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General Mattis

I've just suggested a page move from James Mattis to Jim Mattis at Talk:James Mattis #Requested move 23 November 2017. There seem to be reasonable grounds for either name, so your thoughts and comments either way would be most welcome. --RexxS (talk) 16:56, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

notability of National Commanders of the Civil Air Patrol

There are a number of articles on National Commanders of the Civil Air Patrol. Until August 1975, NCCAPs were military personnel, but thereafter they were civilians who were given the title Brigadier General or Major General. There's a couple of articles for which sourcing is not good and not a lot is visible online. Does WP:SOLDIER's presumption of notability apply to these civilian national commanders, or does only WP:BASIC/WP:ANYBIO apply (with a WP:LISTBIO redirect applied if not)? ~Hydronium~Hydroxide~(Talk)~ 13:43, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

SOLDIER is merely a presumption of notability - one still has to meet WP:GNG - SOLDIER only allows one to assume that sources are probably out there for a given rank. My 2 cents is that the presumption of notability would extend to CAP commanders (who are styled as Major Generals and head a command of some 60,000 volunteers, a few hundred owned light aircraft, and a few thousand volunteer aircraft) - however they may still fail GNG - just as any general might.Icewhiz (talk) 14:03, 23 November 2017 (UTC)
I would say that some of this information should be merged into the Civil Air Patrol article; seems like an un-needed WP:Cfork. Kierzek (talk) 18:08, 23 November 2017 (UTC)

RfC on Benito Mussolini

#1
File:Benito Mussolini Duce.jpg
#2
File:Benito Mussolini (cropped).jpg
#3
#4

There is currently a Request for Comment on the Benito Mussolini article which may concern members of this project. the issue is the lead image to be used in the infobox, i.e. whether to keep the current portrait ("#1"), or replace it with one of the proposed alternatives. Any input would be appreciated, best regards -- Director (talk) 07:32, 24 November 2017 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I am proposing we merge Marine Corps Intelligence into Marine Corps Intelligence Activity, keeping the title of the latter. I have posted notices to both talk pages, but in the interest of keeping the discussion in one place, have requested that all responses be posted to the latter (destination) article's talk page, not on the other talk page and not here. That is where I have laid out my basic reasoning as well. Please have a look a both pages and post your thoughts. Thanks. - theWOLFchild 16:50, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Women in Red/The World Contest

Just a note to say that whoever creates the most new women bios between 26th and 30th November will win $200 worth of books of their own choice. So if anybody here wants to buy some books to help their editing, now's your chance!♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:48, 25 November 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Junayd of Aydın

Hi all, I think that this needs one more definite support. It would be appreciated if you could spend the time. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 08:54, 26 November 2017 (UTC)

Incorrect name for General Walsh

'Donald Edward' Walsh, an Adjutant General of Connecticut should read Edward Donald Walsh. He actually went by E.Donald Walsh his entire life and would laugh when the military called him Edward D. Walsh- so somehow, this is par for the course. I was able to make a few edits but couldn't figure out how to change the basic listing/ header. Thank you for your posting. Cheers- Patricia Walsh — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:18B:8300:AE7E:ADE0:1A08:D32:1AF0 (talk) 12:17, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

The article in question is Donald E. Walsh - any takers? Alansplodge (talk) 17:36, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Momčilo Đujić

G'day all, Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Momčilo Đujić has been nominated for A-Class review since August, has two supports and an image review, and needs another reviewer. Any assistance would be gratefully received. Regards, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:16, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Generals of World War I and World War II

Does this list deserve to exist? Staszek Lem (talk) 01:16, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

Not in my opinion, too damn broad with eligible entries numbering in the tens of thousands.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 04:24, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
I don't think there's that many general officers who served in both wars - which is the inclusion criterion. It's not "generals who served in one war or the other", but "generals who served as generals in both". - The Bushranger One ping only 04:46, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
Seems like a weird cross-categorisation though. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 08:19, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
It's mildly interesting but it doesn't tell us much. I'm not seeing any evidence that these generals have been discussed as a group in scholarly sources so I'm tempted to AfD it. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:35, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
This is some next left listcruft, AfD it.--Catlemur (talk) 09:42, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
Leave it alone. It is quirky, and I wouldn't have created it, but easy to source, and there is some information content in this not too long list (and even if all omissions were to be fixed - one wouldn't expect it to grow too much). This is the sort of article that probably would survived AfD (either as a keep or no consensus) - but will potentially be a large time sink (particularly since WP:LISTN allows quite a bit, and is quite loose regarding X of Y) - and there seems to be little harm in the article existing.Icewhiz (talk) 10:26, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
If this article is kept I think it should be renamed to something like Generals of both World Wars as the current title isn't explicit enough to suggest that the list means people who were Generals in both wars, but any title is going to look awkward. — Marcus(talk) 12:53, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
I often find it interesting if a general has served in both wars from a strategic viewpoint, or when looking at the war mentality, for example the disastrous allied troop placement early in WWII where the command anticipated a repeat of WWI tactics but in fact lost heavily to the German blitzkrieg (otherwise known as the Battle of France). But without any commentary this list is not doing much to inform people of anything right now. Dysklyver 13:17, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
One necessary query is: completeness and subjectivity. I have not wasted my time to review it in detail, but generally I have found that lists such as this run into these two problems. Also, it does run into notability and cross-categorisation problems. Kierzek (talk) 14:25, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
Notability is not a problem here, as all generals are presumed notable per WP:SOLDIER. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 19:03, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
I've looked it over. Lot of British officers present by dint of temporary brigadier general appointment in WWI.GraemeLeggett (talk) 15:33, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
I´d second the renaming. ...GELongstreet (talk) 15:35, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
The Australian section has several errors, all of which could have been corrected by reading the relevant Wikipedia articles. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 19:03, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
I found the idea fascinating, actually, to single out the generals who had appointments in both wars. It's a quick way to identify which general's strategies might carry over from one to the other. I suggest flagging those short-term brigadier appointments...especially if most of them reverted to colonel after a period of time. Definitely rename to make sure it's clear that this is limited to generals of both wars, not each war. And if those brigadier appointments become an issue limit to major general or higher. auntieruth (talk) 17:42, 24 November 2017 (UTC)
One of the complications of such a list is that brigadier general was considered a general rank in WWI, but AFAIK brigadier (from 1922) wasn't. So, for example, those that reached the former rank in WWI (like Raymond Leane), but remained a brigadier until WWII and served in that war in some capacity, probably don't rate inclusion. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 21:09, 24 November 2017 (UTC)
G'day, possibly this is just a red herring, so apologies first up. Not sure if everyone would agree, but IMO, the distinction is really just semantics (at least today). An Australian brigadier is a one-star equivalent, just like a US brigadier-general, for example. Just because the word "-general" appears in the latter, doesn't make the rank higher, IMO, although of course not all are created equal as the saying goes. Some will hold more prominent appointments (i.e. roles) than others, and some will of course be more "notable" than others. For example, a combat brigade commander in the Australian Army (i.e. commander 1X) would be a more prominent appointment than say for instance a staff brigadier position such as say Director Army Health (also a brigadier) – loggies may disagree, though – or for that matter the Force Engineer (also a brigadier or sometimes a full colonel). Coverage of course is usually focused upon combat commanders in wartime, so they will be more likely to be wiki-notable. Of course, they are all Sir or Ma'am to most of us, anyway... Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 21:48, 24 November 2017 (UTC)
A brigadier general was a true general, wearing a general's cap badge and collar tabs. They were referred to as "general" like all generals are regardless of grade. Whereas a brigadier is not; a brigadier wears the cap badge of a field officer, like a colonel does. The whole idea was to cut back on the number of generals, although the Australian Army didn't have as many generals per capita as other armies. The rank of brigadier was introduced into the Australian Army (copying the British Army) in 1929. While the promotions to the rank of brigadier general ceased in 1921, the rank were not abolished per se, and officers who already held the rank continued to do so. A brigadier general was senior to a brigadier. Eventually all of the brigadier generals died, retired or were promoted to major general. For many years a US brigadier general outranked an Australian brigadier, but due to some NATO standardisation, they are regarded as corresponding ranks today. But a brigadier still isn't regarded as a general. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:49, 24 November 2017 (UTC)
Per Hawkeye's last point -- yes, just as an air commodore isn't an air marshal and I understand that a commodore isn't an admiral. What air commodores share with air marshals is that they're all air officers, and I believe a commodore is a flag officer, like an admiral. I'm not sure of the equivalent term in the army... Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 02:04, 25 November 2017 (UTC)
All good points, gentlemen. Regardless of symbols of office, and other affectations, though, I'd argue that brigadier and brigadier-general are equivalent these days. Terms like "field grade" and "general officer", are vestiges of an old system which has not caught up to reality, IMO. I'd argue that these days there are three grades: junior officers (army captain equiv and below), field grade officers (major equiv to colonel equiv), and senior officers (one star and above), but tradition is tradition, until its not, it seems. Anyway, I will put the can of worms back on the shelf, and put the can opener away... Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 03:24, 25 November 2017 (UTC)
I think this got a little off topic here with semantics and the question of whether this article should exist or not should be addressed. Which IMO it shouldn't. It seems like a trivia article that can be too broad. --Molestash (talk) 00:38, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
I'm not sure how it can "be too broad" when it has a very sharply defined scope? - The Bushranger One ping only 03:41, 29 November 2017 (UTC)
Perhaps what we need is an article on the history of the rank of "general" ???? auntieruth (talk) 00:00, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Recent image removals

Today, there was mass removal of aircraft images from List of United States bomber aircraft. I have started a discussion about this on that article's talk page here. Thanks - theWOLFchild 22:16, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Redirect question

I added

Main article: Operation Paddle

to Clearing the Channel Coast to find that it was a redirect to the same page. Is there a way to cancel the redirect? Thanks Keith-264 (talk) 23:38, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Hi Keith-264. After you click on the redirect Operation Paddle, it'll come up in brackets under the name of the article it redirected you to (Clearing the Channel Coast) right at the top of the page. If you click the blue link there (for Operation Paddle) it'll take you to the redirect page without activating the redirect. You can then edit the page to remove the redirect command. You can also bypass the redirect by adding "&redirect=no" to the end of the url for the redirect page (eg [1])- Dumelow (talk) 23:51, 30 November 2017 (UTC)
Thanks Dumelow, your assistance is much appreciated. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 09:19, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
...from your actions, I assume you wanted the redirect deleted in order to write a new article? - The Bushranger One ping only 09:28, 1 December 2017 (UTC)


Nominations for military history newcomer of the year for 2017 now open!

Military history newcomer of the year 2017

  • First place
    First place
  • Runners up
    Runners up

As we approach the end of the year, it is time for us to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. In addition to the Military historian of the year, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate a promising newcomer that they feel deserves a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months for the Military history newcomer of the year award. The award is open to any editor who has become active in military history articles in the last 12 months.

Like the Military Historian of the Year, the nomination process will begin at 00:01 (GMT) on 2 December 2017 and last until 23:59 (GMT) on 15 December 2017. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of 14 days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top editor will be awarded the Gold Wiki; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

Editors are asked to keep their nominations to 10 editors or less and nominations should be made in the following format:

  • [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line, including links in the nomination statement to the most significant articles/lists/images editors have worked on since 1 January 2017. Please keep nomination statements short and concise; excluding links to the articles/list/images in question, the ideal nomination statement should be about 20 words. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalized. Thanks, and good luck! AustralianRupert (talk) 09:38, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Nominations

WP:AALERTS need some help on Community Wishlist Survey

Many of you use Article Alerts to get notified of discussions (PRODs and AfD in particular). However, due to our limit resources (one bot coder), not a whole lot of work can be done on Article Alerts to expand and maintain the bot. If the coder gets run over by a bus, then it's quite possible this tool would become unavailable in the future.

There's currently a proposal on the Community Wishlist Survey for the WMF to take over the project, and make it both more robust / less likely to crash / have better support for new features. But one of the main things is that with a full team behind Article Alerts, this could also be ported to other languages!

So if you make use of Article Alerts and want to keep using it and see it ported to other languages, please go and support the proposal. And advertise it to the other MILHISTs projects in other languages too to let them know this exists, otherwise they might miss out on this feature! Thanks in advance! Headbomb {t · c · p · b} 13:30, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Infobox help request

Talk:Second Boer War Would an aficionado look here to see why some casualty data is outside the infobox? I managed to sort out some of the problems but am a bit stuck. Thanks Keith-264 (talk) 20:03, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

How now? FactotEm (talk) 20:09, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
OK, I got an edit conflict and pasted what looked like a corrected version on the main page and then managed to make it fit. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 20:14, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

Nominations for military history newcomer of the year for 2017 now open!

Military history newcomer of the year 2017

  • First place
    First place
  • Runners up
    Runners up

As we approach the end of the year, it is time for us to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. In addition to the Military historian of the year, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate a promising newcomer that they feel deserves a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months for the Military history newcomer of the year award. The award is open to any editor who has become active in military history articles in the last 12 months.

Like the Military Historian of the Year, the nomination process will begin at 00:01 (GMT) on 2 December 2017 and last until 23:59 (GMT) on 15 December 2017. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of 14 days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top editor will be awarded the Gold Wiki; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

Editors are asked to keep their nominations to 10 editors or less and nominations should be made in the following format:

  • [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line, including links in the nomination statement to the most significant articles/lists/images editors have worked on since 1 January 2017. Please keep nomination statements short and concise; excluding links to the articles/list/images in question, the ideal nomination statement should be about 20 words. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalized. Thanks, and good luck! AustralianRupert (talk) 09:38, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Nominations

Wikipedia has many thousands of wikilinks which point to disambiguation pages. It would be useful to readers if these links directed them to the specific pages of interest, rather than making them search through a list. Members of WikiProject Disambiguation have been working on this and the total number is now below 20,000 for the first time. Some of these links require specialist knowledge of the topics concerned and therefore it would be great if you could help in your area of expertise.

A list of the relevant links on pages which fall within the remit of this wikiproject can be found at http://69.142.160.183/~dispenser/cgi-bin/topic_points.py?banner=WikiProject_Military_history

Please take a few minutes to help make these more useful to our readers.— Rod talk 12:39, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

815 Naval Air Squadron flights

In the 815 Naval Air Squadron article, is it encyclopedic to have information regarding different flights listed on an operational squadron? Gavbadger (talk) 11:02, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Note that this squadron would never operate as a complete unit, only as autonomous helicopter flights attached to various warships. Alansplodge (talk) 11:20, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
The individual flights are -- mostly? -- not notable in and of themselves, but there seems no reason not to list them in this article if the information can be reliably sourced.
The article could do with a copyedit; there's some "however" and "unfortunately", and something that happened in 2013 listed as "current operations". MPS1992 (talk) 20:51, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

Working on World War II Tanks!

Hello! I guess I'm kind of new here, but I was wondering if I could ask for some help? I've recently created an article for the M37 HMC (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M37_105_mm_Howitzer_Motor_Carriage), a somewhat little known self-propelled gun (only 300-ish produced). It was accepted after a lot of edits, but some of the sources are still iffy. I asked the reviewer for help, and he said that some of the people here might be able to help with more reliable references.

I want to continue creating articles about the more obscure prototypes and tanks of World War II, but it's very difficult to find a source, much less one that is reliable. Umm... so basically, may I ask for help with references about those tank related projects? If anyone may have them sitting on a shelf or ideas of sources, mostly for the M37 article and perhaps obscure tanks in general (at least ones not on Wikipedia)? Thank you! Lil'Latios (talk) 22:11, 2 December 2017 (UTC)

G'day, thanks for your efforts. I think Randomness74 (talk · contribs) may have some sources that might help (based on the library listings on their userpage), and they may have an interest in this area. They haven't been active for several months, though, unfortunately. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 22:48, 2 December 2017 (UTC)
There is a related task force, not sure on the activity level. Kees08 (Talk) 01:23, 3 December 2017 (UTC)

Ooh cool! Thanks! Lil'Latios (talk) 01:44, 4 December 2017 (UTC)

I did find:
  • "M37 Self Propelled Gun". www.globalsecurity.org. (not any more reliable than the sources you have already)
  • Merriam, Ray (2017). World War 2 In Review: American Fighting Vehicles, Issue 2. Merriam Press. ISBN 978-1365876103. (but only a brief mention)
  • Duthel, Heinz. La Legion et la bataille a Ðiên Biên Phú: LA LEGION EST LEUR PATRIE. Books On Demand. p. 171. ISBN 978-3734765964. (again a brief mention, this time in French - I don't think it implies that the M37 was used in Indochina, it's just a list of variants of the M24 which was).
Best I could do I'm afraid. Alansplodge (talk) 11:50, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
I have an inkling (perhaps a mis-remembering when I was involved with M19 Multiple Gun Motor Carriage article) that M24 was linked to work on a generic light chassis for multiple uses. In which case Hunnicutt's "A History of the American Light Tank: Stuart" PresidioISBN 0-89141-462-2. might be useful if you can get sight of it. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:09, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
An annoyingly brief "snippet view" on Google Books shows that it is at least mentioned on page 446 of that book. Alansplodge (talk) 16:40, 4 December 2017 (UTC)
I found reference in Chamberlain and Ellis, British and American tanks of World War II to "the desire to produce a standard chassis as the basis of the so-called Light Combat Team -a complete series of tanks, SP guns..." and then lists M37 HMC, M41 HMC (155mm) GraemeLeggett (talk) 06:58, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

1st Infantry Division (South Africa) formatting request

Formatting request: could someone good with tables take a look at the bottom of the page please. ThanksKeith-264 (talk) 00:41, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Fixed. The problem was caused by an incomplete wikilink in the template code, not by the article formatting. Kges1901 (talk) 00:57, 5 December 2017 (UTC)
ThanksKeith-264 (talk) 08:54, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

A-Class review for Sam Manekshaw needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for Sam Manekshaw; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 11:23, 5 December 2017 (UTC)

Hidden content

Per MOS:DONTHIDE, shouldn't templates like Template:Army units and Template:Naval units be initially in the un-collapsed state? Kendall-K1 (talk) 19:43, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

on a not entirely unrelated note, where do you put those templates when they share article with template:military units? GraemeLeggett (talk) 20:21, 7 December 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protection request

I recently edited List of events named massacres but it would appear that this page is quite controversial, especially details regarding massacres involving Jews and Palestinians, but it is the sort of list that attracts nationalists and causes POV issues. I've just been looking through some of the past editors and there are loads who created an account, made one edit to the list, then just haven't edited ever again. Although I'm wondering how many are sock puppets, that aside, would it be prudent to semi-protect this article indef. and require confirmed editors to approve pending edits? — Marcus(talk) 03:32, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

That article is a total train wreck and should just be deleted. The whole thing is WP:OR and the opening line isn't even a complete sentence. Kendall-K1 (talk) 05:01, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
Well, there are 551 refs, which is certainly overkill for an article that big and I'm sure as hell not going through them all, but to say the "whole thing is OR" is probably incorrect. There must be some reliable sources amongst those refs that amount to something. I generally agree that it's not the best of articles, but I don't think deletion is the answer. There appear to be a lot of articles about massacres in various countries, this one seems to be an attempt to put them all together. I haven't read the material much, so I can't comment on it in detail, as I just jumped in to fix the column sorting, which had totally fallen apart due to many editors not applying sorting templates properly. However, I'm more concerned about the article being a point of contention, as it appears to be drawing a lot of IPs and single-use accounts that are applying unsourced or POV-based edits, but very few experienced editors managing it to maintain balance and neutrality. It needs a thorough overhaul. — Marcus(talk) 09:06, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
There is a set of criteria for inclusion on the talk page, which specifies that it is a list of events for which one of the common names includes the word 'massacre'. From what I can tell the page serves as a blanket page for other related lists under Template:Massacres, and things that don't fit under those lists. Alcherin (talk) 10:40, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
Zionists and Palestinians please; Jews were attacked by zionist terrorists as well.Keith-264 (talk) 09:27, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't know the history of these conflicts, therefore I don't really know what terminology to use; to be honest, I don't give a toss about Israel and the Middle East, or its convoluted history. It's unimportant here, on a talk page, accuracy belongs in articles. Since zionists are nationalist Jews, I fail to see the difference, are all zionists terrorists? Since Palestinians are a people and Jews are a people, why would we not use "Jews" to refer to their terrorist aggressors, but be okay with using "Palestinians" to describe Islamic aggressors. That's a form of bias which doesn't belong in any objective discussion. It's either Jews and Palestinians, or Zionists and Islamists, right? — Marcus(talk) 09:44, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
It's potential guilt by association to conflate Jews with zionists. I'm not sure what you mean about Palestinians, they aren't the aggressors. Keith-264 (talk) 09:59, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
Are they not? Oh well... I only noticed a lot of massacres listed in the region, I didn't familiarise myself with the specifics and assumed there were attacks from both sides. — Marcus(talk) 10:06, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
This is a matter I'm not going to get into beyond noting that "Zionists, not Jews" is...widely considered a serious red flag. - The Bushranger One ping only 10:29, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
I replaced "Zionist Seventh Brigade" with "Israeli Seventh Brigade", linking to Israel's Seventh Armored Brigade. Do we need a list of every event called, subjectively, a "massacre"? SpartaN (talk) 10:49, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
No idea. I'm not disputing its necessity, just its stability so long as it remains. Like I said, the content doesn't really interest me personally, so if an AfD is raised I'll just sit it out. — Marcus(talk) 10:58, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
I haven't read the article but can appreciate the controversy it might create. WRT the the IP edits, if it waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck, it probably is. But more significant are duck impersonators? Anyone that has something constructive to add to the article will not be impeded by semi-protection and it would appear to be "due diligence" on our part. The article "might" be crap but this is this is a first step. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 10:59, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
@ Bushranger "widely considered a serious red flag" own it then. RegardsKeith-264 (talk) 13:12, 8 December 2017 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue CXL, December 2017

Full front page of The Bugle
Your Military History Newsletter

The Bugle is published by the Military history WikiProject. To receive it on your talk page, please join the project or sign up here.
If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Nick-D (talk) 11:16, 10 December 2017 (UTC)

British war crimes

I have instigated a discussion about this highly biased and OR driven article at Talk:British_war_crimes#Article_problems. Mabuska (talk) 23:20, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Criteria for Template:Nuclear weapons limitation treaty?

On December 8, 2017, I added "1969 Treaty of Tlatelolco" to the Template:Nuclear_weapons_limitation_treaty, guessing that the year should be entry into force. A big thanks to @Brandmeister: for pointing out that the years in the template entries seem inconsistently to reflect either the signing (adoption?) or entry into force. What are the criteria for entries? And, by the way, should the template name use "treaties" instead of "treaty"? Thanks in advance for your help here. Litjade (talk) 23:56, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

Gender pronouns referring to a ship, in a specific article

I have asked for opinions at Talk:French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle#Gender pronouns referring to the ship on a matter that is likely to be of interest to members of this project. Please comment there if you have an opinion on the matters raised there. Many thanks, MPS1992 (talk) 01:54, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Diffusing or non-diffusing?

Should Category:American military personnel of the Korean War and its brethren (sistren?) be diffusing or not? I've started moving entries into the four branches (all the Es and many of the Ds), but now I'm wondering. Clarityfiend (talk) 03:47, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

Given the size of the cat (1,000+), potential for expansion, and guidance at WP:DIFFUSE, I'd say diffusing across all services is the right way to go. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 06:14, 14 December 2017 (UTC)
Thanks (I guess ... 1,000+?). Clarityfiend (talk) 08:21, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

WP:Teahouse#Loop of redirects

List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross recipients (T) and other lists. Xx236 (talk) 10:37, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Question

Hi all, is there a British equivalent to United States military occupation code? I'm looking around, but cannot find it. South Nashua (talk) 02:07, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

I'm not aware of one, though obviously the British military is a much smaller organisation than the United States'. I'm sure somebody here will have a definitive answer. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 09:02, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
In the Australian Army soldiers have Employment Category Numbers (ECNs), but officers don't. I wonder if maybe the British Army uses a similar terminology. I did some searching, and found one or two vague hits, but nothing definitive. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 11:12, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
www.armedforces.co.uk ARMY PAY SCALES - (April 2017 - March 2018) gives pay grades starting at OR-2-1 (presumably OR = Other Ranks) for a private, up to OF-6 for a brigadier. If a code system for specialisations exists, I couldn't find it. Alansplodge (talk) 13:17, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
Thanks! I ask because of Air liaison officer. If there's an international approach, I think the article can meet notability guidelines. Originally, it was just geared toward the term in the British context and I was not finding much there. There's probably not enough to make separate articles for that term in each specific country. South Nashua (talk) 16:15, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
Is this an older term for a forward air controller/Tactical Air Control Party or a different role? - Dumelow (talk) 18:45, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
Tactical Air Control Party does look like the same thing. I'll take the refs in air liaison officer, migrate them over and then do a redirect. South Nashua (talk) 19:36, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
If you redirect air liaison officer then the term needs to appear in bold on the target page. Also found examples where WWII "air liaison officer" refers to British Army personnel embedded in air force unit (wing level). GraemeLeggett (talk) 20:07, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
That's fine. Just to confirm, Tactical Air Control Party is connected to that term, correct? It certainly seems to be in the U.S. context. South Nashua (talk) 20:21, 11 December 2017 (UTC)
Although my training at USAF's Air Ground Operations School is seriously out of date, I believe in the US military most of the changes have been in terminology. Tactical Air Control Partes (an obsolete term, I believe that abbreviations have been preserved by the term Terminal Air Controller, etc. "Strategic" and "Tactical" went out of favor in USAF in 1992) would be the USAF folks directing strikes from the ground, embedded with an Army unit in the field. Forward Air Controller was usually reserved for the guy doing the same job, but from a cockpit. An Air Liaison Officer (ALO) would be a USAF field grade officer positioned at battalion level or above who would act as a staff member of an Army unit advising on the optimum use of airpower for that Army unit. --Lineagegeek (talk) 23:48, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
A Tactical Air Control Party is all of the personnel assigned to an Army unit (battalion size or larger) whereas the ALO is just the officer in charge of the TACP. A Terminal Air Controller is the fellow, usually enlisted, that actually directs the aircraft onto their targets, although I think the current term is a Joint Terminal Air Controller. I think that the enlisted guys are generally classified as Combat Controllers, with JTAC status awarded to those that pass the various qualification tests, but I wouldn't swear to that. As an Army artillery forward observer myself, I hardly ever saw these people in person.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 00:00, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
Combat Controllers are specific special operations personnel with their own job field (1C2X1) in the Air Force who are also FAA certified Air Traffic Controllers. In addition to directing air support they can set up and operate an airfield, which is a unique skill set in the US military. LargelyRecyclable (talk) 01:41, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon

There is a discussion taking place at Talk:General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon. Members of this WP are encouraged to join the discussion. Mjroots (talk) 06:29, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

What is excessive? Fighter Pilot Template

I am asking for opinions on recent deletions. Please see Template talk:Top German World War II Aces# Proposed change to initial state. I appreciate your comments, thanks MisterBee1966 (talk) 11:51, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

Minor style question

I'm sprucing up the IFF article, and this has led to a question... when an "overview" article like this contains sub-sections like IFF Makr III, generally speaking do you prefer to have a MAIN link under the sub-header, or a link within the text itself? If there is going to be a link in the text anyway, do you still like to have the MAIN? Maury Markowitz (talk) 14:36, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

Unless the regular link to the main article is early in the first sentence, I prefer to have a MAIN link. (Hohum @) 15:09, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
Yes, I think that is good advice. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:14, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I like main links too, they help unburden the prose of blue links.Keith-264 (talk) 00:34, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
If there are several short sections, I suggest rewording so the link is mentioned early like stated by the others. Several short sections, all with main links looks bad to me since the main links would take up a lot of the vertical space on page. --Finlayson (talk) 00:45, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Regular Army (United States)

Just notifying this WP that the above AFD debate just began. Delsort script doesn't have a way to notify WikiProjects, so doing this by hand. L3X1 (distænt write) 22:35, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Army of the United States as well. L3X1 (distænt write) 22:40, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
Already closed as snow keep. -- Euryalus (talk) 20:03, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Operation Albumen

The first source in the Operation Albumen is a dead link, the site is now just a domain reselling page and this is all that the internet archive have copies of as well. I've had a quick look for alternative sources but all I'm seeing are mirrors of Wikipedia. I'm told that this is the sort of thing that there will almost certainly be at least one book written about and that someone here is bound to have one. I'm not a subject area expert - I just found the article on my quest to remove links to domain reselling pages. Thryduulf (talk) 18:45, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

I have a little bit of a passing mention in one of my sources, but the best bet will be histories of the SAS and SBS.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:42, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
The more famous raids on Benghazi, Tobruk and Barce by the SAS, Long Range Desert Group and Popski's Private Army were in September 1942. I'm not sure that qualifies as "in tandem". Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:12, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
Scratch. I found the SAS raids in question. [2] Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:15, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
Added three sources which mention the gig.Keith-264 (talk) 20:29, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

New page: Economics of defense

An important topics badly overlooked in Wikipedia. Started, by, I guess, a high-schooler newbie. I pushed the page a bit in correct direction. However the subject is in a dire need of experts. Staszek Lem (talk) 01:37, 20 December 2017 (UTC)

Doesn't "defense economics" seem like a more appropriate title as well? -Indy beetle (talk) 00:17, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Well, google told me that the 1st version has 20x more hits, but when I double-checked now, the "unique hit" numbers are very close: 147 vs. 150. Staszek Lem (talk) 02:26, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

Post Cold War Task Project

Considering that a lot of conflicts and developments took place since the end of the Cold War, is it perhaps time to create a Post Cold War task project? I created this a while back but lost interest at some point, nevertheless people keep working on this topic and subjects such as the Russo-Georgian War.--Catlemur (talk) 21:28, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree. It's been more than 25 years since the Cold War ended, and since then, many major conflicts have happened, such as the Iraq War, etc. Kges1901 (talk) 21:34, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
What are you considering for scope? The breakup of Yugoslavia and the Gulf War come to mind, but how far forward from that point? -Indy beetle (talk) 01:04, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
I'd say "1990-present" would be the most logical scope. If we wanted to spin a specific date, 11 March 1990 (Lithuanian declaration of independence) would be as good as any. - The Bushranger One ping only 02:13, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
I would say sometime around the breakup of the Soviet Union - present (all ongoing conflicts included).--Catlemur (talk) 12:21, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
I hate to sound pessimistic, and certainly don't want to dissuade you from anything here, but I don't think the task forces serve much purpose anymore. Since they all redirect here (to this central MILHIST project talk page), most of the time these sub-projects get a brief "rush" when they're initially created, and then just dwindle off into distant memory... for example, in the last 3 years we've been in the WW1 centenary period, but there's hardly any talk about what WW1 task force members can do extra, no special goals, no hype – editors are still working on WW1 articles of course, but there's no special attention than usual being paid to it more than normal, it's just "business as usual". The best thing that task force pages are good for is keeping track of articles related to the project, but TBH they don't generate much interest in the way of group interest for any long period and are a pain in the arse to set-up. I think, if they felt more valid or functional there would be all sorts of task forces worth creating and promoting in niche areas of history to help kerb WP:RECENTISM, but I'm afraid they're little more than reference pages at best and editors just use each other's talk pages or come here for help. Good luck, either way. — Marcus(talk) 12:41, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
I'm with MarcusBritish on this one. I was originally going to say something along those lines but didn't want to sound so pessimistic. So thanks for breaking the ice for me, Marcus (or perhaps chilling the room). Anyways, task forces now are little more than organizational categories for maintenance purposes. I'm a member of the African military history task force and the WWI and WWII ones. Nothing ever happens there. I must admit I see little use in creating another task force. -Indy beetle (talk) 00:22, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Yep, I just say exactly how I feel, life's too short to beat about the bush... the major task forces of the bunch are probably WW1, WW2 and ACW, possibly Napoleonic too, but there's no focus on those pages, no community goals, etc. Even the four "Special Operations" focusing on major events and setting targets have a very low amount of activity on their sub-pages and are also little more than assessment tracking lists. I don't know if this happens all across Wikipedia in other projects or where it's just MilHist that is failing to realise its potential in creating task-forces and attracting members into working towards smaller goals within the project. Whatever the reason, I expect any new task force would also go the same way as those Dodos. Portals, which are also supposed to provide a central focus area for select topics, are similarly "dead zones" when it comes to inactivity amd just aren't worth maintaining anymore. — Marcus(talk) 04:55, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
I tend to agree that the task forces are more organisational/category structures these days, assuming they ever were really a focus for effort (before my time, tbh). Having been very active in the Balkan task force for a number of years (in my little Yugoslav segment of it), the number of editors willing to get stuck into overall task force work is pretty limited. Narrowly focussed special projects even struggle to get traction now. I can see an argument that we might want to implement such a thing from a "categorisation" perspective, but its value from a collaboration perspective is highly dubious IMO. The question is, do we care that there isn't a conflict/period task force in our banner for post-Cold War information? Will it result in more concentrated effort on the subtopic it represents? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:28, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
I have to agree that taskforces serve next to no purpose other than categorization, in fact I did not aim any higher than that. That raises the question of what was the purpose of the last taskforce reform which created the Asian MILHIST taskforce among other things?--Catlemur (talk) 13:43, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
The last taskforce reform created additional continent-based task forces to cover countries not covered by other task forces - for example, the European task force covers Swiss military history, etc. Kges1901 (talk) 14:40, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
What I am trying to say is we either cover every historical period/geographic location with taskforces or abolish them altogether.--Catlemur (talk) 14:56, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
When the {{MILHIST}} project tag is added to an article's talk page with the appropriate task force/s included it lets that task force's page automatically track the articles assessment rating, and list it on its A-class, GA and FA tables for prosperity. Since we've determined that task forces are, to many editors, little more than ways of categorising articles, and there aren't many other options other than using actual categories, I suppose they stand more as an administration tool than a community tool, now, for those looking to monitor the status of region/period-related articles. — Marcus(talk) 21:51, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
And that is a very useful way of using them, until and unless they get revitalized, so I still think "post cold war" could be very useful. - The Bushranger One ping only 23:21, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Well then I guess we can create it as a maintenance category. Historians refer to the present as "the Post-Cold War Era" but so many varied events have happened since...heck, it might even help to create a "War on Terror" task force, considering all the things that have happened since 2001. I wonder when we'll enter a new "era" in time, but I guess we won't know that a new era started yesterday until 15 from now. -Indy beetle (talk) 03:26, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
Basically it's the "brushfire war era"; Yugoslavia etc. wasn't really GWOT, nor was the mess in the Causcaus, but both should be included.... - The Bushranger One ping only 04:43, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
If we go down this track, I suggest "Post-Cold War task force" would be the best name, as it encompasses everything since 1990. GWOT etc would be too restrictive. There is a bit of code to be written for the banner to create such a thing, a page to be created and populated for it, and there will be a considerable amount of going back over our articles and adding such a task force to relevant ones. But we really need a consensus to move forward, and I'm not seeing that quite yet. For me, it really comes down to whether the work is worth doing given it likely won't result in any "real" task force collaboration. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:18, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

Russian ship Oslyabya

What ship is "Big Landing Craft Oslyabya. No trace of any vessels with a BDK pennant number on the List of active Russian Navy ships. Mjroots (talk) 10:17, 22 December 2017 (UTC)

BDK-101 Oslyabya
Seems to have pennant number 066 (see photograph) and is listed under that number. BDK is an abbreviation for "Bol'shoy Desantnyy Korabl" (Large Landing Ship). I think it used to be known just by the BDK number and the name was either appended or changed in 2006, see this Russian Navy page. I can't read Cyrillic but the name on the hull in this photo seems to just be "Oslyabya" - Dumelow (talk) 11:35, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
I can read Cyrillic. "Большой десантный корабль «Ослябя»" It does indeed read "Bolshoi Desantni Korabl "Oslyabya" Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:00, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
Kids I went to school with said: "Well, we'll never use that." Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:01, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Victory claim lists in fighter ace biographies.

I've just completed some copyediting on Heinz Schmidt (pilot) and noted with some dismay that the article includes a complete list of his 173 claims. I've looked at a variety of other top fighter ace articles, both Allied and German, and maybe about a third of them have victory lists appended. My question is if we should establish some sort of policy regarding the inclusion of victory lists? My inclination is not to allow them as I believe that they are far in excess of the appropriate level of detail for Wikipedia, being of interest really only to super-specialized readers who can get that sort of detail from books. I consider myself a specialist in the Luftwaffe, and all I'm generally interested in are claim totals and the total number of combat missions. What do y'all think about them?--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 01:57, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

It's central to their notability but they also take up a lot of real estate. I think the best guidance would be that if an editor is willing to put in the work they should make the table collapsed by default. LargelyRecyclable (talk) 02:08, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
(edit conflict) My sense is it's too much detail. On a somewhat related note, what do we think of similar tables for U-boats (like this one)? I think it's fairly common, but if we determine that such lists aren't useful for pilots, it probably also applies to submarines. Parsecboy (talk) 02:09, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
You make a good point, but I'd say that list of sub victories are different, and more useful, because they list specific ships which are probably deserving of an article of their own. That said, I think that collapsing them could be a good thing for those very successful boats.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 02:34, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I'd say include them, but (assuming the MOS wonks don't squeal) collapse them. - The Bushranger One ping only 02:10, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I can live with them, and don't think we should be prescriptive about their inclusion or exclusion, or submarine claim tables for that matter. Like LargelyRecyclable, I think they should probably be collapsed as the default though. We could add that to the biographical article guidance if there was consensus. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:15, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
As previously suggested, a collapsed table essentially removes the problem. (Hohum @) 02:18, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I could live with that; the list for Heinz Schmidt mentioned at the start of this section is considerably longer than the article itself.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 02:34, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I think they should be included (possibly collapsed) - IF we have a RS for the victory list, it is properly sources, and someone puts in the work. It's far from a must, but I wouldn't exclude them.Icewhiz (talk) 11:45, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't like collapsed tables, for the reasons stated in MOS:DONTHIDE, which recommends against them. Kendall-K1 (talk) 14:12, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I just checked the visibility of the table per MOS:DONTHIDE. It is visible, but not collapsible in mobile view. This is acceptable according to "consideration for users without CSS or JavaScript should extend mainly to making sure that their reading experience is possible; it is recognised that it will inevitably be inferior." (Hohum @) 14:47, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I agree that a collapsed table is a simple & tidy enough solution. I believe the victory lists serve a good purpose here, in making Wikipedia a central repository of online knowledge for people. As you say, the information can be gleaned from books, but for those without access to those books (many of them very rare, and/or not in English) it is no use. The whole point of thse articles has been to consolidate the information from a variety of sources into a single place - and the Wiki-links allow instant comparison with other pilots' details. So please keep them Philby NZ (talk) 18:18, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

My take is that it is too much detail. I really do not need to see every kill.19:17, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

I think we have a consensus here to make a note in the bio article guidance about collapsing such tables. I'll make that change. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:39, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
Before we do that, note that there are several FAs with such tables where there was no suggestion during the review that collapsing was necessary. Admittedly those tables are not so large that they're in any danger of overwhelming the article. I think any recommendation to collapse the table should be based on common sense; a table of 100 entries or so might well benefit from collapsing, one of 20 or 30 shouldn't be an issue. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 03:51, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Here's what I've amended it to read:

  1. Where relevant, for flying aces or submarine captains, for example, it may be appropriate to include a table listing their victories, but depending on its size in comparison to the rest of the article, consideration should be given to collapsing it.

Thoughts? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:54, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

That'd work for me, tks PM. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 03:56, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

User group for Military Historians

Greetings,

"Military history" is one of the most important subjects when speak of sum of all human knowledge. To support contributors interested in the area over various language Wikipedias, we intend to form a user group. It also provides a platform to share the best practices between military historians, and various military related projects on Wikipedias. An initial discussion was has been done between the coordinators and members of WikiProject Military History on English Wikipedia. Now this discussion has been taken to Meta-Wiki. Contributors intrested in the area of military history are requested to share their feedback and give suggestions at Talk:Discussion to incubate a user group for Wikipedia Military Historians.

Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 11:29, 21 December 2017 (UTC)

So is that what Meta-Wiki is for, to create more "forum" like user boards for various Wiki projects and programmes to discuss things in broader, more informal, terms? I keep finding cookies for upto 20 different Wiki-related sites but only use this one and Commons because I haven't a clue what all the rest are for... Wikidata especially, makes no sense... — Marcus(talk) 12:41, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
@MarcusBritish: Wikidata is a data mine where you slave away for the Google overlords. Until they collect enough data to ditch Wikipedia altogether.--Catlemur (talk) 13:48, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Lol, okay, thanks for that... although collecting data and putting it into context are two different things. I don't think even Google can make it possible to automate the latter, thankfully... the last thing we need is the entire world's knowledge run by an American mega-corporation which aids government spying and can manipulate data for propaganda campaigns. — Marcus(talk) 14:23, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Is this "User group" really needed or just a time sink? Seems redundant to what is already available herein, but I am open to hear others thoughts on it. Kierzek (talk) 14:58, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
@MarcusBritish: Hi Marcus, thanks for the comment. Meta-Wiki is basically intended for cross-wiki colloborations, community wide programs etc. Simply to say, anything that involves multiple projects, or languages, can be taken to Meta-Wiki. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 02:30, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
@Kierzek: Yes, a user group is definitely needed. Please see the discussion on Meta. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 02:30, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
Does anyone know how organized the other Military history projects are? I see no point in developing a new user group if its going to be dominated by English Wikipedia MHs. -Indy beetle (talk) 03:09, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
That sounds like a good first step, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga. Do you know the extent of military history projects on other wikis? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:38, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
@Peacemaker67 and Indy beetle: The fact is that Military History Project on English Wikipedia is the strongest. However, other Wikipedias also do have pretty good warfare related projects (may their name not be the same). I've invited all the projects present on the other language Wikipedias, if you observe the meta-page, we've got diversified participation from different Wikipedias. Some examples include, WikiProjekt Imperialismus und Weltkriege and WikiProjekt Pazifikkrieg on German Wikipedia, Histoire militaire Projet and Terrorisme Projet on French Wikipedia, Progetto Guerra on Italian Wikipedia. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 04:08, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Charles Howeson

Would Charles Howeson meet the threshold for notability for an article. Mjroots (talk) 09:00, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Not WP:SOLDIER and there may be an issue with WP:1E, but given he was apparently quite wealthy and had a senior health role, perhaps there is enough there. Would need to gather up everything written about him in newspapers etc, but if there was enough from before he was charged with the indecent assaults, quite possibly could meet GNG. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 09:24, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
He wouldn't pass due to SOLDIER (though quite close - one notch down), however he probably passess GNG for his post military business career, e.g. this coverage (pre-scandal) - [3] [4] [5][6] [7].Icewhiz (talk) 09:38, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Awards for 2017

You are all awarded a Mouldy Sandwich, whether you feel overlooked or not. (Hohum @)

Absolutely fantastic, I see I've been nominated for unforeseen work being the scenes. Nobody likes to award me with any with all the work I in, still nothing. Perhaps, I'll stay at Wikimedia Commons. Same old sh*t with each having their own favourite people(s) selected. What have I done wrong cause I've been outspoken several times, especially when Peacemaker67, get his nickers in a twist. Guess everyone loves him? But poor old me, ALWAYS forgotten. Adamdaley (talk) 11:31, 17 December 2017 (UTC)

...just as an observation? Complaining about not being nominated for awards is not a good way to get nominated for awards. - The Bushranger One ping only 23:32, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
I think you're forgetting Des Fothergill. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:42, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
Australian football. That's the real travesty here. SpartaN (talk) 23:54, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
Adam, I understand your frustration, however, I would point out that there are many very deserving editors who also weren't nominated. You operate in a very niche area, where I imagine not many editors come across your work despite its importance to the project. Equally, I would point out that we had very low participation in the nomination phase for some reason, so potentially there was an issue with project members either not knowing about the nominations, or not wishing to engage in the process. Either way, it means that many deserving editors will miss out. (I can think of at least six or seven I'd like to have nominated but couldn't because I'd already nominated others and I didn't want to flood the nominations). That said, it is simply not possible to recognise everyone who contributes to the project, although I would argue that the nominations made this year are more diverse than previous years, with quite a few names that I suspect have not been recognised before. Regardless of all of this, I do not understand why you felt it necessary to say what you said about Peacemaker. It doesn't seem necessary, or warranted, no matter whatever past interactions you and he may have had. Merry Christmas, AustralianRupert (talk) 04:45, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
I thought we were all volunteers working in our free time to make the world a less ignorant place. Is an imaginary barnstar that important at the end of the day?--Catlemur (talk) 13:59, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
Maybe because the idea of making the world a less ignorant place is so unpopular. I once had a Wikipedia editor angrily deny my assertion that our mission was to educate. But it is. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:55, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
This is some hardcore cringe, no one wants to read someone whine about stuff like this. I've never been nominated for a single thing, getting awards is not the point of Wikipedia. Sure it's nice to get appreciation but with an attitude like this you're more likely to alienate people.★Trekker (talk) 14:09, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

I had no idea there was some sort of nom process going on. Maury Markowitz (talk) 14:40, 18 December 2017 (UTC)

The response to the awards this year does seem somewhat underwhelming. Perhaps it's just been one of those years, and people can't find time or comfort in things like this? Hopefully, it's just a temporary lull and members will pick up the pace again in the new year. Either way, there are no losers here, only players. — Marcus(talk) 15:01, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
Well, we don't want to be like U.S. youth soccer ("football" to the rest of the world), where everybody gets a trophy. As for the voting turnout, it is the end of the year and near Christmas, so maybe "real life" is a factor as to voting turnout, thus far. I, myself found it hard to only vote for three. Kierzek (talk) 15:26, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
I was concerned about the newcomer award. I had trouble thinking of newcomers. Are we failing to attract them? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:33, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
It's like the NASCAR Rookie of the Year - some years, you only get one guy who finishes 34th in every race, that's not good but (unlike the screaming that arose asserted when that happened) it doesn't necessarily mean the sky is falling. - The Bushranger One ping only 00:51, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
Analysis of MHOTY Awards

If I could take a moment to play Devil's Advocate and consider the nominations from Adamdaley's POV. Here are some interesting statistics:

  • The MHOTY Award began in 2008, there have been NINE Award years 2008–2016 to date.
    • There are 11 nominations for this year's MHOTY Award. SIX of them are coords (55%), 5 of whom have served as coords before.
Comparatively, from five previous years:
  • 2016 MHOTY Award: SIX coords entered out of 18 nominations (33%). Lead coord: Joined-1st place.
  • 2015 MHOTY Award: SIX coords entered out of 8 nominations (75%). Coords: 1st, 2nd & 3rd place.
  • 2014 MHOTY Award: SEVEN coords entered out of 14 nominations (50%). Coords: 2nd & 3rd place.
  • 2013 MHOTY Award: TEN coords entered out of 16 nominations (63%). Lead coord: 1st place. Coords: joined-2nd/3rd place.
  • 2012 MHOTY Award: EIGHT coords entered out of 15 nominations (53%). Lead coords: 1st & 3rd place. Coord: 2nd place.
  • Since the MHOTY Awards began, EVERY (9/9) 1st place winner was also a coord during that year.
    • Most notably, AustralianRupert has won 4 times (once joined-1st) (4/9), twice as a coord, twice as Lead coord, but wasn't nominated this year.
  • Since the MHOTY Awards began, EIGHT (8/9) 2nd place awards have gone to coords of that year.
  • Since the MHOTY Awards began, SIX (6/9) 3rd place awards have gone to coords of that year.
  • In almost every case, coords were nominated by other coords and most of the votes received were from coords.
I don't want to cast anyone in bad light here, or shame anyone... we all know and agree that everyone works hard to create, develop and built on what the project has acheived. However, let's consider some of the problems these statistics establish with the MHOTY Awards. There can be upto 14 coords, each is allowed to nominate upto 10 editors and then place 3 votes. It would appear, however, that even when coords nominate other editors (non-coords) to balance nominating coords, their limited number of votes weigh more in favour of coords, since coords are winning the lion's share of 1st, 2nd and 3rd place. It looks like an example of inner-circle back-patting, because of the disproportionate number of coords who get nominated and placed most years, to the point that it's almost exclusively a coords Award with few outsiders. Perhaps, after this year's MHOTY Award, a new system should be devised which offers more balance and better opportunities for outside editors to receive recognition and placement in the top 3. I'm not saying coords should be excluded, but it is clear that the number of votes coords have combined forms a majority which leaves lesser-known nominated editors quickly falling into Runner-up. Some editors might see an online award as a trivial thing, but positive recognition has a psychological effect on everyone, and many of these coords who have been editing and nominated and winning year after year are hardly running short of self-motivation. I highly doubt AustralianRupert is going to spit his dummy out because he wasn't nominated this year... in fact, I know it won't bother him at all because he loves editing regardless. But Adamdaley has shown that a lack of recognition can have a detrimental effect, and we shouldn't ignore or dismiss that lightly... I don't entirely agree with his way of putting things, but I understand the message, and I think, looking over the pattern of nominating and voting objectively, that there is and always has been a bias towards and amongst coords, which is probably unintentional and until now hasn't been apparent. I think there is a good chance here to consider the issue and decide whether the MHOTY Award system needs to be rethought in order to reduce coord influence on the outcome of the Awards. There are many options... coords can't nominate coords, coords having less votes, cords can only vote for one coord and 2 non-coords, a separate "Coord of the Year" category, nominations need a second, etc. Maybe even point allocation voting, with everyone having to allocate points so the results come from a tallied total. It really depends if people agree that the Award is too internal and lacks attention from other editors. Maybe it's time to scrap it altogether and stick to barnstars. The ultimate question to consider is, has MHOTY Award ever been anything more than a poorly-received popularity contest? I mean, seriously... the most nominations ever received was 17 editors in 2011 – is that really representative of the most successful WikiProject, an average of 14–16 nominations are entered each year, and the highest 1st place total was 18 votes, and that was way back during the original 2008 Award. Is this the best response the project can muster from hundreds of editors who receive The Bugle each month? If so, is it even worth the effort? Food for thought. Note: Questions posed do not necessarily represent my personal opinions, but are framed to promote further discussion. — Marcus(talk) 00:01, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I find it all a bit American so prefer not to be involved. I'm pleased to say that everyone has rushed to accommodate me by not nominating me for anything this time.... ;O) Keith-264 (talk) 00:30, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
All I would say is that the coord-centric process is probably because the coords are probably most familiar with who does the heavy lifting keeping the project running, who does the reviewing etc. But it depends on what we are intending to reward with this award. The newcomer one is straightforward, there is no expectation that newcomers will be helping run the project or even doing a lot of reviewing as yet. But for MHOTY, is it individual content creation effort in the year (and at what level), gnoming in the open task lists like Adam does, or making sure the project wheels keep turning, reviews get done, comments followed up and articles passed, doing B-Class assessments, checking monthly contests and handing out awards? Or all of the above? Because if it all of the above (which has always been my impression), coords do a lot of that work, so it is only natural that coords get nominated etc. I wouldn't agree with excluding coords from MHOTY, it is my experience in the RW that everyone appreciates recognition, even old hands. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:37, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
Totally agree, recognition is nice and no-one should be excluded. But when we're fielding such a small number of nominations each year, with most of them being coords who have been nominated and won places in past years, in a way, we are already "neglecting" (for want of a better word) to include over 95% of MilHist editors. Certainly 15 or so nominations each year can't be covering more that 1–5% of the project's most regular and dedicated contributors. So why are we repeatedly throwing the same names in the hat each year, to be drawn again, for some unceremonial Award that seems to have become stale, possibly due to the lack of response since it began? I mean, does anyone else feel like this is similar to the way some companies pay all its CEOs a big bonus each year but the rest of the employees get nothing? I'm not suggesting it's an absolute form of cronyism going on here, but there is clearly a history of coord-centric favouritism throughout most of the Awards, which kind of taints the spirit of recognising project members on a broader scale. So my question is, how can the Awards be reshaped and improved to target more members, attract more outside nominations, and not result in heavy-handed voting by coords for coords? — Marcus(talk) 10:32, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
Awards and competitions don't interest me much but I can see how they can show appreciation of hard work. My problem is just one of perception. To me a military historian is a person who researches and writes military history. Whatever administrative or co-ordinating functions they do are secondary to the definition. I fully understand the need to laud the backroom work but its not "doing" military history. Perhaps an award based on amount of editing, not limited to a popularity contest, might be considered instead? That was, people gnoming away like AdamDaley would get their due and, if co-ords dominated, it would be because they are doing the work. If we also wanted a Military Historian award, we could limit it to work done actually on historical content? Don't worry about self-interest here - one look at my editing stats show I wouldn't be a blip on the radar in either competition. Monstrelet (talk) 11:37, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
That's an interesting point, and well made: administrative contributions and content contributions are two different fields, and since the Award does not distinguish between the two areas, someone can be nominated and win a place for perfoming dozens of ACRs in a year, whilst someone who possibly spent more time and effort researching and writing two or three new articles never gets a look-in because they aren't as easily identified in the crowd of contributors, whereas coords see each others work all the time. So the question here is: is someone who mostly performs administrative duties for the project, reviewing and such, really a "militarian historian" vs someone who mostly contributes directly to article content creation? I hope @Adamdaley: considers what is being discussed here and offers his views with less pretension than his original post. — Marcus(talk) 12:23, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
Who even has the ability / visibility to see who's working hard on improving articles? Unless you happen to work on an article that someone else is also working on, or if you're one of the (probably few) people who watch article review nominations (which only represent a fragment of the work done), surely it's mostly behind the scenes? I think it's very difficult to make an informed decision. (Hohum @) 13:43, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I feel it important to reiterate that the process is open to all project members to nominate, and to vote, and within the process co-ords have the same status as any other project member with the same nominating and voting rights. Regarding self-selection concerns: we can only nominate those who we come in contact with. None of us are omnipotent, nor do we have unlimited time to patrol recent changes and tally everyone's contributions. I keep notes on the work I come across throughout the year that stands out to me (particularly focusing on newcomers I come across), but ultimately the main people I work with are other co-ords, who tend to be the same editors that participate in the key areas of the project. Hence, my noms focus on those that submit articles to the contest or to ACR or FAC, or those that review or assess, etc. I would hazard that other co-ords are the same. If we want diversity in nominations (which I believe we do), it behoves everyone (not just co-ords), to get involved and to put up some noms, and then of course to vote. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 13:52, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
I agree with Hohum and AustralianRupert that the logistics of trying to identify contributors and their level of commitment is hard, since there is no record apart from looking at editors' contribution history, and using some of the wiki-apps which help identify where they edit most or what pages they have created. This is also why I think the memberslist needs a massive overhaul, so that it can be bot-automated to help keep track of active members, so that when these Awards come around each year there is something reliable to look through as a reminder; to see if anyone catches your eye that you might have forgotten about but know has been very active. Perhaps having a range of Award categories might spark a more diverse range of nominations, along with the current newcomer's award, a creator's award, a reviewer's award and a general award for all-round efforts, for exampls. I don't know, maybe that might seem like too much effort for some people, since this year the newcomers award only has a few noms I do wonder if most people really give a damn at all or are simply trying to be polite by taking the effort to even acknowledge the Awards exist. Some feedback on why the Awards fails to generate much interest would certainly be insightful, as it really does look like a party where few people turn up and no-one who does wants to get up and dance. — Marcus(talk) 16:32, 19 December 2017 (UTC)
Since I'm unlikely to encounter most project members, my knowledge of them comes from the review processes: DYK, GAN, ACR and FAC, wherther or not I review them myself. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 00:00, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
On a different tack - MILHIST have set the bar really high - last years new MILHISTorian of the year put a shed load of effort in and the recognition was well deserved. Not everyone has the time or resources to match that level of contribution. Perhaps as our standards continue to climb lets not forget the wikignomes and the contributors who might not create A and GA class articles but nevertheless play a role in making this project one of the best on WP. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gbawden (talk • contribs)
I honestly think the only reason the coords get all the votes is because they do the most visible work around here. Up until reading this thread I had never heard of Adam, though everyone says he does a lot of the grunt low-level tasks. Most of the people I recognize on the project in the MHOTY noms are coords. I haven't made up my mind on voting yet there because either I'm not familiar enough with their work (the non-coords mostly) or I feel they get the recognition they deserve and don't need my vote to help (who wants to pile on a bandwagon, after all?). In short, it's as if I don't see the point in voting. That said, I offer my congratulations to most of the people in that list for all the contributions they made. The only reason I cast a vote for newcomer is because I had personally worked with a particular candidate with positive results. I'm surprised I was nominated, as I spent most my time bumping around the African corner of the project, which is not very high profile. I think the fact that I was nominated (by AustralianRupert) does show that the coords are trying to diversify the awards. -Indy beetle (talk) 01:06, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
Like, as if one vote ever made a difference. I thought Adam was a coordinator. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 04:10, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
If a non-coordinator did the same amount of work as they do, that person would likely be made into a coordinator. While you are right about the amount of work they do, they were made coordinator as a result of the fact that they put a lot of work into this WikiProject. But I do agree that it would be more "diverse" to include a nomination for people who put in a significant amount of "under the radar" work. Perhaps we could give a name for such a nomination and vote to include it for next year's voting session? SpartaN (talk) 20:14, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
Sorry to disagree here, but editors are not "made into coordinators" just for doing a lot of work. Each year there is an election, anyone can put their name forward, everyone casts supporting votes and the top 15 become coords. Votes are cast by editors who can judge for themselves if they feel an editor will be suitable. It's not always about how much work they do content-wise, but what skills they have to help administrate the project or motivate members. I was a coord back in 2012–13's tranche XII with hardly any articles written and I was not a reviewer, I simply provided a lot of active support here on the talk page and did a lot of article maintenance. In truth, editors who focus almost solely on content creation probably don't want to become coords as much as editors who like roaming for issues to fix, copy-editing, welcoming new editors, etc, since it takes time away from creation to help around the project and maintain things behind the scenes. — Marcus(talk) 20:35, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
Beside being eligable for the other two award categories, how about Military history gnome of the year? ...GELongstreet (talk) 20:46, 23 December 2017 (UTC)
I do not particularly care about the awards, but I suggest a Milhist Coord of the Year award, and a Milhist Member of the Year award, which would replace the current award. Seems like it would make both sides happy, and would bring to light the work of non-coordinators. Kees08 (Talk) 01:54, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
Milhist Coord of the Year would basically be the lead coord(s), which is derived from the September election, so I'm not sure that would be of much additional benefit. Not sure what the answer to this is. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 09:47, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
You're right. They are elected: "made into coordinators" is not to say they are not elected, but merely asserting that they are "made" coordinators by the community. SpartaN (talk) 10:13, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't think isolating coords from members works either, because if they have to be nominated separately it might result in a small pool of choices should only a couple of names be selected, and if we said "vote from all current coords" without nominations it would seem biased because we can't also do a "vote from all members" given how many there are. I think we need to look at the way we nominate editors and the way we vote and balance it better. I'm not sure how nominating could be balanced, but voting could be more tactical, so instead of saying everyone has 3 votes, everyone could have, say, 5 points each that they can allocate amongst the choices. That would mean you have several ways of distributing your points amongst the nominations: 5, 4:1, 3:2, 2:2:1, 2:1:1:1 or 1:1:1:1:1. When the voting ends, someone adds up the points awarded to each candidate and that results in placements. It's a bit more complicated, but also less restrictive than the current format and allows for a different form of recognition. Instead of a blunt, "I vote you, you and you" which can result in favouritism, it requires voters to weight up their choices and distribute a limited number of points objectively, in recogniton of each nomination's efforts. — Marcus(talk) 16:38, 24 December 2017 (UTC)

Bronze Star Medal recipients

We recently (earlier this year?) decided not to track the Bronze Star in categories. Bronze Star Medal#See also is a section with links to lists of recipients. Two of the lists exist; four are redlinks. I'm not sure if these lists contradict our group assessment or not. I'm pretty sure they're being worked in good faith.--Georgia Army Vet Contribs Talk 03:04, 23 December 2017 (UTC)

Sure, but isn't it excessive? If every combat infantryman badge recipient of WWII received the Bronze Star? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:35, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
Excessive is an understatement. The six lists (assuming the other four get started will never be right/complete. Is it AfD time?--Georgia Army Vet Contribs Talk 20:33, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
To be fair, a lot of lists are dynamic and will never be completed. If we keep it to listing idividuals who are notable it might work.★Trekker (talk) 20:39, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
<wobbles hand> I'd honestly say this is what lists are for, as the scope is well-defined and discriminate. That said, if there is an issue with size, then "Wikinotable only" would be the way to trim it. But I think the bigger issue here is, redlinks are expressly prohibited in see-also sections... - The Bushranger One ping only 22:12, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
Yeah, the redlinks should be removed until they are no longer redlinks.★Trekker (talk) 22:42, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
Isn't this just replacing the category with unreferenced list articles instead? What is the notability of a list of people who have all been awarded a certain low level decoration? That's not the same as identifying each of the individuals in the list as notable. Nthep (talk) 23:47, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't have strong feelings on the subject, I'm just pointing out what could be done if the lists are kept.★Trekker (talk) 23:53, 24 December 2017 (UTC)
All three now at AFD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of World War II Bronze Star Medal recipients. Nthep (talk) 22:40, 25 December 2017 (UTC)
It's worth remembering that while categories must be defining for the subjects, the contents of a list do not have to be individually notable. - The Bushranger One ping only 22:42, 25 December 2017 (UTC)
Accepted, but then it's back to question 1, what is the notability of the list of recipients of a decoration that appears to be of the "coming up with the rations" type? Nthep (talk) 22:57, 25 December 2017 (UTC)

Talk:Panzer ace

Input from additional editors on a large-scale discussion of suitable sources for the Panzer ace article on its talk page would be appreciated. Nick-D (talk) 04:36, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Dietrich von Choltitz recordings

Another editor and I have reached a "agree to disagree" position on the inclusion of historian Randall Hansen's material on the son of the subject, vis-a-vis the potential veracity of recordings made in Trent Park of the subject. I added the matreial in October, it was removed on the 14th. I put it back on the 17th after some discussion and it was gain removed yesterday. Discussion can be found here and additional input would be appreciated. LargelyRecyclable (talk) 20:13, 19 December 2017 (UTC)

Nobody? LargelyRecyclable (talk) 00:22, 27 December 2017 (UTC)

A-Class review for German destroyer Z32 needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for German destroyer Z32; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 11:28, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

A-Class review for Param Vir Chakra needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for Param Vir Chakra; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 11:28, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

Done. Hchc2009 (talk) 11:56, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

A-Class review for German destroyer Z51 needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for German destroyer Z51; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 11:28, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

Done. Hchc2009 (talk) 12:12, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

Military personnel category structure discussion

Please comment on this discussion on category structure for Military personnel by service and war. There are cases where both the categories for Category:American military personnel of the Korean War and Category:American army personnel of the Korean War are included on an article. IMHO, that seems redundant to also include the included cat. Please add a comment if you agree or disagree at the category discussion page here. Thanks. Semper Fi! FieldMarine (talk) 13:26, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

United States Coast Guard Auxiliary

I started the WP:WikiProject United States Coast Guard Auxiliary and I am having difficulty with finding new members to contribute to pages pertaining to the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary.

I am of the opinion that the creation of the following articles would be beneficial: History of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary, Notable United States Coast Guard Auxiliarists, Awards and decorations of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary, United States Coast Guard Auxiliary Interpreter Corps, Director of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary, United States Coast Guard Auxiliary National Commodore, Missions of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary, United States Coast Guard Auxiliary National Executive Committee, and the Coast Guard Auxiliary Association.

Expansion/improvements to these pages:United States Coast Guard Auxiliary and Uniforms of the United States Coast Guard Auxiliary would also help.

Any assistance to support this project will be greatly appreciated. COASTIE I am (talk) 13:28, 28 December 2017 (UTC)

G'day, thanks for your efforts so. Regarding your proposed articles above, I'm not sure that Notable United States Coast Guard Auxiliarists is necessary. I think it would probably be best just to handle it through categorisation, rather than create an article. I'd suggest also that maybe the proposed articles on the commodore and the director should be lists, rather than articles, but only if the positions are covered in reliable sources. Anyway, all the best. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:22, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

Nominations for military historian of the year for 2017 now open!

Military historian of the year 2017

  • First place
    First place
  • Second place
    Second place
  • Third place
    Third place

As we approach the end of the year, it is time for us to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. As part of the first step to determining this year's "Military Historian of the Year" award, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate those that they feel deserve a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months. The nomination process will commence on 00:01 (GMT) on 2 December 2017 and last until 23:59 (GMT) on 15 December 2017. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of 14 days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top three editors will be awarded the Gold, Silver and Bronze Wiki respectively; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

Editors are asked to keep their nominations to 10 editors or less and nominations should be made in the following format:

  • [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line, including links in the nomination statement to the most significant articles/lists/images editors have worked on since 1 January 2017. Please keep nomination statements short and concise; excluding links to the articles/list/images in question, the ideal nomination statement should be about 20 words. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalized. Thanks, and good luck! AustralianRupert (talk) 09:38, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Nominations

  • Borsoka: Over the years Borsoka has produced an enormous output of articles on medieval history, most notably subjects concerning his homeland Hungary. Those include around 60 Good Articles and a single Featured Article. Helping shed light on an important period of European history while Wikipedia keeps struggling with WP:RECENTISM.--Catlemur (talk) 16:40, 8 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Kges1901: Kges has dominated the Writing Contest throughout the year, producing a staggering 143 articles through November, mostly on topics relating to the Red Army during World War II, though he has not been afraid to branch out into other topics as well. One of our most prolific content creators seems to be an obvious candidate. Parsecboy (talk) 19:43, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
  • PBS: From what I can tell, PBS has created over 1,400 articles, many of which are history-related, but doesn't appear to have ever received a nomination for a MHOTY award in the past 9 award years. As such, I think he's long overdue being nominated for his continued efforts in creating and updating content for the project. — Marcus(talk) 19:19, 1 December 2017 (UTC)
  • Peacemaker67: Responsible for at least 14 A-class articles this year, as well as at least 12 featured articles, countless good articles and at least one good topic across a broad range of topics including biographies of military personnel, battles, ships and aircraft. In addition, PM has continued to help out as a co-ord and admin. AustralianRupert (talk) 13:38, 15 December 2017 (UTC)
  • TomStar81: A stalwart of the project who has been around since 2004. Tom has had a hand in quite a few featured articles on battleships and has also played a pivotal role in keeping the project going, working behind the scenes as a co-ordinator and administrator. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 01:27, 2 December 2017 (UTC)


Voting

Voting has closed. Thank you to all who took part. The results will be tallied and awards handed out shortly. The results will also be published in the next edition of The Bugle. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:31, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Nominations for this year's "Military Historian of the Year" award have now closed, and it is time to vote for who you think deserves this honour. As with the awards for previous years, the second and third placed editors and all the runners up will also be acknowledged.

The nominees for this award and the statements given in support of these nominations are provided above. Voting can be done below by adding a hash sign (#) followed by the four tildes (~~~~) to nominee's sections.

All editors are welcome to vote, but are asked to vote for a maximum of three candidates. The winner will be the editor who receives the most 'support' votes by the time voting closes at 23:59 (GMT) on 29 December 2017.

Good luck to all the nominees! For the coordinators, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:55, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

  1. The Bushranger One ping only 08:06, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:46, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Nick-D (talk) 07:57, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. AustralianRupert (talk) 04:57, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  5. Euryalus (talk) 12:53, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  6. Catlemur (talk) 13:46, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  7. Kierzek (talk) 13:47, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  8. —Ed!(talk) 02:53, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. SpartaN (talk) 07:53, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Euryalus (talk) 12:52, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Catlemur (talk) 13:46, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:46, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:51, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 04:33, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Pennsy22 (talk) 07:41, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. SpartaN (talk) 07:53, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:46, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. AustralianRupert (talk) 04:57, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Kierzek (talk) 13:47, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:39, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. LargelyRecyclable (talk) 04:13, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. The Bushranger One ping only 08:06, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. Catlemur (talk) 13:46, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  5. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 04:33, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:39, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. LargelyRecyclable (talk) 04:13, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Pennsy22 (talk) 07:41, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. The Bushranger One ping only 08:06, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. — Marcus(talk) 07:45, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Kierzek (talk) 13:47, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. LargelyRecyclable (talk) 04:13, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. — Marcus(talk) 07:45, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. SpartaN (talk) 07:53, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. Abraham, B.S. (talk) 01:10, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  5. AustralianRupert (talk) 04:57, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  6. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 04:33, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
  7. Anotherclown (talk) 12:44, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
  8. —Ed!(talk) 02:53, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Pennsy22 (talk) 07:41, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Zawed (talk) 08:14, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Euryalus (talk) 12:54, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. —Ed!(talk) 02:53, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Nominations for military history newcomer of the year for 2017 now open!

Military history newcomer of the year 2017

  • First place
    First place
  • Runners up
    Runners up

As we approach the end of the year, it is time for us to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. In addition to the Military historian of the year, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate a promising newcomer that they feel deserves a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months for the Military history newcomer of the year award. The award is open to any editor who has become active in military history articles in the last 12 months.

Like the Military Historian of the Year, the nomination process will begin at 00:01 (GMT) on 2 December 2017 and last until 23:59 (GMT) on 15 December 2017. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of 14 days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top editor will be awarded the Gold Wiki; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

Editors are asked to keep their nominations to 10 editors or less and nominations should be made in the following format:

  • [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line, including links in the nomination statement to the most significant articles/lists/images editors have worked on since 1 January 2017. Please keep nomination statements short and concise; excluding links to the articles/list/images in question, the ideal nomination statement should be about 20 words. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalized. Thanks, and good luck! AustralianRupert (talk) 09:38, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

Nominations

Voting

Voting has closed. Thank you to all who took part. The results will be tallied and awards handed out shortly. The results will also be published in the next edition of The Bugle. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:31, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Nominations for this year's "Military History Newcomer of the Year" award have now closed, and it is time to vote for who you think deserves this honour. As with the awards for previous years, the second and third placed editors and all the runners up will also be acknowledged.

The nominees for this award and the statements given in support of these nominations are provided above. Voting can be done by adding a hash sign (#) followed by the four tildes (~~~~) to the nominee's section below.

All editors are welcome to vote, but are asked to vote for a maximum of three candidates. The winner will be the editor who receives the most 'support' votes by the time voting closes at 23:59 (GMT) on 29 December 2017.

Good luck to all the nominees! For the coordinators, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:57, 16 December 2017 (UTC)

  1. Gbawden (talk) 05:04, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. The Bushranger One ping only 08:06, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:47, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. Pennsy22 (talk) 05:19, 28 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:40, 16 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. Indy beetle (talk) 03:14, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Euryalus (talk) 12:55, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  4. Catlemur (talk) 13:48, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  5. Kierzek (talk) 13:50, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  6. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 04:31, 20 December 2017 (UTC)
  7. Anotherclown (talk) 12:46, 22 December 2017 (UTC)
  8. Ian Rose (talk) 13:06, 28 December 2017 (UTC)
  1. Kges1901 (talk) 02:18, 17 December 2017 (UTC)
  2. AustralianRupert (talk) 04:55, 18 December 2017 (UTC)
  3. Nick-D (talk) 07:39, 21 December 2017 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Battle of San Carlos (1982) detail/presentation

There is a discussion over on the Battle of San Carlos (1982) talk page about the level of detail and presentation style in the article. Additional input would be appreciated. Dbsseven (talk) 00:51, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

Category:World War II military equipment of Czechoslovakia has been nominated for discussion

Category:World War II military equipment of Czechoslovakia, which is within the scope of this WikiProject, has been nominated for delete. A discussion is taking place to see if it abides with the categorization guidelines. If you would like to participate in the discussion, you are invited to add your comments at the category's entry on the categories for discussion page. Thank you. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:14, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

1st Brigade Combat Team GAR

1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division (United States), an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for an individual good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 16:25, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

Loop of redirects

I don't want to add to anyone's workload, but could I get a look at the problem raised at WP:Teahouse/Questions/Archive 701#Loop of redirects? It looks like articles were converted to redirects without taking care that the target of the redirect did not contain a link (in this case, a template-generated link) back to the new redirect. Pinging K.e.coffman as one of the editors involved. I fixed one example. Another example that has not yet been fixed is Willy Unger. There seem to be quite a few. Thanks. — jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 07:36, 29 December 2017 (UTC)

G'day, I think I've gotten these with this edit: [8]. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 08:00, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
@AustralianRupert: yes, that's the correction I discovered was needed. But there are a lot of other letters of the alphabet that still have to be done and I'd like to know if it was only these alphabetical sub-pages that were affected or if there's a list somewhere of all of the articles-turned-into-redirects because of a collective decision (in case there are other areas where the problem has been introduced besides lists of recipients of this particular medal). Thanks, — jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 08:08, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
G'day, not sure if there is such a list, sorry. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 09:23, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Use of the linkclassifier script helps to identify the looping links on each page, though. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 09:28, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
I think I'm getting closer. I found a list at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Knight Cross recipients and the reference back to the RFC that indicates that only these Iron Cross recipients were being examined for whether they should be turned into redirects. Interestingly, the two cases I've already looked at were not on the list. But I can now presume that if I check all of the alphabetical subpages related to these recipients, I shall have closed the set. And some of these pages have already had the nolink=1 parameter set, as done by MisterBee1966 on List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross recipients (Ba–Bm). That linkclassifier script may help with checking. Thanks. — jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 10:44, 29 December 2017 (UTC)
Earlier, working on the list of notables form WW II, I went to one of the Knight's Cross lists, selected "what links here" then selected "redirects only" or similar words. If you see a bunch of pages names that are people's names, that's a good indicator. Hope this helps.--Georgia Army Vet Contribs Talk 16:34, 29 December 2017 (UTC)

OK, starting from the original linkclassifier script and a day of playing around with javascript and I have a revised script linkclassifier-list-self-redirects.js that lists the self-redirects near the top of the page where I can copy them off. Applying this to several of the alpha sublists of Iron Cross recipients, I can see that there appear to be a large number of entries still needing to be fixed. I think there's enough to justify spending a bit more time on an editing script to add the nolink=1 parameters rather than trying to do this entirely by hand. It may be a while before I get to it, but that's a chance for someone who knows better than me to step up and say "STOP! You're doing it wrong" or otherwise intervene. This will not be a bot or fully automatic edit, just some automated assistance to speed up what looks like a fairly tedious task. @AustralianRupert: it looks like "U" was a list that had fewer than the average entries with only 6. Most of the ones I checked appear to be northward of 20. — jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 08:47, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

@Jmcgnh: If you are looking into a script to facilitate the edits, could it perhaps also remove the red links? The result would be similar to List of Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross recipients (Ba–Bm), which has had red links / self-redirects removed. The red links are not needed, since it's safe to say that the subjects considered wiki-notable already have articles. --K.e.coffman (talk) 16:07, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
@K.e.coffman:. Sure, I can plan to give redlinks in these lists the same treatment. I can see why that makes sense. BTW, (Ba-BM) still has some self-redirects. — jmcgnh(talk) (contribs) 16:41, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

Use of war diaries (i.e. primary sources)

What is the current policy about using these sources? WP:PRIMARY states the we should favour secondary sources, and that when we do use primary sources no interpretation or analysis of them should be made, in order to maintain a neutral point of view. I'm currently working on the article about the 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade. With this edit, I added summary information of the unit's movements in late February 1916. Later parts of the diary place the unit in the Ypres salient in June (of that year). There is a detailed account of events from June 2nd to June 16th - locations given and actions mentioned are consistent with the fact that the unit participated in the Battle of Mont Sorrel. Other sources (for example, the 1962 History, by Nicholson) only give summary details of the involvement of this specific brigade. Would a summary (i.e. not "analysis") of events, as described in the diary, be an appropriate use of primary sources? More generally, is it acceptable to use these sources to infer the participation, and the details of said participation, of a given unit in a battle or other event? 135.23.202.24 (talk) 21:29, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Basically, as long as "dry facts" are what the primary source is citing (i.e. "X was at Y on Z"), there shouldn't be a problem with it. Primary sources can't be used for superlatives (i.e. "Company X was the best at drills") or for establishing notability, but for uncontroversial fact-checking, they're acceptable. - The Bushranger One ping only 23:52, 26 December 2017 (UTC)
Basically I agree with Bushranger, but just caution you against relying on them too heavily, as it is easy to stray into interpretation of "dry facts". Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 23:54, 26 December 2017 (UTC)
Diaries, journals, memoirs, letters and dispatches... there are so many primary sources that can indicate a person's involvement in a war/campaign/battle, it would be impossible and wrong to disregard them all. Policy does allow such sources to be quoted, without editorialising or analysis, to help reiterate a point taken from secondary material – using primary sources that amount to contemporary witness statements. But to go into detail you really need a secondary source that has used the primary source and analysed it so as to identify and identify any form of bias or political agenda the author may have had, before incorporating it into their publication. Secondary sources not only help you avoid bias or POV issues, but also to avoid claims that evidence presented from primary sources amounts to WP:SYNTH when conclusions are drawn that were not presented in the sources themselves. Given that many battles end with the commanding officer making a report and sometimes giveing "honourable mentions", and I don't see why we could not use those as sources to prive a certain individual or unit was in a battle, should we treat diaries as any less reliable as long as we're careful with the material and how it is handled? I think it's a tricky area to negotiate, and requires a lot of common sense and objective interpretation before being slapped into Wikipedia articles as "fact". — Marcus(talk) 23:55, 26 December 2017 (UTC)
These aren't private diaries - they're official unit diaries, written (in this case by the commanding officer) mostly in a "X happened on date Z" fashion, with occasional appendices which are operational orders, sometimes messages as sent between units on the field, and rarely maps or hand-drawn sketches. 135.23.202.24 (talk) 00:03, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
The war diaries are a vital WP:PRIMARY resource. If I could give the troops on active service advice, it would be to KEEP THE WAR DIARY UP TO DATE. No end of veterans have missed out on benefits through failure to do this. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 00:58, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
I don't use them very often, but it is a nice way of saying "[article subject] had this to say about event X". In this case, I'm referring to personal diaries. SpartaN (talk) 01:29, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
One of the key things to be careful about with war diaries is the tendency of the writer to reflect his unit in a good light. They are great for movements of a unit, changes in command, casualties etc, but you have to be very careful when using after action reports when they include an assessment of what went right/wrong and whose fault it was. As Charles Bean once wrote about one CO, he was "always keen for a stirring story of his own command" or words to that effect. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 01:31, 27 December 2017 (UTC)
I've used war diaries and equivalents in several articles which successfully passed through A-class and FA nominations without anyone raising concerns over these sources. I agree with the comments above about the need to use these sources sparingly though, as they are primary sources written by interested parties and their quality varies considerably. I use them mainly to fill the gaps in published secondary sources - for instance, to confirm the date something happened or the structure of a unit. I occasionally use them to fill gaps in the narrative - the war diaries kept by higher level Australian Army headquarters in the Second World War often include summary reports of operations written at their conclusion which are very useful (and were a key source for the official histories). War diaries can also be useful for "colour" about the experiences of the unit - for instance, when helping to write the Landing at Jacquinot Bay article I used a war diary to source the diarist's disgust at the condition of the ship his unit travelled in! Finally, they can also be a good source of public domain maps. Nick-D (talk) 22:44, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

A-Class review for Bougainville counterattack needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for Bougainville counterattack; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 08:44, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

Content removal from 1st Brigade, 7th Infantry Division (United States)

A lot of sourced and well referenced content has been removed from the article 1st Brigade, 7th Infantry Division (United States) without any proper explanation. Please see the talk page discussion. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 16:14, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

Articles from the Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research online?

Does anyone know if it's possible to access a copy of the Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research online? The society's website suggests a list of contents only, and only as far back as 2007. Maybe JSTOR, to which I don't have access, has the full contents? In the WP article Yeomanry, I'm sourcing from the SAHR's article The Stirlingshire Yeomanry Cavalry and the Scottish Radical Disturbances of April 1820, published in 1985 (Volume LXIII, I believe). This is available online from Balfron Heritage Group, but I suspect the page numbers don't match, and anyway I'd rather cite directly from an more authoritative sounding source. Thanks. Factotem (talk) 15:14, 30 December 2017 (UTC)

@Factotem: G'day, Factotem, unfortunately I don't have access to JSTOR. You might have more luck with posting this request here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Resource Exchange/Resource Request. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:15, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
I’ve just browsed their list, and didn’t see that one (despite the society’s website’s saying it would be there as of the end of this year). They do have The Journal of Military History (formerly Military Affairs / The Journal of the American Military Institute / The Journal of the American Military Foundation) and numerous general-history and international-affairs journals.—Odysseus1479 09:01, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
That's all very helpful. Thank you both. Factotem (talk) 09:11, 31 December 2017 (UTC)
@Factotem: I tried searching for “Stirlingshire Yeomanry Cavalry” on JSTOR, and also at Edinburgh U. Press, and all that turn up are bibliographies & “Recent Papers” lists mentioning the above article. BTW I second AR’s recommendation of WP:RX.—Odysseus1479 17:23, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

Non-charting album. Was at Tactical (album) at one point but is now sitting over "Tactical". There is a disambiguation page at Tactical (disambiguation), but a dozen mainly military history related articles are mis-linking to the album. In ictu oculi (talk) 10:27, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

I would go with either redirecting Tactical to Military tactics, with a hatnote for Tactical (disambiguation), or else redirect to Tactical (disambiguation) but make sure Military tactics is prominently linked in the opening sentence. Either way the obscure album should not be the primary article - Dumelow (talk) 23:32, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

Articles from WikiProject Middle Ages

I notice that articles from the above wikiproject can be tagged as part of our crusades task force, see for example Zengid dynasty. This doesn't bring them into the main WP:MilHist listing (see for example here) but they do get listed in Category:Military history articles with missing B-Class checklists (for example). Is there a way to prevent this from happening? Pinging User:Kirill Lokshin, who kindly set up this category. This is not a major issue, but I have (very slowly) been trying to reduce the backlog in this category and it would be nice to exclude these articles to which the B-class checklist cannot be added (or is the solution to add the milhist baner to these articles, though there are some which may not be within scope (eg Zaraka Monastery). Thanks for any advice - Dumelow (talk) 23:29, 1 January 2018 (UTC)

@Dumelow: This was recently fixed; please see here for more details. Kirill Lokshin (talk) 02:43, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Excellent, thanks Kirill Lokshin. Guess I should have checked the coord talk page! - Dumelow (talk) 06:38, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Please come and help...

There are requested moves at:

that would benefit from your !vote and rationale. Happy New Year to All!  Paine Ellsworth  put'r there  09:33, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

15th Tank Corps maps

Hello, are there any users experienced with creating maps here? I am asking this because I am attempting to get 15th Tank Corps, a Soviet unit, to FA status, and the maps I have in the article are not in English and poor quality for the article as they don't show units below army level. The sources I used for the article include more detailed maps, but I don't have the expertise to create my own maps. Users that want to help can email me at the address listed on the "Email this user" button under tools on the left side of the screen, and I will send images of maps with translations of foreign terms. Kges1901 (talk) 11:42, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

@Kges1901: G'day, you can sometimes get help here: Wikipedia:Graphics Lab/Map workshop. That said, I've asked a few times and all of my requests have gone unanswered. Hopefully you might have more luck, though. Also, User:Anotherclown has been able to knock a few maps together for me, but I don't know whether he would have the time at the moment. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:00, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
I was more unfortunate, someone replied and bungled the job. Keith-264 (talk) 22:56, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

The Bugle distribution list

G'day, ladies and gentlemen, if there is anyone who is not currently receiving a copy of the project's monthly newsletter, The Bugle, but would like to, I invite you to please add your name to the distribution list. This list can be found here. Thank you for your time. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:26, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Post Cold War era

I believe we have sufficient articles covering military topics dating from after the Cold War that we could consider adding an era task force. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 07:10, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

We started this conversation 2 weeks ago, but it trailed off without a conclusion, probably due to editors having other commitments over the season: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 143#Post Cold War Task Project. — Marcus(talk) 10:12, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
I started the discussion but we came to the conclusion that we do not have enough volunteers to tag all the necessary articles and that since we won't organize editathones we will just create extra workload.--Catlemur (talk) 10:19, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Why don't we have editathones?★Trekker (talk) 10:55, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Actually, I'm not sure that the take away from that discussion was a definitive no. That said, I hasten to add that the work required is not confined to just tagging articles, although that is part of it. There are a lot of extra infrastructure pages that need to be created to make set up the task forces, many of which are a bit fiddly. While I agree that they aren't what they used to be, I would like to say, though, that task forces can be more than just a means of categorisation (although that is a key outcome). They can also be used to share resources, request articles, and identify other editors interested in particular subject areas IOT facilitate collaboration etc. For instance, see the resources and request list at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Australia, New Zealand and South Pacific military history task force. It really just requires a few interested editors to work on the relevant pages. I try to update a few, but I don't have the expertise to identify missing topics and resources etc. for most of our task forces. Of course, we do not have the groundswell of editors to concentrate discussion on those pages, hence why most of the task force talk pages redirect here; however, I don't think they need to be disbanded, and I can see some merits in a post Cold War era task force. I would suggest that if those who are interested in the task force, are prepared to identify resources, and requested articles, etc. (potentially in someone's sandbox), that further discussion could be had. Regarding edit-a-thons, we ran one last March (Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/March Madness 2017) and may also run one next March (it is currently being discussed on the co-ord page to scope initial interest). Anyway, sorry for the WP:TLDR. Feel free to ignore. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 11:55, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Interested participants

As soon as we have more than a handfull of enlistees I think we can go ahead to create the neccessary infrastructure. I have started the Draft:WikiProject Military history/Cold War task force page. -- Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 21:26, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

@Dodger67: Don't you want to move that to Draft:WikiProject Military history/Post Cold War task force? -Indy beetle (talk) 01:40, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
Indy beetle Oops! Fixed. Draft:WikiProject Military history/Post-Cold War task force -- Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 09:59, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
Thanks for starting the draft task force page. I've added a few more elements to it, although I wasn't able to add anything in the way of resources as yet. Please add anything you think is relevant. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:33, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Please add yourself to this list:

Ottoman–Portuguese conflicts (1558–1566)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ottoman–Portuguese conflicts (1558–1566) may be of interest to some of the members of this project. The page (which is likely to be merged) and other related topics such as Ottoman–Portuguese conflicts (1538–1559) could use attention to verify their claims and improve the page structures and referencing. power~enwiki (π, ν) 16:58, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Ranks in the lead bias.

I'd like to see WP:SOLDIER or whatever bio-MOS applies to military individuals be updated to state that a person's last rank should NOT be used in the lead directly before their name. A biography covers an entire person's life, therefore "General John Doe (1 Jan 1800 – 30 Dec 1895)" wasn't born a General in 1800 and likely didn't instantly become a general, probably worked through several ranks and campaigns, and if he died in retirement 30 or so years after his last battle, was he still a general?

I removed "Field Marshal" from Arthur Wellesley some time ago, without opposition, but have received opposition to removing "Vice-Admiral" from leading Horatio Nelson and related articles. I see the article on George S. Patton begins with "General", and find it factually "wrong". A rank refers to a limited and fixed period of a person's career, Wellington, for example, was only a Field Marshal from 1813–15, Nelson was a Vice-Admiral from 1801–05, Patton wasn't promoted to General until 14 April 1945 and he died in December 1945. Is holding the rank of General for less than a year of his 60-year life notable? John Churchill wasn't a general all his life, why should "General" precede his name in the lead?

"Last rank" notability is a form of WP:Systematic bias – we're promoting the false impression that the last highest rank held by military figures is better and automatically notable. I'm willing to call "bullshit" on this and challenge the practice, and suggest the MOS be updated to help avoid it. Nelson may have been notable for dying as a Vice-Admiral at the Battle of Trafalgar, but the Battle of the Nile was an equally notable battle, which he survived, and there he was still a Rear-Admiral. During many of Wellington's notable battles through the Peninsular War between 1808–13 he was a Lieutenant-General or General, but not a Field Marshal. His battle at Waterloo may be his most notable, but that doesn't make his rank more important that all his previous ranks.

Napoleon doesn't begin with "Emperor", Adolf Hitler doesn't begin with "Führer" except in infoboxes where such titles might belong. But these ranks and titles should not be placed in the lead before the person's name, it is not encyclopedic... I could be wanting to refer to a soldier at any point in his life or career, Hitler in WW1, Napoleon during the Revolution, Wellington as Prime Minister, etc. The highest titles we relate to these people do not dictate their entire lives from birth to death. It's a socially engineered form of synthesis to relate military figures with their last rank and imply that it is a primary notable feature. However, since we don't lead articles with honorifics, "President" or "Prime Minister" we shouldn't be leading with high ranks like "General" and "Admiral" either, because it distorts the lead with biased notability. — Marcus(talk) 17:43, 2 January 2018 (UTC)

Not sure why it is bias, using the last rank held in biographies is fairly standard practice so its not promoting anything. I wouldnt support removing last rank. Also note that President and Prime Minister are not ranks so really dont compare. MilborneOne (talk) 20:28, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
It is in MOS:LEAD. I don't see the systemic bias either. Sure, Wellesley wasn't a field marshal for most of his career, but he wasn't the Duke of Wellington either. Use of the highest attained rank is conventional. By its nature it will be late in the overwhelming majority of cases; indeed, in some cases the highest rank held was awarded posthumously. In the case of Thomas Blamey, he is more famous for being a field marshal than for anything else he did, although he reached the rank very late in life. I wouldn't support removing last rank either. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:00, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
Appreciate what you're saying but agree with Hawkeye7, it's in MOSLEAD and helps the reader in providing meaningful context. The MOS makes exceptions for tangential titles or ranks, but I defy anyone to argue (for example) that Nelson is not generally known as an admiral, or not usually referred to in that way in reliable sources. If readers are interested in his earlier ranks, or associated titles, they can move from the lead (which gives the snapshot) to the article body which gives the details. All of which is usual practice, and doesn't seem (to me at least) to cause or have caused issues with systemic bias. -- Euryalus (talk) 23:18, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
I would personally prefer
  • Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, 1st Duke of Bronté, KB (29 September 1758 – 21 October 1805) was a British Vice Admiral in the Royal Navy. 
Instead of:
  • Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, 1st Duke of Bronté, KB (29 September 1758 – 21 October 1805) was a British flag officer in the Royal Navy. 
Would MOS:HONORIFIC already covers in? As in: “In general, styles and honorifics should not be included in front of the name, but may be discussed in the article.” The page lists some exceptions, but military ranks are not among them. Would like to hear what others think. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:31, 2 January 2018 (UTC)
No, I don't think that's relevant. Military ranks are neither styles nor honorifics. As the examples make clear, that rule is there to prevent articles starting with things like "The Right Honourable" and "The Reverend". Proteus (Talk) 19:44, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
Wrong! They're still titles, and the spirit of the guideline is clear, even if you don't want to see it. The MOS guideline is clearly to make the person's name paramount, and to prevent excessive use of titles and honours in articles, since they would not only bloat the artilce if used every time, but pay tribute to the person in an un-encyclopedic fashion. This is Wikipedia, nor Arlington National Cemetery. We're here to write about the people behind those ranks, from birth to death, not salute them for being the highest ranked officers. — Marcus(talk) 11:50, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
Are people intentionally blindsighting the point here, or what? We don't put "President Abraham Lincoln" or "Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher", so why should "General George S. Patton" be acceptable? It's not reaching the rank that is notable, it's their career and actions that merit notability – a rank is a "cause and effect" feature of career success – a man becomes a General or Admiral because he wins battles – those battles are notable events, the promotions are not – by placing their highest rank as the primary feature we're promoting their rank as having higher notability as their military actions. This is not an acceptable encyclopedic standard, and I would expect objective, unbiased-minded military historians to understand that. What is considered "standard practice" is systematic bias because we don't place positions such as President or Emperor in front of political leaders' names, so why would we place military positions in front of military leaders? And yes, MilborneOne, they do compare, they are titles/ranks in different organisations – President, Vice-President, Chief of Staff – your deflection is wrong, and biographically-speaking they amount to the same thing textually. Am I the only one who sees the hypocrisy in this practice? This is a symptom of wanting to promote military leaders to their highest status, which is a form of bias and results in a point of view: "Patton was a General foremost". No, Patton wasn't a sodding General foremost! He was a man who became a soldier and was promoted through several ranks because of his success during notable military campaigns. I would like to know why his being a General is more notable than his once being a Lieutenant, or ant other rank? Why does "General" get the top slot in the lead? And how is this not a biased POV? Because, unless there is a source that says these people were notable in that rank, it's a synthesised conclusion drawn from the social expectation that "General trumps Colonel" or "Admiral trumps Seaman". The "standard practice" is therefore an inherent fallacy based on what people consider notable, but not what actually is notable, per guidelines. The "standard practice" is symptomatic of socially identifying military leaders based on their highest attained rank, instead of their name and merits. And yet there are so many articles that rightly do not do this... this "sychophantic" practice: Erwin Rommel, Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant, Mark Antony, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Douglas MacArthur, George Washington, Stonewall Jackson. As User:K.e.coffman says above, it's better to say "Robert E. Lee was a General in the..." rather than "General Robert E. Lee", because he was a General at some point, but Robert E. Lee wasn't a General always. This removes the pretentious "his highest rank is more important than his name" system that warps various articles. It's all well and good holding military men in high esteem, but Wikipedia needs to present the rank in an unbiased fashion, not be used as a platform for liberally promoting officers with their highest ranks and best medals slapped all over the page without MOS guidance. And titles such as "Duke of Wellington" is given AFTER his birth name Arthur Wellesley, because it was earned and became his title, just like his postnominals are supplementary to his name. Therefore this argument is a moot point. If he was identifed as "The Duke of Wellington" foremost, then we'd have a problem. No soldier, officer, etc should have their rank stated before their name, it's contrary to how encyclopedias have been written for centuries. — Marcus(talk) 00:34, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
I personally prefer the person's name followed by their rank (Bob McSmith was an Irish admiral etc.). In addition to being more uniform with other bios, it also avoids the confusion that can arise with the awarding of posthumous or honorary titles (Émile Speller earned the rank of major in his service in the Luxembourg Army but was conferred the honorary rank of colonel in retirement). I think this is an issue that Wikipedia needs some wide-ranging consensus on. -Indy beetle (talk) 01:36, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
I personally think the suggested approach of banning such presentation is too proscriptive. There are conventions regarding military ranks that don't apply elsewhere. For example, in Australia, if you held the rank of Major and above, you may use that with your name after your service has concluded. I tend to follow that approach with articles, those for soldiers and Captains and below don't use the rank first, those with higher ranks, I do. I don't see what problem this creates. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 06:34, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
♠I'm with Marcus. I've removed a few of them, for the very reason the first line is about the person at birth. Should the page mention the highest rank achieved? Absolutely. Should the lead line, or even the lead photo caption? No. I frankly don't care if Nelson is usually called "Lord Nelson" or "Viscount Nelson" or "707 Nelson"; credit that after giving his birthname, with honors &/or aka (Horatio Alonzo Gates, BC, DVD, aka 707 Gates or "Gonzo" Gates). Neither do I care if he can be called Major or Colonel or First Prime after his service is up; so could this cook & this crook. Big deal.
♠On reflection, there's another matter. This may be less probable, but... If we accept "General Patton" in the lead, & the page says "Patton was promoted to Colonel", do you want to be the one who has to fix it when some driveby, thinking it's a mistake, changes it to, "The General was demoted to colonel"? I don't, but I'll bet it happens. John McIntyre I'm trapped 07:25 & 07:31, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
@Peacemaker67: There are conventions for other titles, in royalty and the honours system, but WP:Honorific prevents titles before their names. Elizabeth II begins "Elizabeth II" not "Her Royal Majesty Queeen Elizabeth II". This is why favouring military titles over other titles that have been "banned" is biased and hypocritical... it's almost like we're saying, "we're going to style military leaders our way to pomp them up and make them look important, and ignore all MOS standards which prevents anyone doing this to royalty, politicians and other dignitaries with pre-nominal titles." Sorry, but military leaders are not VIPs, we shouldn't be giving them "special status" and embellishing in honouring the highest ranking officers. In fact, your comment contains, or implies, an example of bias: You appear to find it acceptable to put "General George S. Patton" but don't feel that "First Lieutenant Audie Murphy" would be appropriate, even though Patton was only a General for 8 months, whilst Murphy was the "most decorated soldier" of WW2. And those two comparions prove my point, Patton is not notable for being a General any more than Murphy was for being a First Lieutenant, it was their actions, not their ranks, which made them notable. Nelson wasn't notable for being an Admiral either, infact it's a common error to call him "Admiral Nelson" because he died a Vice-Admiral. The project isn't here to make top ranking officers poster boys for their countries, or to appeal to the cultural practice of referring to certain reknowned people as "General..." or "Admiral...", it's here to be objective and to present facts in the right order. Biographies follow a linear progression, from birth to death, and when you slap their highest rank before their name, you're jumping the timeline, promoting their achievements, and biasing the entire article from the first word by placing that rank as having more importance than the rest of their life. That's the problem the system creates, and it stems from this project actually ignoring set wiki practices in order to follow external conventions which have been "banned" from other areas of wikipedia where titles are common, because those areas have the good sense to recognise that titles and honourifics should not take precedence over people's names and influence/dictate the rest of the tone of the article. "General George Patton" was only "General Patton" for 8 months, but by refering to him as "General Patton" from line 1, word 1, we're elevating him to a higher position of imporatance, biasing the rest of his biography, instead of allowing the article to build up his career and detail his promotions, like any normal encyclopedia would. Further, the way only some articles do this and some don't is subjective and unbalanced, which means the lack of MOS guidance (an omission which needs addressing) allows for some military leaders to be presented in far better light than others, which is little more than artificial cultural recognition based on opinion, not based on reliable references. It's a form of POV-pushing, along the lines of: "my favourite soldier/officer should always be addressed in a dignified manner pertaining to his rank" which doesn't belong in an impartial project. — Marcus(talk) 11:19, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
"Patton is not notable for being a General any more than Murphy was for being a First Lieutenant" - WP:SOLDIER begs to differ. Flippancy aside, even if this is an improper uses and not just yet another case of the MOS trying to legislate "legalised OR" by mandating a "house style" different than how sources actually use it, the argument should be that it's improper grammar/style/whatever; arguing that it somehow "biases" the article is preposterous.- The Bushranger One ping only 11:33, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
Preposterous or not, I still hold the current practice in contempt and question the integrity of WP:SOLDIER and its pretentious overtones, which undermine the need to properly reference articles instead of passing them off as "notable" because they check a box or two on some cobbled-together list of features. This irresponsible "standard practice" of putting high ranking officers on pedestals undermines the validity of this project and it's members. Feels more like the British New Year's honours list instead of a serious attempt to document history... — Marcus(talk) 12:03, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

@MarcusBritish: - "Patton is not notable for being a General any more than Murphy was for being a First Lieutenant" - wow, sorry, but I could not disagree with you more. And I think your post directly above shows you are very... 'passionate', about this, maybe a little too much so. You seem to be taking extreme personal offence to this issue. Anyway, the fact is, Patton is an excellent example of why the MOS is as such and his BLP introduces him as "General George S. Patton". No, he was not promoted to General at birth, and he had made some very notable accomplishments in his career before reaching that rank, (some not even military, such as the Olympics), but in the end, what Patton is most known for is his leadership on the battlefield as a general, specifically as CO of 3rd Army in France. It was in that role, as LTG then GEN that he is so widely known as one of the greatest military commanders of all time (there is variations on this from source to source), that is why I agree with the lead in his BLP as is, the MOS and most of the others here. I don't see any "bias" here and there is no need for a change. Cheers - theWOLFchild 15:26, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Your comment is dishonest in not addressing the facts. Patton was promoted to full General on 14 April 1945. The war in Europe ended on 8 May, when the Soviet Red Army took Berlin. Eisenhower saw to that. In those 24 days as a General what did he do? What did he do in the 8 months before getting killed? "General" not being the same as Brigadier General, Major General, or Lieutenant General. To me, your reverance is over-rated, the term "General Patton" reeks of American posturing more than fact-based referencing. Similarly, the term "Admiral Nelson" is the result of Anglo-centric nationalism, rather than anything factual. Do kindly focus on the topic in hand, rather than my "passion", I dislike distractions, and I take no offence on the matter, I simply oppose this long-held practice which has no place in an encyclopedia. He should be introduced as "George S. Patton was an American General" not as "General George S. Patton". An impartial encyclopedia presents facts objecively, it does not promote people in their biographies based on anything, not royalty, not honours, not titles, not military service. Abe Lincoln, Elizabeth I, George Patton, Adolf Hitler. They should be named before their titles and such are presented. Wikipedia isn't the place to promote formal titles to anyone, under any circumstances, before their name. That's called unbiased, because it's an "across the board" proposal that prevents nationalism or undue promotion of titles. It's already in place so far as WP:HONORIFIC is concerned and should be extended to military personnel, since the MOS doesn't currently cover this, which is where Systematic bias arises. You are biased, whether you realise it or not, because you favour the term "General Patton" in order to promote his career above anything else. Any form of promotion is a biased practice. Resorting to only giving a person's name without any earned titles is a NEUTRAL POINT OF VIEW. The use of military ranks before names gives WP:UNDUE balance to those articles, because the rank is being more notability than the individual who earnd it. WP:SOLDIER is wrong. It places emphasis on "being a General/Admiral" as a notable trait above how that person actual achieved that rank. This is, as some editor said, a "house style" and lacks cridbility when analysed for its real merit. If I was a General, I'd rather be known for winning X, Y and Z battles than the titles bestowed upon me by "pomp and circumstance". If members of the project think more emphasis of some top-tier organisational title is what makes "military history" notable, I really think they're missing the point of the study of military history and the careers of those men that achieved those ranks. "Hey, you're a General? Nah, fuck how you got there... who cares? Let's just give you a celebrity-status lead on Wikipedia and let other plot the rest of your life up as we go along, no-one reads that far anyway... your life is now defined by your meta-physical rank, General, nothing else matters, we just want people to love you and cloud their vision with your esteemed title." If people can't see the bias it's either because they're not willing or not capable of seeing through their own vanity in wanting to use titles to impress upon readers. There's a word for that... propaganda. — Marcus(talk) 17:18, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

This is like saying we shouldn't include "Sir" or postnominals because people didn't hold them from birth! It's ludicrous. Yes, of course we should add ranks. Unlike many other titles, once held they tend to be used for life. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:55, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

WP:HONORIFIC says we should not include "Sir" or "Madam", "Majesty", "Honourable", etc. Those honours are usually held for life, especially royalty, also. So using miliary titles when all other titles are out is hypocritical. Ranks belong in infoboxes, not as the first word in the lead before their name. Ranks are not more important than a person's name. — Marcus(talk) 17:18, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm going to be very blunt here: trying to claim this is somehow a WP:NPOV issue completely undermines whatever credibility your argument has from the start, and the rest of your argument makes it clear you don't want to have a consensus-building discussion on the matter, given you're claiming this indicates some kind of "who cares how they became a general" mindset (it doesn't) and "places emphasis on being...above how that person achieved that rank" (it doesn't) and taking my "house style" comment literally in the exact opposite position of how it was made (because doing that makes it support your position).
If you had come here and calmly explained that you believe this is wrong according to the Manual of Style, given links explaning how, and laid out your concerns reasonably and asked for a discussion on the subject, then this could have had a productive discussion on the merits of the manner. Instead you came in, laid down What Should Be, and cited a bunch of WP:OTHERSTUFF as comparisions, while (as mentioned) making increasingly, frankly, bizzare claims about the mindset of the project, which has poisoned the well for any practical discussion of this. - The Bushranger One ping only 18:51, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) - In solid agreement with Bushranger's assessment. According to Marcus, I'm "dishonest" and I "reek". But, wait! He wants the discussion to "focus on the topic, not the editors". <rolls eyes> But this isn't a discussion. It's a soapbox. Everyone who dares to disagree is met with a spew of antagonistic verbosity. Apparently no one here really knows how an encyclopaedia works but the OP. Well, I read your position and I disagreed. I then read your response to my reply, and despite the eloquence and charm you lavished on me, you did not sway my opinion in your favour. I still disagree. And further, I don't really see this going anywhere worthwhile, so perhaps it's time to pack it in and move on. - theWOLFchild 19:26, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
Which means you all should calm down and think. I think that User:K.e.coffman has, and I know I´m not saying that often, stated both correctly AND in an absolutely understandable way that according to MOS the first word of the lead section should neither be title nor rank as those can easily be written within the first or following sentences. I´ve not seen anything or anybody really saying contrary so far. Which means User:MarcusBritish should now be able to take that issue as solved, then step off the emotional pedestal and clearly say what remains to complain about - because as I see it you´re mixing up two (if not three) different issues and will not get anything constructive until separating those. ...GELongstreet (talk) 19:08, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
I disagree that User:K.e.coffman has correctly stated the position. I have replied under his post above. Proteus (Talk) 19:44, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

I was the first editor to reinstate the rank on Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson. I see that I was reverted and that @Dabbler: subsequently reinstated the rank again. It would have been appropriate for us to be notified of this discussion by its originator. But anyway, I noted the point made above by User:Hawkeye7 in my edit summary: "he wasn't Viscount Nelson, Duke of Bronte or a Knight of the Bath for his entire career either, and they're included". I don't think there's any risk at all that a reader will infer that a rank was held throughout a person's life (or even throughout a person's career) simply because it's used in this way: it's a standard usage, and everyone knows that the vast majority of military officers are promoted to various ranks throughout their career. I'd note that the proposed alternative ("Nelson was a British Vice-Admiral" or similar) effectively says the same thing (clearly he wasn't always a British Vice-Admiral), and I don't think we want to resort to needlessly complex phraseology like "Nelson was a British naval officer who was a Vice-Admiral at the time of his death". I'd also note that although in Nelson's case his most famous exploits were as an admiral, this isn't always the case: Sir Thomas Hardy, 1st Baronet, for example, though he retired as a Vice-Admiral, is most famous as a Captain at Trafalgar. So how do we include his final rank if not at the start of his name? "Hardy was a British Vice-Admiral" tends to imply that he is famous as such, which is misleading. I therefore don't see anything wrong with starting articles with ranks, and indeed I think it is by far the most straightforward and most helpful way to indicate the final rank held by a military figure. As others have noted, the comparison to "Prime Minister", "President", etc., are misguided: those are positions, not ranks, and are treated entirely differently in sources and in general usage. And I disagree that MOS:HONORIFICS applies here, and have set out why in response to the specific post raising it above. Proteus (Talk) 19:44, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Disagreement is your good right. So it appears I was wrong as we have at least one person saying contrary so far. I obviously disagree with the disagreement but that is not the point. I think you´re mixing up two of the issues, too. When it is about "So how do we include his final rank if not at the start of his name?" I personally would say: Not at all as far as the first sentence goes; especially not if there are several sentences in the lead. Taking Hardy as your own example the first sentece for now says, after the debated part, "was a royal navy officer". I think that is what it should say. You could of course substitute e.g. with was a British naval officer or simply was a British admiral - all of those are correct. The highest full rank can be brought up later in the lead if it is notable on its own in some way or the majority of the subjects notability being connected to it (e.g. taking James Longstreet being the very first and senior Lieutenant General of the Confederate States Army; or that bloke Hermann Göring being the only Reichsmarschall ever; or most of Napoleon's marshals [though they are a bit tricky]) and, of course, in the infobox and within the main text (and categories if applicable). But still that is already two/three issues mixed together.

The issues as I see them:

- use of rank as first word of an article or lead section (which I think is covered by MOS)
- use of general/admiral not just as literal full rank but in the meaning of rank group (e.g. general officers, which includes quite a lot of ranks if we go international)
- use of full rank in the first sentence (or lead at all)
- and probably whatever remains of the bias argument of User:MarcusBritish after excluding the stuff above.
Maybe anybody sees the issues (the issues, not the subjectively right anwers to them) differently? ...GELongstreet (talk) 20:27, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

@The Bushranger: I'm sorry that you don't understand the meaning of "neutral point of view" and would rather deride the suggestion than attempt to undertstand the various examples provided, to the point of exhaustion. The English language can be written in such a way that it either conveys information or attempts to implant suggestions in people's heads. When someone reads "General George Patton" as the very first words in an article, that's NOT conveying information. That's implanting the suggestion that he should be thought of as "General George Patton", and they will do so as they read the article, unconsciously or consciously. It is not a form of neutral wording, it is a biased form of language, because it brings direct attention to his rank as a "fixed" title and provokes the reader into thinking of that person in the format given. Alternatively, when you write "George S. Patton was a General in the U.S. Army during WW2" you are conveying precise information, in a biographical manner, creating a factual account of his achievement without promoting it as a formal means of identification. The article then goes through his career and eventually explains how he attained that promotion. There is no need to force-feed military forms of identifation down the necks of readers in the manner that some articles do. We are civilians, we do not have to address anyone in any military terms. He was just George Patton, plain Patton, or "some American thug who slapped his own soldiers around" for all I care, to us. This is not a military website, it is not a propaganda site, it is an encyclopedia. WP:SOLDIER may well say that Generals/Admirals are automatically notable, but I doubt any article on a General or Admiral is a one-line STUB saying "Bob Brown was a General in the Army" without going into detail about his career. And I bet his career is more notable that his rank. And it's because some articles choose to place emphasis on the rank, over their name and career, that we have a form of systematic bias... because some people, whatever their background, think rank is a form of praise and respect, and choose to preceive the rank as a social status, a class above the rest, and because we refer to some past officers like "Admiral Nelson" or "General Jackson" it is a cultural bias. I know exactly what I mean when I choose to identify the practice of using military ranks in leads as creating a biased or non-neutral tone or even a form of synth, because the pracice is a form of appraisement, not a form of conyeying information in a way thay does not influence the reader's way of thinking, by pre-loading them with a naming convention. Everything else you said, your cute "observations" were rhetorical nonsense. I believe you are unwilling to consider the "standard practice" is a flawed convention, perhaps that's because you favour it, and decided to deflect by points to mask your own ignorance or unwillingness to see a change. Deflection seems to be a common practice these days... if I didn't want to discuss the matter openly, or attain consensus, I wouldn't have brought it here, would I? However, I am surprised to find people who consider themselves "military historians" trivialising the matter, and despite my giving several case examples, several times, they still can't or won't see the truth of the matter. There appears to be as much resistance to this as there was to removing all those medal ribbons from veterans' pages a few years ago... rememeber that cropping up again and again? All because a lot of people don't want an encyclopedia, they just want to use the site to pay tribute to their favourite war heroes, and that often results in nationalistic pride getting in the way of encyclopedic practices. Deny that all you want, but you know it's true. — Marcus(talk) 21:51, 3 January 2018 (UTC)
I entirely understand the meaning of NPOV, and the fact you refuse to listen while continuing to cast aspersions with rampant accusations of bad faith upon other editors makes it clear that you are not having this discussion to build a collaborative consensus. - The Bushranger One ping only 22:32, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

If I may suggest; could people take a breath, and/or a step back, and word their replies to be towards the points made, and not towards perceived flaws with other editors, and to also resist replying to such things. (Hohum @) 22:06, 3 January 2018 (UTC)

Many high ranking officers are notable because of their accomplishments as officers. Patton is a good example. Look him up and he is almost invariably remembered as being "General Patton". Same thing with Douglas MacArthur and many other notable officers. While I'm sure they had other accomplishments while of lower rank, or as civilians, but that does not change the significance of what they did as generals. Btw I don't understand the need to insult Bushranger. Even if he didn't understand NPOV, there is no reason to be insulting about it. SpartaN (talk) 00:57, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
If I may, I would just like to say that while I think this argument has gotten quite out of hand, I do see Marcus' point. Why should MIL BIOS on Wikipedia get to have preceding titles when no one else will? Should we start calling the politicians "Prime Minister ____" and "President ____"? Should we throw the esquire suffix onto certain lawyers? Should we call college educators "Professor _____"? If we won't do it for all these people, then military servicemen should be treated no differently. Furthermore, what would we do with a man like Dwight D. Eisenhower, both a distinguished general and President of the United States. Would we write "General Dwight D. Eisenhower was an American military officer and statesman who served as the 34th President of the United States"? Why should he get that special honor, if we wont put Woodrow Wilson's PhD down in his title? And while the propaganda argument does on its surface seem extreme, it does have some weight to it. Take the Eisenhower example. Makes him sound a little elevated, doesn't it? Idi Amin called himself field marshal (among other things) for a reason. -Indy beetle (talk) 01:12, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
The first sentence of a bios page should always start with the name of its subject. This is not only my opinion but also the sense of MOS instructions. Carlotm (talk) 01:53, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
As one of the people who originally reverted the changes proposed, my feeling was that there is a fairly consistent usage of the last rank in military articles across Wikipedia and changing it for a few would mean eventually having to undertake the gargantuan task of changing it for all. In Britain at least Prime Ministers or other senior politicians are not referred to by their office title once they have left office, so it is Mr Blair, Mr Brown or Mr Cameron unless they are subsequently granted a title such as Baroness Thatcher or Sir John Major. In the latter cases, their articles begin Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher and Sir John Roy Major. Generally knights DO have their title, Sir, included in the opening words of the article. Peers have their titles included after their family names. like titles military commissioned ranks are given for life and do not expire when the holder is no longer active. While most lower level officers etc. do not use their ranks out of the service but they are still held to be in that rank. Dabbler (talk) 02:29, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
Some Tory twit probably added the Sir to Major's page, he needs all the dressing-up they can give him just so we know he has a pulse... however, WP:Honourific states "In general, styles and honorifics should not be included in front of the name, but may be discussed in the article." It then, later, states "The honorific titles Sir, Dame, Lord and Lady are included in the initial reference and infobox heading for the subject of a biographical article, but are optional after that." The MOS contradicts itself by first stating "should not be included" to an "optional" choice. Ridiculous that this has slipped the net. Regardless, knignthoods expire when someone dies. That was made clear after Jimmy Savile's sex abuse history came to light, because people wanted him stripped of his knighthood title, and it was disclosed that it had expired anyway on his death. So that also poses the question, how many articles are using "Sir" on dead people, and who is expected to update articles and remove honorifics when someone dies, because it is technically wrong. This is why honorifics, titles, and similary upper-class snobbery should not be allowed before the name... it posed more problems than it solves. — Marcus(talk) 03:43, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
Frankly, this is turning into a TLDR rant. The whole thing about MOS:HONORIFIC is a canard, and much of the argument here is otherstuffexists. Ranks are not honorifics, they are ranks. If you think there should be a change to the MOS, propose it there and provide a link here. Thanks, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 04:15, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
No, it's not canard. Ranks are formal titles, just like styles and honorifics: Sir, Doctor, Queen, Emperor, General, Admiral – they are all used in the same fashion. You're obfuscating the word "ranks" and trying to seperate it from the issue so that military history becomes the exception to the rule, rather than the bender of the rule. Regardless, it is the practice of using ranks first that is the issue here, not the incidental naming of a MOS section. — Marcus(talk) 11:44, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
A couple of comments/observations. With some exceptions, I would not have a soldiers rank precede the subjects name in the lead. Even then, I might write it as "Patton was a General", rather than "General Patton". One such exception is where the subject died in the course of there service. This would be Patton and Nelson? Another is where the subject has continued to use their rank subsequent to their service per Peacemaker. Perhaps the matter of Thomas Blamey, where Hawkeye observes that their rank is that for which they are most notable. While not a mater of record, it is likely that Blamey died a serving member. The article is silent on his discharge after returning to active duty for the purpose of his promotion. I observe that military rank is not an honorific and that arguement does not hold water in he same way as it does for "Sir". I would not go as far as to describe issue as a POV matter or bias. However, I acknowledge that there are persons, such as Audie Murphy and Churchill who are as notable, if not more notable, for other aspects of their life. Notwithstanding some jokes to the contrary, generals and RSMs are not ready made. Referring in the lead to a subject's "final" rank does not discount their service in other ranks, as alluded to. Regards Cinderella157 (talk) 05:41, 4 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm really not getting the hypocrisy, here. You'd defend General for Patton & Major for Dick Bong, but not Lt. for Murphy? Nor Queen for Elizabeth II? When, at birth, Elizabeth was damn well entitled to be called "Her [Whatzit], Princess Elizabeth", by virtue of being royal at birth, when neither Patton nor Bong were even in the military at birth. That is nonsensical. And on reflection, I'm not at all sure all honors, or any, deserve to be in the top line for anybody. TREKphiler any time you're ready, Uhura 23:10, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Shameless appeal for a GA review

Just like to post here that I recently nominated Jean-Baptiste Ouédraogo for GA status. The article is short, and its subject is an army surgeon who briefly served as President of Burkina Faso before being deposed by the more well known Thomas Sankara. If anyone wishes to review it I'd be grateful, and it would help advance our African sector and counter systemic bias (which seems to be all the rage these days). -Indy beetle (talk) 00:16, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

G'day, Indy, I will take a look today as I am still on holidays. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

A-Class review for Royal Gloucestershire Hussars needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for Royal Gloucestershire Hussars; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 02:11, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Done. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:29, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

Query re: Template:WPMILHIST Announcements

G'day all, anyone know why the template has a whole bunch of GANs that aren't listed at WP:GAN#WAR? The oldest one on the latter is RAF Lossiemouth, but the template has another 16 older ones. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 04:36, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

They're sorted under different sections - the oldest one in the announcements page is Abdullah II of Jordan, which is listed under WP:GAN#ROYAL. Ditto with Curtis P. Iaukea, and Congress of the Confederate States is under WP:GAN#GOVT. Parsecboy (talk) 21:50, 5 January 2018 (UTC)
That clears it up for me, thanks. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:27, 6 January 2018 (UTC)
Yeah, I couldn’t figure it out at first either – then it occurred to me to ctrl+F for Abdullah, and there he was. Parsecboy (talk) 02:07, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

Richard Winters

I don't think I'm getting through here: Talk:Richard Winters#"He was the last surviving Easy Company commander" is inaccurate. If I'm wrong, that's okay, too.--Georgia Army Vet Contribs Talk 16:08, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

Usage of flags in battle infobox in the context of WWI

Hello historians,

I've given a WP:3O on Talk:Fifth Battle of Ypres#Regarding the German Empire constituents. The sides are in disagreement on whether the different armies of Germany, as listed in the infobox, should be shown under the German flag, or under the constituent states' flags. The convention seems to be the former; if the latter is adopted, changes would have to be made to other articles in the category. Your attention would be appreciated. François Robere (talk) 20:58, 6 January 2018 (UTC)

A-Class review for New Britain campaign needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for New Britain campaign; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 02:11, 5 January 2018 (UTC)

G'day, all, this one still needs another reviewer if anyone is free. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 00:06, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Done. Factotem (talk) 12:41, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

Battle of Passchendaele

External links Q; too much trivia? Keith-264 (talk) 16:49, 7 January 2018 (UTC)

The Canadian historical fiction movie with the imdb link is certainly unnecessary. -Indy beetle (talk) 23:14, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
The Times archive, Web Archive and European Film Gateway links don't work for me. The locomotive memorial plate (NZ History Link) is not useful for understanding the battle. Likewise the link to the 2nd Lt Riddel medal citation and Captain Willard personal history. The Irish Military History Forum is WP:OR. I could probably lose the BBC archaeology story also - Dumelow (talk) 23:39, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
On a similar note in "Further Reading" aren't the official military histories "Military Operations France and Belgium, 1918: March – April: Continuation of the German Offensives" and "Military Operations France and Belgium, 1918: 26th September–11th November The Advance to Victory" for the wrong time periods? They might be useful if the reader wants to understand what happened after the battle but I don't think they are directly relevant and can probably be omitted - Dumelow (talk) 23:43, 7 January 2018 (UTC)
Those volumes advert to the Fourth and Fifth battles but since I put them there, I'll defer to opinion here. Stay or go with the rest? Keith-264 (talk) 08:03, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue CXLI, January 2018

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If you are a project member who does not want delivery, please remove your name from this page. Your editors, Ian Rose (talk) and Nick-D (talk) 13:15, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Categorizing Manuel V. Mendoza

He was awarded the DSC in World War II, which was upgraded to the MOH in 2014. Should he be listed in Category:Recipients of the Distinguished Service Cross (United States)? Clarityfiend (talk) 11:07, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

My understanding is that an upgraded award replaces the previous one, for example Gary M. Rose. However, I think we should still include them in the category since they have indeed received the DSC and having the award upgraded won't change that. Kges1901 (talk) 12:16, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
Technically, an upgraded award negates the original award because they don't get to wear both a DSC and a MoH if the former is upgraded to the latter.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:51, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
I agree with Kges1901's reasoning, plus Rose's article includes it. Thanks. Clarityfiend (talk) 11:29, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Content dispute regarding Karam Singh

Please comment at: Talk:Karam Singh#Removal of citation section "Military Medal". --Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 14:06, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Sources without page numbers

63rd (Royal Naval) Division The part ascribed to Sellers 1995 (fn 19) comes from a Kindle or some such device. Is it OK to use |loc=3853–3902 instead of pp=  ? Template:Cite book wasn't much help. Thanks Keith-264 (talk) 13:16, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Hi, last time I looked there we no hard and fast rules about citing a Kindle book -- when I used one for Alan Rawlinson, I employed chapter titles to highlight the relevant areas cited, and the article passed GAN and ACR. I think I found that more useful than location numbers for some reason but I don't see why you shouldn't use location number if it provides accuracy. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 22:59, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
Eythenkew! Keith-264 (talk) 23:35, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm fairly certain that |loc= in the template is meant for publisher's location. I've also successfully done a few articles at GAN with chapter titles as I use .epub books much more than I do Kindle ones.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 23:39, 8 January 2018 (UTC)
I beleive you'd use "|at=loc. 3385–3902". (Hohum @) 02:21, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
That seems reasonable, though it would be nice if that got more publicity than it has.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 02:35, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

Tried it but it suppressed the numbers same as nopp=y.Keith-264 (talk) 08:37, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

|at= does too....Keith-264 (talk) 08:38, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
I didn't realise you were using the sfn template (I should have looked at the article). "loc=loc. 3853-3902" probably gives what you want. I've made the change. (Hohum @) 14:56, 9 January 2018 (UTC)
That's done the trick, thanks Keith-264 (talk) 15:46, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

French frigate Cléopâtre

What is the identity of the French frigate Cléopâtre that was in service in 1843 please? Mjroots (talk) 07:46, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Looks like French frigate Cléopâtre (1838), apparently a 52-gun Artémise class - per List of French sail frigates. Some further information in this book. Launched 1838 and briefly in commission (less than three months) to be towed from its shipyard at Saint-Servan to Brest. Commissioned again 1842 and used as a transport in the Crimean War before ending its days as a storage hulk (broken up 1869). This book states it was in Japan in 1846 as a demonstration of force to try to open up trade with the country - Dumelow (talk) 11:50, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Many thanks, Dumelow. I did a search of the net and was unable to find anything. She rescued those onboard the East Indiaman Regular which was abandoned in the Indian Ocean on 12 July 1843. Will add a link to the shipwrecks list. Mjroots (talk) 12:56, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
No problem. I will see if I can get time to create an article later today, though it won't be much more than a stub unfortunately - Dumelow (talk) 13:12, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Hyperwar

Came across this in the new pages feed. Looks a bit OR/essayish to me currently, and I'm not sure if it is a notable term. I thought it'd be better to check here, however, before sending it ot AfD. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:17, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

It's a genuine term used by some pop-historians to refer to "massive coordinated precision strikes at the start of hostilities in the hope that the disruption to logistics will force the enemy to surrender without a fight, or at least severely impair the ability to counter-attack" (e.g. the Nazi attack on Rotterdam, or assorted NATO plans for pre-emptive strikes on Soviet infrastructure, and most famously the initial phase of the US invasion of Iraq), but AFAIK doesn't have either any significant usage, or any accepted definition. The terms virtually every credible historian use for the concept are "rapid dominance" or "shock and awe", to which this should probably redirect. (I appreciate that The Gulf conflict was also the first example of "hyperwar"— one that capitalizes on high technology, unprecedented accuracy, operational and strategic surprise through stealth, and the ability to bring all of an enemy's key operational and strategic nodes under near-simultaneous attack. is a quotation and not being said in Wikipedia's voice, but I imagine anyone with even the slightest knowledge of World War II is raising an eyebrow at the claim.) ‑ Iridescent 16:42, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Oh dear.Keith-264 (talk) 22:41, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

I'd suggest sending this to AfD. The article is OR, with the lead reference about what 'hyperwar' apparently is not even using the term. At best it's an occasionally-used term used to refer to elements of the Revolution in Military Affairs (a frequently cited concept). Nick-D (talk) 10:12, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Thanks all. I've gone ahead and sent it to AfD because there at least seems to be agreement that there shouldn't be an article. People can discuss the merits of a redirect vs. deletion there. TonyBallioni (talk) 17:45, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

ORDATA template

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Template:ORDATA

ORDATA has moved: it's now at https://ordata.info

Worse: all the ID numbers have been reassigned, so all 61 pages that use the template must presumably be individually updated. It looks like accurately matching Wikipedia entries to ORDATA entries requires domain knowledge which I don't have.

I've posted on the template's talk page, and notified its original author, who appears to be active in this project. Primefac offered to make the necessary changes if supplied with a list of old and new IDs.

Rural Spaceman (talk) 00:18, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

A-Class review for Battle of Halmyros needs attention

A few more editors are needed to complete the A-Class review for Battle of Halmyros; please stop by and help review the article! Thanks! AustralianRupert (talk) 04:25, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Done, one more needed. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:14, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

Likely hoaxes

Battle of Pęcice has existed since January 5, 2008. A quick Google search shows absolutely no results that aren't Wikipedia mirrors. Also from the same author is Żaglowiec Group, around since February 5, 2008. Can anyone prove that these are unquestionably hoaxes? Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 19:44, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

Have you carried out even the slightest WP:BEFORE checks here? If Battle of Pęcice is a hoax, it's a hoax that's fooled numerous veterans into attending a service for the survivors on its anniversary, and that took all of ten seconds to find. Here's the monument marking the spot where it took place. Meanwhile, here's the enormous and exhaustively-sourced article on Żaglowiec Group on Polish Wikipedia. ‑ Iridescent 19:50, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
(edit conflict) This is exactly the type of article you would expect to be more developed in the home language wiki, in this case Polish. A look at the Polish wiki article, which is seemingly well sourced, longer, and better written, does not scream hoax.Icewhiz (talk) 19:57, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
@Iridescent: Then why was I unable to find anything that wasn't a Wikipedia mirror? If something turns up only 40 hits on Google, all from WP mirrors, then yes I'm going to bat an eye and suspect a hoax. Ten Pound Hammer • (What did I screw up now?) 20:18, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
I'm going with "because you're sloppy and didn't conduct the most basic checks" as my working hypotheses, given my experience of your usual "anything I've never heard of is non-notable" approach to deletion. (Just going to put Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chad–Sudan relations here…) Unless you think that in the six minutes between your comment and my reply I persuaded the council of Gmina Michałowice (whose website this is) to create a fake web-site about the Service of Remembrance, created an entire category on Commons dedicated to images of the memorial to the battle, and then faked the informational sign on the battlefield. ‑ Iridescent 20:26, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
To add to Iridescent's comments, searching for the Polish name in Google Books produces several clear mentions predating the Internet. This is pretty basic since the Polish version is linked at the side of the article. Kges1901 (talk) 22:38, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
TPH, please take a step back, take a deep breath, and more thoroughly consider how you approach these - while it's certainly good that you came here first, the reactions above are pretty reflective of your approach to the notability and deletion process, and this hasn't changed in literal years. That isn't good for the project. - The Bushranger One ping only 23:00, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
The Bushranger, TPH didn't come here first; he tagged them for deletion first (which I unsurprisingly immediately declined). ‑ Iridescent 23:37, 10 January 2018 (UTC)
Facepalm Facepalm - The Bushranger One ping only 01:41, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

Is a sledgehammer being used to crush a walnut? The originator made a mistake by being, perhaps, a little careless. I think the avalanche of destructive criticism that follows is unfair.Keith-264 (talk) 09:31, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

​Just to put this in context. We're not talking about a good-faith newbie making an innocent mistake, we're talking someone who's been making sloppy "I didn't bother checking myself but I've not heard of it so I'll assume it's non-notable" deletion nominations—and been being warned to be more careful—for over a decade now. See also his AfD nomination record; at the time of writing of the last 250 AfD nominations he made 61 were deleted, an accuracy rate of less than 1 in 4, and that "throw everything at the wall and see what sticks" pattern of inappropriate nominations is consistent however far back you look. (Just head on over here and dip-sample away if you think the tool is misreading the stats, or that I'm mischaracterising TPH's approach to deletion.) ‑ Iridescent 09:55, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Give the lad some encouragement, this isn't the place for a vendetta.Keith-264 (talk) 10:09, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Sorry Keith, it's not meant as sledgehammering, but this is a consistent pattern of behavior by TPH over eight or more years, including some that make it obvious the item sent to deletion wasn't even read. At a certain point even a saint runs out of patience. - The Bushranger One ping only 11:22, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

If it's been going on that long, I suggest that you change your approach, it isn't working. Keith-264 (talk) 11:37, 11 January 2018 (UTC)

The approach that's been taken, it would appear, is that of a large number of individual editors consistently and continually assuming good faith, rather than eventually comparing notes and calling in adminstrative action. Since, as you agree, the former isn't working, I suppose we can take it that you agree with the latter...? >SerialNumber54129...speculates 15:55, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Pitchforks for sale! I got them all: ---{, ---€, ---£, ---E. Buy one get one for free!--Catlemur (talk) 19:47, 11 January 2018 (UTC)
Setting aside the comments above, the article needs a lot of work, so I'd encourage people to help improve it if possible. I did a little bit, but haven't got the knowledge or resources to do much more. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 04:23, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
My pitchfork (---$) doesn't work well and isn't worth much. I'd like a refund, or a pitchfork that's shaped right. SpartaN (talk) 05:08, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Post-Cold War task force

A task force covering the Post-Cold War era is being incubated at Draft:WikiProject Military history/Post-Cold War task force. Interested editors are invited to participate. This step has been taken after several attempts to discuss the issue here had been prematurely archived. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 07:43, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Wikiproject Template

I have to say that it is something of a hassle that the talk page template for this WikiProject does not seem to be one of the options for AFCH and that it is also kind of hard to find even when I am trying to add it manually ... SeraphWiki (talk) 00:33, 12 January 2018 (UTC)

{{WPMILHIST}}? Seems simple enough to me, but I know I'm odd in a lot of ways. - The Bushranger One ping only 01:45, 12 January 2018 (UTC)
G'day, might be a query for Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Articles for creation/Helper script? Potentially, someone there could help add it as an option. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 02:39, 12 January 2018 (UTC)
AFAIK the AFC script looks for the "conventional" banner template title format {{WikiProject Whatever}} Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 07:50, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
That'd be {{WikiProject Military history}}, then. - The Bushranger One ping only 11:33, 13 January 2018 (UTC)

Generals of World War I and World War II

I started this article with the intention of providing data on every Allied and Axis military leader who was promoted to general before November 11 1918 and who later participated in World War II. However, other users think the title is confusing and have doubts about its relevance. I would like to invite others interested in military history to provide some advice on improving this article so it doesn't get deleted (see also deletion talk page). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 53zodiac (talk • contribs) 00:50, 14 January 2018 (UTC)

Could I get a fresh set of eyes on a cool new page?

I've been doing some AfC reviewing and came across a very well written and cited page Draft:Officer in Charge of Construction RVN. My primary concern is the style of the citation. Other than that (and I've checked for copy vio) I think this is close to B class in draft space. Will someone look at the citation style? I haven't seen this used much recently. BusterD (talk) 04:30, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

@BusterD: As you now know, using that particular form of citation— consistently throughout the draft—is no reason to decline the AfC. However, your way of thinking was still, to my mind, in time with the realities of articlespace. There's enough editors equally unaware of the myriad citation styles we allow that it would almost certainly not have survived in its present form. Someone would certainly have come along and "fixed" them—and probably repeatedly. Even though a citation style shouldn't be changed without good reason, which there would not be. I think you're good to go with it now; as you say, very nice little article. >SerialNumber54129...speculates 12:37, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Agreed, references and inline footnotes are totally valid. Citations only have to meet the general criteria at WP:IRS. This specifies no hard requirement to use citation templates to meet them. -Finlayson (talk) 15:03, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Thanks. After brief conversation, I was leaning that way. I want to encourage this new contributor, not discourage them with excessive hoops. If this is the person's FIRST contribution, I can hardly wait to find out what's next. Appreciate the eyes. BusterD (talk) 16:17, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
The article contains the most desirable approach to references, which is beyond the reach of many editors: the ability to repeatedly cite different pages within a reference without repeating the whole reference. User:HopsonRoad 16:43, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Perhaps someone could direct this good fellow over to WP:GAN? -Indy beetle (talk) 19:15, 15 January 2018 (UTC)
Well I meant the author of it, but yes I'm suggesting putting the article through the GA process. -Indy beetle (talk) 20:59, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

2nd Anti-Tank Regiment (Australia)

I just approved this article at Articles for Creation, but it seems to be having some issues with Wikipedia's system naming requirements (it should be 2/2nd): I'm assuming this isn't the first time people here have come across that problem, so I figured I'd ask here and maybe get some people to have a look over it at the same time. The Drover's Wife (talk) 23:57, 15 January 2018 (UTC)

@The Drover's Wife, this appears to have been resolved? Cinderella157 (talk) 00:56, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

List of ships of the United States Army

I'm not getting into an edit war, so am asking for opinions here please. CobraDragoon has removed valid WP:REDLINKS from the List of ships of the United States Army, claiming the links are not valid. I say they are valid and should be restored. Mjroots (talk) 04:40, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

OK, after reading the WP:REDLINK page, I concurr. My apologies.CobraDragoon (talk) 16:27, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Request for input at Natalya Meklin

Additional opinions would be helpful at Talk:Natalya_Meklin#Awards. Nikkimaria (talk) 21:10, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

This is a storm in a teacup that should never have been beaten up (IMHO and FWIIW). Appropriate intervention might prevent this from escalating further. Cinderella157 (talk) 13:17, 17 January 2018 (UTC)

Combating ignorance about the "Axis minors"

Dear guys, this is something I really want to talk about. You see, the Axis seems to be treated, even today, as only the 3 big countries. Granted they were the founders, but to talk with fellow history enthusiasts and get questions like: "Romania? Did they even fight in the war?" deeply troubles me. Like, what did Romania have to do more, than what it did? Why contributing hundreds of thousands of troops to the Eastern front, take part in numerous major battles, provide the greatest naval force in the Black Sea, have very successful flying aces, get the most German Knight's Crosses out of all the German allies, why isn't all of this enough to at least get Romania a mention here and there when talking about the Axis? It's true that I have a personal stake in this, given that I'm Romanian myself, but I really don't want to overestimate my country's importance, not at all. I am trying to normalize it. Ever since I joined the community in August, I've been doing my best to normalize my country as one of the respectable belligerents to World War II, give it the place at the table that it deserves. I started out with the navy, and am still at this chapter. Hungary too, their contribution is also too great for the disregarding it gets. So, where I'm getting with this, is: What can we do? What can we do, as Wikipedians, to try eradicate this ignorance and have all belligerents given the mentions and honors they deserve within the public talk about WW2? I really wanted to share this with you guys, thankyou for reading. Torpilorul (talk) 17:04, 16 January 2018 (UTC)

Can you point to any articles that have issues?Slatersteven (talk) 17:09, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
Well, for one, it's the Axis Powers article in itself. Romania's sub-section is nowhere near as detailed and portioned as the three main countries, despite it having most of their attributes: motivations, resources, ideology and events across the war, you know, the good stuff. It's much briefer in Romania's case, but so is with the rest of the section. I didn't get to it for I believe it should be a common effort to raise all the "Axis minors" to the quality standards (not the quantity, I am aware that's unfeasible) of the section of the "big guys."
Then, it's Constantin Cantacuzino. The top Romanian ace to this day lacks a copyright-free image. Because of this, his picture can't be featured in the gallery of the List of World War II flying aces article, being replaced by the second best Romanian ace.
A major Romanian military unit, the 1st Romanian Tank Division, is yet to have its own article. It fought at Stalingrad and elsewhere, scoring notable successes.
These would be some of the things that should be addressed. Torpilorul (talk) 17:30, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
In the case of the Axis article this would be because the "Big three" were it founders, the other nations joined latter. Thus much of the article is about it's formation. As to Cantacuzino, that is not an issue we can deal with, this is an off Wiki matter. As to the 1st Armd, we often do not have articles if no one has material to write one up. If you wish to give it a go go ahead as you clearly have access so sources that mention it.Slatersteven (talk) 17:43, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
This is a broader issue really. Our coverage of countries in World War II is rather uneven, with good coverage only for the US, UK, Germany and Australia. Despite this being the English speaking Wikipedia, our coverage of Canada is patchy, NZ fairly limited and South Africa pretty basic. Of the "Axis majors", our coverage of Japan is pretty limited and the material on Italy is rather uneven. As such, there's plenty of room for improvements all round. Regarding Romania, please note that we've had some issues with Romanian nationalist POV pushing over recent years. By all means expand the coverage of Romania in the war, as I have no doubt that it's lacking, but please ensure that it's neutral and reflects the weight given in reliable sources and the nature of the war Romania fought, including its role in the Holocaust and other atrocities. Nick-D (talk) 22:16, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
My own 2 cents - units from the minors, Romania included, who mostly fought in the eastern front (and balkans + some inner squabbles) are often seen as inferior cannon fodder (with inferior equipment and morale) in military history sources. Some of the minors are also perceived to be German puppet states during parts of the war. Arguably Italy's role (as 1 of the 3 majors) is overstated, but it did have its own Africa and Mediterranean agenda. To a certain extent many of these countries have been happy to downplay their participation (and the Soviets as well as the West were not keen on hold them, nor Austria, accountable for allegedly German crimes).Icewhiz (talk) 22:40, 16 January 2018 (UTC)
As always, any improvement I can make, will be done using mainly book sources, of which I mostly get from Google Books. I do hope we can get as many countries as possible adequately covered. I started out with Romania, and more specifically with what it seems to be its most under-served part: the Navy. Romania and Bulgaria cannot be called puppets - they changed sides. Puppets don't get to do that, so calling them this is an oxymoron. Together with Hungary, the three also had their own agendas, with the notable mention of Romania being the only Axis besides Germany to actually annex Soviet territory (IE Transnistria Governorate) and, on occasion, even leading mixed German-Romanian military units. Also, the perception of "inferior cannon fodder", while in part very true, seems to be used as an excuse to avoid working on coverage on these nations. And, quite frankly, I hate that. This mentality is brought into question further more by Romanian military commanders gaining twice as many Kight's Crosses as Italian commanders. As for the last thing Icewhiz spoke about, yes, it is truly unfortunate that these very countries which need improvement in coverage downplay their role in the war, real change must start with them, and I'm sure the world would follow suit. Torpilorul (talk) 10:29, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
Puppets or satellite states often switch sides to align with the victors. In the case of Romania - they flipped twice - once in September 1940 (following German attacks, and a regime change to pro-fascist elements) and the second in August 1944 - when the Soviet forces were already in Romania and German defeat (on the strategic war level) was inevitable - when they again regime changed (but not far enough - the king abdicated and left in 1947)). Flipping to align with the major power who just invaded you (twice!) is not a sign of independent action (and Romania would remain in firm soviet control in the eventual Warsaw Pact). Regarding the navy - yes - Romania was a major player in the minor theater of the Black Sea, mainly due to geographical reality (as well geopolitics of the Bosphorus).Icewhiz (talk) 10:42, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
I beg to differ. Changing sides depending on which of the two is more powerful is in itself an act of free will, that Hungary, who actually became a puppet in March 1944, did not have, for instance. Puppets by definition do not get to make such choices. It is fair to also mention that Romania resisted with Soviet troops on its soil for months before doing it, and even then, it cleared the Germans from its territory before the soviets even entered its capital. And don't even get me started on the Warsaw Pact thing, on how Romania is mentioned and treated as a Soviet satellite for all the Cold War, when it really ceased being one in 1968, if not earlier. Also, I wonder, is it fair to say that Romania became the third Axis when Italy became a full puppet in late 1943? Torpilorul (talk) 11:02, 17 January 2018 (UTC)
This should really be about what the reliable sources say, not people's opinions about some Axis countries being hard done-by (or otherwise). If the consensus of the reliable sources is that they were puppet states, then we say they were, if they say they were satellites, we say that. I have to say that there is a strong case in sources for Hungary as a puppet state after March 1944, but otherwise I believe the reliable sources I've read refer to them both as satellites rather than puppet states. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:10, 18 January 2018 (UTC)
For what it's worth, the Oxford Companion to World War II, which usually provides middle of the road summaries, states that the Romanian Government was almost totally dominated by Germany from 1938 to 1943, when it started making some attempts to exit the war which Antonescu was ultimately unwilling to go through with as he didn't want to break his alliance with Germany (hence his overthrow). It also states that the Soviets installed a puppet government in early 1945. The summary of the country's war effort in the book certainly indicates that it was very complex, so there should be lots of scope to develop articles. Nick-D (talk) 04:29, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

Guadalcanal Campaign

The 75th anniversary of the Japanese withdrawal from Guadalcanal will be on February 7th. I have proposed Guadalcanal Campaign for the featured article that day, and it looks like it will be selected. Its principal author, Cla68, is no longer editing, so I have taken on the task of getting it ready for a main page appearance. Any suggestions and constructive criticism will be welcomed. The article is the lead article for an 18-article in a fully-featured topic, covering a multitude of individual battles in that six-month long campaign.

In what I hope will not be a complicating factor, there is a proposal to rename the article. Interested persons are welcome to comment, at Talk:Guadalcanal Campaign#Requested move.

Thank you. Kablammo (talk) 16:13, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

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