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Summary of Military history WikiProject open tasks watch · edit · full list News and announcements Tranche XXIV of the WikiProject coordinators has been elected. The October newsletter is now available. Editors are advised that Featured Articles promoted before 2016 are in need of review, if you had an article promoted to Featured status on or before 2016 please check and update your article before they are listed at FAR/C. Current discussions No major discussions are open at the moment Featured article candidates Boot Monument • Teddy Wynyard • Siege of Breteuil Featured article review Byzantine Empire • Edward I of England • Northrop YF-23 • Isaac Brock • Pre-dreadnought battleship Featured picture candidates Thorsten Nordenfelt A-Class review Lockheed YF-22 • USS Texas (BB-35) • John S. McCain Sr. • Project Pluto Peer reviews Sher Shah Suri • Rwandan genocide • Battle of Chunj • War of the Antiochene Succession Good article nominees Mohammad Shah Qajar • Battle of Ekiokpagha • Simon Stuart (general) • Dabney Coleman • Crusading movement • Black and Tans • Ottoman destroyer Yarhisar • Regency of Algiers • History of the Regency of Algiers • Perdiccas • Ziaur Rahman • Pierre François Bauduin • Federalist No. 29 • Mongol invasion of Khorasan • HMS Sheffield (C24) • Charles the Bold • James Alexander Ulio • Central Powers • Short Sunderland in New Zealand service • Te Pōrere Redoubts • Aromal Chekavar • Tumu Crisis • 1838 Mormon War • Mseilha Fort • SMS Albatross (1871) • Shō Hashi • Charles Brenton Fisk • HMS Savage (1910) • HMS Diamond (1816) • SMS Brummer (1884) Good article reassessments Battle of Plataea • Mehmed II's Albanian campaign • USS Texas (BB-35) • Hans-Ulrich Rudel • Haile Selassie • Joseph McCarthy Articles that need... work on referencing and citation (149,085) • only work on referencing and citation (43,219) • work on coverage and accuracy (124,590) • only work on coverage and accuracy (19,914) • work on structure (31,946) • only work on structure (335) • work on grammar (8,182) • only work on grammar (46) • work on supporting materials (33,015) • only work on supporting materials (1,291) • assessment (2) • assessment as lists (0) • project tags fixed (6) • assessment checklists added (0) • assessment checklists completed (0) • task forces added (2) • attention to task force coverage (654)

Raul Escribano

Would someone mind taking a look at Raul Escribano and assessing it? Article was just created by a new editor, who for some reason added a {{Edit protected}} to the article's talk page. I think the creator might be mistaking the template as a way to protect the article from being edited by others. Anyway, I'm also not quite sure if this soldier's rank or the positions he has held are sufficient for WP:SOLDIER. -- Marchjuly (talk) 07:36, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

@Marchjuly: As a brigadier general, he is notable enough under WP:SOLDIER. You may be right about the template. TeriEmbrey (talk) 18:29, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification about WP:SOLDIER TeriEmbrey. The template was removed by another editor. Also, thanks to anyone who saw my original post and did some clean up on the article. -- Marchjuly (talk) 20:51, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Based upon c:User talk:Marchjuly#Raul Escribano Image, it appears that Erik4j has declared a WP:COI and may have actually been ordered by his superiors to create the article about Escribano. This is an interesting case, so I'm not sure if anything needs to be done with respect to this other than perhaps advise Erik4j relevant policies/guidelines that relate to COI editing and point him to a page like WP:PSCOI. Anyone come across this kind of thing before? Could this be considered a form of paid editing? -- Marchjuly (talk) 11:13, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

@Marchjuly: This is correct. I work for BG Escribano as an office assistant and he wanted a wiki page to be created for him. I am in the Air Force as an E-5 assigned to a joint position under him, but to my understanding, the term soldier is used for any Army member much like for the Air Force, Airman is used for any individual Air Force member. I apologize if I have mad editing errors but I am not terribly keen on how this editing format works. My boss has a fear that the "anyone can edit wiki" will maybe mess with his public information, so to alleviate that, I did add the edit protection with the understanding that it stops edits without references. The general gave me a task and I'm trying to get this done as best as possible. I used the template from Malcolm Frost's wiki page as a guideline and edited the information to match BG Escribano. Let me know how I can fix any issues! Thanks for your help, it is greatly appreciated! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Erik4j (talk • contribs) 1 December 2016 (UTC+9) (UTC)

Thanks Erik4j. Your boss is correct that the "anyone can edit wiki" means anyone can edit the wiki, including his page ... if he's been a bad boy that might indeed mess with his image. He needs to understand that he does not own the article and has no control over its destiny. You need to read WP:PSCOI and WP:COI and, ideally, make suggestions for change on the talk page of the article and not to the article itself. --Tagishsimon (talk) 00:15, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Hi again Erik4j. In addition to what Tagishsimon posted above, you might also want to take a look at Wikipedia:An article about yourself isn't necessarily a good thing and Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not because it seems that your boss might have some misconceptions about what Wikipedia is about. Basically, articles can be created and edited by anyone anywhere in the world at anytime. The Wikipedia community has established various policies and guidelines over the years to try and maintain a certain standard, but the project is based upon the collaborative editing of volunteers who want to contribute to helping to build the encyclopedia. Wikipedia encourages its editors to be bold, but also wants them to establish a consensus through discussion when there are disagreements. COI editing is not something expressly prohibited by Wikipedia, but it is something which is highly discouraged by the community. Wikipedia articles are intended to be written in our own words in a neutral manner and article content is supposed to reflect what independent, reliable sources say about the subject; articles are not only supposed to reflect what the subject (or those connected to the subject) wants the world to know. Since many COI editors tend to be pretty concerned with the subject's image and portraying it in a certain way, an article can quickly devolve into something too promotional for Wikipedia purpose. When this happens, other editors will step in and clean up the article accordingly. FWIW, Escribano satisfies Wikipedia's notability guidelines for military personnel so the article is unlikely to be deleted simply because it was created by a COI editor; it will only be deleted if there is a very strong policy-based reason that cannot be appropriately addressed. Moreover, even though Escribano does not have any final editorial control over the article, there are still things he can do if he has concerns about the article as explained in Wikipedia: Biographies of living persons#Relationship between the subject, the article, and Wikipedia and Wikipedia:Plain and simple conflict of interest guide#What to do when something goes wrong. Also, this WikiProject has lots of dedicated members (many might even have served or still serve in their country's military) who work hard to try and keep military-related articles in accordance with Wikipedia's policies and guidelines and who have much experience with these types of articles, so they can be a good resource for information and assistance.

One last thing, please try to remember to sign your talk page posts. It's considered good talk page practice because it makes it easier for other editors to know who posted what and when. -- Marchjuly (talk) 02:19, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

• Reached out Hi guys, I've reached out to OP as a fellow Air Force member and I'll try to resolve this.--v/r - TP 19:36, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Thanks TParis. Hchc2009 (talk) 19:40, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

I became aware of this article at T:COI. It seems to cry out for more diverse sources and frankly reads like a Defense Department press release. However, as pointed out above, this is 1) unquestionably a notable subject and 2) the subject ordered a subordinate to write about him. Given that this is the military, and not a widget manufacturer, I think this has to be dealt with extra care to avoid unnecessary repercussions in R/L. Coretheapple (talk) 21:26, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

GlobalSecurity.org removals

User:WoKrKmFK3lwz8BKvaB94 has been removing links to several websites on a number of pages. The one relevant to MILHIST is GlobalSecurity.org, and the user is removing it with the edit summary "removing conspiracy theory website www.globalsecurity.org". Has this reasoning been discussed somewhere before? Thanks. - BilCat (talk) 18:06, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

Note, this has also been raised at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard in this thread. Parsecboy (talk) 18:18, 29 November 2016 (UTC)

I have seen that source being deleted in past years as being unreliable. I don't know about it being a conspiracy theory website, because I haven't looked at it for years. However, I do recall it was generally considered not up to Wikipedia standards of a verifiable source.— Maile (talk) 01:36, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

That's my recollection too. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 01:48, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Likewise. GlobalSecurity.org isn't reliable (as it's a random collection of stuff these days, sadly), but I haven't seen it hosting conspiracy theories. Nick-D (talk) 00:27, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

List of National Defence Academy alumni FLC

Having the passed the A-class review, the list is now a FLC. Presently the list is divided as Chief of Staffs (Army, Navy, Air Force), Wartime Award Recipients (PVC, MVC, VC), Peacetime award recipients (AC, KC, SC), but an editor has proposed to revamp the entire structure stating that the present one is complicated to surf, and must be done based on services. Bit I feel that even if the alumni has been divided per the services, again they need to sud-divided among chiefs, wartime and peacetime award recipients, and would be the same as it is, now. I request comments regarding this on the nomination page. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 00:24, 30 November 2016 (UTC)

Stand-alone lists being nominated as Good Articles

FYI

 – Wikipedia talk:Good article nominations#Request for comment on stand-alone lists being nominated as Good Articles

--Redrose64 (talk) 23:02, 1 December 2016 (UTC)

Note that one of the three proposals in this RfC involves creating a separate "Good Lists" rating and process independent of the GA process. BlueMoonset (talk) 18:22, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

New article created about controversial Russian propaganda analysis website -- PropOrNot

• PropOrNot

New article created about controversial Russian propaganda analysis website -- PropOrNot.

Article spun out from content that was growing overweighted at the article Fake news website.

Related to this WikiProject as a group that purports to analyze Russian propaganda and cyberwarfare and psychological warfare.

Could use help and extra eyes due to possible interest from parties on both sides of the political spectrum and potentially from interested parties both in the United States and in Russia.

Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 18:53, 3 December 2016 (UTC)

Can also please use extra eyes at Fake news website. Thank you ! Sagecandor (talk) 00:11, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Style discussion

There is a relevant discussion at talk:Mk 14 Enhanced Battle Rifle. Felsic2 (talk) 03:22, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Nominations for military historian of the year for 2016 now open!

Military historian of the year 2016

• 
  First place
• 
  Second place
• 
  Third place

As we find ourselves fast approaching the end of the year, it is time for us to pause to nominate the editors who we believe have made a real difference to the project. As part of the first step to determining this year's "Military Historian of the Year" award, all Milhist editors are invited to nominate those that they feel deserve a nod of appreciation for their hard work over the past 12 months. The nomination process will last until 23:59 (GMT) on 17 December. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of forteen days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top three editors will be awarded the Gold, Silver and Bronze Wiki respectively; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

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

• [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line, including links in the nomination statement to the most significant articles/lists/images editors have worked on since 1 January 2016. Please keep nomination statements short and concise; excluding links to the articles/list/images in question, the ideal nomination statement should be about 20 words. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalized. Thanks, and good luck! TomStar81 (Talk) 20:24, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Nominations

• Peacemaker67: For their contributions to articles about warships, especially Yugoslavian warships. Iazyges Consermonor Opus meum 21:38, 4 December 2016 (UTC)
• Kges1901: For their consistent and prolific contributions in the area of the military history of the Soviet Union, including a large number of new articles on Heroes of the Soviet Union. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 23:51, 4 December 2016 (UTC)
• Borsoka: For their contributions to articles on Hungarian royalty. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 06:59, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Keith-264: for his contribution to modern trench warfare. --Tagishsimon (talk) 07:10, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• KAVEBEAR: for what they have done with Hawaiian military history. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:12, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Parsecboy: Made several significant contributions to Austria-Hungary military history. Had numerous GAs to credit this year, and also A-Class and featured content. Regards, Krishna Chaitanya Velaga (talk • mail) 08:03, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• AustralianRupert: Knowing that he is not one to garner accolades, I nonetheless nominate him for his work on the battles of the Kokoda Track campaign and particularly the Battle of Isurava - not to mention his many other contributions, both as an editor and co-ordinator. It is always a pleasure to collaborate with him and his manner is an example of leadership are such to which all Wikipedians should aspire. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:17, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Keysanger: for his contributions to Chilean military history, specially warships and cartography.--MarshalN20 ^Talk 15:37, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Hchc2009: for his extensive contributions to Medieval history, most recently his ongoing series on Henry VIII's Device Forts. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 13:58, 6 December 2016 (UTC)
• Hawkeye7: For his ongoing efforts to improve our coverage of the Manhattan Project and nearly everything associated with it (not to mention his efforts as a project coordinator and continued support in the form of MILHIST bot, and help improving other articles through our review processes etc). Anotherclown (talk) 05:04, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
• Nick-D: For still writing high quality content after all these years (including by my incomplete count at least 6 GAs, 4 As, and 1 FA this calendar year - probably others) and his ongoing work for the wider project via the Bugle (and elsewhere of cse). Anotherclown (talk) 05:04, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
• Ian Rose: For his continued high quality content work (especially with our biographies), as well as his ongoing project work as a coordinator and with the Bugle. Anotherclown (talk) 05:04, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
• Auntieruth55: For opening the discussion which lead to consensus the reorganization of the task forces early this year. TomStar81 (Talk) 06:56, 7 December 2016 (UTC)
• MilHistBot For saving us and our fingers from the agony of a 45-60 minute manual closure of A-Class reviews. TomStar81 (Talk) 06:56, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Nominations for military history newcomer of the year for 2016 now open!

Military history newcomer of the year 2016

• 
  First place
• 
  Runners up

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

Like the Military Historian of the Year, the nomination process will last until 23:59 (GMT) on 17 December. After that a new thread will be created and a voting period of seven days will commence during which editors will be able to cast their vote for up to three of the nominees. At the end of this period, the top editor will be awarded the Gold Wiki; all other nominees will receive the WikiProject Barnstar.

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

• [user name]: [reason] ~~~~

Please nominate editors below this line, including links in the nomination statement to the most significant articles/lists/images editors have worked on since 1 January 2016. Please keep nomination statements short and concise; excluding links to the articles/list/images in question, the ideal nomination statement should be about 20 words. Self nominations are frowned upon. Please do not vote until the nominations have been finalized. Thanks, and good luck! TomStar81 (Talk) 20:24, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Nominations

• The Bounder, for Operation Mincemeat and Henry Morgan. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:05, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Krishna Chaitanya Velaga, for their contributions to Indian military history, including today's featured list destroyers of India. (note: has been around for more than a year, but I think it's still within the spirit of this honor) Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:06, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Hammersfan for McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II in UK service, their first Milhist GA (as far as I can tell). Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:11, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Iazyges: Iazyges has been on en WP for a while now, but only joined the project in July this year. If their work on their namesake article Iazyges and on Velites are an indication of things to come, I am impressed and am looking forward to reading and reviewing their future contributions on Roman topics. (NB: no quid pro quo involved here... :-)) Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:14, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Robert Brukner: a new user as of this year (not just to Milhist), Robert has made thousands of edits in writing naval-related lists. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:16, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Mr rnddude: for their efforts in improving Roman military history, like Battle of Antioch (218). Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:19, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• acfrue, for work on Vietnam-war related articles like Operation Game Warden, Operation Homecoming and Operation Market Time. Hawkeye7 (talk) 09:48, 5 December 2016 (UTC)
• Melbguy05: For their consistent efforts to improve the coverage and accuracy of many of our contemporary Australian articles (for instance Special Air Service Regiment, Battle of Aidabasalala, INTERFET and quite a few others). Anotherclown (talk) 05:14, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Netherlands East Indies Forces Intelligence Service

Re: Netherlands East Indies Forces Intelligence Service

Is the above article the same article as at the National Archives (if you search) "NEI Section" 1939 - 1946 H7 [SRD (Services Reconnaissance Department) HQ -] NEI [Netherlands East Indies] Section IASD [Inter-Allied Services Department]. Also the same section as Section "C" in IASD? Adamdaley (talk) 23:21, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

Anybody? Adamdaley (talk) 23:25, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what you're asking - that's probably the issue. If you're using archive material though, there's an overwhelming likelihood that whatever you're writing will fail WP:OR. If there are no WP:RS (published, high quality sources) as there appear not to be, I'd imagine the topic doesn't meet the notability guidelines and should be folded into another article.—Brigade Piron (talk) 23:49, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

In the National Archives (Australia), there is "NEI Section". Which is Netherlands East Indies Section. I am asking if this would be the same as the Netherlands East Indies Forces Intelligence Service? Because if it is the same, I have information stating otherwise which also includes a printed material in a book. Adamdaley (talk) 01:20, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

I guess nobody knows. Adamdaley (talk) 23:42, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Free Syrian Army-related vandalism

Hello guys, we just stopped a Twitter-coordinated, intense 1 hour multiple IPs vandalism on Free Syrian Army.

I would like to add the following. As the Syrian Arab Army are crushing the Free Syrian Army in Aleppo, the SAA supporters will likely rejoice and vandalize a bunch of FSA related articles. Please watch out vandalism on FSA articles this coming days. If something suspicious arise, ask a semi protection on WP:RfPP. Wish you the best ! --Yug (talk) 23:42, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

Excessive ideological references and Cuito Cuanavale

Howzit all.

We have an ongoing discussion here about lacing the text of Battle of Cuito Cuanavale with references to white supremacy. In several new revisions which have been contested by two other contributors in addition to myself, one side of the conflict has been repeatedly described as "white supremacist".

The editor responsible has countered that references to the ideology of South Africa in the day are necessary to help readers understand the conflict. I have contested this. Many people believe the colonial powers espoused a white supremacist ideology, but that doesn't mean we go around to every battle or campaign-related article concerning the Algerian War or the Portuguese Colonial Wars throwing in references to that fact. Ditto for modern African conflicts similar to Cuito Cuanavale, such as the Rhodesian Bush War.

Anyway, some constructive commentary by some more experienced editors would be very much appreciated, as we seem to be at a bit of an impasse here. --Katangais (talk) 01:38, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

2016 Community Wishlist Survey Proposal to Revive Popular Pages

Greetings WikiProject Military history Members!

This is a one-time-only message to inform you about a technical proposal to revive your Popular Pages list in the 2016 Community Wishlist Survey that I think you may be interested in reviewing and perhaps even voting for:

• Fix and improve Mr.Z-bot's popular pages report

If the above proposal gets in the Top 10 based on the votes, there is a high likelihood of this bot being restored so your project will again see monthly updates of popular pages.

Further, there are over 260 proposals in all to review and vote for, across many aspects of wikis.

Thank you for your consideration. Please note that voting for proposals continues through December 12, 2016.

Best regards, Stevietheman — Delivered: 18:04, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Russian military in the battle of Ilovaisk

Hi, MilHist,

We have a problem trying to find a consensus on the Battle of Ilovaisk article. Considering a critical role that Russian military played in the battle, I've proposed to rephrase the wording of the Battle result to a neutral one: "Major defeat of Ukrainian forces" from previous "Decisive DPR victory". This proposal was reverted by EkoGraf (see Diff). It was explained that in battle articles it is the winning side that is usually stated, not the defeated one. But in the same time, EkoGraf denies mentioning Russian military in the Battle result, saying the sources that prove Russian military participation are not good enough. See the article's talk page, where the sources were discussed: Talk:Battle of Ilovaisk.

I'm asking the community's help to participate in our discussion and express its opinion on the topic. --VoidWanderer (talk) 19:21, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Bias and mis-information within the Greco-Italian War article.

I would like to log my dissatisfaction with the blatant bias of this article held ransom by a clique of Greek editors who are misleading the general public into believing that it was a great Greek victory when in fact, the Greek army failed, in the end, to defeat the Italians and on April 22, were forced to sign a formal surrender to General Geloso of the Italian 11th Army. Many authors have confirmed this fact, which is sorely missing from this article and needs to be included.

Something should be done to bring this article to a semblance of fairness and balance. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.215.109.226 (talk) 22:04, 7 December 2016 (UTC)

Military history of the Soviet Union

• Military history of the Soviet Union
• Crossswords (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

User repeatedly removes mention of major events from history from page Military history of the Soviet Union. [1] [2] [3]

Removes all mention of:

1. Berlin Blockade
2. Cuban Missile Crisis
3. Prague Spring

Bit of background:

Same user has history promoting Kremlin-run mouthpiece Russia Today and Sputnik News on page for a five-year-old WP:BLP [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]

Are these edits by this user appropriate for Wikipedia ? Sagecandor (talk) 00:38, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

you edit the entire day full nonestop and you accuse me of being paid for this? you go instantly to noticeboards instead having a debate in the talk page all the time sagecandor, i gace my reason they should be counted because they are not military conflicts. The listening should be changed and focused on military conflicts--Crossswords (talk) 00:53, 8 December 2016 (UTC)