Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 154

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Tedder certificate

What's a Tedder certificate, "for aiding British personnel to escape" in WWII? See w:Janie McCarthy; [1] for mentions. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 23:30, 21 January 2020 (UTC)

This isn't a reliable source for use in an article, but this forum conversation explains some of the details. From Hill To Shore (talk) 00:21, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Here is a more reliable source that talks about the recipient of a certificate. It doesn't use the name "Tedder Certificate" but says that he received a certificate from Air Marshall Tedder.[2] From Hill To Shore (talk) 01:48, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

They were issued by MI9 to those who had assisted British servicemen to escape from enemy territory (source). They were only issued to foreign helpers in Western Europe, those in the Mediterranean received certificates signed by Field Marshal Alexander and those in the Far East by Lord Mountbatten. Apparently Churchill was originally going to sign each one personally but as most of the escapees were aircrew it was thought best for it to be an RAF officer, though Tedder used a rubber stamp rather than signing the certificates (source) - Dumelow (talk) 08:22, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Kind old King George sent mother a note when he heard that father was gone...signed with his own rubber stamp... ——SN 54129 14:16, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

I've drafted a short article at User:Dumelow/Tedder certificate which I will look to make live soon - Dumelow (talk) 17:47, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Source review needed

G'day all, Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/USS O'Flaherty needs a source review if anyone has a spare few minutes. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 06:12, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Italian OH 2WW online

[3] Can't remember if I've mentioned this. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 19:15, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

MILHIST ribbons

I noticed that our MILHIST awards do not have ribbons, so I created a set for them:

MILHIST ribbons
Ribbon	Medal
	MILHIST A Class Medal
	MILHIST A Class Medal with Oak Leaves ribbon
	MILHIST A Class Medal with Swords ribbon
	MILHIST A Class Medal with Diamonds ribbon
	MILHIST A Class Cross
	MILHIST A Class Cross with Oak Leaves ribbon
	MILHIST A Class Cross with Swords ribbon
	MILHIST A Class Cross with Diamonds ribbon

Comments?. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 22:15, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

Look good to me. Thanks. Gog the Mild (talk) 22:22, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm not a member of this WikiProject, but I can't say I like them. Artistically, you could have taken inspiration from the design of the medal and cross, respectively. The red of the cross and the blue of the medal aren't well-represented here, to my mind. Chris Troutman (talk) 22:35, 17 January 2020 (UTC)

I knew there was someone still holding out. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 06:35, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

I'm also not too fond of this set. The choice of colours may be up to anyone's personal taste, but attributes like oak leaves, swords and diamonds traditionally do not create a different ribbon for an award. Instead the medal's basic ribbon is used with a clasp that denotes the additional rank of the award. De728631 (talk) 02:40, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

I agree, I think an oak leaves device, a crossed swords device and a diamond cluster on two different ribbons (Medal and Cross) would be better. Re: colours, maybe make the primary colour match the main colour of the award, and use three smaller central bands of blue for the Medal ribbon and three smaller central bands of red for the Cross ribbon, similar in layout to the diplomacy ribbon? Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:49, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

The problem is that the conventional representation of bars on Wikipedia is to add numbers eg

If we add a device:

Then we have no room for numerals. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 06:35, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Being an aficionado of Barnstar ribbons, I have found the numerals to be more trouble than they are worth. I would definitely prefer a ribbon with a device. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 06:40, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Discussion on US Space Force that could affect military pages with MOS

Please see and contribute Talk:United States Space Force#MOS Debate. Focuses on WP:INFOBOXFLAG and WP:SEAOFBLUE. Garuda28 (talk) 15:10, 26 January 2020 (UTC)

Featured article reviews needed

Mary O'Kelly de Galway

Mary O'Kelly de Galway received US and Belgian decorations for her work in the Belgian resiatance in WWII. Can we find which decorations? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:37, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

Deh Yak airplane crash

Heads up, the Deh Yak airplane crash involves a USAF E-11A. Can any MILHIST experts expand the background info - operating unit, base etc? Obviously a better title is needed for the article, but that can wait for now. Mjroots (talk) 14:10, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

As there wasn't a list to add the accident to, I've created the List of accidents and incidents involving military aircraft (2020–present). Mjroots (talk) 22:37, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I need assistance. Ref [1] (in the infobox) source is unavailable in Europe. Does it really say that there were five on board aircraft, of which 2 bodies have been recovered and three presumed victims are missing, and that there were also two ground casualties? Mjroots (talk) 06:28, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

You should be able to access the Google cache version. It works for me, at least - Dumelow (talk) 07:15, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

New Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman insignias

There are new insignias for the Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman (SEAC).

Can somebody how is good in creating SVG's create the Air Force and Army SEAC insignias please?

The eagle is the same as the eagle from the DoD Seal.

Thank you. --Malo95 (talk) 10:01, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Done File:USA SEAC.svg, File:USAF SEAC.svg – Skjoldbro (talk) 20:48, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

@Skjoldbro: Thank you very much for your work.

I found at the web page from the United States Army Institute of Heraldry at the side History of U.S. Army Enlisted Grades a description of the logo:

2019. A new insignia was authorized for the Senior Advisor to the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff in December 2019. The Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chairman is the highest serving enlisted service member in the Department of the Defense and serves as the principal advisor to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on matters pertaining to the enlisted force. The unique grade insignia serves to differentiate the unique position, duties and responsibilities. The SEAC grade insignia is unique in two ways. The first is the use of the Department of Defense (DoD) eagle as the major design element, clearly representing the position as serving the DoD and Joint Staff. Second, it is the only Senior Enlisted Advisor chevron that has a four star pattern incorporated into the design. The four stars represent the grade insignia of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, for whom the SEAC advises. In comparison, Service Senior Enlisted Advisor chevrons have Service unique symbolism with only two stars.

Because the website has a geo block i uploaded a jpg version of the logo of the USA SEAC. The eagle has more details as yours. Can you please add the details?--Malo95 (talk) 16:58, 29 January 2020 (UTC)

@Malo95: I have added some detail, hope that it is sufficient. Skjoldbro (talk) 11:20, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Renaming discussions on military campaigns

There are renaming discussions currently active at Talk:Incorporation of Xinjiang into the People's Republic of China#Requested move 22 January 2020 and Talk:Incorporation of Tibet into the People's Republic of China#Requested move 22 January 2020 relating to historical military engagements. Participation is welcome. — MarkH₂₁^talk 19:43, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Discussion on whether to include news on Space Force seal looking like the Starfleet logo

There is currently a discussion at Talk:United States Space Force#Logo/Insignia on whether to include news reports claiming the Space Force seal either looks like or was stolen from the Starfleet logo. Additional perspectives would be greatly appreciated. Garuda28 (talk) 14:41, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

WP:Ten year test. (Hohum ^@) 00:54, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I need this source

I found this thing, "Herald and Presbyter", magazine or newspaper whatever it is, it's old. And it contains some unique info I was unable to find elsewhere. Speaks of a German attack in the area of Szekely Udvarhely (or Odorheiu Secuiesc, to use current day terms), which took 600 Romanian prisoners. This is part of the WW1 Battle of Transylvania. This is, I repeat, unique info, so I need the context. Better said, I need the date of this engagement, but given that this is a snippet view, I don't have this luck. Usually when all I get is a snippet view, I turn to archive.org to find the whole thing. But this time I couldn't find this, even over there. Can anyone provide me with the whole source please? If not the whole publication, at least the page in question? Transylvania1916 (talk) 08:01, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I suggest you check Worldcat for the full citation information and what libraries might hold it, then post a request at WP:RX. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 08:23, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

A general comment re archive.org: Hathitrust.org is generally a better shot. Not here, though; their coverage starts the year after the war. Qwirkle (talk) 08:38, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't know if it helps but this source places a Romanian defeat at Szekely Udvarhely on 4 & 5 October 1916 but there is no mention of prisoners. The town name has been badly mangled by OCR, so search for "October 4 and 5 the most advanced" in the text. The source appears to give a detailed account of the campaign. From Hill To Shore (talk) 09:43, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

On a separate point, I'd be very wary of that Herald source you are looking for. Being printed in 1916 it should be considered primary and potentially influenced by propaganda. If it contains "unique info" not repeated by any secondary source in the hundred years since 1916, that is ringing some alarm bells for me. As noted in the source I linked above, the various powers in WW1 weren't always being honest with their press announcements on casualties and prisoners. From Hill To Shore (talk) 10:11, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

From Hill to Shore Thankyou very much, this helps me a lot. Transylvania1916 (talk) 10:28, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

US Navy Nurse Corps could use a better lead

http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/United_States_Navy_Nurse_Corps

The article could use a better lead, it doesn't explain what the Corps is or what it does, like most organizations. Also some mentioned that it's place in the Naval hierarchy isn't explained. official page isn't much help.

https://www.med.navy.mil/Pages/InfoViewPage.aspx?ItemID=10 Sephiroth storm (talk) 12:21, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

The Great Britain/Ireland Destubathon

Hi. The Wikipedia:The Great Britain/Ireland Destubathon is planned for March 2020, a contest/editathon to eliminate as many stubs as possible from all 134 counties. Amazon vouchers/book prizes are planned for most articles destubbed from England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland and Northern Ireland and whoever destubs articles from the most counties out of the 134. Sign up on page if interested in participating, we have over 44,000 stubs! Even if "contests" aren't your thing, I hope you see this an an opportunity to focus on our British and Irish stubs.♦ Dr. Blofeld 13:00, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Battle of Ligny

Gentlefolk, attention is being drawn to the article Battle of Ligny as being almost unreadable. Since I had written a previous version I have recused myself from participation in further editing as I could have a bias. Would there be an interest in looking at this issue? Tirronan (talk) 04:18, 27 January 2020 (UTC)

19,000 words! Over 60 sections!! I would copy edit some sense into it, but I suspect that it would not last long. Perhaps succinctly summarise your concerns on the article's talk page, gain a consensus, and then move forward? (If you go down this route, could you give me a ping?) Gog the Mild (talk) 21:02, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

And the language! It has a horrible fascination - eg Battle of Ligny#Battle#Decisive French attack on Ligny#"They are lost: they have no Reserve!" - but encyclopedic it is not. Gog the Mild (talk) 21:16, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

I finally made it to the end to discover that it is based almost entirely on a source from 1895; with additions from 1911, 1905, 1856 and even 1818. Siborne is PD, and virtually the entire 19,000 words is cut and pasted from him, Victorian melodramatic phrasing and all. It would seem to me reasonable to remove all of this per WP:NOFULLTEXT and see what we are left with. Gog the Mild (talk) 21:40, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Tempting though it is, my hands are tied on this one. It would just reek of "gee don't improve an article that Tirronan writes" you know?Tirronan (talk) 05:10, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

It being the case that Ligny was only a portion of the Hundred Days (~5,000 words) and a smaller one of the Napoleonic Wars (12,000 words) generally, there is no justification in leaving this article bigger than both of them combined (!!! and that's not counting Napoleon—running in at <18,000, although it is a FA—and Wellington, at <11,000 words). I have boldly restored a previous version, although it could still do with work. ——SN 54129 06:25, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

That looks much better. I have reinstated the copy edit tag - some of the language is recherché. I may get round to doing it myself, and adding some stuff on background and elsewhere. Gog the Mild (talk) 13:27, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

Who won this?

I think I essentially managed to piece together the story of the 1916Battle of Szekely Udvarhely, but I still don't get who won. I'll summarize: The Romanians advanced west on 3 October, defeating the Austrians and taking over 1,200 prisoners. On 4 and 5, a German force counterattacked, checked the Romanian advance, and took 600 prisoners. Then the Romanians retreated, but here's the catch: not because of this development. The Romanian North Army was ordered to retreat due to factors outside its control: the army on its flank - under an increasingly panicking general - was in full retreat, and unfavorable developments south required new troops. I have sources for all of this. But before I make an article, I must get the result. And it's a doozy, because the battle seems strategically moot: if the Romanians continued advancing, they would have been ordered to retreat anyway. The fact that the Germans halted them appears to be irrelevant. So...who won? The Germans because they stopped the Romanians, even though the result - regardless of what it would have turned out to be - wouldn't have actually mattered in the end, or the Romanians because they took twice the prisoners they lost themselves? I'd say strategically inconclusive and tactically a Romanian success. What do you think? Transylvania1916 (talk) 17:21, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

"Indecisive - see aftermath"? Gog the Mild (talk) 17:27, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

What do the sources say? If there's no consensus there as to the victor, then it's WP:OR for us make a decision based on apparently arbitrary factors such as who suffered the most casualties. In these cases, present what the sources say in an Aftermath section, with due regard for WP:WEIGHT, and, as Gog suggests, specify the result in the infobox as "Inconclusive - see aftermath" and link to the Aftermath section. The relevant 'guideline' here is Template:Infobox military conflict/doc Factotem (talk) 09:49, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

"There are no winners in war, only losers" ——SN 54129 09:55, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Yep we go with what RS say.Slatersteven (talk) 10:33, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Well, the sources are quite conflicting. I found two which acknowledge the Romanian success on 3 October, including the capture of the over 1,200 Austrian prisoners. Two others say however that on 4-5 October the most advanced Romanian units were defeated, and a German attack in the same direction resulted in the capture of 600 Romanian prisoners, but this German attack itself seems to have been checked, as a 5th source states that the Romanians "were able to hold their own" in this region. So: Romanian attack - checked but not before inflicting heavy losses, German counterattack - checks Romanian attack but ultimately is checked as well after taking 600 prisoners, and the Romanians in the area ultimately withdrew due to other reasons, so the battle seems to have no real strategic impact, and I'm honestly just confused... Transylvania1916 (talk) 10:46, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Errr, what do they say about the final result. It does not matter what they say happened at 2 o'clock on the 4th. We judge who won by who won at the end, not who was winning mid way though.Slatersteven (talk) 13:27, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

If different sources reach different conclusions, surely the article should state simply that: that there are different opinions. Ideally there would be a ref that states that historians on the subject disagree on the outcome, with a discussion of all the arguments. And, as above, a military conflict does not necessarily have an outright winner - it's not like sports, with things like penalty shoot-outs. See Battle of Jutland for an example of how to handle an unclear result.ThoughtIdRetired (talk) 14:24, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Only if they are conclusions, and not just a given point in a chronology of an event.Slatersteven (talk) 16:33, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

I'll just link you the sources, make it simple for everyone

The really hard part about this is the lack of a unified account of the battle. I have multiple sources, for halves of the battle, and it seems I'll have to piece it together. Preliminary, I'll piece them together right here, right now.

So the first few sources pertain to 3 October, the first day of the battle. We know that this is the first day of this battle due to this: source of date and place: the Romanians advance from Szekely Udvarhely on 3 October. This is confirmed indirectly by Volume 11 of the Times History of the War, page 230, which speaks of a Romanian advance "beyond Szekely Keresztar", obviously meaning Cristuru Secuiesc, which indeed is directly west of Udvarhely (Odorheiu Secuiesc). The location as well as the date are thus confirmed by a second source. Up next is the Austrian casualties. The aforementioned Times History of the War, volume 11, page 230, speaks of the Romanian drive west on 3 October to have resulted in 1,228 prisoners.Times History of the War, Volume 11, just scroll to page 230. The casualties seem to be confirmed by Volume 117 of The Spectator, which states that the Austrians were beaten by the Romanians at Szekely Udvarhely, with "over twelve hundred prisoners". (Source) We know this is about the same event because, if you type the key word and then the month in the search box (Ex: "Udvarhely October"), it does take you to the top of the page, and you can see when this was dated: 7 October 1916. So, we're in the accurate time range. (Like so)

However, this isn't all. Herald and Presbyte seems to continue the story, stating that a German force checked the Romanian attack, and took 600 prisoners.(Source) Doing the same trick as before, we can go to the top of the page and see the date: 4 October 1916. (like so) Finally, there's the Annual Register, which states that on 4 and 5 October, the most advanced Romanian troops were defeated near Szekely Udvarhely. (Source). To make matters even more confusing, yet another source, America, Volume 15 states that the Romanians managed to hold their own near Udvarhely.(Source). Again: same trick to see the date: (7 October 1916). Which slightly makes sense because aside from the 600 prisoners, Herald and Presbyte doesn't state the German attack to have accomplished anything else.

Look, guys, my brain hurts. I've been dealing with the Transylvanian front for months now, and this is the most confusing "battle" I've come across yet. For some reason, sources exclude each other: those who speak of the German attack on 4-5 October exclude the Romanian advance on the 3rd, and vice-versa. I genuinely don't know what to make of this, I wouldn't be here wasting your time if I didn't genuinely need help. I don't know what to grab this by...If I should believe all sources thinking they complete each other, or if they are mutually exclusive and should not be mixed. And in the latter case, which group to pick? I'm just stumped, honestly... Transylvania1916 (talk) 15:29, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Then maybe it was not one battle. Or (as seems to be the case) you are in violation of wp:news in that you are using contemporary news stories rather then historical analysis. This might explain the "discrepancy". I suggest you find a source published after 1920 and see what it says.Slatersteven (talk) 16:38, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Oof, that restricts me rather much. How about from 1917 onward? The year after the one in which the events happened? Not to mention, got a couple really good ones from 1919. Transylvania1916 (talk) 17:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

That is the point, wp:n means that there has to have been some lasting impact, not just brief mentions or contemporary news reports. I suggest that you provide any sources you have so we can see how far they go to establishing this was a real battle and not (for example) a series of insignificant skirmishes.Slatersteven (talk) 18:07, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Well, all the sources I managed to scrounge up so far are up there in that paragraph. In any case, I also have an opposite issue. A battle by the same Romanian Army (there were 3 invading Transylvania), and at about the same time but at a different place is comparatively much more...compact. We know the region, we know the date and duration, we know the combatants and we know the outcome. What we don't know, is details: forces involved, their numbers, casualties and the actual conduct of the battle. Here now, the three sources which confirm its existence: 1 2 3 Transylvania1916 (talk) 18:34, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

This is a perfect example of what concerns me, brief mentions of fighting in areas. Read wp:n.Slatersteven (talk) 19:02, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Huh, so no article on this one either, then? It displeases me that the other two Romanian armies invading Transylvania each have multiple well-defined battles, but the North Army seems to have none. Just brief mentions of fighting/skirmishing, mentions of advances and towns captured, but that's about it. I thought people just overlooked them, but the more I search, the more I realize that, indeed, there is nothing out there for the North one...Make sense, the Austrians in this battle were bottom-tier, and the North Army by far had the least contact with German forces, almost none at all. And when there are, brief passing mentions as well. I keep pumping, but this well seems hopelessly dry... Transylvania1916 (talk) 19:12, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Hm, some thoughts here. If there's not enough information to create a standalone article, then we should probable avoid creating one, as unsatisfactory as it is. The bar for notability on military conflicts is pretty low, but if there's not enough info on the battle or the preparations or the implications of it than it shouldn't be created. I ran into some difficulties when covering the later stages of the Ugandan-Tanzania War, since most battles devolved into brief confrontations where a band of Ugandan soldiers opened fire on Tanzanian columns before breaking and running into the hills. Battle of Bondo illustrates this well, but I do think it clears the bar to deserve an article since though it was very minor 1) a secondary source (a well-researched book) referred to it as ""the last battle of the war" 2) there's some unique info on what the Tanzanian commander's actions were during the battle that would be WP:UNDUE in a more broad article and 3) it had significant implications, because it allowed the Tanzanians to capture a major town. I also simply omitted mention of any "result" in the infobox, not even an "inconclusive" because it didn't really fit there. The Tanzanians suffered casualties due to friendly fire, the Ugandans took no losses, but the Tanzanians ultimately advanced and seized their objective. No source called this a "defeat" or "victory" for either belligerent. Policy does not demand that we have an infobox for articles—though it is recommended—so I certainly see no reason to fill out a parameter in said infobox when the simplicity of the information there would be misleading. When in doubt, leave it out. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:18, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Prelude to Blitzkrieg: The 1916 Austro-German Campaign in Romania (2013) refers to the fighting around the town (under its modern name) as the battle of Brasov. Page 122 is covered in the preview and shows a map with Austrian/German forces advancing past the town on 8 October. If it mentions the fighting earlier in the month, it may be referring to alternative place names (the book gets very precise at times, which you would need a good understanding of local geography to appreciate). From Hill To Shore (talk) 08:30, 3 February 2020 (UTC)

Is Battle of Brassó (1916) what we are talking about? The result given there should be amended to comply with the guidance for the conflict infobox, as indicated by others above. Cinderella157 (talk) 07:41, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

It was a tactical victory for the Central Powers because they managed to secure the place. But they also aimed to cut off and surround the Romanian 2nd Army - as stated lower in the article. This was the aspect of strategic importance, and they failed in this. What exactly is not clear? Transylvania1916 (talk) 13:14, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

In fact, speaking of which, it could well be regarded as a Romanian strategic victory. The Romanians were already in full retreat back to the border. Beats me how one can consider a victory the capture of a place from where an army was retreating anyway. The Romanians, on the other hand, kept the Germans in the city busy for two days, and distracted them even more with a counterattack to the north. This in particular halted the German 89th Division, the very unit tasked with cutting the escape route of the Romanians. Obviously, no source calls it a Romanian victory, and I myself think it'd be a bit of a stretch, but the Central Powers certainly failed in their greater, long-term strategic purpose, and it showed. Transylvania1916 (talk) 08:34, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

If the sources don't call it an "x tactical/strategic victory" then we can't call it that, because that would a WP:OR violation. -Indy beetle (talk) 08:54, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Then how are you supposed to call it, when one side makes land gains but the other maintains the strategic edge? When one sides accomplishes its immediate/short-term goals in terms of land taken - however these goals may be - but the other side also had some notable long-term strategic successes? Don't be absurd, please. Almost never - in my field of work at least - have I encountered the "x type victory" formula, because it's deducible from the actions as stated in the source. And besides, we have whole articles about tactical and strategic victories. Thus, we can compare their definitions with what is stated in the source, and soon reach the conclusion. Even if not a victory in itself, it's a strategic success which is worth mentioning. Like when the Austrians under German leadership drove the Romanians out from SW Transylvania, but the Romanians thoroughly busted their strategically vital coal mines before retreating. It was a Central Powers tactical victory, but the Romanians also scored a strategic success. Like...How else am I supposed to refer to this? What exactly is it that you want from me? Hope and wait for a book that explicitly uses these terms while I have plenty other books implying the result via the actions that transpired? Transylvania1916 (talk) 15:19, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

If you are inferring something from implications in the text then you should be avoiding that phrasing. As mentioned above, you are straying into WP:OR.

A way to get around this is avoiding use of labels. Instead of saying "Central Powers tactical victory. Romania strategic victory." you could follow your source text and say, "The Central Powers succeeded in driving back the Romanian forces but were unable to give chase due to logistical problems. This allowed the Romanians to regroup and solidify their defence."

Your prose explains the outcome and you are leaving it to the reader to decide who won tactically and strategically. From Hill To Shore (talk) 17:23, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Transylvania1916, please note that the template infobox military conflict documentation states:

result – optional – this parameter may use one of two standard terms: "X victory" or "Inconclusive". The term used is for the "immediate" outcome of the "subject" conflict and should reflect what the sources say. In cases where the standard terms do not accurately describe the outcome, a link or note should be made to the section of the article where the result is discussed in detail (such as "See the Aftermath section"). Such a note can also be used in conjunction with the standard terms but should not be used to conceal an ambiguity in the "immediate" result. Do not introduce non-standard terms like "decisive", "marginal" or "tactical", or contradictory statements like "decisive tactical victory but strategic defeat". Omit this parameter altogether rather than engage in speculation about which side won or by how much.

Also the Milhist MoS states:

The "result" parameter has often been a source of contention. Particular attention should be given to the advice therein. The infobox does not have the scope to reflect nuances, and should be restricted to "X victory" or "See aftermath" (or similar) where the result was inconclusive or does not otherwise fit with these restrictions. In particular, terms like "Pyrrhic victory" or "decisive victory" are inappropriate for outcomes. It may also be appropriate to omit the "result

I note many of the infoboxes for battles listed at Template:Campaignbox Romanian Campaign are non-compliant and should be brought into line with the above - Dumelow (talk) 17:53, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Well then, you - all of you - have all my clearance and good will to go right ahead. I personally, don't think I'm mistaken. I think I provide balanced results in the infobox based on what the sources detail in the article. But apparently, that's a no-no. I'm just supposed to either leave it blank, send the user lower in the article, or re-iterate details in the infobox. I do me, you may correct me and "bring me into line" if you must. I'm not after good article status anyway. And besides, I'd actually appreciate if I'd stop being so alone in my work, so by all means, your input will be welcomed. Transylvania1916 (talk) 18:45, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Hi Transylvania1916, on rereading my comments above I came across colder than I meant to, apologies. Im meant no slight against your editing work, I was just trying to state the position of the existing guidance on this subject which exists to try to avoid disputes over the wording in the "outcome" box. Your efforts to improve coverage in this area of the encyclopedia are appreciated - Dumelow (talk) 19:17, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

The infobox victory field should be kept as simple as possible, with the main body covering the issue in detail if needful. In this case "See aftermath" would probably be the most appropriate entry, IMO. Normally we all work in isolation, but if you'd like someone to give your work a look to see how well the topic is covered, how well the prose flows, etc., you can ask informally here. Alternatively, you can formally submit it at Peer Review once it's done. I've been doing this a very long time, but doesn't mean that I don't make stupid mistakes or forget the difference between what's in my head vs. what's on the page, so I really like the various review processes as another set of eyes is invaluable to the quality of my work.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 19:39, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Centered captions

Indecisive, see aftermath. MPS1992 (talk) 05:16, 6 February 2020 (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.

For some reason, Battle of Verdun had centered captions. As that is non-standard formatting, I changed it. As far as I can tell there is no reason for Verdun to have non-standard captions. I was reverted by a user who said that this was standard for the series. Looking at other WWI battles, I cannot find any consistent agreement that captions should be centered. I saw some articles with a minority of the captions centered and a majority standard, as well as most which had all standard captioning. For example, Battle of the Somme has some centered and some standard.

I am anticipating push-back if I revert back to standard captioning (I actually did revert but then self-reverted...yeah). So, as this seems to be the place to go (assuming the user meant a military history related series of articles), is there some unwritten rule that certain WWI battles have centered captions? And, even assuming there is, why? I cannot figure out any reason why some articles should have centered captions while the millions of others do not. Giving notice pursuant to the court rules to @Keith-264:. I am not trying to start anything and if there is a consensus that this is how it is done, I will not fight it. But, I just can't see the reasoning behind it and want to examine the issue Cheers to all. ‡ Єl Cid of ᐺalencia ^ᐐT₳LKᐬ 14:09, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

As I pointed out the series has centred captions, a practice which began years ago because non-centred ones look awful. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 16:00, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

Left-justified captions don't bother me one bit, so I think this is one of those individual style things that should be left alone unless there's a mix in the article.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 16:30, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

MOS:CAPTION doesn't mention anything specifically about centering the text, but it one could argue that it falls under the third bullet. It might also be worth pointing out that infoboxes center the caption automatically. I don't have particularly strong feelings (though I don't center captions, myself), so I'd probably come down on the side of editor preference. Parsecboy (talk) 16:33, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

I don't mind following original editor preference unless the article has been becalmed for years. Keith-264 (talk) 21:37, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

I always centre captions. As Keith-264 says "non-centred ones look awful." Gog the Mild (talk) 22:03, 22 January 2020 (UTC)

For the record, MOS:captions does say “ The text of captions should not be specially formatted (with italics, for example), except in ways that would apply if it occurred in the main text.” This would indicate to me there is no need for special formatting without a reason. Again, I’ll except whatever the consensus is here but it doesn’t make sense to me why there is not a consensus when nearly every single Wikipedia article does not have centered captions. I have seen Centered captions and articles probably less than a dozen times. ‡ Єl Cid of ᐺalencia ^ᐐT₳LKᐬ 01:03, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

If pics, maps and diagrams can be left, right or centre justified, why not the captions? They look so much better like that, same as in real pic, map or diagrams. Keith-264 (talk) 10:41, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Most of my ship books use left-justified captions, but Conway's Fighting Ships puts them left or right, wherever they can be fitted in best. So I'm not seeing any predominance of center justification.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 10:46, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

I certainly prefer the look of centered captions Lyndaship (talk) 11:12, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

Is there wikimarkup to achive centre-ing? I notice that Accessibility says use wikimarkup in preference to HTML element and that <centre> is deprecated in HTML5. Personally I prefer unjustified as it requires no effort and looks fine. GraemeLeggett (talk) 12:24, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

{{center|CAPTION}} Gog the Mild (talk) 12:31, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

This is a question that should be raised on the manual of style's talk page... given MOS:CAPTIONS point three, the Milhist can't really decide this unilaterally. :-) Edit: I have just done this. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 22:43, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

(Here from a pointer to this discussion on Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style‎): This is the wrong way to do it. If we are to center captions, it should be done as a global skin change to the Wikipedia appearance. We should not be making gratuitous formatting changes like this from article to article based purely on aesthetic preferences. If you want to see centered captions, and you don't want to take the effort of persuading Wikimedia to make this an option for all viewers on all articles, then I'm sure it can be done in your own customized css. It should not be hard-coded into articles. —David Eppstein (talk) 23:25, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

The CSS for which is .thumbcaption { text-align: center; }, for those who think it looks ugly. --Izno (talk) 03:34, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

"and you don't want to take the effort" AGF pls. Keith-264 (talk) 04:10, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

That was not an expression of bad faith in anyone here; it was more intended as a roundabout way of saying that I think convincing WMF to make any useful changes is very difficult. —David Eppstein (talk) 05:15, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Concur with David Eppstein here. Don't add gratuitous nonstandard formatting to captions (or elsewhere). Users can pick a centering style if they prefer. Dicklyon (talk) 04:22, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

"Gratuitous"?Keith-264 (talk) 07:08, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Arguably, justification is a matter of paragraph formatting rather than text formatting. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 09:26, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

True but the principle is the same. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 19:17, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

If it is the same in principle, then it is deprecated by the guideline. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 23:34, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

Wiki guidelines are not principles. I was referring to our use of the term "justification", which you mentioned above in relation to formatting. Keith-264 (talk) 23:51, 24 January 2020 (UTC)

The guideline refers to the formatting of text which is arguably not the justification of a paragraph but your response appears to be saying that the formatting of text and the justification of a paragraph is the same in principle? Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 04:00, 25 January 2020 (UTC)

Centered captions, headings, and table headers are not Wikipedia style (see MOS:CAPTION, MOS:HEADING, MOS:TABLE). So, don't center them. Simple. Going around centering a few on a micro-topical basis and then trying to declare this is a new "standard" to which other articles must be changed to comply is just nonsense (in policy specifics, it's a WP:CONLEVEL failure, through WP:FAITACCOMPLI-based attempts at WP:GAMING the system, and through willful misinterpretation of consistency principles like MOS:ARTCON). A consistency should be followed when it exists in the first place for good reasons and through consensus, not because one random editor imposed it on some insufficiently watchlisted pages as a personal web-design aesthetics experiment. See also WP:NOT#WEBHOST policy, and numerous WP:TFDs against templates that were created simply to impose idiosyncratic designs in mainspace (good example here). — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 21:50, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Agree with SMcCandlish and others. This really is unnecessary and unhelpful. MPS1992 (talk) 21:58, 28 January 2020 (UTC)
I just read WP:CAPTION and I don't see anything says they have to be left justified or can't be center justified. So lets waste a lot of time arguing about it or setting a guideline which makes no difference, instead of improving content. Additionally, all pictures of eggs must be pointiest end upwards. (Hohum ^@) 00:51, 1 February 2020 (UTC)
Cute WP:WIKILAWYERING attempt, but obviously fallacious. All content on WP is left-justified, unless there a specific exception calling for something else (e.g. at MOS:NUM for aligning columns of financial figures and such by their decimal points). There is no exception made for this in particular, so there ya have it. If we went around and added "By the way, this too should be flush left" to every single thing MoS covers, then a) that would be stupid, just WP:CREEP on meth, and b) everyone would scream and holler about rule-mongering and have a general melt-down, and c) anyone with an IQ over 70 would rush to revert it as a bunch of WP:POINT bullshit. You can't "game" Wikipedia into giving you want you want by trying to play weak logic games that don't align with Wikipedia practices, and legalistic "gotcha!" stuff doesn't work here, because WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY; we only codify into explicit rules that which must be codified to put an end to disruptive disputes about the same thing over and over again. We let WP:Common sense take care of the rest. The obvious common sense here is that if WP isn't going around centering captions, then doing it at your pet articles is not a good idea, and trying to force it on other editors is going to result in them telling you "nope". If the WP community wanted centered captions, it would be the default output of our image markup. If you think it should be, try WP:VPPRO. — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼 05:57, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Hilariously ironic accusation of wikilawyering after reading what you just said. (Hohum ^@) 13:21, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Sensing a consensus to not do such idiosyncratic formatting, I have (again) removed the centering from the article Battle of Verdun. Hopefully it will stick this time and we can be done with this odd tangent. I don't understand why Keith-264 thinks that non-centered captions "look awful", but that's not a thing that has come up in the the 99.99% of Wikipedia, as far as I can see. Dicklyon (talk) 06:14, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Please lay off the disingenuous pretexts. Keith-264 (talk) 10:29, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I don't know what you mean. Are you saying I'm mis-reading the consensus against idiosyncratic formatting on your articles? Dicklyon (talk) 20:26, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

I think you know very well. Keith-264 (talk) 00:55, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Some of the positions might be a little hard to read, but I think I see 8 objecting to overriding normal style with centering, 3 who prefer centering, and 3 who don't much care but don't mind leaving it as it is. Do we need an RFC, or can we just admit that there's no consensus that idiosyncratic formatting is OK? Dicklyon (talk) 05:06, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Looks like your senses are playing you false. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 11:22, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

What's your sense of the count? Why do you keep re-doing the idiosyncratic formatting? Dicklyon (talk) 05:56, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

I see you've been the source of these odd centerings, since 2013 at least, e.g. in here and in this edit. Did you have some basis in Wikipedia style for doing that, or is it really just your own idiosyncratic style? Dicklyon (talk) 06:33, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

A general comment: Given that the most prominent part of articles, the infobox just up by the lead, -is- center justified, one could as easily make the case that the this is the preferred method, but honored more in the breach than observance...

This would be a bit silly, of course, but that seems to fit in with the whole tenor of the discussion here. We have had an argument about personal taste, which is, of course, proverbially non disputandem, and a hand-wave at a MoS section which did not, in fact, actually address it.

My personal take is that centered captions are preferable for short captions, but often look like bad concrete poetry for long ones. Qwirkle (talk) 07:04, 4 February 2020 (UTC)

I would agree that short captions can look very good centered but long ones do look rather odd done that way. That being said, I really can't say I have an issue with left-justifying even short ones. Perhaps this should be made into a preferences option like default thumbnail size so people can easily personalize their own viewing experience as they see fit. CThomas³ (talk) 05:50, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Only too-short single-line captions look good at all. Properly-written ones are almost always too long to be centred. A short centred 2nd or 3rd line looks terrible. Nice to see 2 of my photos used in Battle of Verdun though! Johnbod (talk) 06:09, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Oh come off it, the length of a caption is determined the choice of words. "Brevity is the soul of wit". Keith-264 (talk) 11:46, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

No, the length of a caption is determined by the choice of information to be included, which of course should be as tersely worded as possible. But there is a clear tendency on WP to give too little info. Johnbod (talk) 15:07, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Brevity requires a certain care in the selection and ordering of words, it isn't brain surgery. Keith-264 (talk) 17:16, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Well beside the point, and I doubt many people will want to take advice on visual layout from someone who outdents every comment', a new way of puzzling and confusing the reader that I've never previously encontered here. Johnbod (talk) 18:10, 5 February 2020 (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.

John Crean - notable?

Please could someone take a look at Draft:John Crean? I am reviewing the article at AfC and would like an informed opinion on whether they meet WP:NSOLDIER. Thanks. Curb Safe Charmer (talk) 22:26, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

I would say no - not a general grade officer and his mere presence at an action such as at in Sudan doesn't make him notable and it otherwise looks like mostly passing mentions in newspapers for his series of postings. Zawed (talk) 22:39, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Sorry but no, doesn't meet WP:NSOLDIER or WP:GNG. Mztourist (talk) 04:11, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. That's what I thought. I have declined it. Curb Safe Charmer (talk) 13:06, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

Mexican Federalist War

Your input at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 January 30#Mexican Federalist War would be appreciated. The idea of deleting Template:Campaignbox Mexican Federalist War has also come up. --BDD (talk) 14:59, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Caption vs. Cutline

I had forgotten the vocabulary for this, as the last time I was in publishing’s nuts-and-bolts level was...well, a good while ago... but many actual publications draw a distinction between the short, succinct “headline” for an illustration, the caption, and the longer commentary that sometimes accompanies it, the “cutline”.

Here’s a representative web piece, Wiki’s own article, is, as one could expect, made useless by wikiteurs unable to distinguish between loose and strict usage of a term.

Note that the captions are centered, and the cutlines are left-justfied. Qwirkle (talk) 19:11, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Does WP use anything analogous to the caption/cutline distinction? Not that I've seen. Dicklyon (talk) 05:37, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Aside from above, you mean? In the “Centered Captions” thread? Qwirkle (talk) 20:02, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

Is there something about cutlines there? I thought it was just about captions. So, yes, I guess I meant aside from above. I ask again, Does WP use anything analogous to the caption/cutline distinction? Dicklyon (talk) 22:23, 7 February 2020 (UTC)

FAR notice

I have nominated George B. McClellan for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Wizardman 04:56, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Battle of Strasbourg

I was looking atBattle of Strasbourg this afternoon (in a "using wiki as an encyclopedia" sort of a way, not editing). It is extensive and I note it is A-class. However, reading it, it seems to me to contain large chunks of uncited opinion bordering on OR in describing the battle. I note the assessment was made by bot in 2007. I would be tempted to answer no to B1 but this will remove its A-rating, which I am not comfortable with. Could another experienced editor have a look, please? Monstrelet (talk) 16:47, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

It passed an ACR in 2008. It seems OKish bar the lack of cites. The main contributor has not been active for a while. IMO, if no one can add the cites, it needs knocking back to C class. Gog the Mild (talk) 17:17, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

Agree with Gog. This is today's article in comparison with that which passed ACR; since the review, 17,967 bytes has been added. If anyone can source what's there—that's a hell of a lot—great, but frankly for it to retain its status it should probbaly be restoed back to an earlier version. ——SN 54129 17:54, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

The very heavy reliance on a (literally) ancient primary source also means that it likely fails the modern A-class criteria, especially as there are no shortage of quality secondary sources on this battle. Modern historians tend to emphasise that ancient sources need to be used with great care. Osprey Publishing released a book on it last year, for instance. Nick-D (talk) 21:44, 31 January 2020 (UTC)

I have adjusted the B-class checklist and left a note on the talk page. I believe bots will reclassify automatically, or does anything need to be done in that regard? Monstrelet (talk) 11:42, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

@Monstrelet: G'day, as I understand it, as the article passed an A-class review (here), it should be sent back to ACR for a re-appraisal (which could lead to a demotion, or to editors fixing the issues with the article), per WP:MHR. If the re-appraisal is closed as demoted, Milhistbot would then process a demotion etc. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 04:01, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. I've checked and Gog has already raised this on the co-ordinator page, which I think is the first step. Monstrelet (talk) 09:35, 2 February 2020 (UTC)

@Monstrelet: G'day, please be advised that the re-appraisal is now located here: Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Battle of Strasbourg. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 06:49, 8 February 2020 (UTC)

Idea for new community workspace

Hi. I would like to create some kind of collaborative workspace where coordinators or members of various WikiProjects would gather and provide updates and information on what is going on at each wikiproject, i.e. regarding their latest efforts, projects, and where interested editors can get involved.

For those of you at this very active WikiProject, your input would be very helpful, so I wanted to get your input on whether you'd be interested in helping me to make this happen.

we are discussing this proposal right now at:

* Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Idea for new community workspace

Please feel free to let me know what you think of this idea, and please let me know your preference, regarding the options above. if you do not see any need for this idea, that is totally fine. However, I think that the majority of editors lack awareness of where the truly active editing is taking place and at which WikiProjects, and I would like to do whatever I can to help make people more aware of where the activity is, what they can do to help, and also which areas of Wikipedia offer ideas and efforts that might help them in their own editing activities. Please feel free to let me know.

Would you be interested in an idea of this nature?
If so, which option below seems most feasible to you?
- Create a new page/talk page at the existing WikiProject Council, where members of various WikiProject can gather to offer updates, information and ideas on the latest efforts at each of their own WikiProject, such as Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Town Hall.
- Create an entirely new WikiProject with an inclusive name such as
- Create a new collaborative page or forum, but not as a new WIkiProject, i.e. with some name like
  - Wikipedia:Town Hall or
  - Wikipedia:Water Cooler
- Create a new sub-page in my own userspace, such as User:Sm8900/Town Hall
- Create a subpage at an umbrella-type WikiProject that already covers a broad topical area, such as Wikipedia:WikiProject History/Town Hall

thanks. --Sm8900 (talk) 18:49, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

Not speaking for the project, nor even as a core member, ‘cause I ain’t, but I strongly suspect a great part of this project’s success comes from its separation from the rest of wikipedia, and it would be a Bad Thing to change that. Qwirkle (talk) 15:25, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

International military intervention against ISIL is too big, it is breaking Wikipedia

Details and discussion are at Talk:International military intervention against ISIL#This page is too big after including templates, it is breaking Wikipedia. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 18:32, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Opinions/eyes request on Talk:K9 Thunder about the K9 Thunder and T-155 Fırtına

I hope this is the right place to request this, but I couldn't find a place specific for modern military vehicles. A discussion has started after a disagreement between users about whether the T-155 Fırtına is a variant of the K9 Thunder, and what references should be needed claim this. This concerns edits on both pages. Thanks, Redalert2fan (talk) 20:31, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Who created these Vietnam War Articles to be created titles?

Who created the Vietnam War Articles to be created titles? I am asking because there are several titles there that I either: (1) can't identify what battle is being referred to: Second Battle of Dong Ha, Second Battle of Ap Bac, First Battle of Dong Ha; or (2) that I don't think are really notable or have sufficient RS to allow pages to be created: Battle of Bu Prang, Operation Twinkletoes and Operation Tuscaloosa. Presumably someone at some point came up with a list of battles and operations of the Vietnam War that they thought pages should be created for, but without knowing what they were referring to and/or the basis for selection, they might as well be deleted from the list of Articles to be created. Mztourist (talk) 10:56, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

@CPA-5: added them here. I'm sure he can point you in the right direction. Parsecboy (talk) 12:46, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks Parsecboy. CPA-5 can you please advise how Battle of Bu Prang, Operation Twinkletoes and Operation Tuscaloosa arose? regards Mztourist (talk) 16:24, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

User:LeonidasSpartan by this diff: ‎[5] added Second Battle of Dong Ha, Second Battle of Ap Bac and First Battle of Dong Ha, however he appears to no longer be active on WP (no activity since January 2018) as its unlikely I will get an answer from him I suggest that those 3 titles are deleted. I would note that Battle of Dai Do is sometimes referred to as the Battle of Dong Ha, while Operation Concordia (Vietnam) is sometimes referred to as 2nd Ap Bac. regards Mztourist (talk) 16:45, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

@Mztourist: Oh damn that's years ago I don't remember where I got them. But in a quick search, I found Bu Prang Camp, [6] and [7]. But if you don't think they should be included there you are free to remove them. Maybe I will find their origins where I got them in the following days. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 20:40, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

@CPA-5: yes I wrote Bu Prang Camp but couldn't find much in the way of RS for a battle page. Similarly I couldn't find much in the way of RS on Operation Twinkletoes, that's a nice video but without more RS details a page can't be created. Operation Tuscaloosa isn't even mentioned in the USMC official history: [8], so I don't think there's enough for a battle page. I'll delete all of them. regards Mztourist (talk) 03:42, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Running a Google search of Wikipedia finds those names at Wikipedia:Templates with red links/Campaignboxes, which is itself a list that was copied from somewhere else in 2012. These may just be ghost entries that someone requested over a decade ago but which keep moving from one list to the next. I would advise clicking on the red links and then using "What links here." Hopefully you will find some context for them but if not, at least you know where to remove them to stop them popping up again. From Hill To Shore (talk) 21:55, 10 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks From Hill To Shore I'll give that a try. regards Mztourist (talk) 03:42, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

ORBAT Graphics consistency

I've been reading several ORBAT articles recently, and I've noticed inconsistencies in the presentation (not talking about accuracy) of various military ORBATs.

What I'm curious about, and cannot find, is a WP Policy or Guideline on the production of the ORBAT graphics that we commonly use to show structures of military formations, particularly Armies and Army Groups; is there such a policy? is there any guidance as to what tool / standards etc. are used to generate these graphics? I assume people are mostly using some online editor to create the ORBAT PNG images?

Aeonx (talk) 17:52, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

User:Noclador is probably the person to talk to. (Hohum ^@) 19:48, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

Noclador does this; he does it almost entirely himself, though he distributes his tools to anyone who wants them. There's no wikirules of any sort developed about it. Buckshot06 (talk) 21:29, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

ORBATs can also be presented in tabular form, which is what I have done with a couple of FLs eg Axis order of battle for the invasion of Yugoslavia. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 23:30, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

+1 That would look kind of "wrong" using Nato-symbols. Alexpl (talk) 20:36, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

I have always admired the OoBs from First Battle of Marengo (1799). Gog the Mild (talk) 23:39, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Le Soir, 20 January 2013

Anyone with access to 'Le Soir' (Belgium), daily of this date? Has an article including details of the 17e Division Parachutiste which I'm looking for. Referred to at http://niarunblog.unblog.fr/lalgerie-a-travers-la-presse/le-1er-mai-2009-en-algerie/lappel-a-la-reddition-de-lemir-recruteur-du-gspc/la-situation-securitaire/ . Have posted at WP:RX but just copying this here just in case.. Cheers and thanks Buckshot06 (talk) 21:29, 11 February 2020 (UTC)

@Buckshot06: Sorry, I don't have it. However, looking at that blog post, are you sure you aren't mistaking it for Le Soir d'Algérie? Also, there's an article fr:Régiments de parachutistes commandos at the french wikipedia, maybe that's what you're looking for. Regards, Comte0 (talk) 21:04, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Thankyou - quite possibly the Algerian version. Problem is that the fanboy who is writing those articles is not very interested in references - all off forum posts at present.. Buckshot06 (talk) 21:31, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

The Great Britain/Ireland Destubathon

For those unaware, The Great Britain/Ireland Destubathon will be taking place in March. I found one category (Category:English battle stubs) relating to military history (Category:English history stubs has some as well). Are there other obvious categories that would fit the contest description?

I am also cordially inviting anyone that would like to participate. You do not have to compete for prizes. There is a signup sheet at the project page. Happy editing! Kees08 (Talk) 19:51, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

@Kees08: It doesn't fit your primary aim of "places and listed buildings" but there is Category:United Kingdom military stubs. However, I expect some of the content will have articles about activities by British forces outside of the British isles, so it may water down your competition. Some of the subcategories may be more focused though. From Hill To Shore (talk) 20:10, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

The first one I looked at, Capture of Dunstable, seems to be a non-event by any standards. There wasn't a battle because there wasn't actually a garrison. Alansplodge (talk) 10:00, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

There are probably many that can be merged into other pages or nominated for deletion. If you have time to do either I highly encourage it. Kees08 (Talk) 17:11, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks From Hill To Shore. Although not places or listed buildings, other topics are permitted in the contest (I will likely be expanding a few related to spaceflight as that is my main editing interest). Any expansion of articles that fit in the contest would be great; I know this project has a reputation for being one of the best so I thought there may be some interest here. Dr. Blofeld may be able to expand upon any scope if needed. Kees08 (Talk) 17:12, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

All article destubs are welcome. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:25, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

RfC notice: Iranian Revolution "supported by the United States"

Hi MilHist. Editors are invited to participate in Talk:Iranian Revolution#RfC: Iranian Revolution "supported by the United States". Thanks, Levivich 07:53, 15 February 2020 (UTC)

Notabililty of specific Glock pistols

Do you think that we should have specific articles for Glock pistol models? For example, we have articles on the Beretta 92, Colt 1911, Walther P5, FN Five-seven and SIG Sauer P226. I'm pretty sure the Glock 17, 18, 19, 20, or 26 are about as notable. I'd be willing to create a lot of these articles, it's just that there seems to have been a community discussion somewhere that reached consensus that the Glock 17 is not notable [9].L293D (☎ • ✎) 02:01, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

This isn’t a question about notability, it is about whether it’s better to have more than one article. (I’d say no.) Qwirkle (talk) 02:50, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Depends on if the pistol models are similar and/or related, imo. If they are, then it is better to cover in fewer articles to not repeat the same info across multiple articles. -Fnlayson (talk) 03:10, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
- I get it that most Glock pistols are variants based on the Glock 17, but I still feel we should have a separate article providing more details on, for example, the Glock 26 (Baby Glock), which has a different mass, length, magazine capacity, and other stuff. L293D (☎ • ✎) 03:30, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
  - Apparently if its reliably sourced you can write as much as you want. Mztourist (talk) 07:09, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
    - I would have thought that given the commonality of operation between the Glock models the best way to handle it would be to put it all in the Glock article and tabulate all the key data that varies between models. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:39, 14 February 2020 (UTC)
      - Then, should the sections about Glock models be expanded to include more detail? I would be fine with that as well, but right now, I feel it's missing some important information. L293D (☎ • ✎) 17:27, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
        Add notable details, yes. This is the usual first step before splitting off an article when needed. -Fnlayson (talk) 19:01, 15 February 2020 (UTC)
        Absolutely expand the details on each model, but I would aim to keep all the common information in one section (with subsections), then only details specific to each model in the section about that model. I don't foresee a need to split the article at this point, but have an open mind depending on how big it gets. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:53, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

March Madness Drive

Next month the project will be running a backlog elimination and content creation drive. This will target several areas including tagging and assessment, improving our task forces, and content creation. The drive will begin on 1 March and continue through to the end of the month. Barnstars and mentions in despatches will be awarded to participating editors. Interested editors are encouraged to sign up now. Gog the Mild (talk) 10:36, 10 February 2020 (UTC) G'day Gog. Remind me a few days out from the start and I'll send a mass message to the troops encouraging them to sign up. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:55, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Battle of Ligny, partie deuxiéme

Per Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Archive 154#Battle of Ligny.

PBS prefers to restore the previous, non-consensus version. It is good that they have started a discussion on the talk page. It is less good that that discussion effectively constitues an ultimatum and little else. ——SN 54129 17:54, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

The place to discuss changes to articles is on the article talk page. Not sure what "discussion effectively constitues an ultimatum and little else" means perhaps you would explain what you mean on the article talk page. -- PBS (talk) 18:06, 16 February 2020 (UTC)

Template:Campaignbox Quantrill's Raid into Kansas has been nominated for deletion

A MILHIST campaignbox from the US Civil War campaign series, Template:Campaignbox Quantrill's Raid into Kansas has been nominated for deletion. Please comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page.

Campaignboxes are not merely navboxes but really functions as an infobox extensions. From WP:MILMOS#NAV it is also beneficial for providing a consistent appearance to the entire set of articles within our scope. Mojoworker (talk) 23:07, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Ha ha! I'm sorry you had to go through this. Solutions looking for a problem. BusterD (talk) 03:28, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Flag icons and rank insignia on military service sections of US President infoboxes

I'm sorry to bring this up again, but a few minutes ago in reverting vandalism I deleted a US Coast Guard DOD shoulderboard from William Henry Harrison. The shoulderboard it replaced was from the USAF! So obviously that was inappropriate. So I started looking around and many of the presidential mainpages have similar inconsistencies. I'm of the opinion that such flag and rank insignias are so often incorrect the article would be better without them. I've already acted in what someone viewed as a politically incorrect way this month reverting what I saw as portal bullying, so I'm seeking some consensus before I fix these. Input? BusterD (talk) 03:41, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Personally, I am very much against the use of flags/logos/ranks insignia in infoboxes per WP:INFOBOXFLAG, as "they are unnecessarily distracting and give undue prominence to one field among many". Harrias ^talk 07:14, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Agree with Harrias regarding rank insignia, although I do use flag icons when there are several entries in the same field (allegiance for example). Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:26, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

The Bugle: IssueICLXVI, February 2020

Your Military History Newsletter

Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results
Articles: Last month's new featured and A-class content
Book review: Nick-D looks at a failed German counterattack in the Battle of Normandy

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) 13:04, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

help with article: Wargamer's Digest

Hi Wikiproject Military History, I'm hoping some members can help me with an article. I was patrolling new pages and stumbled upon this article Wargamers Digest WW2 Rules which is, rightfully, going to be deleted. It occurred to me, however, that the parent magazine of the ruleset, Wargamer's Digest, is certainly notable. I started a draft Draft:Wargamer's Digest that includes the soon-to-be-deleted content as a subsection. However, sources to used for this article are a bit tricky to come by--they are out there but are pre-internent, print only. I was hoping some folks here might have access to some sources that would strengthen the article. AugusteBlanqui (talk) 15:04, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Professional military journals might be helpful here - they often carry articles about serious types of wargaming. While archives of these are now often online, they sadly usually lack indexes though. Nick-D (talk) 22:16, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Discussion about use of non-reliable sourcing at Sukhoi Su-35 - a GA

Please see the discussion Talk:Sukhoi_Su-35#Unreliable_sourcing.Nigel Ish (talk) 18:11, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Evacuation of Novorossiysk (1920) and HMS Montrose (D01)

Has anyone got any sources that confirm whether or not HMS Montrose (D01) took part in the Evacuation of Novorossiysk on 23–27 March 1920? Google snippets of Churchill's Secret War With Lenin: British and Commonwealth Military Intervention in the Russian Civil War, 1918-20 hint at Montrose being present, but annoyingly, the key page isn't viewable by me.Nigel Ish (talk) 21:45, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Yes, she was ordered there around the 25th according to Halpern's The Mediterranean Fleet 1919-1929, p. 179.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 22:00, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks.Nigel Ish (talk) 22:23, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

Neutral Powers World War I

In editing the World War I casualties page, and researching the WW2 casualties page, I realized that there is an article for Neutral powers during World War II, but not one for neutral powers during WW1, which is an interesting topic in and of itself. I don't know if this is the right place to bring this up, but it seemed important to me that this page does not exist. Should a page be made? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 02:27, 21 February 2020 (UTC)

Should this message be posted somewhere else? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 15:07, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

G'day, this page should be fine to discuss your query, IMO. Taking a quick look, it seems like it might be viable as a stand alone article. I found a few sources online, but for a full treatment a much broader search would be needed than my quick Google search: [10][11][12]. Can I suggest potentially you start something in draft space? That way others may be able to assist. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 22:49, 22 February 2020 (UTC)

Thank you! I'll set up a draft space so others can chip in if they want. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 05:34, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

The draft article can be found here: Draft:Neutral powers during World War I. If anyone is able to assist, I'm sure it would be greatly appreciated. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 08:15, 24 February 2020 (UTC)

Canadian Ensign vs Canadian Government Ensign

There is a discussion at Template talk:Country data Canada#Battle of the St. Lawrence about whether the Canadian Government Ensign should be used to represent Canadian warships and the Royal Canadian Navy during World War II or if the White Ensign should remain. Llammakey (talk) 12:55, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Kanchana Senerat Kadigawe

Thoughts on this article? I came across it while removing an unreliable reference. My view is that "mentioned in dispatches" is no claim of notability at all. FDW777 (talk) 12:44, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

The only possible claim to notability would be as the only Asian (or one of only a tiny handful of Asians) in the Parachute Regiment (if true). -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:17, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

(After edit conflict) I can't comment on the source reliability but one of the references in the article says he was the only Sri Lankan recipient of the "Oak Leaf for Distinguished Services." He was also a senior police officer in the Prime Minister's protection detail. Whether he fails specific Soldier criteria, we also have to consider general notability or people notability. Unless the existing sourcing is shown to be questionable, I think it is a keep. From Hill To Shore (talk) 13:22, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Isn't oak leaf just the mentioned in dispatches? The linked page suggests it might be.

I've had a look at the references, and I think there's problems. His surname seems to be alternately spelled Kadigawe and Kadigawa, so please bear that in mind if doing any research of your own.

The Island is a Sri Lankan newspaper from 2009, and would appear reliable on the face of it. However it claims the person was awarded the Military Cross and was mentioned in Winston Churchill's memoirs. Neither appear to be independently verifiable, if they aren't that would tend to disqualify it as a reliable reference.

Different article in The Island from 2009. I'm not sure whether it's a letter from a reader (due to the address at the bottom) or an article by the paper. The only apparent mention of the subject is "My grandmother’s brother, Senerath Kadigawa".

Another article in The Island from 2008, written by the family member. In this he's called "H. S. Kadigawa", not entirely sure where the "H" comes from,

Daily News is another Sri Lankan newspaper from 2002. It's written by "Sharm de Alwis", who is the family member who wrote the last two articles. It essentially repeats the claims, but leaves out the supposed Military Cross award and instead says the oak leaf is "the over-flow of the Victoria Cross for bravery" which seems dubious at best.

Asian Tribune article from 2008 (apparent reproduction on another website) says he received the Military Medal. Again, I haven't been able to verify this anywhere else.

Times of Ceylon 31 July 1944 I have no access to.

Sunday Times is another Sri Lankan newspaper from an unknown date. It repeats the Military Medal and Churchill's memoirs claims.

London Gazette says on the previous page "The KING has been graciously pleased to approve that the following be Mentioned in recognition of gallant and distinguished services in the field". I assume that's "mentioned in dispatches" or something else of that nature?

The Sunday Leader from 2008, this is definitely the reader's letters page though.

The Island again from 2008. This is a fawning opinion piece written by the same person who wrote to the Sunday Leader.

That's the lot. Plenty of fawning from friends and relatives, and the occasional reference written by people apparently unconnected with the subject repeating the same apparently dubious claims. Can it be confirmed he was awarded the Military Medal or Military Cross or was mentioned in Churchill's memoirs? (The author of the article reports difficulty with verifying claims at Talk:Kanchana Senerat Kadigawe also) If not, I suggest most things written about him should be taken with a rather large pinch of salt. FDW777 (talk) 14:18, 14 February 2020 (UTC)

Unlikely to have been awarded the MC, given he wasn't an officer. But both the MC and the MM are third-level decorations, so they wouldn't make him eligible for an article anyway even if he did have one. His police rank (senior superintendent) doesn't make him notable either - we've previously deleted Sri Lankan police officers with higher ranks than that. The oak leaf almost certainly just means a Mention, essentially a fourth-level decoration. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:14, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Nominated for deletion, see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kanchana Senerat Kadigawe. FDW777 (talk) 16:38, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Hijackers in the September 11 attacks#Merge discussion

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Hijackers in the September 11 attacks#Merge discussion . RightCowLeftCoast (Moo) 02:33, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Withdrawing A-class nom

I'd like to withdraw Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Manuel Noriega from its A-class review. I have been swamped with RL work ever since I nominated it, and do not see myself being able to do substantive work on it in the near future; as such it's unfair of me to clog up the process. Many thanks to Buidhe and Peacemaker67 for their comments, which I will address before renomination. Apologies if this is the wrong place; if I need to post this elsewhere, please let me know. Vanamonde (Talk) 16:13, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

No worries, I'll close it without prejudice. Give us a yell before you re-nominate, as we have to move the old review page first. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:09, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Will do, much appreciated. Vanamonde (Talk) 22:50, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

Kibi Clan Rebellion

QuickTrial (talk · contribs) removed the content of the Kibi Clan Rebellion article, describing it as "pseudohistory presented as fact". I've restored the content, but marked the article with a {{disputed}} header until someone knowledgeable can take a look at this. If it is pseudohistory or myth (perhaps like the Arthurian legends?) its content should probably be marked as such, rather than the whole article deleted. -- The Anome (talk) 15:42, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

HMS Asp

What is the identity of HMS Asp, stationed at Sheerness in 1900? Mjroots (talk) 19:42, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Hmm... An HMS Asp appears in a 1906 novel The Private War Being the Truth about Gordon Traill His Personal Statement by Louis Joseph Vance, which references the 1904 Dogger Bank incident, but imagines a Japanese counter attack. Otherwise, I have drawn a blank. Alansplodge (talk) 20:51, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Colledge volume 2 lists an Asp as a dockyard tank vessel of 330 tons, built by Greens of Blackwall in 1890 and disposed of in 1947. Nthep (talk) 20:58, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

"A steel water-tank, fire-float and tug vessel built to the order of the Admiralty, was launched at Blackwell in October, 1890 and delivered to Sheerness in January, 1891. Besides being used as a tug, the Asp will carry 100 tons of fresh water, and a powerful fire engine, which will discharge water to the height of 100 feet at the rate of 200 tons an hour. Her dimensions are: Length, 115 feet; beam, 21 feet, depth, 10 feet. The triple-expansion engines are 300 I.H.P., and have succesfully passed their trials. It is understood that this is first of a number of vessels of this type which it is the intention of the Government to build." General Information series United States Office of Naval Intelligence on google books MilborneOne (talk) 21:34, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

"Asp A steel water-tank, fire-float, and tug vessel, built to order of the Admiralty, was launched at Blackwell in October, 1890, and delivered at Sheerness in January, 1891" (The Year's Naval Progress US Navy Department, Washington 1891). She was still at Sheerness in 1911 according to page 402 of that year's Navy List - Dumelow (talk) 21:40, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict), great minds etc. - Dumelow (talk) 21:41, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Thanks guys, have added the info to the relevant article. Mjroots (talk) 19:55, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Boshin War undergoing Featured Article Review

I have nominated Boshin War for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. -- Beland (talk) 20:13, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

March Madness 2020 is now on!

G'day all, March Madness 2020 is now underway, and there is bling aplenty for those who want to get stuck into the backlog by way of tagging, assessing, updating, adding or improving resources and creating articles. If you haven't already signed up to participate, why not? The more the merrier! Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:35, 1 March 2020 (UTC) for the coord team

Rollback required

Robert the Bruce has been vandalised and needs rollback of all edits by 86.27.91.143. Regards Newm30 (talk) 22:25, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Done. Thanks for flagging it up. Gog the Mild (talk) 22:41, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Short descriptors added to list articles.

I've noticed in my watchlist a number of 'List of ….' articles getting a short description "Wikipedia list article" which seems to give less information than the article title. Anyone in this project got a view on better descriptions than just for instance using the article name? GraemeLeggett (talk) 08:28, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

I think we could do better than that. Could you provide a diff, Graeme? Thanks, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 09:49, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Of course, should have done earlier but mobile editing put me off. example at List of battlecruisers of the Royal Navy. If I've interpreted discussions, it seems that there's a big drive on to add short descriptions to as many pages as possible so as to override descriptions being picked up from wikidata. GraemeLeggett (talk) 15:39, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

Probably ought to @Lepricavark: the editor adding them so they're aware of the discussion. Parsecboy (talk) 15:41, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

My personal opinion is that list article titles are generally self-explanatory, but I have no objections if anyone wishes to override my short descriptions with something more specific. Graeme is correct that the objective is to override the descriptions from Wikidata, as it is much easier for vandalism to go undetected on that site. LEPRICAVARK (talk) 16:47, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

The short name isn't really seen (except when editing) and given the intent (which I assume isn't contrary to anything of importance), does it really matter? Of course, it doesn't stop a better name being added. Cinderella157 (talk) 03:55, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

My concern is/was that the short description appears external to en.wikipedia eg web search engines. If that's not the case, then there's nothing for me to worry about. If the short description appears supplementary to the article name, then it's a minor issue. (An aside: does anyone trust wikidata to infill on en.Wikipedia's behalf?) GraemeLeggett (talk) 16:10, 1 March 2020 (UTC)

Using the "magic" short description "none" will over-ride the WikiData short description without actually making a short description. If the ONLY goal is to prevent vandalism through WikiData, this is the way to do it. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:11, 2 March 2020 (UTC)

The Great Britain and Ireland Destubathon

Hi all. Just a note that The Great Britain and Ireland Destubathon is running throughout March. I am going to use it as an excuse to expand some of the articles from Category:Stub-Class British military history articles, others may well be interested? - Dumelow (talk) 10:23, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Rebels

I have been told that for an article on an American Civil War regiment, Wikipedia articles on the war use the more neutral term Confederate rather than 'rebels'. If that is the case, I will abide by that rule—but I want to make sure that is the consensus of WikiProject Military history. It seems to me that avoiding the usage of the term “rebel” is too extreme and re-writing history. Major sources (such as Dyer) call the war the “War of the Rebellion”, yet there should be no “rebels”?!? What about the Rebel yell? Should it become the “Confederate Yell”? Comments on this topic will be appreciated. TwoScars (talk) 16:26, 25 February 2020 (UTC)

"Rebel" seems like a US cultural assumption in that first context. I assume Wikipedia:EPOV applies. Alexpl (talk) 12:42, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

All depends on context, technically they were in rebellion. But we do with what RS say. Now I have never seen the ACW called the “War of the Rebellion” (I have seen the American revolutionary war called this). As to the specific example Rebel yell is a clearly notable cultural phrase (As in "With a rebel yell she cried more, more, more").Slatersteven (talk) 14:29, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Jayzus. Halleck? Qwirkle (talk) 15:34, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

No Billy idol.Slatersteven (talk) 15:36, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

Well, I suppose that’s a kind of seminal cite. Qwirkle (talk) 15:46, 26 February 2020 (UTC)

The official title of the U.S. War Department's compilation of documents from the American Civil War, often cited as Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies is "The War of the Rebellion: a Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies." See e.g. http://collections.library.cornell.edu/moa_new/waro.html. Other books and records from the 19th century in particular use term "War of the Rebellion." Two examples are https://books.google.com/books?id=eTAOAAAAIAAJ&pg=PR5&focus=viewport&dq=War+of+the+Rebellion A History of the Negro Troops in the War of the Rebellion, 1861-1865 and, as noted above, the famous and much used reference and statistics book https://books.google.com/books?id=OBkNAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=War+of+the+Rebellion&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjKqqyZy_bnAhVTmHIEHV5eA5AQ6AEwAHoECAMQAQ A Compendium of the War of the Rebellion by Frederick H. Dyer in 1908, often cited as Dyer's Compendium. Plenty of examples can be found in a search for "War of the Rebellion" in the Google Books category. The official records and other two books mentioned here are the first three. Donner60 (talk) 10:55, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

The previous is as information about the term "War of the Rebellion," not as an endorsement of using "rebels" rather than "Confederates" in articles, at least where it is contrary to the style guidelines or where some corresponding use would not be made with respect to Union soldiers or units. I would guess there still could be some sentences where rebel or rebellious might be well used, other than direct quotations where the use would be obviously permissible. I would be careful about such use, and particularly with respect to units. I would have preferred to use other terms than Confederate and Union in some articles that I have written or expanded, rather than constantly repeat those terms. But it rarely seems appropriate to do so as a matter of style. Donner60 (talk) 11:15, 29 February 2020 (UTC)

I had a look at it with Google ngrams [13] This shows that the two terms have both been used since 1861, but that "War of The Rebellion" was the more common term from 1880 to 1890. After that, the use of the "American Civil war" slowly gained in popularity while usage of "War of The Rebellion" fell off sharply during the nadir of US race relations period from 1890 to 1920. You can see also that "war between the states" also gained traction, and was the most common term in the 1940s and 1950s. "American Civil war" became the dominant term in the 1960s, most likely as a result of the official celebrations of the centenary of the conflict. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 18:57, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

Vandalism at Pacific War

User talk:180.95.40.67 appears to have a history. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 02:36, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

Apparently just received a 2-years school block. ...GELongstreet (talk) 02:50, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

Can't start A-class review

I tried to do so at Talk:Battle of Hel [14] but I am not seeing any "currently undergoing" link to click on? Can you see it (lag)? Did I mess up the code? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 07:38, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

@Piotrus: G'day, Piotrus, I hope you are well. I've adjusted the banner for you now. The "currently undergoing" link should now display. If it doesn't, the direct redlink is here: [15]. Please create the ACR nom page when you are ready. Good luck with the review. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:52, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

Doh, I must have been really tired, thank you for fixing this obvious (now...) mistake. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 04:40, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

No worries, happy to help. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 05:35, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

WPMilHist template and task force tagging file talk pages

Should files that come under the scope of military history have their talk pages tagged with the project's template and relevant task forces? I'm guessing they can and should be but I want to make sure before I do so. TheBestEditorInEngland (talk) 18:25, 4 March 2020 (UTC)

You can do that, class=IMG. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:21, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

You don`t even have to add a class for most non-article pages anymore; they get automatically assigned according to the page name - FILE for images (files), CAT for categories, TEMP for templates etc etc. ...GELongstreet (talk) 01:37, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, I hadn't caught up with that. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 10:52, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

War of the League of Cambrai FAR

See Wikipedia:Featured article review/War of the League of Cambrai/archive1 if you would like to improve the article. b uidhe 14:58, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Active Status for American Civil War Regiments

What is the best date to use for the active status in the InfoBox of an American Civil War Regiment? I have seen a) the date the first company mustered in; b) the date the regiment got its name; c) the date the regiment got its marching orders. For example: on July 26, 1861, the secretary of war authorized someone to recruit a regiment that eventually became the 5th New York Cavalry. Company A mustered in August 15, 1861. On October 1, the staff was mustered into service of the United States. The 5th New York Cavalry got its name on November 15, 1861. The regiment departed from New York on November 18, 1861. Which is the best active status date to use in the InfoBox? TwoScars (talk) 17:07, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Easter Rising and World War I

I'm probably going to get skewered for bringing this up again, but I was wondering if the Easter Rising should be considered as part of WW1, meaning the words "Part of World War I" would be in the Easter Rising infobox. I was somewhat recently in a very heated argument at Talk:Easter Rising, and the discussion turned stale on both sides. I argued that it was part of the wider world war, with its events being heavily influenced by the war (limited German support, etc.), while the opposing side argued that it wasn't, saying that it was not a main battleground of the war (little influence), and that previous events in Ireland were of more determinable importance (I think that fairly represents the different arguments). Does anyone have any opinion on this case, and what action should be taken to edit the page, if any? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 16:16, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

I can see both sides of the argument, Roger Casement and all, being valid. But it was only tangibly linked to WW1 (more a case of at the same time, rather then part of it. Here (for once) other stuff may be valid, do we do this with other conflicts that occurred at the same time?Slatersteven (talk) 16:19, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Got it. Thanks for the closure. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 16:20, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Its not closed, and my answer is not definitive. I would wait for wider opinion.Slatersteven (talk) 16:21, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Whoops. Was a bit too quick in replying. To answer your question, it depends, I guess. Would the Franco-Thai War be a similar case? For the Central Asian revolt of 1916, it is stated as part of WW1 (full disclosure, I made that edit). 98.221.136.220 (talk) 16:26, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

The former is a bit tough, as Cochin China was (in effect) under Japanese occupation and this affected the outcome. But yes the latter seem analogous and would indicate its a common practice. Thus I would say that (for consistencies) sake it should be part of WW1.Slatersteven (talk) 16:31, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Do we describe the Russian Revolution as part of WWI?

I would see both as separate from WWI. Primarily because they were civil conflicts, rather than national conflicts. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:29, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

The Russian revolution is not described as part of WW1, to the best of my knowledge. Perhaps the Greek Civil War might be of relevance? That's about all I can come up with. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 16:34, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Dingley, that is the argument that some users used on the Rising talk page, that like the Russian revolt, it was influenced by WW1, but it doesn't mean it was part of it. It's a good counterpoint to adding it as part of the war, IMO. 98.221.136.220 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 16:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

The Finnish Civil War might be relevant, too. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 17:23, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Template:Campaignbox World War I. A list of wars I made during WW1 that aren't part of it. Should the Rising be added? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 17:26, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Could the botched Easter Rising have been conceivable without the war and the German policy of stirring trouble in the Entente slave empires? Keith-264 (talk) 18:58, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, as the IRB was already planning that even before WW1 started. Maybe the timing would be different, but not the rising itself. The Banner talk 19:47, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Does the article itself make a strong enough case that the Rising was part of the war to justify such a statement being added to the infobox? And shouldn't this discussion be happening on the article TP? Factotem (talk) 19:36, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

There is already al large discussion on the talk page of the rising. By and large with the conclusion that it was not part of WW1. The Banner talk 19:52, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Talk:Easter_Rising#Not_part_of_World_War_1. This is in fact a repeat from the discussion last December The Banner talk 19:54, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

The IP also claims that the Armenian Genocide is part of WW1. But as that went on till 1923, that seems not correct to me. The Banner talk 19:52, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Part of it was part of WW1. The other part occurred in the Turkish War of Independence. Please don't mischaracterize my views. But let's stay on topic. As the Banner has made clear, the discussion at the relevant talk page was resolved with the majority of users saying that the Rising wasn't part of WW1. I've come here only for a short second-opinion, and if a similar ruling is made, then I will add the Easter Rising to the list I made of wars that occurred during WW1 but are unrelated to and not part of it. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 20:11, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, you mix up "during" and "part of". Not everything during the WW1-era is also part of the First World War. The Banner talk 20:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

I am not an idiot, I don't conflate the two words. Is there a verdict so I can place the Rising among unrelated wars or not? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 20:54, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

The Rising was a war??? Factotem (talk) 22:07, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Better words are rebellion, or brief conflict. There was some fighting. My question still stands. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 22:38, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

If the Rising is unrelated, then what is the sense of adding it to Template:Campaignbox World War I? It makes the campaignbox only confusing when there are also unrelated events listed. The Banner talk 22:59, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

I'm trying to match the campaignbox with the Template:Campaignbox World War II. I'm not trying anything new. So that way no one gets confused about if something was part of the war or not. Plus, my question still stands. I'm pretty sure Banner isn't the only one with an opinion here. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 23:06, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Ow, I think I have to wait until you came op with the 1917 Potato riots as another campaign or battle?

The Banner talk 23:10, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

Please stop taunting me. My question still stands for other users. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 23:14, 7 March 2020 (UTC)

This whole argument is an attempt to synthesise sources.

The Finnish Civil War was part of World War 1
The Easter Rising was similar to the Finnish Civil War
Therefore the Easter Rising was part of World War 1

That's quite simply a policy violation and a non-starter. There can be no attempt to enforce consistency across different articles when references don't treat them consistently. This tendentious campaign of changing one article to use as leverage to change another article should stop. The IP admits they changed the Central Asian revolt of 1916 yet uses that as a reason to change the Easter Rising article. The IP doesn't mention here they have zero interest in improving the Easter Rising article, their end game can be seen at Talk:World War I casualties/Archive 2#Allied U-boat Losses, Arabian states, and Others. FDW777 (talk) 11:46, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

That is not true, but ok. My main concern right now is Template:Campaignbox World War I, or whether I should add the Rising as a conflict that occurred during WW1 but is completely unrelated to it. This is similar to Template:Campaignbox World War II, under the contemporaneous wars section. Assume good faith, and I recently was making minor constructive edits to the Rising page [[16]]. Should I add it to the unrelated conflicts, or should I get rid of both sections in the campaignboxes? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 16:52, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

"It is true, however, that my edits were based on changing the WW1 casualties page". FDW777 (talk) 16:58, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

In the past, but not now. My question still stands. 98.221.136.220 (talk) 17:11, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

WP:NAVBOX would suggest vaguely related articles should not be included, the part reading The collection of articles in a sidebar template should be fairly tightly related, and the template should meet most or all of the preceding guidelines. It also states that navigation needs to be bidirectional, so the template would need to be placed on the Easter Rising article. Obviously that discussion would need to take place on that article's talk page, or a proper notification placed there so editors of that page are aware. FDW777 (talk) 17:17, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough. Just for clarity, I should get rid of each section in both campaignboxes? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 17:23, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Personally, I would prefer to place the Rising among the unrelated contemporaneous conflicts, so as no one gets confused as to what is part of what. In the case of the WW2 unrelated conflicts, the WW2 campaignbox is generally not present on those articles, so there would be no need to place the WW1 campaginbox on the Rising article. The part that talks about bidirectional stuff in WP:NAVBOX says "normally should," so it isn't exactly a hard and fast rule (because in this case, the articles in the box are identified as being unrelated, and thus there is no need to place campaignboxes everywhere). What do you think? 98.221.136.220 (talk) 17:34, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

USS Memphis (1862)

I've rewritten and expanded the USS Memphis (1862) article. Needs a reassessment as to class. Mjroots (talk) 19:18, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

The article is fully cited and seems complete. I've assessed it as a B class. Regards, -Fnlayson (talk) 19:37, 8 March 2020 (UTC)

Unable to confirm story on Wikipedia about German surrender in Channel Islands

In three different Wiki articles (Minquiers, Liberation of the Channel Islands, and Timeline of Axis surrenders), there's a story about a group of German soldiers surrendering on Minquiers, a group of reefs of the Channel Islands, on May 23rd. Here's the version from the Minquiers page:

A small company of Wehrmacht soldiers on the Minquiers were among the last to surrender in the Second World War. A French fishing boat, skippered by Lucian Marie, approached the island of Minquiers and anchored nearby. A fully armed German soldier approached and asked for help saying 'We've been forgotten by the British, perhaps no one on Jersey told them we were here, I want you to take us over to England, we want to surrender'. This was on 23 May 1945, three weeks after the war in Europe ended.

I'm unable to find anything to verify this story. All the other sources online are unreliable or clearly originated on Wikipedia. Nothing reliable shows up on Google Books or Google Scholar that I can see. Can anyone verify this story? Thanks for the help! Ganesha811 (talk) 20:06, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

It appears in Caddick-Adams, Peter (2011). Monty and Rommel: Parallel Lives. London: Arrow Books. p. 450. ISBN 978-1848091542.: "The last Wehrmacht soldiers to surrender in Western Europe were an infantry company on the tiny Channel Island of Les Minquiers".

The author is described here as "one of Britain’s leading military historians". Alansplodge (talk) 20:28, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

A further appearance in here, with a slightly different quote, this time referenced to Whiting, Charles (1973). The End of the War: Europe: April 15-May 23, 1945. Stein & Day. ISBN 978-0812816051., although sadly no page number. Alansplodge (talk) 20:51, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Alansplodge, thank you very much! I was able to track it down to page 168 of the Whiting book. I'll add the source to the articles. Ganesha811 (talk) 20:59, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Most welcome. The text in our Minquiers article is almost an exact copy of the Caddick-Adams account; one wonders why no source was added at the time. Alansplodge (talk) 21:10, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

Having occasionally tracked down the source of unsourced statements in various articles, my suspicion for this is lazy editors. RobDuch (talk·contribs) 20:33, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

John Manners (cricketer)

Hi all. Sadly Lieutenant Commander John Manners, the oldest living first-class cricketer, passed away three days ago aged 105. If anybody fancies expanding the information on his military career from WWII, the Cricket Project would be much obliged. StickyWicket (talk) 21:05, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Assistance needed with Bombing of Tokyo (10 March 1945) TFA

Bombing of Tokyo (10 March 1945) is going to appear on the main page as TFA on 10 March. I took the lead with developing this to FA status, but will unfortunately be out of town for most of that day. As this article covers a controversial topic, it might attract a larger than standard amount of unhelpful editing. I'd be grateful if other editors could please keep an eye on it. Thanks, Nick-D (talk) 10:44, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Will do. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 10:50, 5 March 2020 (UTC)

Thank you. The article got off much more lightly than I was expecting. Nick-D (talk) 05:35, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Referring to people by military rank

At Talk:Elham Valley Railway/GA1 there seems to be a disagreement about the sentence "A Board of Trade inspection took place on 1 July, conducted by Major Charles Scrope Hutchinson. It passed, and the line opened to passengers on 4 July." in regards to whether the person should be referred to as "Major Charles Scrope Hutchinson", "Charles Scrope Hutchinson" or "Major Hutchinson". I figure people from this project would be familiar with the issue, so please could someone opine in the linked discussion (search in the page for: by Major Hutchinson). Thryduulf (talk) 17:06, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

One of the issues is that many Ex-officers insist on being called by their rank as if its a title (such as Lord or Sir). So I would suggest we use such articles as a guide Mick Jagger for example, so in the first sentence Major Charles Scrope Hutchinson from thence on Hutchinson.Slatersteven (talk) 18:02, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Yup. There's no problem at all using his rank the first time he's mentioned, but no need subsequently. -- Necrothesp (talk) 11:21, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Notice of RFC at Adolf Hitler

Hi all. I have opened an RFC at Talk:Adolf Hitler regarding what number we should use for the number Jewish deaths in The Holocaust. Talk:Adolf Hitler#Request for comment on number of Jewish deaths in The Holocaust.— Diannaa (talk) 13:13, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Reference request Battle of Smolensk (1941)

Footnote 6, "I. P. Statyuk 2006" anyone know the source, I can't find it. Thanks Keith-264 (talk) 16:13, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

I have added the full reference. Kges1901 (talk) 16:38, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue CLXVII, March 2020

Your Military History Newsletter

Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results
Articles: Last month's new featured and A-class content
Book review: Recent external reviews

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) 01:51, 15 March 2020 (UTC)

Need help on scrubbing the article for military medals and honours

Hello all,

I need help on my recently published article. The user AngusWOOF recommended that some one from the military community check and confirm the medal and honors for the article. Can some one form this group please check? Apologies if this is not the correct forum to discuss this. It would be great if you could point me in the right direction.Manas.chafekar (talk) 22:38, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

What article are you referring to? Nick-D (talk) 00:33, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

@Nick-D: G'day, Nick, I think it is this one: Suryakant Chintaman Chafekar. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 04:23, 14 March 2020 (UTC)

Yes, this is the correct one Suryakant Chintaman Chafekar. Sorry for not posting the article name. Manas.chafekar (talk) 02:57, 16 March 2020 (UTC)

How to add a historical locator map

Ping at the larger forum since I asked at a niche one: Module_talk:Infobox_military_conflict#How_to_add_a_historical_locator_map. TIA for any help! --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 03:49, 11 March 2020 (UTC)

Ping User:Gog the Mild: FYI it should be possible and I asked for help here but nobody replied :( Should we try at WP:VPT? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 03:49, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

There should be some examples of WP:Mil or other articles with a locator map to go by. Here's some WP:EN articles with locators that I just found: Montalva, Montalva that might be of help. -Fnlayson (talk) 04:43, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

A GA review in need of a new reviewer

CPA isn't able to be online much right now, so he can't finish this review - could anyone pick it up for me? Thanks in advance. Parsecboy (talk) 11:55, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

I'll take over. Harrias ^talk 12:13, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Help on Boshin War

Boshin War is up for Featured article review due to some sourcing issues. Please see Talk:Boshin War#Paragraphs needing references for more details on specific things needing fixes. Any help is appreciated. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 00:38, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Just a note of correction: [17] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 00:53, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

@SandyGeorgia: Nothing in my post here is in any way incorrect, so I don't know what you're trying to correct. Please try to assume a little good faith here. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 01:30, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Nihonjoe, please chill; we are on the same team. It is important to the FAR process that notifications be done, and when you said, "The MilHist project was not notified of this discussion", that was incorrect and that requires correction, since it would not be a good thing if notifications were not being done at FAR as required. Hence, I checked. More importantly, I continue to suggest that the template of notifications be added here somewhere. And since I have a decades-long history of collaborating with MILHIST, I will continue to do so, and wish that you would tone it down. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 01:51, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

The problem being that I didn't make that comment here and we already addressed it there, so your comment here made no sense. All I did here was request people to come help there. Period. There was no valid reason for "correcting" here something from somewhere else. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 17:52, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Egyptian frigate

What is the identity of the Egyptian frigate Said Gehaad (The Standard, 3 November 1862) / Schah Gehaad (Liverpool Mercury, 3 November 1862) which was involved in a collision with the schooner Grace Evans in the River Mersey on ~~1 November~~ 31 October 1862 please? Mjroots (talk) 06:06, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

I had a look in The Ottoman Steam Navy and didn't turn anything up, unfortunately. Parsecboy (talk) 11:52, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Could it have been a sail frigate? Mjroots (talk) 21:20, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

That's what I'd assume. Parsecboy (talk) 21:54, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

Actually, probably not - it's likely the vessel described here, given as Faid Gihad. I've also seen other variants, including Taid Gehaad, among others. The Ottoman Steam Navy refers to the vessel as Feyz-i Cihat, later renamed the Sultan's yacht Sultaniye. They report the vessel was rebuilt in 1862 by Forrester & Co., of Liverpool, which puts it in the right place at the right time. Parsecboy (talk) 22:15, 18 March 2020 (UTC)

I tossed together a short article on the ship at Ottoman yacht Sultaniye. Parsecboy (talk) 02:07, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Thanks guys, have amended the entry on the relevant shipwreck list. Mjroots (talk) 04:28, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Help with finding sources

Does anyone know how/where I can find sources to complete this list - USAWC IF Hall of Fame. DTM (talk) 11:10, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

Arabic speakers: is there a name for the 2003 Free Iraqi Forces in Arabic that I should add to the lede?

Not sure we have any Arabic speakers here, but it'd be good to have the Iraqi rendering of the term. Clearly it was a US initative, but presumably it was called something in Arabic. MatthewVanitas (talk) 08:48, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

Casualties in conflict

What's the consensus about pages relating to soldiers from different nations, being killed in different conflicts? For example: List of British fatalities in Afghanistan, or List of Spanish fatalities in Lebanon.

Why? How would these be encyclopedic?Slatersteven (talk) 13:25, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

I also don't think these would be encyclopaedic or notable. There isn't a body of literature that discusses the subjects as a group, and almost none of the people on the list are notable (ie would qualify for their own Wikipedia article). There are a handful who have earned gallantry awards who have (or could have) articles, but that's not necessarily related to their deaths. Also, imagine trying to do a list like that for a major war. It would be unbelievably long. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 13:44, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

We already have British Forces casualties in Afghanistan since 2001 a good example of a memorial page that shouldnt really exist. MilborneOne (talk) 18:22, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

I would agree, this is what cenotaphs are for.Slatersteven (talk) 18:25, 20 March 2020 (UTC)

I agree that a listing of everyone killed as on British Forces casualties in Afghanistan since 2001 is pointless, but pages providing a general description of casualties has value.Mztourist (talk) 06:09, 21 March 2020 (UTC)

These aren't encyclopaedic and are basically breaches of WP:NOTMEMORIAL. Are we going to have a list of WWII casualties? WWI?

Limes listed at Requested moves

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Ian Smith Featured article review

Ian Smith has been nominated for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:43, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

USS Theodore Roosevelt UFO incidents

You are invited to review this article and to join the discussion at Talk:USS Theodore Roosevelt UFO incidents which is about an article that is within the scope of this WikiProject. Thanks! --Gtoffoletto (talk) 13:56, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Infobox military unit or Infobox law enforcement organization

We've had a recent string of military and paramilitary organizations that also have a degree of law enforcement functions have their infoboxes changed from military unit to law enforcement organization - including organizations like the French National Guard which are a full fledged military branch. As a community, which of these should take precidence? My personal preference would be military unit as these are first and foremost military (or paramilitary) forces, but keeping LE template for those only tangentially related to the military (such as the National Republican Guard (Portugal) or People's Armed Police). Pinging user @Ckfasdf:
A full list of the affected articles appears to be:

Military Police Corps (Indonesia) ← Military Police
Army Military Police Corps (Indonesia) ← Military Police
National Guard (France) ← Gendarmerie
Gendarmerie Nationale Togolaise ← Gendarmerie
Military Police (Russia) ← Military Police
National Guard of Russia ← Gendarmerie
National Aeronaval Service ← not military unit, as Panama have abolished military in 1990
Civil Guard (Spain) ← Gendarmerie
Maritime Gendarmerie ← Gendarmerie
Panamanian Public Forces ← not military unit, as Panama have abolished military in 1990

My ultimate concern is that somehow this will result in the U.S. Coast Guard's infobox changing because it has a law enforcement role, but what about its military role? Where do we draw the line? Garuda28 (talk) 14:11, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Actually it was a good question. Most of the unit mentioned above are doing mostly law enforcement tasks (establishing law and order for civilian or armed forces personnel, include criminal investigation). And those unit can be categorized as either gendarmerie and military police. Also, LE infobox have parameter for those both of them . So, I dont think it's a problem to change infobox for them. Panama and Costa Rica are few example of country without military, again it would be makes sense to replace them. IMO, if that military unit is either Gendarmerie or military police, then it would be ok to change infobox into LE infobox. Other than that, just keep it as military unit infobox. Based on definition, U.S. Coast Guard infobox will not be replaced to LE infobox. Ckfasdf (talk) 15:25, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

EDIT: you said on my talk page that your concern that it may affect Military Police Corps (United States) which if we use my definition above it will be affected. Could you elaborate more about military role of that unit. Ckfasdf (talk) 15:41, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

Also with United States Air Force Security Forces. In the U.S. they have very extensive base defense and combat roles, outside their law enforcement duties. I’m not sure how this relates to other states, but in some units it’s over half of their role. Think of it akin to the Coast Guard on a high level. Garuda28 (talk) 16:23, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

I think United States Air Force Security Forces role is more into base defense and ground combat mission than law enforcement. So, I don't think there will any changes on infobox. My proposal is to change all military unit infobox for unit that mainly tasked for establishing law and order. AFAIK, only gendarmerie and military police that qualified to do that. Exception can be made for military police that are more known for military task such as ground combat operation. Ckfasdf (talk) 16:48, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

EDIT: further clarify why samples mentioned above get the infobox replaced (it's beside name of affected pages above using font and font). And also, infobox law enforcement (LE) have parameter for those both of them (which are |military= for military police and |gendarmerie=), so they are designed to be used for military unit that perform law enforcement duties. Ckfasdf (talk) 00:49, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Need help on scrubbing the article for military medals and honours

Hello all,

Hope you all are well in the CoViD 19 pandemic. I need help on my recently published article Suryakant Chintaman Chafekar. The user AngusWOOF recommended that some one from the military community check and confirm the medal and honors for the article. Can some one form this group please check? Manas.chafekar (talk) 15:17, 26 March 2020 (UTC)

@Manas.chafekar: G'day, as far as I can tell, this has already been done with this edit: [18] by MilborneOne. @AngusWOOF: can you please confirm for Manas whether or not you believe your concern has been addressed? If it has, I think the tag can be removed. Cheers, AustralianRupert (talk) 07:12, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

As long as MilborneOne is good with this, I will remove. Thanks for checking in on this. AngusWOOF (bark • sniff) 21:52, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

MilborneOne (talk) 22:00, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

thank you all for the help. Hope you have a great day. Stay safe! Manas.chafekar (talk) 04:14, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Limes listed at Requested moves

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Writing article on camo (Dubok/TTsKO name thing)?

Need to ask if Dubok (Butan) is the "formal" name of the old USSR/Russian camo back in the 80s/90s(?) 'cause I also heard that TTsKO is also the name. Ominae (talk) 08:20, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

As big bureaucracys go - I guess it was just: "ВСР-84" (eng: VSR 84) based on the year of acceptance. Like stated on the russian WP disambiguation page. Alexpl (talk) 09:56, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Guessing that means Butan is the article name then. In commons, the categories is "Dubok (Butan)". Ominae (talk) 11:52, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Should be both then: "ВСР-84 «Бутан»" for "Armed Forces Colors 1984 «Butan»". That way, it is more simple to index following patterns like ВСР-98 [19] a.o.. Alexpl (talk) 12:20, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Guess I (or someone) will figure that out when the time comes. Ominae (talk) 13:59, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

London City Airport

I'm seeing reports on social media that London City Airport closed to all civil traffic last night and has been taken over by the military as RAF Nightingale. Not seeing any mainstream confirmation. Can we find a source for this and amend the article if this is true? Mjroots (talk) 07:18, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

It's definitely been closed to commercial and private flights since 25 March (Reuters) and there's talk of it being taken over by the RAF (UK Aviation News) but I haven't found anything confirming this has happened yet - Dumelow (talk) 07:50, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Not considered a reliable source but the Daily Mail has a story on London City, "RAF Nightingale" may have been made up by the media but plenty of evidence that at least one RAF Hercules has been operating in and out of LCY. [20] MilborneOne (talk) 21:59, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

This aviation industry story from two days ago says that the airport "Could Become RAF Nightingale", not that such an organisation has (yet) been established. Nick-D (talk) 22:09, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

Another source is a social media post from an Air Training Corps leader, so maybe in the realms of the mythical. Alansplodge (talk) 17:00, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

The name "Nightingale" is derived from the naming of the large new temporary hospital, NHS Nightingale Hospital, at the ExCeL London exhibition centre, after Florence Nightingale (https://www.nursingtimes.net/news/coronavirus/new-temporary-coronavirus-hospital-in-name-of-florence-nightingale-revealed-24-03-2020/); seemingly not fully operational yet, which the LCY airport arrangements are intended to serve. Let's be clear here; there's no precedent for a temporary RAF airfield name to be allocated like this since the Second World War, and the Daily Mail and others are interviewing their typewriters - creating new designations - hyping things probably most likely in order to sell newspapers. There's room for a brief mention of the use by media of the name at the LCY article, but much more justified is solid referenced information about how heavily RAF transport aircraft are using LCY. My thoughts and best wishes go out to all of you in the UK. Buckshot06 (talk) 18:33, 29 March 2020 (UTC)

Agree with Buckshot06's comment about media hype, but the mentions I saw were from sources that might be described as at least "semi-official" rather than the mainstream media. No mention of "RAF Nightingale" needs to be made in the article unless it is announced as by an official source such as the MOD. If it is reported that the RAF is using the airport, then of course that info should be added to the article. Mjroots (talk) 06:11, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

If the RAF was to establish a new named air station, it seems safe to assume that they'd put out a press release or similar. Nick-D (talk) 06:17, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

GA backlog

There are enough Good Article nominations that it is breaking the page (see this discussion). If any of you can find time to bring the backlog down a bit it would help out. MILHIST is particularly affected because the nominations at the bottom of the page are the first that are not transcluded. Kees08 (Talk) 17:50, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Second opinion on identifying individual

Hi. I've been categorising some military photos on Commons and I think I have identified one of Charles Nogues, which is a much higher quality than others we hold of him. However, I would like a second opinion on whether my identification is valid. [[File:Lot 11568-15 (24454858700).jpg|thumb|left|I think this is Nogues on the right in French army uniform]] [[File:Allies Grand Strategy Conference in N Africa- President Roosevelt Meets Mr Churchill. One of the Most Momentous Conferences of This War Began on January 14, 1943 Near Casablanca, When President Roosevelt and Mr A14044.jpg|thumb|Nogues is identified by Imperial War Museum as being in this picture. From the uniform, I am assuming he is in the back row, centre]] From the two pictures, I am assuming that they are both Nogues. Would you agree with that? From Hill To Shore (talk) 16:06, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

An assumption does not pass wp:v.Slatersteven (talk) 16:13, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

I am not trying to verify an article. I am trying to get a second opinion on whether my eyes are correct and two photos are of the same person. I came here specifically as in an ideal world, one of the project members will have a source that has a clear image of him to compare.

I should have also said that part of my judgement is from both photos being taken at the Casablanca Conference of January 1943. It is unlikely that two French officers of similar appearence were mixing with American generals and presidents during those 10 days. From Hill To Shore (talk) 16:24, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

[[File:LT. GEN. MARK W. CLARK AND General Auguste Nogues.jpg|thumb|right|Number 3: Noguès on 9 mai 1943 inCasablanca ]]

Well, its a General, with a Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour (or at least the mounting points for one on the left pouch of the jacket), he was in Casablanca at the time and looks like the guys on the two other photos of someone with that name on that occasion - so you should be good. Alexpl (talk) 18:48, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Another image of Nogues is here. A definite match to my eye. A rather similar-looking French general who was in Algeria at the time was Alphonse Juin shown here, but I'm certain you have the right chap. Alansplodge (talk) 18:55, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Fantastic. Thanks for the help everyone. From Hill To Shore (talk) 19:03, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

Panzer Aces

Panzer Aces, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for a community 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. Mujinga (talk) 21:35, 30 March 2020 (UTC)

April–May 2020 GAN Backlog Drive

Harrias ^talk 12:41, 31 March 2020 (UTC)

Agincourt Mock Trial

The Battle of Agincourt article has long held a (fully cited) reference to a mock trial held in the US in 2010. This was a theatrical production (though involving real legal figures) and is therefore noted in the popular representations section, alongside films and plays. An editor is determined to remove this for reasons that it makes a moral judgement of a historical character. I have reverted twice and asked him to seek consensus - I have no issue if people think it is too trivial or other reasons for removal but am wary of removal just because it could be read as tarnishing Henry V's reputation. Could others with an interest please observe and, if they wish, comment. Thanks Monstrelet (talk) 08:26, 27 March 2020 (UTC)

It used the play as part of the evidence? Seems pretty trivial. (Hohum ^@) 01:13, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

This mock trial strikes me as neither wide nor deep, and one of those is what is needed to be mentioned as “popular culture.” It has to be something everyone knows about, even if they “know” it wrong, or something that has a deep longstanding appeal to some specific group. This looks like ephemeral trivia. Qwirkle (talk) 03:04, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, it sounds like a fun event, but even at the time it doesn't seem to have garnered a lot of attention. --RaiderAspect (talk) 03:01, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

Talk:Battle of al-Mada'in/GA1

I reviewed this GA back on 3 March, but Cplakidas has been inactive since late-February. Is anyone willing to take the work on to improve this article, rather than me fail it? It would seem such a shame, as the article is in pretty good shape, with mostly just spit and polish needed to meet the criteria. Harrias ^talk 11:45, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

I can take a look later today, see what I can do Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 12:07, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

One more reviewer and source review needed

G'day all, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/SMS Niobe/archive1 could do with another reviewer and a source review if you want something to while away the time in isolation... (NB: co-nom by Parsecboy and I). Thanks, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:06, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Potential WP:MILHIST candidates

I ran a query on pages that have infobox military conflict that do not have a WP:MILHIST talk page banner. The results are in my user space. While not all of those should be tagged for this project, scrolling through it seemed like quite a few were good candidates. I use Rater to add Wikiprojects, personally. I can run queries with other MILHIST-related infoboxes if that would help. If this is not useful, then please disregard. I was doing this for the spaceflight wikiproject and was seeing if any other projects had interest. Kees08 (Talk) 22:14, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Adding the Miltary History banner to Battles, military type operations and other conflicts/actions seem almost automatic to me. -Fnlayson (talk) 22:27, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

Yeah some of those seemed automatic to me too. I just ran against infobox military person and came up with 6861 results. The first one I clicked on was an obvious candidate for MILHIST, not sure what the real percentage is. Probably too big to include on a single wiki page, can be seen here and downloaded however (and placed somewhere on wiki, if desired). Kees08 (Talk) 23:11, 5 April 2020 (UTC)

DYK article

I recently wrote and nominated Alan Cozzalio for DYK, an American Vietnam war helicopter pilot. If anyone can give it a once-over from a Milhist perspective, I'd appreciate it. It will probably be a month or more before it gets to the main page, so no urgency. Thanks. MB 03:48, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

I don't believe that he meets any of the criteria of WP:SOLDIER or satisfies WP:GNG generally. Mztourist (talk) 04:17, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Having his own 276 page biography with a Major General listed as a co-author (though the catalogue entry doesn't specify the level of contribution) suggests significant coverage. I am unfamiliar with the publisher though. The article is also supported by a number of newspaper articles that name him directly (though again, I am unfamiliar with the publishers or the level of editorial rigour applied and I can't read the content behind the paywall). Unless the sources are disputed, it appears to meet GNG. From Hill To Shore (talk) 08:09, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

He doesn't meet any of the 6 criteria of WP:SOLDIER. In relation to WP:GNG, I think there are major WP:SIGCOV issues. Searching the biography ISBN on Google Books it states that the publisher is CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform which sounds self-published and not Lighthorse Publishing Company as stated on the page, while Amazon shows no information. Reference 1 is Vietnam Helicopter Pilots Association which I don't believe is a reliable source. Reference 3 is the VVA review of the book. IMO the other sources fall into "...only mentioned in passing in reliable secondary sources should not be considered notable for the purposes of a stand-alone article...". Mztourist (talk) 09:29, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

British Army 1939 personal equipment

We have a stub article called 39 Pattern Webbing which says from the start that it was made of leather, so it isn't really "webbing" is it? Does anyone know the official designation? Any additional sources would be helpful too. Alansplodge (talk) 18:24, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Here is a google book extract with some details.[21] "In anticipation of shortages of canvas webbing equipment, a leather version of 1937-pattern webbing equipment was approved in 1939." From Hill To Shore (talk) 20:32, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, more research needed. Alansplodge (talk) 12:26, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Need help at the article about Brett Crozier

Hi, folks! Could some of you take a look at the article about Captain Brett Crozier? The article was hastily thrown together when he hit the headlines, and as a result it is missing a lot of the information that should be included in a military biography. The article lacks sourcing for his various commands, and in particular it would be good to have the date he took command of the Theodore Roosevelt added to the "career" section. I'm guessing some of you at this project know how to find that kind of information. Any assistance in making this into a properly sourced biography would be appreciated. -- MelanieN (talk) 16:25, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Finding biographical info on British war photographer

Hi. Can anyone point me in the direction of sources of birth or death dates for a British war photographer from WW2? I am trying to fill out some of the Wikidata information for Sidney James Beadell (Commons:Category:Sidney James Beadell) who was a Lieutenant in the special branch of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve during the war. I am mainly interested in the date of death though, as that will determine when his pre and post war photographs enter the public domain. As this is for Wikidata and Commons rather than Wikipedia, the quality of sourcing can be lower than what we set here (Wikidata is at the stage of collecting whatever data is available and then verifying the recorded entries - if a higher quality source disagrees with the original claim, the superior claim is given precedence). From Hill To Shore (talk) 16:01, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

If they're photos taken in performance of his duties, then they're Crown Copyright which is effectively public domain for all photo taken before 1 June 1957 or published before 1970. See the template PD-UKGov.--Sturmvogel 66 (talk) 17:42, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks but we need to establish his death date for non-governmental work. You are right that his photographs during the war are Crown Copyright but his photos before the war and after (if he survived) are his own copyright and become PD 70 years after his death. Establishing his year of death will tell us when we can allow upload of his other works to Commons (if he died before 1950, they are PD now). From Hill To Shore (talk) 17:55, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

If you want to register for the free trial, then you may find out here. Gog the Mild (talk) 18:30, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Is this him? Family Search You'll probably have to create an account, but it's free (so far).--Georgia Army Vet Contribs Talk 18:44, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you both. Those two items together have solved it. The newspaper OCR text says the photographer Sidney James Beadell (serving with the Royal Navy) was 34 in 1942, meaning that he was born around 1908. The family search then gives records for James Sidney Beadell born between January and March 1908 and a later death record for Sydney James Beadell born 15 February 1908 and died 1974. It looks like he reversed his first names at some point. Dying in 1974 means we can start uploading his other files in 2045. At least all of his data will be ready for a future editor. :D From Hill To Shore (talk) 22:07, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

Colonel = general?

Quick question, sorry to bug you guys. WP:NSOLDIER provides that generals are inherently notable, as well as their historical equivalents. What does that mean for modern armies where the top rank is colonel, rather than general - do they get lumped in as "historically equivalent"? ♠PMC♠ (talk) 18:21, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

I think highest ranking officer might still be a pass "Held the top-level military command position of their nation's armed forces".Slatersteven (talk) 18:23, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Well...it concerns the Military of Suriname. Colonel is the highest-possible rank in their system, but there's more than one person with the rank colonel. There's the Commander of the Armed Forces - Military Chief, Colonel Robert Kartodikromo, who I think would be considered to have the top-level military command position, but there are other colonels with "lesser" positions, such as Colonel Jerry Slijngaard, Director of the Coast Guard. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 18:31, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

"or of a department thereof (such as Chief of Army Staff)". So any heads of departments count under that criteria.Slatersteven (talk) 19:31, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Ah, okay, thanks. ♠PMC♠ (talk) 19:35, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

RfD notification: Military preparedness

Hi all, your input at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 March 31#Military preparedness would be appreciated. --BDD (talk) 20:54, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Help on establishing consensus about duplicate wikilinks

Can we get some help on establishing consensus about duplicate wikilinks over at Talk:Gloucestershire_Regiment#Duplicate_links. No drama, and not hugely fussed either way myself, but it's a Featured Article, so standards are high. Any comments welcome; even a drive-by yay or nay would be most helpful. Thanks. Factotem (talk) 15:15, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

References from an e-book question

I did a spring clean of Attack on Convoy BN 7 and realised that the page numbers for O'Hara were different to earlier edits. I have it on Adobe and when alter the text size (varies from small to ultra large) the page numbers for a piece of text vary. Does anyone know which settings I need to use to avoid giving misleading page references? Thanks Keith-264 (talk) 14:25, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Not familiar with Adobe, but GBooks sometime allows books to be read with original pages (and therefore page numbering) rather than flowing text with its variable page numbering. My only suggestion would be to use the default page size for Adobe. It might also be a good idea to add a duplicate entry in the article's References section for the E-Book version of O'Hara's work and specifically cite that where it is used. The Cite Book template has a type= paramater which I set to E-Book when I'm referencing such a work. You could then format the refs in the article with something like O'Hara E-Book. Factotem (talk) 15:30, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

I’ve used representative sentences, enough for a search engine, to handle this in personal note keeping; would it be possible to work this way here? Qwirkle (talk) 16:37, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks that's really helpful I didn't know about parameter=. I don't suppose you know how I can find the default settings? I've looked at the Adobe settings and the browser settings. I'll have another look. Regards @Qwirkle: Not sure what you mean. Keith-264 (talk) 16:39, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

I really don't know Adobe. I would assume that the default text size is whatever it's set to when first opened, but if it remembers that setting after closing then who knows? Factotem (talk) 07:46, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

For certain electronic references, it is easier to give up completely on conventional page numberings. On some, chapter, paragraph, and sentence doesn’t even work well, because of inconsistency in paragraph notation. If the thing is searchable, the easiest way to tag it is with a unique sentence, phrase, or clause nearby. Qwirkle (talk) 16:47, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks; it might be easier to buy the %(*"er. ;O) Keith-264 (talk) 16:57, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Free War

This new article (started in September) is basically just a translation of the short Fria kriget article from the Swedish Wikipedia. This article needs help to fit here, but in what direction? I'm even unsure about its name. While Google Translate has Fria kriget as "Free war", I'm not sure this is correct. Should "War" really be capitalized? Is it better identified as "warfare" rather than "war"? Should "Free" be better translated as "independent", "detached", "irregular", or even "guerrilla"? I understand that it's a defined subject in Swedish, but is it recognized in English enough to merit its own article? --A D Monroe III^(talk) 22:28, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

I am not sure the sourcing is enough for this to be a stand alone. This is just the Swedish military's doctrinal name for (basically) Asymmetric warfare.Slatersteven (talk) 10:07, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

It appears to be a little more than just asymmetric warfare; it's something regular soldiers were trained for -- acting on their own initiative to disrupt or harass after being cut off from their chain-of-command by an invading enemy. But, as noted, the sources are poor; they are primary sources, in Swedish, and -- if the article text is an indication -- may be poorly translated. I agree we need something better to salvage this. --A D Monroe III^(talk) 22:40, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Frankly I just this this as a merge, not a stand alone (at this time).Slatersteven (talk) 22:57, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Read like Auxiliary Units, a Stay-behind formation.Slatersteven (talk) 08:58, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Category:Victorian-era corvettes of Germany

The scope of the Category:Victorian-era corvettes of Germany is currently "for corvettes designed, built, or operated by Germany during the Victorian era (approximately 1837–1901).". The problem is, the German Empire did not exist before January 1871. Therefore I propose that the category's scope be changed to "for corvettes designed, built, or operated by Germany during the Victorian era (1871–1901)". Other similar ship type categories to be treated in the same way. Vessels not in service in 1871 to be removed from said categories. Discuss. Mjroots (talk) 09:58, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Looks like there's a discussion at Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2020_February_28#Category:Victorian-era_naval_ships_by_country that may result in this being changed to "19th-century [ships] of... [nation]" for all non-British Empire nations - Dumelow (talk) 10:16, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

In which case, "19th-century ships of Germany" would only cover those vessels in service during the perion 1871-1900. Ships in service before then would be in a category for the relevant country, such as the Kingdom of Hanover, Duchy of Oldenburg, Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Kingdom of Prussia etc. Mjroots (talk) 11:37, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps "19th-century ships of the German Empire" would be more specific? Before 1871, the words "Germany" and "German" were used to define a cultural and linguistic area. Alansplodge (talk) 14:24, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Good article review needed for Veterans benefits for post-traumatic stress disorder in the United States

I nominated Veterans benefits for post-traumatic stress disorder in the United States for a Good Article Review. WP:MILHIST is an interested WikiProject for the article. If you (anyone reading this) could conduct the GA review, that would be awesome! :0) I nominated it under the Culture, sociology and psychology subtopic. If you have not conducted a good article review before, take a look at the good article reviewer instructions to see what is involved. If you decide to conduct the review (thank you!), please be sure to read Markworthen/Veterans-benefits-GA-nom where I provide some important history/background info about the article, e.g., 2015 SME (subject matter experts) review; WP:MILHIST's very helpful advice, including superb suggestions from AustralianRupert; 2015 GA nomination feedback; 2019 Peer Review; 2020 Guild of Copy Editors review, etc. Much appreciated - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I'm a man—traditional male pronouns are fine.) 16:37, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

The Bugle: Issue CLXVIII, April 2020

Your Military History Newsletter

Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results
Articles: Last month's new featured and A-class content
Book review: Hawkeye7 looks at the logistics behind the Crusades and the USAF's early Cold War nuclear deterrant

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) 05:21, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Help re-assessing Milhist Indian task force articles copyedited by the GOCE

G'day all, GOCE are conducting a one week blitz focussed on our Indian task force articles with b4=n. They are making big inroads in the 63 articles in that category. Their progress is at Wikipedia:WikiProject Guild of Copy Editors/Blitzes/April 2020. If you have a chance, could you take a look at the ones that have been done and re-assess them, particularly against b4, but more generally. I've done the the articles completed up to now, but another couple of editors taking a look each day would be great. The blitz ends on the 18th. Thanks, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:51, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Notability question

Does Caspar Goodrich pass notability? All I see is that there was a ship named after him and his father, and he was only a lieutenant, doesn't seem to have gotten wide coverage anywhere. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 19:10, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

It does not seem notable to me. I vote for PRODing or AfDing the article. I question if a ship would be named for both his father, Rear Admiral Goodrich AND for Lieutenant Caspar Goodrich. -Fnlayson (talk) 02:44, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

DANFS confirms it was named after both, but I don't think that confers notability on the son, the father is notable due to rank. I would PROD it in the first instance. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:48, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Doesn't meet WP:SOLDIER or WP:GNG. Mztourist (talk) 09:27, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Article Question

Hi all, I'm a copyeditor for the Guild, participating in the Blitz focusing on Milhist-themed articles. As part of the blitz, I'm working on the article Modern Sub Machine Carbine, but was wondering if it should be Modern Submachine Carbine. (Two words to one). Before I moved it, I thought I'd ask y'all to see if there is some consensus to keep it two words. Thanks! --Puddleglum ^2.0_{(How's my driving?)} 21:26, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi Puddleglum2.0, it appears this is a proper name (given the use of the name and initialisation MSMC throughout and in the sources). Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:22, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Thank you! --Puddleglum ^2.0_{(How's my driving?)} 14:28, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Award citations

I noticed that a number of articles on recipients of some awards such as the Medal of Honor or the Victoria Cross give the full, often lengthy citation. For example, in Bennie G. Adkins that's about as much prose as the rest of the article combined. For other awards such as Hero of the Soviet Union, the various grades of the Legion of Honor or the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross no citations appear to be given (at least I couldn't find any examples). I wonder whether, firstly, there is a rationale why the citations appear to only be given for awards by English-speaking countries, and secondly, whether the citations shouldn't be considered problematic in general since a large part of those articles is based on a single primary source instead of on secondary sources as articles generally should be. For the Param Vir Chakra there might even be copyright issues since at least the website cited as a source for Manoj Kumar Pandey says that permission must be obtained by mail, which isn't compatible with CC BY-SA. Thoughts? Huon (talk) 00:58, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Such citations are normally quoted when they are available, but this is not always the case. The citation length can vary greatly, even for the same award. There are no copyright issues; text can be quoted under fair use. See WP:COPYQUOTE. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 01:11, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Agree, citations are usually quoted where available. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:55, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Source review requested

G'day all, Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Operation Rösselsprung (1944)/archive1 (my nom) just needs a source review to get over the line. If you have a few spare minutes please take a look. Your help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 06:50, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

This has been done, thanks to Factotem. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 02:57, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Korean Air Lines Flight 007

Korean Air Lines Flight 007, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for a community 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. AIRcorn (talk) 03:24, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Women as warriors

There is a discussion about whether to remove the section of the article Warrior on women warriors on the talk page. The section isn't a fine specimen of encyclopaedic writing and legitimately could be culled as a bold edit but it will leave a coverage hole. There is material to fill this out there but I'm not interested enough in the article (which could do with a total rewrite) to tackle it at present. Any assistance welcome. Monstrelet (talk) 08:21, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Tom Moore

Many of you will have seen Tom Moore (soldier) in the news; he is fundraising for NHS charities and has (so far) raised £7.85 million. Perhaps some of you can flesh out his military record, and add the medals he is seen wearing in [22]? Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 16:25, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

1939–1945 Star, Burma Star, War Medal 1939-1945. Woody (talk) 19:29, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I have added a few wikilinks to the article. Some details of the 9th DWR are in Valentine Infantry Tank 1938–45 (p. 92)]. Alansplodge (talk) 19:39, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

But there's conflicting information in The Fighting Tykes: An Informal History of the Yorkshire Regiments in the Second World War which says that the 9th (146 RAC) didn't arrive in Burma until "the end of 1944" and took part in the Battle of Ramree Island, too late for our Arakan Campaign 1942–43 article. Alansplodge (talk) 19:52, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Article amended per the "Fighting Tykes" article. Alansplodge (talk) 09:11, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

I've added some detail from the Gazette relating to his early career with the Duek of Wellington's Regiment, but have found nothing from after his transfer to the Royal Armoured Corps - Dumelow (talk) 10:04, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Sourcing medal entitlements from photographs is essentially OR. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 11:50, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

I take your point, but given that the qualification for the Burma Star is "1 day of operational service in the army in the above qualifying areas [i.e. Burma]", the War Medal 1939-1945 "is awarded to all full time personnel of the armed forces wherever they were serving" and the 1939 to 1945 Star "is awarded to personnel who completed operational service overseas between 3 September 1939 and 8 May 1945 (2 Sept 1945 in Far East)", [23] and we have several references that he fought in the Burma Campaign, then those are the medals that he would inevitably have been awarded: Wikipedia:You don't need to cite that the sky is blue. Alansplodge (talk) 11:29, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

I disagree. All of the medals should be able to be attributed to specific text. We don't have a cite photograph template for a reason. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:57, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Page movements

Komić killings and Golubić killings both seem to have been moved from Komić massacre and Golubić massacre, by 3E1I5S8B9RF7 with the comment "Not labelled as massacre by reliable sources". However, both articles still start with "The ____ massacre". Could someone with knowledge of the topic weigh in on whether it should be called a massacre or not? Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 22:49, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

@Peacemaker67: You might be able to help? -Indy beetle (talk) 06:49, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

There are few reliable sources on these two events, but Balkan Insight [24] [25] uses "killings" in both instances. The indictments called them murders. I think killings is fine, the lead and body text needs to be changed to reflect the titles. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 08:29, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Potential issues with US Medal of Honor citations

You guys might want to take a look at Talk:Donald Sloat#Medal of Honor citation. It seems very possible we may have similarly-incorrect citations for other MoH recipients whose articles were sourced from that same army.mil page. And looking into this issue is complicated by the fact that nearly every one of our articles on Vietnam-era recipients that includes the citation (Webster Anderson, to pick one of many examples) cites it to broken links at [26] or [27]. -Elmer Clark (talk) 21:45, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes unfortunately the ACMH seems to have reordered/hidden many of its resources. Mztourist (talk) 10:39, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)

Does anyone know why sfn's with |ref=harv are getting CS1 error notices? Should they be replaced by |ref={{harvid|Some bloke|some date}} or removed altogether? Regards Keith-264 (talk) 14:32, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Keith-264, It appears that after an update |ref=harv became the CS1 default per this discussion, so the ending is redundant, and can be removed. Perhaps Trappist the monk can clarify if I'm mistaken. Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 14:41, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Also see Help talk:Citation Style 1 § make ref=harv the default for CS1 Eddie891 ^Talk _Work 14:42, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Always a good place to look for answers to cs1|2 questions is WT:CS1. |ref=harv is now the default state for all cs1|2 templates so the |ref=harv parameter-value pair is superfluous. The maint cat is there so that editors can find where |ref=harv is used and either remove that parameter or choose a more appropriate value.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:43, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks very much. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 14:51, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Oh, if there are several authors will it make a difference? Keith-264 (talk) 14:52, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean. With or without |ref=harv, cs1|2 templates will build an anchor ID from the first four contributor, or author, or editor surnames (in that order but never mixed) and the year portion of the |date= parameter. Assuming same capitalization, same spelling, same name-order, and same year, the short-form templates will create a link to the full citation.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 18:40, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

When I tried ref = harv with more than one author I couldn't make it work but that was in the past, it might be different now because the change , I'll have a go. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 20:30, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

You may get warnings when anchors are not required, as in the section above. Use |ref=none to suppress this. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:35, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, the ref = { { harvid | some bloke | some date} } I've looked at don't have CS1 warnings; is that something that will change? Regards Keith-264 (talk) 21:17, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

The maint messages are not warnings. They are merely messages that the templates emit so that editors will know where to find those template that have superfluous |ref=harv parameter/value pairs. Because |ref={{sfnref|<name>|<year}} is not |ref=harv, the templates don't emit any messages about that. Usually |ref={{sfnref|<name>|<year}} is not needed; the link from a properly formed short-form template to a cs1|2 template with matching names and date will work fine without {{sfnref}}.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 21:59, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Ta but I've never written sfnref, only sfn. Regards Keith-264 (talk) 23:06, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

{{sfnref}} is the canonical name for {{harvid}} (a redirect).

—Trappist the monk (talk) 23:12, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

GA reassessment: Outremer

Outremer, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for a community 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. Borsoka (talk) 03:53, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Is the term "battle for the railways" used in English historiography for WWII sabotage?

In Polish historiography there's a term pl:Bitwa o szyny (battle for the railways), referring to the sabotage of the communication (primarily, rail) infrastructure by the partisans against the Nazis during WWII. But I can't seem to find a corresponding term in the English literature? What would be a good English name for such a stub if I was to create it (or does it already exist)? Use Polish term, effectively introducing it to the English discourse, or use descriptive term such as Railway sabotage during World War II? (Sample RS in Polish: Krzysztof Komorowski (2009). Boje polskie 1939-1945: przewodnik encyklopedyczny. Bellona. pp. 40–. ISBN 978-83-11-10357-3.; Stanisław Kania (1986). Polska gwara konspiracyjno-partyzancka, 1939-1945. Państwowe Wydawn. Nauk. p. 130. ISBN 978-83-01-06619-2.; the term even is used in Polish encyclopedias Kazimierz Sobczak (1975). Encyklopedia II wojny światowej. Wydaw. Min. Obrony Narodowej. p. 70.; online so you can Machine Translate that one) Ps. I found the term War of the Rails used in the context of the Soviet partisans, Phillip W. Blood (October 2006). Hitler's Bandit Hunters: The SS and the Nazi Occupation of Europe. Potomac Books, Inc. pp. 101–. ISBN 978-1-59797-021-1., Alexander Hill (10 December 2008). The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, 1941-45: A Documentary Reader. Routledge. pp. 212–. ISBN 978-1-135-76526-2., Alexander Hill (2017). The Red Army and the Second World War. Cambridge University Press. pp. 281–. ISBN 978-1-107-02079-5., but Polish historiography uses it more broadly, certainly applying it to the actions of the Polish resistance, not just Soviet. My gut feeling is that the term originated in Soviet historiography, was translated into English at that point, and than got adapted in a wider meaning by the Polish historiography, but that's OR. Also, see The Battle of the Rails, a French movie about French WWII rail sabotage. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 02:53, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

I'm seeing nothing much in English for "battle for the railways" or "battle of the railways" with regards to WWII sabotage, except in relation to the French movie. It has other uses, though, mostly in economic initiatives or corporate rivalries and the like. If you're writing an article on Railway sabotage during World War II in Poland, then go ahead and use the term Polish historiography uses. If you're writing one more broadly, I'd say stick with the descriptive term. -Indy beetle (talk) 06:47, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

I haven't seen this term used. English language works tend to refer to 'Railway sabotage in [country/region]', and I'd suggest using that formulation. I agree that it's a significant gap in our coverage. Nick-D (talk) 08:36, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

I would interpret "Battle for the railways" in a military context as an offensive aimed at capturing the railway network (compare Battle for Henderson Field, Battle for the A-9 highway, Battle for Jalibah Airfield…) rather than as being about railway sabotage. I agree that "Railway sabotage in [area]" would be a less ambiguous term. ‑ Iridescent 09:08, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Hmmm, I do not know the term either. The closed thing I have found on Wikipedia was Transport Plan (but that was more bombing it to smithereens) and Operation Concert, a campaign connected to the Battle of Smolensk (1943). The Banner talk 10:09, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Ministry of Defence (Somalia)

Can some coding whiz help me with the defence ministers' table here? I would like the first column removed and the second row lined up with all the other rows. Many thanks in advance for your help. Buckshot06 (talk) 02:37, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

@Buckshot06: G'day, Buckshot, I hope you are well. I had a go at this. This is my change here: [28]. Is that what you were hoping for? Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 05:29, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Many thanks. Seems to be fixed. Good luck to you all amid this COVID crisis. Buckshot06 (talk) 06:44, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

AustralianRupert, can I request some "reverse Nui Dat" (UBIQUE!!) aid again? The table at Armed Forces Medical Service Department (Egypt) is still giving me problems.. Buckshot06 (talk) 07:38, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

G'day, I think I've fixed it now. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 08:16, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

WW1 Casualties

Can somebody please do a quick review of the World War I casualties article and see if it is worthy of [29] such a warning? User:The Banner insists that there is an issue (namely the inclusion of events not pertaining to WW1, and his claim is disputed by me), and it would be helpful if an expert can resolve the confusion. 2601:85:C101:BA30:8560:48BC:2A07:81B0 (talk) 23:22, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

My doubts about the reliability is part due to his earlier attempts to make the 1917 Potato riots in Amsterdam (in neutral The Netherlands) and the Easter Rising in Ireland part of the war. Recently the was discussion about the Austro-Hungarian casualties, in which he and somebody else used different versions of the same book resulting in conflicting/unclear numbers. Other instances he made part of the war were the Armenian Genocide, the Maritz rebellion, the 1915 Singapore Mutiny, the Finnish Civil War and many others. Criticism is often countered with annoying behaviour (see this, he has now jumped to his third IP). To my opinion everything has to back fact-checked, or all his edits have to be reverted (this includes his edits with the IP 98.something). The Banner talk 09:20, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the Banner has misstated what's going on. I admit I made an honest mistake with the 1917 Potato riots, and when the Banner brought that issue up, and he was right, I removed it from the chart. The Easter Rising is another matter, which I also removed per his requests. But the Armenian Genocide was part of the losses since before I started editing this page around October (I think) of last year. I have never made any edits regarding the Maritz rebellion, I was only asking in the talk page if the losses there were already in the chart Talk:World War I casualties (because I thought there was a possible discrepancy). I did add losses regarding the Singapore mutiny (since it was part of the Hindu-German conspiracy, and is also in the Template:Campaignbox Asian and Pacific Campaign), and I did add losses regarding the Finnish Civil War because it is considered "part of World War I" in the infobox, and because military losses for Russia only go up to 1917, and thus did not include Finland in 1918. My question still stands, can someone review the article to see if it matches up with Wikipedia standards? 2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2 (talk) 17:48, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

The sheer fact that you brought them up was enough to sow some serious doubt. Just a look at your own talk page is enough to see how many people disagreed with your actions: User talk:98.221.136.220. And also Talk:Easter_Rising#Not_part_of_World_War_1, where you tried to prove your point (and failed). The Banner talk 18:05, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

That doesn't get rid of the fact that you outright lied by saying that I added the Armenian Genocide and Maritz rebellion to the chart. 2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2 (talk) 18:14, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2, can we WP:AGF please! Gog the Mild (talk) 18:18, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

The number of dissenting views is a non sequitur, it isn't a beauty contest; what do the RS say? Keith-264 (talk) 18:23, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Ask the Banner to WP:AGF as well please. Keith-264, I provided reliable sources (and that can be reviewed of course) for every edit I made. If my edits violated some policy that I am unaware of, please WP:AGF, and I would welcome changes and revisions to the article. I think what Banner is driving at is that the article needs to be reviewed by the experts here from this Wikiproject. 2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2 (talk) 18:38, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

I indeed asked a fact check en full review as I do not think the article in the present state is reliable. The Banner talk 18:42, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Just to make things clear, the Banner is "taking issue" with "my" inclusion of the Armenian Genocide, as well as the Maritz rebellion, the Finnish Civil War, and the Singapore Mutiny. Firstly, I was not the one that added the Armenian Genocide into the article. Secondly, I never made any edits on the page regarding the Maritz rebellion, although it actually is part of the South West Africa Campaign of WW1. Thirdly, the Singapore Mutiny is listed in the Template:Campaignbox Asian and Pacific Campaign for WW1, so I'm not the one serendipitously making these connections. And lastly, the Finnish Civil War literally says "part of WW1" in the infobox. Yet the Banner accuses me of wrongly claiming these as part of the war, when in fact other users have already determined them to be part of the war. I'm honestly struggling to assume good faith with the Banner's attacks. And it is factually incorrect (to use a euphemism) to say that I made these events part of WW1. Other users have. 2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2 (talk) 22:19, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

After all your harassment this sounds rather dubious. And in fact, you take infoboxes and campaign boxes as solid proof, instead of the sources. The Banner talk 22:50, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

I haven't been harassing you. Assume good faith. And I don't take infoboxes as solid proof, I'm just saying that these connections which you falsely (I think the word is lie, to be honest) claim I'm making weren't made by me. Other people edited the campaignboxes. Why must I be to blame for their alleged errors? And what sources are you talking about that support anything you say? I've provided a source for every edit I've made. 2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2 (talk) 23:11, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

As far as the wiki pages and campaign boxes mentioned in this discussion, these are user generated and are not reliable sources by themselves. -Fnlayson (talk) 23:53, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. Thus I am not the one originally claiming that they are part of WW1. Other users have. If other users incorrectly made a connection with the war, it isn't my fault necessarily. And if those infoboxes need to be changed, fair enough, just don't blame me. And I will reiterate that I provided sources for every edit I made on the page. If someone would like to check those sources, be my guest. IMO, the Banner may make claims about wording such as "related to," "part of," etc., but he never engages with me on the WW1 casualties talk page, never specifically delineates what exactly warrants inclusion or exclusion, and invariably resorts to simply mocking me, such as here Talk:World War I casualties/Archive 2#Unreliable: "... goody. Houston, we have a problem." Banner, or anyone else for that matter, what exactly is part of WW1 for you? Can you even answer that question without making a derogatory quip? 2601:85:C101:BA30:780A:6933:9DC2:38D2 (talk) 00:26, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Is the article bibliography comprehensive and reliable? Are there any sources not used which also meet those criteria? Keith-264 (talk) 09:47, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Here is a list of sources I used for my edits. It might not be complete (it is lengthy though) because I've made many edits, but it's about as many as I can remember. One or two were already present on the article (which I'll label with an asterisk), some I found on other language versions of Wikipedia, the rest I added:

"Narrative of Their Doings in the Mutiny". The Straits Times. 26 April 1915. p. 12. (46 mutineers killed during 1915 Singapore Mutiny)
Farwell, Bryon (1992), Armies of the Raj: From the Great Indian Mutiny to Independence, 1858–1947, W. W. Norton & Company, ISBN 0-393-30802-2 p. 244 (47 mutineers executed after the 1915 mutiny)
Strachan, Hew (2001), The First World War, I: To Arms, Oxford University Press USA, ISBN 0-19-926191-1 p. 802
http://www.rmslusitania.info/people/lusitania-victims/ (2 Indians killed in sinking of the Lusitania)
Doran, Christine (April 2002). "Gender Matters in the Singapore Mutiny". Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia. 17 (1). (16 civilians killed in 1915 Singapore Mutiny)
Donato, Hernâni "Dicionário das Batalhas Brasileiras" ('Dictionary of Brazilian Battles') (in Portuguese) IBRASA 1987 ISBN 8534800340 Page 153
Francisco Verras; "D.N.O.G.: contribuicao da Marinha Brasileira na Grande Guerra" ("DNOG; the role of Brazilian Navy in the Great War") (in Portuguese) "A Noite" Ed. 1920
(*)Tang, Chi-hua: War Losses and Reparations (China), in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War. (98 civilians killed during Siege of Tsingtao)
Doran, Christine (April 2002). "Gender Matters in the Singapore Mutiny". Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia. 17 (1). (3 civilians killed during 1915 Singapore Mutiny)
Steamer Chaparra, in: uboat.net.
Abbott, G. F. (2008). Greece and the Allies 1914–1922. London: Methuen &Co. ISBN 978-0-554-39462-6. Page 160-161.
Damianos Athanasiou (10 July 2014). "Εγινε χθες η παρασημοφόρηση της ένδοξης σημαίας της 1/38 Διοίκησης Ταγμάτων Εθνοφυλακής Ευζώνων (φωτορεπορτάζ)". Dimokratiki.gr. Retrieved 16 January 2018.
Η Ελλάς του 1910-1920, Γεωργίου Βεντήρη: Αθήνα 1931, Identifier: 000074165, σ.σ.106-131 (listing 12k Greek civilians killed during Bulgarian occupation during WW1)
"Tα ξεχασμένα Νοεμβριανά". Kathimerini (in Greek). 18 November 2006. Archived from the original on 20 July 2011. Retrieved 18 August 2009. (35 killed during the Noemvriana)
https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/caribbean-theater-haiti-and-first-world-war
Shellum, Brian G. African American Officers in Liberia: A Pestiferous Rotation, 1910-1942. University of Nebraska Press, 2018, pp. 108.
"Commission Calls 1916 Tsarist Mass Killings Of Kyrgyz Genocide". Radio Free Europe.
Sokol, Edward Dennis (26 June 2016). The Revolt of 1916 in Russian Central Asia. JHU Press. p. 158. ISBN 9781421420516.
Whyte, Brendan; Whyte, Suthida (2008). "THE INSCRIPTIONS ON THE FIRST WORLD WAR VOLUNTEERS MEMORIAL, BANGKOK" (PDF). Journal of the Siam Society. 96: 175–192. Retrieved 29 August 2018.
Traxel, David (2006). Crusader Nation: The United States in Peace and the Great War, 1898-1920. Random House, Inc., New York. ISBN 9780375724657
"THE BLACK TOM EXPLOSION.; FOUR BODIES FOUND THE SUPERINTENDENT MISSING". The New York Times. 18 January 1875. Retrieved 5 June 2019.
(*)Prost, Antoine: War Losses, in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.
"Causes of war death 1918 according to the political affiliation of the killed persons". War victims in Finland, 1914-22. Retrieved 7 December 2019.
The Blockade of Germany after the Armistice 1918–1919 Bane, S.L. 1942 Stanford University Press page 791. (100,000 deaths in 1919 during the continuation blockade)
Gregory, Adrian (2016). "Imperial Capitals at War: A Comparative Perspective". The London Journal. 41 (3): 219–232. (Ottoman civilians killed by Allied strategic bombing)
"Six unexpected WW1 battlegrounds". BBC World Service. BBC. 26 November 2014. Retrieved 12 July 2016.
Schatkowski Schilcher, Linda: The famine of 1915-1918 in Greater Syria, in: Spagnolo, John P. (ed.): Problems of the modern Middle East in historical perspective, Ithaca 1993: Cornell University Press, pp. 229-258.
Tucker, Spencer C. (2006). World War I: A Student Encyclopedia. New York: ABC-CLIO. p. 113. ISBN 9781851098798.
Bjarnason, Gunnar Þór (2015). Þegar siðmenningin fór til fjandans. Íslendingar og stríðið mikla 1914–1918. pp. 236–38, 288–89.
Faber, Ernest (1932). Luxemburg im Kriege 1914–1918 (in German). Mersch. p. 155.
Lith, Hans van. Plotseling een vreselijke knal. Zaltbommel: Europese Bibliotheek, 2001, pp. 176–177. (862 fisherman killed by the German U-boat Campaign)
Lith, Hans van. Plotseling een vreselijke knal, pp. 91–95. (3 civilians killed by accidental British bombing)
http://www.rmslusitania.info/people/lusitania-victims/ (persian civilians killed on the lusitania)
Ward, Steven R. (2014). Immortal, Updated Edition: A Military History of Iran and Its Armed Forces. Georgetown University Press. ISBN 9781626160651., p.123: "As the Great War came to its close in the fall of 1918, Iran's plight was woeful. The war had created an economic catastrophe, invading armies had ruined farmland and irrigation works, crops and livestock were stolen or destroyed, and peasants had been taken from their fields and forced to serve as laborers in the various armies. Famine killed as many as two million Iranians out of a population of little more than ten million while an influenza pandemic killed additional tens of thousands."
"Olof Palme (1884 -1918). Mannen som kunde ha blivit en svensk fascistledare". Dagens Nyheter (in Swedish). 26 November 1995. Retrieved 3 January 2016.
"Name lists on war victims". War victims in Finland, 1914-22. Retrieved 7 December 2019.
"Gefallen 1916 an der Dreisprachenspitze". www.suedostschweiz.ch (in German). Retrieved 9 December 2018.

That is every source I have added. 2601:85:C101:BA30:F1E3:ADCE:985E:A4DB (talk) 17:26, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

So you speak Dutch, Swedish, German and Greek? Or did you just copy away? And about calculating, see this. I will not respond for a couple of day, as this joking is getting under my skin. The Banner talk 18:30, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Ah, another meaningless comment by a user that delights in harassing. Does anyone else have a comment, negative or positive, about the sources? 2601:85:C101:BA30:F412:D64B:B959:89A6 (talk) 23:43, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

If no one here makes any statement or criticism on the sources or supports or refutes the Banner's allegations, then I will remove the tag from the page. His statements are unfounded and untrue, so this is a waste of time. 2601:85:C101:BA30:B516:347A:7B47:EF3C (talk) 18:23, 20 April 2020 (UTC)

Somebody found enough reason to revert all your edits. So yes, there is criticism on your edits. The Banner talk 13:31, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

WW1 Casualties

Can someone other than the Banner please see if the WW1 casualties article needs to be reverted back to its mid-2019 version. It seems like WP:HOUNDING and vandalism at this point. 2601:85:C101:BA30:85AA:4FD2:627D:4738 (talk) 13:45, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

What I see is an IP editwarring to keep ownership of the article and harassing (again!). The Banner talk 13:52, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

I have done none of that. I see a user that has repeatedly lied (by claiming I added the Armenian Genocide to the aticle) in order to block constructive editing from the article. Not to mention WP:HOUNDING. 2601:85:C101:BA30:85AA:4FD2:627D:4738 (talk) 13:56, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Are you sure?? The Banner talk 13:58, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I was trying to undo your unreasoned reversion of the article back to mid-2019. So I see you accept the fact that you lied... 2601:85:C101:BA30:8DDC:7F16:6AF8:3E8A (talk) 14:32, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

And more harassment. It does not work to quickly change of IP for that. The Banner talk 14:52, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Well I mean you did say I added the Armenian Genocide when I didn't. Call it whatever you want, a mistruth or a lie. And also thanks to your mass revision, World War I casualties now lists Africa as part of the Allied powers. Great job buddy. Vandalism, perhaps? 2601:85:C101:BA30:F560:9BEB:9934:76C6 (talk) 15:47, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Instead of edit warring how about making a case at the talk page?Slatersteven (talk) 15:50, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

I am. I would appreciate if other users chipped in to resolve this issue. I hope people here don't think that the continent of Africa is an Allied power, as the Banner recently made it so on the article. 2601:85:C101:BA30:F560:9BEB:9934:76C6 (talk) 16:20, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

United States Navy environmental protection award pennant

Hi! Wonder if some editors here might be able to lend a hand to this article? Maybe some context on what the pennant means. Know it's not a copyvio issue as it's likely PD-Gov but it's copied from somewhere that doesn't make the context clear at all. Thanks! StarM 21:48, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikipedia:The 50,000 Destubbing Challenge Focus of the Week

Just to announce that this is running from May 1 to July 26. It's not a full blown contest but there is a planned £20 (c.$25) worth of Amazon vouchers each week for destubbing (stub eliminating) articles. If anybody wants to contribute and raise something to buy books to contribute to military history feel free to sign up and contribute. There is a different regional focus for each of the 12 weeks, though 4 or 5 are British oriented given that it's a WMUK endeavour and one week, June 15 - 21 focuses entirely on UK and Ireland castles and country houses. I've otherwise kept it open to all topics each week though, so somebody could technically win something each week simply by improving articles related to military history. The openness of it also means that nobody has to commit to doing it for all weeks of the 12, and can have a break when they want it or opt out of the focus. Thanks.† Encyclopædius 15:13, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for letting us know. No doubt some of our members will particpate along the way. Regards, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 23:57, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

American Civil War unit naming conventions

I know there's been plenty of discussion on this in the past but I think we need some ACW users to weigh in on establishing more specificity re: ACW unit naming conventions. This is prompted by a wave of ongoing page moves by Hhfjbaker. I requested on his talk page that he hold off until there's some consensus. Back when this cropped up in 2010 I was a big proponent of using the "official", i.e. full 19th century naming convention. At this point, I don't much care what is used provided it's consistent. With the present changes some units are getting dates in the title, some are not. Just looking for consistency. Thoughts? Suggestions? Thanks. Historical Perspective 2 (talk) 17:22, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

The first discussion where an outcome resulted was this 2008 discussion, where Kirill Lokshin referenced the then-new guideline WP:MILMOS#UNITNAME, which says to use, in cases "where a formal name is not commonly employed by historians, the most common name used in historical literature." The original post in this thread references this discussion. The majority of historians do not use the 19th century word order, and that so the consensus has shifted to, for example, titles such as 74th Indiana Infantry Regiment for the majority of articles. Kentucky and Massachusetts regiment articles are the major outliers here. In most books from the last 25 years about Civil War battles, regiments tend to be referred to in the format of, for example "74th Indiana" or "74th Indiana Infantry" in text, dispensing with even mentioning the 19th century official designation. For example, see books by Gordon C. Rhea [30], Peter Cozzens [31], Stephen W. Sears [32], Allen C. Guelzo [33], and Larry J. Daniel [34], among many others. It seems to me that if style guidelines are generally to be followed across the articles within the scope of the project, then we should follow the usage in history books about the Civil War, which is to title articles in the format exemplified by 74th Indiana Infantry Regiment. 'Volunteer' can be omitted because it seems that most historians don't mention it as most Union regiments were called 'volunteer', and 'regiment' appended in order to distinguish units in states that also had battalions with nearly the same designation (mostly a Confederate States Army issue). I'll note that I originally thought 'regiment' generally superfluous for Union regiments, but discussions such as this one in 2018 seem to show that other users would prefer appending regiment in all cases.

So, is it okay to undo the moves I made?Hhfjbaker (talk) 18:20, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
- Kges1901 convinced me with his/her interpretation of guideline WP:MILMOS#UNITNAME. I really do not think reverting my changes should be qa problem.Hhfjbaker (talk) 18:38, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Let's hold off on any further moves until other users comment in this discussion. You aren't the first to do mass moves and I'd like to have a clear consensus here to avoid further issues like this. Kges1901 (talk) 20:15, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

As to the appending of dates in titles, that appears to have been an attempt at disambiguating between Spanish-American War units and Civil War units. In that case I'd say that the Civil War unit should be the primary topic with a hatnote pointing to the Spanish-American War unit since most state volunteer units in 1898 didn't see combat and as a result have much less coverage than Civil War units that they shared designations with. Kges1901 (talk) 17:40, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Thanks, Kges1901. I agree with that. The Civil War unit should be the primary with a hatnote (with Massachusetts we also need to differentiate from Rev War units of the same or similar name). So, the dates that have been added to article titles should be removed (i.e. the article name changed). But aside from the dates, I guess I'm okay with the names as changed. Maybe just a little sorry to see the full name of the unit go. And keeping "regiment" is important with Massachusetts as there were instances of "4th Battalion" and "4th Regiment" etc. Historical Perspective 2 (talk) 20:04, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

To clarify, I meant to remove the dates from the Civil War unit and keep the date on the Spanish-American War unit. Kges1901 (talk) 20:15, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

I continue to consider that Regiment should be appended to all ACW regiment titles to avoid potential confusion. For the rest I bow to the greater knowledge of the ACW specialists. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 00:05, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

What's the deal with Sibiu/Hermannstadt during the Battle of Transylvania?

One of the most confusing aspects of my research, is the Romanian occupation of this city during the Battle of Transylvania in 1916.

Some sources do not even state that the city was occupied, but I found the likely reason for this. I have multiple sources that attest a Romanian occupation of the city on 2 September 1916, including the New York Times newspaper issued on the following day. The reason why this place is stated as unoccupied by some sources is the sheer briefness of the occupation. The International Military Digest shed light on this by stating that while Romanian advanced troops occupied the city on 2 September, they evacuated the place on the following day, so, 1-day occupation - very easy to overlook, you blink and you miss it, as they say. What makes this scenario all but certain is that Erich Ludendorff himself states this in his memoirs: "Kronstadt and Petrozseny, with their coal mines, were occupied as early as August 29. Rumanian patrols were soon seen in Hermannstadt.". I find "soon" to be an acceptable description of the 29 August to 2 September time span, so this scenario is most likely the case. But, it isn't all...

In a WW1 almanac, I found a statement that Sibiu was occupied by Romanian Army on 6 September, but no further details. I paid little mind to this, since it was just a single source...Until recently when I found a second one which says the same thing. Thus, this scenario became a somewhat legitimate contender for the 2 September one. As a side note, I looked over some maps of the area during that time. The Romanians occupied villages astride Sibiu, to both east and west. A horizontal line drawn between two such points cuts off the southern half/third of the city as it appears on the map, and I highly doubt that the Romanians went out of their way to avoid going through the city. As a note, all these above-mentioned sources use the name "Hermannstadt".

So why all the fuss? Cause Sibiu is kind of a big deal, as a former capital of Transylvania. It is practically certain that Romanians occupied it, sources that state otherwise failed to notice the 1-day Romanian occupation on 2-3 September, as well as the NYT edition of the following day and Ludendorff's own statement in his memoirs. Southern chunks of it were almost certainly occupied by the Romanians afterwards, but to what extent and for how long, I don't know. The 6 September scenario is still largely a mystery to me. If anyone can help bring more clarity to this, I'd greatly appreciate it. Transylvania1916 (talk) 13:32, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

I have tried to carefully read through your description several times, and your conclusions sound reasonably solid.

But you're treading right on the edge of WP:ORIGINALRESEARCH. While we always want to work out what actually happened, our job is not to be the historians, our job is follow along and mirror most of what the historical consensus is, while noting major, significant outliers, as reflected in other historical sources, if any. Your descriptions sound like you're right on the edge of writing an academic article. If you wish to do that, feel free to talk to Hawkeye7 and Simon_Harley (care of the Dreadnought Project, not here). But here, for Wikipedia, you are pushing beyond what the limits of the secondary sources say, into interpretation of primary sources. So take a step back and leave the ambiguities unresolved - unless you want our experts' help to get a paper published.. Buckshot06 (talk) 09:35, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Well, the consensus in this case is definitely the 2 September: more and better-quality sources attest this. Rest assured, any further details that I might get, I will verify and make sure to find it in a book. If I won't be able, I won't add them. Transylvania1916 (talk) 14:28, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

Egyptian hospital ships

Can I get some help from our holders of up-to-date editions of Jane's, Conway's etc? At Armed Forces Medical Service Department (Egypt) some imported, uncited data claims that Egypt has 3 hospital ships and some hospital barges. Was this true in the 1990s maybe? Can anybody provide some more information from the gold standard sources? Buckshot06 (talk) 05:49, 23 April 2020 (UTC)

No mention of any such vessels in the 2002–2003 Jane's Fighting Ships.Nigel Ish (talk) 19:50, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

or the 1998 Combat Fleets.Nigel Ish (talk) 19:52, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Anyone have access to Jane's?

Hello Milhist! I'm working on 2020 coronavirus pandemic on Charles de Gaulle, the French aircraft carrier, and there's an article in Jane's that looks like it could be quite useful.

Specifically, it ought to at a minimum provide details on what ships were in the carrier's battle group at the time they were forced to head to port due to the coronavirus pandemic. This would be useful because it's weirdly difficult to figure out exactly what ships were in the carrier battle group at that time vs. the ships that first deployed to the Middle East. More info over at WP:RX#Jane's Navy International article. Thank you! Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 19:43, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Links attached or accessible via Alindien in the Indian Ocean with their support ships, particularly the unrep/command ship Marne (fr:BCR_Marne_(Pétrolier-Ravitailleur)) may be useful. Buckshot06 (talk) 21:10, 24 April 2020 (UTC)