Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Operation Mincemeat/archive1

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Sarastro1 via FACBot (talk) 21:23, 27 March 2017 [1].

---

Operation Mincemeat

Nominator(s): The Bounder (talk) (an acknowledged account of SchroCat) 08:55, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

This is a story that has fascinated me since I saw the film about it some thirty years or more ago. Most people have heard of it, but even now it seems such an odd long-shot to try that it's difficult to believe it's not fictional. I've been working on the article recently, and I would love this to be an FA, if people think that this merits the attempt. It's recently been through a successful MilHist A-class review, and I look forward to all additional comments and suggestions people can make. – The Bounder (talk) 08:55, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

I've just had a quick read-through, but two comments:

• I think you could do with clarifying 'Purchase informed him that "he does not have to look like an officer – only a staff officer"'. I'm sure it's obvious to MILHIST people, but it isn't at all clear to me why a staff officer would be expected to be malnourished but any other officer wouldn't.
• "Haselden asked if the heat of the day and smell of the corpse, the doctors should bring the post mortem to a close and have lunch": I think a word is missing here.

Might come back to this one later and give it a more thorough going over. Caeciliusinhorto (talk) 20:35, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

• Many thanks Caeciliusinhorto. I've tweaked on both points, following your suggestions. All the best, - The Bounder (talk) 21:02, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Comments by Bruce1ee

A really interesting read, I enjoyed it. Just a few comments:

Lead

• Last paragraph: Why not mention the name of Duff Cooper's novel (Operation Heartbreak) here.

Inspiration for Mincemeat

• "First and Second world wars": shouldn't it be "First and Second World Wars"?

Developing the plan; the corpse's new identity

• "£53, 10s 6d": Why the comma?
  • I see you changed the comma to a period. Why the punctuation? "£79 19s 2d" appears later in the same paragraph with no punctuation. I'm not aware that any punctuation is required in pound/shilling/pence figures, but please correct me if I'm wrong. —Bruce1ee^talk 07:00, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
    • There are a few ways of punctuating L.S.D., including none at all. I've removed it to be simple and consistent. – The Bounder (talk) 13:04, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

Deception documents

• Stupid question, but who are "the Bosche" in the blockquote? The Germans? Perhaps an explanation in single square parentheses would help.

Spanish handling of the corpse and the ramifications

• The opening sentence needs to be dated.
• "On 11 May the briefcase was returned to Haselden by the Spanish authorities": with the original documents I take it; perhaps that should be added for clarity.
• "the diplomatic bag": why not "a diplomatic bag"?
  • "the db" is (in British English) the way the system is referred to. – The Bounder (talk) 21:14, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

German reaction; outcome

• The opening sentence needs a year.

Sources

• Subscription sources (like JSTOR) should have "(subscription required)" appended.
• There are several duplicated author name links.
  • Now removed (think I got them all) – The Bounder (talk) 21:21, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
• The "BBC Documentary, 5 December 2010,a & b" references point to the two "Macintyre, Ben (5 December 2010). Operation Mincemeat (Television production)" entries. Wouldn't it be better to use "Macintyre 2010b" and "Macintyre 2010c", and change the existing "Macintyre 2010" to "Macintyre 2010a"?
  • I've gone with an alternative which makes it even clearer. – The Bounder (talk) 21:14, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
    • You're using the source's title as the reference link, rather than the author. I suggested the above change to bring it in line with your other references, which are by author. In the Sources section all the entries are listed (and sorted) by author, so it makes sense to link by author. This is no big deal – if you would rather leave it as it is, I'm ok with that. BTW I see there are a few other non-author reference links, like "The Guardian, 29 October 1996" – for consistency perhaps they should also link to the author. —Bruce1ee^talk 07:00, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
      • I was advised in a previous FAC that this was the best way to go. I'll certainly swap out things like the Guardian ref to the author, as that makes better sense, and tighten up one or two of the others so that the references and sources are more obviously referring to each other. I'll ping you when it's done, but hopefully within a couple of hours. Thanks again. – The Bounder (talk) 07:13, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
      • Hi Bruce1ee, Now all done. I'm flexible on the Macintyre 2010a & b for the book and TV programme if you think that would be preferable. Let me know and I'll swap them around a bit further. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 07:40, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
        • If you've been advised elsewhere, and would prefer to leave it as is, that's fine with me. —Bruce1ee^talk 12:18, 3 March 2017 (UTC)

—Bruce1ee^talk 17:43, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

• Many thanks, Bruce1ee. I think I've covered all your points, with the exception of the diplomatic bag. Should you have any further comments I'd be delighted to deal with them. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 21:21, 2 March 2017 (UTC)
  • Hi The Bounder, there's just the outstanding query regarding the pound/shilling/pence format above. Thanks. —Bruce1ee^talk 12:18, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
    • Sorry Bruce1ee – missed that! Now all done. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 13:02, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
      • Support the prose and MOS. Thanks for all your work on this article, I think it's nicely done and looking good. Good luck with the nomination. —Bruce1ee^talk 17:46, 3 March 2017 (UTC)
        • That's great: thank you very much for your very germane comments. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 08:06, 4 March 2017 (UTC)

Image review

• File:Charles_Cholmondeley.jpg: suggest {{non-free biog-pic}}, and the FUR needs work - the "minimal use" entry is incorrect. Same with File:Ewen_Montagu.jpg
• File:UK_National_Archives_-_WO_1065921.jpg: per the given tag, is a more specific tag available? Nikkimaria (talk) 22:03, 4 March 2017 (UTC)
  • Thank you Nikkimaria. I know next to nothing about image licensing, and I hope that the changes I have made on Cholmondeley, Montagu and the NA images have not broken anything too badly. Thank you once again - and please let me know if there is anything else I need to adjust. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 10:20, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
    • The NA image is now fine, but I'm still not quite happy with the FURs. I seem to recall seeing an "examples" page somewhere but can't for the life of me find it, so take a look at Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2008-09-22/Dispatches. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:11, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
      • Hi Nikkimaria, I'm struggling to know how to change these. Cholmondeley and Montagu were the two main planners of the operation, and it is counterintuative to remove them from the page (particularly when there are images of the 'bit-part' players throughout the article). If you could find the examples page that would be great, because I am not sure how to add "it's common sense to have these on the article" in Wiki-image-licensing speak! Is there a FUR help desk or something, as this is a particularly specialist area? Any help you can provide would be most appreciated. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 10:54, 8 March 2017 (UTC)
        • There's WP:MCQ, but that's not quite what you're looking for. Basically the parts of the FUR correspond to the various non-free content criteria - you want to specifically address how those criteria are met, rather than just say "this is fair use". So for the minimal use criterion: how many non-free images in the article? Could one image show both individuals? Have the images been cropped? Are they low resolution? (You've actually got some of this under the Commercial criterion). For Source, the site linked is actually crediting Wikipedia for the images, so that's creating a circularity issue - presumably these were published elsewhere at some point? What have you done to try to find the original source? Purpose is the trickiest criterion - the images should enhance reader understanding of the topic. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:29, 9 March 2017 (UTC)
          • Thank you Nikkimaria, that's extremely helpful. There is a photograph of the two men together here, which shows them in front of the vehicle that transported the body (i.e. during the operation); its not the best image of the two men, but I think it should be easier to put together a stronger rationale. Would you think this would be a better course of action? All the best, The Bounder (talk) 21:53, 10 March 2017 (UTC)
            • I do, yes. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:26, 11 March 2017 (UTC)
              • Hi Nikkimaria, now done. I hope this will have a stronger rationale than the orevious two. If it does pass the threshold, do I need to do anything with the images I replaced? Do they get automatically deleted as they are no longer being used? All the best, The Bounder (talk) 08:28, 11 March 2017 (UTC)
                • You can tag the old images with {{orfud}}. The new image is pretty much fine, just needs two small tweaks: suggest using {{non-free biog-pic}}, and the "minimal" criterion should reflect not in how many articles the image is used but rather how many non-free images are in this article. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:09, 11 March 2017 (UTC)
• All now done. Thank you so much for all your help with these. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 16:07, 11 March 2017 (UTC)

Comments. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. - Dank (push to talk)

• "The Spaniards did not notice the eyelash fall out of the key letter from Nye.": How could we possibly know that? Even if a source is willing to take that guess, I'd leave this detail out.
  • I've reworked it to remove the suggestion that the spanish didn't notice, but retaining the information that the eyelas was not placed back in the envelope. - The Bounder (talk) 09:22, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
• "directly mainly": directed mainly?
  • Yes, my typo there. - The Bounder (talk) 09:22, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
• Support on prose per my standard disclaimer. These are my edits. - Dank (push to talk) 03:42, 7 March 2017 (UTC)
  • Thank you, Dank. I've addressed your two points, and I hope that these are suitable. Thanks again for your efforts. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 09:22, 7 March 2017 (UTC)

Comments by Smurrayinchester

This is always one of my favourite WWII stories, and I'm glad we have such a good article on it. A couple of tiny points:

• The location map might work better if it simply shows the whole of Spain - showing just a truncated part of the south coast makes it a bit harder to place.
  • How does it look now? - The Bounder (talk) 12:54, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
• "[The letter] should name Sicily and another location as cover" - is this "other location" known?
  • The letter suggested Sicily and another, without specifying somewhere specific. - The Bounder (talk) 12:54, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
• Images should have alt text (although since most of these are just decorative pictures of people, "alt=Photograph" or "alt=Portrait" would probably do for most of them - the ones that add something to the article and need more explanation are the van, the photo of his "fiancée", the map of where he was found, and the image of the corpse in uniform). Smurrayinchester 09:59, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
  • Thank you: I had no idea about alt text. I'll have a read through the guidelines and add them shortly.
  • All now added. - The Bounder (talk) 14:57, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments: I will work on the alt text point shortly. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 12:54, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

• Many thanks Smurrayinchester, I think these are all done now. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 14:57, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
  • Looks good, Support Smurrayinchester 15:24, 15 March 2017 (UTC)
    • That is very kind of you: thank you very much for your commnts. All the best, The Bounder (talk) 15:33, 15 March 2017 (UTC)

Coordinator comment: I'm not quite sure whether Bruce1ee covered source formatting and reliability above; if not, we need a source review. Also, I think we would need a spot check of sources as this would be your first FA promoted. These can be requested at the top of WT:FAC. Sarastro1 (talk) 22:10, 24 March 2017 (UTC)

• Hi Sarastro1, hopefully yes it will be the first. I'd forgotten about the talk page notification, and I'll do that now. All the best, - The Bounder (talk) 22:29, 24 March 2017 (UTC)
• Hi Sarastro1, my review above covered prose and source formatting, but not a source review. I see The Bounder has added a source review request to WT:FAC. —Bruce1ee^talk 07:56, 25 March 2017 (UTC)

Source review Good to Go

• Aldrich is properly quoted.
• 3 cites each to Macintyre (the book) and Smyth verified
• If possible links should be provided to the newspapers in the refs.
• It would probably be good to put cites like [80][79] in numerical order.
• No copyvio noted.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:24, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
  • Thank you very much, Sturmvogel 66. The cite swapping and newspaper linking is all done: is this what you meant? All the best, The Bounder (talk) 16:56, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
    • Almost, I meant links to the actual newspaper articles themselves, although links to the newspapers are a good addition.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:16, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
      • Ill see what I can find, but some of them are not available online (and the Times ones are behind a paywall which I can't access). If I can't verify the info, I won't put in the link, but the refs have page numbers and dates, so the links are a 'nice-to-have', rather than being essential. Leave it with me, and I'll see what I can dig out. – The Bounder (talk) 18:03, 26 March 2017 (UTC)
        • Be sure to put "subscription required" for stuff like the Times.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 18:55, 26 March 2017 (UTC)

Not much in the way of success with these (partly because I used a third party database to access text versions of the articles which give the original print versions, but not the addresses for the versions, often because these differ).

• "Mystery Warrior Identified": too old for online
• "Jean Gerard Leigh; MI5 clerk whose photograph provided the 'love interest' in one of the great wartime deception" A similar article (a version appeared on the previous day) but this differs in a few places (the sub-title, for example) but not the print version we used. As there is no real benefit to putting in a link that may disappear behind a paywall, when we have the full details, including page number, etc, then I'm a little reticent about adding a link to something with a different title and date
  • If the facts that you reference are the same in both versions, I'd be fine with going with the online version.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:52, 27 March 2017 (UTC)
    • OK done. - The Bounder (talk) 15:18, 27 March 2017 (UTC)
• There are three other articles from The Times:
  • Logan, Brian (16 June 2009). "The Man Who Really Was". The Times. London. p. 14.
  • Macintyre, Ben (5 April 2008). "Bond – the real Bond". The Times. p. 36.
  • Norwich, John (13 November 2003). "The Corpse That Fooled Hitler". The Times. p. 10.

I must be doing something wrong with my searches, because I can't get past a login page for subscription holders and a 'site within' search doesn't bring up anything. Can you have a stab and see if you have any more success than I can? - The Bounder (talk) 09:12, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I'm not understanding the issue here; stalling at the login page is what I'd expect if you don't have a subscription. And that link would be fine; you just need to tell the reader that a subscription is required.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 14:52, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

The problem is that the only link I can provide (for all three) is https://login.thetimes.co.uk/?gotoUrl=http://www.thetimes.co.uk/ which takes readers to the front page and they have to find their way to the article after that - and I'm not sure that is helpful to anyone! I didn't get it from the online version, and I'm not even sure if any of them are on there. - The Bounder (talk) 15:18, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I searched by article title on Bing and got [2] for the one that I did. What did you use for a search engine?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 15:56, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I used Google. As I know that online versions very often differ from print versions, I'm uncomfortable adding a link to an article without being able to check the full text. As a weblink is no better than the full hard copy details (i.e. including date and page), I do not think this would be a good step to take. - The Bounder (talk) 16:05, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

I think that you're more sensitive to this issue than am I, but that's fine.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:30, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• Thank you Sturmvogel 66 - much appreciated. Sarastro1, is there anything more you need me to do? All the best, The Bounder (talk) 18:39, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• Closing note: This candidate has been promoted, but there may be a delay in bot processing of the close. Please see WP:FAC/ar, and leave the {{featured article candidates}} template in place on the talk page until the bot goes through. Sarastro1 (talk) 21:23, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

• That's fantastic news - my first one. Thank you very much! - The Bounder (talk) 21:32, 27 March 2017 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.