This is an archive of past discussions with User:Paul Siebert. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.
Incidentally, the number of editors associated with the various Eastern European-related disputes hanging around the World War II article seeking to push their POV is getting pretty concerning. Nick-D (talk) 23:16, 3 November 2012 (UTC)
The problem is not with EE or other nationalist editors, but with the users who are pushing their viewpoints irrespective to the counter-arguments presented to them. You and I know at least one EE editor who is absolutely capable to accept the arguments from his peers, who is trying to convince others, and, simultaneously, is prepared to accept other's point of view when opponent's arguments appear to be stronger. In contrast, a number of editors, not only from Eastern Europe, ignore all arguments, and participate in discussion just pro forma. That is sad, and I fully share your concern.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:58, 4 November 2012 (UTC)
It is a wide brush with which tar is being applied. One could argue you don't listen to counter-arguments, so let's not go anywhere with general comments which imply the superiority of one's own position to the detriment of others. Feel free to delete this after reading, no offense taken. VєсrumЬа ►TALK20:34, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
It seems to me you believe I kept you in mind when I was writing that. In actuality, I really kept in mind just a handful of users, because overwhelming majority of Wikipedians are quite prone to dialogue. Therefore, the brush was very narrow, and by no means affects all EE editors, many of whom I genuinely respect. Whether you belong to this category or not, you can decide by yourself...
I can provide many examples when I changed my viewpoint in a responce to reasonable arguments from others, and that is a feature of all good faith editors. Can you provide at least one example when you changed, or at least significantly modified, your point of view during a dispute with me? I cannot remember even a singe example...--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:45, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
I've changed my mind over many things in researching topics for WP, aside from generally becoming better informed. The times I have changed my mind based on another editor's exposition of position on specific points are far fewer. Both these are as they should be.
That we have not persuaded each other on anything isn't really relevant. For example, you believe the USSR, an ally of Germany at the beginning of the war and guilty of dividing Eastern Europe and sharing responsibility for WWII (actually, the embraces of multiple non-aggression pacts dooming all the territories in-between as Snyder has argued) belongs atop the list of Allies fighting the Nazis. I find that position informed more by your self-stated defense of the USSR against the anti-Soviet nationalist hordes than by historical appropriateness and therefore irrecoverably flawed. VєсrumЬа ►TALK04:03, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
Thank you, however, I saw not much vandalism in the VW article. Just a normal content dispute. In any event, thank you very much:) --Paul Siebert (talk) 16:55, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
Well, when there are people who would go into any length to "defend" their point of view and the sources that support it, I'd call it vandalism :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zeraful (talk • contribs) 10:20, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
Please, re-read WP:VANDAL. By no means the people you are talking about fit this definition. They even cannot be considered disruptive editors, although I partially share your concern about some problems with their behaviour.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:27, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
That is a long story. Briefly, the article had been locked as a result of the permanent edit war (where a currently banned user and his sock had been deeply involved). Currently, some group of users vetoes any changes using purely procedural means. The situation is unique, and I am currently pondering about possible steps to resolve the issue. If you have more concrete questions, feel free to ask. --Paul Siebert (talk) 17:42, 13 January 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, this is the first time I've dealt with a major edit war, and I'm rather annoyed by Collect's strawman arguments on the talk pages and attacks on my suggestions. Here [1] he also tracked down some of my edits on the Mao's Great Famine and removed some of the criticisms.--LucasGeorge (talk) 05:19, 14 January 2013 (UTC)
Porter has been declared an unreliable source per a consensus on a previous Vietnam War-related article. Nice try with your attempts at pro-communist cover-ups, delusion, lies, extorting and propaganda spreading. Nguyen1310 (talk) 08:47, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, Porter's "Myth of the Hue Massacre" is less reliable and less mainstream than his "Myth of the Bloodbath," which was declared unreliable at RSN. I don't recall any "Sheehan". Mainly I was removing an excessive amount of dead, dubious, or repeat external links per WP:ELNO. I probably removed as many anti-communist sites (like Rummel) as pro-communist sites. At the same time, I lowered the exaggerated estimate that the communists massacred 6,000 unarmed civilians, indicating my good faith.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 09:51, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
Nguyen1310, I'm speechless. But TheTimesAreAChanging, which still have enough decency to make a proper reply (which I really grateful for it), let just say that the opinion regarding Massacre at Hue was controversal, with sources from one side portraying it as conducted by the communists, while others saying that the mass grave are the result of the indiscriminate bombing in the 45-day siege, and probably an attemp to cover up a massacre conducted by US and ARVN forces. Also most authors based their information on Douglas Pike's report, which was also subjected to as much debate as Porter's account. And again, you used RAND. So, it would be best if you can check the information used in the article, and for future edit, remember to notice other in the talk page first, especially with large edit like this.--Zeraful (talk) 10:40, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
"The mass graves are the result of the indiscriminate bombing." Such an absurd and implausible argument is almost automatically fringe. Porter co-wrote his piece with Edward S. Herman, who denies the Rwandan and Cambodian genocides. Herman has a history of denying massacres. For example, he wrote that "The evidence for a massacre, certainly of one in which 8,000 men and boys were executed, has always been problematic, to say the least....the 'Srebrenica massacre' is the greatest triumph of propaganda to emerge from the Balkan wars....the link of this propaganda triumph to truth and justice is non-existent". Unfortunately for Herman, investigators of Srebrenica have already found over 6,000 people in mass graves, and named some 8,100 victims. In light of communist forces repeatedly admitting their responsibility for the killings at Hue--and the clear evidence that those in the mass graves had been beaten, strangled, or buried alive--and the wealth of documentary testimony from survivors who said it changed their view of the communists--denial that there was any massacre at all is silly. Herman is given no attention at Srebrenica Massacre--why should his denial of the Hue Massacre be more mainstream? But if you would like to discuss this further, or challenge any other edits I might make in the future, perhaps we could talk somewhere else besides Paul Siebert's page.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 18:14, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
@Zeraful: Despite staunch US and ARVN attacks on Hue to recapture it, they couldn't have killed thousands of people in a very short period of time in an attack which didn't flatten Hue and reduce it entirely to rubble. Remember, they also had street battles and house-to-house battles as well, so they can't "indiscriminately bomb" Hue and kill their own troops and civilians trapped there, and i find that comment completely absurd. On the other hand, communists have been long known for indiscriminately slaughtering and massacring its own people en masse. Look at the North Vietnamese land reform and purges for one. Look at the violent quash of peasant revolts in Nghe An in the 1950s. Look at the Hue Massacre and Dak Son Massacre. Look at Mao's Cultural Revolution and land reform and purges. Look at Stalin's Great Purges and forced Ukrainian famine. I'm not done with this list, but there's a sample. Why would VNCH and the US fight difficult street battles and struggle to liberate Hue, losing many of their soldiers, instead of easily bombing Hue until it's flat and killing everyone, if they wanted to massacre people? You know why your communist regime hasn't built memorials to Hue and Dak Son Massacre victims like they did for My Lai? You know why your beloved communists remain silent or deny the massacres? Because they know they massacred these innocent people, they know their guilt. If the US/ARVN committed these, i guarantee you that thy will build memorials and publicize these massacres to try to denounce their opponents. You called me an "idiot" in the HoChiMinh article talk page, well i just proved otherwise, haven't i? Very amusing to see when someone's attacks on someone else backfires. Guess what, i came from Hue and have heard and seen enough for myself that this massacre took place, those mass graves and rotting bodies, so go ahead, lie in my face that this never existed or that you communists haven't committed it. And, you've once again proved yourself to be a chuyen gia but chien (Hanoi-paid online propagandaist and troll). Nguyen1310 (talk) 18:50, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
TTAAC, firstly, I don't remember that the RSN conclusion was that Porter is unreliable. Only Vecrumba said that, and he refused to provide any argument in support of that his claim. Moreover, I am not satisfied with the way you presented these sources in the Vietnam war article. I am going to return to this issue when I'll have more time. Regarding the rest, you gentelmen seem to speculate too much: remember, you are not allowed per our policy to reject the sources just because you see inconsistencies or flaws in what the author says. The arguments like "Herman is given no attention at Srebrenica Massacre--why should his denial of the Hue Massacre be more mainstream?" are totally unsatisfactory. You cannot reject sources on that ground. I have no opinion on Herman (I simply didn't read him), however, if he is revisionist and apologist, some reliable source probably reflected that fact, and the only correct approach is to identify and present such a source. If no sources exist that support the idea that Herman is revisionist or denier, then you cannot reject him, independently on how many errors do you personally see in what he writes. You also can reject him is you demonstrate that he is non-notable, non-scholarly or fringe, however, that is a quite different story: in that case he can and should be ignored because the lack of criticism is because the author is totally ignored by serious scholars. If you follow this approach, which is in full accordance with our policy, your opponents will have no choice but to agree with you. However, if you will continue to act in the way you are acting now, the most probably you will be sanctioned. Let me re-iterate:
If some author is a reputable scholar and his works have been wetted by a scholarly community, you cannot reject him independently on how many sins or mistake the author committed, in your opinion;
If you believe the source is not good, it can be rejected for a very limited set of reasons: (i) irrelevant (just tangentially related to the topic); (ii) not notable (no citations, or not wetted by a scholarly community: for example, published in some obscure journal, blog, commercial web site, etc); (iii) severely criticized (many negative reviews in peer-reviewed journals); (iv) obsolete (new sources exist that provide fresh evidences contradicting to what the disputable source says). I strongly encourage you to use the arguments of that type, and to abandon your current rhetoric. Good luck. --Paul Siebert (talk) 20:14, 1 February 2013 (UTC)
Itsmejudith's posts from that RSN discussion are reproduced below:
"Reliable. He was proved wrong on Cambodia, but he was not the only one, and that was at a time when there was little or no information coming out about Cambodia. Here, he has a reasoned argument, which I don't think anyone has been able to refute. I would not consider Chomsky's writings on Cambodia RS for Cambodian history. Itsmejudith (talk) 10:46, 8 January 2013 (UTC) "
"WP:HISTRS should apply to this article, and Porter's article does not meet it by the usual criteria, except for the fact that his point has been accepted by later academic writers. If Vietnamese government propaganda is to be distrusted, that does not mean that all pro-American sources are automatically correct. Both could be wrong. It would be really useful to know what recent Vietnamese historians are writing on the topic. I don't know if it is possible to do an online search of the journals. Would someone like to,post on WikiProject Vietnam for advice? Itsmejudith (talk) 07:45, 9 January 2013 (UTC) "
I don't think her words can be interpreted as "unreliable": it meets V (a policy) but does not fully meet HISTRS (an essay). That means the source is acceptable, but, since we have better and newer sources, we should use them.--Paul Siebert (talk) 05:18, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
And we would goes on and on about who think what source is unreliable? First is, the only "communist" source that confirm the massacre is Truong Nhu Tang "Memoir of a VC", which no matter how well put, could not be taken as official about the matter. "Official" communist statement is that the mass grave is for the VC fighters and civilians died during the battle, which if you look at it from a Vietnamese perspective, is plausible. And you might take a visit to the talk page, it seem there are people who put doubt on Pike's account.--Zeraful (talk) 04:54, 2 February 2013 (UTC)
Hello Paul, many thanks for your tireless and pointed efforts in the current debate on the Hitler entry. I agree with you that the time has come to consider an ANI if the editor arguing for deletion of the lead sentence continues to revert the established consensus and/or to string the discussion further. I'm prepared to weigh in at the ANI should we need to go that route. Thanks again. Malljaja (talk) 21:51, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Hi Paul. You wrote: "I did not read the rest of your post: you ignore my answers" and "If you want to present new arguments, please respond on my arguments first."
As I feel your answers are outside of the specific point of dispute, I answer them here.
But, if you will not read my answers how can you fairly accuse me of not answering your points? I actually did attempt to answer specifically your question, even taking some time to provide you with sources. Here is the answer I previously gave which you admit you didn't read:
"As for the rest you keep widening the conversation by posing what I consider only loosely related questions. But to humour you: what exactly were the peace proposals that Churchill refused in 1940? Do you know? ...they did include an independent Poland and "(ii) vacating the territory of France he occupied in 1940" [3]. Of course without Hitler and his "policies", the situation would never have arisen in the way it did. But I have not been arguing against that (your own strawman?). I am arguing there were other leaders' "policies" involved. E.g. regarding: revoking the Treaty of Versailles; [4][5] the fear of the spread of communism; fear of a socialist United States of Europe; [6] fear of the international rise of Fascism, especially in Italy (Mussolini), Spain (Franco), Britain (Mosley), France (Bucard), ... etc., etc., etc. Which all I think demonstrates AGAIN the oversimplification and thus inaccuracy of the disputed (and I argue unverifiable) sentence that we are discussing. But this is a side shown to my main point, (which was my original third point): can the disputed sentence be verified by the cited source of Rummel. I say not. Can you humour me and show how it can, please.--Mystichumwipe (talk) 11:18, 14 December 2012 (UTC)
Here is an answer on responsibility of outbreak of war to other factors than just "Hitler's policies".
H.G. Wells, in his 1933 The Shape of Things to Come, wrote: "Creation of the Polish Corridor was part of the Versailles Treaty, intended to weaken Germany whatever the specific issue. The Poles and their aspirations were cynically used for this purpose, against the true interests of Poland itself."
You have since asked: "do you have any evidences that by signing a separate peace with Hitler Churchill could prevent any death?"
Naturally no evidence can be presented for something that never happened. We can only conject. What we can do when writing history is record the intentions of the protagonists. Exactly my issue with the disputed sentence. In that regard I link you to this speech:
"...In my previous speeches in the Reichstag I made proposals with this end in view. At that time they were rejected - maybe for the simple reason that they were made by me.
...these problems must be solved sooner or later, then it would be more sensible to tackle the solution before millions of men are first uselessly sent to death and milliards of riches destroyed. Continuation of the present state of affairs in the West is unthinkable. Each day will soon demand increasing sacrifices.
... One day, however, there will again be a frontier between Germany and France, but instead of flourishing towns there will be ruins and endless graveyards. Mr. Churchill and his companions may interpret these opinions of mine as weakness or cowardice if they like. I need not occupy myself with what they think; I make these statements simply because it goes without saying that I wish to spare my own people this suffering. If, however, the opinions of Messrs. Churchill and followers should prevail, this statement will have been my last. Then we shall fight. ...Mr. Churchill may be convinced that Great Britain will win. I do not doubt for a single moment that Germany will be victorious. Destiny will decide who is right. One thing only is certain. In the course of world history, there have never been two victors, but very often only losers. This seems to me to have been the case in the last war. May those peoples and their leaders who are of the same mind now make their reply. And let those who consider war to be the better solution reject my outstretched hand."
I presume you agree that these words were made publically by the subject of the article under discussion? If you still maintain that we must ignore these, becaue Hitler's words are not trustworthy, then I hope you will also agree that ALL sides distort and lie. Churchill himself wrote:" In time of war, when truth is so precious, it must be attended by a bodyguard of lies." Therefore an accurate history can ONLY be reached by analysing all the evidence without bias. --Mystichumwipe (talk) 10:51, 16 December 2012 (UTC)
You correctly write that "naturally no evidence can be presented for something that never happened, we can only conject". In connection to that, did I understand you correctly that your conjecture that by signing peace with Germany Britain could stop WWII is a solid ground for you conclusion that Britain shared with Germany a responsibility for continuation of WWII?--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:01, 16 December 2012 (UTC)
You previously asked: "do you have any evidences that by signing a separate peace with Hitler Churchill could prevent any death?" I HOPE YOU AGREE that I have now shown that this was not a helpful question in discussing the DISPUTED SENTENCE. Regretably, I feel your reply above merely asks another unhelpful and irrelevant question, as what you are I think is of little importance. Q: Is the disputed sentence accurate and can it be linked to verfiable reliable secondary sources. Could you answer my question above please (which you have now ignored twice), viz. can the disputed sentence be verified by the cited source of Rummel. I say not. Can you humour me and show how it can, please. (Here it is in its latest form: "Hitler's supremacist and racially motivated policies... indirectly and directly caused the deaths of an estimated 50 million people during World War II.")--Mystichumwipe (talk) 13:28, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
That was probably the worst SPI report I've ever seen, and was basically harassment. I'd suggest that you ask an uninvolved admin to follow up on this. Nick-D (talk) 07:25, 5 March 2013 (UTC)
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard regarding a content dispute in which you may have been involved. Content disputes can hold up article development, therefore we are requesting your participation to help find a resolution. The thread is "Adolph Hitler".
Guide for participants
If you wish to open a DR/N filing, click the "Request dispute resolution" button below this guide or go to Wikipedia:Dispute resolution noticeboard/request for an easy to follow, step by step request form.
What this noticeboard is:
It is an early step to resolve content disputes after talk page discussions have stalled. If it's something we can't help you with, or is too complex to resolve here, our volunteers will point you in the right direction.
What this noticeboard is not:
It is not a place to deal with the behavior of other editors. We deal with disputes about article content, not disputes about user conduct.
It is not a substitute for the talk pages: the dispute must have been discussed extensively on a talk page (not just through edit summaries) before resorting to DRN.
It is not a court with judges or arbitrators that issue binding decisions: we focus on resolving disputes through consensus, compromise, and explanation of policy.
Things to remember:
Discussions should be civil, calm, concise, neutral, and objective. Comment only about the article's content, not the other editors. Participants who go off-topic or become uncivil may be asked to leave the discussion.
Let the other editors know about the discussion by posting {{subst:drn-notice}} on their user talk page.
If you ever need any help, ask one of our volunteers, who will help you as best as they can. You may also wish to read through the FAQ page located here and on the DR/N talkpage.
City, Soviet Union (now 'new country') isn't my primary choice, It's merely a compromise proposal. My primary choice is City, Soviet Union or City, SSR, Soviet Union :) GoodDay (talk) 19:36, 11 March 2013 (UTC)
See my talk page answer. I find your "City, SSR, Soviet Union" incorrect. We should write either "City, Esttonian SSR, USSR", or "City, Estonia, Soviet Union". However, that would be correct had the USSR been currently existing. Since it split apart in 1991, we should reflect that fact, so "City, Estonian SSR (then in USSR)" is more correct. However, since the name "Estonian SSR" disappeared in 1991, we should use a current name, so "City, Estonia (then in the USSR)" is the most correct. --Paul Siebert (talk) 20:15, 11 March 2013 (UTC)
To clarify: City, Lithuaninan SSR, Soviet Union; City, Latvian SRR, Soviet Union; City, Estonian SSR, Soviet Union are acceptable. Otherwise, go with City, Soviet Union. GoodDay (talk) 20:20, 11 March 2013 (UTC)
I did read all of your arguments. TFD did object to the inclusion of famine, but as the article discusses famine at length in other sections, and addresses the controversy of their inclusion in depth, that seemed a question of larger scope for another, wider discussion, one which I think is worth having. At the same time, he voiced no opposition to the other additions in the new text.
I happen to agree with you that that one !vote didn't add anything to the discussion, so I didn't even consider it. But since your objections to Rummel's estimates would apply just as well to the current text, and those were the only two options put forward, it seemed that the net consensus was in favor of the new.
For what it's worth, I think the other editors might have responded better to your concerns if you had proposed alternative texts that you could endorse. Laura Scudder | talk14:13, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
Unfortunately, you seem to be unfamiliar with previous history of this article. After the article was fully protected, I tried to propose many different changes, including the changes that are directly required by our content policy, and all of them were rejected by the same group of users (although supported by others). By the way, it is exactly the same group of users that rejected our proposal for mediation. Therefore, I had no hope that in this concrete case my proposal would be accepted.
Regarding famine, this is a major subject of the dispute. The article does discuss famine at length, moreover, famine death constitute lion's share of deaths under Communist regimes. One group of authors include famine victims into the "mass killing/democide" category, and draws far reaching conclusions (including comparison of Communist and Nazism), however other authors severely criticise such an approach, and majority of single society scholars characterise famines not as mass killings. In other words, this article has a serious POV problem, and your edit just exacerbated this problem (by giving even more weight to the first viewpoint). Again, I respectfully request you to self-revert.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:24, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
You write: "I think the other editors might have responded better to your concerns if you had proposed alternative texts that you could endorse", however, this argument is totally unsatisfactory. In my 10 February 2013 post I did propose an alternative scheme: I described the scheme that would allow us to avoid already existing POV issues. Obviously, before starting to write anything I expected to see comments on this scheme. Instead, Nug just !voted, and Darkstar left an absolutely insulting post. In that situation, it was quite correct to conclude that discussion had ceased, and no consensus had been achieved (at least, my reasonable concern was totally ignored). Therefore, your conclusion about some alleged consensus was incorrect. I again request you to self-revert, otherwise I'll have to resort to arbitration (remember, the article is under WP:DIGWUREN). --Paul Siebert (talk) 13:31, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
I don't think it is a good idea to start WP:THREATENing the closing admin. FWIW you cannot dismiss my input as a !vote, I reviewed the text and found that it complied with WP:NPOV and WP:V policy and said so. --Nug (talk) 20:09, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
Thank you for regularly reading my talk page. Please, keep in mind, however, that to address to AE is a standard way to resolve an issue with the article under discretionary sanctions, and I am talking not about the sanction against a closing admin, but about reverting the action that is a violation of a procedure. I am somewhat busy during the next week, so I'll return to that later. Meanwhile, could you please explain me what criteria do you use to discriminate !vote from a balanced decision made upon careful reviewing of the subject? I recall during the last Baltic related RfC you dismissed all opponents' opinia as !vote. Double standards?--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:34, 24 March 2013 (UTC)
Sorry for the slow response. It's spring break on campus, which means I've been making the best of a library without undergrads.
I am not intimately familiar with the history of this article, but that's rather the point: to have someone without a vested interest in any particular outcome assess consensus. But I went back and reread the discussion, and it, quite frankly, still looks to me like there was consensus for the change. Laura Scudder | talk19:29, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, Laura, but I cannot understand your logic. During that discussion, two users (TTAAC and Smallbones) supported the proposed text (Collect brought no fresh arguments, so his opinion can be ignored per !vote), and two users (TFD and I) expressed a reasonable concern based on the analysis of the sources. Later, I proposed an alternative scheme of the section, however, this my proposal was totally ignored: Nug just !voted (no arguments were presented), and Darkstar made an absolutely offensive remark, which meant the discussion had died and degenerated to an ordinary quarrel I didn't want to be a part of. In that situation, it is hardly possible to speak about any consensus. I would say, had my last post been properly addressed, we could speak about some emerging consensus (two parties proposed different concepts, which could theoretically been reconciled during a subsequent polite discussion), however, since no polite discussion occurred (remember, my proposal was totally ignored, in an absolutely insulting form), we cannot speak about any consensus here. For a third time, I respectfully request you to self-revert, otherwise I'll have to ask the arbitrators for a help.--Paul Siebert (talk) 02:45, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
You are flogging a dead horse Paul. As I said, I took time to review the text and found that it complied with WP:NPOV and WP:V policy, so please stop dismissing my policy based conclusion as merely an "!vote". Feel free to take it to the arbitrators if you feel your POV wasn't embraced, but I think you will find that they do not review content issues. --Nug (talk) 21:50, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
You provided no arguments, so it was not clear from your post if you really did any analysis, or just presented your opinion. Since your post contained no arguments and looked like !vole, it should be treated as such per DUCK. Sorry.
By the way, your unsolicited comments on this talk page are not welcome. I would be grateful if you limited yourself only with those posts that are required by our rules (formal notifications, etc). Thank you in advance for your understanding and cooperation.--Paul Siebert (talk) 23:29, 5 April 2013 (UTC)
Persecution of Christians in the Soviet Union
Certain editors with declared membership in eastern orthodoxy are engaged in persistent edit-warring and the imposing of dubious materials based on unreliable sources. [7] . The user My very best wishes is tag-teaming with them. 75.51.174.240 (talk) 02:17, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Dear anon IP, problems at the article started when you came in and deleted stable, sourced, content. Don't canvass responsible editors to join your campaign. VєсrumЬа ►TALK03:34, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Splitting the Battle of Kursk article?
As you might remember, I've proposed splitting the current Battle of Kursk article into its three component operations, Operation Citadel, Operation Kutuzov and Operation Rumyantsev. There's consensus among three of us that this is a viable idea, but you haven't made any comments lately, so I'm pinging you to see if you'd like to make any comments before we proceed with the split.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:34, 30 May 2013 (UTC)
There is a discussion about belligerents order for WWII in the talk page [8] which challenge previous consensus. Current change for WWII article is ranking USA above United Kingdom, ranking France above China and adding the leaders of Romania and Hungary into Info box. I thought you should know, as you seem to join the previous discussion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.134.38.217 (talk) 01:16, 21 June 2014 (UTC)
Holodomor question
Hi, I hope you can offer an opinion on my dillema. I recently posted on the Holodomor talk page - Lead para, and was politely, but firmly rebuffed by user Iryna Harpy, who appears to be heavily involved with the article. I concur with them that I should have done some research on the topic first before posting. So that's how I came across you name - see Archive #13
I generally agree with your position:
"My conclusion is, Holodomor was a part of the Soviet famine, although, taking in account Kuban', a major part. Nevertheless, one has to have a respect towards other victims. The analogy with the Holocaust seems to be incorrect, because many sources disagree with that. --Paul Siebert (talk) 05:53, 4 February 2009 (UTC)"
"Since I know at least several other sources that support Ellman's ideas, I don't think the statement that Holodomor was a deliberate measure to kill Urkainians (or other statements that are based on this idea) can be placed in the lead. (Although, of course, this point of view can and has to be discussed in the article itself.)--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:44, 5 February 2009 (UTC)".
I hold similar views and therefore I was surprised to find that such strong notions - Holodomor as genocide and Holodomor as Holocaust - were supported by such weak language (suppositions) and even weaker sources.
I much prefer the statement from Holodomor genocide question: There is no international consensus among scholars or politicians on whether the Soviet policies that caused the famine fall under the legal definition of genocide. As of April 2008, the parliament of Ukraine and the governments of 19 countries have recognized the Holodomor as an act of genocide.
Compare to:
The loss of life has been compared to the Holocaust.[better source needed=May 2015] If Soviet policies and actions were conclusively documented as intending to eradicate the rise of Ukrainian nationalism, they would fall under the legal definition of genocide. (From Holodomor)
This former is factual and unemotional, as Wikipedia should be. The latter is weakly sourced, vague (compared by who?) and suppositions.
As a prior participant on the Holodomor topic, do you have any advice for me? Should I drop the topic? Any insights on the prior consensus that may have been reached? K.e.coffman (talk) 07:10, 20 November 2015 (UTC)
You participated in an MfD discussion about an essay by Collect that was in mainspace. The result was userfy and it was moved to user space accordingly. The essay has been moved back to mainspace. There is a discussion as to whether it should be renamed and moved. The discussion is here. Writegeist (talk) 00:35, 17 May 2016 (UTC)
WW2 talk
Dear Paul Siebert, I cannot quite understand why you keep trying to debate me when all I am doing is providing some observations and suggestions (which may not even be relevant at all and can safely be ignored). Getting yourself all worked up on such heavy issues is no good, believe me. Regards, --Prüm (talk) 19:58, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
I am sorry that it looks like I am debating. I am just providing my observations in response to your observations. Regarding your suggestions, as you can see, I mostly agree with what you propose.
Ok, but just for an example: Do you really believe that Ribbentrop, of all people, was "masterful", as you put it? I could not believe it when I read that, indeed, I think that he was as trite and foolish as people can get when they do not have their head straightened sometimes. gn8, --Prüm (talk) 22:42, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
I think he was a brilliant diplomat. Until the end of 1940, foreign policy of Germany was extremely successful. When you compare Halifax and Ribbentrop during spring-summer of 1939, you should agree Ribbentrop was much better.
Many Nazi supreme officials were very talented. The problem was the major strategic goal they were pursuing was fundamentally wrong. --Paul Siebert (talk) 23:00, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
Actually, Ribbentrop was much smarter than Hitler. He was a strong advocate of a full scale alliance with the USSR. Actually, Stalin was prone to a kind of Nazi ideology (the only thing that stopped him from becoming a real Nazi was Marxism he inherited from Lenin; he could not abandon it quickly. Only by the end of his life he unleashed his anti-Semitism). We are extremely lucky that Ribbentrop ideas found no support from Hitler, because otherwise Nazi-Soviet alliance would conquer the world. --Paul Siebert (talk) 23:05, 11 May 2018 (UTC)
YMMD, Nazi-Soviet alliance 8-) Then the U.S. would have developed nuclear weapons in 2 years instead of 4 or some such and we would still be living in nuclear ice age. To be honest, you're running after mirages here. Ever caught one? You could also be playing too much with alt. hist. games, which would be shameful. --Prüm (talk) 00:33, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
In the case of Nazi-Soviet alliance the US would never developed nuclear weapon. The US and Britain would spend all resources for naval warfare and survival. By the end of 30s, about a half of Nobel prize winners lived in Germany. Germany was a leader in rocketry, computers, it was one of the leaders in nuclear physics. Nuclear project was not something outstandingly challenging from scientific point of view, even after some brilliant physicists escaped to the West, Germany had a lot of second rank scientists who were quite capable of doing this job. In a situation when a huge resource base of the USSR would be fully available to Germany, and Eastern front was absent, Germany would have enough opportunity to make an atomic bomb first.
All strategic objects would be moved to the East, and that would make German industry non-vulnerable to strategic bombing (and the US would have no resources for doing them). The US and Britain would never survive against Germany+Italy+USSR+Japan.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:52, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
OMG, you're getting it wrong all over again. The situation you describe was the one before WW I, not WW II. It was actually during the reign of the hated Wilhelm II that the sciences flourished in Germany. Who among the best scientist would have worked for a bad demon like Hitler and felt ok with that? I give it up, I will no longer try to convert you. --Prüm (talk) 04:45, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
P.S.: And as for your Nazi-Soviet alliance: I bet everyone else would have shat their pants. NOT, because everyone knew only one of Hitler and Stalin could come out victorious, and that's exactly what happend. --Prüm (talk) 04:50, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
Just take a look at the list of Novel prize winners.
Yes, a rivalry was very likely.
I don't think you need to convert me. My point is that Hitler was much more dangerous than people think, and America would not defeat it alone. Yes, a long time friendship between Stalin and Hitler was not realistic. My scenario is more relevant to the case if Germany defeated USSR in the same way Japan defeated China. That would create huge problems for the US and Britain. You are looking at the US from a present day's point of view, but America was not as strong as modern people usually think. It emerged as a superpower only after WWII, and as a result of it.--Paul Siebert (talk) 06:10, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
I don't subscribe to the Anglo-Saxon worldview prevalent in the 1920s and 1930s that pitting "Hitler" against "Stalin" was "the proper thing to do". That's the long and short of it. --Prüm (talk) 07:22, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
I am not sure I understand you. Hitler became an influential figure only in 30s. Britain had no well articulated policy towards Germany. There were at least three fractions in British government that proposed different strategies. The idea that Britain was "pitting "Hitler" against "Stalin"" is an obsolete stereotype: actually their actions were indecisive and inconsistent, which looked they are pitting "Hitler" against "Stalin".--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:23, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
You are mistaken again (sigh). The "H" guy was influential at the very least since 1923, when he marched on the Feldherrnhalle in alliance with that other guy (who was very influential indeed during WW1, but whom am I trying to coonvince?). As to your other ramblings, I said that the idea of pitting one against the other was prevalent, i.e. it was being toyed with/entertained in certain circles, not that there was much of a coherence to it. That same idea had worked before oh so many times, so why shouldn't it work again? I'll tell you what I think: you, sir, are nothing bit some meatpuppet posing as a learned scholar when indeed you totally suck at history or at least pretend to. So I am afraid I'll have to stop this little chat before this gets totally ridiculous. --Prüm (talk) 20:04, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
Pitting Communists against Nazi (in Germany) is one thing, and pitting Nazi Germany and USSR - quite another. I agree about the first, but I read history articles about British foreign policy in 30s, and they did not consider provoke a war between Hitler and Stalin. That is an old post war view advocated by leftist historians. --Paul Siebert (talk) 20:15, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
So you mean to say that British appeasement vs. Germany never had anything to do with the silent hope that Herr H. would draw the "right conclusions"? That the British activities in Spain, its policy towards fascist Italy, to name a few, were totally innocuous? I beg to differ. --Prüm (talk) 23:16, 12 May 2018 (UTC)
I would say, there was a fraction in British establishment who wanted to direct Hitler's aggression to the East. However, they never had a majority. There were no majority at all, so British policy was reactive, opportunistic and very stupid in general. --Paul Siebert (talk) 00:49, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
What perhaps baffled and worried me most when I read it, however, was that even the Pope was at one time wishing Herr H. "godspeed" when the latter embarked on his killing spree in the East. So you can perhaps imagine how prevalent the idea was. --Prüm (talk) 04:31, 13 May 2018 (UTC)
Talk page edits
Paul, please avoid edits like this one. You may not have actually refactored my comment, but where I was replying to Collect and My very best wishes, it now looks like I began a section. Even if this isn't a breach of the letter of WP:REFACTOR, it is a breech of the spirit, and it isn't conducive to further discussion. If you want to reply to what I said in a separate section, just open the section yourself and quote me, please (or anybody else). Of all the issues you may get hauled off to ANI about, this is the silliest, and isn't worth the trouble. Vanamonde (talk) 16:47, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
Sorry, it was not my intent. The problem was that conversation was totally irrelevant to demography, so I decided to separate the thread. Pardon me. --Paul Siebert (talk) 17:00, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
No worries, but I suggest you self-revert, and if you wish to reply in a separate section use the quotation template and/or diffs to link to what you're replying to; it will avoid unnecessary ill-feeling. Vanamonde (talk) 17:03, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
I think it would be better to make a proper explanations (as I've already done on the talk page), because it is not completely clear what exactly you are talking about. If you isagree with what I've done, please, let me know, or change it as you want.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:09, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
Look, even if Collect misunderstood the section title, that's his problem; and you shouldn't be changing the section title in any case. Since this is getting to be a sticking point, and is also a small but important issue of etiquette, I have simply removed the section title and the comment you inserted there. If you wish to retrieve that comment, please do so from the history and insert it without the section title where you want it. Vanamonde (talk) 17:21, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
Again, if you feel uncomfortable with what I've done, please, do whatever you want. However, one of two discussions will die as a result, because the section is discussing who separate questions now.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:49, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
BTW, I didn't change a section title, I just split the section I created, to separate one thread from another. That is what we do regularly, and noone finds that offensive. --Paul Siebert (talk) 23:00, 17 May 2018 (UTC)
I'm afraid you're missing the point a bit, Paul. A new section title is fine, so long as you place it after the current discussion or just before one of your own comments. Placing it where you did interrupted the thread of the previous conversation. Vanamonde (talk) 03:53, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
Vanamonde, in my opinion, I placed the title exactly in the place where the discussion jumped from one subject to another. Actually, you comment was not about the subject of the thread (demographic consequences). We were not discussing Collect's reverts in this section. I would say, your comment was more relevant to the section "Recent deletions of reliably sourced materials and systemic bias" where the user whose changes were reverted by Collect asked the same question. I didn't check history, maybe, he created this thread after you made your first comment, but if that was the case, then, as I expected, this user simply haven't noticed your comment, and started another thread on the same subject. That wouldn't happen if the title created by me was preserved. Another reason for this incident was that there was some edit conflict, so the page was a mess during several minutes.
Frankly, I am not sure we need to devote so much attention to this subject. I did that (maybe, it was not the best idea), you decided it was incorrect, fixed it - and I see absolutely no problem with that. We have much more interesting things to discuss :-)--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:19, 18 May 2018 (UTC)
MKUCR
I sympathise with efforts to bring balance to that page, but please stop opening section after section while previous discussions are ongoing, and please stop insisting that any changes need to wait on consensus on fundamental questions. By doing so, you are actively making your own objective more difficult, and making it more likely that the current version gets set in stone. I've worked on politically fraught articles for five years now, and I know how things roll. I'm not interested in lengthy discussion here; this is just food for thought. Vanamonde (talk) 03:22, 22 May 2018 (UTC)
Paul, I think you should self-revert your changes as falling under more the 1RR -- by the way, there was no hyperlink to Harff - I added her name as it was not present at all before, and a hyperlink is reasonable - just do not say it was "removed" when it was never there in the first place <g>. Meanwhile, please self-revert the other stuff. Thanks. Collect (talk) 17:23, 3 June 2018 (UTC)
Admins told me the request was automatically archived because there were no fresh posts there. I don't know if it will work, but if you want to add some comment, maybe you may ask someone to but it back to the ANEW page? I am not sure if it can be done, and I don't know if any admin will express interest in that story, but, at least, it may be worth trying.
In general, I find a situation curious: arbitrators say this case belongs to ANEW, ANEW admins ignore it. It looks like there is a gap in WP policy that allows such behavioural pattern to exist for a long time.
Another possibility is to use this case for renewing the AE story. Ask the admin who closed your request what should your next steps be. You may use as an argument the closing remark that advised to go to ANI/ANEW first. However, I must say your AE report was premature, poorly written, and it looked frivolous. The stress should be done on filibustering, civil POV pushing, ignoring NPOV policy, as well as ignoring other user's arguments.
Admins may not be enthused about wading into something that looks like Round 500 of an eternal dispute. You'd have better luck if you can show that something far out of the ordinary has happened, so now it is a clear-cut case. EdJohnston (talk) 18:54, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
EdJohnston, I remember old good times, when we both were younger. You blocked me for much more innocent technical violation (the only block in my WP life, by the way). Since those times we both became older and wiser, however, you must concede that since I decided (reluctantly) to file this report, that means I came to a conclusion the situation is far from ordinary.
After this story, I cannot treat 1RR restrictions seriously: a user clearly violated 1RR twice, three different users show dissatisfaction with these actions, the user persistently refuses to self-revert and claims they never violated anything - and admins see no reasons to interfere even when they are being openly asked about that?!! Why all these games around DS/1RR are needed in that case? If you guys do not see this as something outstanding, what is outstanding in your opinion? An emotional revert game some newbie is engaged in? That poses no serious danger for Wikipedia. In contrast, the cases when a formal decorum is observed are really dangerous, and the fact that you see nothing outstanding in that is very disappointing. Of course, there are no F$#@ YOU edit summaries here, no multiple reverts, but this type violations can be registered even by a bot. Why you admins are needed if you abstain from the analysis of the cases that go beyond simple violations?
Recently, I proposed as amendment to a 3RR policy that would allow cleaning WP from various garbage (which is becoming a fundamental problem), and the main objections from admins was: "No need in that, we admins are wise, we know it better, and we are quite capable of resolving each situation using a common sense". Ok, I can leave with that, I am ready to rely on your common sense. However, this incident has shaken my belief in your common sense, because I cannot understand what other evidences are needed to demonstrate this case is outrageous.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:30, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
By the way, the thread just above this one is a demonstration of an attempt to game a 1RR (along with this warning that I got when I was peacefully copy editing without any edit warring). Of course, this gaming observes a formal decorum (although other users never get similar requests when they make similar technical violations). I conclude you admins are not doing your job well, because you set the rules that are redundantly strict, which allows their gaming, but you selectively and unpredictably ignore their violations. That is disappointing.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:39, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
Since you guys discuss my editing here, I have something to say. There was no any violation of 1RR. That was purely a battleground report by you guys, just as your ridiculous complaint to Arbcom. It was followed by block shopping. So, please stop doing what you are doing, OK? I do object that you are telling nonsense about me on numerous talk pages. My very best wishes (talk) 19:41, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Hey guy …. My polite message was not gaming the system and I feel you well ought to retract that charge. I do not have secret contacts with anyone about using AN or ANEW or ANI - and I find that when others post offering to renew a complaint that it is they who are GAMING THE SYSTEM. Now please retract your scurrilous charge. Thank you. I had hoped you were trying to reach actual accommodations with other editors, but this sort of thing is unlikely to improve relations. Collect (talk) 19:47, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
Surely, you were. You carefully ignore even non-technical violations made by the users who share your POV, and you haven't apologised for false accusation in edit warring.
Regarding the rest of the post, it was not gaming: a bot archived the thread that had no clear verdict. Unless I hear any concrete info from some admin on the reason why there is no result, I consider archiving as a technical glitch.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:52, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
I suggest that your attitude is far from collegial. You are now barred from my user-talk page unless and until you acknowledge your errors. Collect (talk) 20:23, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
Again, you have not explained what was wrong with what I am saying, and what I have to apologise for. Incidentally, you stopped to respond to my good faith attempts to find a consensus with you on your talk page, so I think the fact that I am barred form your talk page just reflects a current state of things.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:52, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
By the way, EdJohnston, I conclude this is an immediate effect of your decision not to take any action: MVBW came to the page that they are not editing just to delete a well sourced text that was supported by other users; deletion occurred after MVBW failed to provide any reasonable arguments in a support of their viewpoint during the talk page discussion. Of course, this behaviour will not be successful on the WWII page, because other users are quite reasonable. However, I am pretty sure MVBW feels encouraged after my ANEW report went to archive.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:01, 8 June 2018 (UTC)
Recent edit at MKuCR
Did you mean to remove all those sentences when you made this edit to add back some other sentences? I had just added them from the dumping ground page here. I am not going to revert you, but I want to make sure it wasn't just an accident. AmateurEditor (talk) 20:08, 9 June 2018 (UTC)
Actually, it was a consensus about the text that I added. Your edit was more recent, so I probably removed part of what you added. We can merge them, but, frankly speaking, your addition is related to too complicated questions to be discussed in this particular section. Don't you mind to wait a little bit with addition? I'll talk to you a little bit later (maybe, tomorrow) about the way this information (along with other similar data) should be presented.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:21, 9 June 2018 (UTC)
No rush. I trust you to merge appropriately without getting my explicit consensus. And if you just don't want to include it, that's fine too. AmateurEditor (talk) 20:35, 9 June 2018 (UTC)
Frankly, I myself was thinking about inclusion of this (and similar) material, but I would prefer to put it in a different context. It would be good if we do that together (I'll let you know when I am ready).--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:38, 9 June 2018 (UTC)
I have just noticed that you are back, Paul. Wikipedia missed you and your well-thought-out contributions! I kind of missed you too... (Igny (talk) 02:59, 13 June 2018 (UTC))
My father was a tank driver on the front lines with the 9th Army, he received an honorable discharge and is buried in a military cemetary. Americans like my father would not advance if they were told to walk into a minefield. Americans are not Russians--Woogie10w (talk) 19:26, 14 June 2018 (UTC)
Woogie10w, I agree that Americans are not Russians, however, if Russians were not Russians, no Normandia landing would ever occur. Of course, we can blame Russians in brutality of disregard of human life, however, no victory would be possible without that.
I would say the same even in more strong words: if some unknown Russians were not attacking through minefields in the East, Americans could not afford luxury not to attack through minefields. Your father, as well as many other Americans was not killed in the West, because unknown Russians were marching through minefields in the East. You are living because they died.
And, you probably misunderstood one important point: the choice Russians had was not to attack through minefields or not to attack through minefields. The alternative was different: to attack through minefields and not dense machine gun fire, or to attack at a different place, where machine gun fire it 10 times more dense, so the overall losses would be the same. --Paul Siebert (talk) 19:33, 14 June 2018 (UTC)
Thank you, User:Woogie10w. So far, I am interested to know several things:
Which his own works Rosefielde cites in this book (I think I know them all, but it can be possible I am missing something)?
What is the major difference between his and Maksudov estimates (famine death, war deaths, executions or camp/deportation deaths)?
Which sources does he use for China? (Obviously, he didn't do his own research in this area, and majority sources speak about ca 30 million famine deaths).
Americans are not Russians. In 1944 if Ike was ordering our units to clear minefields the GIs would write home to mom & dad and the news correspondents would let the folks back home know the truth. Franklin D. was running again in 1944, you can be sure that he would have talked to Ike and the engineers would be clearing the minefields not the infantry and tanks. In the USSR if you wrote a critical letter home they would lock you up, the news correspondents story would never have passed censorship and the correspondent would have been locked up too. Americans were not Russians in 1944 however in 1864 Lincoln and Grant fought Stalin's war in Virginia--Woogie10w (talk) 12:56, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
Woogie10w that scenario seems a little naive about US censorship, particularly during wartime-
GPRamirez5 that is total bullshit, the restrictions applied to operational planning such as the date and place of the D-Day invasion. Patton was sacked for slapping two soldiers and it hit the news in the US when Drew Pearson reported it. George S. Patton slapping incidents--Woogie10w (talk) 16:28, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
My mom was a loyal German American who worked on the Manhattan project that built the bomb, the FBI gave here a top secret clearance. My father’s people were German speakers from Prussia, he could have had a deferment as a coal miner but volunteered for the Army in 1942. In Stalin’s USSR my parents would have been deported to a special settlement along with Ike.,15-20% of the people died in those special settlements. BTW my mom mentioned that she attended rallies in NY to support the Soviet war effort.[9] Americans are not Russians. --Woogie10w (talk) 16:51, 15 June 2018 (UTC)
Had Germans invaded US, had Boston, New York and Detroit been captured, had Washington been besieged, and Germans bombed Chicago, I am afraid, the attitude of American state towards your mom would be different. Remember, many ethnic Germans and Japanese were deported even in a situation when there were no immediate treat for the US from Germany of Japan. Can you imagine what would happen had Germany invaded the US? You compare apples with oranges.
My mom's stepfather was deported after Stalin occupied Poland. And that was the only reason he survived, because other members of his family (they were Jews) we not deported (he himself served in Polish army, hence deportation); all of them were murdered when Germans came. Mom's stepfather escaped from Stalin's camp (or he was liberated in 1943, he himself didn't tell me about that, and my mom and his brother tell different versions of this story). After that, he took machine gunner's cources and volunteered for the army, despite the fact that the probability to survive after the first attack was 50%. However, he did not care too much, because that had nothing compared to the fate of his first family (for their probability to survive under Germans was 0%). He was lucky, he was not killed, just severely wounded, but his first family (22 people) perished.
Thank you Paul I appreciate that. Paul I grew up in the New York City Little Italy, when I went to University I was sent to speech therapy. I did not fit in with those rich kids from the upper east side. Anyway this is the real me-see this You Tube clip from Mean Streets- Mean Streets (9/10) Movie CLIP - Where's the Rest? (1973) HD. I have mellowed a bit in my old age.--Woogie10w (talk) 13:41, 20 June 2018 (UTC)
Paul, you reply with Volunteer Marek in good faith but he was also part of the EEML using another name. He was even worse in planning the tricks. Read this [10]. If you say this on wikipedia and how the games they play now are like the games they play then they will have their administrator friends block you. So my advice- don't say it! But know it, and don't take time talking to them like they are good faith and honest. 205.251.148.50 (talk) 18:05, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
I perfectly know his previous user name, but I am not aware of anything bad he did after that sad story had ended. That is why I didn't want to openly say about that at the AE page. To me, if Marek just added a remark (something like, "I cannot be considered a neutral party in this particular case for reasons I prefer not to discuss") that would be quite sufficient.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:18, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
Sandstien removed your comments beacuse they were more than 500 words. My very best wishes diffs are 641 words. His comment is additional 665 words. Together more than 1300 words. Look at collapsed complaint about Volunteer Marek who writes 1051 words. None of these are removed to meet 500 words. My belief, this is done to frustrate so you will react with anger then angry reaction will justify block. It's sad that they do this but they are very good at it. Otherwise they don't last 9 years with same problems. 205.251.150.146 (talk) 20:46, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
I am not sure all of that may harm me: all what they deleted was just an auxiliary information. Actually, they are right, it was silly to violate the rule 14 of the internet. Anyway, I see no serious problem in all of that. --Paul Siebert (talk) 20:55, 21 June 2018 (UTC)
Teethgnashing
Sorry if one of my responses at the mass killings page was testy; I wasn't paying attention to who was saying what or to what end. I rewrote it quickly to be more substantive. — SMcCandlish☏¢ 😼 15:46, 22 June 2018 (UTC)
In admiration for the consistent way you are trying to maintain World War II as a good article and turn it into a better one. I don't always agree with your points but have come to greatly respect the diligent way you make, defend and amend them. I hope that you continue drag the quality of the article upwards, possibly kicking and screaming as it goes. Gog the Mild (talk) 09:40, 1 July 2018 (UTC)
I've just converted "Mass killing" from a redirect to the "Mass murder" article into a separate article. The reason is that "Mass killing" is not just a murder of many people, it is a scholarly term coined by genocide scholars. Accordingly, the scope of "Mass killing" and "Mass murder" articles is different. You may be interested to edit "mass killing" article, because it may resolve many non-neutrality issues related to the MKucR article: most genocide scholars do not write about "Communist mass killings", they writs about "mass killings" in general, and mass killings under communist regimes are just one instance of mass killing (that is true for Valentino, Mann, Semelin, Midlarsky et al).--Paul Siebert (talk) 23:13, 30 August 2018 (UTC)
Please stop reverting my edits. I've edited on this article for a while and you just came by recently. The person would makes radical changes should justify them. LittleJerry (talk) 04:15, 25 September 2018 (UTC)
Jerry, I did explain my edits on the talk page. Regarding yours "I've edited on this article for a while and you just came by recently", that is hardly an argument. In my opinion, the style this section is written violates NPOV, and that is a serious problem, which has to be fixed.--Paul Siebert (talk) 04:42, 25 September 2018 (UTC)
From which site did you download Erlikman? I am working with a hard copy purchased in 2004. Anyway I am afraid to download any from Russia--Woogie10w (talk) 16:29, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
[11]. The problem is that the results are in Russian, but google translate seems to work well. For example, this can be easily translated. It is possible to find this book in another format (for example, here, a key link is "скачать бесплатно", literally, "download for free").
From my experience, most links of that type are no more dangerous than other links. Of course, doc files may contain malicious macroses (in theory), but I never had problems with this type content (I mean history web sites): they are not attractive to hackers. Try to avoid sites with popup banners, other sites are pretty safe.
I also have a question: do you have the Valentino's "Final solution"? My library doesn't have it. If yes, can you check what the references 1 and 2 are on the page 91? It seems the figures that Wikipedians attribute to Valentino actually belong to other authors.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:14, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
Thanks Paul, the Russian internet is cool, reminds me of American net in 2002. I like to do a Google translate as a backup since Russian is not my native language. Any way its time for a full scan of the computer. --Woogie10w (talk) 21:03, 8 October 2018 (UTC)
The library just notified me that Valentino's "Final solutions" is available for pickup, I will charge it out tomorrow. Paul what exactly are you looking for?--Woogie10w (talk) 01:48, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
1. On the page 91, Valentino says that estimates of killed by communist regimes range up to 110 million, and provides the ref 1. What this reference is?
2. On the same page, he says that the number of deaths in Cambodia, China and the USSR was in between 21 and 70 million. These figures seem to be taken from the ref 2. What this reference is?
3. It seems that the main Valentino's contribution to this subject is the theory of mass killings, and he didn't do his own research on the statistics of mass killings. Can you please check if I am right, and if he does not present his own statistics of mass killings? If yes, can you tell what sources does he use for statistics?
ref 1. What this reference is? R. J. Rummel; ref 2. What this reference is? Valentino's estimate. I Will do a table stay tuned. On wikipedia Some editors spend their time trolling Google books to find snippets taken out of context to push their own POV. This is the worst kind of OR, they misrepresent a source published by a living person.--Woogie10w (talk) 17:08, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
Thanks. Actually, what I really want to know is what authors does Valentino cite in this table.
Using snippets is hardly OR, it is just non-professional biased editing (not NOR, but NPOV is violated). Regarding "living persons", that is not relevant: Wikipedia applies special restriction to biographies of living persons, whereas the facts presented in books written by living persons have just a tangential relation to their biographies.
If you received a statement from your broker that said Sept 1,2018 $898,532.67 Oct 1,2018 $647,290.71. Losses $251,241.96. Thats it no details provided. You would call the broker and demand an accounting of the details. Thats the real world I worked in as an accountant for over 30 years, Paul Wikipedians need to ask the question, where is the rest?, we need to know the details of statistics. I waste way too much time on Wikipedia --Woogie10w (talk) 18:26, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
Thanks. The problem is that historians are not brokers. They do have to provide details, and especially the sources; and they have to do that not upon demand, the data must be in the book from the very beginning, otherwise the book cannot be trusted. One of the greatest sins of a historian is when they does not disclose their sources. Even Rummel, whose methodology is considered highly questionable, does provide sources for his estimates. I am pretty sure Valentino provided sources for his figures: he is not an expert in history of any country from this list, so he definitely didn't do his own research, what he is doing is a compilation of data from other sources, and, in that case, he should have to disclose them.
Good point Paul, I have just started reading the book. Valentino uses thick academic jargon to define genocide and mass killing. He does provide refrences in the body of the book. You wrote find the references to these sources in this book, otherwise it is not a reliable source I will make note of Valentinos references, and get back to you as I am reading. BTW a great deal of the statistical information on the Wikipedia articles on mass killing and genocide is poorly sourced. Many editors are biased blowhards pushing the POV of the high or low number that they do not understand or cannot explain.--Woogie10w (talk) 21:24, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
On Wikipedia I try my best to post the original data from a secondary source, academic historians tend to take the official data and estimate their own values without providing how they arrived at their figures. Valentino's range of well rounded numbers tell us that further research on the topic is necessary. Take Snyder for example, he never explains out he computes his figures for the Soviet famine. He does cite Dieter Pohl for Nazi war crimes. I have Pohl's book, he just throws the figures at you, Snyder regurgitates this unsourced material for English speaking readers. Another example is Wheatcroft claiming that ADk estimated 8.5 million famine deaths, ADk never made this estimate and Wheatcroft does not provide a source for the figure of 8.5 million, he just calls it excessive. Wheatcroft did not explain how he arrived at his own figure of 5.7 million famine deaths. On Wikipedia if the writer is an academic published by an academic press the material is deemed reliable.--Woogie10w (talk) 21:50, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
This is not a jargon a situation is even worse: so called "genocide scholars" failed event to develop a common jargon, so each of them uses their own therminology.
I am waiting for new data from you, because you are right, and the data in the article about mass killings need to be brought in a due order.
You wrote I am waiting for new data from you. As for the low figures- 1-the official Gulag figure of 1.7 milliom listed by Applebaum, she cites Korochin as her source, I have copies of his stats. Korochin cites archival docs for his stats 2- As for the 799,000 executions in the 1992 Popov data and the 708,000 Special Settlement deaths are cited by J.Otto Pohl, I have copies of his books. 3- Famine deaths in English language sources range from Wheatcroft 5.7 million to Conquest 7.0 million. As for The Higher numbers school, it is presented by Rosefielde who uses his own demographic calculations to arrive at a figure of 23 million. I have his book and have put his data on a spreadsheet. Ann Applebaum, J.Otto Pohl, S. Wheatcroft, Robert Conquest and Rosefielde are reliable academic sources. A Century of Mass Murder by Haynes lists the official figures, this is fine exept for a few minor typos The best source is Poli͡akov,Naselenie Rossii v XX veke:istoricheskie ocherki / Moskva : ROSSPĖN, 2000- I have copied the relevant pages from this source. Since it is in Russian the English speaking editors would object. They present the official lower figures and an estimated 1 million deaths in the special settlements. Is this OK for starters?--Woogie10w (talk) 22:40, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
It seems Rosefielde speaks about population losses, not famine deaths. The difference is significant, because population losses include unborn children, migration, and other categories. I still cannot understand what do you mean under ADK. TsSU is "Central Bureau of Statistics, correct?--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:46, 12 October 2018 (UTC)
Yes, it is good. The goal is to change the way Valentino's figures are presented: he is not presenting his own figures, he is trying to combine the figures of others. That means, we should write something like that: "Summarising the data presented by A, B, C, D, etc, Valentino estimated the plausible scale of mass deaths as XXX-YYY". It is also important to figure out which data were ignored by Valentino. He obviously does not use the data published after 2003. Anyway, it is good to have an exhaustive list of all authors whose data Valentino summarises.--Paul Siebert (talk) 22:51, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
The official lower data Gulag/execution figures were frozen in 2001, that we have and should post. The 1933 famine range of 5.7-7.0 million is well sourced should be no problem. ADK estimated the total at 7.2 million in 2001. Valentino is worthless a waste of time, he copies rough estimates from other sources. The data in Applebaum and Pohl covers the official Gulag/execution data. Steven Rosefielde explains in detail how he figured his stats of 23 million. --Woogie10w (talk) 23:10, 11 October 2018 (UTC)
I myself don't believe Valentino's data are valuable, especially taken into account that his study is not focused on numbers. The problem is that Valentino's data 9and other data of similar quality) are overrepresented in Wikipedia. That is why we need to demonstrate, which exactly data did Valentino take into account, and which ignored.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:42, 12 October 2018 (UTC)
What else do you need from Valentino? I am guessing that editors are cherry picking his numbers from Google books. I use hard copies of reliable secondary sources and my accounting logic before I edit--Woogie 10w 12:02, 15 October 2018 (UTC)
I sometimes use reliable sources that are not peer reviewed, this is acceptable on Wikipedia WP:SOURCETYPES. If numerical data is in question, peer review should be by demographers or accountants. This is generally not the case here on Wikipedia. I bet that the checkbooks of many academics are balanced by their spouses.--Woogie 10w 13:35, 15 October 2018 (UTC)
I need an exhaustive list of sources Valentino uses for the table 2. Paul, Valentino does provide detailed citations in his footnotes.To copy each one would be quite a bit of work, E mail me at berndd11222@gmail.com and I will send jpgs. of the pages. Paul I have been on Wikipedia since 2005, you have nothing to fear, I will not share with anyone else your E mail address or identity. Regards--Woogie 10w 18:18, 15 October 2018 (UTC)
Thank you Woogie. I've pinged you, but I still think any off-Wiki communication should be avoided, except some very specific technical cases like this one.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:20, 15 October 2018 (UTC)
Trump got involved too [12] --Woogie 10w 01:15, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
Mass Killings article
How about an Wikipedia:RFC it seems to me that there are too few people involved. What the fuck,we are pissing into the wind over there.--Woogie 10w 21:43, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
We need an RFC either if we don't know what to do or is there is a serious disagreement. We definitely know what should we do, and I think there is not much disagreement between you and me in that account. I am also having a discussion with AmateurEditor on his talk page. As soon as we come to some consensus, we can implement necessary changes. That may cause some reaction from other users (or may not). So far, no RFC is needed.
By the way, do yo agree the "Terminology" section should make a stress on three things?:
1. New and detailed estimates for population losses in the USSR, China and Cambodia should be presented, and these losses should be itemized where possible (repression deaths, famine death, etc).
2. We should explain which categories are seen as "mass killings" by different scholars
3. We should discuss the attempts to come out with some combined figures for all communist states, present all pro et contra and put these estimates into a broader context
4. We should present these combined figures and supplement them with due criticism.
Paul, I don't intend to get into a pissing contest over there, an RFC might bring in people with a bit of grey matter upstairs. In any case I will be reading Demographic trends and patterns --Woogie 10w 22:24, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
Woogie, do you really expect an RfC will bring some expert who will put all dots in "i"? Let's come to agreement about proposed changes, and then (if there will be any objections), we can start an RfC.--Paul Siebert (talk) 22:51, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
I just ordered Demographic trends and patterns in the Soviet Union before 1991, edited by Wolfgang Lutz, Sergei Scherbov, and Andrei Volkov. New York, New York/London, England, Routledge, 1994. from Amazon Prime, --Woogie 10w 21:55, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
Стахановское движение [13]--Woogie 10w 22:03, 24 October 2018 (UTC)
Off Wiki I have done a lot of work on the Soviet losses, I can't post it up here--Woogie 10w 01:04, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
The sad reality is that one has to argue with the Fox News mentality here on Wikipedia [14] --Woogie 10w 01:12, 28 October 2018 (UTC)
I just received ''Demographic trends and patterns in the Soviet Union before 1991, edited by Wolfgang Lutz, Sergei Scherbov, and Andrei Volkov. Here is an academic source that discusses the topic written by professional demographers. Are you interested? I have no time to waste on blogging about terminology. --Woogie 10w 00:13, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Yes, it would be interesting to see it.
With regard to terminology, I don't understand why do you think it is waste of time. As an ex-accountant, you probably know that if you define some figure as your gross annual income or adjusted annual income, that may have a significant effect on your taxes, especially if you have various itemised deductions. That is why it is very important not only to provide accurate figures, but understand what exactly do they mean.--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:32, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
The mass killing figures are hypothetical, the official vital statistics for live births and natural deaths are fragmentary. Historians push a POV by manipulating estimated vital statistics. Paul I disagree when you say "peer reviewed" because only demographers or others that specialize in numerical analysis should be considered peers capable of reviewing numerical data. Grover Furr and Rudolph Rummel are academic sources that push a political POV. They are both numerical illiterates who disregard and dismiss demographic analysis. The mass killings article needs to include a section on demographic analysis.--Woogie 10w 12:43, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Woogie, you will be surprised, but the data published by Rummel have not passed a peer-review procedure. That means you just confirm what I say.
Actually, I disagree with your words about Rummel. He was a good researcher, but his contribution is greatly misunderstood and misinterpreted. He never tried to produce accurate data, and he had never be interested in going into details. His approach can be summarised as follows:
"We need to know how many people were killed by each regime to perform statistical analysis and find correlations between regime's type and violence. To do that, we need a reliable statistics. Let's take all available data, define all excess domestic deaths as "democide" and calculate a median value of deaths caused by each regime based on the all sources available. We know some sources are unreliable, but, assuming that they are equally unreliable for each regime, our approach can provide us with a satisfactory data set for our calculations."
This approach was absolutely correct, and introduction of factor analysis in the study of violence was a significant step in our understanding of that subject. However, when we are using Rummel's data we must keep in mind their limitations. Their accuracy strongly depends on the initial data set. Thus, his estimates of Cambodia deaths were astonishingly accurate, but his estimates of deaths in the USSR is a total bullshit. The reason is that accurate data for Cambodia were available to Rummel already in late 70s, whereas only rough estimates for the USSR were available by that time.
The only problems with Rummel are: (i) his refusal to take into account fresh archival data for the USSR; (ii) his ahistorism (he attributes deaths only to the current regime and ignores a historical context; (iii) his obsession with statistics (correlation does not mean causation).
To summarise, Rummel can and should be used in the article, but his views should be represented duly, without giving too much weight.--Paul Siebert (talk) 14:23, 2 November 2018 (UTC)
Stats
Drop me a line in future if you need stats. Today the weather in NYC is beautiful, I am going to take the family to Manhattan for lunch and then we'l see a movie this evening. Have a good time at the WSNB, Cheers--Woogie 10w (talk) 15:48, 4 November 2018 (UTC)
Hi I see that the Mass Killings discussion has died down. Paul, one point that troubled me was what other academics may have written about Rummel. A peer reviewed source that you may have access to might shed light on the matter. Back in 1999 I had a friendly discussion over dinner with academics who specialize in U.S. history. I mentioned that I was reading Rummel,they knew about him and dismissed his work calling him a "A hack writer for the CIA". Back then I put Rummel's numerical data on a jumbo Lotus 123 spreadsheet and found a typo, a line that did not add properly. At that time I was corresponding with Rummel by Email. I pointed out the error, his reply was that he would have the people in Virginia check the error. He got back to me and said the typo would be corrected in future editions of "Statistics of Democide". A crew in Virginia was crunching his numbers. That makes sense to me, since Rummel would not have access to all those sources in Hawaii. Also my academic friends mentioned government grants they received for work they did on Civil War history--Woogie 10w (talk) 21:29, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
Woogie, Rummel is a "multifaceted scholar", and one of his major contribution to science is introduction of new statistical methods in historical studies. He proposed a concept of "democratic peace", and other authors who write about him are focused mostly on that, and on his general conclusions about totalitarianism. His estimates are not discussed in mainstream literature, and my guess is that is because people ignore them. The only critical analysis of his approach to estimating the number of killed was published by Dulic. However, being a Yugoslavian, he focused only at one Rummel's book, "Tito's slaughterhouse". He found numerous methodological flaws in Rummel's statistics (actually, they are general, but Dulic didn't criticize other estimates explicitly). The authors writing about USSR or China ignore him (which looks reasonable, because he also ignored all recent works published on that account). Obviously, if someone's figures are ignored, it is impossible to find a source that says that. We cannot write about that in the article, but we can re-organise the article to give a due weight to Rummel and to modern authors. I proposed the way to do that on the Mkucr talk page. I would be grateful is you commented on it.
He is very popular among various creationists interesting, they believe what their advisors tell them. Just like the Russian Orthodox adherents who believe in creationism and tell gruesome tales of Jews in Stalin's USSR killing the faithful.--Woogie 10w (talk) 23:05, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
Paul the Mkucr page is fine on a superficial level, the problem is readers are not informed about how these figures are derived. Off Wiki I have been working on Soviet military casualties in WW2. The official military figures are contrived, the author Krivosheev is a liar. I suspect that the repression stats published in the 1990's are also doctored. Rosefielde makes sense when one considers the fact that "free" Soviet workers were for all practical purposes slaves. 40-50 years ago I spoke to Poles and German POWs who had been working in the USSR, they felt that they were treated as well as the average Russian. Those people with strong backs and a positive attitude survived. My father was a Pennsylvania coal miner for 18 years, in 1938 he was almost killed in an accident. He quit on the spot and came to New York and found work in a hotel kitchen. He could not do that in Stalin's USSR. His grandfather came to the US in 1886 after 18 years in the Kaisers army. Check on You Tube Alte Kameraden ✠ [German march and soldier song][+ english translation]--Woogie 10w (talk) 23:46, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
Woogie, everything is a little bit more complex than you think. Not only the article is superficial, it is directly misleading, because not only it does not explain how the figures were derived, it also does not explain what do these figures mean. Yes, there were four demographic catastrophes in history of Russia (the last one in 1990s), however, the life expectancy increased from 32 years in 1900 to 60 in 1960. In the US (for the same period), it changed from 48 to 68. That means, living conditions were improving much faster in the USSR than in the US, and that happened despite three demographic catastrophes. With regard to your father, I respectfully disagree. The same story could have happened in the USSR under Stalin, moreover, that was happening very frequently: it was a time of an enormous social mobility, the authorities were actively encouraging peasants to move from rural areas to cities, because they needed more industrial workers. A special system of high education, so called rabfak (pronounced as rab-fuck :), was established to allow young workers to take short one-two year courses do get admitted to the institutions of higher education. If you will get an opportunity to speak with several persons from former USSR, you will be surprised to learn that 5 out of 8 of them had a grand(or grandgrand)mother (grandfathers are less frequent, because major part of them was killed in WWII)) from rural areas. A standard bio of an average Soviet citizen was: grandparents are peasants, parents are workers or engineers, and he/she him/herself has a high education. I would say, social mobility was much higher in the USSR than in the US. In about 40 years, the Soviet society transformed from illiterate and rural society to a well educated urban society. How can it be consistent with what you are saying? In general, anekdotal evidences can hardly prove anything. As an example, I can remind you about Aleksandr Tvardovsky, who was kulak's son and one of official Soviet poets. I can tell about myself: my grandparents were peasants, both parents got master degrees, I am a PhD. All of that happened in the USSR. That is not an evidence per se, what is more important is that my situation is more a rule than an exception.
With regard to Polish or German POWs, you forget about two factors: the period they were describing was a post-war time, when the whole country was literally devastated, and male population was more than decimated. It was the time when people had no opportunity to relax, because the war de facto had not ended, but transformed into the war for economical survival. A second consideration is that those POWs made their observations in labour camps and the areas around them. I am sure those places were not the best places in the USSR. However, if you take some person from, for example, Romania, and show him just two places in New York: urban area around Jamaica station and Southern Bronx, what conclusion about the US will this person make?--Paul Siebert (talk) 03:13, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
I read this in 1970: The Soviet citizen : daily life in a totalitarian society Inkeles, Alex Published by Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1959 You can get it for $ 3.65 on ABE books--Woogie 10w (talk) 03:57, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
My ancestors lived in this totalitarian society, and I know what they were telling me. Their life was not easy, based on modern standards it was terrible, but it was not as bad as many books say.--Paul Siebert (talk) 05:24, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
I remember the book as mentioning the increased social mobility as a favorable factor which was mentioned in the mentioned in the interviews. The authors were professional sociologists who interviewed defectors in the post war era. Many did not return because they feared punishment for collaboration. Its been so long, I have only a vague idea of the books contents.
the life expectancy increased from 32 years in 1900 to 60 in 1960. In the US (for the same period), it changed from 48 to 68 The USSR lost so many adults in the Stalin era, the life expectancy of the younger cohorts was greater than the older group.--Woogie 10w (talk) 04:10, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
I am not sure defectors is a good representative sample: for example, if you build your impression about Mexico by interviewing immigrants and by talking with average people in the Mexico City, the results will be totally different.
Yes, a lot of people died prematurely (or were killed) during Stalin's era. However, the life expectancy data I am talking about take that into account.--Paul Siebert (talk) 05:24, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Paul the best place to put a demographic analysis is here Demographics of the Soviet Union. The Russian material on Demoscope should be OK, I know Demoscope is considered a unreliable source on Russian Wikipedia. The Mkucr page is dominated by stunads, ehi! furget about that article--Woogie 10w (talk) 04:16, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
You say it must be fixed, I agree. This will not be easy because many historians are numerical illiterates,Synder,Rummel and Valentino fall into this category. ADK, Maksudov and Rosefielde tie their data into the population balance explaining how the numbers are derived.Synder and Valentino just copy numbers without explaining where how the numbers were derived, they pontificate. We both know Rummel's methodology, the numbers are worthless. On Wikipedia many editors shop around the internet for the low or high number from a reliable academic source and then spin a story pushing their POV. These folks don't have a clue about tying into a population balance, they just regurgitate numbers. Some editors stalk other Wikipedians looking for a petty Wiki rule that has been broken. These ballbusters like to role play being the boss. Anyone can edit Wikipedia.--Woogie 10w (talk) 15:47, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
I am not sure I know what official Russian sources are telling, because I am trying not to read them. If what I am saying partially coincides with what they say, that means I found this information somewhere else. For example, from Western scholarly sources.--Paul Siebert (talk) 16:19, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Regarding yours "these folks don't have a clue about tying into a population balance..." that is not the worst mistake they do. Even if the population balance is correct, it is not sufficient to claim that "5 millions were killed" when these 5 million were obtained from demographic sources. I already gave you this example, but I'll do that again, because you seem to not understand that: Rosefielde and Maksudov claim there was about 4 million excess deaths in Russia in 1990, and they correctly attribute these losses to democratic transformations of the society. However, you will agree there were no "mass killings" of that scale in Russia in 1990s. --Paul Siebert (talk) 16:25, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
208,500 additional deaths could occur by 2026 under the Senate health plan [16]----What we know about the death toll in Puerto Rico [17] Demographic estimates for the US are in the public eye--Woogie 10w (talk) 18:16, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
You are speaking like a Commie :-) You should probably have known that cutting taxes for the rich is a quintessence of Freedom, and nothing that leads to this noble goal can be considered a crime in our Free World :-). Actually, American health system is extremely cost-inefficient, it wastes an enormous amount of money, so even its reorganisation can provide everybody with affordable health service for less money. However, since the government is not involved in that directly, there is no formal pretext to accuse it in "mass killings". --Paul Siebert (talk) 19:05, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Joe Six pack hears 100 million were killed by the communists on Fox News, he goes to the internet and finds Rummel’s estimates., page after page listing the millions killed by the communists. On Wikipedia he sees “Mass Deaths” which brings to mind executions ,death camps and planned famine. Rummel is considered a reliable source by the cognoscenti who manage the RSNB at Wikipedia. The guy in the red(MAGA) hat believes the propaganda on Fox News, he edits Wikipedia and manages the RSNB at Wikipedia. We need a credible source that clearly explains why Rummel wrong.--Woogie 10w (talk) 18:51, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
We don't need a source, we just have to explain how exactly did Rummel obtain his figures. We also have to provide modern data and explanations (we have sources for that), and to explain why his approach is not valid (we have sources for that too).--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:57, 9 November 2018 (UTC)
Hello, Paul Siebert. Voting in the 2018 Arbitration Committee elections is now open until 23.59 on Sunday, 3 December. All users who registered an account before Sunday, 28 October 2018, made at least 150 mainspace edits before Thursday, 1 November 2018 and are not currently blocked are eligible to vote. Users with alternate accounts may only vote once.
The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors, primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the authority to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail.
Actually, you should discuss the casualties issue with Woogie10w, who knows this subject very well.
Frankly, I think the sources you are using are not good: various memorial sites do not do independent studies of this issue, they are frequently politically biased, and they do not check figures meticulously. It is also incorrect to use various online encyclopedia or similar resources: this is strongly discouraged by our policy. Indeed, if Wikipedia is based on what various encyclopedias write, why it is needed? We should not use online encyclopaediae for editing, and I think your WWII edits were reverted correctly.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:47, 5 December 2018 (UTC)
Soviet Gas Vans?
Paul,
Like you, I am surprised to see the anonymous claim, under "Great Purge," that gas vans were used by the Soviets, or Stalinists, or whoever, and even crazier, that "The use of gas chambers in the Great Purge later inspired the Holocaust." The quotation is from the anonymous poster just above your entry.
I know very little about how to handle Wikipedia (and thank you for your series of tutorials, above. I have clicked on Five Pillars and Tutorials to read next.) So I have merely entered a couple of lines in "Talk" over there saying that I agree with you and am puzzled. I wrote, but then erased, my frothing at the mouth over the obscenity of gas vans "inspiring" the Holocaust...
What should one do about this sort of thing? The poster is anonymous. The allegation of gas van use is certainly exaggerated and almost certainly incorrect. The term "gas vans" is new to me. The Polish short film "Ambulanz" in the 1960's showed children being murdered in vans where the exhaust was piped into the back of a small closed truck. The Germans tried CO2 in the form of diesel exhaust in Polish gas chamber before they found Zyklon B. But "gas vans" is entirely new to me -- and I was, twenty or thirty years ago, fairly well read on the Holocaust.
That's it: I agree with you; and I'm worried about this anonymous crank posting meretricous falsehoods.
David Lloyd-Jones, I am not sure I understood what exactly do you mean? As far as I know, gas van is mentioned just twice in the Great Purge article. There are two problems with that. First, the three references in the lead are the sources that cite the same article published in 1990 in some tabloid. That means, it would be correct to combine them together, otherwise a false impression is created that these sources are independent. Second, the mention of the gas van usage in the article's body uses the words "for example", although there was just a single example (usage of the gas van by Isaj Berg, as described in the tabloid article). That should be fixed. With regard to the alleged inspiration of the Holocaust, I haven't found this statement in the article.
Paul Siebert Paul, I think the claim is bogus and should be removed -- unless somebody has some evidence I don't know about. I hesitate to do so, but you seem pretty competent in these things. Is all...
I also wonder whether there's any way of warning off the person who anonymously made the claim. There is genuine evil involved here, but adding invented frills does nothing good.
Greetings. I noticed that in your text initiating the discussion about the World Net Daily's reliability as a source you put up the full URL to the WND link through your use of the 'nowiki' instruction. I'm curious as to why you did that instead of this. It's not something important, of course, but perhaps there is something I can learn from this. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 08:21, 5 December 2018 (UTC)
Frankly, I don't remember why did I do that (and I even am not sure if that was done by me; probably, someone else added nowiki later). Yes, usually I provide a direct link (like you did).--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:41, 5 December 2018 (UTC)
I took the liberty of streamlining it, in the process of closing down the discussion. I hope that's alright. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 11:09, 6 December 2018 (UTC)
Name of Nazi-Soviet pact
Re. your reversion of my edit to Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, I said 'The cited sources don't indicate that the pact is commonly called "the Nazi German–Soviet Pact of Aggression"'. In your reversion, you say "Misleading edit summary; that is exactly wheyt Britannica says."
I'm looking at the Brittanica article linked ([18]). I may be missing it, but nowhere in that article do I find that the pact was called the "Nazi German–Soviet Pact of Aggression". Can you point me to what I'm missing?
I do find the statement "This nonagression pact was in fact a pact of aggression against Poland, which was to be partitioned, roughly along the old Curzon Line", which is, of course, true. But the question isn't whether this pact was an agreement for aggression against Poland--it was! But rather, the question is, is this pact ever called "the Nazi German–Soviet Pact of Aggression"? And I can't find any such statement in the two linked sources I can access. (The third is subscriber's-only.) That's why I think that purported "name" should be removed. Your thoughts? — Narsil (talk) 00:57, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
Addendum: I did a Google search for "Nazi German–Soviet Pact of Aggression", and the only results I can find are Wikipedia, or pages quoting the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article. I can find no other cases of people using this name. (Whereas searching for other unofficial names for the agreement, like "Hitler-Stalin Pact", produces hundreds of thousands of results.) — Narsil (talk) 01:01, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
As you can see, I self-reverted even before I got this message from you. Thank you for noticing this nonsense. By the way, there are many other ridiculous statements in this article, and it definitely needs some cleanup.--Paul Siebert (talk) 01:11, 15 December 2018 (UTC)
Shevyakov
Ellman and Maksudov cite Shevyakov as the source for civilian war casualties [19] Shevyakov was a communist party hack, read his articles [20][21] Shevyakov does not provide copies of the documents he used to prepare these articles. The material came from the Extraordinary State Commission. I understand that that the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has a microform copy of the flies of the Extraordinary State Commission. Do you know of any research done using this material? --Woogie 10w (talk) 19:12, 16 January 2019 (UTC)
belated greetings
I've become somewhat of a sloth the last couple of years, so just noticed your return, very happy to see you back. All the best to you and yours. --Goldsztajn (talk) 14:07, 8 February 2019 (UTC)
Thanks, Goldsztajn. I am happy that you are still active too. By the way, in close future, I will probably need a consultation from you regarding some technical questions. --Paul Siebert (talk) 20:30, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
May I have your opinion on Grylev, A. N. : Dnepr, Karpaty, Krym. Osvobozdenie Pravobereznoj Ukrainy i Kryma v 1944 g. 1970 which have been recently added to the article Dnieper-Carpathian Offensive?
I'm dubious of the claim made by Grylev that the harsh winter hindered the Red Army's advance, as claimed by Tai3chinirv7ana diff while still being victorious. This reminds me of German post-war apologetic historiography, see K.e.coffman excellent webpage, Brutal Winter. Also some claims of casualties and equipment losses seems highly suspect, and in stark contrast to recent studies. Regards Wildkatzen (talk) 11:16, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
Hi Wildkatzen, I see no problem with the statement about the effect of harsh winter: the Red Army was by no means immune to that factor. I also see no parallelism between the apologetic German historiography, which attributed their own defeat solely to the harsh winter, and the Soviet historiography that claim that the victory was achieved despite a harsh winter. By the way, according to modern historical data, in 1912, Kutuzov's army in Russia suffered from the cold weather at the same extent as the army of Napoleon, and it sustained comparable losses. However, it would not be apologetic to say about that (although it would be apologetic to claim Napoleon was defeated by "Gen. Frost": he lost his army primarily due to terrible logistics, and that happened long before the winter started).
With regard to the rest, I agree that the book written in 1970 during post-Khruschev's censorship conditions is hardly a good source for figures, and if more fresh data are available they should be used instead. However, I am not sure the fresh sources based on German data are good for Soviet losses.--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:33, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
Hi Paul, thanks for the reply. I didn't mean to draw doubt about the Soviet victory during the harsh winter, but I do find that some of the explanation given, could've been straight coming from exculpatory narratives. My point is that the attrition and losses experienced by harsh meteorological conditions applies to both, the attacker and defender and is not limited to one side. Or was it really praticular difficult for the Soviet AF to deploy their aicraft under these conditions? By the wording used, the German AF was apparently unaffected and only the Soviet AF had these glaring issues. It seems to be an excuse for the high losses during the offensive, even though in 1944, the Soviet pilots definitively fought on equal terms. The poor maintenance and reconditioning affected the Soviet AF much more than unavailable airfields because of mud as it was claimed. And supply lines on the German sides were also generally poorer as they mostly relied upon horse-drawn for transport and movement of heavy equipment.
Well, I'm fine with using Russian sources, but Tai3chinirv7ana dismiss the use of recent studies diff based on German sources aswell. Is it possible that Grylev used Müller-Hillebrand book from 1956 for his work? That might explain the difference of the Divisions destroyed. Much of Hillebrands figures are estimates and based on memoirs and distorted German POV. Which why I don't recommend it either. Wildkatzen (talk) 22:48, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
Wildkatzen, to the best of my knowledge, harsh weather has more impact on advancing forces than on retreating ones, because they are moving in the area where infrastructure is mostly destroyed. The same can be said about air forces: retreating Germans just relocated their plains to their own airfields that already had all needed supplies, whereas advancing Soviets had to use severely damaged airfields captured from Germans or to build new ones, and to deliver fuel, parts etc. That looks obvious.
With regard to German sources, please, keep in mind the following general aspect. During the Cold war era and even after that, the Western scholars had a full access to German archival materials and to ex-Wehrmach generals, so lion's share of the information about Eastern front was obtained from Germans. In contrast, due to Iron Curtain, and due to ideological and language barriers, the information from the Soviet side was almost unavailable. As a result, the whole history of the Eastern Front is written from German perspective, and that happened not because Western scholars are biased, but because the sources they have are intrinsically biased, and another point of view was unavailable to them. In addition, the German sources, where everything is meticulously recorded and documented, look much more trustworthy than Soviet ones. However, that is not always the case. Let me give you just two examples.
First, tank losses. When you read German books about tank losses, you may be surprised by the astonishing ratio of German and Soviet tank losses. Usually, it is attributed to better quality of German tanks (German "medium tank" Panther was just 2 tonnes lighter than than late Soviet IS-2 "heavy tank") and better training. However, another reason was the difference in the methods of calculation of losses. According to Germans, a tank was not considered lost if it had been evacuated into a repair facility. Even if the tank is totally destroyed and irrepairable, but the Germans had managed to transport it to a repair shop it was not considered as lost, just damaged. However, when we look at the number of operational tanks at every concrete date, we see that the number of losses was much greater. In contrast, the Soviets considered every severely damaged tank as lost, and this approach was reasonable, taking into account that their tanks were much cheaper.
Second, it is generally believed in the West, that the Soviets were the initiators of the Soviet-German rapprochement in 1939, and that belief is based on the report about the meeting of the German state secretary with a Soviet ambassador Merekalov in April 1939. According to this report, Merekalov came to the secretary and, after some unimportant introduction expressed his concern about the state of Soviet-German relationship, and after that added that the Soviet side would take needed steps to their improvement. However, the Merekalov's own report about the same meeting, which was declassified only in 1990, gives a totally different picture: Merekalov had a very concrete goal: to request that Germany, which captured Czech Skoda military plant, took all needed steps to allow Skoda to fulfill the contract they signed before Czechoslovakia was occupied by Germany, because the USSR already paid money for that. That was a very hard meeting, and at the end Merekalov said few general words about the needs to improve relationships, which, obviously, was just a politeness. What was the reason for this discrepancy? Obviously, a chief of German foreign ministry, Ribbentrop, was a sincere Russophil, who wanted a full alliance with the USSR, and his subordinates wanted to show to their boss that they are making progress in that direction, and their reports were written in such a way that their boss would be pleased. In contrast, Merekalov had no need to shift accents in his report: his boss, Litvinov, requested him to figure out the state of Skoda contract (the telegram from Moscow is available), and Merekalov did that. However, Western historians didn't know about that, and during 50 years after the war his books implicitlty reflected Ribbentrop's vision.
In connection to that, due to the unintentional pro-German bias of English historical literature, it is always good to use good quality Soviet sources to somewhat dilute this bias. By saying that, I do not mean Soviet sources are better, they just biased in n opposite direction.--Paul Siebert (talk) 23:59, 3 May 2019 (UTC)
Kyiv vs Kiev
Hello, I am new to the realm of Wikipedia content editing, but I saw that you made a change in the post on Kyiv (Kiev) recently. In adding to the discussion, I would recommend having the main title of the page called Kyiv, with Kiev being secondary. While Russian is a major language in Ukraine, only about 8 million Ukrainians speak Russian as their mother tongue.
Furthermore, Ukrainian is the official language, and many Ukrainians, especially since the Revolution of Dignity in 2014, have been trying to get western media outlets to use Kyiv instead of Kiev. However, some argue that Kyiv will confuse the readers. I think a great way to start getting Kyiv into more mainstream use is through Wikipedia, since many individuals get surface level information.
As an experienced editor, I would hope that you would consider this request.
If you have any questions, I would be more than happy to answer!
Hi Pkop1, please, read talk page discussions (we have had at least three during the last year). Briefly, "Kiev" should stay because it is a standard English word (like Prague, not "Praha", the "Hague", not "den Haag", Vienna, not "Wien", Rome, not "Roma"). The fact that English "Kiev" coincides with a Russian name transliterated to the Latin alphabet is misleading: "Kiev" is not just a transliteration of Russian "Киев", it is an English word.
With regard to "official", Wikipedia is based on good quality secondary sources, whereas official documents are primary sources.
And, by the way, Wikipedia's goal is not a popularisation of new trends, the goal is to adequately represent a status quo, and currently "Kiev" is an English dictionary word, whereas "Kyiv" is a transliteration of the official Ukrainian name. We do not popularise "Moskva" (instead of the English "Moscow") or "Köln" (instead of English "Cologne"), why should "Kyiv" be an exception?--Paul Siebert (talk) 02:30, 21 May 2019 (UTC)
Thank you for your prompt response. That makes sense about the other translations and that Kiev is an English word.
The Polish text PB added to Commons - diff - "To jedna z najciekawszych fotografii Białegostoku z czasów sowieckiej okupacji. W tle kościół Świętego Rocha, a wokół sierpy, młoty, pięcioramienne gwiazdy - symbole nowego porządku." - "This is one of the most interesting photographs of Bialystok during the Soviet occupation. In the background, the church of Saint Roch, and around the sickle, hammers, five-pointed stars - the symbols of the new order." - which does match more or less match TVP (itself - a questionable[22][23] source) - but completely mismatches the "Jewish welcome" in English. This Polish/English mismatch probably helped this survive longer in Commons - as a Polish editor verifying just the Polish description would see something OK (and I'll note - this file isn't used on Polish wiki.... So no reason for someone to amble by, but....) - "only" the English was bad.
In a reverse image search - I see this appearing on wykop.pl on 24 Septmeber 2015. in this thread. One commenter (banned) describes this as "@czysta: #zydokomuna" - or "pure Żydokomuna" - however there is no description there that matches the "Jewish welcoming" text (other than extrapolating from the general Żydokomuna comment) - and obviously comments by wykop.pl users are not a reliable source. I'll note that the image on wykop.pl seems higher-resolution and fuller scene. The version of commons is also contrast adjustment + rotation + cropping (edges + bottom + alot of top) - this is trivial image manipulation (I could do it, and I'm not a photoshop/gimp wizard) - but does require some expertise. The other option is that it was cropped from a version of the musuem poster - which is rotated (but probably a slightly different version than the one in onliner) - cropping is even more trivial than rotating/contrast (close to anyone).
I'm out of words at ARBCOM (and I have alot yet to add - the image isn't the worst of it - just perhaps the most striking - the ethnicity table you uncovered is worse IMHO) - so anyway - this is what I was able to track down of this photo online. Icewhiz (talk) 06:47, 11 June 2019 (UTC)
