User talk:Kges1901/2016/August

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The Bugle: Issue CXXIV, August 2016

Your Military History Newsletter

Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results
Articles: Last month's new featured and A-class content
Book review: Hawkeye7 looks at disease control and defence satellites
Op-ed: TomStar81 on the rise of air power
Timeline: This month in World War I

The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here.
If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Nick-D (talk) 07:57, 7 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Mobilization or real divisions

Thanks for your continuing hard work. But I need to emphasize again that the high-numbered mobilization divisions are not based (yet) on solid sources - Feskov et al 2013 is already being criticised for its inaccuracy in the Soldat.ru forums. PLease consider writing articles for divisions such as the 254th Motor Rifle Division, an assuredly real division, and other existing units, ahead of articles that you and I may have to rewrite extensively after new Russian data appears in the future. Cheers Buckshot06 (talk) 12:31, 6 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Agree about the 77th Tank Division, but the CFE treaty data (from Lenskii, apparently) for 76th Tank Division appears to show that it existed. Kges1901 (talk) 18:01, 6 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I'm relatively happy with the 76th Tank Division. But let's concentrate on real, low-numbered formations for articles for now - there are so many (34th Guards Artillery Division is a glaring gap in GSFG, for example). Buckshot06 (talk) 12:41, 7 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

About 'Separate' title in naming

Hi, I've noticed you had renamed 8th Mountain brigade. So there's one thing I'd like to clarify - what is the common rule for name translation of Russian/Ukrainian brigades? Are you aware that the vast majority of them are 'Separate' (rus: отдельная/ukr: окрема)? Will we try to have some consistency in naming by omitting 'Separate' or not? --VoidWanderer (talk) 20:23, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Moved to omit separate, as that's what the standard was. Kges1901 (talk) 20:26, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Russian infantry unit names question

Hi, I'd like to discuss what is the best way to translate "Russian: мотострелковый" in Russian military units names. It means just motorized infantry, but is it widely translated already as 'Motor Rifle'? I've seen Bellingcat used the 'Motorized Infantry' translation. Same applies for Ukrainian "Ukrainian: механізований", which is translated as 'Mechanized': the "мотострелковый" and "механізований" mean absolutely the same military unit type. --VoidWanderer (talk) 11:42, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The articles we have on English Wikipedia about motorized units use the word motor rifle as a translation of "мотострелковая", which is the term used in Russian wikipedia articles, for example here. The term motor rifle is used instead of motorized rifle to avoid US-British english conflicts. Kges1901 (talk) 11:48, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

We translate the Russian or Ukrainian terms; we don't apply some arbitrary standard unit type. "Motor Rifle" (or "Motorized Rifle") has been the Soviet/Russian standard since 1957 (and has been reflected by the highest quality English-language sources, again, for decades). "Mechanized" is a new Ukrainian terminology, shared by Kazakhstan and some other Central Asian states, since the early 1990s. Belarus, for example, doesn't use it. Buckshot06 (talk) 22:20, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Military unit's 'History' chapter structure

Another thing I'd like to discuss is the 'History' chapter of each military unit.

On example of 247th Guards Air Assault Regiment - the unit's History chapter currently contains literally everything: all the events happened to the unit. The changes of Location (garrison) are in the same text block with battle engagements, changes of unit's name and even news about the museum was opened.

Maybe it would be the better approach to divide 'History' on logical chapters? Such as 'Previous names', 'Location', 'Engagements'? It would give a much clearer picture. --VoidWanderer (talk) 12:07, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Personally, I feel that breaking the history section up would break up the information. There are only two paragraphs in the regiment's history section, and breaking them up created single-sentence sections. In my opinion, the changes also made the article slightly confusing, for example the Engagements section - the brigade would appear to a reader not reading the whole article to have suddenly become a regiment, and so on. Kges1901 (talk) 13:10, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Personally too, the reader would be much less confused when he sees all the valuable info divided into logically named chapters. It will give him opportunity to concentrate on the reading of the actual event he's interested in, and not be distracted on other info. And the sections will be a huge advantage when the reader came to the page to clarify a single fact. For example, what was the date brigade was relocated from Europe (it's common for Soviet military units), etc.

Yes, I agree the single-sentence sections are not looking good, but it's just a temporary disadvantage. I hope the sections will be filled properly once. At least, that was my intention to do it. --VoidWanderer (talk) 13:41, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Personally I always use a chronological narrative of the history in all my military unit work. i believe that's the most logical flowing way to move from one historical fact to another. Buckshot06 (talk) 22:22, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

7th Division and Ilovaisk battle

Hi, as for 7th Division. Sutyagin just generally mentions 247th Regiment as part of August invasion. But there's evidence the Regiment was in Ilovaisk in particular. Will post that a bit later. --VoidWanderer (talk) 09:56, 13 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, thanks for posting. Kges1901 (talk) 09:56, 13 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Unit names history discussion

Hi, I'd like to discuss what would be the best approach to list previous military unit names.

I've seen you've rolled back the changes made to 247th Guards Air Assault Regiment and had put old names back in template header. But does it really helps wiki? It gives that clogged appearance to the header, and even somewhat hides the current name. Maybe we should add a special chapter in unit's 'History' which would explicitly describe the dates and the changes that were done to military unit's name? --VoidWanderer (talk) 11:57, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging Buckshot06. The name changes are described in the unit history section. I added the previous names in the template header because of what I interpreted as a standard with units that had previous names. Kges1901 (talk) 13:05, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I doubt it's a standard. The template field is named explicitly 'Name', not names. And if you take a look at 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team that you mentioned earlier, this unit also had its name changed in the past, but previous names weren't put in the title. --VoidWanderer (talk) 13:26, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The original unit that had previous names in the header was some number Rhode Island Infantry Regiment, where I copied this usage from many years ago. My application of the principle for units across the former Soviet Union - and sometimes beyond - has made it a de facto standard, for the former Soviet Union. Basically, it's a different army, different rules about lineage. Soviet formations, according to the Russian authors such as Vadim Feskov, trace their history via redesignations of formations, but explicitly trace their heritage back to those differently designated formations. (You can see examples at Michael Holm's great translation site at http://www.ww2.dk/new). The rule was given some Milhist force by the guideline WP:MILMOS#UNITNAME which I started the discussion about and then got incorporated into the Milmos. Wikipedia is not an all-encompassing blanket across all armies, and these rules are not usually applied to the United States Army, which has its own (arcane) rules about lineage, which ignore, often, the history of the numerical designations. Should you wish to contest this usage, best not to do it here, but on a more prominent discussion page such as WT:MILHIST. Regards Buckshot06 (talk) 22:15, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Ok, I've understood you clearly. Buckshot06, please tell me will this approach be suitable to put several names in a title? Example: User:VoidWanderer/test --VoidWanderer (talk) 23:46, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Works just fine, though I usually do the most recent designation at the top, working backwards to the longest-ago formation. Buckshot06 (talk) 23:56, 12 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Good. Can we agree on a direction and then force the usage of this markup as a rule at WT:MILHIST? I have literally zero experience in these discussions, and it will be hard for me to advocate it properly. --VoidWanderer (talk) 00:03, 13 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I wrote a long reply which mis-up-loaded and got lost, but succinctly this isn't really appropriate to beyond the fSU (eg British Army brigades do not, except in the rarest of cases, change their designation and type), and for the fSU just be WP:BOLD and spend more time creating and editing unit and formation articles (please, however, when creating unit articles, sketch the bare bones of the history in without just writing the definition sentence and leaving others to do the hard yards. GTranslate will give you the sense of the Ukrainian or Russian articles without too much difficulty). We're one of the many uber-uber specialised groups in MilHist, and beyond about six editors nobody will care. But if you wish to start a discussion at Milhist, just open a talkpage section and state your case, because I've just realised it might be appropriate for the French Army of today, at least. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.191.104.68 (talk) 11:23, 13 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, I'm ok with implementing the change. Kges1901 (talk) 00:00, 13 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:No. 41 Squadron RAF/GA1

Kges1901, on August 7 you posted at the bottom of the page that you were failing the GA nomination, but you never actually did so; the review is still open.

If you still wish to fail the nomination, please see the instructions at WP:GANI#Failing and use them to guide you in completing the process. If you have any questions on what's needed, I'm happy to help. BlueMoonset (talk) 18:31, 18 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

168th Motor Rifle Brigade

Thank you for re-evaluating the evidence for this formation. This is exactly why one needs to be careful of setting up too many pages based on Holm; we really don't know yet!! If we submitted a query to Soldat.ru forums we might get contradictory answers!! Buckshot06 (talk) 11:56, 20 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

And in accordance with Order SV/2016/0004z of the Red Army editors' group, I hereby recognize your contribution of 20th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union). Thanks for your continuing hard work to memorialize the millions of Red Army soldier who fought in the Great Patriotic War. Buckshot06 (talk) 14:47, 20 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for Pyotr Georgyevich Novikov

On 23 August 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Pyotr Georgyevich Novikov, which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that Red Army Major General Pyotr Georgyevich Novikov died in the Flossenbürg concentration camp? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Pyotr Georgyevich Novikov. You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, Pyotr Georgyevich Novikov), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

— Maile (talk) 00:02, 23 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for 20th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union)

On 24 August 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article 20th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union), which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that the 20th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union) was almost entirely destroyed during the Battle of Białystok–Minsk and the Battle of Smolensk? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/20th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union). You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, 20th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union)), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

— Maile (talk) 00:01, 24 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for Andrey Shebalkov

On 27 August 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article Andrey Shebalkov, which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that Hero of the Soviet Union Andrey Shebalkov was deprived of his title on charges of sending anti-Soviet letters? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Andrey Shebalkov. You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, Andrey Shebalkov), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

Gatoclass (talk) 00:01, 27 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

DYK for 17th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union)

On 29 August 2016, Did you know was updated with a fact from the article 17th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union), which you recently created, substantially expanded, or brought to good article status. The fact was ... that the Soviet 17th Mechanized Corps lost all of its armored vehicles in the Battle of Białystok–Minsk? The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/17th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union). You are welcome to check how many page hits the article got while on the front page (here's how, 17th Mechanized Corps (Soviet Union)), and it may be added to the statistics page if the total is over 5,000. Finally, if you know of an interesting fact from another recently created article, then please feel free to suggest it on the Did you know talk page.

Gatoclass (talk) 00:01, 29 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

331st Rifle Division

Hey, Richard.

My most recent Wiki article, on the 331st Rifle Div., has already been rated B, and I think it has a chance to be rated GA if it's nominated. Would you care to do the honours? Also, I used your user page as a template to finally set up one of my own, so thanks for that.Wreck Smurfy (talk) 02:53, 27 August 2016 (UTC)Wreck Smurfy[reply]

@Wreck Smurfy: I've nominated 331st RD for GA. I'm pleased to see another editor interested in improving Russian, Soviet, and CIS Military History articles to GA-class. Kges1901 (talk) 08:35, 27 August 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Much obliged to you. I also got your email re: 60th Army and will have a look-see ASAP. Wreck Smurfy (talk) 00:58, 29 August 2016 (UTC)Wreck Smurfy[reply]