Talk:World War II casualties/Archives/2010/July

Jewish genocide

Hi

Tim Kirk's The Longman Companion to NAzi History (1995), p. 172 provides a table of the lowest and highest estimates of deaths caused by the Holocaust along with a breakdown of the Jewish population of each country affected.

The figures generally agree with the stats here but some are lower and some are higher. I do not own the work however the table is reproduced in an uni e-book am reading therefore i can provide a photo of the information if needed?EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 10:57, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

the numbers on the page now are from Martin Gilbert's Atlas of the Holocaust. The book is easy to obtain and verify, Gilbert is a well known and respected historian.--Woogie10w (talk) 11:14, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

No problems. Just to note i wasnt questioning the source in use ;) If you need the information i have just drop me a line :)--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 11:35, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

BTW is there anything else of interest in that book re casualties? Recently I have been on the Russian internet and have discovered interesting details in academic journals on their civilian losses. --Woogie10w (talk) 11:44, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

I dont know abuot the book as i dont own it unfortuantly. The book am currently working through, as of yet, doesnt seem to have anything down on the overall Russian/Soviet casualties nor anyone else bar the info mentioned above. Sorry.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:45, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Remarks by UserUser:Stor stark7 Re Overmans

User Stor Stark7 posted these comments Re WW2 Casualties to my talk page

I believe they belong here so other editors can participate Posted by --Woogie10w (talk) 22:12, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

No records

Hi Woogie, since you are interested in German casualty statistics I though I'd share one piece of context information with you.

• [1]
• [2]

Turns out the U.S. in mid 1946 was not happy with the existence of and ongoing work of the "German Agency for the Notification of War Deaths of Members of the Former German Armed Forces to the Next of Kin". They ordered it shut down, and made sure that the German casualty records, presumably including those for the post-war POW period, would be destroyed by the remaining staff (except for any specific items of information already requested by Allied agencies).

The specific Allied decision was:

"b) To destroy as soon as possible all documents not required by such Directorates, Delegations and Agencies,

c) Not to allow documents which the Germans might find interesting and might therefore wish to recover to fall into German hands."

I suppose there were some items of information that would not be good for the future democratic German government they were supposedly working towards to know.

I wonder if the French reply to the U.S. request for information about the missing 290,000 Germans captured by the U.S. was treated in the same manner.[3]

I suppose that if some of the documentation for key periods has been deliberately erased in this way then available casualty estimates are just very vague guess-work.--Stor stark7 ^Speak 07:13, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

The issue of the German POWs in Allied hands is the subject of another Wikipedia article Other Losses. Claims of an Allied cover up and massive German POW losses have been dismissed by respected the historians Steven Ambrose and Rudiger Overmans. There is definitely no evidence that there were circa. 1 million German POW deaths in Allied hands. These unsubstantiated claims are still put forward by the radical right in Germany and should not to be treated seriously.

IMO the use of the primary source documents you posted on Wikipedia would be original research. We would need a secondary source that analyzes the validity of these documents. We cannot use the documents as is on Wikipedia as a source.

The research by Rudiger Overmans puts the total number of German POW deaths in the hands of the western Allies at about 77,000(1% of those captured).

regards--Woogie10w (talk) 10:54, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Hi woogie10w. I re-read your reply and I am still a bit puzzled. All I was meaning is that wikipedians should be critical when they review sources, and perhaps not aspenbergerlike fight over numbers when the whole overlying concept the numbers rely on may be flawed. What sense is to to waste energy detailing arguments on sources who argue whether the earth is flat or square, if it may turn out that in-fact it is round. As an example in case, if for example Overmans knew and took into account that the records have been censored when he made his casualty estimates, then all is good and well, and we can expect to find an analysis of the primary source I linked to above above (or of the deliberate destruction of German casualty records that it talks about) in his work. If he has not done so then his estimates are actually worse than useless since they give an illusion of accuracy. I would also caution about putting too much trust into authority and fancy titles, as the Germans apparently had a tendency to do when Herr Doctor Goebels told them the Jews were simply being resettled in the east. He was after all a PhD, and a government minister so how could they other than believe him.

I am already well aware of the "other losses" debate by the way. In what way is it relevant to the sources I provided you with above? Were they invented by the German right wing? As far as I understand it Bacque showed there was a policy of revenge and hostility towards the prisoners, and that civilians were prohibited to feed prisoners. Bacque argued that as a consequence of these types of policies 200,000 Germans died in France and 700,000 in Germany. Ambrose called a conference in the Eisenhower center, and made a book out of the proceedings. In this book they apparently convincingly refute Bacques mathematics, the records cant be used to prove what Bacque claimed they proved. Still, even if the real casualties are only a fraction of Bacques claims, then that is quite scary numbers too. As to Ambrose it can strongly be suspected that he was bribed by the Eisenhower-center, they after-all made him their president in connection to the conference, and in reviews of the book he edited it has been noted that nothing in it really tries to refute the "motives" section of Bacques arguments. The Book hasn't closed all aspects of the case, and certainly shouldn't be use to silence questioning of tangential sources. History is after-all reevaluated all the time and has lots of fallacies in it..

As an example:[4]

— Beevor frequently quotes from personal memoirs of Allied soldiers that have been available to historians for years. But could it be that they were ignored by them until now because they didn't support the image of the "greatest generation," the term that Americans have liked to use to describe their victorious soldiers from 1945? It would seem that no shadows were to be cast on the war that gave the Americans, in particular, the moral right to have a say in shaping Europe's postwar future as well as creating the practical conditions for it to do so.

Ambrose is most certainly one of those historians that ignored sources, and he was one of the strongest proponents of the "Greatest Generation". What else was he wrong about?

Two other good examples of faked history, taken from this working paper from the University of Paris:[5]

— The first example consists in the accounts made by French veterans and historians of the war in Indochina (1946-1954). Even in fairly detailed accounts such as the 5-volume history by Lucien Bodard (1972-1973), there is almost no mention of the role played by the United States. Yet, just by browsing through the articles published in the New York Times one quickly becomes convinced that this role was both massive and crucial. (i) Almost all the war material was provided by the United States (ii) French tactical plans had to be approved by the US Joint Chiefs of Staff (iii) American military advisers were present at French headquarters (iv) French troops were often transported in American planes piloted by US airmen (more details on all these points can be found in Roehner 2007, p. 137-143). It is of course easy to understand the rationale of such omissions. For French military it would be fairly uncomfortable to recognize a subordination of this kind; for US advisers it would be equally embarrassing to mention their role, all the more so because the whole campaign ended in disaster at DienBienPhu. Similarly (and for the same kind of reasons) the role of US Forces in the civil war between Nationalists and Chinese Communists is down played in most American accounts.

and

— The second example concerns the statements made by Edgar Hoover, the Chief of the FBI, about acts of sabotage during World War II in the United States. He claimed repeatedly that “there had not been one act of foreign-directed sabotage in the country. Every suspect act was the result of vandalism, pique, resentment or a desire for relief from boredom.” (NYT 31 December 1944, p. 16 and website of the FBI).

Well, just by browsing through the articles published in the New York Times one quickly realizes that soon after the war began in Europe there was a tremendous increase in the number of explosions which occurred in US defense factories. A similar wave of suspect explosions had occurred in World War I; during the war many saboteurs were arrested and in the decades that followed the end of World War I, it was recognized by both American and German authorities that most of the explosions were the result of a systematic campaign of sabotage. During World War II, negating sabotage by enemy powers was a convenient posture for all parties involved. (i) The FBI would thus be exonerated from having failed to prevent acts of sabotage. (ii) This posture was also seen with favor by the American government because it would prevent any panic or demoralization in the public (iii) the German government was pleased as well because it helped him in its efforts to prevent the United States from entering the war.

After the war, what had been a convenient (but untrustworthy) presentation of the facts became the established truth.

Regards--Stor stark7 ^Speak 20:10, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable secondary source that would support the use of these primary source documents? The documents cannot be taken out of context and used on Wikipedia as is, because it would be OR.

Overmans did in fact review the German personnel records and found 77,000 dead in Allied captivity, his study breaks out the total losses of POW in detail. Overmans and Ambrose have made it quite clear that there is absolutely no evidence to support the claims of Bacque and the radical right that the Allies were responsible for the deaths of 700,000 German POW. --Woogie10w (talk) 21:03, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

If including them in wikipedia is OR or not depends entirely on which context they are inserted. Trying to draw any conclusions from them in a wiki article would of course be OR, but the information in the documents themselves need not be. If you are in doubt ask at the appropriate help page for in what context they can be used.

A separate issue, that I hope that you are not confusing, is that since they come from reliable sources they can for us as editors also be useful to compare against when evaluating the reliability of secondary sources that deal with that topic.

When you write that "Overmans did in fact review the German personnel records and found 77,000 dead in Allied captivity" that in no way answers the question I asked. I have no doubt Overmans made a breakdown using the records he had available. My key question is did he show that he was aware that some of the documents available had been doctored in 1946 by the U.S. authorities through the removal of information that "the Germans might find interesting and might therefore wish to recover".? If he does not mention this censorship of raw data and explain how he compensated for this when he made his detailed estimates then there is great risk that the detailed breakdown he presents is simply nothing but very detailed and very useless crap.

Cheers --Stor stark7 ^Speak 21:23, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.

Per Wikipedia:No original research#Primary, secondary and tertiary sources

--Woogie10w (talk) 22:21, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the link, but precisely like your excessive repetitions about Bacque and 1 million or 700,000 on my talk page, you needn't have bothered. This is quite frankly getting tedious. I get the feeling that you perhaps have failed to grasp or are simply misunderstanding what I have written here. Perhaps if you are not a native English speaker you might consider trying a translating machine or changing the machine. The Wikipedia policy you copy paste is pretty much exactly what I wrote in the first paragraph of my previous post. I would however like to draw to your attention something a few lines down in the policy: "Our policy: Primary sources that have been reliably published may be used in Wikipedia, but only with care, because it is easy to misuse them. Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation." I don't understand why you're going on about this by the way, discussing primary sources on talk pages is very different from using them in articles. Cheers and good night --Stor stark7 ^Speak 22:41, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Those PDF documents you have linked to my talk page are were not published and reviewed in a reliable secondary source. They do not belong on Wikpedia.--Woogie10w (talk) 22:47, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Sigh, be a chum and take the time to actually read and try to digest what I have written. The primary documents are from reliable sources, one is the U.S. government site on military law, and the other is even more reliable and less a primary source since it is an edited publication of primary sources published in edited form by the United States Department of State. I get the feeling you would prefer if they did not exists, but, face it, they do. And again, if Overman made his analysis without taking the deletion into account then all those nice numbers in his books are just junk. It does not make Bacques numbers more accurate if that is your fear, it just means that Overmans also become unreliable and should not be used. Sometimes facing reality can be tough, but every now and then it can't be avoided. If you are against these sources possibly being used on Wikipedia in the future then instead of writing on my talk page I strongly suggest you go to WP:PRIMARY and by WP:BOLD delete the sentence that begins with "Our policy: Primary sources that have been reliably published may be used in Wikipedia" instead of pointlessly repeating your opinion on my talk page. Cheers and Goodnight again --Stor stark7 ^Speak 23:11, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Again I repeat- All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.--Woogie10w (talk) 23:48, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

BTW your remark No Records is just not so. The Overmans project, which was sponsered by the German government, had access to the wartime German Army Personnel records and the post war German search service files. I have the book and have read it. --Woogie10w (talk) 00:02, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

In your last response you mention that Overman had access to the "wartime German Army Personnel records" and the "post war German search service" files. This later I presume to be the files used by the "Suchdienstes des Deutschen Roten Kreuzes" (Search service of the German Red Cross). The primary source I linked to above tells of the destruction of parts of the records of the "German Agency for the Notification of War Deaths of Members of the Former German Armed Forces to the Next of Kin" which had been working during the occupation until mid 1946. If those records are missing then Overman was basing his study on incomplete data and the result is false.

BTW, according to the German search service 1,300,000 German POWs have an unknown fate, they are still listed as missing. Did Overman blame the Russians for all of them? Nevermind, no need to answer that, the important question is below.

Again, please answer my original question, did Overman show that he was aware that in mid 1946 the records of the "German Agency for the Notification of War Deaths of Members of the Former German Armed Forces to the Next of Kin" had had been destroyed of all information that could be interesting to the Germans? A simple Yes or No will suffice.

Again, just a simple yes.... or a no...

Cheers--Stor stark7 ^Speak 07:37, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

The discussion of the primary source documents you discovered and your critism of Overmans needs to be addressed on the WW2 Casualties talk page, not on our own user pages. We need to have other editors and admins involved in the discussion.--Woogie10w (talk) 10:12, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

BINGO- on page 109 Overmans notes that on 14 June 1946 Gen. Clay ordered that the records at WASt not to be destroyed The records were not burned and turned over to French control. Overmans notes that the records at WASt were not critical to the study of German losses because of the chaotic stitution at the end of the war.--Woogie10w (talk) 10:27, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Congratulations, Overman rises in my estimation. And that is exactly the thing we can use primary documents for. I will have a look at it when I find the time.

Then perhaps Overman also says something about the missing 290,000 from the 740,000 that the U.S. had sent to forced labor in France? The U.S. was very insistent, they also insisted that the French tell them the breakdown of how many of those missing 290,000 that had died in a MoU from March 11 and 13, 1947. I expect Overman must include the results of the French answer? http://untreaty.un.org/unts/1_60000/4/25/00007208.pdf

--Stor stark7 ^Speak 21:48, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

I have moved the discussion to the WW2 talk page so that others can participate--Woogie10w (talk) 22:20, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Reply of User:Woogie10w to User:Stor stark7 re: Overmans

- The issue of the German POWs in Allied hands is the subject of another Wikipedia article Other Losses. Claims of an Allied cover up and massive German POW losses have been dismissed by respected the historians Steven Ambrose and Rudiger Overmans. There is definitely no evidence that there were circa. 1 million German POW deaths in Allied hands. These unsubstantiated claims are still put forward by the radical right in Germany and should not to be treated seriously.

IMO the use of the primary source documents you posted on Wikipedia would be original research. We would need a secondary source that analyzes the validity of these documents. We cannot use the documents as is on Wikipedia as a source.

The research by Rudiger Overmans puts the total number of German POW deaths in the hands of the western Allies at about 77,000(1% of those captured).

regards--Woogie10w (talk) 10:54, 6 July 2010 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable secondary source that would support the use of these primary source documents? The documents cannot be taken out of context and used on Wikipedia as is, because it would be OR.

Overmans did in fact review the German personnel records and found 77,000 dead in Allied captivity, his study breaks out the total losses of POW in detail. Overmans and Ambrose have made it quite clear that there is absolutely no evidence to support the claims of Bacque and the radical right that the Allies were responsible for the deaths of 700,000 German POW. --Woogie10w (talk) 21:03, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.

Per Wikipedia:No original research#Primary, secondary and tertiary sources

--Woogie10w (talk) 22:21, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Those PDF documents you have linked to my talk page are were not published and reviewed in a reliable secondary source. They do not belong on Wikpedia.--Woogie10w (talk) 22:47, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

Again I repeat- All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.--Woogie10w (talk) 23:48, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

BTW your remark No Records is just not so. The Overmans project, which was sponsered by the German government, had access to the wartime German Army Personnel records and the post war German search service files. I have the book and have read it. --Woogie10w (talk) 00:02, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

The discussion of the primary source documents you discovered and your critism of Overmans needs to be addressed on the WW2 Casualties talk page, not on our own user pages. We need to have other editors and admins involved in the discussion.--Woogie10w (talk) 10:12, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

BINGO- on page 109 Overmans notes that on 14 June 1946 Gen. Clay ordered that the records at WASt not to be destroyed The records were not burned and turned over to French control. Overmans notes that the records at WASt were not critical to the study of German losses because of the chaotic stitution at the end of the war.--Woogie10w (talk) 10:27, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

Discussion of Sources Re: Rudiger Overmans

I have opened this thread so that other editors can particapate in the the discussion Re Overmans

I do not expect other editors to read the entire text of our lenghty comments above:

Stor stark 7 has provided the following three links to primary source documents, they are not included in a secondary source that provides analysis of their contents:

His intention is to use these primary source documents to discredit the work of Overmans and support his own POV. He has not provided support from secondary or tertiary sources.

• [6]

• [7]

[8]

I pointed out that All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.

Per Wikipedia:No original research#Primary, secondary and tertiary sources--Woogie10w (talk) 22:42, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

The Wikipedia policy on this matter WP:PRIMARY is very clear on the matter that "Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation". If there was some kind of terrible crime revealed by those documents or that they reveal a flaw in Overmans' research it would have been covered by now in multiple secondary reliable sources and Wikipedia is not the place to conduct new research. Nick-D (talk) 23:43, 9 July 2010 (UTC)

1-I am displeased that User:Stor stark 7 attempted to exclude other editors from the discussion and direct his remarks only to myself.

2-User:Stor stark 7 claims that documents here show that the German military records were destroyed by the US in 1946

• [9]*[10]

A. I found no mention of documents being destroyed in these PDF links. Stor stark 7 I am from Missouri, show me were this is mentioned. I am from Missouri, show me [11]

B. Overmans made it clear that the documents in question were not destroyed, they were turned over to French control.

C.[12] brings forward the discredited claims of James Bacque that large numbers German POW died in Allied hands

In a nutshell the arguments are synthetic claims about primary sources that are not referenced to a secondary source, original analysis of the primary-source material by Stor stark 7--Woogie10w (talk) 00:01, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

My simple reply to all this this is that Woogie10w seems to be confused and has the gall to speculate about my motives and make claims about my intentions based on this confusion!

In particular I would advice anyone here to try to figure out and let me know what he means by his [C] just above, where he connects a book by an author called Bacque from 1990 with a link to a U.S. foreign office publication from 1947????

I advice anyone who feels inclined to bother with this to just read the original discussion (User_talk:Woogie10w#No_records)(User_talk:Stor_stark7#German_POW_deaths) instead of relying on woogie10ws useless interpretation and copy pastes.--Stor stark7 ^Speak 10:04, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

First, let me admit I did not read every word of the linked PDFs. However, as I understood it, the 290K were in French hands to begin with, not turned over by the U.S. I saw no mention of destruction of records as alleged, but rather destruction of Nazi propaganda or like material. And reading Stor stark 7's comments, I do get the sense there's a POV not supported AFAI can tell by the evidence. TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 23:19, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Please do an actual check before commenting next time, otherwise you are just cluttering up talk pages with noise. Admitting you did not do the minimum reading required first, and then commenting anyway, is really bad style. The Decision file (one doc split in 2 physical pdf) has an index at the end of one of the files by the way, they tell you that "Disposal of Records of German Agency for Notifications of Deaths" is on p.176-178, it's under "Notice of Death" in the index. Quite frankly I'm also a bit incredulous as how you interpreted the 290,000 in the state department papers as having been captured by the French during the war (that ended in May). I will quote the relevant aspects so that it may be compared to your interpretation.

"Note also states that of the 740,000 prisoners of war transferred to France in July 1945, 290,000 have already been 'stricken off the rolls'". Cheers --Stor stark7 ^Speak 07:52, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

The incident in question has in fact been covered in the Overmans book Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Overmans does not refer to the documents in question, but on page 109 he notes that on 14 June 1946 Gen. Clay ordered that the records at WASt not to be destroyed The records were not burned and in fact turned over to French control. Overmans notes that the records at WASt were not critical to his study of German losses because they were incomplete due to the chaotic situation at the end of the war.

The lesson we have learned from this episode drives home the point that All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors.

As editors we cannot use these primary source documents on Wikipedia to POV push the discredited arguments in James Bacque’s Other Losses . OR by editors using them should be deleted ASAP--Woogie10w (talk) 09:47, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

I hope am not missing something here: there primary sources, guidelines say we cant use them, end of?--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 11:55, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

It's even simpler than that. Where has anyone claimed future intent to use them in an article? What we have here is simply a case of a problematic editor using a version of the fallacy "Have you stopped beating your wife" twisted to be more like "Stop planning to beat your wife, it is against Wikipedia policy", and I would kindly ask Woogie10w to kindly cease and desist with these absurd claims about my motives and intents, but have belatedly realized that its best to avoid interacting all-together with this one and leave him (or her) all-alone.--Stor stark7 ^Speak 18:15, 12 July 2010 (UTC)

Woogie10w isn't suggesting that you intend to use the documents in an article - his summary of his concerns is that your "intention is to use these primary source documents to discredit the work of Overmans and support his own POV. He has not provided support from secondary or tertiary sources". This is amply supported by this post by yourself on his talk page. Moreover, given that you used the third of the above primary sources (eg this) as a standalone reference when you created the Forced labor of Germans after World War II article you're not well placed to argue that you have no intention of using these as references in articles anyway. Woogie10w is about the last person I'd describe as a "problematic editor" incidentally - please stop your personal attacks on him and the above editors. Nick-D (talk) 08:37, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Sequence of Events, as seen by Stor stark7

• 1

I post the links of an Allied decision to delete German casualty records, so that information that could be intresting to them does not fall into German hands. I advice Woogie10w that if the Allies had such intents, and if documents are missing, then the accuracy of later casualty estimates will by necessity be lower.[13]

Woogie10w replies by bringing up an apparently discredited author (Bacque) that in 1989 claimed 700,000 German POWs died in American hands, and point out that he is discredited. I do not see exactly why he makes the connection to the PDF of documents from 1946 that I provided him with, but fine, this was his spontaneous reaction.

He further gives his opinion that using the documents on Wikipedia would be original research. Note that I at that point had said nothing about using the PDF's on Wikipedia.[14]

• 2

I responded by stating my confusion at his strong reply (with Bacque etc) and noted that I intended that we should be critical when we review sources, and that if we are aware of primary documents this can help us evaluate secondary sources. (maybe I'm right, maybe I'm wrong, but that is still my opinion) Since He brought up Overmans, just as He brought up Bacque I gave as an example that if Overmans casualty estimates are reliable then he will have dealt with the issue that was in the PDF. Easy to check. I further caution against trusting authority just for the sake of authority and pointed out that Dr. Goebbels was a PhD. too, and Germans were fairly foolish if they uncritically trusted him because of his academic merits. I further showed some examples of misinterpreted history for political reasons. I say nothing about using the primary documents beyond having them in mind when evaluating sources.[15]

Nevertheless, Woggie once again goes on about using the documents on Wikipedia would be OR. He pretty much repeats his previous statement that Overman only estimated 77,000 dead in Allied captivity and that No evidence supports Bacques or "the radical right" claims. [16]

• 3

"the radical right" is by the way an euphemism for "Nazi", unless I'm grossly mistaken. By now I'm a bit tired of having this woogie10w making postings om my talk page that have the feel of making me look like a Nazi supporter for anyone who is reading only woogie10ws half the discussion. I reply by politely pointing out that there is indeed wikipedia policy permitting the use of these documents under certain circumstances, should anyone on wikipedia feel so inclined. I say nothing about myself being inclined to do so. I point out that there is a separate issue, that of using knowledge of primary sources when evaluating secondary sources. Since he had read Overman I ask him directly if Overman took the primary documents into account.[17]

Woogie replied with a copy paste of NOR policy, but omitted the part about when primary sources may be used. Not that I really cared, since I hadn't made any claim of intent to use primary sources. [18]

• 4

I pointed out to him that I was getting fed up with his posts on my talk page, and made a note of my previous post where I wrote:

"If including them in Wikipedia is OR or not depends entirely on which context they are inserted. Trying to draw any conclusions from them in a wiki article would of course be OR, but the information in the documents themselves need not be. If you are in doubt ask at the appropriate help page for in what context they can be used."[19]

Woogie10w replied "Those PDF documents you have linked to my talk page are were not published and reviewed in a reliable secondary source. They do not belong on Wikipedia." [20]

• 5

By now I have the feeling I'm talking to a wall. I again repeat my question from earlier, had Overman dealt with the topic in the PDF? I also reminded woogie10w of the section of policy on primary that he had omitted to copy paste earlier. I advised him that if he wanted to make sure those documents would never be used on Wikipedia then he would be better served by changing policy than by continuing to post the same statements over and over on my talk page.[21]

Wogie10w replied by repeating himself again with policy copy paste.[22],[23]

• 6

I, foolishly, replied by repeating myself again too. Had Overman dealt with the PDF?[24]

Woogie10w replied that "my criticism" of Overy needed the attention of other editors, and that Overy had in deed dealt with the topic of the PDF.[25],[26]

• 7

I replied "Congratulations, Overman rises in my estimation. And that is exactly the thing we can use primary documents for." I also asked whether Overman had any information on the third document (dealing with France) that we so far as I was concerned hadn't been discussing.[27]

Woogie 10w replied that he had moved the discussion here to this talk page.[28]

And so he did, unilaterally, and on this talk page he starts out with (my bolding)

• "[Stor stark7s] intention is to use these primary source documents to discredit the work of Overmans and support his own POV" and
• "User:Stor stark 7 attempted to exclude other editors from the discussion and direct his remarks only to myself" and
• "[Stor stark7] brings forward the discredited claims of James Bacque that large numbers German POW died in Allied hands" and provides this link that I provided him with as "evidence".

And now I see that I have been followed over to the NOR page by woogie10w, where he has posted

• "Stor Stark7 is attempting to misuse these primary source documents to synthesise a case that the US was responsible for the 800,000 deaths of German POW after WW2. "[29]

Well, excuse me if I find woogie10ws behavior as highly questionable, and excuse me if I see Nick-Ds (whom I've repeatedly encountered in the past) seemingly automatic support of Woogie10w as questionable as well.--Stor stark7 ^Speak 00:08, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Reply to Nick-D

Nick-D wrote. "Woogie10w isn't suggesting that you intend to use the documents in an article - his summary of his concerns is that your "intention is to use these primary source documents to discredit the work of Overmans and support his own POV. He has not provided support from secondary or tertiary sources". This is amply supported by this post by yourself on his talk page."

Dearest Nick. As far as I can see you have cherry-picked from the discussion between me and woogie10w. I had expected better from you. You say that Woogie10w is not focusing the discussion about using the documents in a Wikipedia article. Fair enough, he never says so explicitly, but I think the discussion speaks for itself, especially his repetitive copy pasting of policy on primary sources. You further stand-behind Woogi10w in this statement of his ""[Stor stark7s] intention is to use these primary source documents to discredit the work of Overmans and support his own POV" and you link to one of the edits I made.This.[30] I'm not going to let you get away that easy. Please be specific, what exactly in my edit are you using in support of Woogie10ws (and now yours too) allegation about my intentions?

• And also let me question you specifically, hasn't it struck you how wrong it is to make this type of allegations about editors intentions, regardless?

You also wrote: "Moreover, given that you used the third of the above primary sources (eg this) as a standalone reference when you created the Forced labor of Germans after World War II article you're not well placed to argue that you have no intention of using these as references in articles anyway." Mmmmm, you deleted that one in January, and I have respected your deletion haven't I? Still, you nevertheless try to make a case about my future intentions from that? However I just now posted a question about it on the NPOV talk page to get confirmation of your opinion, to which I was quickly stalked and had some defamation heaped on me.[31]

And lastly, you wrote: "please stop your personal attacks on him and the above editors." Well I feel very much ashamed, I thought I was the one under attack here. but I will try to improve if anyone feels attacked. But just to make sure that it does not look like you are making bogus allegations, please help me. Provide me with the sentences with personal attacks that you say I wrote, and the names of the editors they were directed against so that they may confirm and so I can apologize. From your wording I recon it must be at least 3 editors, Woogie10w and more than one additional since you use plural. Please assist Nick-D. --Stor stark7 ^Speak 00:08, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

If you do not plan to use the primary sources in the article or discredit anything, and it would appear then there has been a slight break down of commuications; why do all parties just let it go and return to the status quo?EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 07:57, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Axis Pie Chart

Looking over the pie charts ive noticed an anomaly which concerns their accuracy. Axis co-belligerants such as Iraq, Finland, and Thailand are not listed in the axis pie chart. I do believe however that allied casualtied fighting these nations are included in the allied chart. Also bulgaria is listed in the axis chart when Finland incured a signifigantly higher number of casualties and yet is not listed. To remedy this i suggest including finland in the axis chart and combining Iraq, Thailand, and Bulgaria into an other section as is labeled with the various minor powers in the allied chart.XavierGreen (talk) 05:56, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Channel Islands

Should this page include the Channel Islands, which per our article at Occupation of the Channel Islands lost at least 700 residents to the concentration camps? Of course it is a rather small number in the context of the war as a whole, but we do tabulate similar numbers for Mexico, Cuba and Newfoundland, for example. I haven't added it myself because anything to do with WWII and Nazis does tend to excite a lot of debate on Wikipedia, and thus I suspect it may have been discussed before. Barnabypage (talk) 19:52, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Please read the article Alderney concentration camps the 700 deaths were not Channel Islands residents, they were Soviet and Polish prisoners.--Woogie10w (talk) 20:25, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Ah, my mistake, in haste - thanks for clarifying it. Barnabypage (talk) 20:27, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

So the turning of the Channel Islands into "fortresses" was done on the back of slave labour! Learn something new everyday.EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 09:21, 16 July 2010 (UTC)