Talk:Latvian War of Independence

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[edit] Quick-fix POVing

To Irpen -- interesting, what is cheap and blatant? And "quick-fix"!? I had hoped that the revert would restore the title, actually. So quick-fix wouldn't be changing the title without any discussion whatsoever, I guess... not if your buddy Ghirla does it? Isn't this the very first entry in this discussion? Ever read a non-Soviet history book, Irpen? What is this war called? "Latvian-Soviet War"? Where? Read the original text of this entry, please. This type of crap, strongly contributed to by you, is one of the reasons I will no longer edit. Poka! --Pēteris Cedriņš 05:54, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I will ignore the personal remarks and will reply on the issue only. Quick-fix POVing is making some easy but significant POVish changes to the very start of the article. Words like liberation/occupation/invasion do have such flavor and all you did is invaded the intro with liberation. CHanges of such kind is an easy way to introduce a strong POV over the whole article without doing any work.
Relatively obscure EE conflicts often do not have universally established names in the English language literature. For such conflicts, the neutral descriptive title is the best solution. MilHist project has guidelines for the article names and "XY War" is such name. If you want to argue otherwise, that the POVish name is a single most widespread name in the English books that also has a significant usage, care to use the talk pape. Ata, --Irpen 06:28, 7 December 2006 (UTC)
Just because somebody flatly states something is non NPOV, doesnt mean it's so. Firstly, "war of liberation" is a term defined in English Wikipedia itself. Secondly, renaming you (sorry, Ghirlandajo) did is manifestly incompatible with the contents of the article - it was not a strugle of Latvians against Soviets alone, it was a struggle of Latvians against several adversaries, Soviet Russia among them. The reasoning provided - namely, arguing from "analogy" of not naming something else something - has nothing to do with this article. I'm reverting. Doc15071969 13:29, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

You failed to provide evidence about the prevailance of the name you use (see my paragraph above). --Irpen 18:22, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

See, I need not to prove anything just because you or any other editor decides to arbitrarily delete or replace some words not to your liking, summarily charging "POVishness" in a way of pretext. It is up to those arguing something to substantiate it, up to those making changes to provide a reasonable grounds - something in a way of argument "why" - rather than flatly stating that that name is "POVish", but this is "such [guidelines] name". I have read the guidelines, and I gave an explanation why the renaming did not improve anything - it made it worse.
Both "war of liberation" and "war of independence" are used to refer to events in question, in both cases - Estonia and Latvia. Some examples can be found on Google's book search, the most notable author to used "war of liberation" is perhaps Winston Churchill in "The second World war". One will hardly find any extensive and detailed scholarly works on those events outside Baltic states themselves - because they don't exactly represent milestones in the world history, whereas in the history of Baltic states - they do. So, for the reasons already stated earlier and especially because Latvian-Soviet unjustifiably narrows the scope of the events, why "jump" on this few paragraphs article just to "extirpate" word liberation? :) When there is the definition of the term present in Wiki itself, when there are other articles (closest example: Estonia) named similarly. It was a liberation for Latvian people, and a reasonable person would see it that way. If you'd prefer it that way, let's switch the "liberation" and "independence" around, but "Latvian-Soviet" narrows the scope; the conflict encompassed more than that. Doc15071969 22:18, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Move request

I was not aware there is a move request pending and, unfortunately, nothing in the article or on the talk page indicated it either. I have also changed about half of articles that previously linked to "Latvian War of Liberation". I suggest we leave the article at "Latvian War of Independence" (and withdraw the move request) because: 1) the use of "independence" was not objected by editor who made first move (Ghirlandajo) or who otherwise objected (Irpen); 2) there is similarly named category for this kind of conflicts; 3) the phrase is used to refer events in question in both English (Google Book search Google Scholar search) and Latvian; --Doc15071969 17:05, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Date

I got a problem with this - It doesn't seem to be correct to say war started on 18 November 1918, proclamation of independece may be causus beli, but war surely didn't break out the very day. My History textbook gives 3 March 1919 as the Latvian-German forces started counter attack Isoklat. Isoklat, which had conquared most of Latvia crossed Latvian border on 5 December 1918. I choosed 5 december as apparent first offence as begining of war, but then I noted that book also says that war lasted exactly 628 days, which based on my quick calculations, gives 22 November 1918 as date of beginning, if the end date is 11 August (apparently most of fithing had ended on 1 February and there were only few border conflicts afterwards, so it also could be concidered the end date in the book). Any ideas about which date should be used ? -- Xil/talk 01:08, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Seperate numbers for the Germans and the Communists

OK, I have split the Germans and the communists to show that they did NOT fight alongside each other, but I was unable to find a way to accurately split the numbers from those two sides. Can anyone find a source for numbers of troops for the German-Freidkorps and for the Soviets? ELV

[edit] Bermont

You'll pardon the gaps and not that good at military terms or transliterating Latvianized German and Russian names, and doing this all too quickly...

The German occupation army, in accordance with the peacekeeping agreement of November 11, 1918, was to remain in Latvia until the Latvian Republic's leadership could organize its armed forces. However, the German forces evacuated to Germany, opening the way for the forces of Soviet Russia. Without its own arm, the Latvian provisional authorities discussed creating a joint force with Germany. The anticipated force was: 18 Latvian ROTAS, 5 BATERIJAS; 7 German ROTAS and 2 BATERIJAS; and 1 Russian ROTA; altogether, 26 ROTAS, 5 BATERIJAS with 6,000 soldiers and 870 horses. It was decided to appoint a commander from a neutral power (perhaps Sweden), but until such a commander was found, German army's major Sheibert was put in charge. But he soon returned to Germany because of differences with the local Germans. For a short while he was replaced with general major baron Freitag-Loringhoven. The union with the German forces did not work out, they left; nor did they leave arms for the Latvian force. What arms they did leave they left for citizens of German extraction.
... skipping the Soviet Russian invasion...
The Baltic Germans (the lords of their manors, not the Baltic German commoners) were not ready to give up their power, wishing to remain in charge of a Latvia turned into a German colony. They got the German army leadership and Obershtab under their influence, in opposition to the Latvians and their government. First, general von der Gotz prohibited mobilization of forced by the provisional authorities. Documents seized off a Swedish commander disembarking off the Swedish steamship Runeburg on February 18 in Liepaja laid bare the barons' landmarshall Heinrich von Stichs' plans against Latvia. Strichs disappeared. Von der Gotz quashed release of this information as well as any further investigation. February was spent spent with both sides, Latvian and German, preparing for hostilities. Kalpaks commenced military operations for the Latvians on March 1st.
...
Under Kazdanga's baron Hans Manteifel, with outside assistance [of German forces], toppled the provisional government on April 16th. (Leadership escaped and took refuge on a British warship in Liepaja. Riga was still under communist control.)
...
After heavy fighting, Estonian and Latvian forces defeated von Goltz and his forces liberating Riga (now under the Germans) with a truce signed July 3, 1919.
...
Goltz was eventually ordered to return to Germany with his forces. The Baltic Germans were not ready to give up. Goltz persuaded his troops to proclaim their independence from Germany and to go into the service of the Russian "Western Army" service, whose leadership had been taken over by the former Russian commander (translation for ROTMISTRS?) Bermont. Bermont arrived in Jelgava in the summer of 1919 and started forming a unit (the Keller Corps) from Russian prisoners from Germany. Bermont unified a number of Russian forces along with Goltz's former German forces and prepared for war against the Latvian forces.
...
"Bermont's forces. Bermont in his book estimated the total of his forces at 51-52,000, of which 40,000 were German volunteers."
...

From "Latvijas brīvības kaŗš" (Latvia's War of Independence), 1928, published by Army command headquarters training division So, Bermont Russian, forces largely German. Both Gotz and Bermont were focused on the continuation of Baltic German hegemony over the Baltics. (How I read it.) PētersV 05:18, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

What about French navy ? Didn't they also support Latvian forces, my sources mention something like that ~~Xil...sist! 16:02, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bermondt-Avalov

The Western Volunteer Army was formed primarily from Russian POWs captured by Germany during WW1 and later merged with the Russian Imperial Army corps in the Baltic region. General Bermondt-Avalov was appointed to his position as the commander of West Russian Volunteer Army by General Yudenich himself, the supreme commander of White Russian forces in the West. Bermond-Avalov was a subordinate of Yudenich and obeyed his orders until 1919.10.09 when Gen Yudenich declared Bermond-Avalov a traitor because of the latter's refusal to withdraw from Riga. Germany, pressured by the Entente, stopped supporting him as well and withdrew the Landeswehr and the Iron Division from Latvia a month later. The German Reserve Guard division was transferred to Bermond's command (in the hope of maintaining German presence in the region), however it was not enough and the Western Volunteer Army was subsequently defeated by Estonian-Latvian-British offensive and Bermond-Avalov escaped to Germany. It should be noted that although Bermodt-Avalov was a self-proclaimed Germanophile and monarchist, he never took orders from Berlin. http://www.vojnik.org/civilwar/2 http://www.hronos.km.ru/biograf/bio_b/bermondt_avalov.html —Preceding unsigned comment added by 155.246.121.113 (talk) 19:19, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

The POW's were only a part. Three quarters of Bermont's forces were German army which Goltz left behind. Goltz obeyed the orignal recall but told his army to remain. They became a "volunteer" force (40,000 out of Bermont's 51-52,000). Neither "Germany" nor "Russia" are the most appropriate for Bermont.
   That said, the Baltic German gentry's role is consistent throughout in looking to topple the Latvian government and to retain their possessions and power. They were the primary driving force.
   As I've said elsewhere, if the Baltic Germans had a flag, that would be the best choice. The German flag is better than the Russian flag (there was no Russia per se).
   If our (anonymous IP) friend at Stevens Institute of Technology insists on correctness, then there are three choices:
  1. no flag for Bermont
  2. Baltic German crest for Latvia
  3. all three flags for Bermont: Russian, German, and Latvian (since the German nobility were essentially conducting a civil war)
Thoughts? There was no alliance with Russia as non-Soviet Russia did not exist. PētersV 22:25, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
Bit more checking, found the right flag... United Baltic Duchy. :-) The right answer. PētersV 00:54, 1 November 2007 (UTC)
Ok, I agree with the current status, let them be under the UBD flag while the commanders under their national flags. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kami888 (talk • contribs) 03:40, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Questions about casualty figures

Hi all. I am trying to track down a specific source for these casualty figures. Bonus points if anyone knows a source in English. Thanks. Cissyhammers (talk) 06:01, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Those given in infobox are from the book given in references, it is a textbook for 9th class available in Latvian and Russian (maybe in other languages as well, but I haven't seen any other translation)~~Xil...sist! 11:08, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Poles

Now if I can only remember where I read that the Poles briefly partnered with the Latvians in their attack on the Bolsheviks (negotiations had failed) in the taking of Latgale but things went sour when along with Vilnius the Poles also wanted to keep Dvinsk (Daugavpils) as part of a buffer zone. The Latvians wound up threatening to attack the Poles unless they vacated (which they did). —PētersV (talk) 05:57, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Try: Edgars Andersons, Latvijas vēsture 1914–1920 (Stockholm: Daugava, 1967). Part III, chs. 9 & 10 deal with the Latgale offensive in 1919/20 and the problems of demarcating the new borders thereafter. — Zalktis (talk) 07:52, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Timeline

As the article currently dosen't give much insight in the acctual events, I translated timeline from Latvian Wikipedia - it is a bit rough and in my opinion should be removed if someone expands the article to cover the events in prose ~~Xil...sist! 23:34, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

I read through the time line, I think it's valuable even when we get some real prose. I have a couple of Latvian books on the war of independence, I'm hoping to get to scan them in some time later this year. One is a Latvian army publication so I think it counts as being in the public domain, another was written in the U.S., published by a committee to commemorate the 50th anniversary, I'm trying to track down heirs/etc. to get official permission on that one. —PētersV (talk) 00:19, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
Including timlines in articles isn't exactly good thing (perhaps it could be split into seperate article later). Also I noted that it has some issues which should be corrected - it dosen't give full facts - e.g. it says that peace treaty was signed in Strazdmuiža, but dosen't say by who, it dosen't refer to military units clearly - it uses both army and brigades to refer to Latvian forces, refers to Germans, never naming units, and some details are unclear - Latvian government was in Riga to proclaim the state, but next time it's metioned it is in Jelgava; It says that Battle of Cēsis continues until 3 July, yet it is won on 22 June ~~Xil...sist! 02:31, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Maps?

Hello, do you know or have any good maps of the war? I am creating some maps for Lithuanian wars and I could incorporate Latvian front... Renata (talk) 16:32, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

I've got some (copyrighted) maps in Latvian, I could scan them (tomorrow) for you if that suits you ~~Xil * 17:28, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
Sounds good, you can email them to me (just attach Gmail to my username). You can see what I am up to here. Thanks, Renata (talk) 19:23, 6 April 2008 (UTC)