (talk) 03:00, 21 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Seconded. I do few reviews anymore, but I always watchlist them - and I have serious doubts any of the reviews here have dome so. I am not going to be talk page pinging the reviewers again, and I'd like to as the closing admin to consider closing this soon if we have no other comments. I believe all of the reviewers points have been addressed.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 06:50, 21 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Much good work has been done, but could you please make sure that you do everything (or disagree with reviewers' points) that is asked for before plinging the reviewers. For example, much effort has been put into the formatting and standardisation of the citations; however, there are still a few citations that are not using templates (my command of Polish is to poor to fix them), so I will not strick my delist !vote until they're consistently formatted. --Eisfbnore• talk18:14, 21 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
1a The prose is not up to standard. Put in a request at GOCE so that an uninvolved editor may go over the article. I just caught one very simple mistake. A request should have been done three months ago.
2c Referencing is totally chaotic. Sources are missing various information like publishers, location of publication. Author names should be last and first. The date formatting on referencing is all over the place. Pick one format and stick to it; either of MDY, DMY or YMD will do but only one format throughout. There are repeatedly cited sources that should be moved into a bibliography section and then only author and page numbers given as citations rather than repeating the source over and over again. Look at any recently passed FA to get an idea of how things should be setup.
MOS:LINK is still a problem that I pointed out three months ago. My two recent edits to the article should give example of common terms that do not require linking. Brad (talk) 00:21, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Re 1a - the prose is freaking fine (actually, it's very good), just like the number of images in the article is fine. This is just another completely unfounded bullshit objection, just like your previous one (the discussion of which you recently collapsed [28], I guess because it embarrassed you). If there are any problems with the prose, they are very very minor - and hell, despite repeated requests for you to provide specific examples you have repeatedly failed to do so.
Re 2c; "location of publisher" - are you serious? Since when is the freakin' "location of publication" a requirement? I have edited a whole shitload of Wikipedia articles and have NEVER seen this as something of importance. If I felt like wasting more of my time on this joke-of-a-review I'd actually go out and get some data for you (just like I did with the number of images) but I seriously doubt that this has EVER been raised as an issue in a FA review before and it's obvious that it wouldn't help. Just looking at some existing FA's so far... here, let me check at random Flag of Armenia - none of the sources list "location of publisher"; Lisa del Giocondo - 3 out of the measly (compare to this article!) 38 sources give the location; Carrington Moss - 2 out of the measly 58 sources give the location; Smells Like Teen Spirit - 2 out of the 78 sources give location (as "UK", which is pretty broad).
Re 2c - "publishers"; - no, the information on publishers is given to the extent that it is available. Again please at least bother yourself to point out where it is missing. Every book that is referenced gives it.
Re 2c - "author names" - author names are given "First, Last" which is the way I standardized it after somebody complained about it above. There might be one or two exceptions that slipped through, since this article has 126 references. If you notice one, then fix it.
Re 2c - "repeatedly cited sources" - again, this has already been done. Again, there might be one or two that were missed, mostly because going through 126 references is a painstaking process and... it's entirely possible that couple got missed.
Re last point - it's not a problem unless you've got some very peculiar and idosyncratic idea of what MOS entails. All you've done in your two recent edits is change things like "Polish soldiers and policemen had become prisoners" to "Polish soldiers and policemen had become prisoners " - really? This is the freaking reason you want to delist this article? Because the double brackets are not in the exact place where you happen to think they should be? Lemme guess, in a few months someone's gonna come around and decide that it should be "Polish soldiers and policemen had become prisoners" and then some reviewer will make me waste more of my time by jumping through arbitrary idiotic hoops (set on fire) again. If it really is that big of a deal change it yourself. This is nothing but some exercise in sadistic power mongering at this point. Volunteer Marek (talk) 01:08, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, just fuck it. This whole process has been ridiculous. Reviewers come here, piss on the hard work of others, make demands on serious' editors time - and sure, some of the original criticisms were justified - but then don't even bother to check back in, to engage the editors who've worked on this and then keep making up completely arbitrary objections. I can easily show you a couple dozen current FAs that are nowhere near meeting the standards and objections which have been raised here, most of which haven't been reviewed for at least four years. At this point I'm feeling like I'm being treated like some god damn poodle that some people find it entertaining to make him jump through some hoops. And when the poodle does jump through the hoop, somebody decides it would be funny to make it jump through a different hoop. And so on.
Cite templates are used throughout, and MoS allows various ways of referencing. You want to shorten some refs? Go ahead and do so, but don't invent make-work for others. Ditto for the other issues, which are not a MoS issue, but a personal preference. There were constructive comments, but I have to agree with VM that most of Brad's comments are ridicolous and not policy supported (just see the graph above for a great example - somehow Brad never apologized for his false claims there...). Point to specific problems and they will be fixed, but you cannot cite general polices, and claim they are not followed where they very much are. For the record, I claim that prose is up to standard, references are up to WP:CITE, and MOS:LINK is respected. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 07:16, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Came back here to catch up on progress. I've devoted quite a bit of time to this FAR and to see it categorised in these terms:
This whole process has been ridiculous. Reviewers come here, piss on the hard work of others, make demands on serious' editors time - and sure, some of the original criticisms were justified - but then don't even bother to check back in, to engage the editors who've worked on this and then keep making up completely arbitrary objections.
The Featured article processes are strenuous and fairly stressful, I know. But that's bad faith. If you would like me to re-review the prose, I will, but as things stand my objection remains. To categorise the problems I have found with the prose in this article as anything other than good-faith and substantial 1a problems is just insulting. --Dweller (talk) 11:43, 23 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Your comments earlier where helpful - and addressed. VM has a point that it took you a while to come back and check on that (but we all have other obligations, of course), and some other reviewers have been much less helpful, to say the least. I do believe that VM went too far with his comments, but the fault is on both sides. I'd suggest that VM refactors his post above to remove bad faith/PAs - and that if the reviewers abstain from useless, example-unbacked generalities. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk 02:22, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry about popping my head in without at least a small review, but I think I read something here about some Russian book requiring translation. if that still needs to be done, I'm game. Buggie111 (talk) 05:06, 4 September 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Nikkimaria, Volunteer Marek appears to have Retired three days ago, and has not edited since. I can pinch-hit on some of the nitpicky stuff that remains, if any. UltraExactZZSaid~ Did14:10, 11 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I see that a lot of the issues raised above have been fixed. I didn't check every reference, nor every link, but the article seems to be quite well referenced and cleanly formatted. The images lack proper alt text, unless standards for that have changed - if that's a necessary thing, I can take a crack at it later. UltraExactZZSaid~ Did14:03, 11 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Done, though a few already had good, descriptive captions. Those got the standard "Refer to Caption" as per WP:ALT. It appears that I need to brush up on my Polish, as well, seeing as I have none to speak of. UltraExactZZSaid~ Did13:08, 12 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Per my comments just above this, are there any other issues that need to be addressed? Insofar as the technical ones, I can't see anything obvious to do here. As for the rest... it appears that we've dealt with everything, from my reading of the discussion. But, as per usual, I could well be missing something. UltraExactZZSaid~ Did13:59, 31 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Additional closing note - After over six months at FAR, there appears to be no consensus for delisting, and the review page has continued to descend into sniping and ill feelings, until finally going essentially quiet. At this point, due to the lack of consensus, I am closing the review as "keep", because that is the default close at FAR. If editors still feel that there are major issues that warrant this article not remaining at FA status, they may bring this article back to FAR in a few months - at which point hopefully feelings will have cooled. Despite this close, I would recommend that major editors to the article re-read the review with an open mind to take into consideration any and all comments made and evaluate them based on the FA criteria and how they could be used to further improve the article. Dana boomer (talk) 23:52, 18 November 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
this list is OR, because while it lists individuals who received the award, the Jewish part is debatable at least. There have been some AfDs a few months ago with regards to "list of Jews" type ones, and the major issue was that while somebody may be able to show their ancestry, there is nothing in terms of references to show that these people practice Jewish customs, or eve care about their ancestry.
Race is a more clear-cut division, but ethnicity, and especially Jewish ones, are extremely tricky. Yeah, such a list could be featured, but this one in specific is nowhere near close at not raising some eyebrows.
Keep. Nergaal correctly identifies his nomination as problematic. He would do well, if in his personal subjective opinion is that the lede would be better if made longer (his very first bullet), to follow wp:sofixit, as long as his edits conform with consensus. I'll be happy to work with him in that regard. His second bullet is not an issue for here either. His third bullet is baseless -- if he were right, we would not have any references to Jews on wikipedia at all ... whether or not that is his preference, that is not how wp operates, as he may be aware if he has been involved in discussion of these issues elsewhere. His fourth bullet -- Tricky, tricky ... -- fails for the same reason as the third bullet. The third and fourth bullets are reminiscent of the arguments he raised that were rejected in his failed deletion effort at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Jewish Nobel laureates, and should fail here for the same reason that they failed there.--Epeefleche (talk) 00:08, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, let's put it blunt then: how is this list featured, when for there is absolutely no reference provided for either of the entires that these people actually identify themselves as Jewish. Who declares them Jewish? Wikipedia? Nergaal (talk) 00:22, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
While I disagree that this list lacks the qualities necessary to be a Featured list I think some of your comments have some merit and I will work to improve the list over the next couple days. I do disagree that its OR. There are references for each of the individuals that identify them as being Jewish and I will try and incorporate them. I will also try to make the sections flow a little better as is the case of some of the other recipient lists. I partially disagree about the comments relating to the race and ethnicity. There has been quite a lot of documentation regarding persecution and prejudice towards Jews and regardless of whether its a racial issue or not I think the separation into its own list is fair. --Kumioko (talk) 02:31, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks that helps a lot. I also noticed there are a couple dead links for census info so I will get those fixed as well. --Kumioko (talk) 14:28, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
When you say update, what would you like to know. I have already made a few fixes and I just got the Book by Brody in the Mail so I can start looking through that for referencable material. --Kumioko (talk) 19:03, 24 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I understand you're doing what you need to do which is good, I wanted to know from the nominator how he felt too. We can't have an FLRC hanging around for too long. Cheers, The Rambling Man (talk) 19:30, 24 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - rightyho, been another couple of weeks, no further feedback from Nergaal or Kumioko. If I hear nothing in the next day or so, I'll close this as no consensus to demote (i.e. keep). The Rambling Man (talk) 16:45, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delist – I'd like to see some more work on this list before the FLRC closes. There are a few issues that should at least be looked at, the one tag in particular. I'm very uncomfortable letting a list with a tag keep FL status.
Obviously the dead link must be addressed. The good news is that a replacement for old Census statistics shouldn't be too hard to locate.
I'd be interested in knowing if there are any copyright concerns from the size of some of these quotes in the table. A couple of them go for 8–10 sentences. I like the idea of having quotes, but how much is too much?
Now I think I got it. I also added it to the body since it shouldn't be in the lede if its not in the body somewhere. Let me know if you see anything else. --Kumioko (talk) 00:59, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Would you mind citing the quote in the lead? I don't insist on people using references in the lead too often, but a direct quote is one of the things that should be cited in a lead section. Giants2008 (27 and counting) 01:37, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Second paragraph of the American Jews section also needs citations.
The lead says "at least 18 American Jews" received the medal, but the Medal of Honor section says 21. What's with the difference? By the way, I count only 20 in the table. Is anyone missing?
Done The 18 represents the fact that the exact number of recipients is unsure. Different refs state different numbers between 18 and 20 as reflected in the notes. I have clarified and corrected the numbers in the article.--Kumioko (talk) 00:55, 9 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with the nominator that the lead is short. Two small paragraphs is quite thin for an FL nowadays. It should be possible to beef it up with some more info from the two sections of prose, or some summary details from the table.
American Jews: choppy (However, it may be as high as 6,444,000 (2.2%).) Why is US contrasted with Israel? Why not Canada or another demographically similar country. Last half is missing refs.
Comment: the US is contrasted with Isreal only because they have the highest number of Jews. If Russia or Canada had the most I would have used them. Thats the only reason. Even then I only did it to emphasize the point about the size of the Jewish population in America as ademographic percentage as compared to the rest of the world. I might be able to locate some stats on some of the others, maybe who's next behind the US or something but I'm not sure if this article would benefit from that level of granularity. --Kumioko (talk) 14:04, 9 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks all, there's a lot of good comments here. Still trying to get all the refs together. Sorry its taking so long. I have some of them now and should be able to start making some of the mentioned improvements soon. I understand though if it gets delisted. I've got a lot on my plate at the moment and I don't know exactly how long it will take to make all the changes.
One question though. Can someone take a look at this reference and tell me if its suitable. If nothing else it has a lot of refs listed that I can use...books and such. --Kumioko (talk) 23:19, 7 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - as Kumioko is still working on this, I'm prepared to keep the nomination going a little longer. Please, if you can help, do help. Cheers all. The Rambling Man (talk) 13:55, 9 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for being so patient. Sorry its taking so long. I also sent out a couple of requests for some photos so hopefully Ill get those back sometime soon. --Kumioko (talk) 14:04, 9 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I should be done in another day or so. I just need t add more details to the WWII and American Civil War sections. Then I can expand the lede and rewrite the American Jew and MOH sections a bit. I should be done by Friday at the latest. --Kumioko (talk) 03:16, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
KeepComments: this list has been improved considerably, IMO, since the beginning of this review. Good work. I would like to make the following comments/suggestions for improvement (most are minor style issues, which are suggestions only):
the lead needs work. It seems a bit choppy, i.e. one sentence doesn't seem to flow into the next. My suggestion would be to start by describing what the MoH is and then talk about how many Jewish Americans have received it. You might include a lit bit more detail here too, for instance maybe list the first and last recipients to represent the spread;
Your right. I hadn't really gotten to this yet. I was building up the rest of it and then I will expand the lede. --Kumioko (talk) 13:03, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
the second paragraph in the "American Jews and the Medal of Honor" section probably needs a citation: "the ultra-Orthodox Haredi communities to Jews who live a secular lifestyle";
in the American Civil War section, this sentence possibly needs to be rewritten: "After the Medal of Honor was created through the present 1522 Received the Medal for actions during the American Civil War...";
there seems like a bit of overlinking. For instance in the Korean War section Tibor Rubin is linked three times (four if you include the table). Also in the citations "United States Center for Military History" is linked a lot. Is that necessary?;
Citation # 1 "Thornton, 1990" - is there a page number?
On this one the whole book discusses the various wars and campaigns and the effects of them from the time columbus landed until the early 1900s. With the statement I made about it be a series of wars throughout that time period I couldn't think of a way to show hte page numbers without showing 10 or 12 different page numbers. --Kumioko (talk) 13:03, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, that's fine. My understanding is that it is okay to quote a whole work in this way. Another possibility might be to provide a large page range, but either is probably fine. AustralianRupert (talk) 23:55, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Citation # 16 "Brands, 1997, pp.756" - is there a second page number (i.e the "pp" makes it look like it should be a page range);
Comment. I'm not especially familair with Judaism, the MoH or FL, but I was just passing by. I tightened a sentence and removed a pair of square brackets that had gone astray and thought I'd make the briefest of comments here. I would think there's room for expansion of the lead a little and the brief mention of the MoH and religious discrimination left me wanting—it would be nice if there were more to say, perhaps examples of other Jews who are thought to have been denied the MoH because of their religion. Perhaps something on anti-Semitism in the US military (without getting too distracted from the topic of the MoH). This is just a drive-by comment, not a real review, but if you need me to revisit it, ping my talk page. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:07, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for taking the time to comment and your absolutely right. I intend to expand the lede some more and add a couple more things in the next couple days. I am trying to get some of the missing images and am looking through some references to see if there are any more missing or if they are mentioned anywhere else. I hope to wrap this FL up by this weekend. Please let me know if you notice anything else. --Kumioko (talk) 01:11, 26 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delist. I have a passing personal knowledge of MoH. The article seems to speculate or emphasize the view that low number of Jewish MoHs was related to anti-Semitism, but this is really not well proven or established scholarship. We should be more neutral here. Also the Jewish Virtual Library (webpage) is a poor source.TCO (talk) 00:44, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
For what it's worth, I am in favor of a list on Jewish MoHs, think there are enough of them, glad they are honored for their heroism, think we can work around definitional kvetches on ethnicity versus religion by use of appropriate notes and/or discussion in article. Just don't like the implicit Wiki-editorializing. We should play it more down the middle. If someone really wants to make a structured, argument that the MoH was systematically unfair, then write it up to professional standards and put it in a historical journal. We are not the right place for that sort of thing and peer review will look at it more thoughtfully anyway and allow debate at a high level. (And no, Jewish Virtual Library webpage is not what I mean by an academic journal.) TCO (talk) 00:52, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I will try and tone it down a bit. I still need to expand the lede a bit and fix a few other minor things. I am also going to try and replace some of the lesser grade references like the one you mention and the Mishelov one. I don't really even like the home of Heroes so I will probably move that to external links. With that said I do think that there have been a couple specific cases of anti semitism such as the case of Tibor Rubin. Please let me know if you have any other suggestions. --Kumioko (talk) 01:30, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If Rubin was noteworthy for his late medal (and it sounds it) then we should definitely cover this aspect. I would clean up the "who many believe" (which who? vagueness is used to allow making an implicit statement by the writer). I would not generalize from that case to some general view that Jews are poorly treated in US Military for medal awards unless this is well established and agreed on. TCO (talk) 04:03, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It doesn't look like that much work has been done on the list in the last couple of weeks. Given that this has been at FLRC for almost two months now, we need to see some progress soon or this will have to be closed. Giants2008 (27 and counting) 18:04, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Delist - I do have some concerns about using race in the context of this list, and I would definitely like to see an actual link to the 1993 Army study that's mentioned in at least two places (in line with TCO's comments above). In the historical period covered by the list, discrimination existed against a number of groups, some based on race and in other cases based on national origin (I'm thinking here of the Irish, but the focus changed with each wave of immigration). At this point I just don't think the case for a separate list is strong enough.Intothatdarkness (talk) 16:54, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I am currently in the process of trying to get the 1993 and 1996 surveys because I agree. They are not available online as far as I can find but I have been asking around for them. I understand if you need to delist it although it would be very disappointing. Aside from these surveys I will try and get in and expand the lead a bit in the next couple days. --Kumioko (talk) 17:07, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, yes there were actually 2 different studies. One targetted Jewish and Asian Americans and the second targetted African Americans. --Kumioko (talk) 19:18, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Aside from personal feelings and concerns about the a race/religion associated list and aside from the fact that I still have not been able to get the actual studies (I'm still working on it) I think I have addressed all the concerns identified above. The list has been massively rewritten even locating references with recipients that weren't there before and have now been added. Comparing the Current version to the version before we started here I feel like we have improved the article/list to the point were it can maintain its FL status. --Kumioko (talk) 19:49, 20 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
This is free because it is in the public domain, and has historical significance as one of the greatest speeches in World War II. It is used primarily to support the following articles:
It needs a much more specific tag, explaining why it's out of copyright in Britain. It's not clear at present. For example, are we presuming Crown copyright on the speech itself?
It's particularly important to document meticulously in this case, as, apparently, there's a widespread copyfraud situation surrounding Winston Churchill's wartime speeches. Crown copyright, as Churchill was acting as a British government official, should cover it, but we really need to document this. Adam Cuerden(talk)08:43, 3 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Support Sounds good for the age. Great Ev. I'd like to see more of these, but we should be careful only to use the speeches he made during the war, not the re-recorded ones sometime later. Ben (Major Bloodnok) (talk) 09:34, 20 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]
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Done.
Done
Coordinator note: I've pinged a castle editor, Nev1 (talk · contribs), to see if he can take a look at this article, but you may want to try finding other potential reviewers too. Regards, Ed [talk] [majestic titan] 05:19, 28 May 2011 (UTC)
