Talk:Leroy Petry

Religion

Is there any information about his religious affiliation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.188.228.180 (talk) 12:14, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Article by Peerman

I would suggest this be removed as a source - Petry's cousin wrote the piece, so it's really not RS, and he makes at least one factual error; one cannot enlist in the Army "indefinitely", if only because of retirement age. MSJapan (talk) 21:45, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

I'd say it passes muster for an RS on basic biographical details and first hand accounts. If there's a question as to the accuracy of technical issues such as enlistment terms I'd say this source should probably take a second place to others. As long as the Peerman isn't making controversial assertions about Petry there isn't reason to discount his knowledge of him as a person. TomPointTwo (talk) 21:51, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Indefinitely enlisting is a term that we use pretty often in the US Army. At a point in your career as an enlisted Soldier, you have to re-enlist "indefinitely"; until retirement. "The indefinite reenlistment policy requires all soldiers reaching the rank of E-6 with ten years of service to reenlist indefinitely.Their new separation date becomes either the year they are required to leave the service if not promoted or their retirement date,whichever occurs first." http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/2007/RAND_MG553.pdf Hal06 (talk) 21:54, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Actually as someone who is in the actual US Army I can say that you can enlist indefinitely. I hate civilians that don't know what they are talking about.--207.132.184.130 (talk) 15:01, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Enemy

Enemy is not one of the words under Words to watch. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:05, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Awards

Unit citations

Per AR 670-1 unit awards are to be worn while the soldier is a member of the unit, but are not permanent to the wearer unless the soldier was assigned to the unit during the time frame which the unit received the award (such as a PUC or MUC). If there are reliable sources that the subject of this article wears any of the unit citations as permanent personal decorations, then it is the opinion of this editor that they should be included in his award list, but not until that time.

Furthermore, please provide references from reliable source(s) when adding additional medals/awards/badges per WP:VER & WP:BURDEN. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 09:36, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

I have created a discussion regarding this issue at the MILHIST Wikipedia talk page; all interested editors are invited. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:50, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry I didn't see this section before I made my change to the article. I've commented on the relevant section at MILHIST. TomPointTwo (talk) 19:04, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

None of the Presidential Unit Citations for 2nd Ranger Battalion came during SFC Petry's time of service. All six of the battalion's citations were for WW2 or Vietnam service, as can be found at the Wikipedia entry for the battalion (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2nd_Ranger_Battalion_%28United_States%29). The Valorous Unit Awards and Meritorious Unit Commendations were also awarded during Vietnam. They are appropriate for the picture in the article because it is his uniform while assigned to Second Ranger Battalion. This is the problem with merely transferring the awards on someone's uniform picture to a section which is designed for awards and citations personally received by an individual. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.48.109.157 (talk) 03:41, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

I just checked his bio at the US Army website (http://www.army.mil/medalofhonor/petry/profile.html) and it lists him as having received a Valorous Unit Award and also the EIB. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.48.109.157 (talk) 03:52, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Per the above post: http://www.army.mil/medalofhonor/petry/profile.html lists a Valorous Unit Award. Should all other unit awards now be removed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dbraz (talk • contribs) 19:24, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

There has been no consensus as to wheaher unit citations, not considered permanent wear per AR 670-1, should or should not be included as personal awards of subjects of a military BLP. The archive of that discussion can be seen here that occurred at MILHIST. Therefore, I have re-added the discussion tag here. Per WP:BRD please do not re-revert and please continue the discussion that I have now restarted.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:48, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Potential applicable orders

Here are two potential applicable permanent orders which may apply to the subject if the article, that is if the subject was part of these companies during the period described in the permanent orders:

• Permanent Order 061-05 for a Valorous Unit Award for the day of 14 June 2005
• Permanent Order 061-06 for a Valorous Unit Award for the period of 28 June 2005 to 12 July 2005

--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:22, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

Joint Service Achievement Medal

Image previously provided as reference does not clearly show that the subject of this article has been awarded the Joint Service Achievement Medal. Is there a text reference from a reliable source that indicates that the subject of this article was awarded the aforementioned medal? That being said the reference photo here shows him wearing the corresponding ribbon, but I have not found other text based references saying that the subject has been awarded the medal. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:39, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I have notified outside interested editors regarding this issue at the MILHIST Wikipedia talk page. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:52, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I'd say that unless the veracity of Petry's uniform is in question that picture would qulify as a primary source for the purpose of identifying the what awards and ribbons he has earned. I'll reflect such at MILHIST as well. I'd also speculate that, for ease of use, most of this can be resolved here without having to seed discussions in more than one place. TomPointTwo (talk) 19:07, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Seeing as how we have two competing reliable source references, one showing he is wearing it, one not stating he was awarded it; I say for now leave it out per WP:BURDEN, unless there is consensus to add it or additional reliable sources indicate the awarding of the medal of question (specifically text based). --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:29, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

I'll continue this discussion at MILHIST, exclusively, barring substantially third party interest here. TomPointTwo (talk) 19:36, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

WILCO, will do the same. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:49, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

As no consensus was reached at MILHIST and the discussion has been archived the content shall be tagged until I hear back from the army for my request for information that I sent (see the archived discussion regarding that). --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 19:37, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

I received mail on the 20th of August stating the following (my name being redacted):

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED

Caveats: NONE

Dear Mr. XXXX,

Thank you for your inquiry (#2011-1209). In response to your request of 2 August 2011 regarding SFC Petry’s wearing of the Joint Service Achievement Award, I regret that the U.S. Army Military History Institute does not have personnel records nor can we make determinations as to award eligibility. To find out the reason behind this discrepancy, I would suggest contacting the Army’s Public Affairs Office. Contact information is below:

U.S. Army Public Affairs
Community Relations Division
Office of the Chief of Public Affairs
1500 Army Pentagon
Washington, DC 20310-1500

I am sorry that the institute could not be of greater assistance to you.

Sincerely,

Mr. Shannon S. Schwaller
Technical Information Specialist
Military History Institute
U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

At this time, the question goes officially unanswered by the Pentagon, and antiquated snail mail will bed to be used. I will let interested editors know when a response is reached through those means. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 02:46, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Does anybody here really believe that Petry would have presented himself to the President to receive the MoH, representing the U.S. Army and his whole country, wearing the ribbon of a personal award that he did not receive? Also, RightCowLeftCoast, I would ask you kindly to speak of Mr. Petry as a "person" and not a "subject". Thank you! claudevsq (talk) 17:11, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I have reverted the removal of the discussion tag as the issue remains unresolved. This discussion is not an attempt to cast negative persuasions upon SFC Petry, but to abide by WP:VER & WP:TRUTH, as two different references contradict and no census was reached in the archived discussion linked higher in this section. Per WP:BRD please do not re-remove the discussion tag, and discuss this issue here.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:57, 25 September 2012 (UTC)

Restructure the table

If everyonen is ok with it I would like to clean up the table and restructure it like the one on the Ross A. McGinnis article. I would also like to take the images of the ribbons and unit out of the infobox. We can leave the county, service and even the rank if we have to but I think the infobox looks very cluttered with all the images. --Kumioko (talk) 17:19, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

In the infobox, country, service, and rank should be sufficient. Award ribbons are not necessary, as there is already an awards section. Within the awards section, we can break up individual awards, from service and campaign medals, but IMHO that is not necessary. If we need to place the table in a collapsed format, we can do that too.

Questions regarding Unit Citations and the JSAM should continue to be discussed in a central location, as is presently done on MILHIST, and the awards tagged as is now the case.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 17:38, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

Thermobaric Grenade

The Medal of Honor action section mentions that the subject threw a thermobaric grenade. Neither cited source mention specifically a thermobaric weapon. I believe that this should be edited unless we have proof of this action. I dont believe that we have proof of this type of weapon being deployed as a "hand" grenade just as rumors of a 40mm weapon delivered grenade.

Should we talk more or should the edit be made? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Bamm314 (talk • contribs) 04:54, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

There is this, which mentions that "Petry threw a thermobaric grenade in the vicinity of the enemy position." - SudoGhost 04:57, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Actually, the one of the references in the article supporting the "thermobaric grenade" sentence does mention it, although the LA Times one does not. - SudoGhost 05:00, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Thank you SudoGhost. I wish we had more information on the specific weapon but thank you for pointing out my misread and giving another source.

Bamm314 (talk) 05:33, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Leroy Petry/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Cdtew (talk · contribs) 16:34, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

I'll be happy to review this; I'm still new at reviewing, so I appreciate your patience! I'll have some points here, if any, shortly. Cdtew (talk) 16:34, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

This appears to be a great article containing about all of the publicly available and encyclopedic information necessary to understand the subject with a layperson's level of knowledge. There were a few areas where details became a little technical, which I'll discuss below. As I have not served in the military, there are some terms and phrasing that are fuzzy to me, and would be fuzzy to a majority of readers (e.g., "side plate"). I think a little clarification may help, but otherwise this article is right for GA.

Changes I made

I tried to make each of these sets of changes in discrete packets, so feel free to revert if you disagree:

• "Sergeant First Class" to "sergeant first class" per WP:MILTERMS, and as used in other MOH articles (see:what I believe is your work in Clinton Romesha)
• "U.S. Army's" in lead to "United States Armed Forces'", similar to usage in Salvatore Giunta
• Also removed dashed parenthetical (is there a word for that), containing "the medal of honor".
• "winner in any branch" changed to "winner from any branch", since the rest of the sentence tells us he's still in the branch, and that would otherwise be redundant.
• September 11th Attacks to "September 11th attacks"
• "Washington State" (dablinked) to "Washington (state)|Washington state", style per that state's wiki page.
• "Over the course of his career" to "During his time in Iraq and Afghanistan,"
• "Petry lost his right arm" to "Petry's wounds resulted in the loss of..."
  • All of these sound good. Thanks! —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Further suggestions

Lead section

• Would you consider breaking the section into three grafs, with the third starting at "Petry, who now wears a..."?
  • Done. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Biography

• Who described Petry as "very active and likeable"? Seems like a paraphrased quote, which would require an immediate inline cite.
  • Clarified this. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• "had to repeat his freshman year" - it might be just me, but "had to repeat" seems colloquial. Would you accept "Was forced to repeat"? That may not be accurate. I suppose after a certain age, you wouldn't have to be forced to repeat anything, depending on what state you're in.
  • 'Was forced to repeat' is passive voice, which Wikipedia frowns upon. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• Yeah, I suppose passive is no good, but this isn't a critical thing to GAN, so I don't think we need to worry about t much. Cdtew (talk) 04:38, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• The stuff about fixing cars and cooking...I don't mind it, but it does stick out as a little awkward. This also seems like a good time to discuss the U.S. Army source that information, as well as other information, comes from. I personally don't strictly think that the military should count as an "employer" for the purposes of determining whether or not a military source about a present or former military officer is a "reliable third-party source". In other words, I think your use of it is fine, generally, and heck, maybe its even customary to accept that as a source in MOH circumstances. But, to play devil's advocate, would you accept, for instance, the Soviet Union's releases about, say, Yuri Gagarin, as reliable 3P sources? At the time of Gagarin's post-spaceflight tour, the Soviet union used his farm-boy past for all sorts of propaganda reasons, and, while I don't have any handy, I could easily see written descriptions saying things like "and in his spare time as a boy, Gagarin would hunt for muskoxen, and play hockey on frozen lakes" to humanize him and fit their patriotic "every Russian can do anything because of Russia" message. Long story short, that's what i thought about then I read this section; I'm not opposed to leaving it in, but it seems incongruous.
  • The U.S. military has a far more reliable track record than the Soviets though; I'll grant you no article would pass with only U.S. military sources, but this one has enough of a mix of military and independent publications. When it comes down to it, people seem to turn to the most basic idea of WP:CITE, where information like his hobbies and background aren't that important or likely to be challenged, so they don't need as rigorous a test. The finer details of the more important stuff, like the Medal of Honor action itself, would be a different story. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• Sounds reasonable to me. Cdtew (talk) 04:38, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• When did he marry Ashley? If not available, it's OK, it just comes at you out of nowhere.
  • Just took another look; I still can't find anything reliable on a marriage date or when the children were born. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Military career

• Unless Ranger training is a one-day seminar, I think the sentence "On the morning of the September 11th Attacks..." seems awkward. Perhaps it'd be better as "At the time of the September 11th Attacks,"?
  • Done. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• I think the sentence beginning with "By the time Petry had been awarded the Medal of Honor, he had seen a total of eight deployments:" has too much foreshadowing. I think it'd be simpler, and less out-of-order to say "Petry saw a total of eight deployments:"? What are your thoughts?
  • Fixed it. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• Is it common to say one's military education "includes" in the present tense, especially while in active service? Most of the soldiers I deal with have been dead for 200 years, but it seems like "includes" is a little strange. I would suggest "included", since he has completed his education, for the most part. If its common usage, I'm ok with it.
  • In this case, he's still an active soldier and he's still alive, so present tense is preferred for BLPs. He may well elect to undertake more education, and more deployments for that matter. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• Good enough explanation for me. I suppose military education is continuing, and isn't like getting a bachelors or such. Cdtew (talk) 04:38, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Medal of Honor action

• "which was on a daylight raid" seems abrupt, maybe "which had been ordered to make a daylight raid"?
  • Again, that creates passive voice problems. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• I guess the only other way would be to insert a subject doing the ordering; this isn't anything to probably worry about for GAN, just a thought.

• for a lay reader, what's so special about being "senior non-commissioned officer at the site"? What duties or privileges does this entail?
  • The link has the information, and adding it here might be awkward, I think. Basically non-commissioned officers usually aren't the senior people on the scene in a battle, so it's an unusual exception worth a note when one is. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• The helicopters sort of come out of nowhere. Maybe just changing it to "after getting out of the helicopters that delivered Petry's unit to the attack site..."
  • Fixed. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• The site description seems a little disjointed, like for instance -- is the outer courtyard a part of the target building? And the building he cleared before entering the OC, is that part of the target building, or an adjacent one?
  • The map on the right is intended for reference. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• What is a "side plate"? I'm assuming it's a component of body armor. Lay readers will have the same question.
  • Clarified a little. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• Did he actually throw the grenade, or attempt to throw? It sounds like the grenade was possibly a foot or perhaps more from his hand when it detonated, so I'm not sure if the best verb is "throwing the grenade" or "attempting to throw the grenade".
  • Well he successfully threw it (the alternative would have been he'd been holding it or had dropped it, neither is the case) —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• Final graf of that section, is "the Platoon Sergeant" a different person from Staidle (in which case it's OK to capitalize), or is that Staidle's command description (in which case I think it should be uncapitalized).
  • Uncapitalized the term. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• "state-of-the-art" I'm not sure this violates a policy or anything, but logically, someone reading this article in 2023 may think Petry's current (circa 2013) prosthesis is a piece of garbage like we think of a walkman or a vhs camcorder. Just a thought about the wording.
  • Agreed. Reworded. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)
• I think your last usage of "Sergeant First Class" is fine as capitalized, since it refers to the rank as a proper noun.
  • WP:MILMOS favors uncapitalizing ranks unless they immediately precede a name. —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Ribbon bar

• What can you tell me about the current status of the controversy at Talk:Leroy Petry#Awards? It appears as if most of the disputed awards were removed from the ribbon table, although...
• 2-b: the Joint Service medal is there, and was one of the disputed medals, but doesn't appear to be supported by the source used.
• 2-b: Army Good Conduct medal with four good conduct loops, but the source would indicate only two loops are warranted;
• 2-b: Afghanistan Campaign Medal with two Service stars --> source only mentions one combat star
• 2-b: Iraq Campaign Medal with two Service stars --> source only mentions one combat star
• N.B.: I'm no expert, but I understand the basics of how ribbons and stars/oak leaves/etc. work; if you think I'm missing something here, let me know. At the least, though, I think this needs additional source support.
  • Discussion about whether or not to include some of these awards is continuing right now at Salvatore Giunta. I believe until something changes they're staying in for now. As far as the extra stars and oak leaves, those may well be more recent than the sources, but I can't find something with a more recently updated list. Would you prefer they be removed? —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

• The awards line up with what's in the official US Army photo shown in the infobox. Ive read all the arguments, and while i see what RightCow's point has been,i think theres more than one way to skin a cat, and one doesnt necessarily need the permanent orders to support the unit awards. The same goes, in my opinion, to more recent combat stars and Good conduct loops. For the purposes of WP:VERIFY, I'm willing to accept a portrait by the issuing authority to be a reliable source at this point. If the argument wants to continue later, I think that's an accuracy issue that's beyond the scope of GAN. Cdtew (talk) 04:28, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Images and captions

• Images check out; most are PD-USGOV, and the few that aren't have free-use or fair-use tags.
• Captions here don't require cites, as information and sources found on individual image pages.

Copyvio/etc.

• No copyvio detected through DupDetector and random google searching
• No Dablinks
• No linkrot per Checklinks or bare URL's

Summary

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (reference section): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images and other media, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free content have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

I've responded to all of your comments. Thanks for reviewing the article! —Ed!^(talk) 02:27, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for your patience! I have tried using a holistic method of GAN review, but I'm afraid the volume of comments I make may be both irrelevant for the sole purpose of passing GAN, and may be frustrating to editors whose articles I'm reviewing. A the same time, i like providing comments for articles to "grow on". I guess I need to learn to be more succinct, and not think out loud as much in my reviews. Take care! Cdtew (talk) 04:52, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

Yes, congrats to Ed! for working on this article for improving this up to GA.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 18:45, 14 February 2013 (UTC)

IP edits

I have reverted two edits by an IP editor per WP:BURDEN, individual made the following changes, neither supported by a reliable source. The reliable source labelled "lcsn20110604" does not support that he has been divorced, and until a a reliable source can be found to verify a change in content, the content should remain unchanged.
I will warn the IP of the need for reliable sources.--RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 01:19, 6 August 2014 (UTC)

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Awards and decorations - table help

I updated some of the device names for uniformity (ie to match other award and decoration tables I've seen), but I am a new user so I am not sure how to adjust the column width and center the text; if someone can assist with that (or describe how to further my education), I'd appreciate it! Doghouse09 (talk) 20:09, 17 May 2020 (UTC)