Talk:List of SOE F Section networks and agents

Comments

1 - Please change "7 Carter" into "7 Carver".
2 - Asymptote circuit was not F section circuit, but RF section.
3 - Monk circuit was a seperate circuit to Monkeypuzzle. Monkeypuzzle formed in June 1942 by Raymond Flower (Gaspard) in La Sologne and included Marcel Clech, Pierre Culioli, Yvonne Rudellat. This circuit later became Adolphe when in March 1943 it became a subgroup of Prosper in Touraine. Raymond Flower was sent back to London. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.203.183.66 (talk • contribs)

Sidney Jones: the composer, quite sure?

I'm afraid that Sidney Jones (composer) is mistakenly linked as a SOE operative (see the "Inventor" section), provided that the named article makes no mention of such a relevant event in the composer's biography.

--Filippof (talk) 21:42, 4 February 2018 (UTC)

"Dakota expert" (section: Salesman)

I can't get what a "Dakota expert" may be.

Thanks in advance for suggestions & explanations. --Filippof (talk) 23:05, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

As best as I would be able to get . . . >
an expert in what a Dakota can do . . .

From Wikipedia Douglas C-47 Skytrain :
About 2,000 C-47s (received under lend-lease) in British and Commonwealth service took the name "Dakota", possibly inspired by the acronym "DACoTA" for Douglas Aircraft Company Transport Aircraft.

Though to think SOE Europe is to think Lydander (Westland Lysander). > http://home.earthlink.net/~mrstephenson_umsl/spy2/transportation.html
A Mr.Tony Baldwinson offers an appreciation on Flickr : https://www.flickr.com/photos/robbber1/22620875746/

SOE used the Dakota over distances in Burma.
--Laurencebeck (talk) 23:48, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

References

Special Forces Roll Of Honour

@Smallchief: please provide evidence that John Robertson of Ayr, Scotland is "an established expert on the subject matter, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications", since the website is clearly a self-published source. FDW777 (talk) 16:58, 5 January 2020 (UTC)

• There are two choices here. The first choice, which you've chosen, is to delete a multitude of footnotes of this article because the source is self-published. You've added a tag saying the article needs references and that "unsourced material can be challenged or removed." The second choice is to leave the sources of the article as is -- with footnotes from a self-published source.

• I believe the second choice is better. The footnotes have been there for 8 years and the accuracy of the information they reference has not been challenged. By eliminating all the footnotes and putting an unreferenced tag on the article you open it up to being vandalized or deleted in part or in whole. This article should not be deleted. I'm not aware of any other compact list anywhere of SOE networks and personnel belonging to those networks.

• What is the nature of the "self-published source?" The compiler has simply compiled a list of SOE personnel and he gives basic biographical information about each person: full name, date of birth and death, SOE network(s), awards, etc. He makes no value judgments, says nothing that would be considered controversial or non-neutral. He simply lists information. He probably makes a few errors -- but so does every source.

• So-called "reliable, independent publications" contain a multitude of inaccurate information about SOE agents. As M.R.D. Foot, the official historian of the SOE, said, "there is a large popular literature, almost all of it worthless." Are we to accept the "worthless" material in popular literature as reliable sources, while ignoring or calling into question a compilation of basic facts as contained in the self-published source of this article?

• That being said, this article can be improved, both in substance and format, a task I plan to undertake over a period of time. On format, for example, I don't like the way the footnotes on this article are listed. The innumerable footnotes require the reader to navigate a complicated web page. An easier way of citing the source of the information would be to begin the list with a note saying: "Unless otherwise noted all the information in this article is derived from the alphabetical list at the "Special Forces Roll of Honor," [1]". That seems a better way of doing things: more practical, more informative. Smallchief (talk) 11:56, 6 January 2020 (UTC)

A website doesn't become more reliable because it's been used in an article for a long time without people noticing. I've challenged the reliability of the website, and Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 153#specialforcesroh.com overwhelmingly backs up my stance. In the absence of evidence of reliability, I will be removing the website, or all text it supposedly references, in the near future. FDW777 (talk) 15:16, 7 January 2020 (UTC)

If you're planning to persist in adding more unreferenced content, I'll just remove all of it per WP:BURDEN. Please fix the existing problems with this article. FDW777 (talk) 07:42, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

Added under construction tag. Smallchief (talk) 15:06, 18 June 2021 (UTC)

RFC about inline citations for article SOE F Section networks

Should inline citations be required in an article listing only basic, factual information or is a bibliographic note on sources acceptable? Smallchief (talk) 08:39, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

Discussion (inline citations)

The article SOE F Section networks was created in 2003 and contains contributions from 92 editors. This is intended to be a factual list of the networks and agents of the clandestine Special Operations Executive (SOE) in France during World War II. Ninety-odd SOE networks operated in France and the total number of SOE agents was about 470. Most of the networks and about one half of the SOE agents are now listed in the article in its present state of construction.

On 18 June 2021 User:FDW777 added the following message to the ongoing discussion on my talk page: "If you're planning to persist in adding more unreferenced content, I'll just remove all of it per WP:BURDEN. Please fix the existing problems with this article. FDW777 (talk) 07:42, 18 June 2021 (UTC)"

In response, I note that WP:Burden says the following: "Whether and how quickly material should be initially removed for not having an inline citation to a reliable source depends on the material and the overall state of the article. In some cases, editors may object if you remove material without giving them time to provide references; consider adding a citation needed tag as an interim step. When tagging or removing material for lacking an inline citation, please state your concern that it may not be possible to find a published reliable source and the material therefore may not be verifiable. If you think the material is verifiable, you are encouraged to provide an inline citation yourself before considering whether to remove or tag it."

Attempting to meet the concerns of FDW777, I immediately put an under construction tag on this page. I assume the "problems" FDW777 refers to are the lack of in-line citations in the article. I'm not aware of any challenges to the factual accuracy of the article.

So, my question is: are in-line citations required in a non-controversial list such as this? To add in-line citations to each entry in this article (when completed) would require 1,000 or more footnotes. Moreover, the great majority of them would be identical and come from one of three sources. M.R.D. Foot, SOE in France is the gold-standard reference for SOE articles, but his book does not include many dates and names needed for a complete list. The second essential reference is a website, [2] by David M. Harrison. Harrison's record as a historian of the SOE includes an article "Special Operations Executive: Para-Military Training in Scotland during World War 2," which is cited as a reference in the List of SOE establishments Wikipedia article. Harrison also wrote the foreword to a biography of SOE agent Jacques de Guélis, and he is cited elsewhere on the web and in books. His website gives names of all agents and networks, date of arrival in France, and whether captured, executed, or survived. The third major source is Unearthing Churchill's Secret Army, by John Grehan and Martin Mace which gives dates and details of the death of more than 100 SOE agents killed in the line of duty.

My alternative to putting 1,000 repetitive and nearly identical footnotes in the article is a biographical note stating that the above three sources are the references for all entries in the list unless otherwise footnoted. Is that acceptable? I repeat my point: this is an non-controversial article of dates and facts - not opinion or analysis. One needed improvement might be to retitle the article "List of SOE F Section networks," to indicate this is a list.

My proposal for a bibliographic note rather than inline citations is supported by WP:Inline citation. "The opposite of an inline citation is what the English Wikipedia calls a general reference. This is a bibliographic citation, often placed at or near the end of an article, that is unconnected to any particular bit of material in an article, but which might support some or all of it. It is called a "general reference" because it supports the article "in general", rather than supporting specific sentences or paragraphs."

Frankly, I am reluctant to continue work on this article if it is threatened with deletion.

Now, a bit of further background. The fact that this article is presently unreferenced is due to FDW777. On 19 December 2019, FDW777 deleted from this article 185 footnotes citing a website [3] he deemed unreliable. My contributions to the article at that time consisted only of one small edit, but I reverted his deletion, opining that his deletion of the footnotes was a worse not a better outcome. He then deleted all the footnotes again. I didn't contest his second deletion. He raised the issue to confirm his deletion at [4] and after a brief discussion three editors agreed with him (although one stated that the info on the disallowed website would be hard to find elsewhere -- and nobody pointed out any errors in the article due to reliance on that source). I didn't participate in the reliable source discussion but accepted the results of it and added a citation needed tag to the article.

I will appreciate your concurrence that a bibliographic citation, as proposed above, will preserve the article, rather than requiring the extraordinarily burdensome task of footnoting at least a thousand facts. Smallchief (talk) 08:39, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

soe_french.tripod.com is not reliable, it's someone's self-published personal website. Harrison doesn't appear to be an estalished subject matter expert, his "book" (assuming it is a book and not a pamphlet) is described as a "private publication". You've had since at least January last year to add citations to this article. Since February 2021 you have made a significant number of edits to this article, and yet SOE F Section networks#References has exactly the same number of references it had before. I won't accept general references as the material has been challenged for so long, so as the material has been challenged please provide inline citations. There can be no local consensus that policy doesn't apply to this article, so please just get on with it and fix the article. IF you choose to continue this prevarication, I'm removing all the unreferenced material. FDW777 (talk) 09:07, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

Furhermore Special Forces Roll of Honour was not something I personally deeemed unreliable as claimed, it was deemed unreliable at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 153#specialforcesroh.com. The unreliability is obvious to anyone with eyes, since it's a forum!!! FDW777 (talk) 09:09, 19 June 2021 (UTC)

• WP:LISTVERIFY makes it clear that the verifiability policy applies to stand-alone lists the same as any other content, meaning that for each entry on the list I should be able to identify a reliable source that supports the information. For a list this long, the only way I can see being able to verify individual entries is by using inline citations. A local consensus to suspend the verifiability policy for a certain article is by definition invalid. (t · c) buidhe 07:18, 20 June 2021 (UTC)
• No it does not. buidhe seemingly has made up his own requirement that long lists require inline citations...there is no such policy. If it were a long list with different sources for every entry that would be one thing, but if it's all sourced to only 3 sources, no way in hell is that mandatory. Also, regarding his statement that A local consensus to suspend the verifiability policy for a certain article is by definition invalid, I suggest he reread WP:IAR and also notice that every single policy and guideline states at the t op to use common sense and occasional exceptions apply. FDW777, there's something you need to understand: sourcing concerns alone is not a legitimate reason to "challenge material. In other words, anyone may challenge content they think is likely to be wrong or misleading if it's unsourced; but challenging content for NO OTHER REASON than that it is unsourced or poorly sourced is disruptive. Using that as a reason to demand inline citations is atrocious. Had there been general references already in place, that would not have been challengeable. Because there weren't, you "challenged" the content, and then you demand inline citations because it's "challenged content". I'm sorry, but that is WP:POINTY and disruptive as all hell. Firejuggler86 (talk) 09:14, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• I suggest you read the policy you're talking about. WP:BURDEN says Attribute all quotations, and any material whose verifiability is challenged or likely to be challenged, to a reliable, published source using an inline citation (emphasis in original). It does not say "material whose accuracy is challenged". Even if it did, the fact that this article has been constructed using no references and self-published references (including many uses of forum posts) means I'm quite entitled to challenge the accuracy. I've been generous in giving the editor an opportunity to fix the problems with the article, they chose to try this end-run round policy instead. FDW777 (talk) 09:22, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• • Irrelevant. None of the uncited material contains quotations. Smallchief (talk) 10:13, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• Did you even read the policy? I'll say it again for you. Attribute all quotations, and any material whose verifiability is challenged or likely to be challenged, to a reliable, published source using an inline citation (emphasis in original). Do you see the word "and" between "quotations" and "any material"? That means they aren't the same thing. The material has beem challenged, please add inline citations. FDW777 (talk) 10:19, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• • No, removing content because it's unsourced is perfectly justified. You don't have to prove the content is wrong before removing it. That's the core of WP:VERIFY, which states, "Any material that needs a source but does not have one may be removed." Material that needs a citation includes, "any material whose verifiability has been challenged or is likely to be challenged". What does it mean to be verifiable? "verifiability means other people using the encyclopedia can check that the information comes from a reliable source". WP:V is policy, while WP:Truth is an essay, so I would conclude it's actually more justified to remove information for failing verifiability than because one editor believes it may be wrong or misleading.
  • Yes, it's true that if there were only a couple sources then you might be able to get away with not using inline citations, however, the page ranges would probably be too long for the information to be verifiable. (t · c) buidhe 09:25, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• Furthermore the whole "it's only three reference for the whole article" idea is a nonsense to start with. There is the reference section from before I removed the unreliable reference. Practically every single one is a forum post. If material has since been added (and the article history shows exactly which editor has added the overwhelming majority of the material, they are called Smallchief) from other references, then I'm terribly sorry to have to inform you that they should have added the appropriate reference(s) at the same time as adding the material in the first place. FDW777 (talk) 10:11, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• To be absolutely correct, FDW777, I have not added "the overwhelming majority of the material', but rather 51.1 percent of it. Smallchief (talk) 10:17, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

• I suggest looking at the article history since the forum post was removed, you are clearly the main offender. This was made clear by the part of my post saying "since been added", with "since" obviously referring to after the specific point in time mentioned. FDW777 (talk) 10:20, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Responding to User:Buidhe. It's not as clearcut as you make it out to be. Here are two quotes from Wikipedia citation policy.

Wikipedia: Inline Citation "Some articles (e.g., articles about controversial people) will require inline citations after nearly every sentence. Some sections (e.g., dense technical subjects) may even require more than one inline citation per sentence. Others may not require any inline citations at all." [Emphasis added]

Wikipedia: Stand-alone lists "Stand-alone lists are subject to Wikipedia's content policies and guidelines for articles, including verifiability and citing sources. This means statements should be sourced where they appear, and they must provide inline citations if they contain any of the four kinds of material absolutely required to have citations. (Note: None of the agents and networks named in this list, in my opinion, are of the four kinds of material required to have citations.)

"When an inline citation is not required by a sourcing policy and editors choose to name more sources than strictly required, then either general references or inline citations may be used. It is generally presumed that obviously appropriate material, such as the inclusion of Apple in the List of fruits, does not require an inline citation."

In addition to the above statements of policy, Wikipedia:Stand-alone lists names several list articles as good examples that editors should follow. Several of the examples in Wikipedia:Stand-alone lists have few or no inline citations for entries on the list. The List of winners and shortlisted authors of the Booker Prize has only a few inline citations. The List of cat breeds has only a few inline citations. The List of fictional dogs has only 2 inline citations in a long list of notable and non-notable fictional dogs. None of these articles are challenged for lack of citations. Shall I rush to tag these articles for inadequate citations and threaten to remove all uncited material?

An interesting example is List of Finns, a very long list of notable Finns with only 2 inline citations. All the Finns listed have wikipedia articles. Following the Finn's example, we could retitle List of SOE F Section networks and agents as List of notable agents of SOE F Section, delete the names of all SOE agents presently without wikipedia articles (about one-half of the agents), and we would have a perfectly acceptable list article with few or no inline citations. If we retitled and reworked the list with only notable agents listed, it would still be a somewhat useful list, but a completed list would be ten times more useful.

My point is simple. List of SOE F Section networks and agents is a non-controversial, factual list that is being singled out to meet an unreasonable standard not required by Wikipedia policy and Wikipedia practice. I have given numerous examples to illustrate my point.Smallchief (talk) 11:56, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Do you intend to add inline citations to this article? Yes or no? FDW777 (talk) 12:04, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Some general points.

• This article has been tagged as needing additional references since January 2020.
• The Booker Prize entry at Wikipedia:Stand-alone lists is talked about in terms of article layout, specifically chronological order. It does not give you free rein to claim since that article doesn't have many inline citations, this article doesn't need them either.
• The latter part of the previous point is made clear by the section of the guideline at WP:LISTVERIFY, which says Stand-alone lists are subject to Wikipedia's content policies and guidelines for articles, including verifiability and citing sources. This means statements should be sourced where they appear, and they must provide inline citations if they contain any of the four kinds of material absolutely required to have citations.
• Of the four kinds of material absolutely required to have citations, one is Any statement that has been challenged (e.g., by being removed, questioned on the talk page, or tagged with {{citation needed}}, or any similar tag). Since the entire article has been tagged since January 2020, this clearly meets one point which is all that's needed since it's not all three points that need to be satisifed. If not, it's quite clear the content has been questioned on the talk page since the article has been constructed from forum posts and other unreliable references. Or if that's not enough, when I remove the offending content, that will satisfy the "being removed" part.

So I ask again, do you intend to add inline citations to this article? Policy applies to this article the same as every other. FDW777 (talk) 14:52, 20 June 2021 (UTC)

Salesman

Salesman I -- Philippe Liewer (organiser), Violette Szabo (courier), Isidore Newman (radio operator), Claude Malraux, Bob Maloubier

Salesman II -- Philippe Liewer (organiser), Violette Szabo (courier), Bob Maloubier, Jean Claude Guiet (radio operator)

References: As for articles on Szabo and Maloubier, plus Scholar of Mayhem: My Father's Secret War in Nazi-Occupied Europe, by Daniel C Guiet and Timothy K Smith, New York, Penguin Press, 2019, ISBN 978-0-7352-2520-6

I'd add this to the article, but I don't want some jackass to delete it because I don't know how to add references. 104.153.40.58 (talk) 23:45, 15 October 2022 (UTC)