Talk:Japanese prisoners of war in the Soviet Union

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A fact from Japanese prisoners of war in the Soviet Union appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column on 9 July 2007.

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Contents 1 Extensive rewrite 1.1 Edit war 2 Sent to North Korea? 3 Requested move 3.1 Survey 3.2 Discussion

[edit] Extensive rewrite

This article needs to be re-written extensively. I've done my best as far as spelling, grammar, and the like; but there needs to be some major clarification as far as the point of this article.

• The title needs to be moved to "Japanese POWs in the Soviet Union".
  • Objection to pluralizing the TLA, but it seems that indeed it became a word itself. `'Miikka 00:33, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
• The article notes that the (former) POWs don't even consider themselves as Prisoners of War during this time period; but rather as internees. Why, then, is the article titled as though they are POWs; and why is the term "POW" used throughout the article?
  • Because sources use this term. `'Miikka 00:33, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
• The article states that the number of POWs/"internees" are not significant. However, it seems, given the number of Japanese soldiers detained by the Soviets (in the hundreds of thousands), this does not seem to be true.
  • Read carefully. `'Miikka 00:33, 10 July 2007 (UTC)
• Also, this article needs to be seriously rewritten to explain why mention of "several" books written in Russia about these POWs/internees is notable enough to be mentioned in this article.
  • Huh? `'Miikka 00:33, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Just my two cents. --Micahbrwn 23:36, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Colleagues, yis are very welcome in helping me with Inglisch, but DON'T mess with facts in areas you have no minimal idea. Please keep in mind that I have already translated from Russian into Inglisch, and when you start translating Inglisch into English, an excessive zeal produces the Telephone game. `'Miikka 00:39, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Edit war

We seem to be having a slight edit war. A certain paragraph discussing repatriation of Japanese POWs is written thusly [with the citation tag omitted for the purposes of this discussion]:

The repatriation started in 1946. Released: 1946 - 18,616 1947 - 166,240, 1948 - 175,000, 1949 - 97,000 (and 971 were transferred to PRC) By the end of 1949, there were 4,573 persons left. In 1950 1,585 more were released. The remaining were detained as convicted for various reasons. the release continued since 1953 under various amnesties, and the last major group of 1025 Japanese POW was released on December 23, 1956.

I have re-written it as it appears below [with the citation tag omitted for the purposes of this discussion], as the "bare bones" statistics-style does not belong in an encyclopedic article. However, it appears to have been reverted, for reasons that are unclear to me.

The repatriation of Japanese POWs started in 1946. That year, 18,616 Japanese soldiers were released from the Soviet Union. The following year, 166,240 were released. In 1948 175,000 were released. In 1949, 97,000 were released (this figure includes 971 prisoners who were transferred to the People's Republic of China) By the end of 1949, there were 4,573 prisoners left in the Soviet Union. In 1950, an additional 1,585 were released. The remaining were detained because they were allegedly convicted for various crimes. The release of POWs continued through 1953 under various amnesty agreements between Japan and the Soviet Union, and the last major group consisting of 1,025 Japanese POWs were released on December 23, 1956.

If the first way fits better in the article, please explain how. I have no objection to the first style in a table, however. Perhaps that is a valid compromise? --Micahbrwn 02:16, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

In will be a good exercise as a wikipeidan for you to find your two liberal additions besides stylistic rewriting, so that in the future you will be more careful. "Barebone statistic style" is better than idle words placeholders wasting reader's time, but this is less important. `'Miikka 07:58, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

The series of parallel sentences would be more legible as a table. —Tamfang 01:45, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

I'm not that expert at doing that sort of thing on Wikipedia. Can someone else do it? --Micahbrwn 13:07, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Done. It's easier than it looks: click the rightmost icon above the edit pane, and imitate what you see. —Tamfang 06:39, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sent to North Korea?

Apparently 27,000 POWs were sent to NK by the Soviet Union; Russian government officials handed over a list of their names to Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2006. I had found an English article on this earlier (from mosnews.com) when writing Japanese people in North Korea, but it's since disappeared behind a paywall or something. If you read Japanese, see p14 of [1] (journal article from Acta Slavica Iaponica), or page 9 of [2] (Japanese government report). Dunno how this fits in with all the rest of the statistics quoted above.

(Regarding another question discussed above about the naming of this article, at least in Japanese government documents, the officialese term is "抑留者" = detainee, rather than POW. I've got no real position on what this article should be called, though; present title seems fine to me.) Cheers, cab 03:50, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Requested move

Japanese POWs in the Soviet Union → Japanese prisoners of war in the Soviet Union — spell out acronym. —Kusunose 09:46, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Survey