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[edit] Lince (tank)

I have just finished what I consider to be a rough draft, and I'm looking for input on how to improve the grammar (since it was written while looking at various sources and I just wanted to get the ideas down) and how to improve the, admittedly, short article. Thank you. JonCatalan (talk) 01:06, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Leithp

  1. A comparison table to contemporary MBTs would be useful. How does it compare to the Leopard 2 that they eventually adopted or the French, British and US tanks they could have gone for? Pretty much what you provided on the Verdeja article would do the trick.
  2. Unit conversions: Speeds, mass, power etc
  3. Vickers offered the Valiant? Are you sure they didn't offer the Challenger? I'd only heard of the Valiant WW2 tank, so that stuck out.
  4. "Coproduction" or "Co-production"?
  5. How successful was the testing? The article covers the procurement process extensively, but is light on manufacture and testing. Was it a match for competing tanks? Was that part of the reason the programme was canceled?
  6. Perhaps not actionable, but I'm curious that Spain started off with a domestic future tank programme and ended up by adopting last-generation cast-offs from the US. Were there Army cut-backs? What was the reason for the indecision? A change of government? There might be something more to say about that.
  7. The infobox gives two figures for length.
  8. You mention that the Lince "was almost entirely based on the Leopard 2A4". What is the difference between it and the licence built Leopards that they eventually adopted?
The article looks quite good so far, though.
Leithp 07:03, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
First of all, thank you for your extensive help in both this article and the Verdeja; there are few editors willing to do so much copyediting to transform a relatively poorly written article, into a well written article. Now, on to your points!
  1. I added a table with the Lince, Leopard 2A4, Leclerc and M1A1 Abrams. I did not add the Italian MK3, because AFAIK this never entered production either (or did as the Ariete), and the Vickers Valiant since I don't have a good literary source on the vehicle.
  2. I converted all the units in the infobox and will convert most of those in the text when I start to clarify the article, and perhaps add some more information (not much more I could find, admittedly).
  3. I actually had a problem finding information on the Vickers Valiant, as well, although the referenced article in El País specifically mentions it as the Valiant. I remembered that Vickers presented what was called the Vickers Mark 7/2 to the Chieftain Replacement Program in 1987, but any text I have does not refer to it as the Valiant. So, I did a google search and apparently the Vickers 7 is the Valiant.
  4. Changed coproduction to co-production!
  5. No prototypes were ever built. I need to clarify in the article that it was mostly a procurement program, leaning heavily on the German offer. For example, had Spain opted to manufacture the Leclerc it would have still be named Lince. I was going to add that the Leopard 2E's battle management system is called the LINCE, but I'm not 100% sure that the acronym was made to 'transfer' part of the 1980s program to the Leopard 2 program.
  6. From conversations on Tank-Net the Spanish Ministry of Defense was running out of funding, and as said in the article Krauss-Maffei was not particularly happy about the waste of funds due to the indecision. Apparently, the Spanish Army preferred the Lince but the government did not (in the end, the Leopard 2E was really the better choice, though), as it would cost much more to produce than the Leopard 2. According to those on Tank-Net, this was a similar issue which befell the Italian government when it decided to put the Ariete into production - it could only procure a limited series due to production costs. I believe that with the issues in avoiding a specific contract, pressure from the French government and the availability of cheaper tanks to replace ageing M47s and M48s the Spanish government simply decided to scratch the program and opt for the M60, and later succumbed to pressure from the Army to begin negotiating for the Leopard 2.
  7. Oops; thanks. I specified its length gun forward.
  8. That's a good idea. When I begin to clarify the article and whatnot I will also add some information on the differences between the two.
Again, thank you! JonCatalan (talk) 10:49, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ham

(WP:VG collaborator)

  • Article name and lead sentence: Is the Lince a "tank" or a "tank program"? This needs to be established clearly so that there is consistency in how the subject is approached. If the Lince is a tank, as the article name suggests, it should be called a tank in the lead sentence. If the Lince was a tank development/acquisition program, without any actual resulting tank, you might consider changing the article name to Lince tank program or similar. In any case, if no Lince tank was actually built, the article needs to be clear that this tank only exists on paper.
  • Image captions: these need to be clearer in stating that the pictures are of other tanks, and not Linces. (This goes back to the first point, is there an actual Lince to have a photo of?)
  • Second sentence: "received offers" for what?
  • General issue throughout article: Try to reduce the alphabet soup wherever feasible. If the difference between an AMX-30E1 and AMX-30E2 isn't relevant to the context of the Lince, just refer to them all as, e.g. "upgraded AMX-30E". To a general audience it appears redundant to continually list minor variations of tank designs and makes the prose harder to follow.
  • History section
    • First paragraph might be a little too detailed with the production numbers for previous tanks. I don't think there is a point that the number of existing tanks was a factor for the need to build the Lince, so production details for these other tanks are not necessary and distract from the main issues. It should suffice to say which tanks the army was using at the time and what their deficiencies were.
    • These sentences: By the end of production of the first batch of AMX-30Es in 1979, the Spanish Army were already aware of the mechanical deficiencies of the new tank. As early as 1979 the Spanish Army and the manufacturer, Empresa Nacional Santa Bárbara (now Santa Bárbara Sistemas), began a research program to upgrade the AMX-30 in the areas of mechanical reliability, modernization of the fire control system and an increase in armor protection.[5]
      • can be rephrased as something like In 1979, nearing completion of the first batch of AMX-30Es, the Spanish Army and the tank's manufacturer, Empresa Nacional Santa Bárbara (now Santa Bárbara Sistemas), had already begun a research program to address deficiencies in the new tank such as mechanical reliability, the fire control system and armor protection.[5]
    • I'm not sure what the word "realized" is supposed to mean in the last sentence of the first paragraph. It could be interpreted as "fulfilled" or "recognized".
  • Third paragraph: Again perhaps a little too much detail with regard to production numbers of aircraft and the contract history between the countries. The paragraph teases at who gets the contract but doesn't explicitly say who.
  • Missing chunk of time. The article jumps from "who is going to get the contract?" to "decline of the program", without describing pertinent events that happen in between, such as how the design of the Lince progressed, etc. Specifically, how did the tank arrive at the specifications listed in the comparison table?
  • Decline of the program section
    • Again, a lot of seemingly needless detail regarding numbers of other tanks produced or upgraded.

I hope you'll find some of that helpful. Keep up the good work. Ham Pastrami (talk) 05:09, 5 June 2008 (UTC)


Yes, this was very helpful! I will respond, as usual, point by point!

  1. This is a tank program. If I move the article do I need to do anything to this peer review, in terms of renaming it? I added a few sentences to mention that no prototype was ever built, but perhaps I could find a way to integrate the sentences better.
  2. There is no photograph of the Lince. I was going to lineart an image of what KMW's entry was supposed to look like, but it came out pretty badly. I tried to make sure the images were clearer on what the image is about.
  3. Changed it to received bids for the tank program.
  4. I tried to take the variant numbers where I thought it was proper. For example, I thought it was proper to keep M60A1/M60A3, because they need to be distinguished in order for the sentence after to make sense. Otherwise, I reverted M47EXX and M48EXXs back to just M47s and M48s where I saw them. The other second has been refrased as suggested. And 'realized' changed to 'recognized'.
  5. Production numbers are taken out for those aircraft. The issue is that the Spanish government teased, as well! But, you're right, it should probably be clearer. Neither of the two really got the contract; it was just recognized that KMW had the greater chance at scoring the final production contract.
  6. The specifications listed in the table are the same specifications that were given by Krauss Maffei/Santa Bárbara in 1984. They were theoritical specifications for the vehicle, as no vehicle was ever produced. But since this would have been the most likely contract scored, it seems the best to put under 'Lince'. The French offer later became the Leclerc.
  7. I changed that section a bit.

I hope it looks better. Thank you! JonCatalan (talk) 10:15, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Izno

"VG editor who saw this posted on WT:VG" - I'm (only) going to "tear apart" the lead, as I don't really have the time to go over the entire article (nor indeed, do I feel it would be effective for one editor to attack the entire thing). I ended up doing most of this before Ham's comments, so if it's duplicated, I'd probably go with what he said. This is my first review, so bear with me (if it seems too harsh, it is not meant to be). =)After writing most of this up, it started sounding like a copyedit may be needed in general, but these specifics should give you an idea of how much improvement can/should be made in that direction:

The first sentence reads a little awkwardly; I suggest that you rephrase it thusly: "The Lince was a tank development program initiated by Spain during the late 1980s and early 1990s." I removed "main" and "battle": the former isn't really necessary in my opinion, and the latter is presumed from the link to tank.

The second sentence introduces a broken general rule my 6th grade teacher taught: "No two sentences in any one paragraph (should) start with the same word" - Keep it in mind for future writings. Obviously the second sentence starts with "the" also; this may be an unintended result of writing in the active voice, but I feel following the rule diversifies the text, even so. My suggestion in this case would be to remove the countries these companies are originating in (this may be unwanted eliminations, so take this into consideration), and to rephrase like so: "GIAT, Genderal Dynamics, Vickers, and Krauss-Maffei Wegmann submitted offers to the Spanish MoD to develop the line." A question which stems from this is "Who won the bid to develop the Lince?" if there was a winner; if there wasn't a winner, the article should state that.

And then you jump right into the reason to develop the tank line without a change in paragraph. Either this is a result of bad organization or simply that you forgot to indent. ;) I'm guessing the former, tbh, which may reflect on the article as a whole, so have a look at how the article is presented.

The next sentence ("During the 1980s...") in general reads haltingly. Another lesson learned: Read the text out loud to yourself. I would suggest these tweaks to the sentence: "In the 1980s the Spanish Army was equipped with a large number of M47 and M48 Patton tanks, and was manufacturing the French AMX-30E indigenously." Another comment I would make if I were certain on it is that the sentence seems to be mixing tenses... Might just be me, however. Should definitely wikilink "indigenous".

The next sentence, and the one after, again begin with "the", but I'm not sure how to replace it in the first without going into the passive voice. You can have a look at it. In the second, I'm not sure if it's the AMX that was in production?... It is a little confusing to say the least. Rephrasing that without the "the" as well as to clear up confusion would be a good idea.

I love the next two sentences, though you're definitely mixing tenses in the first case. Either the whole paragraph should be in the style of "was to put" or it should be "put"; not both. ;)

The next paragraph begins shakily. I would simply edit it to: "In the late 1980s, the Lince program was threatened by the decision to upgrade the Spanish AMX-30Es to the standard of the AMX-30EM1 and AMX-30EM2 models." I'm not quite sure if that endings how I like would like it... but I find it to flow better within the sentence. The next sentence is essentially a runon, however, but I'm not sure how to break it up.

Again, I can't speak for the rest of the article, but I'm guessing it is in the same vain as the Lead: Needs a copy edit, probably a little clarification here and there. Nice work for a rough draft. =) --Izno (talk) 06:19, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks! Now, to confirm the changes -
  1. Apparently, someone reverted it tank back to 'main battle tank'. So, I am confused on which one is preferred.
  2. I reworded the sentence (after the edits made for Ham) and changed the beginning of the second sentence to, To gain the contract for the development program the... and I added this, The program ended without a prototype being manufactured and without a clear choice in who would gain the contract...
  3. Tbh, it seemed like the sentence was misplaced, so I moved it so that it seemed more relevant to an introduction to the Lince.
  4. I just got rid of the sentence altogether!
  5. Changed to - At the time the AMX-30E was being manufactured for the Spanish Army, and the Lince was planned to serve along with the AMX-30.
  6. I'm not sure how 'was put' would make sense,
  7. As per the previous edit, the sentence is changed to, In the late 1980s, the Lince program was threatened by the decision to upgrade Spanish AMX-30Es.
And yes, the rest of the article probably needs to be edited extensively as well. :( But, I will get on that! JonCatalan (talk) 10:31, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Krator

From WP:VG

  • The lead image in the infobox is not about the actual tank itself, and doesn't allow for a lot of identification. It may be hard to provide a good image here, but as a suggestion, perhaps the Spanish government has released some images in the public domain during the development and procurement process.
  • The first part of the lead concerning the goal of the program to replace tanks through a military assistance programme is much more informative than the first paragraph of the history section on the same topic. The history section itself starts very abruptly: some general introductory statements about tanks in Spain in that period, with appropriate links, would be very informative, instead of starting with an acronym and a patent in a sentence without context.
  • The history section reads like proseline; four consecutive paragraphs start with "In (year), ...". This doesn't read really nicely, see the linked article.
  • What is 120 bil pesetas in a current currency, at current value? How much is that compared to similar programmes of the time? Just the number doesn't really tell me much.
  • the last paragraph of the history section doesn't flow well, use some linking words.
  • The paragraph break between the first and the section paragraph of the Decline section would be more appropriate after "...upgraded to the equivalent of the M60." (one sentence later than the current break). Then, you also see that the proseline (see above) continues here, as the new paragraph would again start with a year.
  • "While the Lince prioritized firepower..." - at the very end of the article. This would be something to also write much earlier on, when discussing the specifications of the tank.
  • On the references, #25 needs additional information, such as author, date and accessdate. Also, the format of the References section could be more succinct if it used Harvard references, where you do not need to use the whole title of the book cited, but just the author, year and page.

User:Krator (t c) 10:38, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for taking the time to review! As per my style, I will respond point by point with confirmation/information -
  1. Unfortunately, the only image I have of the Lince is a drawing. I haven't seen any official schematics published, and currently government archives are not online and are 'difficult' to access (I still have to get my 'historian liscence' to access the military achives at Ávila). As I said above, I tried to draw it and failed misreably! The only bid which was all-new (as in, different from existing tanks of today) was KMW's and this resembled the Leopard 2A4 the most. The information on the infobox also belongs to KMW's bid.
  2. I added a bit to the first paragraph of the history section, which I hope makes it a bit more interesting.
  3. I reworded and moved some dates around to make it seem less like proseline.
  4. Currency converted. The Spanish peseta was pegged at 166.386€ and so, I will convert to € manually and then use a currency convertor to convert to $.
  5. Reworded the last paragraph in the history section a tad.
  6. Moved the sentence and took out the date.
  7. I will expand on this!
  8. Gave access date, which is the only thing I could give (no author stated).

JonCatalan (talk) 12:02, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Giggy

For the record, I'm a VG guy.

  • It's weird to have an infobox image not of the Lince... you don't have a pic of it?
  • Some cases in the lead where stuff other than "The Lince..." would work better... eg. at "To achieve these goals, the Lince adopted..." (...it adopted...)
  • "However, the first M47 tanks were delivered in 1954 and their service life was already extended to thirty years" - maybe it's just me, but the meaning of this sentence felt slightly lost (especially the however)... I dunno, read it yourself and see if it's just me confused.
  • "The French government proposed a cooperative tank design between the two countries, stating that the resulting tank would be completely new, while the German-Spanish proposition was based on technology developed during the 1970s. On the other hand, the French government admitted that there would be restrictions placed on Empresa Nacional Santa Bárbara when it came to exporting the tank." - Not sure what the purpose of the "on the other hand" is here...
  • What, for the unacquainted, is indigenous production?
  • "As a consequence, by late 1985 only the German offer, French offer and a similar Italian offer for co-production of a future tank, known then as the MK3, were considered." - the commas here are rather confusing.
  • "although this time also offered the more lucrative term of joint export." - reword... perhaps "this time offering the more lucrative term of joint export."
  • The footnotes at the bottom of the Comparison to Leopard 2A4, Leclerc and M1 Abrams table are awkwardly placed... dunno, can put them somewhere else, they aren't pretty at the moment, if you get my drift.
  • Ref 25 needs formatting (publisher, access date, etc... {{cite web}} is useful if you like)

Overall, though, it's pretty close to GA quality at least (I'd say). I hope these comments help! Cheers, giggy (:O) 10:47, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

By the way, I edit conflicted with Krator, so I might have repeated some stuff he (or others) have said. If so, sorry about that. I wish I got 5 reviewers on some of my VG peer reviews... :) giggy (:O) 10:48, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
Like above, point by point. :P
  1. Unfortunately, no.
  2. Took out some 'Linces'.
  3. Reworded.
  4. When the program is done inside the country and the production, as well [indigenous program/indigenous production]. It's normally a huge boost to the national industry and gives the country the expertise to design its own weapons of the same type at a later date. I changed some of those to 'local', instead of 'indigenous'.
  5. Reworded the sentence to get rid of some of those commas.
  6. Reworded!
  7. Instead of at the bottom, they are after their respective tank - now.
  8. Done!

Thank you for the comments. I'll put the article up for GA review, as the peer review continues (similar to what I did for the Verdeja article). JonCatalan (talk) 12:24, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

  • Looking a lot better now, good luck at GAN! (Obligatory WP:VG/PR spam goes here.) giggy (:O) 08:47, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jappalang

Based on this version, I think there should be clarifications on the following:

  • Which event truly marked the death of the Lince, the acquisition of the M60s or the procurement of the Leopard 2s?
  • Is "Lince" the name for the government programme or the name from the German-Spanish bid?
  • Was the 120mm cannon and composite armor a requirement from the Spanish Army? If not, I presume they are from the German-Spanish bid. Why are these specs used as the standards even if the government did not award the project to them?
  • Were the AMX-30Es built in the 1979s to address the concerns raised by the research program, or was the program still ongoing to analyze the defiencies of the AMX-30Es as well?

The Czech fansite ([1]) provides an image of the Lince. From what I can make out of Google's translation, it states that the picture is either of a prototype or a scaled model. Perhaps you can get in touch with the site's owner (contact address is on the site) and ask him for his sources. Jappalang (talk) 02:58, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Responses one by one!
  1. I don't know how to clarify the text any further; in the decline of the program it says, The Lince program was finally officially canceled in 1989. In the introduction it says, The arrival of M60 tanks, starting in 1992, marked the official end of the Lince program. If anything it's contradictory, but I can't find anything which suggests that the Leopard 2 might have been the end of the program. I edited the introduction's sentence.
  2. The Lince was the name of the government program, as it's mentioned in the introduction. I use the specs of the German-Spanish bid because it was the most likely to win the contract, and the French bid was the Leclerc, while the Italian bid became the Ariete. It's also used because it was the only bid which had defined specs, at the time.
  3. All the bids had a 120mm cannon and composite armor.
  4. I edited that sentence to clarify it a bit.
Thanks for peer reviewing this article. It has truly gone through remarkable change. JonCatalan (talk) 09:45, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
And, unfortunately, that email no longer exists. :( It looks to be like a wooden mock-up, and it looks like the drawing I have. JonCatalan (talk) 10:53, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
Hmm, that is a shame but I think you can still use that image or your drawing instead of the Leopard 2. I hope you do not mind my copyedits. Feel free to revert them if you think I mistook the gist or caused the flow to be worse. Jappalang (talk) 13:23, 6 June 2008 (UTC)
My major issue is that some of the facts got reworded and their meaning changed completely, making them untrue statements. For example, aid did not begin at the beginning of the Cold War and was specifically from the United States. Deficiencies in the AMX-30E were not corrected in the second batch, they were corrected in the modernization program of the late 1980s. I will go through the article and try to find these and fix these. JonCatalan (talk) 14:00, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kariteh

I copyedited the article a bit and have two comments to make:

  • The article has only two incoming links, meaning it's orphaned. More links should be made.
  • MTU in the infobox needs to be disambiguated.

--Kariteh (talk) 09:58, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for the copy edit. MTU has been disambiguated, and once I finish the Leopard 2E article (currently in my sandbox) it will link to the Lince, and then I'll edit the Leopard 2 article to upgrade its entry on the Leopard 2E. JonCatalan (talk) 10:27, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cold War

The article passed an A-Class review earlier this year. However, I've made some major improvements in the past few weeks and I would like to know if there is anything else to be done before the article would be fit to undergo a FAC. Also, the article is rated #10 on WP:MHSP. Any inputs will be deeply appreciated! --Eurocopter (talk) 11:07, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Looper5920

Just some initial thoughts so take them for what they are worth. I was wondering if there should be any mention of Proxy war (after military alliances maybe?) in the intro as the US and USSR seemed to make a habit of it during this period(Vietnam and Afghanistan being the 2 big examples). Also, "sport" is mentioned in the intro but the only mention in the article was about the 1980 Olmpics. I used to remember that everytime the US and USSR met in any competition it was pretty big. Usually it was every Olympic sport but sometimes it was events like the 1975–76 USSR Red Army ice hockey tour of North America. I think that maybe a paragraph on Sports and cultural issues might be worth a go. Again, just my initial thoughts, hope it helps.--Looper5920 (talk) 12:44, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
Proxy war is mentioned in the lead, while the proeminent proxy wars are described quite well in the article. Also, I don't know if this article should contain events like 1975–76 USSR Red Army ice hockey tour of North America; 1980 Olympics is mentioned because it became notable as the US did not participate due to a political decision. Such events like 1975-76 hockey tour might be mentioned in the Cold War (1962–1979) article, as they did not alter in any way, the course of the entire Cold War. Another better place for mentioning such events would be Culture during the Cold War. --Eurocopter (talk) 14:37, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Central Intelligence Agency

Article (edit) • Article talk (edit) • Watch peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because it has undergone some tremendous work since about last December, thanks primarily to HC Berkowitz, whose commitment to it has been nothing short of incredible, and I'd like to see if people think it is ready for FA nomination, or how it could be improved. As I hope you will all see, this article has already been greatly reduced in size and a huge amount of information has been created in supporting and related articles. I realize it is still a large page, but it is a large topic, and given size and scope of the topic, I think this article, as it stands, as very nearly as small as we could get it.

Having said that, I think we all look forward to any constructive criticisms or opinions you may have.


Thanks, Morethan3words (talk) 10:06, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ealdgyth

You said you wanted to know about FAC, so I looked at the sources for the article.
  • Give ISBNs where possible.
  • When citing a book, give a page number
  • A large number of your web site citations lack publisher information. Author isn't enough, publisher is also needed.
  • Some website citations lack last access dates.
These are pretty basic needs for GA or FAC. Drop me a note when the above issues are taken care of and I'll be happy to double check the reliablity of the sources in terms of WP:RS and WP:V. 16:16, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ruhrfisch

Interesting article, but needs a lot of work before FA in my opinion. I agree with Ealdgyth's reference comments. Here are some suggestions for improvement:

  • Article is way too long - take more out and make separate articles per WP:Summary style. For example, Could the whole "Internal/presidential studies, external investigations and document releases" section be a sub-article?
  • At the same time, summary style says there should be a summary of the article removed left behind. "Linkages with former Nazi and Japanese War Criminals" with just a See U.S. Intelligence involvement with German and Japanese War Criminals after World War II. or several other examples - this would be a big problem at FAC
  • There are many short (one or two sentence) paragraphs that break up the flow and need to be combined or expanded. Also several very short sections.
  • The lead should be an accessible and inviting overview of the whole article. Nothing important should be in the lead only - since it is a summary, it should all be repeated in the body of the article itself - my rule of thumb is to include every header in the lead in some way. I think that the article may need fewer sections / headers too. Please see WP:LEAD
  • Article needs more references, for example the last paragraph of Organization and the first two paragraphs of Executive offices are unreferenced, as are four of six paragraphs in National Clandestine Service, including a direct quote. My rule of thumb is that every quote, every statistic, every extraordinary claim and every paragraph needs a ref. See WP:CITE and WP:V
  • Several bullet point lists should be converted into prose
  • I think I might put History first, before Organization. Telll how they got there
  • Per WP:HEAD the name of the article should not be repeated in headers - so change "Early CIA, 1947-1952", "Abuses of CIA authority, 1970s-1990s" and "2004, DCI takes over CIA top-level functions".
  • Article either has no images or too many in a given section.

Hope this helps. If my comments are useful, please consider peer reviewing an article, especially one at Wikipedia:Peer review/backlog (which is how I found this article). Yours, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 03:37, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

PS I ran this tool on the article here. It says it has Readable prose: 75.5 KB which is a bit much Ruhrfisch ><>°° 22:01, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 13th Airborne Division (United States)

I have just finished writing this article today, and I believe it to be up to the standards of at least a B-Class Article. Any comments or reviews of the article would be extremely welcome. Skinny87 (talk) 19:57, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

You are going to move the sourced list of units of the division back into the main article, aren't you? Also appropriate might be to pare down now the references so as list only the ones you've used. Y Done
Also, looking at the 82 ABD page, the exact nature of the transfer of troops from the 13 ABD is unclear. Were any units transferred? Did the 13 ABD personnel simply bring 82 ABD units up to strength? You could expand on that and put a note in the 82 ABD article as well.

Buckshot06(prof) 01:11, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

I will indeed - should they go under something like 'Divisional Order of Battle'? Skinny87 (talk) 06:32, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Added in, and did the same for the 17th Airborne Division to boot! Skinny87 (talk) 06:53, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
In regards to the transfer of personnel, there are two problems. The first, and foremost, is the fact that there is practically no information about the transfer of personnel other than the referenced texts saying in essence 'they were transferred'. I scraped together this article from half a dozen books, and the majority from about three, as an airborne division that does little fighting and makes no combat drops doesn't really merit a mention in what little literature there is on airborne warfare. So unfortunately I can't add anything else for the very reason that I can't find anything else :( The second reason is that the article on the 82nd is rather long and complex, and having been here less than a month I don't feel confident enough to begin editing such a large article - it's kinda daunting. Hope that answers your questions, and I hope it won't affect the article from going to B-Class and possibly even GA-Class Skinny87 (talk) 10:02, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
No of course not. I'm a real grognard on these sorts of questions, and it's a very minor point. With the 82nd, or any article, I'd say, judging from your contributions so far, referenced, sourced, well-balanced for potential controversies, I'd very much encourage WP:BOLD changes from you. One other point. FA-class articles have references & notes - nothing else. Any external links should be either one of those two, and see-alsos have all been moved into the text. Buckshot06(prof) 23:52, 14 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, thank-you kindly for the complement! Is this article upto B-Class, do you think? I'll place it for GA Nom later Skinny87 (talk) 07:46, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 17th Airborne Division

I have been working on this article for the past two weeks or so, and I believe I have it at a stage where it can be peer-reviewed and possibly graded for B-Class status. Any comments would be greatly appreciated. Skinny87 (talk) 22:17, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

A few things that could be improved:

  • The lead ought to be lengthened to two/three full paragraphs. Y Done
  • There's no need for an "Activation" sub-section when there's nothing else in the "Formation" section. Y Done Skinny87 (talk) 08:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't think the pulled-out "See also" links add anything. Using {{details}} there might be defensible, but those articles aren't really see-also ones. Y Done Thanks for that, I just thought they looked snazzy, but I'm still learning! Skinny87 (talk) 08:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
  • "Disactivation"? Not "Deactivation"? Y Done Teach me to edit last thing at night :) Skinny87 (talk) 08:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Dates should be linked as Month Day or Month Day Year, not as Month Day Year. Y Done Skinny87 (talk) 08:27, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Overall, though, quite a nice article. Kirill (prof) 02:31, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

Quick note: where is Camp Myles Standish? Buckshot06 (talk) 03:51, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no idea! Let me look around for the location and I'll add it in! Skinny87 (talk) 08:24, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Found it! It's in (or was) Taunton, Massachusetts. Added to the article Y Done Skinny87 (talk) 15:59, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Late Roman army

I have a very minor part in writing this article. The work was mainly done by EraNavigator (talk · contribs) who now wants some feedback through a review. Wandalstouring (talk) 11:59, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] llywrch

Some unorganized thoughts:
  1. First, this is a very broad topic with a lot of traps for the unwary, but I think you've provided a satisfactory coverage of the material, & presented the mainstream opinions accurately. However...
  2. Mention of one important source for this period has been omitted: Vegetius' De Re Militari, which is the closest thing we have to an army manual from the time of the Roman Empire. While this document has a lot of problems in itself, I think it's fair to include some mention of it under "Sources".
  3. The lack of manpower under the Later Empire is more of a generally accepted hypothesis, rather than a proven fact. I'll admit that I'm somewhat skeptical about this claim, due to my own thoughts about the primary evidence, but I hope we would all agree that rephrasing the language about this theory, & providing some of the sources, would be an improvement.
  4. One important detail that needs to be mentioned in the section about cavalry is that the Roman did not make much use of the stirrup -- assuming that they knew of this invention. Without stirrups -- & similar technological improvements -- a horseman will find it a challenge to stay on the back of his steed during hand-to-hand combat. This means a cavalry charge was a far less useful tactic then than it was centuries later, & that horsemen were used instead as scouts, to secure flanks (where a horse's speed would allow a few men to defend a wide fronting), & pursuing a defeated enemy.
  5. Part of the debate over the "barbarization of the army" includes the significance of Germanic buckles found in graves that have been dated to the 4th & 5th centuries. While many archeologists/historians convincingly argue against this interpretation of these artifacts (a "Germanic" buckle does not mean it was worn by a Germanic warrior; fashions often cross ethnic & class lines), there are some who use them as evidence for this belief. (And it offers the possibility of some images that can help make the subject more tangible.)
  6. The table "Roman Army numbers 24-337 AD" is disappointing because there is no breakdown of figures after Severus. Obviously the legionaries & auxilaries were replaced with different kinds of soldiers (comitatenses & limitanei), but omitting the later qualities of soldiers from the table makes it look, frankly odd.
  7. The table "Renumeration of Roman Common foot soldiers" is interesting, but may I introduce my own idea to replace it? There are reliable sources that provide the pay in contemporary coinage, & reliable sources which provide the amount of silver in these coins -- why not create a graph to show how the buying power declined? (I'll admit that I created this exact graph some years ago, & it made quite clear the nature of the problem the Empire had with disgruntled troops.)
Hope this helps. -- llywrch (talk) 21:07, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
Thank you for your helpful comments. I would respond as follows:
  1. No comment (thanks for the praise)
  2. I took a deliberate decision to ignore Vegetius as being "more trouble than he's worth". Vegetius is an unreliable and misleading source. Neither a soldier nor a historian, his work De Re Militari is a rag-bag of military doctrines/assertions dating (by his own account) all the way from the middle Republic to the time of Hadrian (early 2nd c.), all out of chronological context. Regarding the late army, examples of how misleading his comments can be are (1) his statement that the soldiers in the late army gave up wearing body armour and helmets because they were too heavy. This is clearly contradicted by the archaeological record (cf Elton (1996) 110-4); and (2) his complaint that young men in his day deliberately avoided service in the "legions", preferring the more lenient training and discipline of the "auxilia": at a time when such a distinction no longer existed and when the auxilia palatina were regarded as the best infantry units in the army.
  3. I agree we need to state the opposite view on the manpower issue: Elton, for one, doubts there was a recruitment problem (Elton (1996) 152-4). But recruitment (and retention) difficulties within the empire do seem the inescapable conclusion of much heavier barbarian recruitment and coercive measures such as regular conscription, forcing veterans' sons to serve, branding recruits and restricting leave. This dovetails with the point about lower pay. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that soldiering was a much less attractive occupation in the 4th c. than during the Principate, when the army could rely largely on volunteers.
  4. The belief that lack of stirrups made charging and melee fighting impracticable has of late been largely discredited. This is due to the recent successful reconstruction of the Roman four-horned saddle, and subsequent testing by re-enactors. This has shown that the saddle gave a very firm seat which compensated for the lack of stirrups. On this issue I would recommend a recent book, Philip Sidnell's Warhorse: Cavalry in ancient Warfare (2006). Written by a veteran mounted re-enactor, the book is described on the back cover by Adrian Goldsworthy as "laying to rest...the persistent myth about the central role of the stirrup in making effective shock cavalry possible".
  5. I will add a mention of Germanic-style buckles to the text. But as you say, they prove little about barbarisation. The Roman army's great strength was its willingness to freely copy other peoples' tactics and equipment: most notably the gladius itself, a sword design taken from the Iberian people of pre-Roman Spain.
  6. The difficulty with adding a breakdown for the late army's figures is that the comitatenses/limitanei distinction in no way corresponds to the legions/auxilia split. Another problem is that whereas the Principate figures up to 211 are well-documented and robust, the late army's breakdown is far more uncertain and speculative. But I shall endeavour to include the breakdown in the table in a way that is not misleading. The central aim of the table is to show that the late army is unlikely to have been larger than the Principate army.
  7. Your graph on military purchasing power sounds very interesting. Would you care to reproduce it on my talk page so I can consider how to integrate it into the text? 86.85.44.73 (talk) 09:58, 13 May 2008 (UTC) Sorry, forgot to sign in EraNavigator (talk) 09:59, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] JonCatalán

This is not really criticism, but in regards to points #3 and perhaps #5 I have a paper which may interest you on 'Raising New Units for the Late Roman Army'. I also have a number of papers on metallographic reports of Roman weaponry, most of which is from the late Empire. If you're interested, I could email them to you. JonCatalan (talk) 14:42, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] United States Special Operations Command

This article just passed its GAN last week. I just wanted opinions about any improvements that should be made before an A-class review. I'm definitely going to expand on the Unit sections and probably add a few pictures. Outdawg (talk) 04:17, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Regarding the lead;

  • The part that says: "charged with overseeing the various Special Operations Commands (SOC or SOCOM) of the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines of the U.S. military." To improve flow maybe drop the "of the U.S. military" part and add a "United States" in front of Army, so it looks something like this: "charged with overseeing the various Special Operations Commands (SOC or SOCOM) of the United States Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines." Also you could probably drop the "Marines" (as they're part of the Navy, sort of) if you wanted, that's not to say you have to, it really is your own personal preference.
  • Might wanna add how USSOCOM is pronounced.
  • Also an explanation of how the acronym USSOCOM was formed (lol I do know, but others might not), perhaps by using BOLD letters.
  • Need a space after ref number [2] and [3]
  • Find alternative words for "overt" and "clandestine", I don't know what they mean (not in this context at least), I'm not ashamed to admit it LOL. Oh and don't link them to wikitionary instead, the light blue link apparently ruins flow by drawing the readers attention.

Ryan4314 (talk) 19:32, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

I think that this article needs a bit of work before it's ready for an A-class review. My specific comments are:

  • The article needs a copyedit to remove the military jargon (eg, "The command's SOF are composed of highly trained, rapidly deployable Airmen, conducting global special operations missions ranging from precision application of firepower, to infiltration, exfiltration, resupply and refueling of SOF operational elements" and "The MSOSG specifically provides combined arms planning and coordination, K-9 support, special operations communications support, combat service support (including logistics) and all-source intelligence fusion capability"). I'd suggest that all the brief descriptions of the main units within SOC need to be re-written, as they're not likely to be understood by non-specialist readers
  • Y Done Purple prose like "USASOC includes such fabled units as Special Forces (SF) and Rangers, and such relatively obscure ones as those involved in Psychological Operations (PSYOP) and Civil Affairs (CA). But no matter how famous or obscure they are, they all have one thing in common. They are the one of the Army's main weapons for waging unconventional warfare in an age when conventional conflicts have become increasingly rare." should also be re-written.
  • Doing... The history section does not cover the period between 1987 and 2001 or discuss the evolution of SOC as an organisation (eg, the raising and disbandment of elements, changes to reporting arrangements, funding issues, issues with attracting, equipping and training suitable personnel, etc)
  • The coverage of the post 2001 operations needs to be re-written so that it's a comprehensive history rather than the current series of incidents
  • The USMC's reluctance to raise specialist SOF units and assign them to SOC needs to be mentioned - from memory, the USMC until recently held a view that all of its infantry units could perform special forces missions and that assigning marines to SOC was undesirable as they would lose control over these elite units.
  • The article does not presently mention the criticisms, from without and outside of the military, of the need for this command (which continued after it was established) and of its performance
  • Too many of the references are military websites - these are not independent of the Command
  • Y Done The formatting of the descriptions of the units is unusual - I'd suggest that you include the descriptions of the units in the bulleted text Nick Dowling (talk) 10:31, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] USS Missouri (BB-63)

Previous Peer Review
Its been over a year since this article was last reviewed in any official capacity, so I am request a new peer review for the Mighty Mo to ensure that she stays current with FA standards and to gain input on anything that may need to be addressed now that didn't need to be addressed then. All comments, no matter how small, are welcome. TomStar81 (Talk) 02:46, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Maralia

I've given her a fairly thorough copyedit now, and to my great surprise, there were no typos (insert Twilight Zone music). If it weren't such a blasted long article, it would have been a super easy copyedit :) A few issues:

  • Please be careful to un-DANS-ify text ('departed Sasebo June 4' is okay occasionally for variety, but normally should be "departed from Sasebo on June 4" for better English).
  • I noticed a lot of redundant interwiki links; I cleaned up tons of these manually, but a pass with AWB could help cut this down even further.
  • Is "Anniversary of the End of World War II ceremony" the literal name of a ceremony? If not, it shouldn't be capitalized.
  • Please review the external links: HNSA is redundant given the ussmissouri.com site; why link one video from ussmissouri.com when we already link to their main site; the NVR link is better off in References as {{NVR}}; the hazegray link could be added as a second parameter on the {{DANFS}} template; etc.

Maralia (talk) 05:34, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

Right. My sleep cycle has been badly disrupted owing to my finals, but I will get around to fixing these up in the next day or two. TomStar81 (Talk) 17:01, 9 May 2008 (UTC)
  • OK, I have reviewed the external links breifly and removed three that I think have no business being here, more may be trimmed as I get down to business. "Anniversary of the End of World War II ceremony" is not a formal name, to my knowalge, so as you pointed out it should not be captialzied. For the redundent interwiki links, do you mean for the foriegn wikipedias or the linking of things already linked in previous paragraphs? And I will look into un DANFSifiying the text some over the next few days. TomStar81 (Talk) 22:36, 15 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I meant redundant in the sense of linking Japan repeatedly, etc. Maralia (talk) 03:36, 19 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Usally what I do is relink past terms when starting a new section header to cut down on the amount linking to the same term. Also, in a few cases (like Japan) the term may be linked to seperate articles (in Japan's case, either the Japan of today or the Empire of Japan from back then). If it bothers you though I will come up with some new system to reduce the linkage. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:48, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Underground nuclear testing

This article has been under development since late '06, and I've recently added the material that was clearly needed for any approximation of completeness. I'm requesting review of this article (of which I'm the primary author) because I'm a little too familiar with the content and I'd like some input about how it could be improved. I'd be grateful for any comments and suggestions. Thanks, Jakew (talk) 22:57, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Leads needs expanding, feel free to ask if you need any ideas with this. Ryan4314 (talk) 19:10, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I must confess that I had completely forgotten about the lead! Now rewritten. Jakew (talk) 21:01, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] John_Emilius_Fauquier

I rescued this article from deletion (with considerable help from a few other users who are listed in the article history). I also feel that this article represents and interesting look at the RAF and the RCAF in WWII (See the talk page for discrepancies in other articles and sources I found while researching this article). I feel this article could be considerably improved by peer review, most notably by suggestions with regard to cleaning up references, offering new sources, and so forth. Protonk (talk) 20:08, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Lead could do with expanding, might wanna drop the "exceptional", it's kind of an opinion. Ryan4314 (talk) 19:09, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 36th Engineer Brigade (United States)

This article seems to be the same quality as my other GAs, but it has failed two (questionable) GANs and I'm getting impaitent with it. Looking for ways to get the article to A-class quality. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 04:10, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

A few comments, in no particular order:

  • Do we really need to leave redlinks in place for battalion-level engineering units? I very much doubt any of them will have the history needed to sustain a full article. A preemptive redirection to some sort of list—even a crude one—will make the article easier on the eyes.Y Done
  • As before, rowspans on the campaign streamers table would be helpful.
  • "Prior to its withdrawal from Korea, the unit did not participate in any notable campaigns until its inactivation on 30 May 1972 at Fort Lewis" - presumably this should be "After its withdrawal..."?Y Done
  • Is there any detail available on the unit's activities in Korea?

Kirill (prof) 04:03, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 15th Sustainment Brigade (United States)

This article seems to be the same quality as my other GAs, but it has failed two (questionable) GANs and I'm getting impaitent with it. Looking for ways to get the article to A-class quality. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 04:10, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Not bad, overall, but a few areas that might be suitable for improvement:

  • Is there any more detail available on what the unit did in Vietnam? Certainly, if they received a Presidential Unit Citation, I'd expect there to be some material covering their activities, if only on the level of the citation itself. (Or were the awards given to all of 1st Cavalry, with the support group receiving them indirectly? If so, that's not really clear from the text.)
Y Done Info was copied from the 1st CAV DIV page. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 23:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
  • {{command structure}} might be a suitable replacement for or complement to the long in-text lists of subordinate units.
Y Done added. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 23:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
  • "Legacy" is a poor name, given that the unit is still active. Perhaps that section could simply be merged into the OIF section?
  • Using rowspan= in the campaign streamers table would help eliminate the repetition of "Vietnam War".
Sorry, I'm not familiar with that practice. How should I use it? -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 19:20, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
I've changed the table to use it; please feel free to revert if you don't like the result. Kirill (prof) 12:31, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

Keep up the good work! Kirill (prof) 03:58, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Leithp

  1. It might benefit from trimming some of the more technical language, to assist readability for the layman: e.g. "most of the units of the 1st Cavalry Division that were not assigned to the major subordinate maneuver commands", "the Special Troops Headquarters was reorganized under the Pentomic concept of Headquarters, Division Trains. This designation immediately predates the DISCOM designation.", "task organized under their supported maneuver brigade" Concepts and terms like these are not widely understood or used by those outwith the US Army.
    Y Done reworded. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 01:08, 5 June 2008 (UTC)
  2. Are VC casualty figures taken from the US Army considered reliable?
    Y Done I changed it to "which, according to the US Army, saw 5,400 enemy killed and 2,000 captured." because there doesn't seem to be any source that contests that data. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 23:21, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
  3. An image from the Vietnam deployment would be good.
  4. The abbreviation HHC isn't explained.
    Y Done in Organization section. -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 23:18, 4 June 2008 (UTC)
  5. "Southwest Asia"... wouldn't "the Middle East" be a more commonly used term?
    Y Done -Ed!(talk)(Hall of Fame) 23:18, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

I hope that helps. Leithp 21:53, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Verdeja (tank)

Greetings, I was looking forward to expanding this article for a while - since the T-26 article really. I have finally found the time and I have finished the 'rough draft'. I still have to look over my writing and make the prose better, but I would appreciate it if anybody could peer review it and offer specific aid. Thank you. JonCatalan (talk) 20:36, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Skinny87

Hey Mac! I'll give it a look over now and see if I can give you a hand. I'm fairly new, but hopefuly I'll find something by tonight. Skinny87 (talk) 10:17, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

One thing comes to mind - the red-linked Captain in the Lead. Will he be notable enough to be given an article, or could it be replaced just by text? Skinny87 (talk) 10:39, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
Hey Skinny, thank's for taking the time to look at the page! I stubbed that article to get rid of the red link; I may expand the article at a later date, when I can gather enough sources to make a decent article. Thanks! JonCatalan (talk) 11:09, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
No probs. Looking over the lead, this : "The program was headed by Captain Félix Verdeja Bardales and led to the development of four prototype vehicles, including a self-propelled howitzer sporting a 75 mm cannon." might be a good candidate for a citation. I know there's one on the next sentence, but I think it warrants one. Skinny87 (talk) 17:33, 29 May 2008 (UTC)
Hm, I normally wouldn't hesitate to put a citation where someone asked me to put one, but do you think it's necessary? I was reading a number of comments on other article's talk pages to pass the good article review and there was one which said that a good lead had as many few citations as possible, as the citations were in the rest of the text. The text does cover all four prototypes in depth, so I don't want to add an unnecessary citation and be asked to remove it down the road.JonCatalan (talk) 11:19, 30 May 2008 (UTC)
Well, it's only my first review and you make a good point, so don't add it in! Skinny87 (talk) 17:07, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Dhatfield

This is well written and excellently cited. I'd say the best way to improve it is to summarise the text, particularly the lead paragraph. "The tank's proved superiority over the T-26 during testing conducted in Spain was not able to influence a large enough effort to put the tank into mass production", is particularly jarring. Although I hesitate to suggest it, consider trimming down the number of facts you present to get better flow, conciseness and notability - this is a barrage of information. Thanks for your citiation work on Tank. Dhatfield (talk) 11:23, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to read the article and offering kind words! As per your suggestion, I reworded that specific sentence in the introduction - Although the Verdeja was considered a superior tank to the T-26, after a lengthy testing period, the vehicle was never put into mass production. Furthermore, I took some things out, but I wasn't sure on exactly what could be considered extraneous information (at least, relative to the rest of the information) - for example, I took out references to the angle of the sloping of the plates. In the meanwhile, I will try to improve the introduction by providing a better summary. JonCatalan (talk) 12:15, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Unconventional warfare (United States Department of Defense doctrine)

See also Simultaneous second peer review
Article (edit) • Article talk (edit) • Watch peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review, in the interest of demonstrating there can be a globalised article (i.e., insurgency) with one or more national doctrines implementing it. There has been some confusion as a result of an unconventional warfare article that is quite distinct from this one.

Thanks, Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 20:11, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ruhrfisch

Ruhrfisch comments: First off this article needs to follow the five pillars of WIkipedia, one of which is Neutral Point of View. As written, this seems to me to be an example of content forking. This is not to say that there could not be a very good and neutral article on this topic, but right now this ain't it. Still it is clear that a lot of work has been put into it and so here are some suggestions to make it better. These are broad as a lot of work to clean this up has to be done. I will also give examples, but usually there will be many more occurrences of the problem that need to be fixed in the article - the examples are not an exhaustive list. Here goes:

  • The lead needs to be completely rewritten to be a summary of the whole article. See WP:LEAD A more NPOV version of the current lead could perhaps be used as an overview after the lead.
  • The title of the article needs to be mentioned as early as possible in the first sentence of the article - currently the US DOD does not appear until the second paragraph of the lead (and then is linked twice in two sentences - avoid overlinking).
  • Bold fonts are way overused in this article - see WP:MOS and read it (and not just on use of bold)
  • The article needs many more references - every section, every pararagraph, every quote and statistic needs a ref. Now for example whole sections such as History and World War II are unreferenced. See WP:CITE and WP:V
  • Refs that are given need to be consistent and provide more information - for example internet refs need url, title, publisher, author if know, and date accessed. Use {{cite web}} and other cite templates may help.
  • The MOS asks that an image be put in the top right corner - the skydivers over Afghanistan is visually striking and seems like a good possible lead image.
  • Do not repeat the article name in headers (or its abbreviation), so "Evolution of the UW mission" could just be "Evolution of the mission"
  • Much of this reads like a field manual for UW - talk about the topic and how others have analyzed it, not how to do it.
  • Above all, please do not use this article to critique the Unconventional warfare article.

The article is generally well written and interesting, it just needs some work to more closely conform to Wikipedia's policies and guideline. Hope this helps, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 05:07, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Unconventional warfare (United States Department of Defense doctrine)

See also Simultaneous second peer review

Ideally, read this after having read the globalised article, insurgency. This article is intended to address U.S.-specific doctrine. It has no relationship to the article unconventional warfare.

This should be part of a series for the U.S., and hopefully for other countries. Other U.S. special operations doctrine articles include special reconnaissance, which is in reasonable shape, and the evolving foreign internal defense.

Thanks! Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 15:29, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

With apologies, I have, at least for quite a while, given up on editing at Wikipedia. Please don't waste effort on this review if you don't want to do the changes yourself. Unless it fails, I'm finding Citizendium a much better working environment. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 15:06, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Jon Catalán

I looked over the article and have a few questions:
I do appreciate the effort. In general, however, many are issues where the way I prefer to write is not the WP way, so I am reducing my WP involvement. That doesn't mean something isn't sourced, but not in a readily available reference -- and Wiki anonymity prevents my using direct expertise on the subject.

- Superficially, UW is the opposite of conventional warfare, which has so many potential meanings and overtones that an attempt to discuss "unconventional warfare" as defined in opposition to "conventional warfare" becomes virtually impossible. <- Is this phrase needed? It contradicts itself (intentionally, I presume), but I don't see how the contradiction is entirely necessary. It seems more of a statement on conventional warfare, as well. I think it should be more direct in how it defines unconventional warfare as compared to conventional warfare. I think my opinion is justified given the next sentence:

This article focuses on the United States Department of Defense terminology and its associated usages; discussion of the other aspects of the topic requires a settled definition of the term "conventional warfare," which has not yet been reached. If it has nothing to do with the overall definition of unconventional warfare, then I don't think that such a arguable sentence before it is necessary.

There had been a very adamant IP insisting that no matter how something was explicitly described as US doctrine, it had to be globalised. This was Wikiselfdefense.

- In the United States, "special forces" refers specifically to the United States Army Special Forces (SF), as opposed to the usage in most other countries, where "special forces" refers to the range of unit types that the U.S. calls "special operations forces" controlled by the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). <- IIRC, 'special forces' when it comes to the US Army is spelt 'Special Forces', to denote that it applies to the US Army Special Forces, or Green Berets.

spelling error.

- The main strength of these movements came not from U.S., but local personnel. U.S. "behind the lines" units such as Merrill's Marauders, in modern doctrine, were not conducting UW but DA and SR. and then A variety of organizations, including United States personnel. conducted UW missions. <- These two sentences contradict each other. As to now create another point, I think the WWII section needs some sources, if they are available.

No, I don't see a contradiction, if one looks at the operations of the other units.

- After World War II, the original SF mission of UW, as shown in the first SF deployment of the 10th Special Forces Group to Europe, was in expectation of a Soviet attack on Western Europe. SF would help organize, train, and lead resistance movements to such an invasion. <- I think this needs a source, if one is available, because although it may seem 'common sense' to some, it might not be to others. In the sourced quote below, there is no mention of the Soviet Union, so I believe a source is necessary above, as well.

Again, this is where I come to a parting of the ways with Wikipedia.

- SF supported Kurdish resistance to Iraq under Saddam Hussein. In the 1980s, SF worked with the Afghan mujahadeen against the Soviets, but in a role of supporting rather than leading the local personnel. They did not need to create an underground and an auxiliary, and often supported the guerillas from outside the area of operations. Parts of the Afghan resistance, supported by SF and CIA elements, later became hostile to the U.S. <- Those statement need sources. I know they're hard to come by, especially since a lot of this information is classified top secret, but if they are available they should be added. The 1990s and 2000s sections also need sources, IMO. In general, without quoting everything, the article needs sources if they're available.

Often, sources are not available, or not public ones. I've relied, to some expense

What about other groups in the United States, other than Special Forces? Specifically, Delta Force (well, they could be considered part of Special Forces, but ... then again),

Delta Force is a DA/SR force. They don't do UW.
Combat Control and SEALs? SEALs operated in Afghanistan in much the same way that is described by the article.
I am unaware of SEALs doing other than DA or SR. They aren't trained, or even have personalities selected, for a UW mission. In the special operations community, there is a bitter argument that Rumsfeld, in particular, were taking Special Forces away from UW and giving them "door kicking" missions for which Delta and (some) SEALs are optimized; DEVGRU is the SEAL equivalent of Delta force.

Unfortunately, my books are not with me and so I can't direct you to a good source, but information on these groups should possibly be added in. Right now, it seems more like an article on Special Forces than on unconventional warfare.

Since UW was the original mission for Special Forces, that is not surprising; it is the only U.S. Special Operations organization that is fully trained for the UW mission. FID is the mirror of UW, so that also fits.

I hope my comments are moderately helpful! JonCatalan (talk) 14:23, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] MrPrada

A few quick comments from an ex-SOF guy.

  • If this article is supposed to be about counterinsurgency doctrine, it needs to be named counterinsurgency. FID/UW is a totally different animal. Right now the article reads as though it is in fact about UW.
  • In the tactics section, the article does not go into nearly enough detail on CA/PSYOP, which is a major component of UW.
  • The article does not distinguish between low-intensity conflict, and high-intensity conflict. The major parts of the doctrine you've summarized are from the manual UW/Special Ops in Low Intensity Conflict, so it would certainly need to discuss what it is, what the differences are, etc.

02:02, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Verrières Ridge

I've been working on this article since April 2007. It passed its GA Nomination several days ago (April 28, 2008). I've got several expansions planned for the article before I go for A-Class Nomination. However, I would love to have some opinions and/or ideas from some of the other members of the project. Any and all suggestions & comments are welcome and highly appreciated. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 23:56, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Just a minor thought, in regards to the lead, instead of; "and elements of three SS panzer divisions", maybe "against elements of three SS panzer divisions". It just at first glance it appeared as though the canadians were allied with the SS lol! Ryan4314 (talk) 18:37, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Y Done. That's a good point, don't know why I didn't catch it before. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 22:43, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Quite nice, overall, but a few areas that could use some improvement:

  • Numerical strength is more useful instead of (or in addition to) numbers of divisions in the infobox; it's not very easy to get an immediate sense of the scale from a list of units.
when I can find an exact statistic for it, I shall. Terry Copp has a new book coming out on the entire battle within the next few months, so I figure that will probably have a numerical strength figure in it. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 04:56, 7 May 2008 (UTC)
  • The "Allied Forces" and "German Defences & Forces" sections are quite short, so it may be worth merging them into a single "Dispositions" or "Forces involved" section.Y Done
  • "Canadian Controversy" might be better as "Historiography", as it touches on matters other than the purely Canadian perspective.Y Done

More generally, I'm not convinced that it's worthwhile to retain Operation Atlantic and Operation Spring as separate articles, given that the bulk of them is merely repeating what we have here. You may want to consider simply merging those two into the corresponding sections in this article, and having essentially a single narrative of the entire Canadian operation against Verrieres from July 19 to July 27 as a single article.

Keep up the good work! Kirill (prof) 01:26, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

The thing is that Operation Atlantic and Operation Spring had areas of attack other than Verrieres Ridge itself (Atlantic had the banks of the Orne & the suburbs of Caen, Spring had Bourguebus & Tilly-la-Campagne). I'm fully aware that I need to do some major expansion & revision of Operation Spring in order to better incorporate those aspects of the battle. Thanks for the suggestions. They are all greatly appreciated! Cheers! Cam (Chat) 04:52, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle for the Hague

Another lesser known battle of WWII. I have done most of the work on this one as well. I am curious to see what my peers think of my work. I believe it is very good, any suggestions will be appreciated. (Red4tribe (talk) 19:25, 24 April 2008 (UTC))

[edit] Roger Davies

Promising start but perhaps needs more focus on the basics. The lead, for instance, needn't say that this was a battle (the title tells us that) but should mention who the combatants were (ie Royal Dutch army and German army]]; the date/s when it took place; and what the outcome was. Other things?

It would probably benefit from an overview section. What part of the war this slots into; what the overall plan was; what each side stood to gain or lose.

Battle articles are usually enormously improved by some blood and guts description. That is focusing on individual actions and what those people did.

It needs a copy edit. The use of capital letters is not Wikipedia-standard (eg "force the Queen to Surrender"); it has a few typos ("immediatly" > "immediately"); and some sentences are unclear ("The Germans were slowly reinforced by burning transport aircraft who were crash-landing anywhere they could find"). Easiest is to find a word-nerd as a collaborator (and we have plenty here who can help: try posting a request in the Logistics dept at WP:MHL#COPYEDIT).

--ROGER DAVIES talk 09:10, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Agree with Roger in regards to the lead.

"The Battle for the Hague was a battle that took place as part of the Battle of the Netherlands ("Battle" said 3 times in one sentence, might want to mention it was part of WW2 too). German paratroopers (you could add a link to them, and put their German name too) dropped in (where? the Hague? the Netherlands?) and were assigned to take ("capture" or something like that would sound sexier lol, but seriously it'll avoid you having to use "take" again in the next sentence) Dutch airfields and the city. After taking the city, the plan was to force the Queen to surrender and defeat the Dutch in a single day."

I hope it doesn't sound like I'm teaching you to suck eggs, but I recommend copying a lead section from an FA class battle article, then swapping it's information for yours. Also try to imagine you've just stumbled across this article per "random page", and ask yourself does the lead summarise this clearly now? Ryan4314 (talk) 19:00, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of The Afsluitdijk

This is about a little known battle in WWII in which the Germans suffered one of their rare defeats in the opening stages of the war. I did probably 95% of it myself so I am curious to see what is thought of this article about a little known battle. (Red4tribe (talk) 22:39, 23 April 2008 (UTC))

[edit] Gaia Octavia Agrippa

Looks good for a minor battle and is in depth. A few comments though:

  • Inline citations please
  • The references and notes section should be one with all references shown will help of a {{reflist}}
  • Many more internal links needed
  • Any external links would be helpful
  • Make the number of people/planes in the main text words instead of numbers to give a more professional feel.

If it wasn't for not having enough citations this would be a very stable B-class article. Gaia Octavia Agrippa Talk | Sign 17:48, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

In regards to the first sentence of the lead; un-bold the "The" at the very start, move the Afsluitdijk link out of the "Battle of the Afsluitdijk" to the "control of the Afsluitdijk dike" later on (we're meant to avoid bold wikilinks), you'll wanna change the "[[May 1940]]" to look like this "[[May]] [[1940]]" (although personally I'd not link it all, you only need to link if you have the exact day as well) and also mention it was part of WW2 as well (I know 1940 makes it pretty clear, but some people are thick and don't know the dates of WW2).

"The Battle of the Afsluitdijk was an attempt by the German Army to seize control of the Afsluitdijk dike in May 1940. (Say they lost before this sentence) If the Germans had successfully taken the dike, it is very likely that they could have taken North-Holland from its north. The amount of ("Northern-Holland from the North and the amount of)" civilian casualties could have been devastating. The Dutch troops were lead by Captain Boers and the Germans by General Feldt. (This looks a bit odd here maybe merge/shuffle it around)"

Basically the lead is meant to be a summary for anybody who accidentally stumbles across this page (i.e. the "random page" feature), as you edit it, try to imagine you're one of these people. Also it couldn't hurt to beef it up a little. Ryan4314 (talk) 19:22, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Operation Varsity

I've chosen to submit this article for peer-review because I'm a new user, and would really like some peer feedback for the article from more experienced users. Skinny87 (talk) 19:42, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

I've left my comments on the talk-page of the article itself. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 00:30, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Operation Varsity#Peer Review Request. (Link for reference). Woody (talk) 13:03, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Woody

I notice you are getting lots of help on the talkpage so I will make it brief. It is a very well-written article, and it is developing well. Couple of suggestions:

  • WP:DASH Make sure you have – between numbers and dates so 1943–44 and in p. 1–4
  • WP:MOSNUM Some of the dates had "the" in front of them which is unneccessary e.g. " on the 23 March 1943" should be on 23 March 1943"
  • An image or two would be useful, though I know it is hard to acquire them.
  • Citations. It needs to be more thoroughly cited when summing up eg."Although the result of this drop aided the British troops landing against German troops, and the 513th quickly rallied, it was still a fundamental error, and one that should have been solved after so many operations. The failure to correct this flaw again shows that the Allies did not completely learn from the errors made during their previous operations, despite the flaw existing for several years and being crucial to the success of any successful airborne operation." is entirely uncited. Without a citation it is WP:OR
  • Existing citations. The links being used in the "Notes" section need to be formatted and attributed correctly. Wikipedia:Citation templates are helpful in achieving this. See Victoria Cross for an example of how they can be used.

So, an excellent start, but still needs some rigorous citations and little MOS fixes. Well done. Woody (talk) 13:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Great lead, two very minor comments though;

  • "Operation Varsity was a World War II (maybe stick in a "joint American-British" here) airborne operation that took place (and maybe a "towards the end of the war" here) on 24 March 1945.
  • In regards to the ref for "as well as being the largest in history", you might want to read this; Wikipedia:Lead section#Citations. I'm not saying you should change it, just thought you'd be interested. Ryan4314 (talk) 19:31, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] HMS Liverpool (C11)

I've chosen to submit this article for review to address whatever issues are identified as further expansion is unlikely right now. Per SoLando tradition, prose is choppy in parts and the post-war section is especially disjointed (there's a paucity of information on Liverpool's activities in the Med'). That lack of sources has really impeded the development of the post-war section. Woody kindly searched the Times Archive earlier this month without much joy. But I believe the article is proportionate to the availability of reliable sources and comprehensive. Apologies if I'm not prompt in my response; April has been a month of distraction ;-). SoLando (Talk) 08:03, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

This is a pretty good article. My comments are:

  • As a general comment, much of the article is written in a passive voice, and the article would be more engaging if this was switched to an active voice.
  • As another general comment, the article only deals with the highlights and notable incidents during the ship's career. Were there any lowlights? (eg, accidents, bad captains, groundings, crew discontent at long deployments, war damage due to missjudgements, etc)
  • "Liverpool began to operate in September [1938] monitoring the Persian Gulf for potential Axis activity" this was before the Axis was formed (Sept 1940 according to Axis powers).
  • The bit on the boarding of Asama Maru is confusing - I suggest that you replace 'certain passengers' with '21 of the ship's passengers believed to be survivors of the scuttled German liner Columbus' in the first instance.
  • "escorted a convoy transporting ANZAC forces" - replace 'ANZAC force' with 'Australia and New Zealand forces': the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps of WW2 only existed for a few weeks during the Greek Campaign in 1941, and the Australian and NZ Armies were totally seperate apart from this.
  • The date was she torpedoed during Operation Harpoon should be added.
  • What happened to her during 1943 and 1944? Was she repaired and then laid up, laid up without being repaired or very slowly repaired? Also, why was she assigned a low priority for crewing? - did the RN have more cruisers than it needed by this stage of the war, or was there some flaw in her design that made her less effective than other ships?
  • On that topic, can you add an assessment of how this ship's design performed during the war? - did it prove successful? (I believe that it did, and from having toured HMS Belfast in London, it was certainly an impressive class of ships). --Nick Dowling (talk) 11:13, 28 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I've copyedited the article to try to address and reduce the passive. Has the prose been improved? It hasn't been entirely eliminated - some I've decided to retain as the alternatives caused repetition or just didn't sufficiently flow. Writing an article on a ship is always a challenge when consciously trying to minimise gender nouns (to no avail from the beginning) and diversify sentences. Not that I'm being defensive ;-).
  • Google hasn't yielded much more information than that present in the article right now. Certain tactics Liverpool employed during her operation in Japanese waters appear to have been "irregular" and potentially controversial. The first torpedo attack certainly was; however, these accounts are only supported by one website which doesn't attribute its material to any source.
  • Ugh, that is a fundamental error. Moving swiftly onto the next issue.
  • Revised for clarity
  • Addressed
  • Addressed
  • Information on the process of her repairs at Rosyth is almost non-existent. If I recall correctly, the newest construction usually had priority over damaged ships and assets whose value was in question (such as the battleship Rodney). That and the scarcity of available manpower for a crew-intensive cruiser like Liverpool appear to have been the reason. I'll add it later.
  • There's little information directly pertinent to the article. Certainly, the Towns were a highly regarded class although if I recall correctly it was the final batch (Edinburgh and Belfast) that was considered to be the RN's definitive wartime cruiser design.
Nick, thank you for reviewing the article. Are the revisions satisfactory? SoLando (Talk) 20:08, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
Yes, that looks better. I agree that it can be hard to find detailed information on ships like this which weren't particularly remarkable. --Nick Dowling (talk) 12:04, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Ok mate, I gave it a quick read through (only fair, you did it for me after all).

  • In the 2nd paragraph of the lead there's seems to be an almost comical amount of "twos" and "fours" (almost to the music of the 12 days of Christmas lol)
  • Can you put the link for Torpedo bombers earlier in the article, maybe by the first torpedo attack Ryan4314 (talk) 14:50, 29 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Thank you. Haha, I hadn't noticed that. I assure you there was no ulterior numerical bias - just a cynical attempt to flesh out the intro' ;-). Both issues have been addressed. SoLando (Talk) 20:08, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Powhatan Beaty

I've been working on this article for a while now and am looking for feedback. I'm hoping to get this to FA status, what do you think? jwillbur 23:58, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

I will be posting a more detailed review of this later, but great job so far. I came across this article last month and added it to the featured bio list of Portal:ACW, I really like it. MrPrada (talk) 00:26, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Very nice, overall; a few suggestions, though:

  • The MoH citation might be better off integrated into the ACW section (perhaps as a pullquote or something of that sort).
  • It'd be nice if the see also links could be worked into the text somehow.
  • The lead should be expanded if possible.

Keep up the good work! Kirill 13:53, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Two minor minor suggestions regarding the lead;

  • Just a thought, what do you think about moving the "During the American Civil War" bit up? So it looks something like this;

Powhatan Beaty (October 8, 1837–December 6, 1916) was an African American soldier during the American Civil War and actor. He served in the Union Army's 5th United States Colored Infantry Regiment throughout the Richmond–Petersburg Campaign.

  • Can we have the name of the play and his role please, so it may look something like this;

"His most well-known stage performance was an 1884 appearance as Tybalt in Romeo & Juliet at Ford's Theater in Washington, D.C., opposite Henrietta Vinton Davis."

Ryan4314 (talk) 23:19, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Erich Hartmann

I would like to bring this article up the quality scale. Please let me know where it requires improvement. MisterBee1966 (talk) 09:18, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

Overall, a good article with a large amount of content.

  • given that, however, I feel that the number of citations is inadequate for an article of this size. Of particular note, there is a section of 3 or 4 paragraphs under "Career in the Luftwaffe" that have almost no citations.Y Done
  • I feel that the entire article could benefit from a copyedit, as there are some places where the phrasing is quite disjointed, particularly in the "after the war" section.Y Done
  • I feel that the article may go into a bit too much detail at times, especially in the sections describing individual kills. It tends to read too much like a historical novel or textbook, and not enough like an encyclopedia.

That said, you've done a great job on this article. Good luck in taking it forward. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 22:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gaia Octavia Agrippa

A very interesting article.

Could do with:

  • More details about personal life, it is a biography after all.Y Done (partly)
  • Could do with more subheadings to split up the larger sections.Y Done
  • Needs rewriting to make it the correct order of events and to link up thing (eg the Russians dropping the charges of war crimes and him getting charged with them) perhaps in there own sections.Y Done

Other than that it is a very good biography and i personally believe it is better than B-class. Gaia Octavia Agrippa T | C 20:27, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

Concerning the lead;

  • ref [1] needs to be after the full stop.
  • What's the rule on 1st and 2nd when it's 352nd, anyone?
  • Maybe have "JG 52" acronym in brackets after first mention of "Jagdgeschwader 52" in lead.
  • add "false" before "War Crimes", at the moment the lead section makes him sound like an actual nazi war criminal.
  • What did he do after he retired? and lengthen the sentence about his death. Ryan4314 (talk) 23:35, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Quartermaster Dick Libby, USN (1834)

Quartermaster Dick Libby, USN: "Twenty years in the Navy. Never drunk on duty - never sober on liberty." Portrait painted c.1834
Quartermaster Dick Libby, USN: "Twenty years in the Navy. Never drunk on duty - never sober on liberty." Portrait painted c.1834

I love this painting. Dick Libby would have made a fine Rembrandt common man model. The worn face, the rumpled uniform -- this artist knew his stuff. Compare to Image:Der Mann mit dem Goldhelm.jpg.

Image is from the Naval Historical Center. [2] links to full picture data, including the quote in the caption. WP Image links to Uniforms of the United States Navy and Old salt.

Nominated by
Pete Tillman (talk) 04:00, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Comments
  • Size doesn't meet FP criteria and I suspect some people will have problems with the text on painting, although that's easily fixed. My other concern would be encyclopedic value. I don't know how well it really illustrates Old salt. I think with a bigger scan and better article placement this could gather some support though. Tomdobb (talk) 17:23, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for your comment -- I didn't realize there was a 1000px minimum, but "Exceptions to this rule may be made for historical or otherwise unique images, if no higher resolution could be acquired." Wikipedia:Featured picture criteria. The only real way to get a better photo would be to rephotograph the original painting(which is, or was, at the United States Naval Academy), not very practical since I live in Arizona.
Perhaps this image could also illustrate a historical naval uniform article, but no such article seems to exist. Hmm.... Thanks again, Pete Tillman (talk) 18:44, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
Image now linked to Uniforms of the United States Navy, which has some historical info. Cheers, Pete Tillman (talk) 20:01, 8 April 2008 (UTC)
The historical policy is more for if the original itself is historical on its own right but fails the technical requirements. Here is a painting 2.5 feet tall; the problem is not in the historical origninal but in the modern digital reprodiction. Thegreenj 00:48, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
-- and that's an insoluble problem, without rephotographing the painting. Oh, well. Something to do on my next trip to Annapolis (or yours??).
Too bad, as it's an exceptionally fine painting. Better reproduction than the Rembrandt (above) too <GG>.Thanks for your comment, Pete Tillman (talk) 18:26, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Oh, by the way, do you know about Wikimedia Commons? If you upload free media there, rather than to Wikipedia, it can then be accessed from foreign language Wikipedias and other Wikimedia projects. Thegreenj 00:52, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
Seconder


[edit] Portal:British Army

Hi. I'm after possible improvements and ideas before I nominate this portal for featured status. Jhfireboy Talk 15:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hossen27

Very sound portal

Not much wrong here.

I made a few mostly minor changes to the layout and removed some redlinks.

just a few more things.

  • make all the images in the selected articles the same size (around 200px), just for consistency.
  • try to make the selected articles similar lengths, keeps the portal looking more uniform even though it automatically refreshes the content.
  • Its not a necessity (in my opinion) but adding the source of the selected photo is always a nice touch. see Portal:Military of Australia/Selected picture for examples.

Go ahead and put it up for feature review if you think its ready. They will find the other little things that need a change that I missed in my 10 minute check.

Well done Hossen27 (talk) 02:13, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

A very nice portal, as Hossen27 says. There are a few things that may need some fiddling, though:

  • The background color seems a bit dark for me; it's difficult to read the blue links on it, at least on my screen. You might consider using a lighter shade of khaki instead.
  • Selected pictures do, generally speaking, need sources.
  • The "Things you can do" box shouldn't contain anything that's already been done. Y Done
  • I'd avoid using thumbnail markup inside the boxes, for consistency; the captions can be positioned under the image via a table instead.
  • The main portal navbar ("Culture · Geography ...") appears twice; I'd suggest removing the one at the top, to avoid needing the horizontal line there. Y Done
  • A list of major topics would be good (and is likely to be requested during the featured portal review).

Keep up the good work! Kirill 02:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

Well, as mentioned by Kirill & Hossen27, really good portal. However, there are a few minor things that I think could use some improvement.

  • Kirill, you're not alone. it's difficult to see the blue links on my screen too (despite the fact that I have brightness turned to absolute max). Might I suggest a lighter colour.
  • The "Related portals" seems a bit out of place. I'd argue that it is taking the place of something more important, such as Featured Article or Featured Event or something along those lines (incidentally, I notice you don't have a "featured event", perhaps you should add that).
  • I think the whole page could benefit from a re-arranging of the boxes. Generally, Featured Article is the first one on the portal in most cases, rather than the featured picture.

Other than that, however, I think this thing's pretty much ready for Featured Portal nomination. Excellent work. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 04:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kyriakos

Good work so far. The portal is looking good, I just a few comments:

  • As mentiond above I would standardize the size of the images, I personally think that 150 px is a good size.
  • As stated by Kirill, a major topics section would be great as looking through several of the MILHIST Featured Portals they all have one.
  • You might like to get rid of the thumb on the images.
  • I would be good if you added images for every article when possible. In the selected units, Royal Horse Artillery and Scots Guards don't have images, when their symbols could possibly be used.

Otherwise, the portal looks very good. Kyriakos (talk) 07:25, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gaia Octavia Agrippa

Very good portal. Only one problem and that is with the colouring. It is not very easy to read the first section. Can i suggest that you use something other than blue on green as the background. Great content though. Gaia Octavia Agrippa T | C 20:33, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] BusterD

Some good work here. Building a new portal is a lonely task. Much of what I'll suggest is intended to invite the casual reader to participate. I personally think that there's way too much background color showing (Selected picture, for example), but that's an artistic choice, and not by any means a deal killer. There are several issues that will come up during any promotion process and must be resolved in some way, if my recent experience at P:ACW is indicative. I'll also suggest you look at Portal:Norway (a newly featured portal maintained by User:Cirt, a frequent FP commenter) for examples of what is expected in that process.

  • Current style is that instructions appear on each content page. See how I've adapted this for Portal:American Revolutionary War/Selected event (in Kirill's new portal effort).
  • A page layout is also a good idea (same examples), in order to make it very easy for a new portal contributor to make finished, correctly styled entries all by themselves.
  • A redundant link to each subsection entry (look at the page code for Portal:American Revolutionary War/Selected event to see what I mean) is another handy handle a new editor can use to see exactly where to click.
  • Your "Things to do" subsection references things to do on the portal itself, and strangely, that's not the task the section normally performs in a featured portal. Look at similarly intended (but very different from each other) subsections in Portal:Comedy and Portal:American Civil War. I'd use a {{todo}} template on subpages to tell the new editor what tasks need doing. On the main page subsection, I believe the accepted style should be pointing the editor toward helping content-area articles. If there was a British Army task force, you could simply transclude their to do list. Since you have a Britsh military history task force, you can pull from that. Keep the red-links to high-priority requests.
  • IMHO, you're going to need way more selected sub-articles and pictures. Six of each is a very small number. Size of each entry should be roughly similar; right now when one cycles the selection, page composition varies widely, when it should be fairly stable. Read current FP process to see what metrics are currently being applied to such issues. It's a good idea to start reading FP process anyway.
  • Maybe it's my browsers or platform, but the "Show new selections" link is partially hidden behind the two top subsection boxes.
  • Intro box needs a footer: (More about the British Army)

I suspect there's more to do, but since you need many more sub-articles and pictures, remind me to look again after you've built those quantities up a bit. BusterD (talk) 00:17, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

This looks better. I'm not sure what the ideal number of entries will be, but keep adding a few a week, and then you're ready. Expect some sharp critique at featured portal (you'll be busy for a week or two); the accepted practice is to self-nominate your own work, so you can choose your moment. Congratulations on important work done well. BusterD (talk) 23:58, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kenneth Dewar

I have just had this article promoted to GA standard, and I'm interested in where to proceed from here. The article is getting a bit long, but I feel that whatever detail I've included is relevant to the subject. Dewar is perhaps a little out of the way as far as naval history goes, but after I elaborate a bit more on his intellectual leanings I reckon he'll stand as an example of a unique sort of RN officer - controversial, cocksure and very intelligent. It would be nice to get the article up to FA-class standard, but anything which improves the article will do. Regards, Harlsbottom (talk) 10:44, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Howard C. Berkowitz

Interesting article. Minor note: some of the sentence construction and word choice is British rather than American English. I happen to find phrasings such as "promoted (rank)" to be more pleasant than the American "promoted to (rank)", and I'm not sure of the rule here -- should an article on a British topic use British English, or is the general American English rule applicable.
The mark of a good article often is that it makes me want to know more about the subject. For example, was he too junior, or was he affected by the Fisher-Beresford feud? Given the impact of failing to force the Dardanelles, I'd have liked to see more about his critique of Naval training and what should be fixed. As an aside, did he have any comment on the WWII sinking of Royal Oak?
This article may indicate a need for some additional background articles, or linking to ones that exist. Alternatively, some of the issues may not have been the practice at the time. As I understand, a RN officer now elects Navigating, Gunnery, Engineering, Supply, etc. early in his career, and command of a warship is an option only for navigating officer. Here, however, Davies is described as a gunnery officer yet received command.
Note B is a bit redundant. Unless one serves in a navy with Voudoun chaplains, being killed is definitely incapacitating, but one can be incapacitated by wounds, or being perfectly healthy but without communications.
I enjoyed reading it. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 17:46, 30 March 2008 (UTC)
The guideline on British v. American English is, as far as I know, editor's choice, as long as you are consistent. Carom (talk) 11:50, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
As regards promotion, when Dewar joined one basically had the Executive Branch and the none-Executive Branch, the latter including Engineering, Medical, Accountant, and all the rest. Before Dewar had joined, the Navigation Branch, formerly separate had become part of the Executive. One either didn't specialise, but off the top of my head I can't think there were that many who didn't, or you specialised in Gunnery, Navigation or Torpedoes (which also included the electrical branch). All naval cadets were given a formal and rigorous training in sciences and basic engineering, so specialising didn't detract too much to anything they had learned about seamanship and the like. Before the Selborne Scheme came into effect, which requires alot of explanation, only the Executive branch could command warships, whatever their specialisation, provided that Their Lordships at the Admiralty felt that the officer in question was capable. At any rate they would have been expected to be capable of commanding a ship. I'm re-reading a very good book on the education of naval cadets, if and when I feel confident I will try and impart some of it into Wikipedia and this article.
As to background, he would have watched the Beresford-Fisher Feud I am sure, however, until I can find a copy of his memoirs I am stumped. I haven't come across anything in The Naval Review on it yet but I'm sure something will turn up. Ditto with the sinking of Royal Oak. I need to obtain a copy of the books on the "Mutiny" or grill User:BillC at some point.
You have a point about Note B, I will reword as there is a little something more to impart on tactics and chain-of-command there I think. Anyway, thanks for the comments, very stimulating! Harlsbottom (talk) 16:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

This is pretty well done, I think. I would recommend expanding the lead a little; it does it's job, but it's perhaps a little short based on the length of the article. There're also a few places where a few more refs wouldn't be amiss - the end of the "post-war commands section" doesn't let us know where the information comes from, for example. Overall, nice work! Carom (talk) 11:50, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

Will sort some more refs out - it would seem I missed a few out for some reason when I first drafted it! Cheers for constructive comments! Harlsbottom (talk) 16:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Mahamat Nouri

This is the biography of the leading Chad rebel commander. I want to ask a review of this article so to see how far it is from a potential A-class category, and what is most necessary to be done. The great lack, as all may notice, is the lack of images; there's little I can do, unfortunately, as free images of prominent Chadians are in general extremely rare (there's only one in wikipedia, and it's that of the current President of the country).--Aldux (talk) 18:46, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Quite nice, overall. A few minor suggestions:

  • There's a lot of redlinks in the article; any chance of getting some of the more prominent ones stubbed out?
  • Are there images available of any of the events, particularly in the civil war? Maps could potentially work here, if nothing else can be found.
  • Should there be succession boxes for his political posts, or are they all single-holder things?

Keep up the good work! Kirill 12:36, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Javascript review

The following suggestions were generated with the aid of a semi-automatic javascript program:

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, DrKiernan (talk) 13:36, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Technical intelligence

Before I started "improving", this article had the reasonably limited scope of US-oriented technical intelligence (TECHINT) at the tactical level. I then started working on Farewell Dossier, which dealt with Soviet/Russian strategic scientific & technical intelligence (STINFO). The damage done by the Farewell Dossier, in turn, pertained to both economic intelligence (no article yet) and the stub economic warfare.

In other words, this article probably is several articles crying to go in their own directions. To confuse things further, financial intelligence is in reasonable shape, but certainly will tie into economic intelligence, when and if someone creates it.

Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 03:17, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Yes, I think there's definitely potential for several articles here. Aside from the topical distinction, I wonder if the "Allegations of intelligence collection at the national level: charges and countercharges" section might not be better off as a stand-alone list of some sort; the single-sentence sub-sections there, in particular, don't really work as pure prose.

Beyond that, there's still a focus on US matters in certain portions (e.g. "Tactical agencies", etc.); I'm not sure if this is merely due to a lack of information—but if it is, those sections could also form separate articles if/when they're fully expanded to cover all the relevant states. Kirill 00:34, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

You surmise correctly that a lack of information is the concern for non-US tactical agencies. IIRC, there is a NATO agency, but, as with SIGINT, there may be a US unit supporting it. Any sources on non-US agencies and doctrine would be gratefully appreciated.
While I'm not sure where to split the article, there's probably the most information, besides the US, on Soviet STINFO, and then possibly on France (and a lot of speculation). Have you any idea how much Soviet work in this area may have continued into the Russian Federation? Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 00:51, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
No idea; I've never really focused on Soviet/Russian operations. Someone like Buckshot06 may be in a better position to provide an answer. Kirill 00:56, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Montana class battleship

This rewrite is roughly six months in the making, its still not done entirely, but at this point the major overhaul is as complete as I think I am going to get without getting a second opinion (or third, or fourth, or...well you get the idea :-). I'm offering a spelling star to the first person whose brave enough to take on the article, otherwise I'm all ears as to what I can do further improve the article. The goal, as always, is FA-class. TomStar81 (Talk) 08:40, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

BTW: I am struggling with school, and as a result won't be responding during the work week, however I will read this and I will work to address the concerns brought up (if any) whenever the opportunity to do so appears. Trust me :) TomStar81 (Talk) 08:49, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
Updates
  • I have added a subsection to create an independent fate section. Does this work, or should I try to get rid of both sections?
  • The 1944 in the secondary battery section was a typo, it has been corrected.
  • I addressed both hidden notes.

Feedback on these new improvements would be appreciated. TomStar81 (Talk) 05:43, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Notes to Myself (TomStar81)

  • Need to address the two hidden notes left in the article namespace. TomStar81 (Talk) 19:06, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Need to switch out the deprecated infobox currently in the article for the new one. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:43, 31 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Very nice, overall (as usual!); but a few minor points that ought to be cleaned up:

  • The "References" section doesn't actually list all the sources used in the footnotes. If it's intended to only be general references, the section titles/structure should be adjusted to indicate this; but I'd just make it comprehensive.
  • The entire article needs a thorough copyedit for MoS compliance, particularly as regards spaces/unspaced/dashed units; you have all sorts of variations here ("20 mm", "40mm", etc.) at the moment.
  • The single "Design" subsection looks a bit peculiar; is there any way to eliminate it or to split it into multiple sections, so as to avoid the single nested sub-heading?
  • The "Secondary battery" section refers to "the cancellation of the Montana-class battleships in 1944", but the article earlier states that the ships were canceled in 1943; is this just a typo, or are there actually two different dates (for different phases of cancellation?) involved?

Keep up the great work! Kirill 03:06, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

The updates look good to me. Kirill 20:18, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

Excellent article. Just a few comments

  • I'm of the mindset that the "design" section needs to be eliminated (primarily for continuity), and the content shifted into the various other sections (armor, armament, propulsion, etc). Although a lot of this would normally go under "construction". This page is unique because the Montana-Class ships were never actually built.
  • Your "notes" and "citations" are interspersed. I'd suggest separating these into two separate sections. Carom once told me how to do it, but I never did quite figure out how to properly do so. Separating the two, however, allows for slightly more continuity.
  • I'd go into slightly more detail concerning the cancellation of the class. I know you mention it quite a bit in the opening, but I'd create a separate section going into more specifics on it.

That's all I can catch off the top of my head. All the best with taking the article forward! Cam (Chat) 01:45, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] From SG

Hey, Tom! Sorry for the delay. I only had time for a quick glance, but I found a number of things that would indicate a rough go at FAC. There's actually quite a lot of MoS cleanup needed; I suggest you ask Epbr123 (talk · contribs) to run through (after you've cleaned up the citations), as he's prompt and thorough. Are terms like Montana-class and Essex-class hyphenated or not? The article is inconsistent. See my one edit for the issues I found only in the lead. There are missing conversions on many units also, and inconsistent date formatting in your citations, missing publishers, WP:MOSNUM issues, mix ups in hyphens, MOS:CAPS#All caps issues, WP:DASH issues (no unspaced emdashes), punctuation problems on WP:MOS#Captions and I found a long sentence in the lead which may indicate you should get someone fresh to run through the prose. I wouldn't recommend coming to FAC until someone else has gone through the prose, all citations are complete and consistent, and Epbr123 has run through on MoS issues. I wish I had time to just dig in and do some of this for you, but alas, my time is more constained these days. Good luck, and hope to see you at FAC soon! SandyGeorgia (Talk) 23:35, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

Sandy, I believe that Tom's plan for this article is GA and A-Class before going to FAC, but I'm sure the heads-up is appreciated. I can answer about the hyphenation on Montana-class and Essex-class, see {{Sclass}} for details of those links. If you think the usage needs to be changed between adjectival and noun forms, it is an easy change, it just requires a copyedit for tone and grammar. -MBK004 00:38, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Naissus

I would like to see this article being assessed for A-class but perhaps it is too small and more concentrated on the events around the battle (because there is too few information for the battle itself in the primary sources). Anyway, User:Roger Davies suggested me to ask first for a peer-review. I liked the idea of getting help in order to improve the article. Some problems I could benefit of some help are the following :

  • Greuthungi and Tervingi : while some primary sources are mentioning them, I don't think those names fit to the history of 260s. My secondary sources don't bother with this problem. What do you think?
  • Map : this is a self-made map. Possible quality problems could be corrected relatively easily, since the prototype is a layered digital image.
  • The balance between the sections : as I mentioned above, the balance would inevitably lean away of the battle itself. Perhaps the article should be called The Gothic Invasions of 267-270 (or might include the entire 3rd century) but I think it would draw more attention with the current title. Besides, in a more generic subject, most of the current details would seem out of place.
  • Zonaras : I don't have a version of the Greek text with proper column indicators so I can't use citations to him at the moment.

Dipa1965 (talk) 23:23, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Pretty nice, overall; but a few areas that could use some attention:

  • The coin image in the infobox breaks the layout; I'd suggest removing it.
  • The lead should be somewhat longer; two or three paragraphs is ideal.
  • Given that the footnotes are not heavily repeated, I'd suggest doing away with the naming and using combined footnotes at each point in the text, to avoid long strings of successive note numbers.
  • Footnotes should be placed consistently relative the closing punctuation; placing them after punctuation is preferred.
  • I'd pull all the footnotes to the ends of sentences; the material is not so controversial as to require individual phrases to be cited, in my opinion.
  • All images should have captions.
  • The primary and secondary sources should be in a single "References" section; if splitting is desired—and I don't think it adds anything, personally—this can be done within that.

Keep up the good work! Kirill 20:25, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for everything! I tried to follow all suggestions with minor exceptions here and there (mostly for combined footnotes). I made the introduction longer (two paragraphs), is this what you meant by saying "The lead should be somewhat longer"? I removed the coin image but I think it would be nice to have it anyway, perhaps in a single row of the box (what do you think about the position and size of the coin image on Battle of Abrittus?). Dipa1965 (talk) 09:15, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Geuiwogbil

Good work! I'll make comments as I go through the article:

  • I don't think the image is showing up correctly: the caption reads "'Scythian' invasions of 250–251 AD". It's the same as on Battle of Abrittus, I believe, though it has the correct filename. Perhaps you should re-upload it? The March 12 version looks like the correct one. Geuiwogbil (Talk) 19:23, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
Hello Geuiwogbil and thank you for the constructive comments! I fixed the image. I 'll respond one by one to the rest of your comments Dipa1965 (talk) 19:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
It would be indeed. Originally, I thought of including it but I hesitated due to the rather mediocre quality of that article. But you are right, it is so strongly related to this one (Besides, I intend to work on the Crisis of the Third Century in the future). So I am now mentioning it in the lead. Dipa1965 (talk) 19:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I've made some tweaks in the "About the confusion of the primary sources" section, which I've renamed to "Sources" (hope you don't mind). I've added some details from Potter. "Each of these works provides an almost radically different interpretation." Does this sentence refer to the histories that make use of Dexippus (Zosimus, Zonaras, George, HA) or the works in which direct citations to him survive (HA, "ninth-century Byzantine collections of excerpts from earlier writers")? Are they making radically different interpretations of the "text" or of the "events"? Do you have a citation for the statement? I've made some assumptions and written up the sentence as "To make matters worse, the works making use of Dexippus provide an almost radically different interpretation of events." Do correct me if I'm wrong. I'm sorry if I introduced this confusion myself. :( Geuiwogbil (Talk) 19:52, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
I am happy with all modifications you made. The shorter title is better and the text is now much clearer. Now I will try to explain "Each of these works provides an almost radically different interpretation". It refers to the histories of Zosimus, Zonaras, Syngellus et al. We don't have the original Dexippan text (except for a few fragments) but, since each of the later historians and chronographers offered his own course of events (different dating, different sequence of invasions, different number of invasions, different targets, different results), scholars assume that either Dexippus' text was confusing or that they were not able to use it properly (or probably both). Even Gibbon understood the problem, blaming the historians. So I think that your modification was correct. The confusion is exposed indirectly in the next paragraph but I now added one more citation to D.S.Potter and John Bray about it. Bray also suspects (rather rightfully so) that they all also used a second (unknown) source which added to confusion, so I mentioned it. Dipa1965 (talk) 19:14, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Thanks! Who translated Herwig Wolfram's History of the Goths? It should be noted in the "References" section. Geuiwogbil (Talk) 23:10, 17 April 2008 (UTC)
Done. Only a minor question left. Why putting "ndash" instead of a simple "-"? Ndash is neither shown as an option when one edits a page while the simple "-" and the larger "—" are. Dipa1965 (talk) 20:22, 18 April 2008 (UTC)
It's there, right before the mdash ("—") after "Insert:". I express it as "ndash" for the same reason I express the mdash as "mdash": because my keyboard doesn't have a key for it. Its use is mandated by Wikipedia's 'Manual of Style' at WP:MOSDASH. The ndash is required for "disjunction" (where it is used in "ranges" (pp. 211–19, 64–75%, the 1939–45 war, May–November) and "As a substitute for some uses of and, to or versus ((Canada–US border, blood–brain barrier, time–altitude graph, 4–3 win in the opening game, male–female ratio, 3–2 majority verdict, Michelson–Morley experiment, diode–transistor logic)), "negative signs and subtraction", and in "lists". Geuiwogbil (Talk) 00:41, 19 April 2008 (UTC)
  • "Heruli leader Naulobatus came in terms with the Romans." Do we have details for the terms? Favorable? Unfavorable? Any characterization would be good.
  • "In the past, this battle was identified with that of Naissus, but modern scholarship has rejected this view." This could use some detail, I feel. Why (on what evidence) has modern scholarship rejected this view? Who propounded the old view? Who supports the new view?
  • "On the contrary, there is a theory that the victory at Nessos was so decisive that Claudius' efforts against Goths (including battle of Naissus) were no more than a mopping-up operation." How does this contrast with the previous sentence? (This should be elucidated in the text, since it seems like a jump from the preceding sentence at present.) Who supports this view and why? Does Potter provide an (positive, negative) evaluation of this theory?
  • "After his victory, Gallienus left Marcianus in place and hastily left for Italy, intending to suppress the revolt of his cavalry officer Aureolus." Marcianus who? What's he doing here? The reader hasn't been introduced to him at this point. Where's Aureolus revolting, and where's Gallienus going off to?
  • "Gallienus was assassinated outside Milan in the summer of 268, in a plot led by high officers in his army." I've been tweaking this sentence because it sounds off, but prose is one of my weaknesses, so I'm probably worsening the issue. Some concerns, though: Why is he being assassinated? What led his high officers to be so dissatisfied with him to try to off him or usurp his title?
  • "Claudius was proclaimed emperor and headed to Rome to establish his rule." Was Claudius there, in Milan? Was he an accomplice in the murder? Where was he?
  • "After he defeated them in the Battle of Lake Benacus, he was finally able to take care of the invasions in the Balkan provinces."¶"In the meantime, the second and larger sea-borne invasion had started." The second sentence follows the first, but isn't the first referring to the events of the second? If it is, then it should be clarified as such: Claudius "turned his attention to new disturbances in the Balkan provinces". If not, then it should be made clear earlier on that the Balkans remained unstable in spite of Gallienus' campaign, and that Claudius is returning to clean up continuing instabilities.
  • "The battle most likely took place in 269." Are there competing chronologies? (There are always competing chronologies in ancient history, aren't there? ;)) This could be an interesting point of dispute, even if the discussion was confined to a footnote.
  • "an epidemic affected the entrapped Goths." Do we have scholarly speculation on what sort of epidemic it was? Does Zosimus say?
  • "the battle did not entirely break the Gothic tribes' military strength." Can you cite instances of continued Gothic military strength in the text to demonstrate this point to the reader? A bit of the political history of the Goths following the battle (continuing effects, immediate effects, a change in foreign policy, no effect at all) would be interesting.
  • "The psychological impact of this victory was so strong that Claudius became known to history afterwards as Claudius II Gothicus" Is this the only evidence of psychological impact? If there was a profound psychological impact, perhaps a more detailed account of that impact could be written?
  • Some more background on why the invasions have taken place at all would be beneficial. What were the Goths' objectives? Plunder? Lebensraum? Specific land claims? Seasonal migration? A brief overview of the Goths' prior relationship with the Romans could help here.
  • I feel that "The Gothic Invasions of 267–270" would work better as a subject for the article: so much content in the article is already on material surrounding the battle, and it looks like there's not much to be written about the battle itself. Your concerns about drawing attention are understandable, but, personally, I think that the proposed title (minus the "The", which I think is against our naming policy) would attract more eyes than a "Battle" article, which anyways misrepresents what this article contains. A "campaign" article would also provide a good opportunity to clarify the origins, background, and long-term effects of the campaign, which are a bit obscure in this version.
  • Since there isn't much content as it stands, more discussion of the source material and related historiographic concerns would be a good supplement to the narrative. More detail would be useful in the second paragraph of the "Sources" section, for example. At the moment it isn't clear why these individuals hold such contrasting views. Provide the reader with some understanding of what the key points in the dispute are: what evidence is being used, what positions have been discredited, where have they been discredited, who is doing the argumentation? Since there's enough space for it, the specific primary sources used behind the narrative in the article could be cited and discussed. Are there competing claims made for the evidence at a particular point? Has a secondary source made any specific criticisms of the primary sources at a point where it might help in the analysis of the historical narrative? That sort of information is appealing to me, at least. :)
  • Still, very good work. I feel like it could use a copy-edit, but I'm not very good at that sort of thing. Have you considered calling up a MilHist Copyeditor to give it a look-over? I think they could help. :) Geuiwogbil (Talk) 01:56, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

An impressive review! Since you also noticed it, it seems good to re-think the material on the basis of a campaign article. It will need a lot of work (e.g. addressing all the issues you mentioned) which I initially wanted to avoid in a battle article. The latter should be concise and narrative, the former would permit more analysis on the problematic nature of our sources. I will return on it later, when I will have available the entire books of John Bray and Alaric Watson. I have recently purchased the Barrington Atlas which will also help a little on the geography of the campaigns. Dipa1965 (talk) 05:07, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Paul Nobuo Tatsuguchi

It's been more than two years since I tried to really develop a biography article, so, I could really use another set of eyes to ensure I'm doing this correctly. I discovered this story recently while doing Pacific War research and thought that it was a very interesting story. Any comments and critiques are greatly appreciated. Cla68 (talk) 05:29, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

  • You can probably drop the "(US)" after the United States.

Otherwise, sweet lead. Ryan4314 (talk) 19:35, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Very good, overall, but a couple of minor things that need fixing:

  • In quotes, editorial comments (e.g. "sic") are normally given in square brackets, not parentheses. Is there some reason for the different usage here?
  • Extended quotes are sometimes cited at the end of the introductory statement and other times at the end of the quote itself; I'd suggest using a single style.

Other than that, this looks ready to go. Kirill (prof) 03:30, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Corrections made. Thank you both for taking the time to review the article and leave comments. Cla68 (talk) 13:06, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] World War II

Previous review here.

The article has just undergone a huge reworking (thanks primarily to Oberiko). We'd like to see what everyone thinks of the new version, what improvements should be made, etc. Thanks for all input. Parsecboy (talk) 22:28, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A preliminary question: there are many sections with no inline citations whatsoever. Why is this the case? I'm assuming it's not simply an oversight, and I'm curious as to the rationale. Carom (talk) 22:37, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I believe the issue there (and I could be wrong), is that the current version was created on a temp page, and when it was substituted, the references in the previous versions were lost. The task of working through the old version and transplanting the references into the current version still lies ahead of us. Parsecboy (talk) 00:36, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I see. Some other thoughts, then:

  • The "see also" section should be removed. Links here should be incorporated into the larger body of the article.
  • The "bombings" and "war trials" sections might warrant a little bit of expansion.
  • There should be a link to World War II material on Wikimedia Commons.
  • The prose is generally good, but could use a thorough copyedit.

Other than the lack of citation, I have no major complaints at this point. This is an excellent job so far; everyone involved is to be commended. Carom (talk) 01:12, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

The citation issue is my doing. As I was writing, I really didn't see any facts that needed to be cited, considering that it's mostly a collection of links. If you see any disputable facts, let me know and I'll add a source. Oberiko (talk) 03:04, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Hm, I've always interpreted the citation guideline a little more strictly than that. It's not really just a collection of links; it still provides a narrative of the war. It seems to me that it should really be cited like any other article with regards to consistency and density. I also imagine that this might become a fairly large stumbling block if you intend to run this up to FA. Carom (talk) 03:29, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Shouldn't be a problem to add them if required then, the page is (by necessity) such a generic overview that finding hard-copy confirmation shouldn't be an issue. Oberiko (talk) 12:40, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] EnigmaMcmxc

Am curious about the caption under the image in the info box. I know it doesnt mean to, but to me that key code is implying that all countires in light green joined because of the Japanese attack on the USA.

(on a slightly related note, wasn't Persia carved up between the Soviets and British before the American entry into the war?)--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 00:24, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we are working on the map issue at the moment. Another installment of the infobox montage discussion (which would replace the map) has been started here, all input there would of course be welcome. At the moment, Oberiko is working on a new version of an animated map that will address the concerns expressed here and elsewhere. Parsecboy (talk) 00:36, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Cool, i look forward to seeing it--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 10:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Here's a link to the new montage: Image:WW2Montage.PNG. Take a look and see what you think. Parsecboy (talk) 15:03, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TomStar81

I have to agree with Carom on the citation issue, I would like to see at least one citation perparagraph for the article because at the moment much of it is to me uncited. I will grant that this is largely a narrative history on the war, but the same could be said of the Iowa class battleships and those articles all have citations on a per paragraph basis. I will take a closer look at the article when I have the chance to (at the moment I have a book report to work on thats due Thursday) and will have further comments then. TomStar81 (Talk) 04:34, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

This article is vastly improved and I'd congratulate everyone involved. The process in which the improvements were made (by proposing text on the talk page before adding it) is an excellent example of a consensus approach to editing and is a model for other difficult to manage articles. My comments are:

  • I agree with the need for citations as the article does make some assertions and they act to deter vandals. Using brief histories of the war should make this managable (I recomend John Keegan's excellent book).
  • The article's prose is rather breathless and hard to read at times. I'm not sure what can be done about this, but the article could be longer.
  • The common use of 'British' and 'United Kingdom' when describing actions of Commonwealth forces is inappropriate and inaccurate. For instance, Australian, and not 'British', troops made but the majority of the force which invaded Syria in 1941. Use either 'Commonwealth' or 'Allied'.
  • I'm suprised to see that China didn't declare war on Japan until after Pearl Harbour (4th para in the 'The war becomes global' section).
  • The article doesn't always describe the impact of the events it described. For instance, there's no mention that the Soviet offensive at the Battle of Moscow inflicted devastating losses on the German Army and that this was a key turning point in the war. --Nick Dowling (talk) 10:02, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
Your fourth bullet is correct; neither side formally declared war in the SSJW until after the US was attacked, because neither side wanted to alienate the US (which was trading with both China and Japan), which had been pushing for peace at the time. Parsecboy (talk) 14:22, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
The Commonwealth issue I'll try to get taken care of today. I'd rather not have any analysis of battles/events here, a large number of them (Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk, France (1940), El Alamein, Overlord, Bulge, Coral Sea, Midway, Guadalcanal, Okinawa etc.) can be described as pivotal; I'd rather leave explaining their significance to the daughter articles which cover the major theatres. Oberiko (talk) 16:28, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Mrg3105

Despite the amount of editing done, and the significant improvement achieved, there is an entire concept, and at least a large section simply missing from the article!

  • For Germany SWW was predicated on the economic fallout of the previous war, and the Nazi rhetoric. What followed was a territorial expansion by any means, with the goal being an expansion of German economic power. Germany lost the economic war a few months after the commencement of Operation Barbarossa. Ultimately combined Allied economies secured victory on the battlefields. None of this s evident from the article. The economic dimension needs its own section at last, which will hopefully mention the role of women in wartime economies, and the effect this had on the post-war societies of the World.
  • If the economic issue was implicit in the Nazi Germany policy, then in Imperial Japanese policy this was an explicit cause for expansion of the Japanese Empire and its Economic Sphere. Where is this in the article?--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 03:41, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
We don't have it yet. If you check World War II/temp, you can see that we have a blank section called "Home front". This is where production figures and such will be located.
I don't really want to get to in-depth to the reasons for German or Soviet actions. I briefly mention Japan's motive (to create a defensive perimeter while exploiting the resources of SE Asia), and Italy's motives (to create a new Roman Empire) but Hitler's motives were at least as much about ethnic eradication and world domination (indeed, he was making plans for the eventual war against the United States after conquering Europe) as they were about economic gain. I feel that the European Theatre of World War II would be a better place to talk more about it. If you can summarize it briefly though (a sentance or two), then by all means give it a shot. Oberiko (talk) 12:46, 13 March 2008 (UTC)
Yes, I kept looking in temp to see what's new. Sadly I can not devote time to this. This is a huge subject which comes trough in other articles where production and logistics are concerned, so of course the Eastern Front. It needs a category revamp, and not just a section here. The reason I'm concerned is because the Soviet wartime economy in Wikipedia is covered by two short paragraphs!--mrg3105 (comms) ♠♥♦♣ 02:03, 14 March 2008 (UTC)
The wartime economy and production for each of the major belligerents (U.S., U.K., U.S.S.R., China, Japan, Germany, Italy and France) each merit full articles. The most one could do in the WWII article itself is give a very brief comparison. Oberiko (talk) 02:46, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Omar Khadr

I'm throwing this up for Peer Review as I finalise the summaries of the three tribunals (satisfied with Tribunal #1 as of last night's efforts, working on #2 today, #3 next week) - I'd appreciate critique of the article and suggestions for improvement since the article has been pretty much 100% my creation at this point - so I'm worried that I may be blind to some of my own errors.

I recognise that the tribunal #2 and #3 sections need reworking, but other than that, what could I do to improve this article?

Thanks, Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 18:19, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Roger Davies

I appreciate that this cannot have been an easy article to write and you have done good work. From a quick read through, the biggest gap is a comprehensive setting out of the evidence against him. I think it needs a sourced timeline of exactly what he supposed to have been getting up to in Afghanistan. The absence of this also impacts on the article's neutrality. --ROGER DAVIES talk 19:02, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Hrm, you mean between 1996 (when he was 10 years old, and his family moved to Afghanistan) and the July 2002 firefight (when he was 15)? He's not really accused of doing anything prior to the Firefight is the crux of the problem, but I assume you're not referring to the firefight. Are you thinking that the videotape (showing him planting landmines and talking to the men in the hut) of the ~week's events prior to the firefight should have their own heading? The single reference to "weapons training" allege it occured a month before the firefight, though it's not clear how long Omar was working alongside al-Libi or the three men killed alongside him - I can try to clear that up with the family this week, though it'll obviously breach OR guidelines. So, your thoughts on a seperate heading for the week/month prior to the firefight?Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 19:16, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
I was after a timeline of the stuff the charges are framed from, based, I suppose, on US-released documents. There has been plenty of commentary so this should be possible.
I've been thinking through the rest of the article and wonder why it doesn't mention the close involvement of the family with Al-Qaeda. It really needs a separate section.
The ambivalence of the Canadian govt/press is another unexplored area.
If you have amicable links to the family, you must disassociate yourself from the article. This area is sensitive enough without adding WP:COI to the cocktail.
--ROGER DAVIES talk 19:27, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
First of all, unless it can be shown that my writing is not neutral, there's no reason to "disassociate" myself from a topic simply because I have some familiarity with it. By that reasoning we would ban scientists from writing about science-related articles because they'd studied it themselves.
Back to the review, the parts that mention Canada (Gould's interrogation, etc) originally had their own section, but were re-worked into the chronology so that Canadian enquiries when he was at Bagram are under the Bagram heading, Canadian interrogations while he was at Guantanamo are under the Guantanamo heading. Do you think it would be better to re-separate them, or leave them combined with their current topics?
I'm a little confused still by the phrase "a timeline of the stuff the charges are framed from", not trying to be snarky, just trying to figure out what exactly you want. The charges are framed on the actions inside the compound, primarily the throwing of the grenade that killed Speer - they already have an exhausive timeline with ~40 references under the "Firefight and Capture" heading. Do you mean you want a point-form div-box in the side that just summarises in five-word sentences the bare minimum of information? Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 20:12, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
To be candid, I don't think your writing is entirely neutral: that's the point I initially made after scanning it briefly. It fails to give as much prominence to the US position as to Khadr's. It needs a section clearly setting out of the US position: why they are holding him; why they are according him such prominence; the conclusions they reached after apprehending him following a four-hour firefight; their belief that, brought up as he was in an Al-Qaeda family, he is probably unlikely to renounce insurrection. The family details are also glossed over: Khadr's father was apparently killed in a firefight on the Afghanistan/Pakistan border with Pakistani security forces; Khadr's brother was allegedly a suicide bomber. These allegations have been widely reported in the press so they ought really to be included. I will not pursue this further here and will be interested to see what other reviewers think. --ROGER DAVIES talk 20:57, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

(outdent)In an article already struggling with size, I imagine details about the firefight that killed his father belong in Ahmed Said Khadr, not Omar's article. See also Khadr family for the details that deal with the family as a whole. Omar's article should deal strictly with the facts that are relevant to Omar - I don't think that's a POV assertion. His brother was not a suicide bomber, so obviously I don't think that should be included (although the false assertion is mentioned in the article Abdullah Khadr about his brother. So leaving out the fact that I don't deal with his entire family in the article about a single member of the family - your complaints which I'm still anxious to help resolve are;

  • "clearly setting out of the US position: why they are holding him;" I would say this has been exhaustively dealt-with in the article, again, there are ~40 citations about exactly why he's being held, including quotes from both the prosecution and defence attorneys.
  • "why they are according him such prominence;" to be honest, I haven't seen any references suggesting he's been accorded prominence or why. Unfortunately, I don't think they exist. if you have such sources though, I'd be happy to include them.
  • "the conclusions they reached after apprehending him following a four-hour firefight" ummm, there are 28 paragraphs about the their conclusions following the firefight, and I've put all of the documentation, his ARB/CSRT findings, his trials and the motions on Wikisource, and are linked in the article. I'm not sure what kind of "conclusions" you still want. "Conclusion, he is a bad guy" is kinda POV, I'm dealing strictly with the facts - are there any facts I'm missing in the article?
  • "their belief that, brought up as he was in an Al-Qaeda family", this isn't really a "belief", it's a fact, and it's outlined in the section "Early Life", specific details about the family members can be found in *their articles*. Let's not give way to "We should mention how EVIL Hitler was, in the article about Goerring"-speak, this article is about Omar, we should carefully weigh family-facts whether they relate specifically to Omar.
  • "he is probably unlikely to renounce insurrection." I've never seen that listed on the charge sheets the US has brought against him, probably because "being unlikely to renounce" something isn't a crime...am I missing something? Nobody significant to the case has ever complained that "he won't renounce X", yet *you* believe it should be one of the accusations against him? Again, if you provide evidence that a prosecutor, a guard, a military policeman, a judge, an attorney, a soldier...*anyone relevant to the case* has ever suggested that "he is probably unlikely to renounce insurrection" is a damning fact against him, I'd be *overjoyed* to include it in the article...but I'm not adding it just because you personally think that makes him a bad Canadian.

But since most of your complaints seem to be about the content, not the structure of the article, can you perhaps take this to the Talk Page of the article, rather than Peer Review? Thanks! :) Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 21:25, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wandalstouring

You shouldn't link the dates. Wandalstouring (talk) 06:22, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

You mean the dates like August 1, or years? I understand August 1 is typically linked because it allows readers to choose whether it displays as "1 August" or "August 1", or is this no longer the accepted style? Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 06:54, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Brian Horrocks

This is an article I've been working on for a while (3 years or so, which should give you an idea of my work-rate) and I'm looking for suggestions for improvement. I'm aware of the fact that the North Africa and Europe sections need in-line citations and I also intend to do a fair amount of copy-editing/re-writing/expansion, particularly on those sections, and would appreciate other opinions on where I should direct my efforts. Leithp 12:33, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Update: As part of the recent review for GA status, citations have been added to the N Africa and Europe sections and those parts have been slightly expanded. I'd appreciate comments on further improvements that could be made (I'm still aware of the combining refs issue that Kirill mentioned, and will eventually get round to finishing that) or opinions on whether the article is ready to be taken on to A-class review yet. Leithp 07:17, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

A few other areas that might need looking at:

  • The lead seems too short for an article of this size.Y Done
  • Given that you're not repeating footnotes too much, I would suggest avoiding named ones at all, and instead combining the notes for each sentence into a single one. Certain areas of the article seem a bit too densely footnoted; the material isn't really controversial enough to warrant citing individual clauses, In my opinion.

Overall, though, this is a very good article. Kirill 13:49, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

I've combined the references on a couple of the worst offenders. I'm not sure the rest of the multiple-footnotes affect the readability. Let me know what you think, please. Leithp 06:34, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan4314

In the lead;

  • Which Olympics? Y Done
  • I know who Montgomery is, but you might wanna mention he was the North Africa allies commander.Y Done

Ryan4314 (talk) 19:37, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of the Kalka River

I recently rewrote the article and I am planning of taking it to GA and beyond. Any constructive critism or comments are most welcome. Thanks. Kyriakos (talk) 23:49, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

Just a few comments:

  • The lead doesn't have any citations. I realize that a majority of the article already has significant citation #'s, but it would be nice to have some in the lead as well(especially since the lead contains info that isn't referenced to elsewhere).
  • In the Aftermath section, "To stop the Mongols from the western side of the Dnieper, Mstislav destroyed all the boats he could find." stands to be reworded. I'd change it to "To stop the Mongols from crossing to the western side of the Dnieper, Mstislav destroyed all the boats he could find", simply for slightly more clarity.
  • The last two paragraphs of "aftermath" could do with a minor copyedit and some fleshing out. The wording simply seems too choppy.
  • I would replace the satellite image of the Dnieper with a map of the battle around the Dnieper, as this seems to have slightly more relevance to the article itself.

You've done well with this article. Great work. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 00:25, 10 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Overall, a very nice article; but a few points that might be worth looking at:

  • There's some slightly confusing wording regarding the two Mstislavs (e.g. "...the Mongols slaughtered them and executed Mstislav. Mstislav the Bold escaped..."); I think it may be better to use the epithets everywhere, to eliminate any ambiguity of this sort.
  • The "Background" and "Caucasus raid" sections seem like they ought to be combined somehow; both are really background material. Or perhaps "Caucasus raid" and "Prelude" could be made sub-sections of "Background"?
  • "Rus fall" is a very strange construction, as "Rus" here doesn't refer to a permanent grouping, and "fall" doesn't really take an adjective in any case; it should be "Rus defeat", or perhaps "Fall of the Rus".
  • There's some inconsistency regarding whether the name is rendered as Rus or Rus'.
  • As long as you're using short-form notes, I'd suggest using short-form titles as well.

Keep up the good work! Kirill 18:07, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks again, Kirill. I have added the Mstislavs epiphets and have made "Caucasus raid" a sub-section of background. I have also changed the "Rus fall" to "Rus' defeat" and I have also made the change from Rus to Rus'. Kyriakos (talk) 07:37, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wandalstouring

Misleading intro: The Battle of the Kalka River (Russian: Битва на реке Калке) took place on May 31, 1223, between the Mongol Empire (led by Jebe and Subutai and Kiev, Galich, and several other Rus' principalities) and the Cumans, under the command of Mstislav the Bold and Mstislav III of Kiev. The battle was fought on the banks of the Kalka River and ended in a Mongol victory.

On which side did Kiev fight? It is presented as part of the Mongol Empire in this intro. Wandalstouring (talk) 14:23, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] James Graham (soldier)

I am interested in gaining comments from interested persons about this article on the "Hero of Waterloo", with a view to improving the article and nominating for GA. It is not long, but covers the relevant information about Graham. I am aware it lacks pictures; some paintings exist but I do not know copyright issues. Any help or advice appreciated. Many thanks, Gwinva (talk) 09:28, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

  • Update I have provided a section on Graham's early life and service, and a summary background into the Bergen op Zoom and Waterloo campaigns, and supplemented the information of Graham's laetr career, as well as worked on the stylistic points mentioned by Cam and Gaia Octavia Agrippa below. I would appreciate comments or review of the article as it now stands. Thanks, Gwinva (talk) 09:17, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

On the whole, a very good article. However, there are several things that stand out as needing some tweaking and/or improvement.

  • On a format note, The Quotebox on the right side of the main section is messing up the flow of the entire article. Is there some way for you to work that directly into the text? Although quoteboxes work for smaller blocks of text work, I think that the quotation for the box is way too long for usage in the quotebox, as it disrupts the format of the entire article.
  • I think that the lead needs to be expanded. Although it gives a brief outline of James Graham, I think it could go into more detail.
  • There is absolutely nothing dealing with James Graham's earlier life (i.e. Before the Battle). I think that, before you nominate it for GA, you need to find some information about his earlier life & training. This will substantially improve the quality of the article.

I see very little issue with the content already there, it's mainly the content that should probably be added within the near future. All the best with taking the article forward. Cheers! Cam (Chat) 21:46, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for those helpful comments; they give me a good idea of where to go next. I will sort the formatting out, as you suggested, and expand the lead. And you are quite right, the article does just leap straight into the battle at Waterloo. There is little information available about Graham's earlier life, but since I have his years of service I will be able to describe his military experience a little, from the more general Coldstream Guards information. Again, thanks for the pointers. Gwinva (talk) 00:41, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gaia Octavia Agrippa

It is a good biography but there is a lot still to be done in my view.

  • It needs more details of his career before and after the battle.
  • It needs details about his personal life.
  • It needs reformatting to improve the layout of the page.
  • It needs more relative links.
  • It definitely needs a picture of him.
  • It should have more information in the info-box.

Overall it is a B-class article but has a long way to go to become A-class or even GA . Gaia Octavia Agrippa T | C 20:49, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the pointers. As I mentioned to Cam above, there is little information or details about his personal life available, but I will follow up regimental histories to get an overview of campaign experience. I presume the formatting isssues are similar to those mentioned by Cam above? But what do you mean by "relative links"? And what other information needs to go in infobox? (I've added allegiance and service branch). As to the pictures of him, there are some around: portrait (held at National Gallery of Ireland) and Robert Gibb's famous painting of the closing of the gates at Hougoumont but I don't know how to discover the copyright status of these. Are they held by the museums? Or has copyright expired on all paintings of that age? Many thanks for the comments and help so far. Gwinva (talk) 01:02, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Noetica

I have nothing much to add to the suggestions above. I do think it needs more detail of his life beyond the military: his early circumstances, his family, and the like. Yes, a portrait would be good too. I'd be reluctant to spend time on formatting right now, until any new images or other elements are in place. I have just done a copyedit of the whole article. I think it was already quite orderly, and I can't immediately find any way to improve it with the current content. I have left a couple of questions in my edit summaries (marked in capitals: "QUESTION:"), which may be worth following up. A good article, modest in scope. Does its job well!

–⊥¡ɐɔıʇǝoNoetica!T– 07:06, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Noetica. I have followed up on those questions in the edit summaries. I have failed to find any verifiable information about Graham's early circumstances, so will have to leave it there. As far as pictures, there seems to be copyright issues with paintings held in Britain (copies are subject to copyright, regardless of whether the original is in the public domain or not). I have queried this at Wikipedia:Media copyright questions (see [3], which seems to confirm this. In addition, I've emailed various sites which use the paintings, without success. At this stage, it will have to remain a "good article, modest in scope". Thanks for all the help! Gwinva (talk) 05:56, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] USS Comfort (AH-3)

I have recently expanded and improved this article and would like to get some feedback on what else is necessary. Thanks in advance. — Bellhalla (talk) 22:56, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Woody

Excellent article I have to say. I have done a little copyedit, but there wasn't much to copyedit to be honest. Seems to meet the MOS. I have a couple of questions though.

  • You say she faced the "prospect of" quarantine. Was that realised?
  • Can you rephrase They were in the first group of the first American troop convoy the repitition is annoying me, but I can't seem to find a way around it.
  • After consideration of re-outfitting the ship for dependent transport was rejected, What is dependent transport? Could this sentence be rephrased slightly; consideration of re-outfitting just doesn't flow for me.

Otherwise, as I say, looks very good to me. Go for A-Class. Woody (talk) 20:18, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

  • "Prospect of quarantine": The news coverage from The New York Times was not necessarily complete. If I recall correctly, it was announced that the ship was going to be in quarantine but there was no follow up on whether or not it actually did.
  • "first group of the first convoy": I changed it to "lead group" which avoid the repetition but also conveys that it was first.
  • 'Dependent transport' was bringing home war brides and children from overseas. I've rephrased it and combined that sentence with the next short one, too.
Thanks for taking the time to review the article. — Bellhalla (talk) 22:24, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
No problem. Your fixes look good. I would remove the "prospect of quarantine" or rephrase it unless you can find a source discussing whether it did go into quarantine. It is a bit of a loose end at the moment. Woody (talk) 22:36, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
OK. I looked back at the original source, then searched the next day's paper and got it resolved. The ship would have been detained in Havana (not New York) and was released after 1 day. Text and additional reference now reflect this. Thanks again for you suggestions. — Bellhalla (talk) 00:50, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 11th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment

Previous peer review
Article (edit) • Article talk (edit) • Watch peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I want to start the FA nom process but give editors one more look at it before I do. I think this article has solid bones, with some great citations. I am working on removing the last few unauthoritiative sources and will do so before I pass it up for FA nom, so please don't comment on those. Part of my request involved editors examining citation format, prose, spelling, and other style issues which may be of concern. I would appreciate anything you can give me on this. Regards, Daysleeper47 (talk) 19:26, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] The Rambling Man

Hey Daysleeper, certainly not an area of my expertise but I'm happy to provide general comments where I think the article could be tweaked...

  • "that fought with the Union Army" - could be ambiguous to fight with someone could read as in "to have a fight with someone..." - "fought on the side of the Union Army" perhaps?
Adjusted with "a regiment of the Union Army"
  • "Zouaves" - what does this mean?
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Link "Commonwealth " accordingly.
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep citations in numerical order - you have a [4][3] at the moment, there may be others..
Question: If the citations are the same, I thought I could use the same citation name, thus only creating one entry. See citatin 11 as an example. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
'Response: Yeah, reusing them is fine, but reuse them in such an order that the citations appear numerically... The Rambling Man (talk) 11:08, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
I've rechecked and it looks fine now. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • "flashy Zouave uniforms " "fashioned in flashy uniforms" POV unless you can cite "flashy". Even then, it's probably worth a reword.
  • "fezzes " - link this to Fez.
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • You've redlinked "Henry Willard" - do you expect him to have an article, i.e. is he sufficiently notable to warrant one?
He was a notable Washingtonian, who yes, I expect should or one day will have his own article. The hotel in question still exists and is one of Washington, D.C. finest. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Early action has several short paragraphs, consider merging a couple of them.
  • " First Battle of Bull Run" needs linking in the "First Bull Run" section.
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • " double-quick" - why italics?
My own added emphasis from several months ago. Removed to maintain nuetrality. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • "their foul conduct in camp" expand and explicitly cite I think!
  • You have a section heading "Draft Riots.." is Riot a proper noun here? If not then it should be lower case, as you have it in the main prose.
Draft Riots is generally assumed to be the name of the event, and the article maintains capitilization for both words. The only instance in the article in which I use the two words together is in the header, which I believe to be an acceptable usage. If another editor can find a described use to contrary, I will certainly change it. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • There has been a slow move towards having a combined references section with subsections General (your References) and Specific (your Notes), possibly worth considering.
I will have to look at how other articles have done that; I'm not familiar with that style but will certainly give it a look. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

That's all I have right now, I enjoyed the article a lot, let me know if I can help further. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:39, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. Daysleeper47 (talk) 03:25, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

One more comment - ensure you use the en-dash for separating page ranges in the citations. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] HMS Cardiff (D108)

Previous peer review
Article (edit) • Article talk (edit) • Watch peer reviewThis peer review discussion has been closed.

I'm going to nominate this article for FA, i would just like a quick peer review before hand. There are two main things I am interested in; 1. Is this article understandable to people who don't know about the Falklands & Gulf wars or warships? 2. Would you all mind taking a look at the gallery on commons and suggesting what images (and how many) you think should be in the article please.

Cheers, Ryan4314 (talk) 14:29, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Note: Because of its length, this peer review is not transcluded. It is still open and located at Wikipedia:Peer review/HMS Cardiff (D108)/archive2.

[edit] Pakistan Air Force Academy

I do like to promote this article from the current B ranking, so want a review to make further improvements. --SMS Talk 13:38, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A few comments:

  • The lead should be expanded. It should really provide both an overview of, and an introduction to, the rest of the article.
  • The section "Qaid's address" seems superfluous. Overly long block quotes like this are usually unnecessary, and in this case, it doesn't really seem to add anything.
Should it be shortened or completely removed? SMS Talk 09:44, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
I would remove it entirely. Carom (talk) 19:19, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Y Done SMS Talk 20:04, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
  • There are a number of very short sections. These should be expanded, not only to give the reader a more complete understanding of the topic, but also to enhance the visual appeal of the article.
  • The "see also" section is unwarranted, and should be removed.
Y Done SMS Talk 03:43, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
  • The entire article really needs copyediting. We now have a dedicated request center for copyedits; you can ask one of the editors listed there to help you with this.

Hopefully these are helpful for you to be going on with at the moment. Carom (talk) 00:53, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

Good article on a neglected topic. Quick note - the 'Story of Pakistan Air Force' and 'History of Pakistan Air Force' need publisher and date information. Could you also explain the use of 'Royal Pakistan Air Force'? Is that correct? Agree with all Carom's comments as well. Buckshot06 (talk) 22:03, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I will surely add the publisher information. And about 'Royal Pakistan Air Force', which was the name of the force when it was established 60 years ago and that is only used in the quote of the Quaid-e-Azam, as I think i can't change the quote.--SMS Talk 03:34, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
No, no worries. I looked up the main article and I understand why it was used. Cheers Buckshot06 (talk) 03:55, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Benjamin Brice

I'd like to start transposing some of Eicher & Eicher and flesh out the info on staff officers, departments, etc., that is currently MIA from the ACW TF. I'd count this as a template article, there is innumerable detail on the staff officers in the OR, it could take an entire year just to write one really good FA on each, however in the mean time I would at least like to get a reasonably sized bio up there. I'm interested in hearing what you think of what's already there, and what you think needs to be added, removed, etc. MrPrada (talk) 07:28, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Also, this brings to mind a related MILHIST thought. The finance corps is missing from Category:Branches of the United States Army. MrPrada (talk) 07:32, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rockfall

Nicely done, though I have a few points on reading the article:
  • The first section is called Early Life and Background and yet has a paragraph of his life 'after' the war, which is covered in the final section.
  • Main section is referenced (but seemingly from only one or two sources), though could do with some more wikilinks on some of the locations and names, for example Kansas and Paymaster.
    • The writing style of this section is very percussive - all short sentences will one piece of information in each. I feel this slows down the flow of the article.
  • Final section is good, though I am curious what Brice's role was, if any, in Reconstruction, which obviously was very important historically.
Overall I think the article is a good start which could perhaps do with a little more detail - it is hard to write that they have been unfairly neglected by historians and then not detail some specific examples of his actions in the war, or even personal details like family etc. Rockfall (talk) 14:57, 6 March 2008 (UTC)\

[edit] Carom

Well done so far, although a few comments:

  • The lead probably warrants a brief expansion. Although the article is short, the lead should always give the reader a fairly complete overview of the topic.
  • There's some oddly placed information - for example, the last sentence regarding his brother-in-law. A slight reorganization of some information would, I think, be beneficial.
  • I would change the organization to Notes-References-External links (I believe this is slightly more conventional).

With regards to the missing category you mentioned, it's no problem to create one - I'm guessing it should be Category:United States Army Finance Corps? Carom (talk) 00:47, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 53rd Pennsylvania Infantry

When this article was initially created, it appeared to be just a copy-and-paste job from another webiste. I've tried to bring it more in line with other similar Wikipedia articles (adding an infobox, links to other articles, etc.) and have also extensively edited and rewrote it. Any further suggestions for improvement (and corrections of errors) would be greatly appreciated. Wild Wolf (talk) 18:55, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Roger Davies

I'm sorry if this turns out to be a damper but this article has several very substantial problems.

  • It still contains significant amounts of text that remain cuts and pastes from the source webpage. These need re-writing in your own words.
  • The webpage itself is probably not a reliable source. You should look for other sources to support what the article says. The upside is that will give you more information.
  • The article isn't properly cited or sourced. See WP:V for what to cite and WP:CITE for how to cite it.
  • It needs breaking up into sections for readability. A lead section to set the scene, followed by three or four sections, dealing with the regiment's formation, battle honours, and so forth.

The way forward is probably to ask for assistance on the talk page of the American Civil War task force. It has many experienced, knowledgeable and helpful editors. --ROGER DAVIES talk 20:56, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Red Harvest

I agree with the above.

  • Many of the web pages on the topic reference Samuel Bates' History of the Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-65 published in 1868. This would be public domain if you can be certain that passages are taken from the original.
  • Dyer's Compendium contains lists of dates and actions for the regiment. Fox's losses and the Official records should also be cited where appropriate to confirm the material gathered from other web pages, etc.
  • The history section definitely should be broken up into headings or subheadings. Red Harvest (talk) 21:31, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A few supplementary comments:

  • You may actually find it more productive to start from scratch. Locate some reliable sources (the ACW task force may be a good place to start), identify a useful structure (3rd Battalion 3rd Marines might serve as a model of sorts), and produce some prose of your own - you may find it easier than attempting to rework someone else's.
  • You will also want to keep in mind things like proper citation format, etc. as you move forward.
  • I don't know if images are available, but they are always a bonus.

Best of luck. Carom (talk) 00:16, 6 March 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Leobold1

I'm more of a detail and link expansion person.

  • I did make 2 very minor edits to fix the link for William H. French and Israel B. Richardson. It was written as [[William. H. French]] with a period after William, and missing the middle initial for Richardson. These were quick and easy fixes and would have been stupid to write it out telling you rather than make the edit.
  • More info on the "Grapevine Bridge" could be helpful (what kind of bridge, distance, etc). Also a link through to the Chickahominy River could help show where the bridge was built.
  • Links for:
    • the First Battle of Bull Run instead of just telling about it.
    • City, location, and unit links are varied. Some have a link, some don't. Even a red link, at times, is better than none.
    • Make another pass through the names to make sure all the people involved don't have articles on them.
    • Parts of the Union Army the regiment was attached to (II Corps, AOP, etc)
  • The first few paragraphs under "Fredericksburg and Gettysburg" need to be rewritten. The regiment is at the battle before the battle is mentioned.
  • A Google search for images (along with other references) would be extremely helpful.
  • Prose is uneven. The article reads like it was written by at least 3 people, the originator (Copy & Paste), you, and you trying to fix the copy & paste. This makes it read very uneven.
  • Check out these links. You don't need a library or a large booksshelf for these. Google Books search for 53rd Pennsylvania Infantry
  • Little more on the reenactors would be helpful.

I realize I'm nitpicky, but these are the things that jumped at me.

Leobold1 (talk) 20:24, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Daysleeper47

I created and did 99% of the work on 11th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment which can serve as a model for your work. Please feel free to take a look at it and use its style to mirror this article. It is currently a GA (which the previously mentioned 3rd Battalion 3rd Marines is an FA) but is a more relevant comparison as a Union regiments. Regards, Daysleeper47 (talk) 19:43, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Iraq War troop surge of 2007

I am filing a peer review for this article to invite comments on how the article may better be improved. I do not have any vested interest in the article, but will take any suggestions placed here to improve the article and try to implament them. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:23, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

It seems to me that the biggest problem at the moment is an overly intricate and detailed structure. I know that, like many recent events that receive extensive news coverage, we have a lot of information and a lot of sources available, but I feel that the level of detail here is overkill. A lot of work has gone into the article as it currently stands, I'm sure, but I feel that the main road to improvement is to cut back. Additionally, the intermixing of prose and timelines is difficult to follow. Everything really needs to be converted to prose and then trimmed down to a reasonable level of detail.

Less importantly, some images would be nice, and the "see also" section should ultimately be removed.

Let me know if you want further suggestions on trimming down the article - it's a big job, and I'm sure it's also likely to be controversial. Carom (talk) 17:54, 29 February 2008 (UTC)

  • I would be grateful for any further suggestions on trimming down the article, and I will look into adding images and subtracting the see also section. TomStar81 (Talk) 20:03, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Some things that jump out: short sections, sometimes only two sentences. "Problems with readiness," "Bush's reaction" and "Plan B" are all quite short, and there are a few others as well. This proliferation of short sections indicates to me that the article is being broken down to too fine a level of detail. It might be most productive to lay out a new structure (in userspace, perhaps) that attempts to be more of an encyclopedic summary than a fine-grained reporting of events. To me, something like "Demand for change," "Development of the policy," "Presentation of the policy," "Reaction," "Implementation," and "Aftermath" might be better. Also, the timelines are really disruptive - they could perhaps be split out into "Timeline of the Iraq War troop surge of 2007, and then linked to. Carom (talk) 20:35, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Romanian Land Forces

This article has passed over two unsuccessfull A-Class reviews and I would like to know what else does it need to be finally promoted to A-class status. Cheers, --Eurocopter (talk) 20:01, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Prior peer review here

[edit] Carom

A few comments and observations:

  • Many of the sections are very short, which detracts from the overall visual appeal of the article.
  • The article is, I think, a little undercited. There are places where factual claims are uncited (for example, the second paragraph under "manpower"), and this needs to be remedied.
  • The "current structure" section might be better as a table.
  • The "see also" section is probably best removed, and the links incorporated into the main body of the article.
  • In places, the images seem to clutter the article a little - you might be able to find a better layout for them.
  • You might consider Russian Ground Forces as a potential model, although I don't know what its' condition is relative to its' condition at the time it was featured.

Hopefully these comments are helpful. Carom (talk) 23:04, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

I still have to say that this is not ready for A-class. The 'Beginnings' section needs much more content and context, and so does the Second World War section on the Eastern Front. There's masses of information about the Cold War orientation and tasking of the Army, particularly after the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, from the US Country Study that is not included (apart from the small section that was). There is masses of order of battle information, provided by W.B. Wilson and I, plus links and other data, that has not been inserted. There has been no attempt to insert Cold War International History Project data into the article either. One cannot trace histories of formations through the Soviet period to today from this article. Also, of course, echo Carom's comments on lack of references and removal of a See Also section. (On the RGF, the lead has changed slightly and the equipment section also, but otherwise it's still a reasonably good FA model as it was when it was promoted.) Buckshot06 (talk) 07:58, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Marion

I've listed this article for peer review because I would like this article to become an A-class article, and I need to see what to work on.


Thanks, Redmarkviolinist Drop me a line 19:55, 17 February 2008 (UTC)



[edit] Carom

A few comments:

  • You may find it useful to break up the "background" section. At the moment, it is a little difficult to parse, and might benefit from subheadings such as "tactical situation," "political situation," etc.
  • Make sure you follow the citation guidelines throughout. The "first day of battle" section is very sparse.
  • In the "aftermath" section, it may be useful to discuss the larger consequences of the battle, if any.
  • In many places, a slightly more encyclopedic tone is necessary.
  • A copyedit would be useful, as the prose is occasionally choppy and difficult to read.

Hopefully these thoughts are helpful. Carom (talk) 23:09, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Oberiko

  • I'd take the pictures out of the infobox, it's not something I've seen anywhere else.
  • I don't think you need the header on the "Outcome" sub-section
  • The Chronology, having three points, really isn't all the useful and is basically summarized in the introduction
  • There are to many infoboxes on the bottom, most of which are barely related to this event. I'd recommend scrapping them and putting a campaign box under the main info box. Oberiko (talk) 21:21, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Automated

Here's some automated suggestions I got using User:AndyZ's script. The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question.

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, Nousernamesleftcopper, not wood 02:57, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

  • The "Territorial Changes" part in the infobox needs some fleshing out. "Southwest Virginia" is a fairly general term. Personally, I would simply add more detail to that one element of the infobox, without making it overly long.
  • Considering the size of the article, there are very few citations. When I have more time, I'll add the "Citation Needed" clips to the article. Density of citations is also very low in some of the sections
  • I'm going to have to agree with Carom. the "Aftermath" Section needs a lot of fleshing out.
  • In the infobox, you need to find a statistic for "strength". The casualty figures tell me that this was a relatively small battle. however, I would prefer to have an actual figure for the strength of the opposing armies.
  • There are places, especially in the "first day of the battle section", that are very difficult to fluently read.
  • There are other places, mainly the opening of the "Second day of the battle" that read too much like a historical novel. I would suggest reformatting this to fit the prose of an encyclopedia, rather than a historical novel.
  • I checked the history of the page, and it was once 20,000 bytes in size. Now, it's only 16,000. I would investigate why this is, and consider adding back in some of the stuff which was cut from earlier versions, so as to flesh out many aspects of the article.
  • Lastly, the "outcome" section is almost contradictory at times. The Union forces achieved a tactical victory, and yet the rebels had inflicted heavy casualties against the Union Army. This is further contradicted by the casualty figure in the infobox. A tactical victory usually means that one side inflicted more casualties on the other. I, personally, would qualify this as a Tactical Confederate Victory, Strategic Union Victory.

Good luck carrying the article forward. All the best

[edit] Battle of Villers-Bocage

The article has been dramatically altered over the past two months, although some are unhappy with the current changes, the article has been expanded considerably and I would like a 3rd Party to give it a look over to see if it is heading the direction it should be. Thank you for your time and help. --EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 21:26, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A few comments:

  • The lead needs considerable expansion. In general, the lead should provide both an overview of, and an introduction to, the rest of the article. The relevant guideline may be helpful here.
  • The prose is quite choppy in places, and makes some sections very difficult to parse. The entire article really requires a thorough copyedit from an experienced copyeditor.
  • The extensive use of direct quotations does not seem to really enhance the article. Some of them are just tacked on at the end of sections and not contextualized, which is particularly problematic.
  • On the positive side, the article is well cited, and the structure seems passable.

There is certainly potential here, but substantial improvements are necessary. Carom (talk) 02:03, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] DMorpheus

Carom, thanks for your comments; they echo some I've been making. Unfortunately this article has been the subject of many disputed edits over the past two months. I think that's one of the reasons for the poor writing. I have sought to improve it but there's a combination of copyedit needs and content disputs that makes any edit difficult. I welcome additional comments on what has become a very weak article. Regards, DMorpheus (talk) 23:36, 17 February 2008 (UTC)

Lets not start this again Morpheus, i have attempted to work with you however you would rather have an article full of historical errors, which is one sided, doesnt cover the entire battle and in some cases dishonouring the men on both sides who fought there.
Carom, i thank you for your comments. I will look over the article you have linked to and attempt to improve the introduction.
Two questions on your comments:
  • Regarding the layout and grammar, is there an area you highlighted as being particular weak which should be worked upon immeditaley? And also so i have a better idea on what i should do for the others.
  • The quotations, i have repositioned the one which as you say was just tacked on at the end. I should have fixed that allot sooner. Was there any other quotes you were paticularly referring to?
Again thank you for your time and i do look forward to hearing from others as well on how to improve this article even more.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 00:06, 18 February 2008 (UTC)
As far as grammar is concerned, virtually the entire article needs attention. Some things to consider include: incorrect comma usage and awkward constructions, in addition to a need to diversify language (i.e., not beginning several consecutive sentences or paragraphs with the same phrase.).
As far as quotes are concerned, single-sentence quotes probably don't need to be blocked off, but can instead be incorporated into the natural flow of the text. In the case of long quotes, you should really ask "what does this add to the article?" In many cases (not just in this article) long quotes add very little, and the information contained within them could be incorporated into the body of the article proper. While they can be useful, large block quotes, or the excessive use of block quotes, can break up the article in disconcerting ways and detract from it's visual appeal.
Hopefully this provides some clarification. Carom (talk) 00:18, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Anon = the rat in all your woodwork <waves paw playfully>

  • Thoughts:

I'd like to echo Carom's point about the lead. At only three sentences, it seems more like a 'preview' or a 'teaser' to the main article rather than a concise introduction. It does not discuss the larger context of the battle at all, nor the background before the events, nor the aftermath of the battle.

The lead also displays the same kind of sentence structure problems that the rest of the article faces. For example, I think that Early on June 13, elements of the 4th County of London Yeomanry and the 1st Rifle Brigade entered the town. In the following 15 minutes SS-Obersturmführer Michael Wittmann and a small force of Tiger I tanks ambushed and destroyed 13 tanks and a dozen or more half-tracks and Universal carriers[11], which lead to a day long battle between the 7th Armoured Division and German forces.[10][12] should be rewritten to Elements of the 4th County of London Yeomanry and the 1st Rifle Brigade entered the town early that day. In the following 15 minutes, SS-Obersturmführer Michael Wittmann and a small force of Tiger I tanks ambushed and destroyed 13 tanks and a dozen or more half-tracks and Universal carriers. The day long battle then ensued between the 7th Armoured Division and German forces.[10][12]

I also agree that the small, single quotes seperated out should really be put into the rest of the article. One sticks out in particular: Although Dyas himself, when commenting on the engagement had something else to say: “….bloody Moore!”[sic] The tone of this seems odd, and I personally think that that whole sentence should be removed. When it comes to the block quotes in the "Late morning and the afternoon fighting" section, I think that the first one interrupts the natural flow of the article and I would actually remove it altogether. I don't really know about the second one. I lean twoards incorporating most of its content into its above prose sentence.

The aftermath section in particular needs expansion and seems one-sided as is. What did the allies do in the area following the battle? How did they eventually retake the area? Support for the British was available from several sources. An accompanying US artillery forward observer called in very heavy and accurate artillery fire to break up one German attack.[75] Several uncommitted infantry brigades were available[76] and could have been used to reinforce Villers-Bocage,[77] but Hinde, the British commander, did not request help.[citation needed]. The term "several sources" is weasely: What forces exactly? Where were they? What were the situation that they were in? That final citation is also really needed along with context; readers naturally wonder-- why didn't he request the help?

Some historians state the withdrawal from Villers-Bocage ended British hopes of unhinging the German front south of Caen.[79] This necessitated repeated operations to capture the city and the open terrain beyond it, following Operation Perch. They also believe that a great opportunity had been lost through poor execution of the plan. Dempsey later remarked that "This attack by 7th AD should have succeeded. My feeling that Bucknall and Erskine would have to go started with that failure. ...the whole handling of that battle was a disgrace.".[80] "Some historians" and "they" is weasely. Who said that?

  • Comment:

Overall, I agree that this article has potential and that it's well cited. Thanks for expanding it and for bringing it to other users' attention. 24.32.208.58 (talk) 05:29, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the input, the aftermath section i have not really touched so far but was planning on making it allot less one sided when i did get around to it. As for the other tips (when they retook the area etc) i had not thought of adding them in when it came to editing this section so will do.
Cheers for the other comments to :)

--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 09:47, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

Intro

The introduction to the article was highlighted a particular weak spot and in need of expansion. After reading the article linked to I have came up with the below draft (needs some bits of information checking and there are a few ‘X’ or ‘insert comments here’ remarks made were information needs to be added etc). Before adding it into the article, do people feel that this is a much better version and what everyone is looking for?

The Battle of Villers-Bocage was a battle fought on June 13 1944, during the Battle of Normandy, between the British 7th Armoured Division and German forces made up of the Panzer Lehr Division, 2nd Panzer Division and the Schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101 at the town of Villers-Bocage in Normandy, France.

The battle was part of Operation Perch; an operation launched by XXX Corps, to push south of the city of Caen and envelope it from the west while other British troops from I Corps would attempt to envelope it from the east. The city, a D-Day objective, had not been captured and was considered a vital objective to be under allied control. The battle was a result of improvisation due to a successful push south by American troops to the west of XXX Corps, which created a gap in the German lines several miles long. Due to this gap the 7th Armoured Division was ordered to push through the gap around the main defences of the Panzer Lehr Division, which was holding up the rest of XXX Corps and delaying the operation to capture Caen. With the town and high ground named Point 213, to the east of town, under British control it was hoped this would force the Panzer Lehr Division to retreat and allow the operation to capture the city to get back on track.

The lead elements of the 7th Armoured Division, the 4th County of London Yeomanry and the 1st Rifle Brigade, entered the town during the morning of June 13. A Squadron of the 4th County of London Yeomanry pushed on from the town up the main road, Route Nationale 175, and captured Point 213 XX miles to the east. Following the capture of the high ground, three Tiger tanks under the command of SS-Obersturmführer Michael Wittmann, the commander of the 2nd Company, Schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101, whom had been encamped to the south of the main road attacked the British tanks. Wittmann and his crew pushed down the main road towards Villers-Bocage and in the following fifteen minutes destroyed thirteen tanks, two anti tank guns and a dozen or more half-tracks and Universal carriers. The 7th Armoured Division reinforced the town with the 1/7 Battalion of the Queens Regiment and the Germans now aware of the danger posed to the rear of the Panzer Lehr Division dispatched more tanks and men. At 1300 hours fighting resumed and for the next six hours the men on both sides battled it out in the streets of Villers-Bocage, which resulted in the destruction of several Tiger tanks.

At XXXX hours Brigadier Hinde, the commanding officer of the British forces fighting within Villers-Bocage, reluctantly ordered his men to fall back due to the increased pressure from the German forces. They pulled back XX miles to the west of Villers-Bocage to the village of insert name here, here with other elements of the division they formed an all round defensive “brigade box” and continued battling with German forces on the following day. This following action became known within the 7th Armoured Division as the Battle of the Brigade Box. Historians have declared the Battle of Villers-Bocage to be a German strategic victory as it halted any British hopes of unhinging the German defences southwest of Caen and capturing the city during first half of June. The British Second Army would continue its Battle for Caen finally capturing the city on insert date here. --EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 12:19, 18 February 2008 (UTC)


Here's my rewrite:

The Battle of Villers-Bocage was a battle fought during the Battle of Normandy on June 13, 1944 between the British 7th Armoured Division and German forces made up of the Panzer Lehr Division, the 2nd Panzer Division, and the Schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101 at the town of Villers-Bocage in Normandy, France.

The city of Caen was a vital allied objective and had not been captured as planned during D-Day. XXX Corps launched Operation Perch to push south of the city and envelope it from the west while other British troops from I Corps would attempt to envelope it from the east. The improvised battle resulted from a successful push south by American troops to the west of XXX Corps, which created a several mile long gap within the German lines. The 7th Armoured Division attempted to push through the gap around the main defences of the Panzer Lehr Division, which was holding up the rest of the XXX Corps. The British believed that control over Villers-Bocage and the higher ground to the east of the town, called Point 213, would force the Panzer Lehr Division to retreat and allow the operation to get back on track.

The lead elements of the 7th Armoured Division, the 4th County of London Yeomanry, and the 1st Rifle Brigade entered the town during the morning of June 13. A Squadron of the 4th County of London Yeomanry pushed on from the town up the main road, Route Nationale 175, and captured Point 213 XX miles to the east of town. Three Tiger tanks encamped to the south of the main road under the command of SS-Obersturmführer Michael Wittmann, the commander of the 2nd Company, Schwere SS-Panzer-Abteilung 101, then attacked the British tanks. Wittmann and his crew pushed down the main road towards Villers-Bocage and, in the following fifteen minutes, destroyed thirteen tanks, two anti-tank guns, and a dozen or more half-tracks and Universal carriers. The 7th Armoured Division reinforced the town with the 1/7 Battalion of the Queens Regiment and the Germans, now aware of the danger posed to the rear of the Panzer Lehr Division, dispatched more tanks and more men. At 1300 hours, fighting resumed and went on throughout the streets of Villers-Bocage for the next six hours.

At XXXX hours Brigadier Hinde, the commanding officer of the British forces fighting within the town, reluctantly ordered his men to fall back due to the increased pressure from the German forces. They pulled back XX miles west into the village of insert name here and formed an defensive “brigade box” alongside other elements of their division. The fighting continued the following day in the Battle of the Brigade Box. Historians x name and y name have called the Battle of Villers-Bocage a German strategic victory and stated that it halted any British hopes of capturing Caen during first half of June. The British Second Army continued the Battle for Caen and finally captured the city on insert date here.

Ideally, I think that it should be a bit tighter with the first two paragraphs made into one and the same for the next two. Nonetheless, this is a big improvement over the article right now. 24.32.208.58 (talk) 03:27, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


Cheers for the input and ideas. However on looking at the way other articles have been written, is stating that "Historian A and B consider XYZ" the correct way of doing things, should it not be a statement and just footnoted like the rest of the article? --EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 14:05, 19 February 2008 (UTC)


Since I'm not that familar with the larger Battle of Normandy, I'm assuming that the assessment of "german strategic victory" is something that's arguable. If it's not and if it's not disputed, than I don't think there's any problem with rewriting that sentence into a simple statement. 24.32.208.58 (talk) 15:55, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
This is kind of a side note but it's still related: Will you be listing Operation Perch for peer review as well? 24.32.208.58 (talk) 15:58, 19 February 2008 (UTC)
"German strategic victory" is a widely-held view; in at least three of the cited references you will find that view. That's not to say people don't debate it ;) but in this article that is one of the few items that haven't been particularly contentious. Regards, DMorpheus (talk) 20:00, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Cheers for the input on the intro, ill make final ammends and get into the article sometime this week. At the momment Perch to me at least is a heavy work in progress, there was nothing there for it so its started from stratch so currently there is no citations, needs allot of rewording, expandings etc but am happy to discuss it, prehaps over on its dicussion area so not to distract further from this conversation?--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 20:14, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

A good example of how a misplaced comma can mess up the meaning of a sentence. "7th Armoured Division, the 4th County of London Yeomanry, and the 1st Rifle Brigade" is wrong; the comma has to come after "Brigade" because these units were the lead elements; the rewrite mistakenly uses the list form and makes them not part of the 7th Armoured Division. Hawkeye7 (talk) 04:57, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Thanks for catching that. 24.32.208.58 (talk) 01:22, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the input there guys, i have now added it into the article. Over the next few days i will try and get around to the other issues we have discussed.--EnigmaMcmxc (talk) 18:29, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Oberiko

A few comments:

  • I think the infobox is a bit to packed. Right now, the "strength" portion doesn't tell me anything, as brigades and divisions can be different sizes. I'd recommend changing it to "X infantry, Y tanks" and putting the organizational information in the article or in an order-of-battle page.
  • I wouldn't do external links to individuals. Keep it as an internal link (red link if need be) so that it doesn't have to be changed later.
  • No need for titles in the commanders section, just list the individuals in order by rank. Also, the little icons should be taken out
  • Casualties don't need to be broken down by unit. Again, something for an OoB page or the article itself
  • Within each section, pictures should start right-aligned and then alternate.

Oberiko (talk) 14:28, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Messines

Specific comments welcome of course, but really looking for more general feedback at this point. Carom (talk) 19:38, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

I think that the article is off to a good start. My comments are:

  • I like how the article is structured
  • The background section should cover the tactical situation in the area prior to the attack in greater detail - eg, why did the British choose to directly attack a German strong point?
  • The bit on the conversion of one of the mine craters to a "pool of peace" should go in the aftermath section
  • The opposing forces section should include the numbers of troops involved and their quality/combat readiness
  • The description of the battle is nice and clear, but could be longer. The structure is great and should support an expansion.
  • the phrase "only 16,000 total casualties" is awkward. While less than what the Germans suffered, these were still very heavy losses for a 216,000 strong force to suffer in half a day.
  • The aftermath section is good, but could be longer. Why did Haig think that this carefully planned operation which took over a year to prepare mean that the general offensive would suffer a similar casualty rate?
  • Have you considered using the Australian official history of the war as a reference? The full text of it is available online, and volume V has two chapters on the battle while the summary publication has a single chapter. The Australian official history is still considered a highly reliable source. --Nick Dowling (talk) 05:34, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
  • Many thanks for the comments. I will look into addressing your concerns, and I will also see what the Australian official history has to offer. Carom (talk) 17:39, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hawkeye7

  • In addition to the chapters that Nick mentions, Bean also has a gripping account of the underground warfare in Appendix No. 1 (pp. 949-959)
  • Here's another good source: Messines and Third Ypres NB: On p. 115 there is a full breakdown of casualties, by branch

I'd like to see:

  • more on the elaborate preparations for Magnum Opus, especially the engineering, signals and artillery plans;
  • more on the opposing troops, listing the divisions involved on both sides;
  • a description of the infantry tactics, especially those of assaulting ferro-concrete pillboxes, and the controversial technique of "leapfrogging" at the operational level;
  • the artillery probably deserves at a least a paragraph of their own, describing the barrages and the CB effort;
  • a paragraph on the logistical support of the battle;
  • a paragraph on the weapons and technology used, including tanks, gas, machine guns, and trench mortars

Do you need any pictures?

10:18, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

  • Many thanks for your comments also. I'll see what I can do to add detail to the sections you mention. As far as pictures are concerned, I have not got as far as looking for them, so I'm not sure what is freely available. Carom (talk) 17:41, 11 February 2008 (UTC)
  • The Australian War Memorial's online database at [4] might be useful. A simple search of 'Messines' returns over 500 photos and 60 artworks, all of which should be out of copyright. --Nick Dowling (talk) 09:33, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Auxiliaries (Roman military)

I want to submit this article in its yet finished form to see what needs to be improved before submitting it for A-class. Wandalstouring (talk) 10:54, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Let's see:

  • I don't see any benefit to having the "X redirects here" note at the top unless there's a disambiguation page that needs to be linked. None of those terms have any other meaning that needs to be disambiguated, as far as I can tell.
  • The text is very heavy with parenthetical dates and numbers; while some of these are unavoidable, I think copyediting could reduce the density somewhat.
  • Circa is generally only used for dates, not for numbers; "identify c.40 of these units" should be "identify about 40 of these units", for example.
  • There's a lot of inconsistency with date abbreviations; there are examples of "cX", "c.X", and "c. X". According to the manual of style, the last form is the preferred one.
  • I'd try and cluster footnotes at the end of sentences, or at least clauses; footnoting individual words doesn't seem necessary for a topic of this sort.
  • References to other sections should be linked.
  • The sub-sections of "Relationship with legions", "Unit types and structure", and "Everyday life of auxiliaries" should have proper section headers.
  • The use of "we" should be avoided.

Overall, though, great work. Kirill 17:00, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

The credit goes to EraNavigator. Wandalstouring (talk) 11:46, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rockfall

  • I'd definitely agree with the above on the footnote front. Footnote marks should always been after a piece of punctuation, and preferably at the end of a sentence.
  • The unresolved issues section - is this necessary for the main article? It represents a historiographical debate rather than facts about the article subject. Perhaps consider putting this in a separate article referenced here.
  • Much of the body of the article is very text heavy. While this is all very good detail, the text sometimes strays off into a narrative of Roman history. Some editing work to tighten this up could help to reduce the weight of these sections.

Other than that, a very comprehensive article. Rockfall (talk) 15:43, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

The editor is using British English and the British way to put footnotes. Wandalstouring (talk) 16:37, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] List of Indian Air Force Bases

I just added this list to MILHIST. I'd like to know how it can be improved, in any and all respects. Specifically, I'd like an opinion on what information can be added, and any way to improve the page itself, in terms of syntax. Thanks. T/@ Sniperz11 editssign 01:40, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

First and most important thing you could do is add some sources. Is this from official data? Spotters? Bloggers? Be good to make that clear. Buckshot06 (talk) 03:01, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Roger Davies

Very promising indeed though I agree entirely with Buckshot about sources as the first step.

Other thoughts? Some pictures would be good. Perhaps as a gallery? I think a wikilinked paragraph describing each of the air commands would be good. The states should be wikilinked.

The list would probably be more useful as one single sortable list. This has many advantages over the current lists. You can sort by base name, command, state etc. It's much easier to find a base in sorting a single 60-base list alphabetically than by going through five separate lists. If you wanted to sort by Lat/Lon, you could do that too. I've dummied this up quickly with a couple of bases from each of your sub-lists with background colours for each command: the colour choice could be improved considerably (a comprehensive colour list is here). There's also a neat template {{coord}} which links to maps: I've done the first couple as examples.

All this, by the way, is far less work than it seems :)) --ROGER DAVIES talk


Base Command ICAO Runway Elevation Lat/Lon State
Adampur AFS WAC VIAX 13/31 775 ft. / 236 mts 39°25′59.35″N 75°45′38.85″E / 39.4331528, 75.7607917 (Adampur AFS) Punjab
Ambala AFS WAC VIAM 12L/30R
12R/30L		 900 ft. / 274 mts. 30°22′07.16″N 76°48′54.21″E / 30.3686556, 76.8150583 (Ambala AFS) Haryana
Amritsar AFS WAC VIAR 16/34 755 ft. / 230 mts. 31° 42' 27.95" N
74° 47' 57.25" E		 Punjab
Agartala AFS EAC VEAT 18/36 48 ft. / 14 mts. 23° 53' 20.90" N
91° 14' 27.90" E		 Tripura
Baghdogra AFS EAC VEBD 18/36 412 ft. / 125 mts. 26° 40' 53.26" N
88° 19' 41.21" E		 West Bengal
Barapani AFS
Shillong		 EAC VEBI 04/22 2910 ft. / 886 mts. 25° 42' 06.10" N
91° 58' 41.45" E		 Meghalaya
Agra AFS CAC VIAG 05/23
12/30		 551 ft. 167 mts. 27° 09' 20.99" N
077° 57' 39.21" E		 Uttar Pradesh
Bakshi Ka Talab AFS
near Lucknow		 CAC VIBL 09/27 385 ft./ 117 mts. 26° 59' 18.40" N
80° 53' 35.10" E		 Uttar Pradesh
Bamrauli AFS
Allahabad		 CAC VIAL 06/24
12/30		 322 ft./ 98 mts. 25° 26' 20.99" N
81° 44' 03.00" E		 Uttar Pradesh
Begumpet AFS
Hyderabad		 SAC VOHY 09/27
14/32		 1,741 ft. /531 mts. 17° 27' 08.70" N
78° 27' 40.00" E		 Andhra Pradesh
Bidar AFS SAC VOBR 02/20
08/26		 2,178 ft. /663 mts. 17° 54' 28.41" N
77° 29' 09.03" E		 Karnataka
Car Nicobar AFS SAC VOCX 02/20 42 ft.s / 13 mts. 09° 09' 11.51" N
92° 49' 09.81" E		 Nicobar Islands
Bhuj AFS SWAC VABJ 05/23 268 ft./82 mts. 23° 17' 16.18" N
69° 40' 12.53" E		 Gujarat
Gandhinagar AFS
Ahmedabad		 SWAC VAAH 10/28
14/32		 189 ft. 58 mts. 23° 04' 29.05" N
72° 37' 54.30" E		 Gujarat
Jaisalmer AFS SWAC VIJR 04/22 887 ft. / 270 mts. 26° 53' 21.83" N
70° 51' 52.87" E		 Rajasthan

[edit] Askari Mark

Some additional comments to those points already made:

I like Roger’s suggestion of a sortable list. Although a list, it would seriously benefit from a graphic (map) for each Air Command. Intro should start with a statement about the subject of the list, which is airbases, not commands. The Intl. Air Command would actually be an eighth command – on top of the five listed and the other two which are implied to not have an airbase of their own (which fact should be made explicit). Since lists are more for navigational purposes, it might be a good idea to expand the tables to include the flying units currently based there.

Considering the small number of IN airbases, it might be a good idea to refocus this list on Indian military airbases, thereby capturing all of them in one list. Consideration should also be given to a section including no longer active airbases. (I would not necessarily encourage including former units for these, since the squadrons have often moved around.) Askari Mark (Talk) 18:47, 4 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] South Atlantic Medal

I've recently made some big edits to the article and would like to know what people think. Due to a lack of "Style Guide" from the "WikiProject Orders, Decorations, and Medals", I instead took inspiration from the Victoria Cross article. Ryan4314 (talk) 12:38, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

A good start, but there are still some areas that could use further work:

  • The lead is quite short, and could probably be expanded a bit.
  • There's no material about the creation and adoption of the medal.
  • I'd suggest moving both obverse and reverse images into the infobox.
  • In general, any additional information would be beneficial for an article this short.

Hope that helps! Kirill 23:11, 2 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Heuschrecke 10

Previous peer review

It is currently on a real peer review, but I have gotten no good answers and it has changed a lot, see this diff which shows the difference from the old peer review to this one. Dreamy § 01:16, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Megapixie

A promising start. Suggestions:
  • The lead is a little confused - i.e. there are single sentences like "The manufacturers were based in Magdeburg.", which spoil the flow of prose a little. Try and break it into maybe three paragraphs, which each paragraph about a specific area.
  • Y Done
  • When I write these articles I try and split it clearly into a Lead, Development, Description, Operational history, Variants. The description should include a front to back description of the vehicle. Example: "The tank has a welded steel hull varying in thickness between 10 and 25 millimeters. The driver sits at the front left of the hull, with the engine to his right. The engine is a The driving controls are lever based, with four forward gears and two reverse gears connected to the Acme hydrotransmission system by a series of rods. Behind the driver, in the center of the turret is the two man turret..." This is important, as the article should be able to stand alone to a certain extent.
  • Y Done
Megapixie (talk) 04:41, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] GraemeLeggett

  • MoS stuff for a start. I've fixed some of it.
  • Could you please explain what must be done?
  • Introductory paragraphs are confusing - the intro should be a clear overview of it.
  • Y Done
  • The relationship between the two designs is confusing. Were there 2 designs of which one was selected and one not, or were both selected?
  • The comparison of the two is over-complex - especially since they both have the same crew and engine and other details. The specification comparison should be summarised for those who can't follow the spec table.
  • How would I do that? And if you notice there are differences. Doing...
  • Where does the 165/1 fit in - another design, a derivative?
  • Yes... It doesn't need to be there, it is just another weapon-carrier that came before the Heuschrecke. I'll remove it.Y Done

GraemeLeggett (talk) 13:07, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Kleidion

I would like someone to check the article for structural, grammatical, punctuation and other mistakes. Also as you can see many of the sources are Bulgarian and/or in Bulgarian language and I need an opinion whether they should be written in Cyrillic as they are in original or I should write them with Latin letters. My purpose is to nominate it for FA or GA so any comments and suggestions for further improvement would be welcome or whether that aim is possible at all. --Gligan (talk) 13:32, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wandalstouring

Is it possible to find some sources in English perhaps, so it is easier to check for national POV issues (the article doesn't read like there is a problem, but as Lenin said, controll is better than trust). Wandalstouring (talk) 14:44, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
I will try to search for sources in English in the Internet. --Gligan (talk) 14:55, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

You can check Sir Steven Runciman here [5] Lantonov (talk) 14:59, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

I see that you know German, so the following may also be useful:

And this [6] is in French. Lantonov (talk) 15:50, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Another book in English exactly about this battle (which I haven't access to, however) is:

I have added the sources found by Lantonov, one found by me and two more footnotes from English historians. --Gligan (talk) 16:44, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
Good job. The article is far better than the new sources :). What else needs to be done is writing the date when each onlinesource was retrieved behind it. Wandalstouring (talk) 11:11, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
I think it is done. --Gligan (talk) 19:55, 7 February 2008 (UTC)
Sorry, I think you missed some. When you are done, submit it for A class review. Cheers Wandalstouring (talk) 16:36, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Yannismarou

  • "place on July 29, 1014", "29 July ". Inconsistencies with the dates. Further MoS issues: "The next phase of the war began in 1000, when Basil". Do not wikilink single years per MoS.
  • "In the ensuing battle the Byzantines were completely defeated". Shouldn't be better like that: "In the ensuing battle the Byzantines were completely defeated".
  • "Skylitzes records that Basil completely routed the Bulgarian army and, according to John Skylitzes's account of the battle, took 15,000 prisoners". I don't like the repetitive and a bit "clumsy" IMO phrasing.
  • "According to Skylitzes, Samuil died of a heart attack as he saw his forces march past on July 31, although other sources indicate that Samuil lived until 6 October." Yes, but you cite only Skylitzes. The other sources?
  • It is peculiar the way in which you present your sources without using the WP templates for this purpose. Nevertheless, it seems consistent.
  • I would like the photo of the infobox to be a bit more informative. Where is the picture from?--Yannismarou (talk) 16:13, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] United States Army

Content-wise, I believe that this article is suitable for promotion. However it has few sources and thus recently failed an A-class review. I am looking for comments on any other ways that the article can be improved. -Ed! (talk) 01:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

This is a reasonable quality article, but needs a lot of work to meet A class, especially as there are lots of excellent sources which are available. The United States Marine Corps article is a FA and provides a useful model. My suggestions are:

  • More citations are needed - as a rule of thumb, provide a citation for everything. The sources should also be independent from the Army wherever possible - most of the current references are to the Army's website.
  • Some of the article is confusing - for instance, why are the figures for numbers of personnel in the lead for different dates? - is a common date available. "The U.S. Army is led by a civilian Secretary of the Army" is confusing as the same sentence says that this official's role is to provide "oversight" for the Army's Chief of Staff and it's later said that the "Chief of Staff of each service only has the responsibility to organize, train and equip their respective service component" which suggests that it's they who are in charge of the Army as an institution while other people command its deployable elements during operations.
  • Given that the article states that the Army traces its history back to the 18th century, why does the history of the Army's organisation in the poorly named "Army components" section start at 1917? The 2.5 para discussion of mass civilian mobilisation in the event of an attack on the US in this section also seems excessive given the very low likelihood of this ever happening - one sentance would probably be enough given that it's now an antiquated concept which has little relevance to the US Army's actual organisation and doctrine.
  • More generally, some bits of the article provide a brief history of the topic while others don't. I'd suggest that the article be restricted to the Army as it currently stands, with histories being spun off into History of the United States Army and appropriate sub-articles.
  • The history section presents a very simplistic and triumphalist history of the Army which focuses on its combat performance and says almost nothing about the history of the Army as an institution. Claims like the victory in the 1991 Gulf War "proving the effectiveness of the new untried all-volunteer force" are troublesome as they don't demonstrate a relationship between cause and effect - if the victory over Iraq in 1991 was a particularly significant achievement why did the US Army call one of the official histories of the war 'Certain Victory' and does the bungled occupation of Iraq after 2003 mean that the all-volunteer Army is now a failure? Other bits of the section seem outright wrong (eg, "the Army had a small participation in the successful invasions of Panama" - the article on this topic indicates that more than a division's worth of troops were involved and the Army made up the majority of the invasion force) and the process of integrating African Americans and women into the Army needs to be mentioned as these are key parts of the Army's history.
  • The weapons and training sections are pretty good.
  • Get rid of the 'Values' section - mission statements and the like add nothing to the value of encyclopaedia articles as they're inevitably noble statements developed my marketeers. A section on 'military discipline' or similar might be worth including and would cover similar ground in an encyclopaedic manner.
  • The 'Famous former soldiers' section should also go as this is basically a trivial list of famous people who happened to have once been in the Army (which was a very common experience in the days of mass conscription). What rationale is there for listing people who are famous only because of their military service such as Douglas MacArthur and Stonewall Jackson listed alongside people who achieved fame through totally unrelated fields such as Mickey Rooney and Jimi Hendrix?
  • The major commands section should be integrated with the Combat maneuver organizations section. --Nick Dowling (talk) 10:27, 22 January 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Leobold1

Couple things jump out at me

  • There should be a direct link to the court case that places the Army under Federal jurisdiction over the complaints from the Governor. Findlaw and Lexis would be good ones, and one with this type of controversary would be listed elsewhere on the internet.
  • Each of the Unified Combat Commands, as well as units listed under "Combat maneuver organizations", should have a link at least to their homepages.
  • The wikilink for "Battalion/Squadron Commander", "Headquarters and Headquarters Company/Battery", and "Company/Battery/Troop Commander" should be changed to "Battalion Commander", "Headquarters and Headquarters Company", and "Company Commander" which gives the information for both and is a good link.
  • A list of the brigades under the divisions under "Combat maneuver organizations" can be listed, just as the "Army Special Operations Command" has.
  • The title of "History" should be changed to "Battle History" or "War History" as that's all it has. There was much more that happened during the life of the Army than just wars. Should have more info added or the name changed.
  • Couple more details on the Indian Wars under "1800s" as well as links can be added.
  • The Boxer Rebellion actually happened mostly in the 1900s, not the 1800s (only the last 2 months of 1899) as listed. May want to change to 1900s.
  • The links for Futuresoldiers.com is a bad one. The webpage linked doesn't have the quoted listed on it anywhere. The links should go directly to the webpage that the information comes from, not a general site where you have to search for the information. None of the links from the webpage shout out where the quotes come from.
  • "Uniforms" should list more than just the current uniform. A couple of paragraphs on uniforms since the American Revolution can be added (with pictures if you so choose).
  • The Future Force Warrior system isn't part of the Uniform. Placed in a separate section either in Equipment or a new part for Future of the Army (which there are a few articles that can be referenced) would be much better. Category:Future American weapons
  • The "Equipment" section is very well detailed and written well. Only minor additions as to the funtion of the equipment can be added.
  • More information on the different training schools and different MOS's are needed.

Overall, a well written article, with some minor (yet somehow time consuming :) ) changes including links and addition of information here and there. Really, aside from the links, these are minor tweaks and don't take much away from the article. Just reading it gives a small feeling of incompleteness.

Leobold1 (talk) 21:00, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] USS Orizaba (ID-1536)

I'd like to get some feedback on this article to see what it lacks and what it needs for improvement — Bellhalla (talk) 21:34, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

Very well done. I have only a few comments.

  • The "World War II" section appears to be completely uncited. This is perhaps the only major problem, but should absolutely be corrected.
  • There are a few places with some clunky wording and awkward phrasing; a copyedit is probably warranted (we have a new request department for dedicated MilHist copyedits, you may get a fast-ish response there).

Once these two things are taken care of, I would say that this article is ready for A-Class. Carom (talk) 00:58, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Ryan

Small note: when viewed with Internet Explorer there is a big white gap between the section title of "Brazilian Navy service" and it's text, perhaps caused by a combination of the infobox and the 1950's pic being on the right. Ryan4314 (talk) 20:10, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cam

Just a few comments:

  • In the lead, it mentions "second fastest turnaround time in port", or somehting like that. I would add a citation for this one.
  • The WWII section has almost no direct inline citations. This should probably be addressed quite quickly.

Those are the only things I can find immediately. The citation issue encompasses a large majority of the article, and should be addressed AQAP (as Quickly as possible) Best of luck in taking the article forward! Cam (Chat) 20:25, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

The "second fastest" bit is discussed in detail in the body of the article and cited there. I try to avoid citing in the lead if possible. — Bellhalla (talk) 10:57, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Thanks

Thanks to all who took the time to review the article. I will be addressing have addressed the referencing that all mentioned. — Bellhalla (talk) 10:57, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Byzantine navy

I have just finished a major overhaul and expansion of this article, and think it is now quite comprehensive and factually correct. I would like some input from other editors prior to considering nominating it for GA. Any improvements or suggestions on stylistic issues or content would be greatly appreciated. Cplakidas (talk) 13:43, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A good article. A few comments:

  • I would perhaps expand the lead. While it seems comprehensive, it is also fairly short. I think at least two paragraphs are warranted here.Y Done
  • Although the article seems well cited, there are places where it is not clear what information comes from what source. I would personally consider end-or-sentence as opposed to end-of-paragraph notes, but that is admittedly a personal preference.
  • I'm not sold on your "notes" section - it seems like this information would be better incorporated into the main body of the article. If it's important enough to say, it's too important for a note, I think.Y Done

Hopefully these are helpful comments; well done so far. Carom (talk) 14:02, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Very nice, overall. Some suggestions:

  • {{Infobox Military Unit}} might work here; there's no particular need to have the Byzantine navigation box in the top right, I think.Y Done
  • The lead could stand to be a little longer; two or three paragraphs would be about right.Y Done
  • Personally, I find {{details}} to produce neater output than {{main}}.Y Done
  • The citations seem a bit sparse; there are paragraphs (and entire sections—e.g. "Decline") with nary a footnote in sight. You might pass GA like that, but it's certainly something that'll be complained about in any of the higher reviews.Y Done
  • "Notable events"—which is really a timeline—might be better off in a format other than a bulleted list. The best option, in my view, would be to integrate the whole thing into the prose of the "History" section; but that'll take quite a bit of work.Y Done
  • I'd avoid splitting the list in "References", particularly as some of the works in the top (e.g. Treadgold) aren't specifically naval histories.Y Done
  • The "See also" section should be eliminated as much as possible; these links shouldn't be too difficult to integrate into the text and/or an infobox.Y Done

Keep up the good work! Kirill 14:08, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I am trying to address most of your and Carom's points, but as for the {{Infobox Military Unit}}, I really don't know what to put in there. Only the title, the nation, and perhaps some notable commanders would come to mind. I don't think the standard infobox is suitable to cover an entire naval force that spanned 1000 years and evolved continuously... I'll try to come up with something though, most likely a dedicated template, because I too feel the upper right corner is a bit empty... Best regards, Cplakidas (talk) 16:51, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wandalstouring

  • please add information how many of the rowers and sailors participated in the fighting (were in the top row)
  • provide footnotes for all Greek terms that can't be linked with articles of their own.Y Done
  • More citations are needed.Y Done
  • A information about the influence of Byzantine shipconstruction on the European seapowers could be expanded. Very good is the section about the arab navy.
  • How the Byzantine Navy adopted firearms could be expanded.Y Done
  • A section about the changes of equipment of the marines and armed rowers would be good.Y Done

All in all, good work. Wandalstouring (talk) 15:34, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Very good comments regarding the content. I want to point out two things: 1) I intend that the stuff about Byzantine ship construction, manning etc to be added in the "dromon" article, as the article on the navy is already too big, and, either way, that's where it belongs (cf. the trireme article). I intend to deal with it, (hopefully) soon. More stuff about the Arab ships will go there too. 2) I don't really understand what you mean about the footnotes on all Greek names - they are covered by the references at the end of the sentences or paragraphs where they occur. Best regards, Cplakidas (talk) 16:51, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Rockfall

Very comprehensive article, and well laid out. Few quick points.

  • The "Struggle against the Arabs" section is perhaps a little long. While there is nothing there that I would get rid of, perhaps some subheadings would break up what is otherwise a screen-long block of text.Y Done
  • For the existing subheadings, eg. "Early period", some dates would make the overall structure clearer, even if they are approximate.Y Done
  • The "Ships" section: perhaps arrange the list of ship types into bullet points? This is purely a personal preference for lists of non-English words. Also, in the final paragraph, "chelandia" is neither translated or referenced.Y Done
  • References: you rely heavily on John Julius Norwich and Treadgold. I appreciate that these are the two leading experts on Byzantium, but my inner historian doesn't like seeing footnote blocks full of one or two authors.

Otherwise a very good article, with excellent written style. Rockfall (talk) 15:15, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, I appreciate your remarks and will try to address them. Regarding the sources, I agree with you, however there is one big problem: the Byzantine navy is, if anything, under-researched. Norwich was used not so much by me as by an anonymous user who had written most of the "Notable events" list. I merely incorporated the events into the main history section following the suggestion of other users above. Either way, as a reference for events, he can be relied upon. My primary source for the navy per se is the "Age of the Galley" book, which is very comprehensive, and written by several authors who are experts on ancient and medieval ships. I used Treadgold and, to a lesser degree, Haldon and Bartusis, where they have something new or more concrete to add, since their works deal with the Empire and its institutions as a whole, and only mention the navy in passing. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find the "Age of the Dromon", the premier source on the subject, however I am confident that the article doesn't miss anything essential. Regards, Cplakidas (talk) 16:04, 6 March 2008 (UTC)
Unless any more comments are forthcoming, I am going to close the review in the next few days, and go on to GAR. Thanks to all who have reviewed the article! Regards, Cplakidas (talk) 13:09, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gregory R. Ball

I noticed this stub about a fairly notable and colorful State Legislator and had serious concerns about NPOV and UNDUE regarding the controversy section. In researching him, I found a great deal of information and I've tried to include as much as is notable and covered by two or more publications. I would like to get the article to a point where it can be featured as a GA. Obviously it must be vetted for accuracy, POV, and to some extent, the prose. I look forward to hearing your comments and implementing them. MrPrada (talk) 05:44, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

Well done so far. A few comments:

  • If you're aiming for featured status, I would expand the lead. It should provide an overview of the entire article.
    • Y Done I expanded it to the requisite 3 paragraphs for a 40k article
  • There's an image tacked on at the very bottom, it should really be incorporated into the body of the text somewhere.
    • Y Done The wikiquote was supposed to go there, and the image in the se ealso section.
  • The links in the "see also" section should be incorporated into the main body of the text and the section should be removed.
    • Question. Is this in the MoS? I've seen other articles (especially ones on the State Assembly) that have "list of members of the State Assembly" in a See Also section. I was assuming this was the standard for all of them, so I'll leave it for now unless I hear otherwise.
  • No, it's not MOS. It's a convention that's arisen amongst the editors working on military history articles, so it's more of a preference than anything else. However, there is one MOS issue - articles linked in the main body of the article should not be re-linked in the "see also" section, so make sure not to duplicate any of them. Carom (talk) 00:40, 9 March 2008 (UTC)
  • A copy edit is needed, both to clean up some grammar, and to check for typos (like "chicken suite").
    • Partially done. I'll submit it to the league of copywriters to double check my work.
  • There's a few places where I would use different wording - "Ball did not dispute that he ran hard for his seat" is an example of the kind of phrasing that should really be cleaned up.
    • Y Done

Hopefully these comments are helpful. Carom (talk) 12:50, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

    • Definitely. Thanks a lot! MrPrada (talk) 21:42, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] AndyZ

  • LA script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style. If you would find such a review helpful, please click here. Thanks, APR t 20:47, 29 February 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Geometry guy (talk • contribs)
    • Y Done

[edit] Rockfall

  • The "First term" section is enormous and hard to navigate. I notice that much of it is his position on various issues. Perhaps this could be moved to a separate section for better reference? Regardless, I feel that this needs breaking up into some sort of subdivision.
    • Y Done I split it up into four sections. I had originally planned on doing so, I guess I forgot, heh. :)
  • Very well referenced, definitely up to scratch on that score.
    • Thanks!
  • Given that he is notable for his political career, I am curious as to how he comes under the military history project, but that is another matter...
    • He was an Air Force Captain who worked in the White House. So far I haven't found too much data on that, but when I do I will expand the section. Its under MILHIST primarily for that reason.
  • In the Courage Cup section, there is no description of what the Courage Cup actually 'is'. That entire section could perhaps be expanded.
    • Y Done
  • The media file after the 2006 election section: would it not be more appropriate to place this at the end of the article, as seems to be the norm with such audio quotes?
    • Hmm, I wanted to place it as close as possible to the "Most dysfunctional legislature" section of the article. Is there an MoS for audio quotes?

Hope that is helpful. Rockfall (talk) 15:29, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

Very. Thank you! MrPrada (talk) 21:42, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] USS Siboney (ID-2999)

I've been working on this a while and would like to get some feedback on what improvements could be made. — Bellhalla (talk) 14:14, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A few thoughts:

  • The "World War I navy service" section needs more rigorous citation.
  • Some copyediting is needed, mainly to check for typos.
    • I corrected misspellings of "camouflage" (in an image tag) and of "Gibraltar" in the main article. I'll see if I can get some outside eyes to take a look for others.
  • It may or may not be useful to recombine some of the paragraphs so that there are not so many single-sentence, one-line paragraphs. In some places, this detracts from the visual appeal of the article.
    • Sentence length comment noted. Perhaps a copy-editor could make some suggestions for changes.

Hopefully these comments are helpful. Carom (talk) 17:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your comments, and, yes, they are indeed helpful. — Bellhalla (talk) 17:51, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TomStar81

  • Comments
    • I think the fate tab should say "Scrapped in 1957" since that was the ship's ultimate fate.
      • Y Done
    • Make absolutely sure that the article adheres to an all "she/her" format or an all "it" format.
      • Will do. Y Done
    • Lose the "History" header, since the whole article is history it would be best to make your sub headers the primary headers.
      • Good point. Y Done
    • Just curious, but would you happen to know if the ship was unique or part of a class? I won;t hold this question against you, I just want to know if you know. TomStar81 (Talk) 18:05, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
      • DANFS entries don't show a class for either, but Siboney and USS Orizaba (ID-1536) were both built by Wm. Cramp, both have basically the same dimensions and displacement, both were originally laid down for the Ward Line at essentially the same time, and both taken over by the Navy in WW I. Where in the article would be an appropriate place to say that they were, if not a class, sister ships (in a non-OR-ish way, of course)?
Thanks Bellhalla (talk) 18:58, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
If it were me I put it in the intro, something like "USS Siboney (ID-2999) was a transport ship for the United States Navy during World War I. She was the sister ship of USS Orizaba (ID-1536), although the two were not part of a ship class." Otherwise, it looks good. Well Done. TomStar81 (Talk) 22:09, 20 February 2008 (UTC)
Y Done Bellhalla (talk) 22:21, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] HMAS Melbourne (R21)

I've just finished a massive expansion of this article. I want to start the ball rolling towards Featured Article status. So tell me people, what's screaming for a fixing? -- saberwyn 06:12, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

UPDATES by saberwyn:

Tweaks of grammar and phrasing have been made per the points below: I hope I'm getting the right stuff fixed. Any assistance from other editors would be aprreciated, because I wrote almost all of the text that is present and may have a blindspot covering some of the more glaring errors. The section on the Evans collision is being worked through in my userspace (User:Saberwyn/HMAS Melbourne (R21)/Evans collision‎), and Maralia will perform a progress review of this in the near future. Are there any other parts of the article that need looking at?? -- saberwyn 10:05, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
An automated peer review has been run. See below
An updated collision section has been inserted into the article, because its better than what was there, but it still needs a lot of work. Are there any other parts of the article that need working on, or should this peer review be wrapped up a new one opened when the collision section is comepletely fixed? -- saberwyn 07:07, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
Maralia and I have sorted out our concerns regarding the Evans collision section, by trimming down the material on the investigation to a single paragraph, and leaving the detailed accusations of bias for the subarticle. Aside from the comment on the need for a prose tense copyedit (which will be a continual work in progress), I believe I have answered all of TomStar's concerns to the best of my ability. Unless there are any other points than need fixing, I intend to archive this peer review at the end of the week and begin an A-class review for the article. -- saberwyn 06:46, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TomStar81

I didn't take the time to do a thurough read threw (that will come later today), but two things got my attention right quick:

  • Decide on a tense. I spotted two instances of past-to-present tense in the same section, it needs to be all present or all past
    • Attempting to fix any parts I find. Can you give an example of one of the more glaring occurances of the problem so I know I'm working on the right thing? -- saberwyn 10:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Do not start a sentence with a number. Case in point:"82 of Voyager's crew were killed, and two Royal Commissions were held to investigate the events."
    • Do you mean, do not start with a numeral (which will be easy to fix), or do not start with a number (at the mo I can see no other way to restructure that sentance). -- saberwyn 10:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC) DONE

Sorry for my extremely long delay in getting back to you, school work has proven more difficult now that I am an official upper classman, and keeping pace with demand has required some absence from here on my part. First off let me say that you have done an outstanding job with this article, it reads well and it is well sourced. You are to be commended for your efforts to bring the article this far, but I have a few additional suggestions/clarifications for you below:

  • You have a tendancy to switch tense in the article, which is bad; an article should be written all in the present tense or all in the past tense. In this case in particular I would recommend siding with the past tense becuase the ship herself no longer exists. A case in point: First paragraph, second sentence: "Launched in 1945 and operating until 1982, she was the third and final conventional aircraft carrier[I] to serve in the Royal Australian Navy (RAN)."
    • I will be honest, I don't know the first thing about what tenses are and how to properly use them. I just write the way I've learned/taught myself to. To use your example, "Launched in 1945 and operating until 1982" just feels right to me compared to "Launched in 1945 and operated until 1982". Given my lack of knowledge, I think the best I can do is hand the article over to the League of Copyeditors or somebody else, and hope they can make sense of and fix my mess. In progress/requires further comment
      • Fair enough, the Leauge of Copyediters would probably be better suited to deal with that issue. As one who can't spell I can relate to writing the way one learns/teaches oneself to. I'll leave it to you to find a good copyediter.
  • The lead sentence in the third paragraph reads "During her career, Melbourne never fired a shot in anger, only having peripheral, non-combat roles in the Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation and the Vietnam War.", but I think it might flow better if it read "Melbourne never fired a shot in anger during her career, having only peripheral, non-combat roles in the Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation and the Vietnam War."
    • Done
  • We have articles for ship naming and launching and other related ship cermonies that you may want to link to from this article for the sake of allowing unfamilar readers a chance to discover the answers to their question without having to ask someone for the answer. If you do decide to link to the articles I would recommend linking from the Construction and acquisition section.
    • Could you slap that link in where you feel it is most appropriate? Requires further comment
      • Will do. I see about getting to it tomarrow.
  • As noted below, make sure to use non-breaking spaces with regards to numerical values.
    • I've used non-breaking spaces in every spot I can find that needs one. Done
  • We wouldn't happen to articles for the radar sets on site, would we? If we did it would be a good idea to link to them.
    • I've anchor-linked to List of World War II British naval radar for the 277Q and 293Q radars in the Weapons and Systems section, but not the infobox as yet. None of the other radars have articles, or articles I can find. Requires further comment
      • To be fair, I have been trying to locate enough information to create a radar page for the Iowas, and so far have found little if anything of substantive value. The explination I got from a former USN Fire Control Technition is that alot of the technical stuff from back in the day remains classified becuase the same basic principles apply to modern radar.
  • Based on what I have seen in the article your information and the sorcing are good enough to lay the groundwork for a rebuilding of the class page. It maight be a good idea to try that so you can break out some of the information from the Construction and acquisition, Design, and Armament section and there subsections to help reduce the length of the Melborne page; at present your Melborne page weighs in at 85 kbs, which is almost the length of my Iowa class battleship page in its current form (presently at 87 kbs). Long pages are harder for our dialup user to get to, so I strongly recommend going with this option.
    • I could farm some of the material out to Majestic class aircraft carrier, Colossus class aircraft carrier, and Aircraft carriers of the Royal Australian Navy. However, the problem I see is that (to my eye), most, if not all, of the material present falls into one of two categories
      1. The material is specific to Melbourne. This is mainly for the technical material, as although the six ships of the Majestic class were identical in design during the early phases in construction, the fact that construction was suspended completely after the war, then restarted at different times and completed with different end-goals and for different navies mean that (in my opinion), the Majestic class consists of five unique ships and one pile of scrap metal (Leviathan was never completed). Just by looking throught the Wikipedia articles here, I cannot see a consistent post-launching configuration for any of the ships for any of the normally common components - radar sets, weapons outfits, etc. Only half the class had angled flight decks. There appears to be a lot more variation between the configuration of the Majestics than the Iowas, and without going into a detailed study of each of the other five carriers, I wouldn't know what are the common elements to list in the class article.
      2. I believe the material is important to understand the history of Melbourne. The exaple that comes to my mind is the acquisition of the two Australian carriers. I've tried to trim down some of the material, but this is a key component of the ship's history, and should be dealt with as completely as possible here.
    • On the matter of being oversized, I will try to trim the article down, but I don't know how much smaller I can get it without ommitting any more information. I've trimmed one or two kb off the article by tightening up the wording and removing some of the more excessive details (i.e the latter section of the article contained a lot of lists of accompanying ships while the earlier sections had none, and a lot of these lists have been removed). If a blanket revert is required or desired, this is the version of the article prior to the cutting down. Requires further comment
      • Fair enough. Very long articles are permitted provided there be a good reason to keep them instead of carving them up, and it sounds like you have a good reason to keep yours big. On the issue of trimming: all articles could do with a little trimming (even FAs), but don't trim so much that you create a train wreck. If there is a good reason for having info in the article then so be it.
  • Are any of the exercise names metioned in the history part annual? If so we may have an article on them, and if not could you try and find out what the exercise was for?
    • By my understanding, most of the were multi-naval training exercises. I will try to find names and wikilinks for as many as possible. In progress None of the exercise names currently in the article or in Gillett's HMAS Melbourne - 25 Years have an accompanying article, and there are no details as to what the specific activities of these training exercises were. Requires further comment
      • Thats ok. I was just curious, so I won't hold this one against you. I know sometimes exercises have a specific thrust, like the one we have at Fort Bliss by annually, and was curious if any of those were perhaps similar in nature.
  • Consider adding a commons link if any additional images of the carrier can be found there.
    • Link to a commons category of images is located in the Footnotes section. If you feel it would be better elsewhere, feel free. Done

Otherwise, as noted a bove, it looks good. Well done! TomStar81 (Talk) 04:47, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Maralia

I've given it a cursory copyedit, tweaked the reflist to columns, removed a redundant category, alphabetized the books list, and moved the last image up to avoid large whitespace. Overall, this is well written and thorough. A few issues:

  • It needs a more comprehensive copyedit. Particular issues include semicolons vs colons, slight overuse of passive verbs, and overcapitalization of officialese like 'government' and 'squadron'.
    • Copyedit is a work in progress, due to my proximity to the text as it was written all assistance to get what I miss is appreciated. -- saberwyn 10:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Is the construction "HMA Ships x and y" actually used by/for/about RAN ships? The capitalization of 'Ships' in it makes sense, but it looks wrong.
    • I have seen the form used several times before (see this search for "HMA Ships" at the RAN's official website [7]). -- saberwyn 10:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
      • Noted. You learn something every day :) Maralia (talk) 16:55, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
  • I'm really not satisfied with the Evans collision section. The primary source is a book written by the spouse of the accused. Criticism of the USN's participation in the joint board may be wholly warranted here, but the sources and presentation are questionable. If criticism is rampant, plenty of non-COI sources (and US rebuttals) should be available; if not, then this section suffers from undue weight.
I agree. I knew that this was going to be the weakest section going in to this. The text in question is used as a resource by other Australian naval historians (Tom Frame in Pacific Partners and David Stevens in The Royal Australian Navy) I will attempt to reacquire these books from the library and see how many sources I can change. I will admit that I have not looked too hard for other sources (this was one of the first sections finished, and I was too concerned with filling out the rest of the ships history to ensure that this and the other collision section did not unbalance the article), and the ones I did find focused only on the events of the collision and how the Americans were punished, the latter being more appropriate to the Melbourne-Evans collision article. I'll try to find some time to put it on the slab and tinker with it, but I cannot promise much at this moment in time. -- saberwyn 10:28, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
It's not surprising that 'Australian naval historians' use her book ;) I haven't been able to come up with any US-perspective books about the collision. I did, however, find vast quantities of evidence and documentation from the joint board inquiry, at [8]. Of particular interest are the final two pages ("Responsibility for Collision") of [9], which places the majority of blame on USN personnel. Indeed, 3 USN staff were court-martialed, with at least 2 found guilty of dereliction of duty, while Stevenson was the only RAN staff court-martialed, and he was "acquitted with honor". [10] Also note [11] which gives some USN commentary on the proceedings, including "King [...] is to be complimented for the outstanding investigation conducted under his direction. It is thorough and complete in all respects." Maralia (talk) 16:55, 28 January 2008 (UTC)
From the looks of things, the second weblink is an exerpt from the Board's findings, while the third and fourth weblinks are identical reports sent up the chain of command. The first weblink does not want to work for me. First up, I dislike using primary sources unpublished sources, wouldn't have a clue how to cite them properly if used, and trying to make sense of them smacks a little of original research to me.
In other news, I've started a rewrite of the section in my userspace I've already substituted in references for Frame's Pacific Partners, Bastock's Australia's Ships of War and Gillett's HMAS Melbourne - 25 Years. Unsubstituted material is underlined, and I'll be working to clear this away as I get hold of more texts. -- saberwyn 10:13, 30 January 2008 (UTC)
As an update on the whole Evans issue, the main problem is that there are only two published sources I have been able to identify that deal specifically with the subject of the collision and the Board of Inquiry: the book by Jo Stevenson (or its previous version) and an article by Anthony Vincent in Quadrant magazine (which I have been unable to acquire a copy of as yet). Both would be considered conflict-of-interest sources: the former is written by the wife of Melbourne's captain at the time, and the latter by the RAN lawyer kicked out of the Inquiry by Admiral King. Tom Frame has a chapter on the incident which is more or less reproduced across three of his books, and is manipulated or shoehorned in to meet the point of the book (general history of the RAN, the Voyager collision, or RAN-USN relations). All other Australian sources are short paragraphs or sections in general histories, or are reproduced or sourced from one or a combination of these three main writings. The few American-authored sources I can find are short journal articles or book paragraphs that deal almost exclusively with the collision. Yes, the BOI happened, but there is no detail as to the events of the BOI... it just happened. -- saberwyn 05:39, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for a good read. The Evans section is the only reason I didn't immediately bump the article to B class, and A class is only that plus a copyedit away, in my opinion. Maralia (talk) 19:58, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Automated

The following suggestions were generated by a semi-automatic javascript program, and might not be applicable for the article in question.

  • Per Wikipedia:Manual of Style (numbers), there should be a non-breaking space - &nbsp; between a number and the unit of measurement. For example, instead of 000 yards, use 000 yards, which when you are editing the page, should look like: 000&nbsp;yards.[?]
    • Done - the only remaining occurances are in the wikilink [[Bofors 40 mm gun]] (which would break the wikilink) and in the Evans collision section (and has been fixed in the rewrite)
  • Per WP:WIAFA, this article's table of contents (ToC) may be too long – consider shrinking it down by merging short sections or using a proper system of daughter pages as per Wikipedia:Summary style.[?]
    • Not done - At the moment, the only way I can see to shorten the TOC is to have events from 1969 to 1982 lumped into one awfully massive section. I am not willing to do that.
  • This article may need to undergo summary style, where a series of appropriate subpages are used. For example, if the article is United States, then an appropriate subpage would be History of the United States, such that a summary of the subpage exists on the mother article, while the subpage goes into more detail.[?]
    • Kinda done - Summary-style subarticles (actually just cuts and pastes of the appropriate section standing by and ready for detailed expansion) have been created for the Melbourne-Voyager collision and Melbourne-Evans collision. I do not believe any other section would be appropriate for a subarticle at this time.
  • Please make the spelling of English words consistent with either American or British spelling, depending upon the subject of the article. Examples include: armour (B) (American: armor), harbour (B) (American: harbor), metre (B) (American: meter), defense (A) (British: defence), defence (B) (American: defense), organise (B) (American: organize), criticise (B) (American: criticize), isation (B) (American: ization), signalling (B) (American: signaling), travelled (B) (American: traveled), kerb (B) (American: curb), program (A) (British: programme).
    • Done - Pearl Harbor always gets me in these articles. Australian/British is Harbour, but the proper name for the Hawaii base drops the u per American spelling and triggers this comment. Apart from this, the spelling is 100% Australian English
  • Please ensure that the article has gone through a thorough copyediting so that it exemplifies some of Wikipedia's best work. See also User:Tony1/How to satisfy Criterion 1a.[?]

You may wish to browse through User:AndyZ/Suggestions for further ideas. Thanks, -- saberwyn 10:39, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Brad101

  • I'm hardly an expert at what is required to upgrade an article but from current appearance, I'm not sure why this article wasn't given B class; it should be there now, imo. If Ship's cat is at B then certainly this one should be. Anyway, I think you have a good shot at FA as it stands. --Brad (talk) 23:10, 6 February 2008 (UTC)
    • It was not given B because the majortiy of the section on the Evans collision was written by Melbourne's captain's wife, and is therefore a conflict of interest. Rewriting of this section is in progress in my userspace, and after the completed rewrite is put into the article, it will likely be promoted to B class.

[edit] 5th Army (Soviet Union)

Another article on a Soviet field army that's nearly ready to be upgraded. Appreciate comments on what needs to be done for this to reach A-class status. Buckshot06 (talk) 01:30, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carom

A few comments:

  • The lead needs to be expanded, I think. It should really provide both an overview of, and an introduction to, the rest of the article.
  • Unless you have strong philosophical objections, there should really be an infobox.
Something I realised just after I set the peer review request up - I'll put one in. Buckshot06 (talk) 04:11, 24 February 2008 (UTC)
  • I would perhaps either incorporate the order of battle directly into the text, or move it so that is less visually disruptive.
  • You might want to adopt a more conventional Notes-References-External links format, but that's somewhat of a personal preference.
  • Any images available? They would certainly be nice additions.

Hopefully these comments are helpful. Carom (talk) 02:17, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] USS Bridgeport (AD-10)

I think I've gotten this article into pretty good shape but would like some feedback on what could stand to be improved, expanded, etc. Bellhalla (talk) 21:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Maralia

I've made some minor changes, mostly in the lead where I tried to clarify her various names over the years. A couple other things I wanted to point out:

  • In the 'Post war period' section, there's a bit of redundancy in the first sentence: "Toward the end of 1918 [. . .] on December 13, 1918".
  • MARAD gives more info about her final disposal: she was sold for scrap on 6 Feb 1948 to H. H. Buncher Company ( [12], see Disposal Card, Front of Card 1).
  • It might be worth splitting the 'Careers' section of the infobox to distinguish her Army service from her Navy service. With so many 'Characteristics' sections, though, I'm of mixed feelings about whether this would be an improvement.

All in all, it's quite comprehensive and well written. Well done! Maralia (talk) 22:58, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I fixed the first item and expanded on the ship’s demise per your link. I had toyed with the idea of a separate section for U.S. Navy and U.S. Army before, so I went ahead and implemented that as well. And I changed the "Characteristics" section so that there is only one heading, with some "subheadings" indicating differences in the various incarnations. I think the box flows better now. Thanks for your input. Bellhalla (talk) 05:29, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] SGGH

  • I'm not sure about bold so many times in the lead. I would have thought that id no. 3009 would have sufficed as the name stays the same, and just italic the other names? Just a suggestion though.
  • If the dates are mentioned in the prose, they can be cited there and you don't need so many cites in the infobox.
  • You need to move the image USS Bridgeport (far left) is among the ships greeting the arrival of President Woodrow Wilson in Brest. about 4 paragraphs down to avoid that massive gap between Post War period and the text.
  • If you put the book names under References then you can change the cites to just Charles, p. 342. so the differecne between the whole title cites and the "charles p. 11" aren't so obvious. Have a look at Operation Camargue above or Mozambican War of Independence or Siege of Malakand to see what I mean. Again, up to you though, just a suggestion.
  • You need to make re-directs from all her alternate names to this article.

All I can think of, good stuff! SGGH speak! 14:05, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Operation Camargue

Article on one of the largest operations of the First Indochina War, which validated French concerns that they couldn't operate well in the jungle (i.e. they needed, in thier opinion, to try a fixed position like Dien Bien Phu I think it is well written and well referenced, if a little dominated by Fall. Some tweaks will be needed and the last sections may be debated, hoping to make FA eventually. Thanks. SGGH speak! 12:51, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Anyone? I don't want to have to go into FAC with zero comments on two peer reviews.... SGGH speak! 19:51, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Quite nice, overall; but a few (mostly stylistic) matters that need fixing:

  • The ranks of commanding officers are generally not indicated in the infobox.Y Done
  • The "Territorial changes" field doesn't really make sense here, I think; it was intended for formal changes of control following wars, rather than interim gains or losses of tactical control over an area.Y Done
  • I would avoid placing footnotes inside sentences unless the material is truly controversial. In all other cases, it should be sufficient to collect things at the end of a sentence.Y Done where appropriate
  • The lead doesn't need footnotes for anything already cited in the body.Y Done
  • Any chance of getting a tactical map of the operation? Not one that can be used on wikipedia unless I draw it, will give it a go
  • I don't think the pulled-out link to the war at the beginning of the "Background" section is needed; there are already two links to it before then, and another link can be added in-text in the first sentence.Y Done

Hope that helps! Kirill 20:27, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks Kirill, very helpful. I have worked on the points you gave and commented where appropriate. SGGH speak! 22:50, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Roger Davies

I have noted what you say about FA and this review is almost entirely focused on that. I read somewhere that you are considering expanding the background. This, I think, is the best way forward as Operation Camargue seems to me one of those battles that gets infinitely more interesting in context than in isolation. Apologies if I am trying to get my grandmother to suck eggs, as you already touch on some of the issues so they're clearly not far from your thoughts, but I'd be tempted to explore the following:

  • The weather-change in Viet Minh fortunes provided by the Chinese Communist victory in '49.Y Done I have mentioned 1949 as the turning point in the development of the Viet-Minh
  • The failure of French Colnial efforts to keep a lid on events; the politicisation of young Indochinese militants in the French penal colonies; the role of Indochina as a Cold War proxy conflict; events in Korea. I wonder if the last two are two broad-scope to be in this ariticle, and more suited to First Indochina War, I have expanded the background section to include role of Vichy France now
  • The progress of war and the growing Free Zone north of Annam. I feel the background has enough
  • Comparison of differences in Viet Minh tactics in the Free Zone (nascent conventional standing army) and in the French-held areas (irregular guerrilla cells).Y Done
  • Discussion of French tactical choices: use of troops offensively en masse or in dispersed garrisons holding down the local population in a primarily counter-insurgency role.I think this is covered by the sentences detailing the tactics of the French using small defensive locations rather than roaming battle groups
  • Operation Camargue as an experimental French use of jungle-adapted armour (discussed briefly in "Vietnam on Track"), which the French had started developing in 1951.Y Done
  • American behind-the-scenes involvement, supply of matériel, and funding. Fall doesn't mention much on this (though hardly suprising, he is scathing of all American involvement, understandably. Windrow only really discusses it in relation to Dien Bien Phu, do you have work you grab citations from?
  • There's a passing reference in "Vietnam on Track" I think. Otherwise, it would be a translation from Gen Aussaresses' Pour la France: Services spéciaux 1942-1954.
  • I've found a good French source and added a paragraph into background with facts and figures. The scale is astonishing. --ROGER DAVIES talk 07:15, 1 February 2008 (UTC)
  • More or more local French-trained Vietnamese troops coming on-stream, releasing French combat troops for offensive operations.Y Done
  • Giap's thoughts: he discusses the operation in "The Miltary Art of the People's War". I don't have access to this, unfortunately
  • Much more on Viet Minh Regiment 95, which seems to have consisted of at least three battalions [310, 302, & 227).I can hardly find anything, hopefully you have some information
  • On closer examination, only scraps. I have read about this regiment somewhere but I can't find where. --ROGER DAVIES talk 17:46, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Camargue's role as the last major battle before Dien Bien Phu and its pre-cursor, Operation Castor.Y Done I have added this to the introduction and cited it to Fall

If you're looking for collaborators, I'd love to get involved with this. I was heavily involved with Battle of Arras (1917), which took a similar explain-the-background approach. My French is fluent, which may help with sources. And, at a pinch, I can do simple campaign maps (see the Arras schematic one) though the work is usually in the research rather than the execution :)

I am hoping that my partner can sketch a map, she's a fantastic artist and hopefully it will turn out quite clear SGGH speak! 10:02, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Oh good, mine take ages. --ROGER DAVIES talk 17:48, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Other things

I was a bit puzzled about the accent on Mobilé in the text. Normally, it shouldn't be there. Does this come from a really reliable source, perhaps indicating a special usage?

All the best, --ROGER DAVIES talk 17:18, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

In answer to your final question, the French operate in battle groups that they called 'groupment mobiles' and both Fall and from memory Windrow have the accent, so I think it's right. Thanks for your comments, I'll get cracking soon! SGGH speak! 21:05, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
My copy (Pen & Sword 2005) of Fall doesn't. He calls them Groupement mobiles or GMs. Perhaps it's an edition difference. I can understand calling the individual troops "mobilés" as slang, but it's the French/English hybrid (Mobilé Group), I'm puzzling over. --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:38, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
That is interesting.... while my Fall does seem to do it, having looked at Windrow, he doesn't, he only has the accent for Groupment Mobilés, I'll remove the accent in that case. SGGH speak! 10:49, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Probably safest. --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:26, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
And yes you are welcome to get involved, all help is appreciated SGGH speak! 16:55, 26 January 2008 (UTC)
I think it might be ready for FAC now. What do you think? SGGH speak! 10:29, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
I'll take a look :) --ROGER DAVIES talk 10:38, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Based on a quick read through, it's broadly much improved (and it was good to start with). a few niggles:
  1. It might be helpful to explicitly refer to Communist China's 1949 victory;
  2. The Aftermath section has a large number of "howevers" in it (including two in the same sentence);
  3. Giap is less charitable about calling it a French victory (I'll see if I can dig out a quote, the problem is his stuff is written in Maoist jargon so it's difficult extracting sound-bytes);
  4. A regional map would be good;
  5. A few missing hyphens: "division size" > division-sized; "French dominated" > French-dominated
  6. 18th Century > 18th century;
  7. "Freed regular French forces up" > freed up regular French forces;
  8. "to conduct the reassertion of French government" > reassert French governance ?
  9. "French felt that their new strategy of strong ground bases, a versatile French Air Force and a model based on the British Burma campaign would bring victory over the Viet Minh insurgents". A bit clunky. Perhaps brackets or dashes after "new strategy" and "Burma campaign"?
Overall, it still needs a close copy-edit.
--ROGER DAVIES talk 11:26, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) While I remember, the connection between the name is that the Camargue is a river delta and Operation Camargue took place in the Red River delta. (Navarre makes this point in his Agonie de l'indochine and Giap in The Military Art etc.) --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:37, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, red herring. I misread the text. --ROGER DAVIES talk 17:46, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Giap quotes (he calls Operation Camargue the "First Phase of the Navarre Plan", Dien Bien Phu being the second one).
  • "the enemy concentrated in the Red River delta more than 50 percent of the mobile forces and declared that they were changing over to the offensive to regain the initiative in the operations". Giap, p 121
  • "it was announced we suffered heavy losses although in fact our losses were insignificant ... their troops had to withdraw with heavy losses". Giap, p. 121
Hope this helps, --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:37, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Giap also summarises the entire Navarre Plan strategy (Summer 1953-Spring 1954) on p. 120. --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:39, 31 January 2008 (UTC)
Thats cool, could you implement many of the above? I have to go take care of some university work at present. I'll be back later but it would be good to get things done as quickly as possible. See you later SGGH speak! 11:41, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Military of East Timor

I have been working on this article on and off for some months and think that it now provides a very comprehensive overview of East Timor's troubled military. The East Timorese seem to think so as well as part of the history section has been lifted from Wikipedia and posted on the East Timor Ministry of Defence and Security's website as the military's official history! I would be very interested in other editors' views on the article and suggestions for how it can be improved to FA standard. If anyone can point me towards more photos of the military that would also be much appreciated as the article is very bland at present (though the order of battle image which was created by Noclador is brilliant). --Nick Dowling (talk) 07:10, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Quite good, overall. A few stylistic suggestions:

  • Is listing the budget as "Unknown" in the infobox useful? I would have left out that field entirely, if there's no data for it.
  • The diagram might be a bit neater floated at the side; on a wide monitor, the whitespace is a bit excessive.
  • Personally, I find {{details}} to be better worded than {{main}}.

Keep up the great work! Kirill 03:42, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 51st Army (Soviet Union)

Been working on this Soviet army, one of a large number, in conjunction with user:W. B. Wilson, and since it's now in reasonable shape would appreciate suggestions for further improvement. Buckshot06 (talk) 09:29, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

A few suggestions, in no particular order:

  • {{Infobox Military Unit}}?
  • The list of commanders would work better as a table, at the least; another possibility would be to use {{service record}}.
  • Ditto the OOB, but with {{command structure}}.
  • The lead should be considerably longer.
  • Various MoS fixes are needed; in particular, dates need to be properly linked.
  • "In 1987, the 192nd Tank Regiment was re-formed into 97th independent Tank Battalion." - what does this have to do with the army as a whole?
  • Additional detail on the post-war period, if any is avaialble, would be helpful.
Believe me, if the Net or any other source had anything extra, it'd be in there. I'll go back again and see what I can find in translation from Soldat.ru. Buckshot06 (talk) 20:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Kirill 11:38, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

This is a good brief history of the Army. I'd agree with most of Kirill's comments, though I think that the lead's length is OK given that the article is relatively brief. Can you add anything about the quality of the Army during World War II - eg, was it regarded as a particularly good or bad unit? It would also be good if the reason for the Army's formation in 1941 was discussed - was this part of the pre-war mobilization plan and were its' initial units also newly formed? If they're available, some photos of the Army would be great. I like the article's structure, which is very clear. --Nick Dowling (talk) 07:33, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Hope I've sketched in now reasonably well the circumstances of the Army's formation - the 12 August Stavka session.Buckshot06 (talk) 06:03, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] USS Constitution

As important as this ship is to the history of the United States Navy I feel it is time to bring the article up the scale past B-class. What if anything would prevent this article from the next step of Good Article? --Brad (talk) 04:37, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] TomStar81

I'm under the influence of pain killers out the moment, but I can tell you that the information in the table in the specification section should be integrated into the uppermost ship table. I will take a closer look at the article when my thinking is not impaired. TomStar81 (Talk) 04:54, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

  • Having allowed my pain killers to wear off I am now in extreme pain, and as it is difficult to type with my hand carved up I will outline the points that really need to be addressed:
    • Another paragraph is needed in the intro that deals with Constitution's current carreer as museum ship.Y Done
    • Eliminate the history header and instead focus on the remaining headers; since the whole article is history, there is no need to have the history header as the lead header.Y Done
    • More inline citations are needed throughout the article, in particular to adress the points on the milhist mos.
    • Information on the overhauls should be improved; notable with regard to equipment changes (like onloading new cannons or ammunition, spots where bad wood was replaced, what kind of modernizations the ship saw [if any], etc)
    • Eliminate the timeline section (in a sense the whole article is a timeline, so we don;t need to recap it there)Y Done
    • Merge the urban legend part into the pop culture part, either as a new paragraph or as a subsection of the pop culture section.Y Done
    • Break out the books from the reference section. At this point, that section is prabably large enough to exist on its own.Y Done
    • Check the external links and make sure they are all relevant; if they have little to do with ship, then remove them.
Y Done -->Always need to watch.
    • See if you can find some more pictures of constitution in her hay day. Admittedly this one's gonna be hard, and I doubt you will come up with anything, but we do occasionally seem images over at FPC that date back to the 1800s, so it can't hurt to look.
--> Found Image:Chase of the Constitution, July 1812.jpg and placed in 1812 section. Finding others of quality will be difficult.
  • Like I said, thats for starters, and I will update this when I can type again with both hands and without painkillers. TomStar81 (Talk) 10:53, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
Thanks! It's enough for me to do in the meantime. --Brad (talk) 04:28, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Glad to hear that. Now for round two :)
    • Per MoS guidelines check all dates to ensure that they use a consistant format, either day/month/year or month/day/year.
    • Make sure that when you refer to constitution you stick with an all "she/her" format or an all "it" format, do not alternate between the two.
    • Coordinate your efforts to improve this page with MBK004's improvements to the original six page. One of the things I discovered during the FAR(C) for USS Wisconsin (BB-64) is that people will be more likely to support a ship article if detailed information common to the class is presented on the class page. In this manner you can make a case for this article being an extension of the greater whole. If it worked for me, i am sure it will work for you.
    • Do we have an article for Edmund Hartt's shipyard? It would be nice to have one if one isn't here already.
--> I have found nothing online for Harrt and very little for George Claghorn.
    • See if you can find any statistics for much stronger the disgnal cross braces made the frigate.
    • Link to the marine units that served aboard constitution, if you can; this may help you find additional source for the article.
    • See if any ships were assigned to operate with or under consitution during her early carreer. It would be interesting to know if she sailed as part of a battle group or if she sailed independently. If she sailed as part of a group see if you can find out which vessel served as the flagship. I wouldn't be suprised to learn constitution served as a flagship in her day; I bet she would have been a damn good flagship too :)
    • Wikilink the first instance of ranks. Positions like captain and commodore warrent articles here; and it will help enlighten the readers.
    • What are the effective range(s) of the guns mounted aboard constitution, and what kind of ammunition do they use?
    • In the war of 1812, how did the people find out about constitution's victories? It may be worth noting the methode in the article.
    • In the war of 1812, where were the blockades that prevented constitution from sailing?
    • What exactly did they find in the 1830 examination that made constitution unfit for service? I'm guessing rotten or damaged wood due to war service, but you can tighten that up if you get a chance.
    • Where exactly was constitution during the civil war? I assume in boston, but it couldn;t hurt to find out for sure.
    • Any idea what she moved to the paris expo in 1877?
    • there is very little on constitution between 1897 and 1925, see if you can expand that. I don't think you will find anything important, but it would be best to check anyway just to be through.
    • Her 1930 tour mentions visits to 90 port cities; perhaps you could list the ones she started and ended at for the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific legs of the trip.Y Done
    • The 1954 act of congress placing constitution in permanent commission prabably has a name, see if you can find it.
    • Link to sea chest, it may be an interesting read for those unfamilar with the term.
--> There is no article on WP to describe "Sea Chest" though it does appear in word searches. Also appears @ List_of_naval_terms#S but description doesn't fit what HM received.
    • See if you can find the vessel that towed constitution out to sea in 1997, if it was a navy ship then I would give better than even odds that we have its artcle here.
I'm fairly certain the 1997 tow was a commercial tug, I'll have to look at my pictures. However for the 1931 big tour tow:
USS Grebe (AM-43), worked it into article. Looking for PD photo of the two together. --J Clear (talk) 21:28, 2 February 2008 (UTC) Y Done
USS Sumner (AGS-5) seems to have taken a leg on the way back, too, probably worth omitting. --J Clear (talk) 21:48, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
    • link to "ship of state"Y Done
    • If at all possible, try to remove the links in the see also section by incorporating that information into the article body.Y Done
    • Check to see if our articles on events like the Quasi-war and the war of 1812 have any inline citations or external links, you may be able to find innformation on constitution from those sources and links. In a best case senario you'll find a gold mine, in a worse case nothing at all, either way, in may help to fill in blank spots.
  • If I happen to think of anything else I will add it here for you. TomStar81 (Talk) 08:39, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Maralia

I'll have article feedback later, but for now, just wanted to note that I'm doing rather extensive research for Constitution images and will present a list of image options soonish. Maralia (talk) 16:41, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

A quick note in response to Tom's question about where she was during the Civil War: She was a training ship for the United States Naval Academy, first in Annapolis, and from May 1861–summer 1865 at Fort Adams in Newport, Rhode Island when the Academy was temporarily moved there. [13] Maralia (talk) 17:44, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] MBK004

I'll have more for you later.

  • Every item in the popular culture section needs to be cited, and follow the guidelines of the disclaimer I have just added to the section [14]. -MBK004 19:28, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
  • The Ship of state article linked at the request of Tom above does not mention military vessels, just ocean liners with regards to the maritime part of the metaphor. I don't quite know how such an expansion of that article to include mention of the Constitution's status as a "ship of state" would be undertaken. Especially since I have an extremely limited grasp of philosophical topics. -MBK004 05:12, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] J Clear

  • DANFS: No {{DANFS}} citation. We should check DANFS to see if either there is text and we need the citation or if DANFS has anything interesting we could incorportate (and then add the citation). --J Clear (talk) 19:24, 2 February 2008 (UTC) Never mind, I'm blind. --J Clear (talk) 21:06, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
  • If the article grows too much, I suggest we create USS Constitution service history or some such, and put a lot of details there.
  • Also may want to separate her "offical navy history" with her "legend" and current role as a symbol/museum. I tried to do that with Valley Forge and Valley Forge National Park, and it seems to work. --J Clear (talk) 21:40, 2 February 2008 (UTC)
  • Need to work the two reasons for the "turnaround" cruise into the Present day section: weathering, parade.

[edit] Brad101

  • The 3 introductory paragraphs should be rewritten for better flow. I plucked the third directly from the 'Present Day' section just to outline what should be up there. The oldest commissioned ship afloat in the world should be in the third paragraph, imo.
  • I plan on expanding the information a bit about George Claghorn as Naval Constructor but there is very little to be found; not enough even for an article on him. There is one reference available as to why Constitution had several aborted launch attempts that I will add.
  • J Clear: Nice hits with the 1930's tour; Thank you!

Infobox:

  • In the interest of not making the infobox 5 miles long, I'm not going to list every commissioned and decommissioned date found. Someone had started to list those dates but I plan on removing them.
  • The only thing preventing me from removing the section with specifications is the issue of putting the anchors into the infobox but there is no |Ships anchors= line that will work within the box. I've left messages at the infobox page and with TomtheHand but no answer has been given as yet.
  • Flag.. If she is a currently commissioned ship then Don't Tread On Me should figure into the box here. Why the 1812 flag is there seems sort of confusing. Constitution may fall under the DTOM flag in two ways.. Oldest ship in the fleet and as all USN ships are currently flying same.

--Brad (talk) 16:25, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] United States Army Special Forces

I'm requesting a peer review for this article because I think it may be good enough to be raised to a B-class article. Right now the article is still a Start-class. If its not ready to become a B-class, what improvements need to be made so that it meets the B-class criteria?

Outdawg (talk) 04:34, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

Many more in-line citations would improve the article greatly, for a start, but what about recent missions - Trans-Saharan Counterterrorism Initiative, JCET, all that kind of thing ought to be included. Buckshot06 (talk) 00:50, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

I'll echo Buckshot06's comment about citations; the article is very under-cited at this point. Aside from that, a few other suggestions:

  • The "Green Beret" section, while interesting, seems out of place at the very beginning; I'd move it somewhere further down (at least past the history, and possibly into a broader section; see below).
  • The history breaks off rather unexpectedly.
  • The bulleted list in "Special Forces MOS Descriptions" would work better as a table.
  • No information about equipment?
  • Some more detail about the current operations of the SF would be good.

Kirill 02:31, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hans-Joachim Marseille

I would like to know what this article is missing to qualify for a higher rating than B-Class.MisterBee1966 (talk) 20:30, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

The article is pretty nice, overall. Some specific points to consider:

  • The lead should be expanded to two or three full paragraphs.Y Done
  • I'd suggest avoiding footnotes in the middle of sentences where possible. Unless the material is extremely controversial, grouping them at the end of a sentence or paragraph would clean up the flow a bit.
  • The images are a bit cluttered; the large plane image, in particular, will run into the previous one on wider resolutions, and is too large in any case.
  • The entire "Summary of career" section would look better in table form than as bulleted lists. His absences seem a bit too trivial to me, but I suppose they would be less jarring if in continuous form. You might also consider combining all the material into a single comprehensive timeline; but I'm not entirely convinced whether that would be an improvement, at this point.
  • The gray/orange blocks don't really add anything that couldn't be done with a simple table with a single vertical line down the middle, and look a bit garish.Y Done

Higher ratings than B-Class all have associated formal reviews that articles must go through, incidentally; see WP:MHA for more details. Kirill 04:47, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the assessors comments are a little harsh on the colour table, it isn't that garish, the contrast is pretty light.
I don't think that the absences from the front are trivial either, these are important considerations in the career of a fighter pilot- especially so in Marseille's case, given the short period in which his kills were scored. The reader can then understand why mention of his actions, for example, in July-August were non-existant.
I agree that the image is a little too big, this I will correct.Dapi89 (talk) 13:32, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Mmm, fair enough. I'd still suggest that a table form would serve better for the timelines than the current one, though, regardless of what one chooses to include in the timeline itself. Kirill 14:07, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
With regard to the citations covering the nature of Marseille's last mission (see talk page), the citation and note were placed there as the information became disputed (caused by errors in general literature). I trust this is okay? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dapi89 (talk • contribs)

[edit] Franco-Prussian War

I firmly believe that this article is almost ready for a featured article candidacy. All I need is objective criticism on how to ensure that it passes. There are a couple of events that need sourcing and more beef, but 80% of the work is done. Thank you! Monsieurdl mon talk-mon contribs 21:45, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] The Land

Good work so far - there's a lot of very detailed material in it. I think the material is there to make it A-class or FA, but a bit of editing and referencing is needed first. A few comments as I read through:

  • In the infobox, you distinguish French active and reserve strength, but not Prussian.
I fixed that- Howard mentions the "reserves and the Landwehr", and there is no other reference that differentiates the strength by reserves alone. Also, no captured totals for the Prussian Army is listed in any reference I have searched. Monsieurdl mon talk-mon contribs

16:17, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

  • There is a definite shortage of references in the summary-style passages ('Prussian Army Advance' onwards). Even if something is referenced in another article, it must be re-referenced here.
  • Is there more that can be said about the impact/results of the war? This section seems a bit on the short side. (This section is also unreferenced)
  • It is a big topic and will inevitably be quite a long article. Could the 'Causes of the War' section be split off into another article and summarised? At the moment, it's quite a long section and only marginally relevant to the war.
I have created another article called Causes of the Franco-Prussian War, and I am working towards a summary for events based upon the material removed. Great idea! It was a bit too long. Monsieurdl mon talk-mon contribs

20:33, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

  • A difficulty with all big history articles is to find a way to make the article coherent. At the moment, I think this is lacking. The way I would approach this is to identify the key themes about the War (which also demonstrate why it's important and interesting) and where possible to refer to these themes.

Keep up the good work and thanks for taking on this war! The Land (talk) 22:08, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] United States Navy SEALs

This article needs more than a peer review. There are to many people trying to edit and alter this article. It has been stuck at "Start-class" because many people add little bits of false info instead valid information that would actually improve the article. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Outdawg (talk • contribs)

[edit] Nick Dowling

I agree that this article needs a lot of work. Some suggestions:

  • Provide an inline citation for everything. I've been able to greatly reduce the number of bad edits to Australian Special Air Service Regiment by adding inline citations - they seem to deter special forces-cruft to some extent.
  • Much of the wording is sloppy and confusing. For instance the training section states that "Anyone can volunteer" but then goes on to list a number of restrictions on potential SEAL candidates (eg, they have to be in the Navy, male and under 28). The section later gives a list of 'PST' (term not defined) criteria which candidates need to meet, before going on to say that candidates are actually expected to do better than meet these criteria. This is a bit confusing.
  • The history section seems to be rather brief and the prose is choppy. This should be re-written to be a more comprehensive history of the SEALS organisation and deployments.
  • The article would benefit from a section which spells out what roles the SEALS fill - this is briefly mentioned in the lead para, but never referred to again. What do the SEALS do to justify their existence? Why do Navy units operate hundreds of kilometres from the sea?
  • The article is full of military jargon and unnecessary acronyms.
  • Most of the external links should be removed as few seem to be in line with Wikipedia:External links (eg, Navy SEALS fan sites and individuals photo sites are pretty useless as links)
  • The 'Area of Operations' section is written in an odd tone, and doesn't seem to cover anything worthwhile - it basically states that SEALS are required to operate in all terrains and then describes how they survive in different terrains, which doesn't seem to differ from how anyone else would survive in harsh areas.
  • The 'Notable Navy SEALs' should be cited and be limited to people who became notable for being a SEAL rather than notable people who were once a SEAL. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:53, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Howard Berkowitz

Nick gave a good starting list. I'd go a little further on "notable SEALS" (and predecessors); the idea that they are notable as SEALs, or at least special warfare operators, is a good point.

  • If someone is notable as a SEAL, it may be that the things for which they were notable belong in the body of the article. For example, I was surprised not to see Draper Kaufmann (the younger of the father and son admirals) not even in the list, much less the lead of the article. Many will call him the creator of UDT starting in 1943, and the SEAL Program would never have happened without him.
  • Other people key in the development, like Phil Bucklew, aren't there, and again, their role is part of the mainline history. One starting place is http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/agency/navy/navspecwarcom-hist.htm
  • I'd like to suggest you look at Special reconnaissance and Direct action (military), since they both refer to SEALs, UK Special Boat Service, etc., and it would be well to have them use consistent language and be appropriately wikilinked.
  • What about technological enablers of the SEALs? Christian Lambertsen developed the first US Navy rebreather, but really is one of the first physicians who specialized in diving medicine. There are foreign contributors; the Italians are quite likely the inspiration for most swimmer delivery vehicles.
  • Nick brings out a good point: SEALs are treated as general-purpose special operators, which is why you find them on the oceans of Afghanistan :-). I believe it important to bring out that they can be used in some, but not other, roles. The article on Operation Nifty Package is stubby, but there are some interesting starting points. The SEALs assigned to disable his boats had a classic SEAL mission and carried it out perfectly. The attack on Punta Paitilla Airport was a fiasco. When that part of the mission was first given to the SEAL planners, they wanted to infiltrate SEALs, before the invasion, to an apartment that had a line of sight on the aircraft, and destroy it with a Barrett .50 caliber rifle or heavier direct fire weapon. For military political reasons, that covert form of operation was rejected, and they were combined into a larger unit than SEALs typically used, and were given a light infantry, hi-diddle-diddle-right-up-the-middle light infantry mission to make a direct assault on the airport. Light infantry raids, and especially seizing or disabling airfields, is one of the specialties of Army Rangers (75th Ranger Regiment). The lesson was "don't use SEALs on Ranger missions, and vice versa."
  • There is a certain political aspect to using SEALs as special operators far inland, but they do have some of the qualifications. Still, their use in Afghanistan allowed the Navy a role in a landlocked country. There probably is value in cross-training among special operators. There were a few SEALs in Operation Gothic Serpent (first battle of Mogadishu), and, since at least some of the A-teams in a Special Forces Group are expected to be SCUBA-qualified, some mixing is probably useful. All US special operations organizations have specialties, and a SEAL might learn something from how a Ranger would approach something, while a Ranger could learn from an Air Force Combat Controller. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 17:36, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] United States Naval Special Warfare Command

The United States Naval Special Warfare Command article needs a peer review because it is an "Incorrectly tagged WikiProject Military history article" and for normal improvement. Outdawg (talk) 06:23, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Roger Davies

Firstly, I've had a look at the tagging. The first B-class criterion had been set "yes" in error, so I've changed that to "no", but is otherwise accurate. As the article fails on B1, "start" class looks right to me. Does this help?

Secondly, and you probably won't like this, the glaring omission is the lack of inline citations (two for the whole article). Before any expansion takes place, you should provide citations for all major statements. See WP:V for what to cite and WP:REF for how to cite it. As this may well considerably change the content and structure of the article, it might be better to request a fresh peer-review after the cites are done. If you need a hand, contact me on my talk page :)

Otherwise, it's a promising aticle with great potential ... All the best, --ROGER DAVIES talk 11:36, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Special reconnaissance

Peer review requested 2007-12-17 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Hcberkowitz (talk • contribs)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Quite nice, overall. A few points to consider:

  • The article unpredictably mixes footnotes and parenthetical citations; you should really decide on one style and use it throughout.
Agreed -- I thought I had converted all to footnotes, but apparently I missed some. Will fix. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 03:57, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Large portions of the article are uncited; this is particularly important with topics such as this one, where the bulk of the material is not common knowledge.
In some cases, I worked from one source and put the material in consecutive paragraphs. My general rule was that until I gave a new citation, it referred to the same source. Is there a better practice?
The typical convention for large sections from the same source(s) is to cite each paragraph; this minimizes the chance of running into later problems if some other editor inserts a paragraph from another source in the middle of a section with no intermediate citations. Kirill 04:03, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
  • Some bulleted lists may be appropriate, but others (e.g. in the "Infiltration" section) can be reasonably rewritten as prose.
There's something symbolically wrong with avoiding bullets in MILHIST, at least for an article after they've been invented. :-) Will look at these. I definitely want to use them for explaining acronyms such as CARVER.
  • Long quotes should use blockquote formatting.
There may be some formats I need to learn. I've used angle brackets blockquote /blockquote more these days, but I think I've seen some other formatting methods.
  • Bolding should only be used for the title of the article, not as a means of emphasis within the text.

Keep up the good work! Kirill 03:49, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

OK. If you have any suggestions for additional national practices, they'd be very welcome.Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 03:57, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] News Media and the Vietnam War

This began as a media section of the Tet Offensive article. Have expanded it up somewhat and am looking for some constructive criticism.RM Gillespie (talk) 04:11, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Blnguyen

Good article I think. I'm just going through the Ngo Dinh Diem era, since I know about that specifically. Some things might be generally applied.

  • Just from a general stylistic viewpoint, I think it's rather strange that you don't link to terms much, eg Homer Bigart, David Halberstam, Neil Sheehan, 1963 South Vietnamese coup, Arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem are relevant links, among other parts so that people can continue reading about the related topics. The aritcle is generally very sparsely wikilinked.
  • With all the intricate details and many things all happening at once in Vietnam, it might be difficult for a person who doesn't already know what the incidents were about to understand the context. eg, the Buddhist crisis section doesn't tell us at all what it is or how it came to be. Also, in such situations, I think {{seealso}} and {{main}} should be used so that the reader can be guided to articles like Hue Vesak shootings so that they can understand the background.
  • The same applies to Ap Bac I think. The reader needs to know that the battle was significant in that it was the first open confrontation with the VC and that the US generals had claimed that the VC would be easily routed if they stood and fought. Also the reader will not know from the text that the official US army report claimed a victory whereas Sheehan etc claimed that the ARVN was outmanoevred.
  • Notable incidents that might be dealt on in more detail (perhaps)
Also, the other thing is that the Buddhists often tipped off the reporters before the demonstrations and such. Do you have the book by William Prochnau about the US journos in VN?
  • Other generalities:There should probably be more photos of the people being discussed in the article, eg Diem. Also I am surprised that the photo of Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing a VC prisoner is not included since it is usually cited as a media photograph that heavily swayed public opinion.
  • Some parts are sparsely referenced.

Apart from that, it was an interesting read. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:19, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Anglo-Japanese alliance

I've nominated this article for peer review as I would like it to be either brought up to GA-class, or if my own edits have already brought it to that level, I would like it to be rated as such.

Rupa zero (talk) 15:29, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Yannismarou

A well-written but uncited article. These are my proposals:

  • "London at what is now the Lansdowne Club, ". Avoid external links like this one within the main text. Use instead proper citation using Template:cite web etc.
  • The article has almost no citations, and the one existing is mixed with the references.
  • You link sometimes single years, sometimes you avoid doing that, then you do not link full dates ... Inconsistencies. Check WP:MoS.
  • "The Anglo-Japanese Alliance officially terminated on August 17 1923." Stubby paragraph. No further analysis surrounding this event?
  • Format properly references adding ISBNs where possible, and use Template:cite book.
  • "See also" goes before "references", but I would recommend to get rid of the "See also" section and incorporate its links into the main text.--Yannismarou (talk) 16:29, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Toddy1

I have gone through it section by section. In some cases I have criticised the lack of mention of issues at some points in the structure when they are sort of mentioned in other later parts of the structure.

Main faults:

  • Lack of citations.
  • Motivations section - does not mention Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95. One effect of this war was that Japan was taken more seriously. Was the issue of the who annexed Hawaii a factor in Japan wanting an alliance with Britain? Once the 1902 treaty had been signed Japan felt that Japan was now recognised as on a par with Western Nations.
  • Terms of 1902 treaty - the understanding that contemporary writers had during he Russo-Japanese War was that if France joined the war on Russia's side, then Britain would join the war on Japan's side. The summary of the treaty here is insufficiently clear to say whether this understanding was true.
  • Racism issue - at this time there were a lot of Japanese people who wanted to emigrate, and a cause of friction was white racism towards Japanese immigrants who wanted to emigrate to Australia and the West of Coast of the USA. Australian racism was problem to Britain.
  • Regarding Japanese loyalty in WWI, that depends on your point of view. This issue needs discussing fairly describing what Britain hoped/asked for and what Japan gave, and why they did not give as much as Britain wanted.
  • Effects of the treaty - it is confusing to have stuff here that might be better placed in different early sections. The stuff about cultural/information/technology exchange etc. might be convincing were it not for the fact that cultural exchange had been going on from the beginning of the Meiji era.
  • Limitations - putting the racial issues here implies that they were at the end - actually they were present in 1900. The bank issues need to be explained properly and dispassionately so that one could assess whether this was a fair judgement by banks.
  • Demise of the treaty - this section is very much POV. Seems to imply that it was Japan's fault. There are several alternative contemporary/near-contemporary POVs:
    • It was a good alliance for Britain and should have continued. Blame Churchill, who was half-American for Britain quitting the alliance and offending Japan. Admiral Barry Domvile expounded this POV in one of his books.
    • It was a good alliance for Britain, but it was clear that if the alliance continued the Britain would find itself in an alliance again the USA, and it was not in Britain's interests to risk war with the USA.

--Toddy1 (talk) 00:04, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Glorious First of June

About a month ago I started work on this fairly neglected article in my userspace, hoping to turn it into a good piece. It snowballed a little more than I was expecting and now is accompanied by two daughter articles, May 1794 Atlantic campaign and Glorious First of June order of battle. I realise this is an awful lot of words, but if anyone can give me any pointers on any part of these articles it would be greatly appreciated. I am hoping over the next few months to take all three to FA quality and any advice to this end would be appreciated. Regards--Jackyd101 (talk) 14:36, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Excellent articles, overall. As far as the daughter articles are concerned, I think the titles ought to be changed to something more grammatically palatable; my suggestions would be Atlantic campaign of May 1794 (or Atlantic campaign (May 1794)) and Order of battle at the Glorious First of June. The latter of these will be better suited for featured list status than featured article; I doubt an article consisting mostly of tables will pass FAC.

As for the specifics of this article:

  • The title of the first section is a bit misleading, I think, as you're not really discussing the wars as a whole; I'd suggest changing it to the standard "Background" (or "Prelude", although that would be more the role of the later "May 1794" section).
  • Personally, I find the wording of {{details}} more natural than that of {{main}}.
  • "Rear-Admiral Joseph-Marie Nielly had sailed from Rochefort to meet the convoy in mid-Atlantic five battleships and assorted cruisers" - surely you mean ships of the line and frigates? ;-)
  • A tactical map of the action would do wonders for readers trying to follow the text, I think.

Keep up the great work! Kirill 03:19, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Thankyou, I will certainly think on the article titles and I should have clarified that the order of battle was intended to be a FL not an FA. I will change the {{details}} and the first title as suggested. As for the third point, battleships was (and in some sources still is) a synonymous term with ships of the line and can be less of a mouthful. As for cruisers, I was using the word in the more general sense of a "cruising warship" i.e. frigates and smaller rather than the modern cruiser. These terms may be obsolete however, so I will investigate replacing them if they are confusing. I have been unable to find a tactical map of the engagement with or without copyright except this version from the German wikipedia which is confusing and in some areas rather inaccurate. My search continues but if anyone else turns one up please let me know. Thanks again--Jackyd101 (talk) 12:21, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
Jacky - if you have on-line copyrighted maps, it may be worth giving MapMaster a ping. He did the map on Battle of the Gebora (an FA) for me, and didn't take too long about it either. I provided an image of a map of dubious copyright, and he used that to base his own version on. So, I'm sure if you asked, and had a bit of patience (he's not too active, I don't think), he'd be able to help you out. Carre (talk) 16:48, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks to those who have replied, just an update. I think I have addressed everything mentioned, and User:Rama is doing an excellent job sorting out the correct names of the French ships and officers which were muddled by the sources I used (and by me). The only thing I have not dealt with is the lack of a map in the article. Try as i might, I cannot find a useful map online which I can give to mapmaster and in addition, almost all the maps I come across offline are contradictory, confusing or plain wrong. For now, a map seems to be an unlikely proposition unless one can be found. Regards--Jackyd101 (talk) 16:54, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Just to note, Order of battle at the Glorious First of June is now a featured list. If anyone is willing to run over the main Glorious First of June article with a copyedit, I would appreciate it so that I can take it to FA. I have been criticised in the past for my prose style and this might ease the articles passage if some respected editors could look it over. Regards--Jackyd101 (talk) 10:42, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Swarming (military)

Completing request for Hcberkowitz (talk · contribs). Kirill 17:51, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Esskater11

One thing i noticed is that while the article states its about military swarming the article has all kinds of things about non military affairs. I suggest either the title needs re-working or the non military stuff cut out that isn't needed. Esskater11 18:52, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, there are much more detailed articles about biological swarming, so the military aspect had to be disambiguated; that's the reason for the title. The insect behavior described in this article, for example, is strictly in the context of how it is being used in current military research. I'd welcome specific comments about general swarming that does not support the military research aspect. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 19:09, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ERcheck

There is a confusing mix of citation styles used. Both <ref> and {{Harv}} tags are used. The use of the "id" entry in the {{cite book}} is for unique identifiers, commonly the ISBN; I've not seen it used for an editors identifier. The editor's identifiers, such as "Rand-Edwards-2000" seems to be fitting for the "name" in the "ref" tag. — ERcheck (talk) 19:12, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

In light of the extensive use of "ref" tags, I'm beginning to make the citations consistent. — ERcheck (talk) 19:45, 16 December 2007 (UTC)
Done. Very interesting and well-referenced article. — ERcheck (talk) 00:37, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Blnguyen

The way the article is set up in the lead, it seems as though two different articles have been put into one place

  • If you are looking to get this to GA or above, you will need more sources everywhere, there are many unsourced paragraphs.
  • "Instead the best investment for third world nations and groups is to adapt swarming. History has shown that massed swarming has actually had more success than swarming through firepower. The United States is intensely reliant on firepower. As the Viet Cong showed, attacks from all directions, in close quarters can be highly effective" this will sound like OR without attribution and sources, for example
  • The article is at times like a discussion paper or textbook with a rehtorical style, the article explicitly poses questions to the reader "...?" etc
  • At times the article segues into lecturing "Swarming should be adapted, for appropriate missions, but is not a panacea." and especially the header of that given section.

Blnguyen (bananabucket) 06:11, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

  • There are MOS violations in the headers since "Swarming" is not a proper noun and should not be capitalised unless it is the first word in the header.

[edit] Sissi (Finnish guerrilla)

[edit] Creidiki

Article has been re-structured, content and refenrences added, comments please.Creidiki (talk) 06:38, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Please see if this article meets B-class criteria or tell what it needs to be promoted Creidiki (talk) 21:46, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Blnguyen

It would probably need a lead which is at least more than one sentence, and it would also need references throughout the article generally. And the references should be filled out with publisher details, author details and so forth. Do you know how this works.? Blnguyen (bananabucket) 08:37, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

I've done up one of the citations as an example. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 05:36, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

The article also needs a copyedit in some places. Some of the short 1-2 sentence paras will need to be merged.

  • "Sissi troops are trained in: Pohjois-Karjalan Prikaati, Kainuun Prikaati, Jääkäriprikaati"
  • Are these training courses or the locations of the army bases

More sources that are independent of the FDF are preferable.Blnguyen (bananabucket) 05:36, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] FayssalF

As per Blnguyen. The "introduction" section has been moved to form a lead in order to establish context. Some citaions are needed as well. As for content, it would be a good idea to have a section dedicated to operations in which the unit has participated. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up® 16:10, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Heuschrecke 10

Previous peer review

It is currently on a real peer review, but I have gotten no good answers and it has changed a lot, see this diff which shows the difference from the old peer review to this one. Dreamy § 01:16, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Megapixie

A promising start. Suggestions:
  • The lead is a little confused - i.e. there are single sentences like "The manufacturers were based in Magdeburg.", which spoil the flow of prose a little. Try and break it into maybe three paragraphs, which each paragraph about a specific area.
  • Y Done
  • When I write these articles I try and split it clearly into a Lead, Development, Description, Operational history, Variants. The description should include a front to back description of the vehicle. Example: "The tank has a welded steel hull varying in thickness between 10 and 25 millimeters. The driver sits at the front left of the hull, with the engine to his right. The engine is a The driving controls are lever based, with four forward gears and two reverse gears connected to the Acme hydrotransmission system by a series of rods. Behind the driver, in the center of the turret is the two man turret..." This is important, as the article should be able to stand alone to a certain extent.
  • Y Done
Megapixie (talk) 04:41, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] GraemeLeggett

  • MoS stuff for a start. I've fixed some of it.
  • Could you please explain what must be done?
  • Introductory paragraphs are confusing - the intro should be a clear overview of it.
  • Y Done
  • The relationship between the two designs is confusing. Were there 2 designs of which one was selected and one not, or were both selected?
  • The comparison of the two is over-complex - especially since they both have the same crew and engine and other details. The specification comparison should be summarised for those who can't follow the spec table.
  • How would I do that? And if you notice there are differences. Doing...
  • Where does the 165/1 fit in - another design, a derivative?
  • Yes... It doesn't need to be there, it is just another weapon-carrier that came before the Heuschrecke. I'll remove it.Y Done

GraemeLeggett (talk) 13:07, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] CVA-01

I have just rewritten quite a bit of this and put it into coherent sections, and was wondering where to go from there, as well as how good it is at the moment. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 09:17, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] FayssalF

Good article structure. Not enough sources and references. There is also a sentence at the lead section which seems to be very hypothetical. It is unsourced as well. --> Had these ships been built, it is likely they would have been named HMS Queen Elizabeth and HMS Duke of Edinburgh. -- FayssalF - Wiki me up® 17:36, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

That's actually in most of the sources. I've added one of them to reference it. I'll add in further references when I can. --J.StuartClarke (talk) 12:47, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Nick Dowling

I'd agree with Fayssal's comment about the structure being good - the article is off to a good start. In terms of content, I think that the article should take a more critical approach to the carriers. For example, the reasons why the RN wanted such large carriers need to be fleshed out - eg, why did the RN think that large fleet carriers represented the best use of its resources after Britain had lost its empire and was mainly focused on NATO commitments? Was there dissent within the RN over the plans to build these ships? In particular, the discussion of the project's cancellation seems simplistic - was this really just cost cutting (eg, did the Labour government perhaps also not think that Britain needed large carriers? - the ships were cancelled only a few years before the Government decided to withdraw from East of Suez) and did it prove to be a good or a bad decision? (there's lots of material on the performance of the Invincible class during the Falklands war you could draw on here) You note in the article that the Treasury estimated that the RN had grossly underestimated the cost of the ships - this suggests to me that the project might have had serious problems - what were they? As a more general note, the article needs lots of inline citations given that its dealing with a 'paper' ship. However, that all said, this is already a pretty good article and there should be more than enough references available to improve it to an excellent article. --Nick Dowling (talk) 10:51, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Done quite a bit of that. Still need to add those citations. Some may take a while, as they are National Archives bits and bobs. I fear that the structure has been made worse though... --J.StuartClarke (talk) 20:46, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Le Paradis massacre

This is my first ever article on Wikipedia, so I can't judge its quality, nor are there any GA/FA/A articles on similar topics that I can compare it to, so on advice I have taken it to PR. It's biggest weakest that I can see is its lack of inline citations, which at the moment I can't do. I have also requested images for it, which do exist but I do not have the technical skills to get them. Any feedback on these points, or any other issues would be great, I do hope if I can get the citations to take it to GA eventually. Mattyness (talk) 18:30, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] LordAmeth

Looks good to me. I apologize that I don't really have any suggestions to make. Obviously, in-line citations and images would be a great boost to the article, but other than that nothing really stands out. I wonder what other editors think about the use of words like "atrocity" and "massacre" in this article. Don't get me wrong - I'm as anti-Nazi as the next Jew, and if this wasn't an atrocity or a massacre then I don't know what is ... even so, we have to make efforts to show a neutral point of view. If you have inline citations directly quoting that this was called an atrocity and massacre by objective scholarly secondary sources, that'd be great. Otherwise, excellent work for your first article. Welcome to the project!!LordAmeth (talk) 00:14, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Reply When I figure out how to use inline citations properly, I will try and cite the whole article, which I believe is possible although not many sources are avaliable, and I can't find any books devoted to the topic, only ones that mention it in passing.

I see your point about "atrocity" and will consider changing it to something less POV-ish. As for "massacre", a quick Google search shows that nearly all of the correct hits call it the 'Le Paradis massacre', so that would seem the convention. I am still waiting (hoping) for images, or else I will have to try and do it myself.

Other points I would like to add, I have a quote from Pooley on his events of the massacre, but it is all used in the article, so it would basically just be repeating it. Is it worth putting it in? And...damn, I had something else to say but it has gone out of my head as I was typing. Well, thanks for your response. And thanks for the praise! :) Mattyness (talk) 01:31, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Comment I have cited the whole article, although I have not yet cleared up the references and notes sections. I would really appreciate some more feedback. Mattyness (talk) 21:31, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Quite nice, overall; just a few minor issues that I noticed:

  • The footnotes don't seem to actually show up anywhere; you're probably missing a <references/> tag.
  • The "See also" section should be eliminated, if possible. It shouldn't be too difficult to link most or all of these terms from the text. (Totenkopf was indeed a part of the Waffen-SS, if I'm not mistaken.)
  • The long quotes in the trial section should use blockquote formatting, and should ideally be cited directly.

Keep up the good work! Kirill 04:02, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Reply I have done all your suggestions: the references and notes sections have been done, the "See also" section removed, the quotes put into blockquote form, and cited. I welcome all other suggestions. :) Mattyness (talk) 20:07, 13 December 2007 (UTC)
Comment: I will be taking this to GA now, so please consider this PR closed, or whatever the correct Wikipedian term is. Thanks to all who contributed, and I welcome any further comments on the discussion of Le Paradis massacre page. Mattyness (talk) 14:08, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 11th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment

Previous peer review
Article (edit) • Article talk (edit) • Watch peer review

This peer review discussion has been closed.
I've listed this article for peer review because I want to start the FA nom process but give editors one more look at it before I do. I think this article has solid bones, with some great citations. I am working on removing the last few unauthoritiative sources and will do so before I pass it up for FA nom, so please don't comment on those. Part of my request involved editors examining citation format, prose, spelling, and other style issues which may be of concern. I would appreciate anything you can give me on this. Regards, Daysleeper47 (talk) 19:26, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] The Rambling Man

Hey Daysleeper, certainly not an area of my expertise but I'm happy to provide general comments where I think the article could be tweaked...

  • "that fought with the Union Army" - could be ambiguous to fight with someone could read as in "to have a fight with someone..." - "fought on the side of the Union Army" perhaps?
Adjusted with "a regiment of the Union Army"
  • "Zouaves" - what does this mean?
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Link "Commonwealth " accordingly.
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Keep citations in numerical order - you have a [4][3] at the moment, there may be others..
Question: If the citations are the same, I thought I could use the same citation name, thus only creating one entry. See citatin 11 as an example. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
'Response: Yeah, reusing them is fine, but reuse them in such an order that the citations appear numerically... The Rambling Man (talk) 11:08, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
I've rechecked and it looks fine now. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • "flashy Zouave uniforms " "fashioned in flashy uniforms" POV unless you can cite "flashy". Even then, it's probably worth a reword.
  • "fezzes " - link this to Fez.
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • You've redlinked "Henry Willard" - do you expect him to have an article, i.e. is he sufficiently notable to warrant one?
He was a notable Washingtonian, who yes, I expect should or one day will have his own article. The hotel in question still exists and is one of Washington, D.C. finest. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • Early action has several short paragraphs, consider merging a couple of them.
  • " First Battle of Bull Run" needs linking in the "First Bull Run" section.
Linked --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • " double-quick" - why italics?
My own added emphasis from several months ago. Removed to maintain nuetrality. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • "their foul conduct in camp" expand and explicitly cite I think!
  • You have a section heading "Draft Riots.." is Riot a proper noun here? If not then it should be lower case, as you have it in the main prose.
Draft Riots is generally assumed to be the name of the event, and the article maintains capitilization for both words. The only instance in the article in which I use the two words together is in the header, which I believe to be an acceptable usage. If another editor can find a described use to contrary, I will certainly change it. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
  • There has been a slow move towards having a combined references section with subsections General (your References) and Specific (your Notes), possibly worth considering.
I will have to look at how other articles have done that; I'm not familiar with that style but will certainly give it a look. --Daysleeper47 (talk) 23:55, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

That's all I have right now, I enjoyed the article a lot, let me know if I can help further. The Rambling Man (talk) 10:39, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. Daysleeper47 (talk) 03:25, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

One more comment - ensure you use the en-dash for separating page ranges in the citations. The Rambling Man (talk) 11:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Dreadnought

This article was first forked from battleship over the summer. I have far from exhausted my to-do list on it but I'm running out of inspiration, hence the peer review. There was a very brief previous peer review since when I have added a whole wodge of technical material (yes, I know, none of it's sourced- that's next on my list). What does everyone reckon? Regards and many thanks, The Land (talk) 18:55, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Mackensen

Well, you've mentioned sourcing, but let me re-iterate that concerning the "super-dreadnought" section. It was always my impression that the first real super-dreadnought was the Queen Elizabeth, because she incorporated 15-inch guns and oil-burning engines. I'm also a little uncomfortable using Robert K. Massie as a source; he's not careful enough in his research. Marder or something like that would be better. Mackensen (talk) 23:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I agree broadly about Massie - I think he's a reasonable source for most thigs but he does drop occasional clangers. I don't have Marder, but I do have the relevant bit of Conway's History of the Ship, which indicates that the Orionss were the first super-dreadnoughts. The Land (talk) 19:37, 27 November 2007 (UTC)
Massie is an unreliable source (not much different from a blog). He regurgitates old myths. His books are inadequately footnoted, so it is impossible to know the source of his statements.--Toddy1 18:29, 1 December 2007 (UTC)
The 13.5in and 14in ships were described as super-dreadnoughts.--Toddy1 18:29, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

As you've pointed out, sourcing is probably the biggest concern at the moment; there are large chunks of the article with very sparse citation, if any. Aside from that, a few other points to look at:

  • The image placement needs to be reworked; the multiple images stacked along a single margin near section headers produce all sorts of bizarre floating effects on some browsers.
  • The prose is somewhat choppy overall, with many short and even one-sentence paragraphs. I'd try to condense things a bit.
  • Some of the sectioning is questionable. Why is the single paragraph on Japan in its own section? I'd actually go so far as to suggest that the "Dreadnought building" section contain only two sub-sections, one for the UK and Germany and one for everyone else.
  • The section headings could use a bit of work. "Development of the all-big-gun battleship" is rather too long—why not just "Development"—and leading articles should be omitted.

Hope that helps! Kirill 03:16, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] MBK004

As has been mentioned before, keep working on the sourcing. Other than that, I've uncovered a few things that could use (at least for me) some clarification:

  • In the lead: --> The product of British technical superiority and the willpower of Admiral Jackie Fisher, Dreadnought was no bolt from the blue.
    • No bolt from the blue? - What does this mean, perhaps better wording is in order?
  • Shouldn't World War I and World War II be wikilinked in the lead?
  • Is it really necessary to link to a page multiple times within the article? Isn't one link at the first mention of the term appropriate?
  • Long-Range Gunnery section:
    • Wikilinks to Russo-Japanese War, and Naval War College? Could not find any occurrence of these being linked at all in the article.
  • The choppy prose and questionable sectioning mentioned by Kirill above is also something I agree with.
  • Image placement is also as mentioned above an issue that needs to be resolved.
    • This image: Image:British Grand Fleet 2.jpg needs a proper license tag. Proper image licenses (Fair-Use, PD, etc.) are part of the GA requirements. This is something that was brought up in the GA review of USS Texas (BB-35).

Overall, this is a promising article that I look forward to seeing Featured! -MBK004 07:41, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Barrage (artillery)

I've been working on this page for a couple of months and I've taken it about as far as I can without advice or assistance. Last review went backwards from B-class to Start-class, but I think it's improved a lot since then. Cyclopaedic (talk) 11:54, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The Land

Looks good to me. I've upped it to a B. The main comments I'd make at this stage are about structure. The article could use a longer lead section (3 or 4 paragraphs) with a potted summary of the history and a bit of info about the use and misuse of the term. (See WP:LEAD for more info). I think the structure needs to choose more between a chronological framework and a thematic one, or one then the other. As it stands the first section (Development of the creeping barrage) is the start of a chronological approach, and then you get the analysis of different types (Would it be better to integrate the material on standing, box and creeping barrage variants? Perhaps discussing the advantages/disadvantages of each in turn rather than a section on this specifically?), and then you return to a chronological presentation (World War I, World War II, Korea).

Is it worth talking a bit more about the barrage versus other applications of firepower (artillery or not?) - and hence the role of the barrage in doctrine?

Congratulations on a very detailed article!

Have you seen [15]? Regards, The Land (talk) 14:51, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, I've ordered that book, along with [16] which I used in writing the article. Mind, the Bidwell book I did have on my shelves (Artillery Tactics, Almark) is pretty superficial, compared to the Hogg book. Cyclopaedic (talk) 18:04, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
Have just re-read 'Fire-Power' - I think it is worth making a few more points in the article...
  1. Stressing the difference between barrage as a form of suppression vs long preparatory bombardment
  2. mentioning the debilitating effect of the barrage on infantry tactics - walking forward under a barrage hindered the development of infantry small-unit fire tactics
  3. perhaps referring to the barrage as an anti-aircraft technique
Regards, The Land 18:28, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Carre

I'm glad The Land reclassed this to B - I couldn't see any reason for it to drop back to Start at all. I found it a very interesting read, and certainly learnt a lot from it. I've been going through it in the past couple of days sorting out some MOS issues, and I know I haven't fixed them all; therefore, I'd suggest you visit WP:MOS, and familiarise yourself with the various conventions there. Of course, MOS is only house policy in wikipedia, and doesn't touch on content.

I think the article could do with a copyedit, since I got slightly confused in some sections – it's easy to miss simple things out when you're conversant with a subject, which would be useful, indeed sometimes needed, for a layman. Some of the barrage usages in the various wars aren't clear about who's attacking whom. For the First and Second World Wars, there isn't much about how the Germans/Axis used barrage tactics - there is some in the First (eastern front), but not much else.

I agree with The Land about the confusion in structure; while describing the various barrage forms, you refer to the wars...but then you go into a chronological account. How best to address this is a difficult question. I think, since this article is about the barrage, it would be best to explain all the forms, with some examples of where/when they were used, rather than going for chronological. For example, introducing the pepper-pot barrage in the middle of the Second World War is a tad disconcerting!

All in all though, this article shows much promise, and now I have to go and check all my articles to make sure I haven't used the term "barrage" incorrectly! Carre (talk) 16:37, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit]Actually, looking at the history, the drop back to start was justified for referencing reasons, but much improved now. Carre (talk) 16:45, 22 November 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Roger Davies

  1. Promising article with huge potential and very little to add to The Land's and Carre's comments.
  2. A bit more on the history might be useful (Boer War, allegedly).
  3. The role of the recoilless field gun (which facilitated rapid synchronised fire)
  4. You describe a Chinese barrage but don't name it :)
  5. Separate section on directing fire and its development from Wii, WWII and today? (Flash-spotting, sound-ranging, aerial observation, reconnaissance etc etc
  6. Modern uses. Coordinated aircraft / missile / naval gun attacks. Role partially performed differently today.

All the best, --ROGER DAVIES talk 18:06, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Howard Berkowitz

Apropos of fire direction for counterbattery, I have linked sections in three articles on MASINT. Start with Geophysical MASINT#Counterbattery and Countersniper Location and Ranging, then follow links to the relevant sections of Electro-optical MASINT#Tactical Counterartillery Sensors and Radar MASINT#Counterartillery Radar. "Counterfeedback" on the MASINT is very welcome. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 16:32, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Battle of Changban

I've listed this article for peer review because I'd like to know if this article has any possibility of being a GA or maybe a FA, and recommendations. Thanks, Armando.Otalk • Ev 01:02, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

  • A script has been used to generate a semi-automated review of the article for issues relating to grammar and house style. If you would find such a review helpful, please click here. Thanks, APR t 12:48, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Everything has a possibility of making FA (eventually); but there's still quite a bit of work to be done here before you're really ready for that:

  • Citations! An article that's not thoroughly cited stands no chance at all of passing FAC, or even GAN. I'd suggest focusing on this as your top priority.
  • The repetition of names in the "Combatants" and "Commanders" fields in the infobox is somewhat clunky; I'd suggest, at the least, changing the combatants to be "Forces of Cao Cao" and "Forces of Liu Bei".
  • The lead should be quite a bit longer.
  • After the major issues are resolved, some thorough copyediting will likely be needed; there are some pretty rough spots in the prose.

Hope that helps! Kirill 04:37, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Military Revolution

Submitting request for Aryaman13. Kirill 17:41, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

  • Seems heavily WP:ORish and needing a lot more citing(some paragraphs without anything at all). At the moment reads much more like a college(=university) essay than an encyclopaedia article. Buckshot06 22:08, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

This is a very good start, but I would tend to agree with Buckshot06: it still retains an overall structure and flow more suited to an essay than an article. A few more specific points that stand out:

  • The "Origin of the concept" section is woefully incomplete. While Roberts was the first to propose a coherent thesis of the "Military Revolution" under that name, the general point that a revolutionary development in warfare had occurred in the sixteenth & seventeenth centuries was certainly made by historians before that point (F. L. Taylor and Charles Oman, for example). There's some potential for a longer section outlining the develompment of the concept up to and including Roberts' formal introduction of it, I think.
  • A large part of the "Discussion on tactics" isn't, really. I would suggest breaking things apart into multiple sections on the different variations on the basic thesis (Roberts & tactics; Parker & geography; Hall and firearms per se; and so forth); some of these points are more technological than tactical, and trying to cover them all under a single heading is probably not the neatest way of approaching it. Hall's Weapons and Warfare in Renaissance Europe: Gunpowder, Technology, and Tactics may be a useful source for some more material on the technological side of the debate, incidentally.
  • The "Discussion on size of armies" has an unduly prominent place, I think, given that it's only one of the concerns involved; I'd suggest pulling it into a somewhat more general section on the various historiographic issues involved in this debate. Alternately, it may have potential as an entirely separate article on the army sizes of the period; but it's not really the core of the military revolution thesis, I think, and should not overwhelm this particular article.
  • The "Conclusion" section is entirely out of place; such general statements should be made in the introduction to the article.
  • On a more technical note, the footnotes need some cleaning up, and should probably contain page numbers (or ranges) where possible.

Hope that helps! Kirill 23:07, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 1994 Black Hawk shootdown incident

Humbly submit this article for peer review. The article's subject is the most complex and difficult that I've edited yet and I really appreciate any inputs or suggestions anyone might have. Cla68 (talk) 03:08, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Narson

  • A quick glance at it and it looks pretty good, the first thing to leep at me is 'civilian from...Kurdistan'. Kurdistan doesn't exist, they can be ethnic kurds from Iraq or Turkey or any of the other places the theoretical Kurdistan would encompass. I imagine it is referring to Kurdish controlled Northern Iraq there. Narson (talk) 11:53, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
    • Might also be good to find a picture of any of the other non-military non-US 'victims'. Narson (talk) 12:06, 2 January 2008 (UTC)
      • Thank you for the feedback. I changed "Kurdistan" to "Kurdish community" with a wikilink to "Kurdish people". I haven't been able to find any pictures of the non-US victims. Cla68 (talk) 21:25, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Kirill Lokshin

Very nice, as usual; just a few minor points:

  • I'd suggest avoiding contractions ("didn't", "weren't", "couldn't", etc.); they're not really well-suited for a formal encyclopedia article, in my opinion.
  • The positioning of the Commons box causes the two-column footnotes to leave a wide gap along the right margin, since they don't wrap around it properly; I suggest moving it down to the "Further reading" section.

Kirill 03:39, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

    • Done and done. Thank you for taking the time to look at the article. I don't envy you the wiki workload you have at the moment. Cla68 (talk) 05:02, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team (United States)

This article has improved dramatically over the past few days. I am looking to get it promoted to GA status, and FA from there. I was looking for input on any ways the article can be improved before submitting the article for promotion. -Ed! (talk) 16:13, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

If no one can find anything that needs doing, I'll just go ahead and nominate it...-Ed! (talk) 21:36, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Cla68

Nice article, but I have a few suggestions:

  • Expand the intro to two or three paragraphs that summarize the entire article. Y Done
  • Add an "Organization" section before the "History" section to describe how the unit is organized. Y Done
  • Try not to have one paragraph sections, it makes the article look choppy. Expand the sections or combine them. Y Done
  • The "Popular culture" section will look less like a trivia section if renamed "Legacy" and then written in paragraph style instead of bullett style. Y Done
  • If you're thinking of nominating the article for featured, I think the footnotes need to be more formal, with authornames, sources, and dates included. Y Done
  • A good example of a military unit article is 3rd Battalion 3rd Marines, which is featured. Y Done

I hope this helps you with what is already an excellent article. Cla68 (talk) 03:12, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks you very much for your help. I have taken your advice and made all of these improvements. -Ed! (talk) 01:02, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
Looks good. Perhaps others might also look to see if I missed anything. Cla68 (talk) 02:00, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Buckshot06

At least in my browser, the organisation chart, oops, US article, excuse me, organization chart, overflows over some of the text, and there is a lineup of three 'edit' buttons in a row. Maybe rearranging the pictures and spaces might help? One other minor thing, references always go after commas or fullstops, not before them. Buckshot06 (talk) 08:24, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I apologize, but I don't fully understand what you mean by the text overflowing, as I don't seem to be having any problems of that kind on either of the browsers I have been using. Could you clarify? -Ed! (talk) 15:35, 24 January 2008 (UTC)
Literally, in my browser, the organization chart covers some of the words in the text. Buckshot06 (talk) 00:06, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
This is a very late response to this, but the problem is due to infoboxes using right floats, and bugs in CSS implementation (not sure if bug is in CSS or in MediaWiki) that prevents right and left floats sitting alongside each other. I've made a small change that partially fixes the problem for my browser resolution, but is still not ideal (multiple 'edit' buttons are still there), but at least the org-chart isn't over-writing text any more Carre (talk) 20:12, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Carre

If you're planning on taking this to FA, or even GA, you need to sort out MOS issues:

  • Dashes in date ranges (should be endashes (&ndash;).
  • Get rid of the bolding in the reference titles.
  • Consistency on date format in references - an English variant, suggest US format, or ISO, not the mix & match presently there.
  • External Links is turning into a link farm, and could do with trimming, plus be consistent in the format of those links (the last 2 being different to the previous ones).
  • You in-line citation placement isn't correct, and would be pulled up at either GAN or FAC – should be after punctuation, not before.
  • Standalone years should not be linked. Similarly, linking for full dates should be consistent (now that MOS allows you to not link them for autoformatting). There's a "April 1, 1974" in there, for example.
  • In "Reactivation and the War on Terror", you have this sentence "The brigade also participated in Operation Bayonet Lightning in 2003, capturing weapons and materials dangerous to coalition forces,[21] and" – "and" what?
  • Check your wikilinks – how many times is Vicenza linked? Italy? Vicenza, Italy? Basically, watch for overlinking (devalues good links), and look for good links that you haven't got yet. Carre (talk) 20:37, 10 February 2008 (UTC)