Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Peer review/2011

Byzantine–Sassanid War of 602–628

Hello. I've finally gotten some free time and I wish to get this article to FA class. From what I remember from last time, I still need some work, so I hope people can help me. Thanks DemonicInfluence (talk) 17:42, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

Hi DemonicInfluence, what kind of feedback are you looking for here? A few comments which were left at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Byzantine-Sassanid War of 602–628 identified areas of improvement before this goes to a FAC - have these been addressed? Nick-D (talk) 01:26, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

• I was hoping people could help me find out what FA criterion specifically I'm missing and what I can do to correct them. Specifically if there is anything big I have omitted and formatting. I think most of the issues that were raised in the A-class review have been addressed, especially regarding images. However, I was unable to get anyone to copy-edit the page, so that might be an issue. Thanks. DemonicInfluence (talk) 22:43, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Eisfbnore

Consistency review of sources

• Be consistent in whether you provide publisher locations for books or not
• Be consistent in how you abbreviate US states (compare "Conn" with "NY" and "VT"; should be "CT")
• Ref 4, 35, 43, 83, 99, 136, 139, 141 and 145 are single-paged and need therefore be annotated with "p.", not "pp.", whilst ref 51 has a page range and needs therefore be annotated with "pp."
• Be consistent in how many equal digits you include in page ranges (compare ref 118: Foss 1975, pp. 746–47 with ref 130: Gabriel 2002, pp. 282–283)
• References without corresponding books in bibliography: Greatrex & Lieu 2002 and Haldon 1990
• In the bibliography but with no citations: Speck 1984 and Treadgold 1997

I will complete a spotcheck and a close paraphrase check of this article later in this week, drop me a note on my talk if I haven't. Bw, Eisfbnore ^talk 19:40, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

• I didn't have all the locations because lots of them didn't give the location, as in they only said the publisher. I have removed them all so hopefully this is not an issue. I fixed all the "p" vs. "pp" issues and the digits issue. Thanks a bunch for helping DemonicInfluence (talk) 01:49, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Hey DemonicInfluence, leaving out publisher locations is fine, as long as you do it consistently. As for the spotcheck, I have regrettably not access to any of the sources cited in the first section (will do from top to bottom), so I can't do a check there. Also, AFAIK, Google Books should only be linked to where the cited pages are viewable. I would therefore recommend you to remove the links without preview. --Eisfbnore ^talk 10:50, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Spotcheck

No dabs or dead external links (they're all to Google Books) here; regarding copyvio, the CSBot found nothing. Starting with the "Beginning of the conflict" section.

• Ref 12, 13, 14, 15 and 16: I can't access the GBOOK pages
• Ref 17: The source only supports the failure to stop the Perians, not the death of the Narses, but I presume that the Narses death is supported by ref 16 which I cannot access. Also, Kaegi says that Phocas' regime was "losing its reputation", whilst you say that its failure "ruined its prestige". Slightly different.

--Eisfbnore ^talk 11:05, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Next section: Heraclius' rebellion.

• Ref 17, 18 and 19 all check out
• Ref 20, 16 and 21: I don't have access to the sources
• Ref 22 checks out
• Ref 23: GBOOKS preview does not include this page
• Ref 24: The citation says that information is located at page 194, whilst the GBOOKS url sent me to page 226. Which is it?
• Ref 25: checks out
• Ref 26: I don't have access to the source
• Ref 27: ditto
• Ref 28, 22 and 29 all check out
• Ref 30: Source says "regulation", you say "law"; also, the detail that new members of the church staff would not receive pay from the imperial fisc is important and should be included, IMHO
• Ref 31 and 32: Google Books preview does not include these pages

--Eisfbnore ^talk 11:35, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Next section: Persian ascendancy

• Ref 17 checks out
• Ref 33 and 35: same problem as for ref 24; the citations and the GB urls are disagreeing in what page numbers the info is located at.
• Ref 34, 13, 35: GB preview at present not available
• Ref 36: a small close paraphrase: Article says "During the first year of his reign, Heraclius attempted to make peace"; source says "He tried to make peace in the first year of his reign." The clause is different, but the phrase "the first year of his reign" is equal. Perhaps mention the year instead? Also, the source says "document" not "prove", which has a slightly different meaning. Third para: Article: "Early on, the Persians had forced the Byzantines to defend along two major fronts…". Source: "…the Persians compelled the Byzantines to maintain at least two major defensive groupings of troops." The phrase ordering is equal: "the Persians" - "force/compell" - "the Byzantines" - "defend/maintain" - "two major". Please reword.
• Ref 37 checks out (excellent reword btw!)
• Ref 38: Article: "…Shahin's troops managed to escape Priscus' encirclement…". Source: "Shāhīn and his troops managed to escape from the encirclement…". Needs rewording.
• Ref 39: GB not available
• Ref 40, 41 and 42 check out

Ref 43: GB not available

--Eisfbnore • talk 16:28, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

• • Fixed GB issue with refs 12,15,16, 24+33+34 (which was because in the google book for that there is an offset in the # of pages by google and the actual book, I deleted the GB link because it doesn't work anyways).
  • GB links of Refs 13,23,31,32, 39(now 40), 43(now 44) do work for me. 14 was not linked. Ref 30 the source says that he issued a "Novel (law)" to ratify his regulation, so I just said law, but I added the part about fisc.
  • Ref 38 (now 39), I've reworded. Ref 36, I've reworded the first part, the part about the document, I made it a quote about "conclusively proves." The part about two fronts, I've reworded. Also there was a hidden reference in that section that must have not parsed or something, which I've now fixed and it is now reference 37.
  • I deleted the Bibliography reference to Spark. I'm not sure why I had it there in the first place o.o. The issue with Haldon was that the physical copy that I had borrowed was published in 1997, but the electronic copy was referenced on google as from 1990. Since I used both, what should I do?
  • I went through the rest of the references for broken GB links and I believe I got them all. If you notice any more, I'll fix it.

Thanks a bunch DemonicInfluence (talk) 21:19, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

• • • Thanks for rewording the sentences and removing the broken GB links. I am not sure what to do with the Haldon issue; is the text on the same pages in the two editions? If so, you can simply plug in |year=1997 |origyear=1990 in the citation and leave the notes as they are. I will continue the spotcheck tomorrow, btw. --Eisfbnore ^{• talk} 21:28, 19 July 2011 (UTC)
  • I'm pretty sure the text is one the same pages on both. I will check soon. The code you gave me doesn't work so I just changed to 1997. Thanks for your effort DemonicInfluence (talk) 01:40, 20 July 2011 (UTC)
  • I've discovered something strange. It seems that what pages I can view in the Google Books is different if I sign on and off of my Google Account. I'm not sure how to deal with this and linking. DemonicInfluence (talk) 19:04, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Hi again, I ment to plug |year=1997 |origyear=1990 into the {{citation}} template under "Bibliography", not into the {{harvnb}} notes. I've now done that, and here's more spotchecking:

sect. Persian dominance

• Ref 44, 45, 46 and 27: can't view the pages
• Ref 47 checks out
• Ref 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59: can't view the pages

--Eisfbnore • talk 12:14, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

• As I noted above, the viewable pages on google books seems to differ between accounts and between having an account or not having an account. All the pages you listed work for me with an account, and some of them work without one too. DemonicInfluence (talk) 14:34, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Most of the Kaegi pages do work for me. Unfortunately I can't view pages in most of the other books, even if I'm logged in. Also, I do not mention that I can't view the pages to bother you, only to state that I cannot do a spotcheck there. --Eisfbnore • talk 14:38, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

• Sorry for my lashing out. Thanks for helping DemonicInfluence (talk) 17:04, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

sect. Byzantine resurgence

• Ref 54, 60 and 82 check out fine
• Ref 61: the source says nothing about the follis nor the plague

I'm now on summer vacation; the good news is that I have access to more GB pages here in the US than in Norway, the bad news is that I have limited time to do reviewing. Happy editing, Eisfbnore • talk 08:17, 5 August 2011 (UTC)

• • 61 says "the plague, together with so many other calamities..." The thing about the follis is on the previous reference, pg 95 (ref 60). Should I just cite it again along with ref 61? DemonicInfluence (talk) 01:30, 6 August 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Usually I make simple edits myself, but WP has been down for a while so I'll type everything here then save it later when I can. I got down to Persian ascendancy.

• "from 602–622": from 602 to 622. No dashes after "from" per ENDASH.
• "After the end of the war": After the war.
• "where they were just members of certain factions or as opponents of the Christians.": nonparallel; I'd go with "where they were just members of certain factions and where they were opponents of the Christians."
• "soon afterward disappears": I recommend "disappears soon afterward".
• "he made a law which limited the number of state-sponsored personnel of the Church in Constantinople by not paying new staff from the imperial fisc": consider rewording "made a law" and "by not paying". - Dank (push to talk) 20:42, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

• I edited all the things you have suggested. Thanks a bunch :) DemonicInfluence (talk) 01:48, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

List of castles in England

This list has been thoroughly revamped in recent months. I should like to know how the list now measures up to reviewers' expectations of a list of castles in England. Paravane (talk) 16:37, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

MarcusBritish

• Although the use of a Key for English Heritage and National Trust looks good, I think it would be more useful to reorganise the Ownership column with Alpha-codes, for example:
  • EH - English Heritage
  • NT - National Trust
  • PR - Private Residence
  • PP - Private with Public Access
  • PV - Private No Access
  • LA - Local Authority
  • HA - Holiday Accommodation
  • HT - Hotel
  • CE - Church of England

Then make it sortable. Reason I suggest this is, many people like to visit castles, so being able to sort by ownership and find English Heritage and National Trust sites, or whatever type interest someone, easier could be quite useful.

• Has this approach been adopted in other similar cases, are there even standard codes? Using just codes would be neat, but some points:
  • It would increase dependence on the key for understanding, and there are more possibilities to consider - for instance 'Private with Public Access' would need to be split to distinguish free access to private land versus opening for restricted hours. It could be confusing and would be less readable because of the number of codes and the need to refer to the key.

- I don't think there are standard codes, but as Wiki articles are generally "self-contained" I don't think it will be frowned upon if you were to invent them, as long as it's understandable. I was thinking the code column should only contain the code - everything else should be moved into Notes regarding which councils, residents, limited hours, etc. If necessary you could make it a 3 letter code, PRO - Private Access Open, PRL - Private Access Limited - however I would advise it might be better to keep it simple and simply identify access restrictions in the notes. Castles could change hands (new residents, new trust/authority ownership) so it is always good to design a table that is manageable - whilst you might be happy to keep an eye on it and update anything you learn, you never really known if/when your wiki support might wane and require someone else to edit the contents without "breaking" the layout due to confusion. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • There's freedom for variation currently, with named owners and combinations of ownership and stewardship. You could have for instance 'LA - Somerset County Council', or 'CE - Residence of Bishop of Carlisle', but is this an appealing format? Alternatively, some extra information could be transferred to the notes column.

- Yes, I think if you move all information other than the code into Notes, so it becomes a sorting column and key, rather than anything else it would work well. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • It could be made sortable without using codes, the images could be combined with abbreviations EH, NT etc. without opting for other codes, but sorting would not group local authorities etc. Paravane (talk) 21:19, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

- As long as all Councils are marked "LA", for example, then they would group during sorting - not sure what column it would sort by following that though. But as you already have the tables split into Counties then as long as LA's group they should be manageable. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

- Additional: One way of making LA's group by their respective council names alphabetically would be to have something like | LA <span style="display:None">XYZ Council</span> in each LA cell, and then include details of the Council visibly in the Notes column. I can guarantee this method works great as I have a similar use of in an article I created recently. Same could be done for Private Residences, only put the owners name like | PR <span style="display:None">Smith, John</span> in the Notes.. and so on and so forth, wherever there is need to control how it sorts Ownership an extra step beyond just the alpha-code. That way, the sorting result will always appear logical, and this extra step might also push the article an extra step towards A/FL quality a bit earlier. As for the National Trust/English Heritage logos — I suppose they would become redundant if you switch to an alpha-code system, but you could still use them in the Notes or straight below the code for extra visual identification. All your NTE_icon.png's need switching to NTE_icon.svg's if you do keep them — the PNG versions have white backgrounds, oddly, but the SVG versions are transparent, which looks much better on the coloured table background. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

The current ownership info largely predates my involvement, and I'm now reminded that there's a lot of information still missing.

- Yes, seems like a big job what with nearly 300 entries on there to manage. I might also suggest adding a new column: "Grid Ref" and using the {{gbmappingsmall|SU970770}} template (Results in SU970770 for Windsor Castle, for example, to identify the location of each castle geographically on OS maps. That's a lot to do also (adding 1 per minute is ~5 hours work) but I think it would be a very strong addition to the material because it is practical modern information for tourists, etc looking for these places rather than just historical data. And it's not "bulky" content - i.e. only 8 chars and the external logo. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• There is a very long References list, perhaps using {{reflist|2}} or {{reflist|3}} to make it shorter and page-width would be better for the layout.

• Perhaps setting the column widths of each table to eliminate the current "stepping" effect would improve the visual layout. Or simply make each table 100% width and let the columns sort themselves so that they are at least left and right aligned.
  • Not sure if this can be improved. On my machine at 1024x768 all tables are full width.

- I have 1366x768, a laptop screen, and believe me, there is a lot of stepping on the right at this width. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

Points:

• • • Forcing a narrower table to 100% seems to leave the image column wider than the images - even if that column is set to 90px - which looks very poor.

- You may need to account for whatever cell-padding or margins wikitable's have and use 100px or so. Let me know if you want me to take a look, as I've used a few wikitables and with the benefit of wider screen might be able to get it to fit okay, as I can down-size my screen resolution to see the result on 1024x768 also. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • • If the sizes of columns are fixed, I'm not confident that this will not have adverse consequences for smaller format devices such as tablets.

- I don't think it should as long as it's done carefully. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • • Maybe the content could be tweaked to improve layout! Paravane (talk) 21:19, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

- Well, bear in mind, if you use a 2 or 3 letter code for Ownership and move all other info into Notes that you will reduce that columns width quite a lot and gain some room for the rest. The extra info in the Notes will not widen that column either, but will heighten in line with the image column so it will balance out. On a side note, I don't think the line break in each column heading to push the "sort" icon below the heading is a particularly good look - unless it benefits it by minimising the col width, that is. Personal choice, though. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• Hyphens need changing to emdashes (WP:EMDASH) in: "Once no longer needed as fortresses, castles - if they were not abandoned - were..."

• Similarly, all date ranges, such as "11-14th century" or "1892-1930", need endashes, "11–14th / 1892–1930" (WP:ENDASH), not hyphens.

• I feel a few more citations may be necessary to cover a few points, and perhaps a bit more detail. There is a lot of text, but the 9 in-line citations are a bit thin, imo. Few examples:
  • History
    • "During the fourteenth century, as much of England became more peaceful, the construction of strong castles began to decline, in favour of more lightly fortified structures often described as fortified manor houses." - Why did they decline? Evidence of change in style?
    • "In the reign of Henry VIII, prompted by fears of invasion, a series of new fortresses was built along the south coast of England, known as the Device Forts or Henrician Castles." - Invasion from who, and why? Evidence of series being constructed for this purpose?

• I have R.Allen Brown's book on Castles too, only mine is: Brown, Professor R. Allen (1980). Castles: A History and Guide. Poole, UK: Blandford Press. ISBN 978-0713711004. - not sure if you have a US version or if it's a different title altogether. If you need any extra sourcing from it, feel free to ask.

Lovely article, though - lots of potential for A-class, FL ratings. I think it still needs a little work in places to make it easier to view (layout tweaks) and some further work to the historical references. Stronger sourcing and a lot more citations in the text should push it along.

Ma®©usBritish (talk) 22:51, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

I've done a couple of these suggestions for you to save time — there were almost 300 ndash replacements, to save you wading through them I've done them all in one go with a regex, plus a couple of other minor tweaks — no content changes, just MoS copy-edits. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 00:11, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your detailed comments and edits. I'll need some time to address citations. I have responded above to other suggestions. Paravane (talk) 21:19, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

- Thanks. Replied to some of your comments, above. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 23:47, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

I've had a look at your current set-up, here's what I think would work well for the layout of each table - just my 2c though, do what you think best, depending what level of quality you're aiming for at present. I'm suggesting FL quality tweaks here, where everything counts.:

Name	Type	Date	Condition	Image	Ownership	Grid Ref.	Notes
Castle	Hill fort	1400 13th century	Restored		LA	SE194542	Slighted in 1502. North Yorkshire Council
Castle	Motte and bailey	1283 1283	Fragmentary remains		EH	SU970770	Motte and bailey.
Castle	Fortified manor house	1458 c.1458	Restored		PR	NE015844	Brick-built, on site of earlier building. Residence of John Smith Esq.

What I've done in this example:

• Fixed column widths - they do not exceed 700px with the Notes col left to fill the remained of the "100%" fixed table width. Incidentally, I had no problems when testing the Image column at 90px fixed width.
• 90% font-size, it's barely noticeable, but by compressing the content just a little, it becomes more manageable for wider tables.
• Examples Alpha-code and OS Grid Ref (I've just noticed List of castles in Scotland uses OS Refs)) columns. Example of EH logo under Alpha-code to add visual recognition.
• In notes I've put anything relating to Ownership as a bullet point - not sure if this works, but it emphasises ownership a little more.

In addition - the current Dates column does not work as a sortable column at present because it contains dates, ranges, circa years and centuries all mixed up. Although the information is displayed as necessary to read visually, it does not sort logically. It should be possible to come up with a method of sorting the Dates logically using the "display:none" method again. Just to clarify what I mean though:

Sort these, see the bad result: Date 13–14th century 12th century c1066 1801–19 c1403 13th century 1844–50

And now: Better? Date 1400 13–14th century 1300 12th century 1066 c1066 1801 1801–19 1403 c1403 1400 13th century 1844 1844–50

Finally, for all the circa dates, the WP:MOSABBR requires use of "c." for circa, rather just a "c" before the date being estimated. There is a Template:Circa which I'm not recommending you bother using, as it does very little, but it's style uses "c. " with a space before the date which seems right to me, grammatically. I'll go ahead and do this in a moment.

Hope this all helps! :) Ma®©usBritish (talk) 05:08, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

I appreciate the time and thought you're putting in to this.

• Grid references have always been under consideration, but for me were low priority: most sites have their own wiki pages with coordinates already, and pages for the rest are gradually being created. Adding an extra column will have an effect on layout at lower display sizes and as there are ~450 entries it will be a big job. You say it would be a strong addition, but do you not think anyone interested will access the wiki page for the site and get the location from that page?

- Adding empty columns/templates is easy - a regex can do that it seconds. Filling in the Grip Refs would take the longest time, a few hours. at least. Yes, I think it's worth it - OS Grip Refs link to Geographical Data sites with mapping, satellite images, etc - all that might prove useful to people - it's "encylopedic" data. The layout should not be dramatically affected - cutting the Ownership column down from its current width to a narrower width for just 2 or 3 letters would provide the space needed. If you look at this article: List of Sites of Special Scientific Interest in North Yorkshire you'll see there is a Grid Ref col - there are dozens of those SSSIs articles with hundreds of sites listed, many of which are just patches of grass - and probably far less interesting than many castles. It's the sense of "completion" that such data provides, and that it strengthens the article by providing practical data. Anyone can read about a castle, but being able to pin-point it, perhaps to visit, is a bonus. If you've got all the castles in England on one page in front of you with OS Refs, it saves you having to search a dozen other sites for the information. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• Sortable dates is plainly another task to be added to the todo list, your example works well.

- Those can all be done with a couple of regex's in less time too, would save you doing ~450 manually. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• Table widths - I'm glad you supplied an example, because I do not think it works very well at all! At 800x600 it's not bad, but at 1024x768 the columns to the left are large and mostly empty whilst the notes column is almost the smallest, full of squashed text forced to wrap to multiple lines, and causing the rows to be deeper than the images. At 1280x1024 the image column is wider than the images again.
  • I have tinkered with the content of the tables to try to reduce the stepping, but I cannot go higher than 1280x1024.

- I noticed. The use of   between words only serves to stop line-breaks and maintain wider cells. This has the negative effect of preventing cells from fitting narrower screens, because the words will not fall onto new lines. On wider screens such as 1366x768 the stepping is still evident however. It's not just the right edge - the columns are not equally aligned as you scroll down, making it a little awkward to read - visually it's not too appealing in the way it dots about. 100% fitting with fixed widths is usually the only way to control tables, on any website. Unfortunately there are a lot of screen resolutions and it's not always possible to fit them all perfectly. I can understand wiki editors wanting their own contributions to look good on their own screens, but it is always necessary to consider a wider range of common screen sizes - with flat screen monitors and laptops starting to outnumber PCs, there are more wider screens, 1024x768 is the most common CRT monitor resolution. One way of making the notes less "stacked" might be to make them <small> size notes and not too specific - afterall, if each is cited and wikilinked, there's no need to put more that a few key points in the Notes to highlight important points. If the Image col is fixed width, it's not possible for it to go wider at higher resolutions. Another thought might be to make the Names/Type/Condition columns a little narrower and let them fill 2 lines, to give more room to the Notes column. Either way you do it, there is a lack of consistency between one table and the next which I think needs to be addressed for the article to achieve a high standard, to look professional it needs to flow neatly - which is going to require fixed widths, and some sacrifices or alterations to compensate for the amount of data each table holds. I have 1366x768 which seems wide to me, yet I know there are far wider resolutions out there, becoming quite common - their view will be even more "stepped" than mine - the only way to eliminate that is 100%. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • My view is that the single thing which does most to enhance the appearance of the tables is to keep the images fully occupying their cells.

- I agree a "full" cell looks better than one with spacing. Again, it won't always work on every resolution, no matter what you do. And when you weigh the "value" of data in each cell you have to determine what is more important - a picture or sufficient textual data. In the end a few spaced images won't "break" its appearance. There are going to be visitors out there with eyesight issue who make their browser text larger, and that will affect every cell anyway. There's no point in worrying too much about vertical width really, there's virtually infinite amount of that, it's horizontal width that needs controlling. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• Circa - A small point, but in your layout example you have c.1458, no space. I think this looks much better than c. 1458, does this conform to the approved format?

"c. 1066" is right, there should be a space if Template:Circa is anything to go by. I don't think anyone would cry about it if you omitted the space, though - it still means the same thing. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• Ownership - the dates approach could be applied to the ownership column, the codes could be the hidden text. This would enable full sortability whilst retaining the current visible text and images.

- Wouldn't work as well. Just a code would sort by that code, then by another, probably Name resulting in a logical sort order. If you had hidden codes then text it would sort by the code and then by first letter/s of the visible Ownership text, making it no more efficient than it is now. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

I favour this option:

• • It's more readable, without the need to memorise the key or keep referring to it, or the possibility of misunderstanding.

- Current Ownership is a wider column and has no standardised method. A code would make it more logical. People wouldn't have problems with a key, really - people adapt, or sort and search for things they specifically want. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • It's flexible.

- For who? Readers of editors? Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • It avoids mixing ownership information with other information in the notes column

- I don't see this as a negative point, personally. Ownership: Private. Side-note: Owner is Sir John Smith. Seems standard to me and more logical use of the Notes column which is unsortable, allowing better sorting of the Ownership - primarily to extract Accessible castles, such as those run by EH, NT and LAs. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

• • Using just codes makes sparse use of the column, given the width required by the name.

- Putting the Sort icon below the "Ownership" heading would make it narrower, or renaming it to "Owner" would help. It's a trivial matter compared to the benefits of a logical Sort key. Ma®©usBritish (talk)

Not sure what is normal for table headers and sort buttons, I have no particular preference. Paravane (talk) 22:22, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Just another example, of possible display methods, from playing about with tables and sizes. This one combines Name/Image, also to see how it might add more space vertically as well as heighten each row. Again, just throwing rough ideas down; food for thought. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 07:26, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Name	Type	Date	Condition	Ownership	Grid Ref.	Notes
Castle	Hill fort	1400 13th century	Restored	LA	SE194542	Slighted in 1502. North Yorkshire Council
Castle	Motte and bailey	1283 1283	Fragmentary remains	EH	SU970770	Motte and bailey.
Castle	Fortified manor house	1458 c.1458	Restored	PR	NE015844	Brick-built, on site of earlier building. Residence of John Smith Esq.

I've added the Date sorting info so that all the dates, centuries, etc sort logically like in my earlier example - I don't think it's broken anything whilst doing that. Whilst manually correcting a couple of things I noticed that there is a lot of use of Template:convert for tower/wall heights, etc. Only problem here is it's very inconsistently used - sometimes it's going from ft->m, other times from m->ft. I think one way or the other needs to be selected and applied throughout, so that it's uniform which appears first and which in brackets. I don't think there is a MOS standard as to which is best practice. Also noticed some heights use "ft" some "feet", again needs to be one or the other to neaten things up - especially for FLC standards - "ft" is probably best. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 08:48, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks again for your input. I think that's about everything dealt with except the two remaining issues of ownership and grid references. A counter-example to the List of Sites of Special Scientific Interest in North Yorkshire is the List of tallest buildings and structures in London. Paravane (talk) 23:46, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Not necessarily. People tend to use street maps and A–Z guides to find their way around places like London where directions tend to be more specific. Castles, often located in the middle of the country, which doesn't usually have A–Z coverage, are easier to pinpoint by a 6-digit Grid Reference, which would probably be less appropriate on articles like List of tallest buildings and structures in London. Ruins hidden behind trees or just as earthwork mounds to the untrained eye are unlikely to have a postcode whereas anywhere can be Grid Ref mapped and found on http://www.getamap.ordnancesurveyleisure.co.uk/ - which is the same for SSSIs, many are isolated patches in the country, not on public routes, hence Grid Refs being valuable. Like you said yourself, accessibility is sometimes questionable for many castles - OS maps tend to highlight private land/roads, as well as public access routes and NT/EH sites - speaking from experience, as I enjoy hill walking myself and have visited a couple of castles this year as there are plenty in the north, near me. Including virtually all of York. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 01:11, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

The concept behind this list has not been to provide a rigorously comprehensive listing, as there are more than 2000 sites - see for instance The Gatehouse. A complete listing of all sites where there are clearly visible remains is broadly the aim, but only those with 'significant' remains are listed in the main tables, creating a browsable collection of all the most interesting sites - which can be elusive when distributed amongst vanished castles and earthwork remains. This leaves open the possibility of pursuing completeness in separate county listings, already done for Cheshire, for example. For all the earthwork sites which are not in the main tables, there is no provision for location data in the chosen format, but this is available in the county lists, and is also available for every site which has its own wiki page. So if you want to visit Sigston Castle, say, this list as currently conceived cannot supply the location data. The ownership column is now sortable, albeit with a different logic to your original proposal. Paravane (talk) 23:10, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, I cannot imagine anyone wanting to tackle an article with 2000+ sites. This article can sometimes be a little slow to load already, even on broadband, I think many more entries would make it impossible to load given the high number of images and tables it has to render. It is probably best to keep the list discriminatingly selective.

I think the article might be almost set for a BCR once you reference a few more of the details in the text. I think it is a small step to B-class, but I expect it is a long way from A-class and and FLA. I, personally, do not follow the logic of the Ownership column - I find myself referring to the key more often because the icons are not easy to remember and having a mix of icons and text seems rather inconsistent. I don't think this will be an issue for BCR - but for anything higher, I expect it might lack support. My main concern, however, is that you have applied a logic that might not be immediately apparent to other editors or inexperienced contributors. Hence why I think a simpler key would have been much more appropriate. It would be easier for any other editor to pop in "PR" for a Private Residence, and detail the owners name in the Notes, than have to check if there is need for an icon or not, and the way that particular column is formatted. At least with a consistent format there is less room for error. For any chance of FLA, and possibly ACR, I expect a major overhaul would be required to support both readability and simpler editing.

I disagree with your doubt about OS locations. Earthworks are listed on OS maps, sometimes the word Motte in Gothic-script appears on a map when referring to an old long gone castle where nothing remains but humps and bumps in the ground, or a few old remnants of wall a few feet high. Plenty of "Roman Ruins" are labelled in the Lake District on my map too, in much the same way. I passed through one of these "mottes", once. If it weren't for the note on the map, I wouldn't have recognised it as anything more than a deep ditch in a sheep field. But more to the point, there is only one format for OS Grid refs, a 4–8 digit number, depending how accurate you like to be. Most people use a 6-digit grid ref. There's no reason why every single castle on the list cannot be found on a map. I am unsure why the editors of the Cheshire castle list have chosen to use the {{coord}} template - that seems all well and good for people using Google Earth or satellite data online - but your average walker, tourist, rambler, etc doesn't use latitude/longitude - they use a Grid Ref - which leaves this article open to go one better than that and provide practical data for outdoor use, not online use - which makes far more sense. Nevertheless, that article is FLA, due to its consistent layout, and inclusion of data such as geolocation - this article has the same potential, imo.

So far it's a fine article, well developed, with room for more development. Seems to have been a lack of peer reviewers, beyond myself, which seems a shame - I would recommend you stick in a few more citations to strengthen the referencing side of things and then proceed to BCR and see if that gets a few more ideas from reviewers, beyond what I have already suggested would be worth doing extra.

Ma®©usBritish (talk) 04:23, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

As long as you do have icons, I recommend <big>'''&dagger;'''</big> = † for those that are Church of England owned castles. It's identifiable. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 09:52, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

The article has already been assessed as B-class. Regarding the ownership column, your confusion with the icons demonstrates how something that seems logical to one person may not be so easily comprehensible to another, which - thinking of readers rather than editors - might be equally true of the two-letter codes. Apart from a few unusual cases, if a castle has an icon it is regularly or frequently open to the public, otherwise it is not; the icons themselves are a 'standard' resource, used in other articles beside this one. Logic aside, arguably the icons work at an intuitive level, standing out from the text and drawing the eye to the castles open to the public, rather than the rest. I did not myself initiate the use of icons, but I have now extended the logic of it.

I do not doubt the usefulness of grid references, the issue with the earthwork castles is that in the case of those which are simply listed above the main tables in each county, there is no place for a grid reference as the list is currently conceived, unless each name is followed by a grid reference in brackets, say, which would be unsightly.

Thanks for all your thoughts, edits and suggestions, I feel that some reflection and perhaps a wider input of views would be sensible before any more substantial changes are made. The most useful work currently on castles in England is perhaps in creating new wiki pages for all those castles on the list that do not yet have one. Paravane (talk) 20:12, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

I didn't notice that it was already rated. I don't think it meets B-class, personally, I don't think the referencing is strong enough for an article this size. Not the tables - but the text preceding them has too many uncited claims for my liking. I think it needs re-evaluating to allow the new material to be reviewed - can't expect any article to keep the same rating if it has been heavily rewritten. I note the update was performed by Woody here quite recently, but I don't know how he considers all major points as being referenced when that is clearly not the case; there are at least a half dozen things should be referenced - those being uncited historical claims, most of the current citations relate to construction/architecture/state of ruins, etc. Bearing in mind that this is a WP:MILHIST peer review, I think it important to point that out. If you need me to tag those things as {{cn}} let me know, but I think it's pretty obvious what needs sourcing, so I see no need to uglify the article.

I wasn't thinking of readers - I was thinking of both readers and editors equally - I don't think the Ownership is easy to follow and even less so in terms of updating. 2-letter codes are no more than abbreviations - something used in many things - postcodes, reg plates, initials, etc - people have a natural knack for relating letters to words. I still think the sorting order is not as strong as it could be either, simply because mixed icons and text don't allow anyone to comprehend the order. Whilst a logo of English Heritage might well be sorted as "EH", without that distinction, it isn't clear. I have an affinity for logic, mainly from years of web coding, as well as using OS maps that do use icons to identify things - but I still find some elements of the tables less straight-forward than they could be.

Just my 2c though. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 07:31, 16 July 2011 (UTC)

Regarding OS grid references: I'm the editor who put together list of castles in Cheshire. {{coord}} was chosen as when used in conjunction with {{GeoGroupTemplate}} it allowed the reader to click through to a map off all the castles in either Bing or Google maps. I appreciate OS grid references would be useful for UK readers, but those not from the UK might not have a clue what it means. That said, I imagine the majority of the audience will be from the UK so I'm not too fussed either way. Perhaps both types of co-ordinate could be used? As for sourcing, a couple of additional references might be welcome, but the content itself is correct (I know WP:V is policy and I'm not saying more references shouldn't be added, but that the hard work has already been done and that adding a couple of inline citations shouldn't be too hard). However, being familiar with the subject matter I'm not seeing which points need further references so it might help if you list the instances here rather than adding {{cn}} tags to the article. Nev1 (talk) 16:54, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't know if both would be practical, as the OS references also link to online satellite data - I think Google make Grid Refs translate into longitude-latitude coords, but not vice versa. I don't think anyone not from the UK will actually be noting coords, so the use of Grid Refs wouldn't make any difference. Not that I can picture many people wanting to see a castle from space, they're the type of thing you want to see from ground level, personally, not a vague outline from above. But I don't think it's unfair to say, why would Wiki have created a Grid Ref tag that only makes sense to Brits, if they don't expect us to use it? I personally can't make sense of the way longitude-latitude coords are written, it is more complicated - but if both types link to the same data, my preference would be to utilise OS Refs for the bonus that they can be used by walkers with regular OS maps. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 03:51, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Citations

• "Some were later rebuilt in stone, but there are a great many castle sites in England where all that is visible today are traces of earthworks."
  • - citation to support that castles were rebuilt.
  • - citation to support visible traces exist today.

Done. Nev1 (talk) 13:09, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

• "In the far north of England, where conditions remained unsettled, fortified buildings continued to be built as late as the 16th century, not only by the rich and powerful but by any with adequate means, as defence not against great armies, but against the notorious Border Reivers."
  • - citation to support that hostilities in the north existed, hench the requirement for more castles.
  • - citation to support their need to defend against Border Reivers, wikilink alone is not adequate.

• "A castle differed from earlier fortifications in being in general a private fortified residence, typically of a feudal lord, providing the owner with a secure base from which to control his lands, as well as a symbol of wealth and power."
  • - citation to support this difference between earlier defence, and show of wealth and power.

This is already referenced to Brown 1962, it's just that the reference is attached to the following sentence. Nev1 (talk) 13:09, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

• "The many Roman forts of which ruins survive in Britain differed in being wholly military in nature, camps or strongholds of the Roman army: the Romans also built town or city walls in England which can still be seen, for instance at Silchester."
  • - citation/s to support the Roman influence on fortification designs, given that this is the only key mention of the Romans in the article, something material to support their role in this area of English history.

• "By the 16th century the role of fortifications had changed once more with the development of artillery capable of breaching even thick stone walls."
  • - citation to support development of artillery, to prompt the need for greater castle strength; this is an important evolution in castle design, due to the early use of gunpowder and cannons, and should be strongly referenced.

• "Once fortifications had become altogether redundant, it became increasingly rare in England for new buildings to be described as castles,"
  • - citation to support the reduced use of the term/description "castle".

• "—were, over the centuries, adapted and modernised to make them more suitable for continued use as residences:"
  • - citation to support that developments were done in past centuries, rather than by modern organisations to preserve the appearance.

• "In the 18th and 19th centuries especially, many castles underwent 'improvements' by architects such as Anthony Salvin, and in this period a fashion developed for entirely new houses to be built in the style of castles, and to be known as castles"
  • - citation to support that Anthony Salvin existed and did this work, wikilink alone is insufficient.
  • - citation to support that such a fashion developed, as this is a historical claim, someone must have written about it.

• "No list of castles in England can ever be complete, because there will never be complete agreement in every case as to whether the remains of a building are those of a castle, whether a given place is the site of a castle, or whether a surviving building should be considered to be a castle."
  • - citation to support this claim; who says there can't be an agreement? Obviously there are experts in the field of castles, cite one who can support this.

It seems like common sense as border issues are always a problem, but I have added a source. I would also note that new excavations can uncover new sites, as was the case in the 1940s for instance (if you wish to include that, it can be referenced to page xiii of Castellarium Anglicanum). Nev1 (talk) 13:09, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Regards, Ma®©usBritish ^[talk] 07:04, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Paravane, do you want to take care of these or can I chip in? I've only skimmed over them, but I reckon I could take care of the bulk in half an hour tops if my heap of castle books isn't too disorganised. Nev1 (talk) 10:27, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm very happy for you to help take care of this, I have limited resources on my bookshelves. Thanks! Paravane (talk) 12:27, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm getting error messages from the Wikimedia Foundation when I try some of my edits so I'll return to this later. Nev1 (talk) 13:09, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm sure you're both doing a great job; sorry to be a pain, but the higher the citation standard, the better the article - Paravane cited a few points I raised earlier in this PR (seems like a long time ago, doesn't it? Wiki suddenly becomes a FT job..) so the handful I raised here were all that really stood out to me as major points that need sourcing. If I can just make a minor observation, though. You added 2 new books and gave them ISBN-10 codes: in WP:ISBN they prefer the use of ISBN-13 (even to the point of stressing it in bold) where possible. If the book is quite old, and doesn't have a 13-digit ISBN at the back or on the Copyright page, I normally find it's easy to get any off Amazon.co.uk just from matching the title/author/year/format, as it's their Primary key. If not found there, simply Google "ISBN converter" - top result is a tool than converts ISBN-10 to -13 and vice versa; you can also enter ISBNs in the Amazon Search box to confirm them, it doesn't have to be a just title or author you search for. NB: ISBN format simply needs to be "978-1234567890" with no hypens other than the one after 978. Just mentioning this, as it helps maintain consistency with the other titles referenced in an article, is up to date with the latest ISBN standard, and helps get articles promoted quicker by following citation standards (gives quality reviewers one thing less to complain about) - I'm forever doing it as a routine part of copy-edits, especially when converting older articles book lists to the newer {{cite book}} template. Cheers, Ma®©usBritish ^[talk] 14:55, 20 July 2011 (UTC)

Hchc2009

Really good to see this page developing! Some thoughts from me:

• There are some long paragraphs early in the article, such as:

"Pele towers which became known as castles, or preserve a castle-like aspect, are included in the present list. Many others, or their remains, have survived much altered, incorporated in later country houses or farmhouses, and are excluded from the list: amongst these are Aske Hall, Biddlestone Chapel, Bolling Hall, Bolton Old Hall, Boltongate Rectory, Causey Park House, Clennell Hall, Cliburn Hall, Corbridge Low Hall, Cowmire Hall, Craster Arms (Beadnell), Croglin Old Pele, Denton Hall, Dovenby Hall, Dunstan Hall, East Shaftoe Hall, Godmond Hall, Great Salkeld Rectory, Hardrigg Hall, Hepscott Hall, Hetton Hall, Hollin Hall, Hutton Hall (Penrith), Irton Hall, Johnby Hall, Killington Hall, Kirkoswald College, Levens Hall, Little Harle Tower, Littlehoughton Hall, Nether Hall, Netherby Hall, Ormside Hall, Pockerley Pele, Preston Patrick Hall, Randalholme Hall, Rock Hall, Rudchester Hall, Sella Park, Selside Hall, Skelsmergh Hall, Smardale Hall, Thistlewood Farmhouse, Warnell Hall, Weetwood Hall and Witton Tower."

• I found these quite lists hard to work through, as we've effectively got lists turned into paragraphs. I could think of two alternatives:

• You could put the list into a footnote. This would make the intro read more easily, but still include the information within the article.
• You could create list pages for them (e.g. "List of castles incorporated into later houses") and wikilink to the list

• As an aside, I knew what you meant by "how castle-like is the surviving building", but there might be a better way to phrase "castle-like"!
• Hchc2009 (talk) 17:11, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your thoughts, it's good to have feedback from multiple sources! I'm sure others will agree with you in this case, but I have felt the approach is necessary in view of the inevitable arbitrariness in determining what sites should appear on the list.

• I concede that I have created 'paragraph lists', which is an unusual approach. The reason I have created them is with a view to stabilising the main list as well as providing a context for it. I would argue that for this list these are important functions which justify an unusual approach, function ultimately more important than style, and putting the lists in paragraphs keeps the information very compact.
• These paragraph lists are assigned to a section entitled "Scope and exclusions", which warns the reader, if not to expect quite such long lists, at least to realise what is being done. There is no need to read this section at all unless 'scope and exclusions' is a compelling topic. You say you found these lists hard to work through, but I wonder why you would choose to work through them: unless you have a particular purpose, surely you would just skip to the end of the list. Given that each list is all in blue, it's easy to see where the end is.
• None of these lists is separate from the list of castles itself, since they are all mutually exclusive, necessarily so. Once you create separate lists on separate pages, it will be impossible to prevent occurrences of the same building on more than one list, and their function in establishing boundaries and exclusions will be lost. Putting the lists into footnotes would - I would argue - make them less prominent, less likely to be noticed, likely to be thought less important, and less likely to be effective. By being taken out of the main text, they will effectively be demoted.
• 'How castle-like is the surviving building' - there might well be a better way of phrasing it, but it's succinct, avoids trying to answer the question as to what this might mean, and is not invented! (cf. wikt:castlelike) Paravane (talk) 21:24, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Nev1

According to D. J. Cathcart King's Castellarium Anglicanum, the most significant comprehensive index of castles in England and Wales, gives over 1,500 sites in England. While I mention that figure, I note it's reference to Liddiard (2003), but he edited the volume and the chapter being referenced was written by Richard Eales, so the reference needs tweaking slightly. In no way would it be realistic for a single list on Wikipedia to include all of those sites in a manageable form; just take a look at the Gatehouse website to see how long those lists can get. For this reason, I like the approach taken here to concentrate on those buildings with some surviving remains. I think it's a good idea to measure lists against the Featured List criteria, and this issue relates to criterion 3a:

It comprehensively covers the defined scope, providing at least all of the major items and, where practical, a complete set of items; where appropriate, it has annotations that provide useful and appropriate information about the items.

For the most part I think the article satisfies that, but I can think of at least one case where an important castle is relegated because it was utterly destroyed. Bedford Castle was the subject of one of medieval England's best documented sieges, and in the aftermath it was razed to the ground so as there are no remains (apart from a much mutilated motte IIRC) it's relegated to a note at the beginning of its section despite being one of the more important castles in the county. It's possible there may be other cases like this, but that one really stuck out for me. How to address that, I'm not quite sure. Maybe you should just note in the lead that there are going to be some exceptions to the rules laid down in the lead because whichever way you slice the cake you'll probably find some important sites outside your criteria.

On the subject of criteria, the article casts the net wide, which is a must really for this kind of exercise, but not too wide. I'm reminded of the preface to Adrian Pettifer's English Castles: a guide by counties:

English castles are a very diverse group, and consequently it is hard to do them justice. They range from massive edifices which still dominate the landscape to 'motte-and-bailey' earthworks and Border pele tower. Castellated mansions of the later Middle Ages are often dismissed as castles altogether because of the concessions made to comfort, but castles always display a compromise between the requirements of defence and domestic convenience. I have adopted a more tolerant approach and accepted all sites with enough defensive characteristics. ... My aim is to give a brief description and history of every masonry castle except the most fragmentary. I have been more selective with earthwork castle because they are so numerous. ...

Real castles are a medieval phenomenon, spanning the centuries from the Norman Conquest to the Tudor era, and that sets the limits for this book. Buildings and earthworks of other periods fall outside its scope, even if they are popularly called 'castle' like many ancient hillforts, Roman forts and stately homes. I have included the small proportion of medieval fortifications which are not actually castles, these being walled towns, defended monasteries and Tudor coastal forts. They are too closely related and it would be a pity to ignore them. For the sake of clarity a few sites which do not strictly merit inclusion have been allowed in, namely sham castles on genuine sites and medieval manor houses which bear the name castle but do not actually deserve the title.

Had I made this list, I would have stuck to King's list in Castellarium Anglicanum, and if Hchc2009 had written it probably would have taken on a different form from this or how I would have planned it. But there's more than one way to go about this, and I certainly appreciate this approach.

The history section seems fine. It provides a brief history of the castle in England without overwhelming the reader, but there are a handful of minor issues. Where it says "Castles continued to be built in England for several hundred years, reaching their peak of power and sophistication in the late 13th century" the bits in italics could be changed to "military sophistication", it's up to you. Where it says "Earlier fortified structures, such as the Saxon Burh or the Iron Age Hill fort, provided public or communal defences,[9] as did town or city walls which were built in medieval times" I'd ditch "which were built in medieval times" as it implies it was restricted to that period which you then contradict a couple of sentences later when talking about the Romans building town walls. Also shouldn't burh be lower case? The third paragraph interrupts the chronological flow; could this be avoided by making it the first paragraph and adding to it the first sentence of what is currently the first paragraph?

I think some of the lists from the scope and exclusions section can be trimmed. In the table section I notice a couple of maps; I'm not sure how practical it will be to have a series of maps. Some will become very crowded, and when included may cramp an already fairly wide table. For the most part the tables are fine, although I think a key would be useful. For example does date refer to when each site was founded, when building work took place, when it was in use, or some other significant event? And it needs to be made clear that ownership refers to current ownership. I'm not completely sold on the type column. With so much variety in castles it's not always easy to classify them, and as people try to be more precise in their classification more and more obscure terminology is developed, and there is also the issue that the form of a castle can change over time. What may have started as a timber motte and bailey may later find its motte levelled for example. But, as a quick reference I don't suppose it does too much harm. There are a couple of terms that appear in the table that aren't explained elsewhere, for example "shell keep" is dropped on the reader without explanation.

Sorry if I've repeated anything the other reviewers have said, I've only had time to read through the article rather than other people's comments. I am proud to have seen this article develop and I cannot commend Paravane enough for the effort that has gone into this. Nev1 (talk) 16:42, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments, answering your points in the order in which they appear:

• The Liddiard reference was a stopgap, it would surely make sense for the reference to come from King, if he makes mention somewhere of how many sites he has included, but I have not had convenient access to a copy.

• Bedford Castle - it could be given its own row in the main tables, I've done that for Queenborough. The focus has been on surviving buildings, to the neglect of military history. If Bedford, which others - Bristol, Gloucester? It would be preferable for the number of vanished castles in the main tables to be kept to a minimum, I think. From the lead: "Vanished castles or those whose remains are barely visible are not listed, although exceptions have been made for some important or well-known buildings and sites."

• Criteria / post-medieval sites - this list is included in WP:ARCH as well as WP:MILHIST, and of course Salvin and others worked on medieval buildings as well as wholly new ones in similar styles. I feel that including some sites that are not 'true' castles makes the list more comprehensive for general reference and usefully so.

• History - when I wrote this, there seemed to be a reason for the order of the paragraphs, but I cannot now see any reason for ignoring chronology. Regarding "town or city walls which were built in medieval times", I originally had "the town or city walls which..." but 'the' was edited out by MarcusBritish. Strictly, there is no implication that they were only built in medieval times, so no contradiction. The train of thought was that hill fort and burh were comparable, amongst medieval fortifications, not to castles but to town walls; then it is a further observation that the Romans built them too. I'll give a little thought to what changes might be made.

If I altered the actual meaning of any sentences with any of my minor edits, do not hesitate to correct them. My main intent was to make the text less verbose. Whilst I have no doubt about your good use of English, words like "moreover", "nevertheless" and similar words, often added padding rather than meaning to sentences. I cut a lot of them out, to make the text more direct and to the point, and also a little easier for non-English readers to handle, because these flowery words may not make sense to them. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 03:39, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

• On reflection, the reason for departing from chronology is that this piece was intended as a quick and easy introduction to castles, rather than a history of fortifications. Originally it was the start of the article, the current lead was added later. The motivation was to involve the reader directly with castles, and not distract or deter him/her by introducing hillforts or burhs or castra at the start - so more people might continue reading. By delaying, the reader has been exposed to castles for a bit before being pushed to think about comparisons with other types of site. Paravane (talk) 16:33, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

• Scope and exclusions - not sure what you have in mind to be 'trimmed'! As I explained to Hchc2009 above, I see the lists in that section as having quite an important role.

• Maps - these were only added yesterday, not by me, I have no immediate plans to contribute to them. I have put in a request for the template to be upgraded to offer a direct link to geohack from each location on the maps, which would make them more useful. However, Northumberland and others would need to be rather large. I don't know whether putting a full set of maps on a separate page would be an acceptable option. A decision needs to be taken as to whether they are to be kept on the existing page.

• Tables - explanations for date, ownership etc can be added to the key, above or below the icons. I really think current ownership could be assumed, but it's certainly better to be explicit. As regards type, I'm not sure whether you have reservations about including the column, or just the way I have done it. There are some clear distinctions to be made, so I think the column should be there. Keeping the information brief makes it easier to pick out essential differences between sites and helps keep the tables compact even at 1024x768, which is the resolution I work at. This is just a reference list, with links to the specific pages which have more detailed information, my view is that rigour is not the only consideration in this context, though the descriptions certainly should not be misleading. Compare describing the Earth as a sphere, it's not accurate but it's a useful starting point. I was aware that 'shell keep' was not explained, I was inclined to the view that the term 'keep' has been introduced, explaining 'shell keep' will entail going into a greater level of detail, and any article has to make some assumptions about the level of comprehension of its readers.

• Thanks for your support. I've spent a lot more time on this than I originally envisaged! Paravane (talk) 23:00, 18 July 2011 (UTC)

Dank

These are my edits; feel free to revert. I got down to Scope and exclusions. I don't have an answer to the question of how much, if at all, I should be attempting to copyedit for an international readership, and I'm open to talking about it. If you're not on board with these changes, please let me know.

• FWIW, MOS asks for double quotes rather than single quotes, even in BritEng articles. ('castle' -> "castle" etc.)
  • Done.
• "A few castles are known to have been built in England before the Normans invaded in 1066, a great many were built in the years following, the principal mechanism by means of which the Normans were able to consolidate their control over the country.": The first comma is called a "comma splice" on this side of the pond and I think over there too, but whereas they're still forbidden here, they're getting more common over there. I'd still recommend conversion to a semicolon.
  • Done
• "A castle differed from earlier fortifications in being in general": I recommend "Unlike earlier fortifications, castles were in general ..."
  • I agree it's ugly, I'll give it some thought.
    • Changed wording.
• "prompted by fears of invasion": it's not clear who or what was prompted.
  • Changed wording.
• "a series of new fortresses was built": Both "was" and "were" will sound off to some readers; perhaps try "new fortresses were built in series", or just "new fortresses were built".
  • As it stands it is grammatically correct, both of your suggestions do alter the meaning.
    • No problem. - Dank (push to talk)
      • Changed wording.
• "since they were not private residences, but national fortifications, they no longer possess": ... they did not possess
  • I would argue that the present tense is preferable here, in which case a future editor might make the reverse request. It is the present-day perception of these buildings that is at issue, those considered to be castles possess certain characteristics, in particular that they were built as private fortified residences.
• "... a symbol of its possession; a castle becoming a grand residence proclaiming the status of its owner." comma here.
  • I originally had a comma, a previous editor changed it to a semicolon...
    • Changed back to a comma.
• "... built by Salvin; a building so authentic ...": colon. - Dank (push to talk) 21:37, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
  • Done. I originally had a comma, a previous editor changed it to a semicolon, I'm not convinced that a colon is preferable to a comma...

Thanks for your interest and comments, I'll need to think about what changes to make. One thing that is clear is that successive minor copy-edits can generate slight but undesirable changes in meaning, and a process of creep. Regarding your changing the criteria to a list of questions, originally some of them could be read as questions, but the context and lack of question marks indicated that they were not actually posed as questions. I somehow think that this change might foster more changes, I can envisage that initially another editor may come along and object to the phrase 'list include such factors as' being followed by a list of questions. Even though a list makes it easier to read, I am inclined to revert it, changing the word order, e.g. "how strongly fortified was the building" to "how strongly fortified the building was" - it wasn't intended to be read as a question, I just thought that word order was preferable. Paravane (talk) 23:32, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good, and sounds like you're on top of everything. - Dank (push to talk) 00:55, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

Various changes made, there's the outstanding issue of tense referred to above, otherwise I think I have dealt with all your suggestions. Paravane (talk) 20:01, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

In peer reviews, I generally just do some copyediting and make a few suggestions, and don't follow up. - Dank (push to talk) 20:09, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Arms, titles, honours and styles of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

Referring article for BCR, simply due to plentiful updates, expanded content, movement of content from its Main article to here, recently. Is really just a lot of lists and dates to support the Main article of Wellington, but getting it reviewed and rated even as Start or C, is indicative of where it stands for development. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 22:21, 9 June 2011 (UTC)

Jim Sweeney

Don't know where this one can go should it be a list as it mostly is at present or prose, but however it needs more references some sections have no references at all.

The article name is a bit over long but i can not think of anything to shorten it maybe Honours of the 1st Duke of Wellington or Honours of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington Jim Sweeney (talk) 12:10, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Comments per standard disclaimer. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries.

• "along with von Blücher, he defeated the French ...": I agree with the lowercasing on "von", but both because it's unusual to lowercase a name in English, and because we generally introduce commanders with more than just their last name, I'd add something ... at least "Field Marshal".
• "During his life, Wellington received numerous honours, titles and awards throughout his career as a statesman and soldier.": Lose the "during his life", it's redundant to the last bit.
• The lead should summarize the page, per WP:LEAD; it will need more detail to do that.
• "in a unique ceremony lasting a full day": if the main thing that was unique about it was that it lasted a full day, say something like "the only such ceremony to last a full day". If you're referring to something else that was unique about it, then say what that was. - Dank (push to talk) 15:01, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves recipients (1945)

The 1945 list of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves is by far the most complicated of the bunch. I would like to ask the reviewers to focus on the Notes section of the article. Please let me know how to improve the article especially with respect to the English language. Thanks for the painstaking effort involved in reviewing this information. MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:47, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• I made a few tweaks. Looks good.
• "for reasons associated with the deteriorating situation of the Third Reich during the final days of World War II": Better would be to give the reasons, instead of saying there are reasons but not telling us what they are. For instance, "because record-keeping in the Third Reich during the final days of World War II was unreliable". - Dank (push to talk) 03:58, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

• Looks quite good to me, too. I have a couple of minor fix-it suggestions below. (I only looked at the Notes in detail, as I believe that Dan has mainly focused on the body prose).
  • Please check this in the Notes, it doesn't look right to me: "Scherzer does not confirm this entry but states that the WWaiting for announced statementW is noted instead.";
  • "Ernst-Günther Krätschmer however indicated that Kausch was wounded 25 April, therefore he couldn't have received the news on the 25 April." I suggest tweaking this slightly as follows: "Ernst-Günther Krätschmer, however, indicated that Kausch was wounded on 25 April and as such he therefore could not have received the news that day." (I think it would read more smoothly, but this is only a suggestion);
  • there is a slight inconsistency in spelling here: "Domaschk then revoked..." and then "...Major Domasch apparently";
  • I think there is a typo here: ". I appears that this information never arrived before the end of the war." (I think that "I" at the start should be "It" - I haven't made the edit, though);
  • please check this quotation: ""Deffered, because missing in action!" ("Deffered" is spelt incorrectly - there should only be one "f", but there should be two "r"s. If the quotation spells it incorrectly, then it is fine to keep it like that though, of course).
• Keep up the good work. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 13:24, 1 July 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks! I addressed your comments! MisterBee1966 (talk) 14:23, 1 July 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

As a quick comment, is there any reason why the number of these medals awarded in 1945 was so high? - 194 in just over four months of fighting is a much higher rate than any of the previous years of the war (had the war lasted throughout 1945 and medals continued to be awarded at this rate there would have been about 582 recipients). I presume that this is related to some combination of a) Germany's dire situation leading to particularly intense fighting and b) awarding medals was a means of motivating continued resistance, but is there a reference which explains this? It's notable that the number of medals awarded in each year of the war steadily increased. Nick-D (talk) 01:37, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Interesting question! Both Fritjof Schaulen and Gordon Williamson also mention this in their respective books without going into much detail. The conclusion is somewhat similar in nature and they both attribute this to the increasing number of opportunities for individuals to distinguish themselves. A key milestone here is the Normandy Invasion. Historians discussing the question of ending the war in July 1944 (20 July Plot) often point to the fact that roughly half of the German losses during World War II were sustained after 20 July 1944. If this is indicative of the intensity of combat than number of medals presented and German casualties are in the same order of magnitude, roughly half before and half after 20 July 1944. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:03, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Étienne Marie Antoine Champion de Nansouty

I am submitting this article to a peer review, in preparation of an FA nomination. The article has undergone an A-Class review, but was unsuccessful, due to a temporary shortage of reviewers, but I believe that it is not far from FA standards. The article recounts the career and life of General Etienne de Nansouty, a soldier who had a brilliant career during the Napoleonic Wars, as one of the foremost cavalry commanders of his time. He was present and had a major role in some of the greatest battles of his time, from operations on the Rhine in 1792-1797, to Austerlitz, Friedland, Wagram, Borodino, Hanau and the defense of France in 1814. I've also done my best to try to catch a glimpse of the personality of the man, who was often torn between his sense of duty and patriotism and an almost stubborn commitment to try and protect the lives of his men against decisions which were at times unreasonable.--Alexandru Demian (talk) 11:20, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

I mostly do citations and sourcing. I haven't done any plagiarism / close-paraphrase / copyvio / does the source support the statement checking. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:00, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

• Your transclusion isn't user friendly at all, and appears broken.

Fixed by Andynomite.--Alexandru Demian (talk) 10:51, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

• You need to use a consistent citation style.
  • I've noted ,,Title'' "Title" "Title". Titles of works which are whole and entire as published (ie: a book, as opposed to a chapter or article) are not normally quoted. Your quotes vary between French and English in your bibliography. Unless the quotes are themselves part of the title of the work (as listed on the title page) they ought not to be included in the French style.

Fixed.--Alexandru Demian (talk) 10:51, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

• • You vary between "Publisher, Year" and "Year, Publisher". Publishers in acronym form need to be spelt out in full. Courcelles, Jean B. lacks publisher information.

Fixed.--Alexandru Demian (talk) 10:51, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

• • Minus signs or hyphens "-" are not normally used to divide authors from their titles ("Foo, Bar. - Title") as you have it.

Fixed.--Alexandru Demian (talk) 10:51, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

• • Is Chandler the series editor for Castle? If so then it is "Author. Title, Editor (series editor), Series Title, Publisher, Year." Series Titles come before Publishers.

Fixed.--Alexandru Demian (talk) 10:51, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

• What makes "Amis et passionnés du Père Lachaise" or "GeneaNet" appropriate citations? Author, containing work, section of work cited, date etc. etc. What makes either reliable?
• "p. 6-7" => "pp. 6–7" note the n-dash for page ranges "–".
• Consistent citation style please, "Pigeard, Dictionnaire des batailles de Napoléon," versus "Pigeard, Dictionnaire des batailles...,".
• Full stops at the end of your citations, ie: "p. 100" versus "p. 100.", use one style and stick with it.

Hi! Thanks a lot for your comments, I'll start working on them. What do you mean by "Your transclusion isn't user friendly at all, and appears broken". Thanks for clarifying. --Alexandru Demian (talk) 08:49, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

If you go to Military History's review page and click on [edit] in the section, it doesn't work properly, give it a go! Fifelfoo (talk) 10:53, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Fixed. Andynomite (talk) 08:35, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Comment

• This article goes beyond the occasional non-English language sources with 80% of the sources in French, see WP:NOENG. Did you do the translating? I'd see if you could alter that ratio.
• You need to include more of the original french text in the article; for example, the epitaph translation should be in French in quotes, and then translate it separately outside of quotes or in a note; alternately in English with the French in a note. You probably should say epitaph instead of engraving on his tombstone too. Obviously, there are many other instances of this.
• Deathbed "I have carefully reflected upon all my action ever since I was born and in all my life, I have not done anyone wrong" vs. epitaph "In all my life, I have not done any harm to anyone" Again, include the original french somewhere (article/note). As an aside, that's what it says on the tombstone and maybe he never personally 'harmed' anyone but I don't understand what this meant: he was a honest or honorable man or he literally never shot or sabered anyone, he just had his men do it so it didn't count? Kirk (talk) 12:39, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• The changes since the A-class review are fine, but the text hasn't changed much since then, so I'll repeat my comments from there: I got a little more than halfway, down to Étienne_Marie_Antoine_Champion_de_Nansouty#War of the Fifth Coalition. It would be really helpful if the nominator and others could finish up; I think reviewers will respond well to this article at FAC if we can get it polished up. Here is a diff showing some of the changes Ruth and I made. - Dank (push to talk) 03:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

Arado E.381

I am nominating this article for peer review because I wish for this article to attain FA status, but would like comments before I go through the process. Wikicopter _{what i do} s + c cup|former 03:54, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

You may wish to fix your citations for locations; as an offering, I have done this for you (feel free to revert). In particular: No state locations for international cities, "England" => "United Kingdom" problem, contraction vs no-contraction. 4 ISBNs tested okay. Spotcheck for plagiarism / copyright on the one available online source tested okay I can't find any problems, touch my talk page to allow me to note these facts when you hit FAC. Fifelfoo (talk) 04:14, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

I think I did last time. Wikicopter _{what i do} s + c cup|former 16:01, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Sp33dyphil

• I think the placement of "Parasite aircraft were unusual for aviation." at the end of the first para of "Development" is a bid odd; is there a way to merge this into the paragraph?
  • Merged into the second para.
• Italicise "Arado Flugzeugwerke" – foreign word.
  •  Done.
• "External links" should be placed at the very end.
  •  Done.
• "The Mark II was very similar to the Mark I besides having a larger overall size and smaller fins." Can there be an explanation telling the reader about the longer moment arm necessitates a smaller fin?
  • I don't understand what you mean myself :), so I don't think I'm the one to explain.
    • Naturally, a reader would think that, if the a/c is bigger, then the fins should accordingly be enlarged. This is not the case - a longer aircraft only requires a smaller fin; it's to do with aerodynamics, which is not my field of expertise. I recommend Bobrayner as the go-to man. Sp33dyphil ^Vote! 08:24, 31 May 2011 (UTC)
• Re-link Walter HWK 109-509A-2 --> Walter HWK 109-509A-2. Same with Walter HWK 109-509B
  •  Done
• Missing period at the end of second para of "Development".
  •  Done
• Add portal, I'm suggesting {{Portal box|Aviation|World War II}}
  • No "See Also" section so added at Notes section. WikiCopter 02:31, 30 May 2011 (UTC)
  • That's alright. Sp33dyphil ^Vote!

Farawayman

• Lead:
  • "There were three proposed designs for the plane, each being slightly different from each other." Consider "There were three proposed designs for the plane, each being slightly different from the other."
  • "launched from an Arado Ar 234 carrier aircraft to attack Allied aircraft." Consider "launched from an Arado Ar 234 carrier aircraft to attack Allied bombers."
• Development
  • I think "...placing the pilot in the prone position, which increased the sustainable g-force limit." needs a citation;
  • Consider deleting "...Parasite aircraft were unusual for aviation.[3]" Unless we can explain why they were unusual to the typical "non-aircraft" type reader;
  • Last sentence: "This is because the aircraft was cancelled, due to a lack of funds, mother aircraft Ar 234s and a lack of interest by the Ministry of Aviation" - what was the issue with mother aircraft Ar 234s? Shortage or they did not yet exist?
• Arado E.381/I
  • "The pilot would lie in a prone position in the very cramped cockpit behind a removable 140-millimeter (5.5 in) bullet-resistant glass screen mounted in front of the pilot" - think you can remove the second reference to "the pilot;"
  • "The aircraft's straight wings had a blister for a single MK 108 30 mm (1.2 in) cannon and..." If the wings had "blisters" there would have been two of them, implying two cannon. If there was only one "blister" then is would have been on one wing only or center aligned between the wings. Think this needs explaining.
  • The text related to the different variants reads as if they were actually built - contrary to the text in the design section. Perhaps the text in the variants section must indicate that these were design variations and not actual prototypes which differed from one-another.
• Specifications
  • Is the text "Data from Aircraft of the Luftwaffe 1935–1945: An Illustrated History[6] for the Arado E.381/I" needed? Surely a simple cite will suffice?
• General
  • "External Links" section is duplicated.
  • The "Science, Technology, and National Socialism" source can be referenced on-line here [1], pp103-105
  • Interesting graphic depictions here [2]

Dank

• I fiddled with the lead section again, let me know if that doesn't work for you.
• "All these proposals exploited the Luftwaffe's concept of "gaining a tactical advantage by placing excessive stress on the man in the cockpit".": Why did the Luftwaffe think it gave them an advantage to put excessive stress on their own pilots? Or was the stress on the Allied pilots, and if so, what was the stress?
• "due to a lack of funds, mother aircraft Ar 234s and a lack of interest": nonparallel. - Dank (push to talk) 00:36, 21 June 2011 (UTC)

SEPECAT Jaguar

I am requesting a peer review of the article because it seems to be a potential FA candidate, so I want to play a role too see if it really can become one. But first I'd like to see it become A-class. Personally, I am fond of this aircraft, and I think it'll be a pity if it doesn't reach the star. Cheers Sp33dyphil ^{Ready • to • Rumble} 00:48, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

As some quick comments:

• 'SEPECAT' probably shouldn't be in italics as it's also the common English-language name
  • Really? The only common word I see is cat. Anyway  Done.
• "The Jaguars had still provided a valuable component of the campaign, the RAF detachment of 12 Jaguars flew 612 combat sorties, with no aircraft being lost,[48] however significant changes were made both during and shortly after the war." reads rather awkwardly and should be split into at least two sentences.
  •  Done
• "RAF Jaguars were used for rapid deployment and regional reinforcement, and others flew in the tactical nuclear strike role." is unclear and unreferenced (should it start with 'Some RAF Jaguars..."?)
  • Found references for "rapid deployment" and "tactical nuclear strike role". One of them came from Vectorsite.net, do I placed the phrase under hidden instead.
• "The Jaguar was also used in small numbers for the anti-ship role" - should this be in the past tense? - if so, what aircraft have replaced the Jaguar in this role?
  • Changed to present tense.  Done
• The location of the 'Gulf War' section after the section on the aircraft's service withe the IAF is a bit odd. This section also repeats material already covered in the article.

The Gulf War section has always been odd. As multiple operators flew it, it couldn't be placed under one nor the other, and it had a lot of detail in it, making it equally bizarre to partition it into the generic nationality sections. I've never really known what to do with it. Kyteto (talk) 20:20, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

• The level of detail provided to the IAF seems low compared to that accorded to the RAF and French Air Force

When I built it from scratch, I threw in all the detail I could find after keeping the article as my primary focus for a month, I exausted all the sources I had; and other editors helped out as well. Perhaps one reason the IAF is smaller than the RAF, is that the IAF did less things with them, less major wars, no nuclear patrols ect. Operational detail isn't non-existent, but there just appeared to be less of it. I'd love for there to be more though. Kyteto (talk) 20:20, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

• Likewise, few details are provided on the aircraft's service with Ecuador, Nigeria and Oman - can this be expanded? Nick-D (talk) 02:35, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
  •  Done

Kyteto

The Referencing would need a dozen or so citations to be completely replaced to proceed to a higher quality level. Websites likes Ejection-history.org.uk. and nuclear-weapons.info. automatically flag up major red lights. Frankly, it is questionable if they should be allowed in a GA, let alone an FA, so they would definantly need to be switched out. Kyteto (talk) 20:20, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

I'll try to rectify the problem. Sp33dyphil ^{"Ad astra"} 00:51, 13 June 2011 (UTC)

Dank

This is all in the first two sentences:

• "jet ground attack aircraft": ground attack jet, maybe
• "in the close air support and nuclear strike role": in close air support and nuclear strike roles
• "Armée de l'Air": French Air Force
• "as jet trainer": as a jet trainer
• "a light ground attack capability": some ground attack capability, unless "light" is a technical term, in which case, drop the "a": "light ground attack capability"
• "the requirement for the aircraft": the requirements for the aircraft
• "changed to include": included
• "supersonic performance": probably "supersonic speed"
• "reconnaissance and tactical nuclear strike roles.": add an "and": "and reconnaissance and tactical nuclear strike capabilities." - Dank (push to talk) 02:45, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Battle record of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

An important question often asked by historians of the Napoleonic Wars: "How many battles did Wellington fight in?" This article aims to cover that question by objectively identifying the actions he participated in throughout his career. Accuracy is based on factual evidence, taken from sources that have solid backgrounds, as well as authors of military texts, and primary sources that give details in depth. In this way this article serves to answer the question as best it can thus attempting to clearly present the information about this important British commander. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 20:17, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

I have added Notes explaining the intentions of the Outcome column. It seems hard to explain the difference between Tactical and Strategic results, moreso to those who are looking to glorify or tarnish Wellington without any real understanding of how battles are studied. I am worried that without clearly explaining the columns content the table will become an easy target for people who get involved in edit wars because their interpretations of historical data opposes that of the article. If anyone has any suggestions as how I could rephrase the Notes better, it would be appreciated. I realise that the discussion page is always available for people to dispute the entries in detail, but for unregistered readers this is likely to be ignored and edits made regardless.

Ma®©usBritish (talk) 22:32, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Would appreciate further feedback as to the progress of the article, so far - thanks! Ma®©usBritish (talk) 04:28, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

• Where is the source, preferably high quality, which establishes the notability of this topic? You suggest "An important question often asked by historians of the Napoleonic Wars...", cite someone.
• While this is a list format encyclopaedia entry, and we should be slightly more forgiving regarding SYNTHESIS by collation if notability is established, you do not give inline citations for a large number of the battles.
• Your webcitations need to be improved to MILMOS standards. Authors, publishers, works (ie "Wellesley") in other works (ie "Fred's Big Book of UK Commanders Online") etc... Fifelfoo (talk) 02:53, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

• The name "Duke of Wellington" would appear to give this notability, given his importance in British and European history - though I fail to understand why I would need a high quality source or to cite someone for a nomination - what significance is that to the article itself? Google for "Wellington's battles" you get a range of questions about his military career and various aspects of it that are nor answered clearly anywhere. If you need a name.. me.. I'm interested in how many battle he fought, lost and won. Anyone who studies history is a historian, they don't need to be a scholar or author to qualify.
• "SYNTHESIS by collation" - means? A lot of the battles listed have their own articles, which in turn include detailed accounts and references. Do encyclopaedias not cross-reference? I have invested a great deal of effort citing a lot of the battles that are lesser known, than say Waterloo - I'm not sure why it would be necessary to duplicate references further? Again, if you could explain.
• Your MILMOS comment was again too brief to be clear. Sounds like you're refering to secondary sources based on primary sources.. which is basically citing a source from the bibliography of a source to be cited on Wiki?

Thanks, Ma®©usBritish (talk) 03:37, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

• • No worries. The notability of the topic of "Battle Record of Wellington" needs to be separately established regardless of the notability of "Wellington" himself. (The trivial example is "Blue" is notable, whereas "List of Blue Things" is not inherently notable). If historians have debated the number of battles he participated in, then you ought to cite this debate as the cause of the notability of the topic. I believe you when you say that it has been debated by scholars and is therefore notable, but this needs to be cited in the article. Add this point to the article, and cite a number of historians in the debate, and the topic is notable beyond any criticism.
  • This is a list type article. For a normal type article the collation of events not mentioned in conjunction in HQRS would be synthetic original research. However, this is a list (and it justifiably and rightly) takes most battles from a major source, and then adds minor battles from other sources. Because Wikipedia is not read hypertextually, we cannot rely on other articles's citations to support this article. Each article must cite its points of fact on that article itself. The solution to this is easy, for currently uncited battles, find a scholarly hqrs from that article mentioning that Wellington was there, and cite it in your article. (I see no reason this couldn't be a Featured List btw).
  • " "The Duke of Wellington". Retrieved 28 April 2011." ought to be cited as Jane Wellesley (2004) "[# The Duke of Wellington]" Articles United Kingdom: Association of Friends of the Waterloo Committee. Retrieved 28 April 2011.; Websites need to be fully cited, with authors, titles, works that item is contained in (ie: "The Duke of Wellington" in Articles) publishers, publisher location where available, year. When, and only when, elements of this are unavailable should they be left out. Many readers use the citations to determine the quality of the article, and they resent having to extract the citation data from dead weblinks. It is also a requirement of MILHIST B and A class articles that we cite correctly (and I see no reason why this couldn't climb the ladder to greatness). Fifelfoo (talk) 04:45, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Hi Fifelfoo, someone has reviewed and rated the article as B-class recently, which is a good start. I have continued to expand, reference and update the article since then however to incluse more info on Wellington's Generalship, as supportive reading - lots of reading required to find most of these battles (few minor skirmishes missing refs atm); it would be easy enough to pick up one concise book of battles and reference that, but it stinks of bias in favour of one authors opinions to do so, hence why I have taken references from several good military historians, in some cases battles have more than one reference - all fully referenced. It would seem you have a good understanding of Quality Standards and Featured Lists, from your comments. I wondered if you could take another look at the article sometime and advise me what you think may be required to push this article higher than B-class, as you say you believe this article could achieve a high standard with the right content. Thank you. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 07:45, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

P. S. Burton

• I recommend making the table sortable.  Done P. S. Burton (talk) 21:11, 12 May 2011 (UTC)

I tried making the table sortable several times in my Sandbox, but date ranges (eg 4–10 April 1808 or 25 May–3 June 1810) will not sort correctly and cause the table to produce unusual results. I have tried to find a way round this without success. Not sure if there even is a fix. It has been suggested that it is not possible to sort date ranges. Some of the other details are sortable, although most of the entries are in an order already, ie Wars and Ranks.

Ma®©usBritish (talk) 04:11, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

All columns now sortable, in some cases using the "display:none" technique to hide data written in a non-standard method but resulting in correctly sorted columns. Dates sort based by opening date of battle/siege in cases where date is a range. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 08:45, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

• Interesting article; good work so far. I have the following suggestions for possible improvement:
  • the lead needs a little work for clarity and flow. For instance "although not originally appointed as the British or Allied commander..." - this assumes in the lead that people already know who Wellesley was, when that might not necessarily be the case. It probably needs to be stated briefly who he was and what he was notable for (a sentence or two at the most);  Done
  • do we know what units Wellesley commanded in those battles? If possible, it might be an idea to add this to the table;
  • citations needed: in the Military career section, the entire first paragraph is uncited, while the second half of the second paragraph also appears uncited - for B class and beyond and especially if aiming for FA or FL, I suggest adding more citations there and also possibly in the table;  Done
  • I suggest wikilinking the ranks in the table (but only on first mention), as this will give casual readers a better understanding;  Done
  • formatting: some of the citations appear to be in short form (e.g. "Jaques, p. 212") but then others are in long (e.g. "Fletcher, Ian; Younghusband, Tony (1997). Salamanca, 1812") is there are a reason for this? It would probably be best if they were all in short in the References section and then in long format in the Sources section;  Done
  • per above, I suggest moving the full bibliographic details of the Fletcher & Younghusband, Riley, Ayrton and the two Napier works to the Sources section for consistency of style;  Done
  • I wouldn't suggest using internal Wikilinks for references per Wikipedia:RS#Primary.2C secondary.2C and tertiary sources. It would be best to replace these with citations to sources external to Wikipedia;
  • if possible author, publisher and accessdate information should be added to the web citations. AustralianRupert (talk)

Thanks for the feedback. Initial mention of each rank has been wikilinked.

• • Will be looking to add further external sources in the near future, when I get time to focus on it, and find good refs per battle.
  • With regards Jaques - his book was used so much I used short form entry in the References heading, and gave the full details of that book in the Sources section below - something I noted has been done extensively on the main article about Wellington due to repeated use of sources such as Holmes and Longford, seems like a practised method so I used it. Any book only used once has the long form.
  • Not sure if we know what units Wellesley commanded, though it may be recorded - in most cases on the table he would be overall commander, leading the whole army, if we were to add a column just to indicate what he commanded in his first few battles, the rest of the column would be blank and might look out of place. As the article develops I feel it might me better to create a separate section/s detailing any notable points of his participation for those battles, rather than a few simplified entries in the table. It could also allow more room for expansion of this and other articles.
  • Will be coming back to this article soon, its on short hold for the moment whilst I work on a few articles that the summer allows me, and to receive ample feedback and suggestions from this nomination to help push it further along.

Ma®©usBritish (talk) 15:20, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Intothatdarkness

You might want to provide a citation for the claim that Waterloo "left him traumatized", as it seems more opinion at this point and not supported by outside citations. The flow in the first section is also a little off. You might also consider revising some of the "would remain" constructions to "remained" to give it better tone.Intothatdarkness (talk) 21:57, 17 May 2011 (UTC)  Done

I read the "trauma" remark on another site and it also sounds a little opinionated there, and as its on a free tripod-hosted site not a dedicated source I'm a little hesitatnt to cite it. But I will try to find out if it was true, and have ordered Richard Holmes "The Iron Duke" book just now, which appears to be the best biog available on Wellington, and might allow me to reference that with more confidence. Although I have no doubt, personally, that any battle with 50,000 casualties lying around could break the will of even a man like Wellington I hope to shed some light on it. Ever see the end of "Waterloo" with Chris Plummer riding through the piles of bodies, reliving emotional moments of the battle, using the famous "hardest thing to a battle lost, is a battle won" quote? It is a poignant moment which may have some truth in it. Thanks for the feedback. Looking into it further as soon as possible.

Ma®©usBritish (talk) 14:21, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I agree with your analysis of the impact of Waterloo on Wellington, but if you're going to put that in there it's probably best to have a citation to back it up.Intothatdarkness (talk) 13:33, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Opening has now undergone various rewrites, includes citations and background info. Article expanded where appropriate. Ma®©usBritish (talk) 05:11, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

Colombian Navy

Hello, (bit of a newb here, hoping to help)- I'm trying to improve some of the articles related to Military forces of Colombia, and have started with the Navy one, which I'd like to take from 'start' class to at least 'B class' and targeting A class in the middle term, and then use it as 'model' to improve some of the other articles. I have done some work already and I believe the article is much improved now, tho I realize there are still multiple areas to work on; among others, need some more citations, expand history more, improve lists of equipment, improve lists of decomissioned/historical ships .. (and start on some of those related articles). Also, note the Article is pending renaming as well. Nevertheless, as I'm new, I could use an 'informal' review, and get a few comments on how is this shaping up and suggestions on what else should I try to add, keeping in mind the article is very much still a work in progress. Comments are most welcome! --Iceman0108 (talk) 01:39, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

• Article has now been renamed. Iceman0108 (talk) 02:55, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

Hi Iceman, and welcome to Wikipedia. As you've probably noticed, most articles on branches of national armed forces are pretty disappointing, so it's great that you're interested in taking this on. Some suggestions for things you could work on in this article are:

• The article should discuss the Navy's role and (possibly separately) whether it is currently capable of fulfilling this role
• The history section is rather brief and doesn't really explain how the Navy developed over time
• The article should include prose describing the different types of ships the Navy operates and name all the major ships and submarines and specify where they're based (if you can access a copy, Jane's Fighting Ships is an excellent reference for this kind of thing)
• What's the relationship between the naval infantry and the Navy? Is this similar to that between the USMC and US Navy (in which the Marines seem to be effectively independent, despite being administratively part of the Navy) or are the naval infantry more firmly under the command of the Navy?
• There are some examples of high quality articles on national militaries at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Showcase which should be of use in planning the expansion of this article. Some examples include United States Marine Corps, Australian Defence Force and Byzantine navy.

Thanks!.Working on these. The 'types of ships' should be improved now, i think, as well as the linked full list of ships. Slowly adding/cleaning the main classes/types/ships inside that with individual articles. got a couple of references pending for use both in history and the IM via the ARC press office, but may take a few days til i can formally use those.. The IM is formally and fully under ARC command, however they actually work more in sync with the Army; i expect i can clarify this a bit more once i start tackling the IM article in full.. Keep 'em coming! Iceman0108 (talk) 04:09, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• "spanish": Spanish
• "Pacific seas of Colombia": I'm not sure what this means.
• "the extensive network of rivers inside the country": the country's rivers
• ""ARC", for Armada de la República de Colombia is": ARC (Armada de la República de Colombia) is
• "as ship prefix": as the ship prefix
• "for all the Colombian Navy's ships": for Colombian Navy ships
• ", as well as the common abbreviation used in print; ": and a common acronym for the navy itself.
• "this article and many of its related articles use the terms "Colombian Navy" and "ARC" interchangeably.": Delete; see WP:SELFREF. - Dank (push to talk) 03:40, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Done!. did leave the reference to 'extensive' as it emphasizes and connects the fact that the riverine responsibility is larger than a reader can initially assume just by glancing at a map; other than that, all other typos/fixes corrected/cleaned. Keep e'm coming! Iceman0108 (talk) 04:13, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

Good work so far, I have the following suggestions/comments:

• for a successful B class rating, the minimum amount of citations required is one per paragraph (so long as that one citation covers everything in the paragraph). Thus for GA or A-Class you will need to make sure that the level of referencing is higher than that;
• having the list of "Engagements and Conflicts" in the middle of the history section disrupts the flow of the narrative. I think the list should be removed (it is okay in the infobox, though) and replaced with prose which describes the Columbian Navy's role in these conflicts in chronological order (maybe two or three paragraphs per conflict, depending on the size of the navy's involvement);
• in the Equipment section, there are a number of proper nouns that are currently incorrectly capitalised. For instance "american" should be "American" and "german" should be "German";
• "colombian conflict" should be "Colombian conflict";
• in the Equipment section, incorrect punctuation "neighbors, -with Nicaragua over the San Andres archipelago and with Venezuela over the Los Monjes Archipelago-, saw" (commas not needed before or after the hyphens);
• in the Notes, "colombian" should be "Colombian";
• in terms of sources, the article might benefit from the use of a few books. Are there any books written that discuss the history and development of the Colombian Navy? If you know of any, you can search Worldcat.org and you will be able to find out if a library near you has a copy that you can borrow. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:34, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

• Excellent. I was looking for a 'rule of thumb' for references on B rating, that '1 per paragraph' is most useful. thanks!; I agree on the engagements thing and I was already thinking on taking that out to a separate section, but I like your idea of just weaving it into the flow, I think I'll do that when I get a couple more updated sources for history over the next few days; I think i've fixed the small typos etc, there; Work never ends.. Cheers! Iceman0108 (talk) 21:40, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

1st Airlanding Brigade (United Kingdom)

A short lived British airborne formation, that was only involved in two operations which would not be understated to be call them disasters. Thanks to User:Philg88 of the GOCE for a copy edit any suggestions to improve the article welcome. Jim Sweeney (talk) 08:47, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

Yet more great work Jim - it's great to see such high quality articles on British airborne units. My suggestions for how this could be further improved are:

• While the article is generally well written, it would benefit from a copyedit (watch out for missing commas and surplus possessive apostrophes)
• "During the second operation, during fighting around Arnhem" - 'during' is repeated
• " only around 20 per cent of the troops remained, the rest having either been killed or listed as missing" given that the fate of the men who were originally listed as missing has long been known (they were either taken prisoner, killed or escaped) there's no need to refer to this in the lead and then later in the body of the article (I presume that POWs made up most of the missing?)
• "an aircraft capable of transporting eight airborne soldiers that would be used for both assault and training purposes" - should 'that would be used' be 'was'?
• Were men who were in the 31st Independent Infantry Brigade Group who didn't want to be in an airborne formation able to transfer out?
• All-caps unit names such as 'STAFFORDS' and 'BORDERS' aren't generally used outside the military - these should be in lower case
• "left to form the 6th Airlanding Brigade prior to Operation Ladbroke" - what Operation Ladbroke is hasn't been mentioned to this point in the article
• A bit of background to the brigade's participation in the invasion of Sicily would be helpful before the para about it moving from England
• Did the 1st Airlanding Brigade suffer more casualties than any other brigade rather than any other 'unit' during the invasion of Sicily? Nick-D (talk) 10:14, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review all changed, Tugwell actually says for the British so far so added that in. Jim Sweeney (talk) 14:56, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

P. S. Burton

• Could this sentence be rephrased "When withdrawn, only around 20 per cent of the troops remained, the rest having either been killed or were missing or became prisoners of war."? It doesn't really flow.
• Is there a source for the information in File:Arnhem Map 1.jpg?

P. S. Burton (talk) 17:19, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Reworded - I presume you mean the locations of the landing grounds etc, its never come up before the map itself is from the Battle of Arnhem article, but if challenged there area plenty of books with the same image in print.Jim Sweeney (talk) 19:08, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

Nthep

Jim, another great looking article. I've just one point to raise and that is regarding unit names in the section on Brigade composition. I have no concerns over 7KOSB being titled the 7th (Galloway) Battalion King's Own Scottish Borderers as Galloway was part of the unit title when it was raised in 1939 but I am concerned over the use of Airborne in the other unit titles. I agree and accept that functionally it is correct and may well be how they were refered to in contemporary documents to ensure it was clear that these were specialised troops and not line infantry, but I'm not sure if it was ever the official designation of these units? Using the Galloway example, 2nd South Staffs would be the 2nd (Staffordshire Volunteers) South Staffordshire Regiment and 1st Borders would be the 1st (Cumberland) Border Regiment. Happy to be proved wrong though. NtheP (talk) 08:48, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

It is written both ways, admittedly without the airborne is more popular. I will amend the article.Jim Sweeney (talk) 09:17, 27 April 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

I mostly do citations, sources, etc.

• Possible PRIMARY: Blockwell, Albert; Clifton, Maggie (2005). ? Was this a co-authored biography?
• "Arnhem — Jumping the Rhine 1944 and 1945." and other sources —mdashes don't take spaces. They are—used like so. Are you sure it isn't a subtitle and therefore a colon?
• "Ferguson, Gregory (1984). The Paras 1940–84, Volume 1 of Elite series." Are you sure the title is "The Paras 1940–84, Volume 1 of Elite series" and not The Paras 1940-84 Elite Series 1. See "Pegasus Bridge — Benouville, D-Day 1944. Raid Series." for where you handle books in series correctly!
• Publisher location: Harclerode, Peter (2005).
• "Oxford, England" surely Oxford, United Kingdom? similarly "Barnsley, England"
• Funny n dash? Probable subtitle The Second World War 1939–1945 Army – Airborne Forces
• Publisher location: Smith, Claude (1992).
• "p.21" but yet "pp. 28–29" Space consistency between the p. and the actual number
• The OOB site is frustrating to cite given the anonymous status of its author. I'm willing to give this SPS expertise, but you may find difficulties if you go to FAC.
• "Shortt & McBride" but yet "Blockwell and Clifton" in notes
• ""Bower, Sir Roger Herbert (1903–1990), Lieutenant General"" is held at a particular archive at KCL
• Pegasus archive has an author. Fifelfoo (talk) 02:37, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes Blockwell, Albert; Clifton, Maggie (2005) is a co-authored biography

OOB has been accepted in the past but can see your concerns

Bower archive added

I am unable to locate the author listed for Pegasus archive ?

Thanks for the review Jim Sweeney (talk) 09:36, 28 April 2011 (UTC)

The front page for the Pegasus archive gives a Mark Hickman as the site owner/editor. NtheP (talk) 15:26, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Jim Sweeney (talk) 15:43, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

Ranger Steve

I mostly do Arnhem :-)

• As with the 4th Parachute Brigade, a bit of confusion over the Staffords' actions on Day 1 and Day 2. The first lift's contingent (about 60% of the battalion) were despatched to Arnhem at 10am on Day 2 (Middlebrook, 187-188), and didn't arrive until much later in the evening. Overnight they were joined by the remaining 40%. The battalion didn't become engaged until 5am-ish on Day 3 (Middlebrook 200). At present the article makes it look like they became engaged on Day 1.
• I'm not aware that Cain was injured by machine gun fire, but he was temporarily blinded by tank blasts.
• I haven't heard anywhere that Baskeyfield was shot in the head. I believe it was a tank round that killed him.
• Although attached to 4th Parachute Brigade, the KOSB's were still following their original plan on Day 2/3, which was to secure LZ L for the Polish landings. This isn't very clear in the article, which suggests that the whole Brigade were doing so. By then the Staffs were in Arnhem, and the Borders were west of Oosterbeek.
• XXX Corps artillery began defending the Cauldron from Day 5 (I think), at present it looks like it only began on Day 8.
• Barlow was killed by Mortar fire outside Arnhem (Middlebrook 211). His death was witnessed, so its a little inaccurate to state that he was never heard of again.

Really good work Jim, it's nice to see these articles expanding so well. Ranger Steve ^Talk 07:23, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review

• First part changed to clarify Staffords movements
• I got Cain was wounded by MG fire from the VC citation
• Baskyfield changed details
• Clarified KOSB still had to defend LZL
• Added details about Barlow - Urquhart claims he was never seen again just his cigarette case found.

Jim Sweeney (talk) 11:01, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• I skimmed it and couldn't find anything to fix. Most Americans won't understand how "Brigade were sent ... brigade was disbanded" can be right, but it's right, and I can't complain. If someone at FAC asks you to change it, change "were sent" to "went". - Dank (push to talk) 21:11, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks will keep that in mind. Jim Sweeney (talk) 21:25, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Actually, I think you should stand your ground if this comes up at FAC—with brigade being a collective noun, "brigade were" is standard British English usage, so you should point the hypothetical reviewer to WP:ENGVAR. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:59, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Intothatdarkness

• Consider rewording "Men in the battalions who were unsuitable for airborne service were weeded out to be replaced by volunteers." to "Men in the battalions who were unsuitable for airborne service were weeded out and replaced by volunteers." If the weeding actually took place (which your original wording clearly implies) it should be and. To be makes it sound like a future projection that may not have come to pass. If that was the case, then you could rework the sentence to "were to be weeded out and replaced...".
• This sentence is also awkward: "After landing nearby, 1st Airlanding Brigade occupied the Norwegian capital, Oslo where Brigadier Bower became Commander, Oslo area for the duration of the division's time in Norway." You might want to put a comma after the first instance of Oslo and (if it's proper) change the later occurrence to "Commander, Oslo Area" to make it more distinct.

Good article otherwise.Intothatdarkness (talk) 21:20, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross recipients (A)

I want to bring this list further up the quality scale which means A-class is next in line. Please have a careful look at the comments section which details the discrepancies of the sources involved. The general layout of the article is derived from the Oak Leaves lists which are mostly A-Class and FAC compliant already. Thanks for your valued input. MisterBee1966 (talk) 16:17, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Intothatdarkness

This looks really good! No major quibbles from me at all.Intothatdarkness (talk) 21:25, 17 May 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

Citations, terminal periods / full-stops, your style is for using them, but citation one doesn't (Fellgiebel 2000, pp. 113–460, 485–487, 499, 501, 503, 509) Other wise citations and references are excellent. Primaries are only used for illustrative purposes which demonstrate the law of the government in question. Awkward phrasing, "concluded the variants of the Knight's Cross." due to the verb being a highly unusual one to use. The noun is "Knight's...and Diamonds", "became the final variant of the Knight's Cross authorised." Fifelfoo (talk) 01:00, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

done Thanks MisterBee1966 (talk) 08:05, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Michael Shishman of Bulgaria

I have expanded the article but my style is rough and I am sure I have made some grammar and stylistic mistakes which need to be addressed. I would like to know whether the article can be submitted for a GA or (doubtfully) FA review. I would welcome and address (if possible) all suggestions for further improvement. Regards, --Gligan (talk) 14:17, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

I mostly review sources, citations, bibliography. Currently this isn't ready for FA.

• Are External Links references used? If so they should be fully cited with author or corporate author, containing works (ie: the page cited is a section of a larger work or website), publisher, date of access, date of publication, location of publisher (if available). Lacking this information—the sources fail reliability for FA.
  • Although GIBI is available in the internet, it is nonetheless a book like all others, so I think it is better to be cited as a book. As for other external links, they are only two (41 and 42).
    • As of this time stamp "External Links" contains four citations, none of them full. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
      • I have them in proper style with as much information as I could gather.
        • If you can't fully cite a work, then you shouldn't use it as a reference. You can promote the External Links section to a full section rather than a subsection of References. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:02, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
          • I did find more information for the second source and even found a link to the text in Russian. However, I would rather prefer to use the Bulgarian text because I think more Bulgarians than Russians would read that. If you think it would be better, I can put the link to the Russian (or the Bulgarian) article in brackets.
          • How about the current division of the sources? In fact, I am really confused how the separate sections should be titled, I constantly see different titles in the Wikipedia articles... Can you edit the titles (and whether they should be in sections or subsections) yourself?
• You're citing primary sources, "(in Bulgarian and Greek) Greek Sources for Bulgarian History (GIBI), volume X. Sofia: Izdatelstvo na BAN. 1980. http://promacedonia.org/gibi/10/gal/10_224.html.". You don't give the author, title, publisher or holding archive, etc for the documents you've cited within GIBI. Primary sources are unacceptable when used for proof in historical articles, as GIBI is used to demonstrate, "The siege was a failure despite the five-story siege tower with 100 soldiers inside which the Byzantines employed." This is as it constitutes Original Research in a historical sense.
  • About GIBI - the publisher is "Izdatelstvo na BAN" (it means something like Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Press). The title is "Greek Sources for Bulgarian History (GIBI)", the authors are a collective from the Academy (their names are not shown), all cited material is from volume X, Chapter XIX John Kantakouzenos. GIBI consists of ten volumes and is a book by itself. "The siege was a failure despite the five-story siege tower with 100 soldiers inside which the Byzantines employed." is also used in Andreev, I will add his as well but just I dod not want to repeat him too much. Should I remove GIBI from that particular citation?
    • See below for full details in my original commentary. The citation of GIBI for that particular point is radically insufficient, if it is a PRIMARY SOURCE, then it ought to be cited in full, if it is a secondary source, as a chapter in a collected work (as a Central European Academy of Science work would be) then the chapter ought to be cited in full. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
• References
  • You need to provide the title of the works as they were published (and if you choose, a "courtesy" translation of the title into English). As these works were in Bulgarian, I doubt their titles were in English:
    • Andreev, Jordan; Milcho Lalkov (1996) (in Bulgarian). The Bulgarian Khans and Tsars.
    • Bozhilov, Ivan; Vasil Gyuzelev (1999)
    • (in Bulgarian and Greek) Greek Sources for Bulgarian History (GIBI), volume X
    • Pavlov, Plamen (2005). "Russian "Vagrands", Political Refugees and Commanders during the 12-14th c." (in Bulgarian). Rebels and Adventurers in Medieval Bulgaria.
      • Indeed, they are all in Bulgarian. I put them in English because in the review of Samuel of Bulgaria, they told me to be in English even though they are not available in that language. So, if you are sure, I will put them into Bulgarian. Should I put the citations from those books in Cyrillic as well?
        • GA reviews are regularly wrong about citations. Citations ought to be the citation of the work as referenced, which means the citation of the title in the original language and orthography as available on the title page: ie, in Bulgarian, in Cyrillic. Given that Cyrillic is unfamiliar to English readers, an English translation of the title as a courtesy is an additional benefit, but the title ought to be in full in Bulgarian in Cyrillic as written in the title page. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
  • GIBI's volume number is incorrectly cited, unless the title of the work is "... Volume X" it would be Volume X of a larger work. The Volume itself may have a volume title ("Greek sources on Bulgarian History in the Medieval period") etc.
    • It is part of a larger work, there are GIBI from volume I to X.
      • So if GIBI Volume X has a title for the Volume itself, then the Volume title also must be given, in Bulgarian in Cyrillic as given, and as a courtesy with an English translation for English readers. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
        • There is no specific title for the volume. The title of all ten books is "Greek Sources for Bulgarian History (GIBI), Volume ..." That is all in the title.
  • Nicely cited, but check if the Volume has a title: # Kazhdan, A.; and collective (1991). "Volume II" (in English). The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-18-504652-8.
    • In fact the correct IBSN is 0-19-504652-8
  • Cite the page span that the chapter occupies in its book in the References section to allow other readers to locate the chapter in the work: Pavlov, Plamen (2005). "Russian "Vagrands", Political Refugees and Commanders during the 12-14th c."
    • The work is available [3] and as you can see there are no given pages. Perhaps I should cite that as an external link as you have suggested in our first remark, shall I?
      • External links are by en-Wikipedia style for materials not cited in the article and in addition to the citation. If it is a web chapter only, then its fine not to give page numbers, unless the web version has page numbers. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Publisher locations: every work or no work. If I don't know where Textor Verlag is located, I can't write them to purchase a copy of their book.
    • I found it in google, it is in Frankfurt am Main.
• Citations:
  • Kazhdan, p. 1365. & GIBI (but with GIBI note the Original Research problem above) With works containing many chapters, like a dictionary, it is custom and practice to give the chapter title in the short citation, to allow us to ascertain from your citation if it is relevant, ie "Michael Shishman of Bulgaria" or irrelevant "Querns and milling practice in late medieval Bulgaria"
    • What do you mean here? To put "Kazhdan, vol. II, p. 1365" or "Kazhdan, Michael Shishman, p. 1365"?
      • Kazhdan, "Michael Shishman," p. 1365. Chapter titles in English citations normally go "within quotation marks" and titles of full works go in italics. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Fine, pp. 268-269. Don't use minus signs "-" use n-dashes for page ranges "–"
  • "Jireček, p. 419." your style doesn't use terminal periods, check over and remove extraneous ones in short cites like this one.
  • "Andreev, p.250" your style uses spaces between the "p." and the "123" page number. Check over and add spaces where you've missed them.
  • "Bulgarian National Bank. Notes and Coins in Circulation: 2 levs (1999 issue) & 2 levs (2005 issue). – Retrieved on 26 March 2009." the dash appears to be extraneous and out of style
    • I will correct these.
  • Full citation required, author, publisher, containing works, publication date, etc etc... ""Rulers of Vidin" (in Bulgarian). http://vidin-info.hit.bg/vidinski%20vladeteli%202.htm. Retrieved 8 April 2011."
    • There is no information on that.
      • An unauthored work isn't really a reliable source for Military history. Authors can be corporate ("Bulgarian Academy of Sciences" for example). The publisher would be the organisation hosting the content. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
• Notes on Original Research.
  • Where GIBI is your only source, using primary materials for facts, like "b: Trajanopolis was a town near modern Feres, situated at 2 km of the Maritsa river in Western Thrace." you can't use this. At all. It is original research.
    • In fact, that is put in GIBI as a footnote by the authors. Obviously John Kantakouzenos could not have been so thoughful to explain this himself :)
      • So it is a footnote to a primary source in GIBI? Then you need to cite it as such. Editors. Footnote to "Primary source title" in GIBI... Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
  • If your source for the facts is commentary supplied by an editing academic when discussing or introducing the source then you need to be pretty explicit, even in your short citation, "Foo Bar (ed.) Commentary on the source "Iason Donnovan. (?1407). Records of Atrocious Australian 80s Music Sent Back in Time as Manuscripts At the Roman Abbey of Saint Horrible Music. Excerpted from Archive of Time Travelling Pop Stars MS-1408 Sofia, Bulgaria." in GIBI pp. 14–28".
  • Where GIBI is not your only source ("The siege was a failure despite the five-story siege tower with 100 soldiers inside which the Byzantines employed."), and you've got a secondary source to support the fact, (Andreev, p. 256), then why not quote the primary source for the permitted illustrative purposes. "The siege…as recounted in annals, "They then came upon us with a five story siege…"". But then you have to footnote fully... "Iason Donnovan. (?1407). Records of the Lodoss War at the Monestary of Saint Anime History. Excerpted from the Archive of Time Travelling Pop Stars MS-1409 Sofia, Bulgaria. In GIBI pp. 29–48."
    • I see, then I will put indeed Andreev and cite GIBI in full manner.
  • Yes I know this Original Research policy is hard for Central European medieval history. Those are the rules. They're enforced at FA. I can't see any reason why this article couldn't reach and achieve FA. FAC has at least one editor who does a lot of English early medieval Church Figures (Ealdgyth). Asking Ealdgyth about the process might be useful given the similar issues with historical editing you both face. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:58, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
    • I am grateful for your review. As I stated in my request, the more real aim is GA, not FA. Now I will try to correct the sources as much as I can and then we should continue to clean up what I could not. --Gligan (talk) 10:22, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
      • In fact, I have another question. When I put the titles of the book in Bulgarian, should I use the Cyrillic for the names of the authors, the publisher, the location? I will wait for your answers before I do that and the other issues for which I have raised questions above. For now I corrected the dashes and other minor stylisitc mistakes. --Gligan (talk) 10:51, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
        • You ought to give the publication information as given on the bibliographic / copyright page of the book you referenced yourself. If this is in Cyrillic and Bulgarian, it ought to be given as such. Most English readers would appreciate an additional translation. For example (consider text in [brackets as Cyrillic]): [Iosef Iosefsun] (Iosef Iosefson). (1980). [Bulgarian Histories of Great Men of the Military] (Bulgarian) (Bulgarian Histories of Great Men of the Military). [Sofia, Bulgaria] (Sofia, Bulgaria): [Bulgarian Academy of the Sciences Press] (Bulgarian Academy of the Sciences Press). By citing material in this way a scholar with Bulgarian can find the original source, and a scholar with Cyrillic (but not Bulgarian, like myself) can check that your Cyrillic and English match, and a reader with English/Latin only can understand you're citing an academic source which is dead on target for your subject. Fifelfoo (talk) 12:45, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
          • I guess I must really be annoying with my constant questions despite the fact that you seem to have put a lot of effords to make this as clear to me as possible. I think I have done most of your points but I need to know explitly whether:
          • 1. I should put "Андреев, стр. 256" instead of "Andreev, p. 256" on all citations where Bulgarian books are used.
          • 2. I should put "Chapter XIX "John Kantakouzenos", GIBI volume X, p. 256" on all places where "GIBI, p. 256" is cited (if the answer of 1. is that I must must the Cyrillic, of course I will use it in that case as well) --Gligan (talk) 14:21, 13 April 2011 (UTC)
            • In response to 1. "Андреев, p. 256" instead of "Andreev, p. 256". Why not "стр. 256"? Because "стр." and "p." are identical indicators, and while we're citing a Bulgarian source, we're citing it for English readers, so the English style of pages ought to be used. But, in the Bibliography, it would be helpful to list it as Андреев (Andreev) so that people who can't read Cyrillic alphabets can make sense of the name.
            • In response to 2. You should put ""John Kantakouzenos", GIBI Volume X, p. 256". The Chapter Number isn't necessary: it is indicated by the Chapter title. However, this only counts if the item you cited was the entire chapter "John Kantakouzenos", and not an individual source. So for example, if you cited ""An extract of a 1409 manuscript with an account of John Kantakouzenos's birth, Institute of Sciences Archives Sofia, Bulgaria," GIBI Volume X, p. 256" then that's how you ought to cite it. When citing material from GIBI you're not citing a solely authored chapter by an academic, but rather citing documents in a document collection. The "document" is the relevant chapter for citation purposes, not the book chapter. Additionally, as noted above, if you're actually citing an editorial footnote, then it is "Editorial Footnote to "An extract of a 1409 manuscript with an account of John Kantakouzenos's birth, Institute of Sciences Archives Sofia, Bulgaria," GIBI Volume X, p. 256". Fifelfoo (talk) 01:02, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
            • Asking questions is the best way to get answers! Fifelfoo (talk) 01:02, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
              • I think I have done that now. --Gligan (talk) 14:36, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
                • I would also like to know how to rearrange the Bibliography section. Should the authors in Latin come first and then those in Cyrillic or...? --Gligan (talk) 20:37, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Comments.

• "Energetic and ambitious ruler,": "An energetic and ambitious ruler,"

Done.

• "Michael Shishman led aggressive but opportunistic and inconsistent foreign policy ...": I don't understand what this means.

It means that he tried to have the innitiative in his relations with the Byzantine Empire and was usually the aggressive side but despite that he was quite inconsistent, made agreements the broke them, tried to make use of both Andronikos II and Andronikos III in their conflict but without too much actual gains.

• "Born after 1280, and before 1292": "Born between 1281 and 1291,"

Done.

• "sebastokrator Peter": needs a translation in parentheses, maybe "(Emperor)". It should probably be capitalized.

Sebastokrator is a court title which has no equivalent in English.

• "and later married to her in 1298 or 1299": "and married to her in 1298 or 1299".

Done.

• "Shishman and his son received the high courtly title of despotēs from their cousin Theodore Svetoslav and was referred to in a contemporary Venetian source as a Despot of Bulgaria and Lord of Vidin.": The first part is plural, the second part is singular.

Done.

• "According to some historians he was chosen because he was a descendant of the Asen dynasty and interpret his ascenсion": What's the subject of "interpret"?

Well, it is the historians who interpret the acsention of Michael Shishman as...., so I guess that "historians" is the subject.

• "a continuation to the House of Asen": "a continuation of the House of Asen".

Done.

Thank you very much for the comments, we should try to resolve your second point. Knowing my style, I expect that these are not going to be the only comments; I will try to answer new remarks as fast as I can but generally I am very busy that month. Regards, --Gligan (talk) 13:36, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

James Dutton (Royal Marines officer)

I've got this to GA from scratch. I'm not sure it's comprehensive enough for A-class, but I'd appreciate comments aimed in that general direction as well as any suggestions for general improvement. Cheers, HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:48, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Jim Sweeney

• For A Class I would expect to see more on his early life. where was he born, parents, schooling. Also the one line in the Personal life section would need expanding.
• Should the disambiguation not be Royal Marine officer ?
• Is there nothing more on his service in the Falklands war

Jim Sweeney (talk) 17:28, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Comments. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. - Dank (push to talk)

• Even though it's the usual name, I'm not a fan of "40 Commando", at least at the first occurrence. I'd prefer "40 Commando Battalion" (if that name is used) or "the 40 Commando battalion" (if not).
  • That sounds horrible to me. I can see where you;re coming from, but that is the unit name and I've never heard "battalion" appended to it.
    • Many readers aren't quick to pick up on on the clue provided by the capitalization, and at least for a moment, they'll be wondering why it was special that he commanded 40 commandos. "40 Commando" doesn't to my ear sound like something that even could be a proper noun. Of course, the reader will figure it out pretty quickly as they read ... but the difference between good and bad copyediting is, the good stuff doesn't force the reader to put a puzzle together. How about: "the battalion known as 40 Commando"? - Dank (push to talk) 02:34, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
• "Lieutenant General": Almost all jobs and all ranks are lowercased unless they appear right before a person's name.
  • Indeed, I think I mentioned this at a current ACR, as well!
    • Ah, it appears somebody intorduced this by removing the rank from the first sentence. Now reverted.
• "took off": In general, use quotation marks sparingly, and only when they add something. The quotation marks here are suggesting that the phrase is informal; better would be to replace it with a phrase that isn't.
  • I'm inclined to leave this as is, since it is a direct quote and it's not ever so often you can pinpoint the moment someone becomes destined for the top (without indulging in heavy doses of OR).
    • Okay, I buy that. - Dank (push to talk) 02:34, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
• "Newspaper The Times": just The Times.
• "Commander UK Amphibious Forces (COMUKAMPHIBFOR).He relinquished CGRM/COMUKAMPHIBFOR in June ...": "Commander UK Amphibious Forces. He relinquished the position in June ...". If you can find any support for it at all, I recommend a comma after "Commander". - Dank (push to talk) 19:03, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
  • Personally, I would, but the commaless version is the name of the post and thus what's used in almost all sources. Thanks very much for the review. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:06, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
    • Sure. These noun-strings are foreign to American eyes and ears, so I just ask that we make an effort to make them digestible if the sources support it ... if they don't, then you're quite right to keep it. - Dank (push to talk) 02:34, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Ian Rose

• Generally seems close to usual standards as exemplified by say Michael Walker.
• Structure, images and referencing appear sound, and on a brief read-through prose looks okay.
• Overall it does seem a bit light-on for A-Class, however, mainly in the initial part of his career.
• Like Jim, I could wish for more on early life, though I gather there's more now than when you started -- this is not a stopper in itself IMO.
• However I notice there are no dates in the early life section. This confuses me a bit because I'm not sure how he could be born in 1954, then attend uni and gain a degree, all before he joins the military at the age of 18. He must've been quite a prodigy! Is it possible he in fact attended uni after joining up?
  • He might well have done an "in-service degree.
• The 70s and 80s is where there seems to be a pretty big hole, content-wise, that for me keeps it in GA territory only at the moment. First there's nothing at all from 1975 till the Falklands in 1982 -- and again I agree with Jim that one might expect a bit more on the Falklands itself -- then there's nothing on the rest of the decade except a general statement on staff positions.
• From 1990 on I think you're doing fine as far as detail goes.
• To summarise, I'd like to see this A-Class, but I think we need a bit more meat in the 70s and 80s. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:14, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Shimgray emailed me his Who's Who entry. There's a bit more in there that I haven't added yet, including some of his early postings and commands. I'm not entirely sure there'll be enough for A-class, since he doesn't seem to have been pegged as a high-flier until he was a brigadier (and that seems to have been a case of being in the right place at the right time) and then there wasn't much for him to do after ISAF beause he was already higher than the officer supposed to be the highest-ranking Royal Marine. I was pretty chuffed to get it to GA, but I'll see what else I can find. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:32, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Lympne Airport

I've listed this article for peer review because… I would like to get this to FA status. The article has had a copyedit as part of the GA process, and it is now GA rated. The basic military history of RAF Lympne / RNAS Lympne / HMS Buzzard / HMS Daedalus II is covered in the Lympne Airport article, with details of units etc in the RAF Lympne article. Mjroots (talk) 06:29, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

Good work so far, I have the following suggestions:

• in the lead, I suggest mentioning the First World War in this sentence: "RFC Lympne was originally an acceptance point for aircraft being delivered to, and returning from, France during the First World War". This will provide a little bit more context;

 Done, I've also expanded the lede a little to locate Kent, as we are supposed to be writing for a global readership. Mjroots (talk) 06:40, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

• in the Civil operations section, this probably needs endashes instead of hyphens: "Leeds-Lympne-Amsterdam service", particularly as you use them later, for instance in: "Lympne–Edenbridge–Caterham–Croydon route";

I'm not a fan of dashes I can't type on my keyboard. Am aware of the big row currently running over the use of various dashes and hyphens.

• in the 1951-60 section, there appears to be a broken "clarify" tag here: "Permission had been granted for the use of these aircraft for freight operations and it was intended to introduce them on 1 April 1955.{{clarify|and did they?";

I've removed the broken tag. It is clear that the intention was introduction, but I've not found a reference to support actual introduction on that date. Saying that it happened without backup strays into WP:OR territory. Mjroots (talk) 06:40, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

• in the Pre-war air races section, is there a citation for the list of "Races at Lympne"?
• in the Post-war air races section, is there are citation for the list (as above)?
• in the References section there is a slight inconsistency in the citations. For example # 1 "Delve 2005, p. 168." (this uses a full stop after the "p" for page), but compare to # 7 (no full stop after the "p");

Book refs use a full stop, Flight refs don't. I suppose for consistency they should all use one format. Will attend to this later. Mjroots (talk) 06:40, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

 Done All page refs now using "p." Mjroots (talk) 10:20, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

• in the References, I think there are a couple of typos in this title: "Citzen Airmen in Training. Reuslts of First Camps. A New Squadron";

 Done Mjroots (talk) 06:40, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

• in the References, in # 190, there is a capitalisation issue: "flight International". I think it should be "Flight International". AustralianRupert (talk) 06:24, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

 Done Mjroots (talk) 06:40, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Dank

As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. Please check the edit summaries. I made the following changes:

• "as the Air Ministry could not justify keeping the two bases open following the end of the war—they decided to retain Hawkinge." I changed the dash to a comma.
• "there was no permanent customs officer there, a telephone call to Folkestone Harbour was needed to clear customs.": comma splice
• "civil flying": "civilian" is more common.
• "78 feet (24 m) high mast": 78-foot (24 m) high mast

Operation Deadstick

Almost all editors with an interest in WWII will have heard about Operation Deadstick, even if you don't recognise the name. It has just had a copy edit by the GOCE and could use a peer review for any suggestions for improvement. I have enjoyed writing the article and I hope you enjoy reading it. Jim Sweeney (talk) 22:53, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

This is a great article Jim, and my comments are really only about minor details:

• It seems a bit odd to directly link British Army during the Second World War in the first sentence - this sentence should place the operation in the context of the Normandy landings rather than the much broader topic of the British Army's experiances
• "that took place on 5 June 1944" - specify that it was during the night of 5/6 June, perhaps (and the infobox gives the date of the operation as 6 June)
• I'd suggest reorganising the 'background' section so that it starts with the 'British Forces' sub-section (as this explains the background to the operation), followed by the 'Bridges' and 'German forces' sub-sections
• "A further clearance of the trenches and bunkers captured a number of Germans" - 'a further clearance' is a bit awkward - could you use - 'another attack on' or similar?
• Should the names of the British platoons (eg 'one platoon') be capitalised? (eg, 'One Platoon').
• The Clearing the Channel Coast article doesn't seem relevant to what's covered in the 'Aftermath' section Nick-D (talk) 10:41, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review I think 5 June was a typo and I have changed it to One Platoon etc all other suggestions incorporated. Thansk again Jim Sweeney (talk) 13:22, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

I mostly do footnotes:

• "ACTOR RETURNS TO SCENE OF D-DAY LANDINGS" has a date of publication
• Pegasus archive has an author (Editor? Archivist?). What makes this a reliable in transmitting intact "National Archives catalogue number WO 171/1239."? Also the war diary has an author, it has a document title, etc. etc.
• "Obituary, Colonel David Wood" has an author and a publication date
• ps pps n-dashes are good
• "The British Airborne Assault" incomplete bibliographic entry, it is an archive of a website at a certain point in time, originally published by MOD, part of a document series, part of a commemoration, with a last updated indicator
• "John Howard Is Dead at 86; British Hero of D-Day Invasion" has an author, publication date, etc.
• "Memorial Pegasus" has a publisher and corporate author "D-Day Commemoration Committee"

And bibliographies

• "London, England" Really? Last time I checked the recognised state was commonly known as the United Kingdom
• No journal articles? No monographs or chapters in edited collections solely on Deadstick?

And sourcing

• You seem overly reliant on Ambrose for the narrative, broadening sourcing in the ways suggested under "And bibliographies" may help improve the article Fifelfoo (talk) 16:03, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review changes incorporated Ambrose book has much more detail than the others but where possible I used other references. Jim Sweeney (talk) 16:55, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Intothatdarkness

My comments are more general, although they are concerned with sourcing.

• Have you considered using Hans von Luck's memoirs for a German perspective? This seems somewhat lacking in the article as it stands now.

I was aware of the book but have been unable to locate a copy.

• I also have some concerns about over-reliance on Ambrose (especially given the plagiarism allegations that swirl around him), but I also understand that detailed sources might be lacking.

Ambrose is only used in 33 out of 97 references now

• In the 1st Commando Bde section, is it possible to identify by unit the attacking German forces? I know the units are mentioned earlier, but a refresher here might help (or not...it's something of a preference choice).  Done
• There are some typos scattered throughout the article (I noticed "Howard was not told the exact details of the opers(a)tion" and "told Howard that with a full load of men(,) ammunition, assault boats and engineers' stores" within a few lines of each other).  Done
• Other than those quibbles, it's a pretty good article.Intothatdarkness (talk) 20:45, 7 April 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the review.Jim Sweeney (talk) 12:30, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

Ranger Steve

Just a few general comments from me:

• I feel terrible asking this, but is there a reference for the operation name? I only ask because its so unknown, and I notice there's nothing in the text to confirm it. Reference added
• I can't recommend the Private Papers of John Howard enough and I really think this should be in the bibliography if the article goes to A class or above.
• Similarly there are some other books specifically on this operation other than those already in the bibliography. I haven't read it, but Barber's book springs to mind.

Hope it helps. Sorry if it dents the wallet though. Ranger Steve ^Talk 17:46, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks will try and obtain a copy of Howard's memoirs Jim Sweeney (talk) 21:45, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

Dank

I see this was closed a few days ago. I started working on it before and just had a chance to finish half of it, up to Operation Deadstick#Deadstick. I found little to fix, and fixed what I found, mostly commas where few people use them. If you're headed to FAC, change single quotes around a word or phrase to double quotes per WP:MOS#Quotation marks. Single quotes around a letter can stay. I don't know what "an 8 and 10 feet (2.4 and 3.0 m) wide narrow track" is; is it between 8 and 10 feet wide? Do you have any sources that support the spelling "Africa Korps"? Our article is Afrika Korps, and that's the spelling I've seen. - Dank (push to talk) 17:51, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks the track is between 8 and 10 feet wide and spelling of Afrika Korps changed to match the article name. Jim Sweeney (talk) 08:44, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

Air raids on Japan

I've recently greatly expanded this article from this stub to its current status and would like some feedback on how to improve it further - I hope to develop the article to A class and possibly even FA status. I'd greatly appreciate all comments, though I guess I'm particularly interested in comments on the structure of the article (does the combination of chronological and thematic approaches make sense?), level of detail (excessive or OK?) and balance (I think more needs to be added on the Japanese experience of these attacks, but how much and what are some additional sources which can be drawn on?). If you'd like to jump in and change the article that would, of course, also be great.

Please note that I'm yet to give the article a comprehensive read through or copy edit and there's a list of things I and others have identified as still needing work at Talk:Air raids on Japan, so this should be considered a draft-type article. Thanks, Nick-D (talk) 10:35, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

• I note with pleasure the items listed at the Talk: page for improvement and concur.
• The notes are well formatted at this stage; I've not done a minute note proof read as the article is still in development
• The quality of the bibliography is high, both in formatting and source selection. These are primarily improvement notes:
  • ISBNs for all items as available
  • When short citing entries in an encyclopaedia, the title of the entry may be relevant to the short cite. If separately authored, list the authors for the chapter.
    • Good point.
  • Double check DOIs before going A or FAC class, bot provided DOIs may point incorrectly
    • The DOIs are from the PDFs of the articles themselves, so should be OK
  • Oops: (1st ed. ed.).
    • Fixed - and well spotted. Nick-D (talk) 07:53, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

Intothatdarkness

• The first paragraph under "United States Preparations" might read better if it said "...began contingency planning for an air campaign against Japan" instead of its current form. The second paragraph might also read better if this "proved reluctant to allow the aircraft territory under his control" was changed to something like "proved reluctant to allow the aircraft to operate from bases under his control."
• Pre-war Japanese Defenses - delete the ", however" from the end of the second sentence.
• Operation Matterhorn, Preparations - "The Japanese Government stepped-up its civil defenses from the northern autumn of 1943." should perhaps read "early autumn" or "late autumn." If "northern autumn" is a specific event, it should be defined.
  • My understanding is that when seasons are mentioned, the relevant hemisphere should always be specified to prevent confusion
• Initial Attacks from the Mariana Islands - consider changing "which would allow B-29s" in the third sentence to "allowing B-29s" (it reads better IMO that way).
• Not sure if a capsule history of the atomic weapons program is needed here.
  • It's about the same length as the background provided for the other major forms of attack and this topic is normally covered in accounts of the bombing campaign on Japan, so I'm leaning towards leaving this as is.

That's about it. Well sourced and written on the whole.Intothatdarkness (talk) 18:27, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

• • Belated thanks for your comments. Except where noted above, I've incorporated them Nick-D (talk) 11:52, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Citadel of Damascus

This article has just reached GA. I am interested in getting it to A or maybe even FA, but since this would be my first attempt to get an article to that status I thought a peer review might be useful. Points of interest:

• is the complex history clear enough?
• is the description of the citadel sufficient?
• is a map needed for that status (AFAIK, there is no free map and the oldest one I could find only gets into the public domain in a few years from now)? -- Zoeperkoe (talk) 19:01, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
• Are the images sufficient (given that the citadel is not open to the public, it is hard to find good images)?
• does the text read well or is it too condensed (a comment I have received in the past)?

AustralianRupert

Hi, sorry you've had to wait so long for some comments. Unfortunately I don't have any knowledge of the content, so I can't say much in that regard. I've taken a quick look over the article and have the following comments. Feel free to disregard if you don't agree:

• the article is well cited and referenced;
• File:Damascus-citadel.JPG needs an author added to the summary section on the image description page;

 Done

• File:Damaskus1.jpg - I think the "Permission" field is not correct. "PD-OLD" wouldn't be the correct licence, as the image is clearly recent. I think it should be be "PD-SELF" or something similar as the author has released it into the public domain. For instance, see the Permission field on File:Damaskus4.jpg;

• I am not sure what to do here. Should I fix this myself or contact the person who uploaded these images?

 Done

• I think that the number of images would be fine for A-class. I'm not sure about FA, though (I don't normally review at that level);

• OK. I'll decide what to do on that later. Admittedly, I haven't looked at all whether free images are available outside WP, so that is something I can still do.

• in the lead, there is some repetition: "old city of Damascus" and then "Ancient City of Damascus";

 Done

• in the lead, this looks like a typo: "Except for briefs period in 1300" (the word "briefs" is the issue here);

 Done

• in the lead, I think this should be tweaked: "The citadel has gates on its north, west and east flanks." It would probably read more smoothly as: "The citadel has gates on its northern, western and eastern flanks.";

 Done

• in the lead, I think this should be tweaked: "Extensive repairs in response to sieges and earthquakes have been carried out in the Mamluk and Ottoman periods." It would probably read more smoothly as: "Extensive repairs in response to sieges and earthquakes were carried out in the Mamluk and Ottoman periods.";

 Done

• in the Saladin to Al-Adil section, there is a typo here: "hosilities broke out in 1194 between" ("hosilities" should be "hostilities");

 Done

• in the Construction by Al-Adil section, this should not be hyphenated: "and numerous closely-spaced". Per WP:HYPHEN, a hyphen is not used after a standard "-ly" adverb;

 Done

• in the World War I section, this should not be hyphenated: "newly-appointed Ottoman military" (per above comment);

 Done

• in the Gates subsection of the Citadel today section, same as above for: "central unusually-shaped dome";

 Done

• in the Gates subsection, there is a typo here: "while the the vaulted" ("the the" is the issue here);

 Done

• in the Location and layout subsection of the Citadel today section, "Mameluk" - this is inconsistent with previously used "mamluk";

 Done

• in the Towers subsection, there is a typo here: "All towers are crowned by a double parapet equipped with with" ("with with" is the issue here);

 Done--Zoeperkoe (talk) 00:03, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Anyway, overall the article looks quite good to me. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 11:05, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Hchc2009

Ditto, apologies - I missed this when it first came up. I thought this was a well-researched article, which I enjoyed reading.

In answer to your specific points:

• A map would certainly help, but if there isn't one in the public domain, then that's going to be rather hard.
• I didn't find the text dense, but there was a lot of wider history interwoven into the history of the Citadel (unsurprisingly!) which made it feel dense at times.

• I was trying to find a good balance between giving context on the citadel, and not writing a history of Damascus as a whole, but I take it that the general story is more or less understandable?

• Yes, definitely. Hchc2009 (talk) 08:29, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

• I'd have liked to see some more images, but as you say, that does depend on their being available!

• I could try and find some free images outside WP, but that might take some time.

• It would be worth it, I think, as it castles and fortresses do come to life. I think I've found a 19th century one that is in PD - I'll double check later. Hchc2009 (talk) 08:29, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

General:

• You sometimes use "between 1203 and 1216" as a construct, and sometimes "between 1213–1215" - you'll want to be consistent, and it may be worth checking with the MOS which is right (I think the "and" version is the preferred one, but I might be wrong)

 Done

Lead:

• "the emirs of the subsequent Burid and Zengid" "Burid and Zengid dynasties"?
• " and had its defences" - probably "had the defences", as you've already specified which building it is earlier in the sentence.
• "the Mongols had it largely dismantled" - read a bit oddly to me. "the Mongols had most of it dismantled"?
• " the Mamluks controlled the citadel until 1516. In 1516, Syria fell into the hands of the Ottomans. " - repetition of 1516.
• "The citadel continued to serve as barracks and prison" - "a barracks and prison"?
• "Extensive repairs in response to sieges and earthquakes have been carried out " - tense: "sieges and earthquakes were carried out"

All  Done

Old Citadel:

• "The Ghouta in general..." Its wikilinked, but I needed to click on it to find out what it was - worth explaining.

 Done

• "who established himself as ruler of the city" - grammatically correct, but "as the ruler" might read more smoothly.

 Done

• "but was defeated in 1077. Building on this success..." I read this twice, because of the "defeat" and "success" at first appearing contradictory.

 Done

• "and had its leader, Atsiz, assassinated out of distrust " - "Tutush I took over the city and, distrusting the former ruler Atsiz, had him assassinated"?

 Done

• " work was carried out" - you use this a couple of times - are there any more details that could be given?

• In most cases, details on what was done are available. I just wasn't sure how much detail I should provide. I will look into it.

• "and rebuilt or refurbished its residential structures" - unclear if this means that he rebuilt and refurbished the structures, or if we don't know which one of these he did.
• "Nur ad-Din died of illness" - "died of an illness"

 Done

• "Saladin died of illness" ditto

 Done

New Citadel:

• "the old fortifications were razed and a larger castle was built at the same location, incorporating parts of the old Seljuk citadel"- I might have misunderstood, but if the old fortifications were razed (which I'd read to mean a fairly total demolishing operation), how could parts of the old Seljuk citadel be incorporated?
• "but only one of them, As-Salih Ayyub, also modified the defences" - this read oddly to me, but I'm not sure what a good alternative would be.

 Done

• "important changes in its " - "important changes to the defensive system"?

 Done

• "numerous closely-spaced high, massive, square instead of round towers" - the "square instead of round" bit makes this quite hard to read - how about: "numerous closely-spaced, high, massive towers. Unlike the older towers, these were square rather than round in design."?

 Done Reworded and also explanation of function towers as platforms for trebuchets.

• "This occurred when the citadel's garrison had been reduced to below the number needed to defend a castle of that size." - I was curious about why the garrison numbers would have affected their defence against enemy mining (did they do counter-mining at this time?)
• You mention the introduction of cannon. Did gunpowder weapons start to affect the design of the citadel at all?
• "In 1461, the southwest tower collapsed in a fire when missiles were fired from it to force the rebellious governor of Damascus to leave the city." - I didn't understand the link between the fire breaking out and the missiles.
• "with the aim to open the citadel to the public" - "aim of opening the citadel"?

 Done

• "It is expected that, once renovations are finished..." - Expected by who?

 Done

Citadel today:

• "by the urban fabric of Damascus" - I'm not sure "fabric" is the right word here.

• I understand urban fabric to be used for the whole of streets and buildings, and thought it was quite appropriate but I will try to find an alternative.

• "northern walls have been cleared in the 1980s" - "were cleared"?

 Done

• "have been constructed" - "are constructed"?

 Done

• " All other towers" > "All the other towers"

 Done

• "from which trebuchets could be operated" - "were operated"?

 Done

• "Given that during the design of the citadel so much emphasis was placed on the massive towers, the curtain walls are relatively short." - I didn't understand this bit; are you saying that because they built the towers so big, they couldn't built a longer wall? If so, was this because of money, or just because of lack of space?
• "The gate is decorated with a superb muqarnas canopy that is now hidden because the outer door is blocked" - I couldn't visualise this.
• " it has now been shown " - you'll need to be specific about the "now" date.

 Done

Cheers, Hchc2009 (talk) 13:52, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

I'm a MILHIST-A and FAC reviewer, and stick to sourcing, bibliographies and footnotes mostly

• ps, pps, n-dashes, commas are good. Consider filling out the ffs to actual page ranges
• Kedourie 1964, Wright 1926, Adorni & Venturelli 2010 and Allen 1999 could do with page ranges referred to in citation
• Check bot-supplied DOIs and ISBNs before going to FAC. Especially ISBNs as the bot may refer to an edition other than the one you cited
  • No bot was used for the refs; ISBNs/DOIs should be ok.
• Try to supply ISBNs for all books where available if you supply it for any
  • Done. I provided ISBN where available and if not went for OCLC.
• Some of us value translations of work titles, but it certainly isn't mandatory
• Supply US states or State for works published in unfamiliar cities (ie: not the big seven publishing cities); this is an "all or none" type issue of consistency
  • Removed states; should be consistent now.
• Great mixture of monographs, journal articles, chapters in edited collections
• "Ancient City of Damascus" is part of the World Heritage List, a containing work
• "Présentation de la mission" similarly is contained in a greater work
  • I'll try and fix it, but to be honest, I still not understand exactly the difference between "work" and "publisher" in cite web.
• DGAM/DGCS is uncommon enough to need to be spelt out

Otherwise the sourcing, bibliography and citations look pretty good to me Fifelfoo (talk) 16:13, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Stanisław Koniecpolski

An old FA (2005-2009) that I am bringing up to modern standards. Just passed GA. Comments on what can be improved for A-class appreciated. Please note that the book by Podhorecki is the best work on the subject, and that there are next to no English language sources (at least, no that go beyond some brief cursory treatment of the subject). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 00:05, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

• Good work so far. Just a few minor suggestions from me:
  • according to the Featured article tools, there are four disambig links that should be fixed: [4];
  • according to the Featured article tools, there is one external link that is dead and probably needs to be rectified: [5];
  • you might consider adding alt text to the images;
  • some of the hyphens should be endashes per WP:DASH. For instance in the date ranges and also page ranges in the citations. Also in text, for instance "Koniecpolski soon - on 16 January 1646 - married" - these should either be spaced endashes or unspaced emdashes. You appear to have used unspaced emdashes previously, so I'd stick with that;
  • in the Against Gustavus section, this appears to be a typo: "Gniew was retaken, Swedish plans thwarted, and their army weakened.]]."
  • there is some inconsistency in date format. For instance "April 2, 1627" and "18 April". These should be consistent;
  • the titles of books should be capitalised per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (capital letters)#Composition titles. For instance, "Women in early modern Polish society, against the European background" should be "Women in Early Modern Polish Society, Against the European Background". AustralianRupert (talk) 04:36, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. Replies:

Fixed 3 out of 4. The 4th one is the Polish name for a village still somewhere in Russia/Ukraine. I don't know how to properly spell it, and it is not on the dab page...

Removed broken elink, was unnecessary

Added alt text

Is there a script to fix those?

Yes, I've run it over the article now. Please just check, though, that it hasn't broken anything. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 07:13, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

I am not seeing a typo...

It was the two square brackets and the extra full stop. I've fixed them now. AustralianRupert (talk) 07:13, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Dates should be fine now

Titles capitalized

Thanks! --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 17:02, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

No worries, keep up the good work. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:13, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Hohum

• Good work, but IMO it seems to be heavily overlinked. The density of blue and red links makes it difficult to read.
• (Hohum ^@) 15:03, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

• If you see any unnecessary links, please let me know. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 16:38, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Are all 30+ red links likely to become articles? Do carpet, election or aphrodisiac really need to be linked, for example? (Hohum ^@) 00:45, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Red links are notable per WP:RED (places, people, some battles). Carpet wasn't (unlinked - thanks), election was (free election), aphrodisiac seems rare enough to be linkable, too. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 02:29, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

"there are next to no English language sources" bugger, can't those post-1989 Slavonic studies people in the US do something for us?

• "Jerzy Besala, Stanisław Żółkiewski" page range, publisher, citation out of style (see "Leszek Podhorodecki (1978)" for your style)
• "Norman Davies, God's playground," out of style, missing data
• Terminal periods is your style, check all citations for this before going MILHIST A. You become inconsistent mid way through the citation list
• R. Nisbet Bain (28 February 2006). and generally throughout: publisher locations per style (see "Leszek...")
• Clean up the page refs in: Daniel Stone (1 September 2001). The Polish-Lithuanian State, 1386–1795. University of Washington Press. pp. 151–152. ISBN 9780295980935. Retrieved 9 March 2011. p. 158 and p. 195
• ps pps and n-dashes seem good
• How frustrating having to rely on one source! Damn academics. Fifelfoo (talk) 16:21, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean by terminal periods. If you mean the missing publisher locations, well, Google Books doesn't list them, so... --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk} 21:21, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

"Barsa p. 20." has a terminal period; "Barsa p. 20" has no terminal period. Publisher locations are contained in Google Books in the Bibliographic details / Copyright page of the text (usually behind the title page and opposite the Table of Contents). Fifelfoo (talk) 02:10, 13 April 2011 (UTC)

Battle of the Wilderness

I would like to improve this article to at least GA or A-class status. Wild Wolf (talk) 16:52, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Adam Cuerden

The images used are not the best available. The Library of Congress has better scans or images than every (historical) image in the article, as well as a wealth of untapped resources. If you're not aware: Download the TIFF, then covert it to JPEG for a MUCH higher resolution image. Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 01:58, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

FIfelfoo

I mostly do citations, bibliographies, sources.

• If you give locations for presses, and states in locations, you ought to give them in all items, even in further reading.
• Fuller citation required "National Park Service battle description" corporate author, publisher, etc.
• "May-June 1864" n-dash
• "pp. 307-08" and generally: n-dash
• Your short cites for Rhea require a short title or a year: you cite three different Rhea works
• Your citations of websites are incomplete (publisher, author, retrieval date, etc.) Fifelfoo (talk) 16:38, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

List of campaigns of Suleiman I

I have recently expanded the article, and would like some feedback before nominating it for Featured list candidates. Since I do not have any experience in preparing FL, I have made a request for Peer review, before the article is actually finished. Here are some of issues that could use a good advice from more experienced editors:

• Lead?
• Infobox military conflict - Belligerents (should I remove them, or expanded with every single country involved in these Campaigns)?
• Several citations and 'Campaign paths' that are missing, will be added soon.
• I am aware that all images will have to have alt text, but should I leave the images or remove them from the article/list. If we leave it (which I prefer since most of them are closely related to the related Campaign), should I insert image caption in 'Notes', to describe them?
• 'Notes' section describes 'Campaign path' for a particular campaign, as well as the most important things of the campaign. Is this too much, or maybe too short?
• Should I add a new column which describes what was an Otoman Victory, Otoman Defeat, or Indecisive or unclear outcome?

Any other suggestions or questions would be welcome! --Kebeta (talk) 12:56, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Welcome to peer review. I'm impressed by your list of known languages and the quality of your Good Articles. I'm mainly a copy editor, and I covered the Campaigns section.

• The date formats need to be the same (you have 6 November but August 29).
• I'm not clear on what you're saying here: "The Habsburgs once again engaged in conflict with the Ottomans attempting to lay siege to Buda, which was governed by Isabella Jagiellon, with continued support from Suleiman. A humiliating defeat was inflicted on the Habsburgs in the Siege of Buda (1541) when the Ottomans responded to a request for help from Isabella Jagiellon." - Dank (push to talk) 03:41, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Dank for your help. Well, don't be so impressed by mine list of known languages, since hr-bs-sr are very similar. As for your second point, it goes something like this...Buda was governed by Isabella Jagiellon with Suleiman's support. The Habsburgs were attempting to lay siege to Buda. Suleiman took personal command of the Ottomans relief army. Ottoman relief army reached Buda and defeated the Habsburgs.--Kebeta (talk) 21:23, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

Hi, good work with this. Just a few consistency suggestions from me. Feel free to ignore if you don't agree:

• the title has "Suleiman I", but the article has "Suleyman I" - probably should be consistent in the spelling;
• the date in the infobox probably should have an endash rather than a hyphen per WP:DASH;
• the References section is in a smaller font to the Further reading section - this should probably be consistent;
• Footnote # 3 should end with a full stop to be consistent with the other two footnotes;
• some of the citations end with full stops, but some don't (for instance # 17, 20, 22, 23, 24, 29, 34) - this should probably be consistent;
• some of the citations have endashes for pages, but some don't (for instance # 11, 28, 32) - this should probably be consistent;
• check the capitalisation of the titles in the References. They should be consistent with WP:MOSCAPS#Composition titles. For instance, the Faroqhi work should be: "The Ottoman Empire: A Short History". There are a few others that probably need tweaking in this regard also. AustralianRupert (talk) 00:26, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

FIfelfoo

I mostly do citations, bibliographies, sources

• Watch your terminal periods in citations, some have terminal periods, others don't.
• Watch this: p.200 versus p. 200. You use both at the moment.
• This name string "Ágoston and Alan Masters, Gábor and Bruce (2009)." is unintelligible. Is one author's name solely and only "Agoston", and another's "Gabor Alan Masters" and a third solely "Bruce"? See Corvisier, André; Childs, John for an intelligible presentation
• You might as well give us the title of the entry cited in Agoston
• Publisher locations: all items should have them, or no item should have them.
• Similarly with ISBNs (where available)
• Publisher states ( New York (USA) ), all or none

Otherwise looks good. Fifelfoo (talk) 16:45, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Chief of Defence Force (Singapore)

Asked a couple of people for opinions on this, namely (a) what could be added to the article that is currently missing; and (b) would you as a reader consider it an article (and thus subject to GAN/FAC in future) or a list (FLC)? I received mixed messages on the latter point although the two people I asked on wiki both suggested coming here to ask. On the first point, I've added pretty much everything I've been able to find online. There isn't much written anywhere on the specifics of the role so I'm not sure how to further develop the article/list. If MILHIST could provide some direction I'd be appreciative. Strange Passerby (talk • contribs • Editor review) 12:32, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Welcome to our peer review. The article is well-written, and I've copyedited half of it; feel free to revert. I don't think the article in its current form would do well at FAC (they're looking for something "meatier"); I don't have a good feel for FLC. My only comment is that this seems to be a couple of sentences run together: "As the operational head of the SAF, the CDF is also tasked with improving the forces' readiness for operations, with the fifth CDF, Ng Yat Chung, facing a test of this in international operations the SAF faced to help support peacekeeping in East Timor (UNMISET and UNOTIL), disaster relief after the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, and disaster relief after the May 2006 Java earthquake." - Dank (push to talk) 02:35, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments, I've split that sentence up and moved the bit specific to Ng to the section on CDFs since 1990. As for the article/list argument, I think it's a bit too article-like to be a list but I think FLC folks are pretty open-minded about that. Do you have any suggestions on what (if anything) more it would take before GA? Strange Passerby (talk • contribs • Editor review) 03:28, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I don't, I'm mainly a copy editor. - Dank (push to talk) 04:15, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Copying this from my userpage:

Hi! You commented on my MILHIST PR for Chief of Defence Force (Singapore). A content dispute is brewing there, see the page history as well as User talk:Foxhound66. This user first added a line regarding the current CDF taking part in an operation back in 2000, when he wasn't CDF, and I removed it. The dispute then degenerated into (most recently) him removing three whole paragraphs from the article as he claims he doesn't feel what he removed is relevant to the office despite this all being sourced to the defence ministry's change-of-command press releases. I'd like third opinions on the issue, and I hope you're able to mediate. Strange Passerby (talk • contribs • Editor review) 01:30, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I'll copy this over to the peer review and see if someone can help there. - Dank (push to talk) 02:38, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

102nd Intelligence Wing

After a rather quick FAR that failed, I figured that this would be the good way to go. Any suggestions that could help improve this to FA-class would be marvelous. Thank you in advance for any help that you may bring! Kevin Rutherford (talk) 05:33, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

It was a FAC that failed. (Could someone post the link? Wikipedia is slow for me today, and I'm headed out to the Fort Bragg museums). I didn't look closely, but most of the concerns raised there seemed valid to me. - Dank (push to talk) 14:25, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Buckshot06

The link is at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Featured_article_candidates/102nd_Intelligence_Wing/archive1. Kevin, as I said last time, you've got a whole long list of recommended changes in the several reviews this article has had. Have you carefully incorporated all the changes that were suggested? If so, this should be a relatively easy process; if not, you need to consider withdrawing this review, making the changes, and then resubmitting. Kind regards Buckshot06 (talk) 16:42, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I actually did with the exception of a few, and I noted why I didn't at that time. Unless I am missing something pretty blatent, I have done all that I can think of but apparently others are finding stuff as we speak so I want to be more careful before submitting it again. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 18:28, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Kevin, I've just reexamined the lead paragraph, and found a repeating sentence about starting operations at Logan AP. I fear that a number of such other errors may reoccur in the text. Tell me, have you ever printed out the text section only, taken it away from the computer, sat down, and read it throughly? Right now I fear that we'll all say just go back to the last review, if I've found three major copyedit errors in the first five paragraphs. I'm sorry to be this blunt, but I believe that such a print-out-and-read approach might help you to be able to improve your own writing. Kind regards Buckshot06 (talk) 21:46, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

No, but I will try at some point in the next day or so. The only problem with that idea I fear is that I am so ultra familiar with the text that I won't notice anything wrong with it. I am much better at being an outside reviewer on other pages as it doesn't have me literally all over it. I know that my writing isn't the greatest, but I really want others to look it over for me because I fear that otherwise I will not catch things since I am used to myself. Also, please don't fear being blunt as I would rather have that over lies or sugarcoating of the truth. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 07:06, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I see what you mean to a certain extent. Also, I thought I fixed the text issues in the emblem section but apparently that edit didn't save and I didn't notice until now. I'll tackle these issues later on today then. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 07:13, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

MAke sure you print out and read the entire text, would be my advice. Ignore the pics, tables, refs etc, concentrate on the text. Make some changes in longhand - stay away from the computer - and fiddle with it until it reads well. You can upload a draft of the text-only to any user draft page later and I'll take a look if you like. Buckshot06 (talk) 16:26, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I'll get to it in the next few days. Thanks. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 02:10, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

So I just finished tweaking and redoing some things. I now see why you wanted me to go through it because there were a lot of mistakes. It should be good now, but it just needs a copyedit from someone else because I will only re-write it into my own way of writing, which is incidentally what is there right now. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 06:08, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Normally, I just do copyediting, but it's not ready for copyediting yet, the problems (at least at the A-class level) go deeper. The bibliography has just two books, and I'm not sure, but judging from their names and the way you used them, they seem like primary sources to me. The other references are online, and of varying quality. My overall impression is: you've done good work, but this isn't really what we're looking for at A-class (despite the fact that it's passed A-class ... so I could be wrong). We'd like to see a variety of authoritative, secondary sources supporting the article. Also, the tone of 102nd Intelligence Wing#Emblem is rather POV-ish (the quoted material includes "excellence required of Air Force personnel" and "the unit has consistently excelled"), and we don't generally use large block quotes unless the reader needs to get special insight into the quoted material. - Dank (push to talk) 17:08, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, I might be able to use my offical EFOIA information, but that would require digging for information in my house. Those two books, as I have said on other reviews, are holdovers from the creation of the page (in fact they are probably the only thing that hasn't changed in terms of text). Virtually every Air National Guard wing page probably has them listed somewhere. If you want, I can re-write that emblem section and I am actually more than willing to do such a thing. Is there anything else that you want me to do? Kevin Rutherford (talk) 01:16, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Re-writing the emblem section and finding respected secondary sources is all I'm looking for, but other reviewers will probably have more specific requests. I'm mainly a copyeditor. - Dank (push to talk) 01:29, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I can do that sometime in the next day or so. I also added a bunch of books which are viewable on Google Books in the bibliography so you are more than welcome to comment on those. Thanks again for everything! Kevin Rutherford (talk) 21:01, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I just re-wrote the emblem section. If you could review that and tell me what you think, that would be rather swell. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 03:17, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

102nd_Intelligence_Wing#Description describes exactly what we see in the image. I don't personally deal with alt text, but alt text is for describing images for people who are listening to a screen reader or recording of the page. Someone who can see the image doesn't need to be told what's in it. Just mention the parts that you need to mention in the symbolism section. - Dank (push to talk) 12:51, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Okay, all fixed! Kevin Rutherford (talk) 06:22, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Okay, we don't seem to be getting a lot of reviewers dropping by our peer review these days, and I don't think the process is very helpful unless you get different reviewers handling different issues. I think I'll stop participating here and stick to A-class and FAC. I'm not sure where you go from here, because I'd still like to see this article getting some reviews before we try FAC again; I'll ask over at WT:MOS whether a review of the A-class status is the way to go. - Dank (push to talk) 15:24, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Oops ... I meant WT:MHC not MOS, and I dropped the ball on this one, I'll go ask now. - Dank (push to talk) 18:47, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Note: Kevin, unless you've used the books that you've found in the article, do not place them in a bibliography. Split the setup into references and all the ones you haven't used go into Further Reading. This is the way the MOS dictates. Cheers Buckshot06 (talk) 14:21, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

I just put them there so a user could look over them. I think they all can be used since they all have facts that back up something but I'll get around to that soon. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 00:19, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

I have the following observations/suggestions for improvement. Please note, I did not read the whole article word for word, I just had a general look (it is quite late here now):

• the first paragraph in the History/Origins section needs a citation;
• in the Cold War section, this sentence needs a citation: "The 67th Wing was assigned to Air Defense Command";
• in the Cold War section, there is a contraction: "Although the Massachusetts Air National Guard wasn't federalized for the Korean War". I suggest changing to "was not" - sounds more formal;
• in the Berlin Wall Crisis, this sentence needs a citation: "Starting on December 5, 1961 the 102nd began deploying to Wheelus Air Base, Libya for gunnery training";
• in the Berlin Wall Crisis, the third paragraph is uncited and should have a citation at least placed at the end of the paragraph;
• in the Local defense subsection, the caption of the image is incorrectly punctuated. "F-15's From Otis" should be "F-15s from Otis" (no apostrophe and lower case);
• in the Local defense subsection, this is not grammatically correct "at a distance of 10-mile (16 km)", nor is "the distance decreased to 5-mile (8.0 km)". It should be "at a distance of 10 miles (16 kms)" and "the distance decreased to 5 miles (8.0 kms)";
• in the 9/11 terrorist attacks subsection, "Knowing that they couldn't await" - I suggest expanding the contraction;
• in the 9/11 terrorist attacks subsection, this needs a citation: "Unsure of their target, they were directed to a holding pattern in military-controlled airspace Whiskey 105 off of Long Island to avoid New York area air traffic. At 9:03 am, United Airlines Flight 175 hit the South Tower as the fighters were progressing to their holding position. The Northeast Air Defense Sector was not advised of this hijacked aircraft until 9:03";
• as I stated in the last ACR, I believe that the level of detail in the 9/11 terrorist attacks subsection is too great and possibly consistutes undue weight;
• in the BRAC 2005 and New mission subsections there are a couple of very small paragraphs which could probably be merged together to form larger paragraphs;
• paired commas are required in a couple of places. For instance: "April 6, 2008 and was planned" (there should be a comma after "2008");
• in the Bibliography section, the titles should be capitalised per WP:MOSCAPS#Composition titles. For instance, "US Air Force designations since 1978" should be "US Air Force Designations Since 1978";
• the Bibliography probably should be sorted alphabetically by the authors' surnames;
• per recent advice from the FAC process, the portal box/links should be placed at the top of the Notes section, not in the External links section. AustralianRupert (talk) 13:19, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I'll get on this next week. Thanks! Kevin Rutherford (talk) 00:39, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Skanderbeg's Italian expedition

This article passed a GA review last month, but I would like to have it achieve at least A-Class. My main concerns are article length (which may be too long) and the bibliography (which may be too short). Since I do not have any experience in preparing A-Class articles, I was hoping I could get some help. Any comment or concern is welcome.--Gaius Claudius Nero (talk) 23:16, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Kebeta

Hi, an interesting article. Just a couple of suggestions from me:

• I wouldn't worry much about article length if the article is fully focused to the topic.
• Make sure that lead covers most important aspects of the article (what I mean, don't worry about aricle lenght in this case).
• Lead section don't introduce Skanderbeg properly (an average reader doesn't know who was Skanderbeg). Same goes for others. For example, René d'Anjou, who was he, what were his lands...The lead should be able to stand alone as a concise overview of the article.
• Bibliography/References could use more variety of sources.
• Having said that, more secondary sources are welcome. For example, Harry Hodgkinson is tertiary source in this case.
• Names of the sections and subsections could use more work. Unfortunately, I don't have any better suggestions to offer.
• You could add 'Infobox Military Conflict' in the right top of the article. This way, the readers could understand who is who, what is this article about, and the outcome of the story.
• In some cases you use old names, and in other cases new names of places involved in the article. For example, Ragusa is used as an old name - (Dubrovnik isn't mentioned as a new one), and Taranto is used as new name (Tarentum or Tarantas isn't used as an old one)? There are several other cases also in the article (for example, is it Ujëbardha or Albulena - you have to decide per consistensy within the article). You should either use all old names, or all new names. My suggestion is that you use old names all-round, but when the place is first mentioned, you give a new name in brackets. For example, first Ragusa (Dubrovnik), and later only Ragusa.
• I would expand 'Aftermath' section. You have finished with 1463, a year after the expedition. Maybe even the last paragraph of 'Skanderbeg in Italy' should be moved to 'Aftermath' section.
• Try to fix linking. For example, in section 'Situation in Italy' you linked 'Aragon' two times, and in section 'Albanian arrival' you linked 'Apulia' two times (A word only needs to be wikilinked once within each section). And in some cases you don't have a link for a place or a person within the section. Try to be consistent even in linking.
• An image caption should only end with a full-stop if it forms a complete sentence per GA criteria. For example, "A portrait of René of Anjou, the titular King of Naples." shouldn't have a full-stop.
• Watch for redundancies that make the article too wordy instead of being crisp and concise.
• Adding 'See also' or/and 'External links' section could improve the article. Or in front of section or subsection you could add
  See also: Albanian–Venetian War (1447–1448)
  , or something similar which is related to appropriate section.
• It is recommended not to specify the size of images. The sizes should be what readers have specified in their user preferences. For example, try to remove 230px, 350px...where is not necessary for the article layout.
• You should put some image of Skanderbeg in the article, after all, the article is about his expedition.
• Left-aligned images should not be placed at the start of subsections. For example, see sections 'Background' and 'Preparations and Ragusan voyage'.
• It would be good that all images have alt text.

These are some of mine comments. Overall, a very good work has been done. --Kebeta (talk) 15:22, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Again, thanks for reviewing the article. I implemented most of your suggestions. The ones that I didn't I either saw as problematic or I didn't know how to do (such as the last one). If you have any other suggestions, they are much welcome.--Gaius Claudius Nero (talk) 21:41, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

You have a nice, dense writing style. I copyedited the first half of the article (as always, feel free to revert), but I was a bit confused by the subject matter, so there were places where I didn't really follow but left it alone. In the lead section, what does "but the news was" mean? - Dank (push to talk) 21:20, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I removed it to avoid confusion. What else did you find confusing?--Gaius Claudius Nero (talk) 21:39, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

In general, the problem isn't that the text is wrong, but that it raises questions faster than it answers them, so it requires the reader to work harder than they should to figure out what you mean. For example, this passage in the lead: "In order to repay Alfonso for the assistance given to him, Skanderbeg took up the pope's offer to help out Alfonso's son. Before leaving, Skanderbeg tried to negotiate a ceasefire with Sultan Mehmed II, the conqueror of Constantinople, to ensure his domain's safety. Mehmed had not openly declared a truce but he was still sending his armies against Bosnia and the Morea." What assistance? What offer from the pope? How would he help Alfonso's son? If there was no "open" truce, does that mean there was some sort of hidden truce? Shouldn't the "but" be an "and", since sending out armies is in synch with not declaring a truce? It's not unreadable, it's just that most readers will feel a little lost. But I've done what I want to do for now; copyediting is generally the last step, and I'd like to see what other reviewers think. I'm thinking that the A-class review will be the best time to finish up the copyediting. - Dank (push to talk) 22:03, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I understand. I tried to answer those questions and will wait for future reviews. Thank you for your comments.--Gaius Claudius Nero (talk) 22:24, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Magicpiano

• Umm, who is Skanderbeg? The article does not say early on -- we are thrust into the middle of his activities. There is a brief mention of him "going back to Albania" at the end of the lead, giving the merest hint of his nationality, but not his position. His religion is hinted at, since the Pope seems to like him. We don't find out until "Albanian situation" that he appears to be either the ruler or military leader of "Albania" (or both), but this is never explicitly stated.
• We also don't know what the extent is of his territory at this time. You pretty much need a map with all of the relevant political boundaries on it to explain this.
• The League of Lezhë is mentioned in the infobox, but nowhere else. He appears to be its leader -- what is it?
• Have Skanderbeg and/or his people ever been to Italy for military reasons before?
• When you mention Trebizond, you might briefly explain where it is (with reference to modern geopolitical boundaries, like "roughly present-day northeastern Turkey"). This will point out that the Ottomans are presumably moving resources away from the Balkans.
• The second sentence of Aftermath is extremely awkward.

It's generally well written and informative, but the context can be improved. Magic♪piano 15:49, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the review. I didn't state his religion since he is more or less dealt as a secular leader who united Catholics, Orthodox, and Muslims. A proper map for the exact time is hard to find since Skanderbeg's borders fluctuated often. I changed League of Lezhë to Dominion of Albania since he was referred to as dominus Albaniae which I have included in the lead. For Trebizond: I implemented Kebeta's suggestion above and put the modern name in parantheses next to the old one. Yes, there was an expedition in 1448 by some of Skanderbeg's men. I will include that. I also reworded the second sentence of Aftermath. If there is anything else which needs improvements, let me know. :) --Gaius Claudius Nero (talk) 21:41, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

That looks better. However, linking the current name of Trebizond does not convey the geographic implications of the Ottoman move. (My approach to matters of geography: assume my reader is 12 years old, from the other side of the planet, and has a modern atlas. How much does your description help this reader?)

I sympathize that accurate maps are unlikely to be available -- maps 300 years later were still often inaccurate and/or out of date. However, even a map with approximate extents (this may require a schematic map, perhaps made by the map workshop if a reasonable source map can be supplied). I personally consider maps to be essential for military A-class articles. Although the map now in the article is adequate for the describing the expedition, it doesn't show even approximate geopolitical bounds of the Italian or Balkan territories. Magic♪piano 23:37, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

Alright, I changed it as you suggested. I have always had plans to make a map of Skanderbeg's dominions with the locations of all of his fortresses and battles given, but it's hard to find someone willing to do it. I have even asked Albanians who would be interested in the task, but they are usually busy with other things or lack the programs. I will, however, make another request in the Map Workshop and see if I can get anything done. Thanks for the advice.--Gaius Claudius Nero (talk) 22:44, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Thomas the Slav

I have recently de-stubbed the article, and would like some feedback before nominating it for GA status and higher. The article is complex as there are conflicting accounts and subsequently a lot of different views and interpretations by modern historians, so I am anxious to know how well this comes across. I would also like opinions on whether the article should be split into a main biographical article on Thomas and a separate more detailed one on his rebellion. And of course, any other suggestions or questions for clarification would be welcome! Constantine ✍ 17:08, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

Ah, another Cplakidas article, such a pleasure to read.

• Please run through my review of your last article quickly for some ideas ... for instance, I mentioned that it's a good idea to link the first occurrence of "r." since many readers won't know that it means "reigned". We've also been tweaking our checklist for A-class; have a look, and feel free to ask if it seems unclear.
• "the statement in some hagiographic that Thomas": Is there a missing word there?
• Are hetaireia, spatharios, monostrategos, tourma (in the Byzantine sense), tagma and Foederati used in a significant number of English sources? The goal (on Wikipedia, as opposed to journal articles) is for a general reader to be able to read the text without having to click because they have no idea what the text means. Adding a translation in parentheses can help, but if the word isn't one that, say, The New York Times is likely to use, and if there's a reasonably consistent translation used in English sources, then use the translation instead. If scholars often use the Greek words, the Greek words can appear in a footnote or in a glossary article. (I can help with either.)
• "prophesized": prophesied. - Dank (push to talk) 17:56, 18 March 2011 (UTC)
• I copyedited the lead and first section; please check my work. - Dank (push to talk) 17:59, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Hello Dank, thanks for taking the time! I agree with most of your points and changes. I think I've fixed your concerns, esp. the technical terms: I've now used more generic terms first and included the special terms after, in parentheses. In most modern works, the technical terms are used throughout, so it's easy to loose sight of the fact that most people find them weird. On style, I'll certainly submit the article for a copyedit before going for A-class or FA, but I really appreciate any suggestions for improvement as to the clarity of the narrative to a non-expert. When you finish going through the article, I'd also like an opinion on the two major issues I raised above. Cheers, Constantine ✍ 22:26, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

Sure thing, I'll come back to this one after I cycle through the A-class and FAC articles. - Dank (push to talk) 03:10, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Apologies ... it looks like I'm never going to get finished at A-class and FAC. See if you can get some copyediting help, and feel free to bring this to A-class any time. - Dank (push to talk) 18:42, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

I mostly review sources, footnotes, and bibliographies:

• Lemerle, Paul (1965),: publisher
• Kiapidou, Irini-Sofia (2003): publisher, location of publisher
• Kazhdan, Alexander, ed. (1991): location
• Terminal periods in the sources

References are good. Fifelfoo (talk) 16:53, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Done, except for the publisher location for Kiapidou: the Foundation of the Hellenic World is headquartered in Athens, but as the EHW is an online encyclopedia, it is not really relevant (unless I am wrong, of course). Constantine ✍ 15:38, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

It is relevant. The FAC standard is consistency, and MILHIST refers strongly to that standard. In addition, this helps the more academic reader observe for causes of bias in the sources. (The kind of permissible "All scholarly biases" NPOV). Fifelfoo (talk) 22:45, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

OK then, location added. Thanks for the explanation! Constantine ✍ 23:45, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Twelfth Army (United Kingdom)

I've made a start on improving this article, but I'd like feedback on how well this has been done and suggestions on what needs to be done next.Graham1973 (talk) 23:52, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

Hi, good work so far. Just a couple of suggestions from me (aimed at B class):

• more in line citations are required. For instance, the "The second British Twelfth Army" section has no in line citations at all;
• the citation style should be consistent, for instance compare Note # 1 with Note # 3 and 4 (I suggest using short citations for the Notes and add the full bibliographic details to the References section);
• an image or infobox is required for the article to reach B class;
• the heading "Subordinate Units" is incorrectly capitalised per WP:MOSHEAD. It should just be "Subordinate units";
• the template at the bottom of the article might look better if it were collapsed, but it is just a matter of personal preference.

Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:56, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for the delayed response. Thanks for the comments which I will take on board. I'll look at sorting out the references later. My primary source for the units making up the first 12th Army is Holts The Deceivers:Allied Military Deception in the Second World War, his book is based on available public records and contains a handy unit by unit breakdown. I've been trying to find alternate sources/accounts to clarify some of the material he presents, but the historical focus is on the Fortitude deceptions or Mincemeat.

Regarding the "The second British Twelfth Army" section, that was already existing when I added the information on the first 12th Army. So far I have not begun a search of information offline.

Further, I have located a picture of the insignia of the first 12th Army on the back of one account of the Fortitude Deceptions.

Graham1973 (talk) 17:04, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Dank

My gut reaction is that this should be two articles rather than one, since the two armies had little to do with each other, apart from the name. Do you have any sources on either army apart from Howard? - Dank (push to talk) 17:15, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

HMS King George V (41)

Just passed a GA review, I would like to take the article further and was looking for some comments in helping me achieve that. Thanks in advance. Thurgate (talk) 23:42, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

I'm sure that the editors more active in battleship-related articles than I am will provide comments, but to get the ball rolling I have the following suggestions for how the article could be improved:

• The article is fairly brief and lacks any 'depth'. I think that it should be possible to expand most sections of it.
• The range of sources used is very narrow, particularly given that there's a huge literature on the RN in World War II. If you read more widely (for instance, Stephen Roskill's official history) I'm sure that you'll find lots more stuff to cover.
• She didn't transport "Winston Churchill to the Tehran Conference." - she could only have transported him part of the way there (this also isn't cited in the article, and I think that it may have actually been HMS Revenge (06) which carried him)
  • Deleted that particular bit as it isnt mentioned in any of my sources and I believe it was a left over of when I re-worked the article. Thurgate (talk) 01:00, 20 February 2011 (UTC)
• There were no "British airborne landings at Taranto" - the 1st Parachute Division was transported to the city by sea
  • Fixed. Thurgate (talk) 16:39, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• The sentence " During the Okinawa campaign, the battleship supported four fast carriers of the British Pacific Fleet." is out of place
• The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester didn't 'visit' Australia in 1946 - he was the Governor-General of Australia at the time (you should also link directly to Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester)
  • BBC WW2 people's war. Written by a guy who served on the King George V (I don't know how reliable it is but it seems to agree with all my sources). Has a mention on when the ship took the new Governor General of Australia, the Duke of York and the Duchess of Gloucester on a trip to Australia. Added the Governor General link as per your suggestion. Thurgate (talk) 17:48, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
    • The BBC's People's War website is frequently wildly inaccurate (which isn't surprising given that it's written by people remembering events they were part of about 70 years ago) and not a reliable source. While interesting, that account contains some major mistakes (far less than nine BBs were involved in the attack on Hamamatsu, the Allied fleet wasn't attacked by suicide boats, the date of Emperor Hirohito's radio broadcast is totally wrong, etc). I think that you've also misinterpreted the bit on the Australian Governor General - the account says that it carried him and his wife from the Australian mainland (where they lived at Canberra) to the island of Tasmania during the battleship's voyage back to the UK (presumably from the British Pacific Fleet's main base at Sydney), not that it was a visit to Australia. Nick-D (talk) 06:49, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
• Can anything be said about the ship's crew? Nick-D (talk) 07:45, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Do you mean like the conditions they faced etc? Also thank you very much for taking the time to review the article. Thurgate (talk) 18:00, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Anything would be good! (if possible). Nick-D (talk) 06:49, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• I see Sturmvogel has been working with you. Welcome to our motley crew of battleship enthusiasts; I'm sure you'll meet a lot of friends here. I've got some comments on the lead; hope this helps. You may find our checklist helpful.
• Per WP:LEAD, an article of this length (especially after it's expanded as Nick suggests) will probably need another paragraph in the lead section. Three is fine.
• Our wikiproject strongly prefers "King George V" to "the King George V". "The" is fine in "the battleship King George V".
  • Think I've caught most of them, and ill remember that for next time, Thanks! Thurgate (talk) 16:22, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• "the King George V was heavily involved in severely damaging the Bismarck": "King George V severely damaged Bismarck"
  • Fixed. Thurgate (talk) 16:17, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• "She was also involved in the sinking of HMS Punjabi, after the Punjabi collided with the King George V.": Well, you wouldn't say "I was involved in her death, after I shot her." Just say that Punjabi sunk after a collision with King George V.
  • Fixed Thurgate (talk) 16:17, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• "Following the end of the war": "Following the war" - Dank (push to talk) 01:13, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Fixed. Thanks very much for the comments, now I just need to get my hands on some more sources! Thurgate (talk) 16:17, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Sure thing. - Dank (push to talk) 18:36, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Mike Jackson

I've put quite a bit of work into this and got it to GA. I'd like to take it to A-class and, eventually, FAC, but I'm looking for suggestions to make the journey smoother. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:09, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• Please check my edit summaries.
• "Mentioned in Despatches" seems odd to me, almost like a "proper verb". Is this standard capitalization in BritEng? Would it work to lowercase it, keep the link, and put it in quote marks?
  • the article seems to do something like that, so I've de-capitalised it
• "Jackson considered resigning his commission, wondering whether he "had reached [his] ceiling" and missed his chance for promotion to brigadier." It's not clear to me how wondering about resigning his commission led to the loss of a chance at brigadier. - Dank (push to talk) 18:11, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Ah. I've clarified it. See if it's any better. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:16, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
• "then General Wesley Clark": Although he's retired, I still hear him introduced as "General". Perhaps drop the "then".
  • I changed a comma to an mdash, which I makes it clear that the SACEUR was then Clark, not that Clark was then a general
    • "then" is used when there's a risk that the reader will think that we're implying that Wesley Clark is still the SACEUR. I don't think they will, so I've removed it, but YMMV. - Dank (push to talk) 17:44, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
• "there was a risk of an armed confrontation with the Russians": Any word describing a state of mind ("risk" is subjective) should usually be attributed. Do the sources say who was worried about the risk?
  • Hmm, risk might not be the right word. Would "chance" or something similar work?
    • It's a POV problem I think. Judging from the "macho Jacko" nickname and his promotion, there was support for the truth of that statement in Britain. Some in the American military, from what you're saying, either didn't believe this or weren't willing to say they believed it. So my preference would be either to cite an expert making a credible case that it was or wasn't believable, or to attribute the quoted statement, rather than asserting it as truth. - Dank (push to talk) 17:44, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
      • "Risk" isn't necessarily the right word, but I don't think anybody really doubts that the result of following the order would have been some form of confrontation with the Russians. The debate is over whether Jackson should have obeyed Clark because orders are orders. The version of events is essentially the same in the relevant section of Clark's article. Thinking about it, the event might be worthy of its own article. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 18:09, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
        • Okay, I get a different sense of what happened from the relevant section of Clark's article, including this: "Jackson has said he refused to take action because he did not believe it was worth the risk of a military confrontation with the Russians, instead insisting that troops encircle the airfield—a decision which led to the Russian military surrendering control within two days without conflict." I think some details such as that one would help clarify what happened. - Dank (push to talk) 18:28, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
          • I've added some more on it. See what you think. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:27, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
            • That deals with my objection, thanks. - Dank (push to talk) 19:35, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
• "to give the army greater flexibility and capability, and so better positioned to meet modern challenges.": I don't know what the last part means. If specific modern challenges were meant, it's usually better to mention them. Otherwise, maybe something shorter: "to give the army greater flexibility and modernise it".
  • I removed that bit, it just sounded like fluff to me (I'm not sure why I added it in the first place! Facepalm )
• Americans won't know that "Pte" stands for "Private"; I don't have a preference on how to handle this.
  • It was a direct quote, but I broke it up a bit to remove the abbreviation.
• I'm not certain about commas with British unit names. In AmEng, I'd say that "Royal Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment" and "Honorary Colonel, the Rifle Volunteers" need commas at the ends.
  • Do you mean "Royal Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment, in 1997" as opposed to the current "Royal Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment in 1997"? You may have a point there.
• oxforddictionaries.com and American dictionaries prefer "postwar" to "post-war". (I made the edit.) - Dank (push to talk) 04:10, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
  • I didn't know that was one word. Thanks, you learn something new every day. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 05:35, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
    • It isn't one word, not according to the Oxford English Dictionary anyway, which I'd suggest is a more relevant source for a British subject.[6] Malleus Fatuorum 22:33, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
      • Thanks. - Dank (push to talk) 23:36, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Question for reviewers

• The nominator has asked on my talk page whether this is looking good enough to take it to A-class review; any thoughts? My only remaining issue is the "risk" sentence (see above), but I generally focus on prose. - Dank (push to talk) 18:07, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Nikkimaria

I'm not typically a MILHIST reviewer, but HJ asked me to comment here, so here goes:

• File:Genmikejackson.png needs more information. Author is listed as "NATO", which encompasses more than the US Army/DoD of the licensing tag. I'm assuming the author is not known, but is it known that they're American? Do you have evidence of this or a web link to verify licensing?
  • Removed :(. It's been there for years, the original uploader hasn't edited since 2009 and I can;t find it anywhere on the web. Shame, it's the only purportedly free image of him in uniform.
• Wikilink Pristina in lead?
  • I linked tot he airport article
• "claims...claims" - repetitive phrasing
  • Fixed
• Watch for British terms and concepts that might not be familiar to non-Brit readers - for example, "read" meaning to study is not a term typically used in the Americas, and "Birthday Honours" is a very foreign concept that needs to be linked or explained
  • "Read" is deliberate to avoid "studied Russian studies"; Birthday honours linked.
• Some overlinking - mentioned in despatches linked twice in quick succession, as is Lieutenant-General (United Kingdom)
  • Fixed
• Did he attend Sandhurst? The category is present, but this isn't specified in the article text
  • Added
• "He was granted the substantive rank of major general in June 1992, with seniority from October 1991" - as someone with limited military knowledge, I don't understand what this means
  • Clarified
• Don't use contractions outside of quotes
  • Fixed
• "I won't start World War III for you" - this quote doesn't appear in article text, so should be cited in the lead. This source has the quote, but words it differently, as does this source; I'm not sure which is correct
  • Every news report I've read on it reports the quote slightly differently. That wording is from his autobiography, but I've replaced it with the Beeb's version/
• "The point became moot when the US government prevailed upon Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria to prevent Russia using their airspace to fly in reinforcements" - source?
  • Source is the NYT article at the end of the paragraph
    • I must be blind, because I'm still not seeing it. This article, correct? For my benefit, could you point out where? Nikkimaria (talk) 22:29, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
      • My apologies, it's not in there. It's in one of the sources. Might take me a while to pin down which one! That's the rsik when you try to reorganise a big article! HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:21, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
        • Fixed. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 01:37, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
• "done his homework" - wording different in cited source. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:07, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
  • Fixed HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:07, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Jim Sweeney

• He was present during the events of Bloody Sunday, when soldiers from 1 PARA opened fire on protesters in Derry on 30 January 1972, killing 13 people - makes it sound like he was involved.
  • You might be right. Any suggestions on how to tighten it up?
    • As far as I can recall did it not go something like - he arrived on the scene shortly after the Bloody Sunday shootings ?
      • No, he was definitely there, but he wasn't involved in the shooting. I've reworded it to reflect that. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 11:02, 17 March 2011 (UTC)
• before deploying to Germany as chief of staff to the Berlin Infantry Brigade. - units are deployed personnel are posted.
  • I'm not sure about that, but changed
• Same with - Jackson deployed to Bosnia and Herzegovina in March 1999
  • Ditto. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:38, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

otherwise looks good Jim Sweeney (talk) 22:29, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Rumiton

I just waded in and rearranged some sentences and made some phrase changes. It's not a very collegial approach, I know, but it gets things done quickly and my saving grace is that I don't mind at all if my stuff gets reverted. Thanks for doing the hard yards. Cheers, Rumiton (talk) 11:42, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

• A small point. Are Army Boards things of which one becomes a member? Is not the usual expression gaining a "seat" on the board?
  • I've found that writers appreciate not having to make the edits, as long as you've gained their trust and let them know they can revert at will. - Dank (push to talk) 12:17, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Military history of the Aleutian Islands

I believe this article has the potential to get to FA status, but I'd like some external input before I make that jump. Arctic Night 01:13, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

This is a great topic for an article and the current content is rather good - great work. My suggestions for its further development are:

• Was there really no warfare in this area before the colonial era as the first sentence and 'Early history' section implies? (surely the local people engaged in some form of warfare)
• "The Pacific Theater was divided into three sectors – north, central and south, with the Aleutians falling inside the north sector" - it should be noted that this was how the Americans divided the Pacific. The Japanese had different arrangements.
• "the former served as an ideal physical bridge between the two nations of Japan and the United States" - this is confusing given that the article says at other points that the climate was so awful that the islands had little military value
• Other battles were fought only between surface ships well after the Battle of the Komandorski Islands (the sinking of Japanese heavy cruiser by British destroyers off Malaya or American destroyer attacks on convoys off Japan in the last weeks of the war would get this honour, with the Battle of Surigao Strait on 25 October 1944 being the last major battle between surface ships.
• The account of the World War II Aleutian Islands Campaign seeks a bit focused on the experiences of Allied troops (for instance the Japanese defensive preparations and successful evacuation of Kiska are mentioned only briefly compared to the Allied movements)
• After they recaptured the Aleutians the Americans used them as bases to conduct a fairly low-level air campaign against Japan's northernmost islands which laster until almost the end of the war and later seriously considered basing B-29s there (I've got some material on the air raids in draft form at User:Nick-D/Drafts7#Bombing of the Kuril Islands which may be of interest, and Volume Five of the official history of the USAAF in the war covers the discussions about deploying B-29s to the Aleutians). While these raids were largely ineffective, they did cause the Japanese to worry about an American invasion force coming from this direction.
• The islands' role as a conduit for Lend Lease aid to the USSR (particularly for ferry flights by aircraft) seems worth mentioning
• The role of early warning stations in the Aleutians during the Cold War should be covered.
• Likewise the islands' current role as the base for the Sea-based X-band Radar is worth a mention.
• Are any Alaska National Guard units/detachments currently located in the Aleutians? Nick-D (talk) 07:34, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

XavierOfGreen

• As i stated on the talk page and nickd stated above the cold war history needs to be covered, as well as at least some mention of warfare practices of the Aleut.
• There is footage in Victory at Sea of leand lease transfers in the Aleutions, so it should be well documented in print as well.
• The coast guard loran stations in the aleutions should probly be mentioned as well.XavierGreen (talk) 06:35, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• I recommend taking the article to A-class review before FAC; there's a lot to work on here, and we can help you through it. I've got some comments on the lead; hope this helps.
• Agreed with Nick that it's a little awkward to begin by saying that the military history started on such-and-such a date. Not everyone takes "history" to mean written history. Humans have been in the Aleutians for a long time.
• "a number of war strategies examined ...": I'd prefer "War strategists were examining ...".
• "While the Aleutian Islands were seen as a potential staging point for invasions by either side, this possibility was dismissed owing to the islands' dismal climate." Do you mean some saw it one way and some disagreed? Who won the argument?
• "the United States Navy began to take an interest in the islands. However, nothing of significance was to materialize until World War Two.": I don't follow. What did the US Navy do that signified an interest but was not "of significance"?
• "wanted to recapture the two islands,": It's better to discuss actions rather than states of mind, which are harder to document, and usually self-evident (as here). "planned to recapture" or "made plans to recapture" would be better.
• "in January the following year": it couldn't have been January the previous year, so "in January" is better.
• WP:MOS and American style guides ask for double quotes rather than single quotes.
• "to release a blast 385 times that released by": This doesn't mean anything without saying what you're measuring: explosive force? energy?
• "failed by one vote": I know it looks like voting, but say "failed in a 4–3 decision" instead. - Dank (push to talk) 00:47, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Cuprum17

An interesting subject for discussion and a good start. As a retired Coast Guardsman I will make one observation and a recommendation for improvement of the article.

• The article fails to mention anything about the United States Revenue Cutter Service and it's involvement with pelagic sealing treaty enforcement. You may wish to read further about the USRCS and its history in Alaskan waters in a couple of books that I recommend: Irving H. King, The Coast Guard Expands, 1865-1915: New Roles, New Frontiers, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, MD, 1996, ISBN 978-1-55750-458-6 and Alaska and the U.S. Revenue Cutter Service 1867-1915, Truman R. Strobridge and Dennis L. Noble, Naval Institute Press, Annapolis, MD, 1999, ISBN 978-1-55750-845-4. While it may be argued that the USRCS was not a miltary service during that time, they were the principal enforcer of sealing laws in the Bering Sea and the only law enforcement in the Alaska Territory at the time. Any role the Navy played with sealing enforcement was very minor. After the formation of the Coast Guard in 1915 any role the Coast Guard had in the Aleutian Island chain would have had some military significance as by law the Coast Guard after 1915 is an armed service on equal footing with the other 4 armed services.

If I can help in any way, let me know on my talk page. Cuprum17 (talk) 18:45, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Battle of Fort Sumter

I am not a contributor to the article (yet) but I am going to try to usher it through FA review in time for the April 12th 150th anniversary. This is in connection with Operation Brothers at War. I realize time is short, but I am willing to work hard and hopefully it can be done. I think we would be missing a big opportunity if we let this anniversary pass. Any suggestions on improving the article would be most appreciated. Historical Perspective (talk) 12:36, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

Dank

You haven't made any edits to the article. I'd prefer that you at least read the article thoroughly first and make your own edits and suggestions before the reviewers get to work. Also, User:Hlj is "actively involved with this article and may be able to help with questions about verification and sources"; he should be contacted. - Dank (push to talk) 15:21, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

I've most definitely read the article thoroughly. Personally, I find it to be comprehensive and well written. I have no bright ideas as far as significant changes and therefore I have come here for suggestions. About a month and a half ago, I contacted the top three contributors to the article (North Shoreman, Hlj and JimWae) to let them know about my intention to nominate the article for FA and seeking suggestions. I have, just now, made some mostly minor edits including adding some photographs and alt text. But beyond that, I would very much appreciate advice from reviewers. Historical Perspective (talk) 18:38, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

David Fuchs

Hopefully more will be coming, but some quick comments for now:

• "The Civil War had begun."→This seems unnecessary and a bit too informal, especially as it repeats content already in the lead.
• There's some redundant wording throughout that can be cut--use Tony1's exercises as a guide (ex., "However, it had been designed essentially as a gun platform for defending the harbor")

--Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs^(talk) 01:38, 3 March 2011 (UTC)

In the interest of time, I am going to move ahead with FAC. If any has thoughts on this article, I would appreciate their comments there. Thanks. Historical Perspective (talk) 15:21, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Ernst Lindemann

I have been working on this article on and off over the past few weeks and months. With the exception of the period between WWI and WWII (especially the Spanish Civil War) I feel that it covers all major aspects of his life. Please let me know how to improve the article further. Thanks in advance to those that take the time to read and comment. MisterBee1966 (talk) 12:54, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

This is looking really good. My suggestions for further improvements are:

• I don't think that it's necessary to underline 'Ernst'
  • German naming conventions on birth certificates, passports or ID cards indicate the fore name by means of underlining see German name#Forenames. MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Thanks for that, however this convention isn't used in English-language works on German people so it's a bit confusing here. Nick-D (talk) 07:53, 10 February 2011 (UTC)
• It would be interesting to know which cruiser Lindemann's uncle commanded (not that it's important to the article)
  • let me check if I can find this out, but I have my doubts MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• What types of ships Lothringen and Bayern were should be identified
  • done MisterBee1966 (talk) 12:18, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• What was the 'Schutzkompanie Dahlem of the Schutz-Regiment "Groß-Berlin"' - 'Berlin' is the only English word here
• What's a 'board command'? (I think that 'major command' would be appropriate)
  • what I mean is a command of a ship
• The para which begins 'Bismarck left the Kieler Förde' uses the word 'Bismarck' one or more times each sentence, so is rather repetitive - you could break this up by using 'the ship' or equivalent.
• ' Lindemann openly disagreed with Hitler' - the way this is written it implies that he directly contradicted Hitler during the lunch - is this correct? (if not, it might be better to say 'Lindemann disagreed with Hitler during private discussions' or whatever the source says).
  • Yes it is correct! Lindemann contradicted Hitler at lunch with all the other officers present. MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• '180 hectometres' - a 'hectometre' is a rather unusual measure to use - I'd suggest first converting this to metres.
  • German range finders used hectometers. I tweaked the conversion template to report both metric and yard conversion. MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• '(at the time the German's were referring to Prince of Wales as a King George V class)' - what's meant by this? She was a KGV class ship.
  • The German's didn't know exactly what ship they were facing. MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
• There shouldn't be a possessive apostrophe in 'German's' Nick-D (talk) 10:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)
  • done MisterBee1966 (talk) 12:21, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback. Much appreciated! MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:29, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• My BritEng is weak but I'd like to offer some comments on the lead; hope this helps.
• Agreed with the comment above about the underline; it doesn't work in English. Just write "Otto Ernst Lindemann", since the reader can see from the page title that he's generally known as Ernst.
• "eight month-long": "eight-month-long" or "eight-month"
• Kaiserliche Marine is not uncommon, but when I checked sources and Google hits last year, I found the English term was more common, so for this term, my recommendation is that you use the English term in the lead, then give the German term in parentheses somewhere after the lead. I found most English sources preferred the word Kriegsmarine to "postwar navy" and other attempted translations, and you should add the translation of your choice in parentheses. Otherwise, most of the German words you're using aren't common in English sources, and English-language style guides consistently recommend against inserting foreign words that aren't typically put to use in English sources. On Wikipedia, this generally winds up being decided as a matter of policy (see the last paragraph in WP:UE), as well as guidelines (such as MOS:FOREIGN). You can link to articles that give the German term if you like, or link to (and expand) our Glossary of German military terms. Btw, my great-grandfather was German, I read German (with difficulty), and I hope I'm not speaking out of anti-German bias. Readers stumble on words they don't know, including technical jargon and foreign words. OTOH, it's perfectly all right to give German terms when not many English sources mention the term (in English or German), and when English sources tend to rely on the German terms.
  • I don't consider your comments anti-German in any way. I am more or less faced with the same feedback on most of the articles and I have to admit that I still haven't found a universal solution to my dilemma with this issue. First, most of my books are of German origin so my references tend to use the German terms, abbreviations, etc (and the Germans sources themselves are not always consistent either). I more or less have to judge on a case by case basis, is the there an equivalent term in English, which clearly denotes what is meant by the German term. Sometimes a linguistically correct translation is available which doesn't match semantically, if you know what I mean. Sometimes I don't feel comfortable with some of the translations I find in English literature. I do want to give the reader the chance to potentially search for further information if she or he is interested in a specific element of the article. To enable this, I strongly believe that the greatest common denominator is its true native term. And, which happens to be my individual problem here, I may not know how to best translate a specific term due to my lack of English background. That's why I put the article up for peer review; I expect that the experts here help me with the translations. I hope that this is not pushing the envelope. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:52, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
    • Reviewers tend to perform two contradictory jobs on Wikipedia: a copy editor working on behalf of the writer, and supporter/opposer (where the loyalty is more or less to the reader, to Wikipedia, and to the wikiproject ... in fact, reviewers who are seen as acting out of loyalty to the writer are sometimes seen as poor reviewers.) With BritEng articles, I've got the luxury of wearing just the first hat, since my BritEng isn't good enough to allow me to give a thumbs up or thumbs down just on prose issues, usually. So all I'll say is: style guides have more or less settled on an answer to this problem that's different from yours, and I hope that helps. When you're concerned that the translation doesn't catch the nuance of the word, you've got several options: you can add a footnote, you can link to a fuller discussion of the word (and edit the linked article to make it more accurate), or you can give a more precise definition in the text, if that's not too much of a digression.
    • A big part of the problem on this issue is that most copy editors consider academics and scholars to be their worst clients, for many reasons, and many of the sources for Wikipedia are academic ... so not only are you reading bad writing in your sources, you're seeing a lot of those bad habits in other Wikipedia articles. I really need to condense what I've read on the subject into an essay. - Dank (push to talk) 15:07, 18 February 2011 (UTC)
• "in various staff as well as naval gunnery training positions.": "staff" isn't close enough to the word it's modifying, "positions", so the sentence is a little difficult to parse. (It is, I believe, more of a German than an English construction.) I'd go with: "in various naval gunnery training and staff positions", which puts "training" reasonably close to "positions".
• "the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross (Ritterkreuz des Eisernes Kreuzes) which was presented ...": A comma is needed before "which", since the clause doesn't define which cross was presented, that is, the clause is "non-restrictive". I'd also lose "(Ritterkreuz des Eisernes Kreuzes)" per my comments above. - Dank (push to talk) 22:37, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark

I've been working on adding details and references for this article on and off over the past couple of years. The article is complete and most everything is referenced now. I am seeking review comments to facilitate further improvement of this article. Thanks. -fnlayson (talk) 20:32, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

It's great to see so much work has gone into improving this article. My suggestions for how it could be further improved are:

• The one paragraph sections in the Development section should be combined
• Some of the article is written in the present tense, which is a bit jarring at times now that all F-111s have been retired
• Some material still isn't referenced (for example, the 'Similar swing wing aircraft' section)
• It doesn't seem accurate to say that "The U.S. Navy's F-111B was replaced by the F-14 Tomcat" given that the B model never entered service - I'd suggest something like 'the role which was intended for the F-111B was later filled by the F-14 Tomcat'.
• The operational history section seems to be unduly focused on the aircraft's combat service - its role with Strategic Air Command should be covered
• The article doesn't really cover the serious technical problems which delayed the F-111's entry into service by several years
• The coverage of the F-111C could be expanded a bit, even though there's a sub-article on this (for instance, their important role in Australia's defence planning and the upgrades which the RAAF implemented in the 1990s seem relevant in a general article on the aircraft) Nick-D (talk) 22:59, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

• Good points, thanks. And I've been working on them. I have 4 or 5 F-111 books and there is very little of the SAC use of the FB-111As. I'll look some more and see if I can add something of substance. -Fnlayson (talk) 01:58, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

• Good work so far. As Nick points out, there are a few sentences that should have references added. I will list the sentences where I think they are needed if you wish to take it to GA and beyond:
  • In the External ordnance subsection: "Although all F-111s could carry laser-guided bombs, only the F-111F and F-111C with the Pave Tack pod can self-designate targets. Other variants can drop laser-guided weapons with the aid of another laser designator";
  • in the F-111K subsection, "As a substitute, the RAF purchased Blackburn Buccaneers and F-4 Phantom IIs instead. These would eventually be replaced by the Panavia Tornado, another variable-geometry wing design";
  • in the FB-111A/F-111G subsection, "They were retired in 2007" (refering to Australia's F-111Gs);
  • in the EF-111A Raven subsection, "U.S. Navy and Marine EA-6B Prowlers took on the electronic warfare role for the Air Force";
• in the FB-111A/F-111G subsection, there appears to be a slight grammatical error here: "The FB-111A was to selected in 1965 to replace the elegant but troublesome supersonic Convair B-58 Hustler and early models of the B-52". AustralianRupert (talk) 23:39, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

• I had added cite needed tags to some uncited sentences. I would have cited them instead if I readily could have. Other uncited sentences were not controversial and seemed to be almost common knowledge. Anyway, I'll work more on these, but will need some help in places (general comment, not directed at you). I had been missing the extra word in FB-111A selected sentence. That's fixed now. Is good to have other eyes on this article. Thanks. -Fnlayson (talk) 01:00, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Kumioko

Very good job. Most of my comments are minor petty things that should be easy to fix.

• The lede has some inline citations. Since the lede should summerize the article there is typically no need for citations there because the material in the article should contain the citation.
• I recommend moving some of the images around. There are too many on the right IMO.
• It appears as though you are using shortened references for the majority but then you have a few such as 2, 9, 24, 25 and 84 that show the full details. I recommend using 1 consistent format.
• I recommend adding alt text for the images
• There are a few MOS related suggestions per [7] that I recommend taking a look at but I'm not sure if any apply. There are so many measurements in the article I didn't check them all myself.
• Also per the above link there are a couple of DAB pages that need to be fixed. --Kumioko (talk) 19:24, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Kyteto

• I judge the article to be almost ready for a GA-Review, if that is what you would wish to put it through. I would make sure that the book citations are all folded into the Bibliography for the long-hand and that the shorthand citation style is used throughout, as noted above. Additionally, ensuring that all references meet the terms of WP:RS would be a route for enhancement, Joe Baugher is a useful source but certainly at the FA-level, his work becomes uncitable as it doesn't meet the requirements for absolute verifiability. I don't have a problem with it staying as it is, but where possible I'd recommend substituting with books such as Knaak. Kyteto (talk) 21:18, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
• A further thought from studying and doing some work on the article itself; the Operational History seems kind of skant, compared with the lengthy technical details. Perhaps there isn't much more detail in this area to add, but if there is it would be good. Kyteto (talk) 13:13, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

• I have a few F-111 books and am using them to replace the Baugher references a little at a time. My main priorities when I started working on this article was providing a more complete history and getting the existing text cited. I'll try to add notable details to the operational history where I can. Thanks. -Fnlayson (talk) 20:59, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• I've got some notes on the lead; hope this helps.
• In a caption: "in Navarre, Spain in": "in Navarre, Spain, in". See WP:MHCL#commas.
• "was a medium-range ... that also fills the roles": "filled"
• "Developed in the 1960s by General Dynamics and first entered service in 1967 with the United States Air Force.": not a sentence
• "ordered the type and began operating": maybe "ordered the model and began operating" or "ordered and began operating"
• "terrain following radar": "terrain-following radar"
• "Its design was influential, being reflected in later variable-sweep wing aircraft": either "Its design was influential in later variable-sweep wing aircraft" or "Its design was reflected in later variable-sweep wing aircraft"
• "During its inception, however, the F-111 suffered a variety of development problems ...": "inception" generally refers to a point in time, and be careful with "however" to state the contrasting elements. I'd probably go with just "The F-111 suffered a variety of development problems ...".
• "naval interception through the F-111B": Would "the F-111B naval interceptor" work?
• "The RAAF was the last operator of the F-111, using its aircraft until their retirement in December 2010.": Would "The RAAF was the last operator of the F-111s, until their retirement in December 2010." work? - Dank (push to talk) 21:39, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I believe all that has been corrected per suggested wording or otherwise reworded to address the issues. -Fnlayson (talk) 22:34, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Fishery Protection Squadron

This is my first creation of content that goes beyond 2,000 characters, and I'm hoping it will meet B-Class or even GA. The references should be sound - all taken from books at the British Library - but being my first major article, I'm not sure where I might be falling down. I'm hoping the rest of MILHIST will be able to give me some pointers as to where the article needs improvement to be B- or GA- ready. Thanks all, The Cavalry (Message me) 00:36, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Demiurge1000

I've never been involved in peer review before, this is just what sticks out at me when reading the article. There is a bit of unevenness in coverage. Examples;

• The goodwill visit in August 1853 receives a bit too much coverage; it's not notable in itself, or at least certainly not to the extent that the exact time of arrival of the flagship and the relatively unremarkable weather conditions at the time are worth mentioning. The offence taken by the Vice Admiral over the gun salutes is worth including as an interesting anecdote, but it should perhaps be introduced as such, because starting discussion of it by mentioning that a 15-gun salute was fired leaves the reader initially wondering if that is remarkable in itself.

• The end of the section "French Shore" mentions a hope of a substantial expansion of the personnel of the reserve force, and a plan to turn St. John's into a naval fortress. It then doesn't say whether the hope was ever fulfilled, or the plan carried through.

• The section on the Lord Astor incident links in the same sentence an action taken (apparently in error) by battleships of Tsarist Russia in 1904, with actions taken (very deliberately) by a Soviet gunboat in 1923. There is a World War, two revolutions, nineteen years and several thousand miles between these two incidents! It's worth mentioning the earlier incident, and it's reasonable to suggest that it contributed to long term tensions between fishing fleets of the two countries (assuming the sources make that link), but it could be phrased better.

• It's mentioned that in 1957 it was considered sending a fisheries protection vessel to the fisheries off the coast of Norway, but it's then not explained whether one was sent that year or not.

• HMS Belton being sent to the northern fisheries, and HMS Mariner being handed over to the Burmese navy, are put together in the same sentence. This is a bit confusing for the reader, as there is actually no connection between these two events other than both ships being Fishery Protection Squadron vessels. I think the handover to the Burmese is worth including because it's interesting, but in that case it's worth covering the fates of any other ships disposed of (or commissioned) in similarly interesting circumstances.

• The section on the third Cod War should end by mentioning its outcome, rather than cutting off abruptly with a statement that there were fourteen rammings of ships. The trawlers withdrew demanding Royal Navy support, support was provided, the trawlers returned, there were rammings, and then...?

Dank

• Since my BritEng is weak, I only skimmed half the article. A few points:
• "a more policing-oriented approach": "-oriented" is a term to avoid in good writing, because it's commonly used by the press as a way to avoid saying anything that they can be pinned down on. Try to rewrite the sentence without it.
• "1960s-70s": An en-dash would be better, but best would be "1960s and 1970s".
• "There is a formal contract between [X, Y and Z]": In good writing, use "between" when you mean pairwise relationships among the elements in a list of three or more, such as when you're giving a list of players who are all competing one-on-one. Neither "among" nor "between" sounds smooth to me here; I'd go with "X, Y and Z have a contract allowing ...".
• "it is acknowledged to be a very difficult task to patrol UK fishing grounds.": Some will cite WEASEL here, but I don't think there's any sin being committed, it's just a style issue. "it is a very difficult task to patrol UK fishing grounds" with a citation means the same thing, and is generally preferred on and off Wikipedia, unless you want to draw attention to who's acknowledging this.
• "Each aircraft transmits the identity and position of the vessel to squadron ships, which, combined with satellite data from navigational databases which allows the squadron to build a surface picture of fishing activity": You've got an extra word somewhere there.
• "a fishing trawler with foul another's nets": I think you mean "will".
• "to ram each other ... even fire flare guns at each other": Ramming a ship sounds more dangerous than firing a flare gun, to me.

Partly disagree. When we think of ramming, it's normally pretty dramatic (a destroyer ramming a submarine in order to sink it, an aircraft carrier ramming a destroy accidentally and sinking it, a destroyer ramming a battleship at full speed in order to inflict serious damage), but the Cod War rammings were much less serious (one might almost call them "deliberate collisions"), resulted in no sinkings and I don't think any deaths or even serous injuries. While such rammings are obviously a risky thing to do and a somewhat extreme measure in a fishing dispute, firing a flare gun at another ship, and therefore presumably at men on deck, specifically brings about the possibility of serious harm for men on the ship targeted. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 20:56, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

How about "even firing flare guns at the crews"? (I made the edit.) - Dank (push to talk) 21:46, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

• "wafting meaning 'to convey safely' or 'to convoy'": "wafting meaning "conveying safely" or "convoying" ". Single quotes are fine in this context in BritEng, but WP:MOS has some arguments against them.
• "at Halifax, Nova Scotia for": I'm pretty sure BritEng style guides ask for a comma after "Scotia", just as AmEng style guides do. - Dank (push to talk) 20:37, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

World War II Allied names for Japanese aircraft

I'm thinking this might have potential to go for Featured List. Or at least A-class for now. But I'd like to know what y'all think of it first. One thing to note with regard to the references, I'm pretty sure 'Dave's Warbirds' isn't a WP:RS, but the links to the fictional and a few of the 'odder' types to that site are included as further-information kind of things in addition to the 'normal' references. So, aside from that, anything that needs to be cleared up before nominating for ACR? - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 06:28, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

• Just a few minor points from me:
  • the title in the infobox seems slightly inconsistent with the article title. Should these be consistent?
    • Hmm. The short form (in the infobox) is "cleaner", but as the article title would imply all Japanese aircraft, not just those of WWII. Or is this a WP:COMMONSENSE issue and it should be assumed that the reader will either know it's WW2 aircraft or be able to determine reasonably enough?
      • Hi, yes I'm not so concerned about the "World War II" part, but the difference between "name" and "codename". It seems inconsistent and I think some readers would ask, "is there a difference?" Either the article could be renamed to include "codenames" or the infobox could just be changed to "name". That would solve this issue. Ultimately, of course, it is minor but these are the things that stick in the brain of an A-class or FA reviewer. AustralianRupert (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
  • in the lead "western men" should probably be capitalised as "Western men" (Western being a proper noun);
    • Done.
  • "other US and allied units" (I think allied should be capitalised as "Allied" as it is a proper noun in this context);
    • Done.
  • "To this day, many western historical" (capitalisation of "western" per above comment);
    • Done.
  • in the Citations there is Francillon 1970 and Francillon 1979, but the Bibliography only has one Francillon work (a 1979 second edition of a 1970 original). Are two different versions being cited, or is 1970 in the Citations a typo?;
    • That's a typo on my part, fixed. I assume the 2nd ed. date is the one that should be given, right?
      • Yes, that is my understanding. AustralianRupert (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
  • some of the Citations seem to use years but others don't. This seems a little inconsistent, is there a reason for this?
    • The article is the work of multiple editors; in essence, I found the article with the prose done, and then added the list and my own tweaks I'll add the years for consistency (and I see some of the cites can be 'merged', as well). Done.
  • some of the Citations end with full stops, but others don't (e.g. # 16 Tillman 2010, p.276);
    • Fixed
  • are there page numbers that could be cited for Mikesh 1993 and Handbook on Japanese Military Forces? If so, these should be added;
    • The trouble here is, in each of these citations, the page numbers would be different for each and every use of those cites. For example the A6M is on one page, the Ki-27 on another, and so on, ad infinitum, ad nauseum...which would require a different cite for every entry and make the References section even more confusing than it is. My thought is that in this case, with 29 cites to one work, each on a different page, and 63 cites to another, also each on a different page, it would make more sense to simply cite the book as a whole.
      • Its entirely up to you, of course, but I'd strongly suggest adding the citations to the different page numbers. If this means you have an extra 80 odd citations, I don't see the issue, all it means is that the information is completely and (almost instantly) verifiable by someone with the book rather than asking them to thumb through the entire work to locate it. IMO, if this came up in an ACR, you would be risking having some reviewers opposing promotion, but that is just my opinion. AustralianRupert (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
  • in the Bibliography there are different styles of presentation because some entries use a template and others don't. For instance compare Bergerud to Wieliczko. In the first one the year comes straight after the author, but in the second it is almost at the end before the ISBN. Francillon is also presented differently. Use of the template is optional, but these should still be consistent in the way they are presented;
    • Ah, thanks. I'll fix these shortly.
  • are all the See also entries necessary? If you can work the links into the prose, they should be removed from the See also section. AustralianRupert (talk) 12:42, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
    • Not sure about these. I'll see what I can do. Thanks for the review! - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 17:50, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
      • No worries, keep up the good work. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 22:01, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

I don't see any barriers to this reaching A class, and featured list should be possible (though I'm not familiar with how FLCs are assessed). My comments for this article are:

• As noted in the introduction, it should be possible to find much better sources than 'Dave's Warbirds'
• The names weren't "given by Allied personnel" - they were developed by a small team and then centrally proscribed
• Linking 'man' and 'woman' seems to be over-linking
• The description of how the Japanese assigned two different names to each type of aircraft is a bit unclear; more examples might help
• What were the differences between the USAAF and USN's identification systems?
• Was Captain McCoy assigned the task of coming up with a better designation system, or did he do it on his own initiative?
• Is there a reason why the names are those of men and women in the lead but boys and girls in the second para of the 'History' section?
• What's meant by 'fictional type'? Nick-D (talk) 11:02, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Dank

• Since a lot of readers won't know what a "reporting name" is, I think I'd prefer for the first sentence: "The World War II Allied names for Japanese aircraft, often described as reporting names or codenames, were given by ...".
• "During the first year of the Pacific War beginning on 7 December 1941,": I think I prefer "During the first year of the Pacific War, which began with the attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December 1941,"
• "Imperial year 2596": At first occurrence, I prefer "Japanese Imperial year 2596", so the reader won't think that "Imperial" has the same kind of international currency as "Gregorian".
• "each had their own different systems": This is a good example of perfectly good spoken English ... the extra word makes it harder for the listener to misunderstand ... that copyeditors generally consider redundant in formal English. "each had their own systems" is better.
• "into two categories; fighters and everything else.": Semicolons separate sentences that could stand on their own, so a colon is needed here.
• "gave many of the aircraft 'hillbilly' names": Single quotes are much more common in non-AmEng; WP:MOS and American style guides ask for double quotes in most cases, including this one. In addition to the quotes around "hillbilly", I think I'd link it, too, mostly for the benefit of non-Americans; the lead paragraph of that article gives a concise sense of the word.
• "Hap,": The comma goes outside. - Dank (push to talk) 00:45, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Luis Daoiz de Torres

This article has recently passed a GAN and I would like to take it further (A class and maybe to FAC). The subject is an important figure in the outbreak of the Peninsular War and is known more in Spain than the English speaking world (hence the paucity of English references here). I believe the article is comprehensive and balanced but would welcome any further input, particularly with regard to the prose, and any thoughts on whether this is good enough to take further. Many thanks - Dumelow (talk) 13:37, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Hchc2009

My initial thought is on the sources. Apologies in advance if my Spanish has let me down and I've misunderstood though!

Looking through a lot them (ABC de Sevilla, ideal.es etc.), they appear to be newspaper articles on de Torres. There's nothing wrong with that, but in terms of looking of taking the article further, it might be worth trying to find additional scholarly sources. A lot of the citations are from José Manuel Navarro Domínguez's self-published website; I'm assuming that he's a historian of some sort, but if not again it might be worth finding additional sources. I'd also check how you're using the letter from John Hunter (Documento); it is a primary source, and there are dangers of falling into original research with it. Similarly Partes de Guerra, again a primary source, in this case an account of the events by Captain Pedro Velarde Santillán, would benefit from support from secondary sources. Hchc2009 (talk) 14:26, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Very good points in terms of primary sources, something I had completely overlooked! I will search around for secondary sources to replace them (I have found a couple I missed when I was writing this the first time) or mention their origins. Hopefully I will be able to get around to it next weekend. As for Dominguez I searched on Google Scholar for him which showed dozens of articles on this period and he seemed reputable. Many thanks for taking a look at the article, it's been very helpful so far - Dumelow (talk) 15:13, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

I have reduced the amount taken from Hunter and qualified it as his opinion where it is used. I took out the "Partes de Guerra" ref as it was covered by other sources anyway. I have added a new book source (in English) and hope to find a few more articles to beef up the academic side of things - Dumelow (talk) 18:11, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Dank

I've done some copyediting on the lead section. If this were American English, I'd recommend lowercasing Lieutenant and Captain; I don't know the conventions in non-AmEng. I skimmed the rest and have a few observations:

• You may want to use a few more commas. For instance, in "Joaquín's grandson Martin married Francisca Torres Ponce de León, daughter of the Count of Miraflores de los Angeles, in 1766 and their son Luis was born ...", I'd recommend a comma after "1766". In "in particular saber fencing and was able to speak French,", I'd recommend a comma after "fencing".
• It's best to give every instance of "being" a second look to see if you really need it; in some cases, you don't.
• I'm surprised not to see a space in "No.5".
• American style guides require a comma after "Cuba" in: "in Havana, Cuba in ...". I have generally seen the same in non-AmEng writing, but I can't swear that the rule is the same. - Dank (push to talk) 00:23, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

I fixed the ranks (I often make that mistake), the space in the gunboat name and the comma after Cuba. I'll take a look at your other suggestions. Many thanks - Dumelow (talk) 13:41, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Sure thing, let me know on my talk page if you have questions about this article in the future. - Dank (push to talk) 14:39, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Roza Shanina

The article underwent a considerable expansion, most recently from requested scanned sources, and currently I'm looking forward for a higher class assessment. Any grammatical/MOS fixes or rearrangements are appreciated. Twilightchill t 21:24, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

Generally here the sourcing is terrible. Both in that sources with no reliability claim have been used, and, that the handling of bilingual citations makes it difficult to confirm the quality of publications. In particular, the failure to identify containing works for cited objects that are elements of larger works is problematic. In the case of Yevgeny Ovsyankin 2004, the book wasn't identified as a book!

• ""The Sniper Log Book". Sniper Central. http://www.snipercentral.com/snipers.htm#WWII. Retrieved 2008-10-21." has an author "Mel". And it isn't reliable, is is SPS, unedited, and no sign of expertise.
• "Алёшина, А., Попышева, К. Снайпер Роза. Краеведческий альманах "Отечество", №8, Калининград, 2010, сс. 14, 15, 16" is out of style. I think you mean Алёшина, А., Попышева, К. (2010). "Снайпер Роза." [Sniper Rosa]. Краеведческий альманах "Отечество" [Local Lore anthology "homeland"], 8, Калининград, pp. 14–16.? What makes this reliable?
• Brayley, Martin; Ramiro Bujeiro (2001). Osprey has a location
• ""Sniper Roza Shanina" (in Russian). Armoury Online. http://www.armoury-online.ru/links/useful_files/shanina/. Retrieved 2010-12-27." is actually "Снайпер Роза Шанина." [Sniper Roza Shanina]. etc... Translate indicates this is a primary source. You are reliant on a primary source. This constitutes Original Research.
• ""USSR in the Epoch of "Big Leap"" (in Russian). Sarist.narod.ru. http://sarist.narod.ru/dop25.htm. Retrieved 2010-12-30." is "СССР В ЭПОХУ «БОЛЬШОГО СКАЧКА», КОНЕЦ 1920-Х—1941 гг" [The Soviet Union during the "Great Leap", 1920–1941.] История России [History of Russia.] and there's nothing indicating it is reliable.
• Yevgeny Ovsyankin (2004). "Sniper Roza Shanina" (in Russian). Arkhangelsk Pedagogical College. Arkhangelsk: ZAO "Arkhconsult". http://www.pomorsu.ru/avpu/history/08.htm. Retrieved 2008-10-21. is Yevgeny Ovsyankin (2004). "Снайпер Роза Шанина" [Sniper Roza Shanina]. In Архангельский педагогический колледж [Arkhangelsk Pedagogical College.] 2nd ed. (in Russian). Arkhangelsk: Совета Архангельского педагогического колледжа. http://www.pomorsu.ru/avpu/history/08.htm. Retrieved 2008-10-21.
• Also a chapter from Ovsyankin (2004) Архангельский педагогический колледж: "In the years of the Great Patriotic War..." (in Russian). Arkhangelsk Pedagogical College. http://avpu.pomorsu.ru/history/07.htm. Retrieved 2010-12-30.
• Primary source: "The Front Diary of I. E. Kukuyev"
• Improve this citation with the actual Russian titles separated from any attempt to translate or transliterate "Pyotr Molchanov (1976). "A Thirst for Battle" (in Russian). Снайперы (compilation). Moscow: OAO "Molodaya gvardiya". http://www.a-z.ru/women_cd2/12/4/i80_207.htm. Retrieved 2008-10-21."
• Include search method and terms to get the result required, where's the reliability claim? "Database search results" (in Russian). Book of Memory of Arkhangelsk Oblast. http://www.ipc.antat.ru/Ref/fields.asp?f=%D8%E0%ED%E8%ED%E0&s=%D0%EE%E7%E0&l=&y=&m=&r=&b=&np=true&p=1&ID={E2E5335A-A0A0-499A-8354-6EFFAAF8E26A}. Retrieved 2010-12-30.
• Lidiya Bazhenova. "Snipers" (in Russian). A-z.ru. http://www.a-z.ru/women_cd2/12/6/i80_9.htm. Retrieved 2010-12-30. is a probable copyvio, it is a chapter from the book ЖЕНЩИНЫ РОССИИ — КАВАЛЕРЫ ОРДЕНА СЛАВЫ, which appears to be a collection of primary sources. "Here - and unsophisticated recollections of former nurses, svyazistok, spies, snipers, radio operators, engineers, pilots, drivers and stories about military girlfriends, recreating the image of women in war. Here - and poignant in its original sincerity of sketches, highlighting the different angles a diverse and tragic image of war itself." [trans. of "Здесь — и бесхитростные воспоминания бывших сестер милосердия, связисток, разведчиц, снайперов, радистов, саперов, летчиц, шоферов и рассказы о боевых подругах, воссоздающие образ женщины на войне. Здесь — и пронзительные в своей первозданной искренности зарисовки, высвечивающие под разными углами зрения многоликий и трагический образ самой войны."] from "К ЧИТАТЕЛЮ" [To the reader] In ЖЕНЩИНЫ РОССИИ — КАВАЛЕРЫ ОРДЕНА СЛАВЫ [WOMEN OF RUSSIA - Knight of the Order of Glory] "Publication i3_1800_12_6" index.

• There is a solution to the problem of the original research you've conducted into this sniper biography. You write up a limited biography of the sniper and get it published as a research note in a local history journal or other Reliable Source; and then cite that. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:37, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

• I've performed the suggestions. Yet WP:PRIMARY allows the usage of primary sources "to make straightforward, descriptive statements that any educated person, with access to the source but without specialist knowledge, will be able to verify", in this case Shanina's diary. The same actually goes for Kukuyev, there is no interpretation, but a plain example of another military diary. As for database search results, they are located on the website of the Book of Memory of Arkhangelsk Oblast, which is quite sufficient for reliability. Lastly, I believe that the almanac "Homeland" is reliable because it is a Russian local lore issue and the article was supervised by historian. Naturally there are more Russian sources on Shanina rather than the English ones, but all of them are verifiable (I have scans of the offline references). Twilightchill t 02:16, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks for replying. History, including military history, requires that the interpretation of primary sources, including diaries, be conducted by experts (ie: historians, or, people who publish under the supervision of historians). As such there is no straight forward way to interpret a diary without the results of that interpretation being "Original Research" for wikipedia purposes. You're absolutely correct about "Homeland" being a reliable source, local history associations often produce reliable material. Thanks again. Fifelfoo (talk) 00:14, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Buckshot06

I'd endorse Fifelfoo's comments; we need to avoid doing original research. Please contact me for help if you need assistance finding such a journal to place the article in. Buckshot06 (talk) 01:15, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Iowa class battleship

I'm listing this for Peer Review because its been two years since any formal review was conducted on the page, and while there are no longer any CN tags that I can see I suspect that there are still some thing that the community would like to see fixed, altered, replaced, reworded, recited, etc. The previous peer reviews are located here and here. TomStar81 (Talk) 23:57, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

Battle of Porton Plantation

One of the six articles that I have written on Australian battles of the Bougainville Campaign. I am seeking feedback upon what this article needs in order to get it up to GA. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 13:44, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

Intothatdarkness

Comments: The lead is a bit wordy in spots. For example, "The Battle of Porton Plantation was a battle that took place on 8–10 June 1945 at Porton Plantation" could be simplified by removing "was a battle that". After all, the article title establishes that we're talking about a battle. Likewise "eventually" could be removed from the last sentence of the lead. Of course, these are stylistic points so they could be ignored if you like.

Background section - Is there a specific date that the Australian II Corps assumed responsibility for this area? Nov-Dec seems a bit generic. The first paragraph becomes somewhat confused with the long sentence describing the Australian plan of operations. Might it work to start with the southern arm, and then talk about the other two as supporting the main effort? The second paragraph has some issues as well. Cut the dash between "late" and "December" in the first sentence, and in the last sentence you could consider eliminating "in the fighting that followed." You've already established that there was combat on Tsimba Ridge, so don't need to repeat that.

Battle - Cut "however" from the third sentence. This is something of a run-on, and can be corrected by taking out 'however' and capitalizing 'they.' In the next sentence, consider changing "get off" to "get free." You might also want to break this sentence into two by cutting 'and' and capitalizing 'a.' In the second paragraph you could remove indirect from the fire support section, but that's again a style call. In the next paragraph you use "landed" twice (a double-tap on the word - "they had landed landed"). In the fourth paragraph you have a wandering "however" construct. Consider taking that out and making two sentences.

Aftermath - Consider a dash between under and resourced.

On the whole this looks to be a good article with nice sources. Tighten up the writing a bit and possibly see if there are any Japanese sources out there to provide a touch more depth (although this might not be possible).Intothatdarkness (talk) 16:53, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi, thanks very much for the review. I've implemented most of the suggestions above. "Indirect" is necessary, I believe, though because the company did have some direct fire support, but no organic indirect fire support so losing the word "indirect" would change the meaning too much, I feel. Regarding Japanese sources, so far I haven't been able to find anything unfortunately. It seems like it might be too small an action to be covered. I will keep looking, though. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 23:27, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Newm30

Wartime Issue 16, Summer 2001 has an article on the "Ordeal at Porton" by Donald Lawie "Australians on Bougainville in 1945". Do we know what the full name of the Japanese commander is (Was it Captain Erikichl Kato sentenced to death at the Rabaul War Crimes Court)? Should the 26th Battalion be listed in the Units involved due to their actions attempting to break through to the cut off units? Newm30 (talk) 02:20, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi, Newm30, thanks for this. So far I haven't been able to confirm Kato's name at all. You might be right with it being Erikichl. Is that contained in the Wartime source? (If not, do you know of any sources that might cover it?) I will have to see if I can hunt the Wartime article down, I hadn't found that in my research yet. The sources seem to treat the actions on the periphery (i.e 26th Battalion) as seperate to this battle (e.g. the figure of 190 men taking part is just Downs' 'A' Company Group) - as they were fighting around Ratsua, which is in itself treated as a separate battle. I guess, in theory they could be listed in the infobox, along with 4th Field Regiment, but I guess I'm just a little concerned about where we draw the line. There were quite a few units supporting, so should they all be in the infobox? Do you have any strong opinions either way? Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 03:08, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

I have found this: [8]. This says Captain Eikichi Kato was convicted of a war crime in North Bougainville, so that may be the Kato we are looking for. Not sure if it is conclusive evidence, though, unfortunately. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:19, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

I've also found this: [9]. This confirms that the senior naval officer at Buka (Kato) was convicted of war crimes in the same circumstances as that listed in the law report above. As such I'd say that "Captain Kato" is "Eikichi Kato". Thanks for this information, Newm30. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:31, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I've got the Wartime reference and have used that to add in a few more details. Thanks once again for pointing me towards that. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 06:07, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

No problems, glad you could find evidence that confirms Captain Eikichi Kato as the officer in charge. I will leave it to your discretion as to include the rest of 31st/51st Battalion and the 26th Battalion who tried in vain to reach the cut off 'A' Company Group. Regards Newm30 (talk) 23:55, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi. Thanks for creating an entry for Kato, I appreciate it. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 05:44, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

P. S. Burton

Try mentioning that Bougainville is situated in the Salomon Island archpelago or New Guinea in the lead, to give the reader more context. Not many people know where Bougainville is, and it is destracting to have to click on the link in the lead to find out. P. S. Burton (talk) 17:05, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the review. Good idea; I've added this in now. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 22:31, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

Nick-D

It's great to see so much work done on articles concerning this little-known campaign. This is a very high quality article, and my suggestions for further improvements are:

• "an attempt to outflank the Japanese positions on the Ratsua front, which were being held by the 26th Battalion and the 31st/51st Battalion from the Australian 11th Brigade" - this is a bit confusing - surely the main force holding positions was the Japanese, while the two Australian battalions were trying to evict them from these positions. The name of the Japanese unit should be mentioned here (if possible)
  • I've tweaked the wording a bit, but I'll have to go back through the article again after I've finished reading the Karl James source fully. Regarding the Japanese forces, so far I've only found mention of the 87th Naval Garrison Force. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
• The article is heavily focused on the Australian experience of this battle - can more be said about the Japanese experience?
  • So far I've found nothing focusing on a Japanese perspective, unfortunately. Even Tanaka (which served me well on the Sattelberg article) seems to disregard this battle. I'll keep looking and maybe the James work you list below might help. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
• "By nightfall it was believed that there were 300 Japanese" - believed by whom?
  • Good point, I've tweaked the wording. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
• The discussion of the battle's casualties is a bit confusing - unless there's reason to doubt the accuracy of the Australian and Japanese army's own casualty reports, they don't need to be qualified with the other side's estimates (it seems particularly unnecessary to say that the Japanese records 'assert' a number of Japanese casualties). I'd suggest reorganising this material so it presents each Army's recorded casualties and then presents the estimates each Army made of the others casualties (it seems to have been common for estimates of enemy casualties in jungle warfare to have been way off the mark, which is hardly surprising given the nature of this kind of fighting)
  • Fair point. I've tweaked the wording in the prose now. Do you think the infobox should be changed also? AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
    • Yes, I think so (I'd suggest limiting this to the official figures each Army kept of their casualties). Nick-D (talk) 03:45, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
      • Done. Thanks. AustralianRupert (talk) 23:29, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
• Karl James' PhD thesis on the Bougainville Campaign covers this battle in some detail and is available online here. Karl James is currently one of the historians at the Australian War Memorial's military history section and I've read that he's working on turning the thesis into a book, so it's definitely a reliable and worthwhile source.
  • This is an excellent find. I will have to read it a couple of times and then rework the article (looks like I've got a bit of work to do!). Thanks. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
• The June 1945 section of the 31st/51st Bn's war diary on the AWM website includes a couple of useful-looking maps on pages 165 and 166. Nick-D (talk) 01:23, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
  • I'm going to get the 31st Battalion official history from the library again, so I think I'll try to incorporate that with the War Diary too. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
    • Thanks very much for the review and the sources, Nick. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:37, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Battle of Sattelberg

I am requesting this article be peer reviewed because I would like to see what might be required to take it to GAN. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Newm30

• Do we know which United States Army engineer units were dispatched to begin work constructing airfields and other base facilities at Finschhafen? Or should we leave until the creation of the article battle of Finschhafen, in a base development section.
  • I haven't been able to identify these units, yet. Keogh seems silent on it, unfortunately. I'll keep hunting around for it, though (it will definately need to be included in the Battle of Finschhafen article, but it could fit briefly into this one, also). AustralianRupert (talk) 03:22, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
    • Ok, I've found mention of the 808th Engineer Battalion in Dexter, so I've added that. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:31, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
• ...while the 2/24th Battalion would advance north-west across the Siki River and capture the 2200 feature...., should this be Siki Creek? Newm30 (talk) 02:32, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Yes, it should. Good pick up: I've fixed this now. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 03:22, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

PINTofCARLING

• How about a map of New Guinea in the background section? I know the rough shape of New Guinea but I am not familiar with any geographic details (distances etc.) which might be the case for other readers as well. The link to Huon Peninsula campaign doesn't provide any helpful map and the one you provided only shows a limited part (though the most important one, of course). A map of New Guinea like this one would be helpful to get a quick overview.PINTofCARLING (talk) 17:57, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Hi. Good suggestion: I had a hunt around for some general maps before and somehow missed this one. I've added it now, cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 02:06, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Fifelfoo

• Bibliography looks good, but, any journal articles in the military academic presses?
  • Good suggestion, I'll see if I can get access to ProQuest again. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:34, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
• Is Coulthard-Clark a sole authored encyclopaedia, or do individual articles have individual authors. If the latter, the articles should be cited as separate works.
  • I believe it to be sole authored. The individual entries don't have by lines, although they do have references. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:34, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
• Verb at end of clause with massive parenthetical clause, rewrite "At the point where the attack was aimed, a red roofed hut—a part of the mission complex about 300 metres (330 yd) below the Lutheran church—stood."
  • Reworded, thanks for picking that up. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:34, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
• Was there any contemporary analysis, domestic, or political reaction to the battle? Too small to count perhaps?
  • I haven't come across any as yet, but will have a bit of a hunt around. Maybe the newspapers of the time might have something: I think I can view these through the national archives. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:34, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
• Citation density through the narrative looks good, narrative structure looks good. Fifelfoo (talk) 03:47, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the review. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:34, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Cs32en

• German New Guinea Both Sattelberg and Finschhafen are German names, dating back to the period of German New Guinea. As a German reader, I was wondering about the origins of these names (one would expect the names to change after the end of the German protectorate, but they apparently did not). In my view, there should be a short sentence explaining the issue, with a link to German New Guinea.
  • Thank you for taking a look at the article. I've tweaked the article to briefly mention the German colonial adminstration of the area, however, I don't think that it is in the scope of this article to discuss the history of the area in too much detail. I feel that that sort of information would be better placed in the Sattelberg and Finschhafen articles themselves. Regarding the names, I believe that some places in New Guinea were changed and others were not, although I can't really say I have much authority in saying this. AustralianRupert (talk) 22:15, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the addition to the article! Indeed, there is no need for a lengthy explanation here, nor would that be appropriate with regard to the overall balance of the article. The addition clarifies that these places carried German names for historical reasons.  Cs32en Talk to me  08:31, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Hawkeye7

• You mention air support provided by the US 5th Air Force and by No. 4 Squadron, which was sort the the 9th Division's private air force, but other RAAF units also provided air support, including Vengeance dive bombers.
  • Thanks for this. Do you know what squadron they were from? So far I've only found mention of No. 4 Squadron. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:44, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
    • The Vengeance dive bombers were from No. 24 Squadron. (Odgers, pp. 85-87)
      • Added, thanks. AustralianRupert (talk) 07:23, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
• The advanced party of the 808th Aviation Battalion arrived on 7 October, followed by the main body on 23 October. The 870th Aviation Battalion followed by the end of the month. The Seabees did not arrive until December. It was not until then that GHQ decided to build a major base (Base F) at Finschhafen, and the 5th Air Force began moving in, so its really outside the scope of the article. (Read all about in in Casey. Airfield and Base Development) (There were also the Australians of the Finschhafen Base Sub Area.)
  • Ok, I've tweaked the wording a bit. My source (Dexter) says "808th Engineer Battalion") - I'm not sure if what the correct designation is though. I'll keep hunting around to see if there is any more in my sources about these units.AustralianRupert (talk) 05:44, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
    • The correct title is "808th Engineer Aviation Battalion" Casey is your best source. You might also try Builders and Fighters.Hawkeye7 (talk) 06:21, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
      • OK, thanks, I'll have to see if I can hunt down the book. Cheers. AustralianRupert (talk) 07:23, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
• You should mention the 532nd EBSR though. Without them, the Matildas would not have been able to deploy.
  • Good suggestion, I've added mention of them now. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:44, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
• I'm not sure what you mean by "divisional assets" - the 1st Tank Battalion was not a 9th Division unit.Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:51, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
  • Under operational control of divisional headquarters (i.e "attached"), with tactical control at brigade level. Both Dexter 1961, p. 608 and Keogh 1965, p. 329 use the term "divisional resources". Do you think it should be changed to that? AustralianRupert (talk) 05:44, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
    • No, it is fine as it is. Hawkeye7 (talk) 06:21, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
    • Thanks for taking a look. AustralianRupert (talk) 05:44, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

Josef Fitzthum

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because…an image has been added to the infobox from the German Wikipedia page of Josef Fitzthum. Would like to see the article assessed from "Stub" and assess WP Germany. I feel an effort has been made to improve the article from a "Stub". Feedback would be appreciated. Thanks, Adamdaley (talk) 23:33, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

AustralianRupert

I've updated the assessment to Start class. I am unable to assess B2 (coverage and accuracy), but feel that at least each paragraph needs an inline citation at the end of the paragraph if it is to make B class. Beyond that, other suggestions I have are mainly presentation:

• there is a typo in this clause: "as a commander of the for the establishment of the Aufstellung..." (of the for the...) which should be fixed;
• there is an issue with this clause: "...the Austrians had done here during..." ("here" is the issue, it should be "there");
• what is the relevance of the Literature section? Is it necessary? Does it relate to the conflict as a whole, or just to the subject? AustralianRupert (talk) 03:05, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Australian Rupert - To me the literature maybe books containing additional information about Josef Fitzthum and the Waffen SS he was in during World War II? I don't have any of those books, or read German, even though I did learn a little German in High School for 10 weeks. Thanks for looking at the article. Adamdaley (talk) 05:35, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Australian Rupert - They are books containing information. Although I cannot find ALL of them on [Amazon.com], the one's I do find are books containing the author's name and name of book. Maybe that section could be renamed to "Further Reading"? Adamdaley (talk) 09:11, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Hchc2009

This isn't a period I'm a specialist in, but one gap in the article seems to be Fitzhum's political views. It notes that he was notable as a politician, and I'm guessing (given his SS links!) that he was on the right-wing of European politics at the time, but it would be useful to explain what he stood for, why he was politically detained etc. Hchc2009 (talk) 17:31, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

To be honest, I'm not much into politics myself especially a foreign country's politics and a time that was way before my time! Adamdaley (talk) 11:25, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Peter Lumsden

This is the first military history article that I have ever created, so please forgive me if there are loads of things about it that could be improved. This biography of General Sir Peter Lumsden was recently rated B-class, and I'm interested to see how else could be expanded and if it could potentially reach GA standard. I think I've exhausted most of my sources on Sir Peter, although there may well be others. I welcome any advice and comments from the project on how it could be improved. Thanks very much. A Thousand Doors (talk) 00:16, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

XavierGreen

• You will need at least one citation in the second paragraph of the military career section. For G-Class every paragraph of the body and conclusion of the article should have citations. The only section which does not generally need citations is the lead as it summerizes material which has already been cited in the body of the article.XavierGreen (talk) 02:04, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

 Done

• It might be a good idea to add to the infobox a Battles/wars section, as many higher class biographical military articles have that section in the infobox. For example the Bhutan War and any other conflicts he participated in would be included there.XavierGreen (talk) 02:07, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

 Done

• It would also be helpful to the readers if isbn numbers were added to the refs section, for older works without isbns OCLC numbers can be added instead.XavierGreen (talk) 02:09, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

 Done (sort of) I've added all the ISBNs that I can find for the refs cited, but I'm afraid that I'm not familiar with the OCLC.

Thanks a lot for reviewing this article Xavier, your feedback's been very helpful. A Thousand Doors (talk) 02:00, 15 December 2010 (UTC)