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There are no formal limits to how many articles a single editor can nominate at any one time; however, editors are encouraged to be mindful not to overwhelm the system. A general rule of thumb is no more than three articles per nominator at one time, although it is not a hard-and-fast rule and editors should use their judgement in this regard.
The Milhist A-Class standard is deliberately set high, very close to featured article quality. Reviewers should therefore satisfy themselves that the article meets all of the A-Class criteria before supporting a nomination. If needed, a FAQ page is available. As with featured articles, any objections must be "actionable"; that is, capable of rectification.
If you are intending to review an article but not yet ready to post your comments, it is suggested that you add a placeholder comment. This lets other editors know that a review is in progress. This could be done by creating a comment or header such as "Reviewing by Username" followed by your signature. This would be added below the last text on the review page. When you are ready to add comments to the review, strike out the placeholder comment and add your review. For instance, strike out "reviewing" and replace it with "comments" eg:
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It's the 80th anniversary of D-Day, so I thought I would nominate a World War II article. After writing up William D. Leahy, I thought I would tackle the US Navy's second most senior admiral, Ernest J. King, a renowned submariner and aviator who commanded the US Fleet during World War II. Hawkeye7(discuss)
We say he got his first Navy DSC for the salvage of S-51 in the lead and body. But we do not mention what the other two DSCs were for in either the lead or body, only in the Citations section do we have those details.
Y Mentioned in connection with salvage of the S-4. Hawkeye7(discuss) 20:09, 9 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
What I have noticed is that Dates of Rank and Awards sections are ok at A class level but not at FA level. Especially since you already mention, in chronological order, his promotions in the lead sections. Zawed might be best able to resolve this.
I have other articles that went through FAC with Dates of Rank sections. Hawkeye7(discuss) 20:09, 9 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I was quite surprised to see you had used plain <ref> tags instead of sfns. I hope you will change to the latter before nominating for FAC?
I would greatly prefer it. MOS:STYLERET: If you believe an alternative style would be more appropriate for a particular article, seek consensus by discussing this at the article's talk pageHawkeye7(discuss) 20:09, 9 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I could not understand this. Will you be changing to the sfns or not? Matarisvan (talk) 09:12, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot change it without consensus to do so. That would be a blockable offence. Hawkeye7(discuss) 09:54, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think anyone would oppose that, you should open a new section for this on the talk page. Matarisvan (talk) 07:39, 11 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Location of publication is needed for Barlow 1998, Buell 1998, Heinrichs 1998, Stoler 2003
Add an archive link for ref #31? I can't access it, don't know if this holds for others as well. Also, consider running the Internet Archive bot through the page once.
Y Added archive link. It was working a few weeks ago. Hawkeye7(discuss) 09:51, 14 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Source #68: Add Warfare History Network as the website?
Source #89: Can the 3 weird letters after Order 8984 be removed? They seem to be transcription errors.
Y No, it is a unicode/Latin-1251 conversion artefact. The moral is to never use ndashes and mdashes. Hawkeye7(discuss) 09:51, 14 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Link to The Baltimore Sun, as done for other newspapers?
Why did King receive the Philippine Camapign Medal? Our texts do not mention his being involved in the Philippine-American Wars of the 1910s. We do mention his involvement in the Philippine Campaign in WWII. I think this is is a mixup?
One of the most underrated Japanese politician and warlord during Sengoku period. There are many modern historians reassessments about him now to points out his importance for his role during the end of Muromachi periodAhendra (talk) 17:38, 1 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I will add more comments soon, this is a large article so it will take time to read through, I hope that is alright. Cheers Matarisvan (talk) 09:54, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
hello.
Shūri-dayū, (i believe its mistranslation from someone translation, it should be Shuri-no-daifu) is etymologically senior assistant minister of justice. a position from Archaic Japan Empire office. Chikuzen no Kami is literally "lord of Chikuzen" its kind like noble titles
gonna do that
Iga Province obviously, Iga ikki was not officially recognized by the central government.. in this case by Emperor and Shogunate
Hongan-ji during Nagayoshi reign was more like umbrella term for entire Jōdo Shinshū followers here. as the split between west Hongan-ji (Higashi Hongan-ji) and east Hongan-ji (Nishi Hongan-ji) as the sect were more institutionalized were occured later in Edo period. other than that. i have not much knowledge about them, except of their rebellion activities during Onin war until Sengoku period Ahendra (talk) 10:47, 10 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
After taking an ironclad (CSS Baltic) and a tinclad (USS Marmora) to A-Class and FAC, I'm hoping to get another one of the types of American Civil War warships to A-Class and FAC - a cottonclad. The cottonclads were converted civilian river steamers used by the Confederates. The lightly armored vessels were used as naval rams.General Earl Van Dorn sunk a Union ironclad in the Battle of Plum Point Bend, and was the only Confederate cottonclad to escape destruction or capture in the First Battle of Memphis. She was burned by her crew on the Yazoo River about three weeks after the battle at Memphis. Hog FarmTalk 02:27, 25 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think it would make sense to tell readers that the RDF was initially organized to defend New Orleans in the first paragraph of the Purchase and conversion section - then it would make more sense when you bring up later that the fleet had to be divided.
I've actually elaborated on this a bit - they were intended for the Mississippi River in general. The Confederate government actually intended for the vessels to be sent upriver, but local interests and a breach in a key river barrier are what caused part of the fleet to be retained at N.O. I remember reading, although I'm not sure where off the top of my head, that the Confederates for a time actually expected the worst threat to New Orleans to be Union forces coming down the river, rather than from the Gulf.
"The conversion into warships for the River Defense Fleet vessels involved adding 1 inch (2.5 cm) of..." - I'd lead off telling the reader that they added a reinforced bow for ramming. I was attempting to picture what they added to the ship, but had to wait until the 4th sentence to figure out what we're talking about.
I've rearranged some stuff
This is better - the only other thought I have is, would it be good to clarify that the modifications to the bow were to reinforce it for ramming attacks? Theoretically it should be obvious, but you never know. Parsecboy (talk) 00:57, 26 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You might add April 1862 (and a specific date if known, but I'm guessing not) to the box for the |ship completed= field
The ironwork was finished on April 10, I've added that date to the infobox
Don't know that you have room for them, but there are a few images on the NHHC that depict events where General Earl Van Dorn was involved here, here, and here. The first one gives a clearer image of the ship, which may be useful for the box.
I don't know that there's much room for image additions. My understanding of the caption on the first one is that the clearer ship in the foreground is actually CSS General Sterling Price. I may be wrong though - that image may be preferable to the current infobox one anyone, as the current infobox image incorrectly lists the CSS McRae (Marquis de Habana [sic]) as being present. Hog FarmTalk 00:32, 26 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It's hard to say - the caption on the image seems to suggest the one further back is General Earl Van Dorn, but the NHHC caption lists it first, left to right (which I would read to mean the one in the foreground). The caption on the image is more probably correct, I'd guess. Maybe others will have opinions on what image is preferable. Parsecboy (talk) 00:57, 26 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Not much to nitpick, nice work! Parsecboy (talk) 15:07, 25 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Parsecboy: - Thanks for the review! I've replied above. I need to think some more about the infobox image; there's some pros and cons to both images. Hog FarmTalk 00:32, 26 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Given that the article is only 1200 words long, I am concerned that a multi-paragraph lead would be disproportionate to the length of the rest of the article. I also don't think that there's anything not in the lead that is really the level of detail to include in the lead
" burnt by her": did you mean just "burnt" or "burnt by her onboard personnel"?
Have changed to "burnt by the Confederates"
Do we know who the builder was? Anyone significant?
I don't think it would be wise to include any such information - either the original vessel is unknown or its Junius Beebe, which I think is too uncertain of an identification to include information for
Are the speeds, complement and range for this ship known?
Not in any source that I've seen.
"setbacks further inland": Any specific battles or campaigns which could be added in the body or a note?
I've made this a bit more detailed
Could we have some details on how the rest of the Confederate Fleet was captured or destroyed at Memphis, per NOFORCELINK?
I've added another sentence on this
That's all from me, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 08:01, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
General Earl Van Dorn was purchased for Confederate service at New Orleans, Louisiana, in early 1862 for service with the River Defense Fleet.
Change for service with to serve with
Her conversion into a cottonclad warship involved installing an iron-covered framework of timbers to her bow to serve as a ram, and protecting her machinery with timber bulkheads packed with cotton.
Her conversion -> She was converted
The general rule: A subject pronoun (she) is used in the subject of a sentence. A subject pronoun indicates who or what the sentence is about. An object pronoun (her) is used to indicate what receives the action in a sentence.
Suggest -> She was converted into a cottonclad warship by installing an iron-covered framework of timbers to her bow that would serve as a ram, and the ship's machinery was protected with timber bulkheads packed with cotton.
General Earl Van Dorn left New Orleans in late March 1862 and arrived at Memphis, Tennessee, early the next month.
For what purpose?
Suggest adding this or something like it -> The Van Dorn was a Side-wheeler powered by steam and was 182 feet (55 m) long. She carried a single cannon on her bow—a 32-pounder. (BTW, the dictionary spells it Side-wheeler as does the link.
Purchase and conversion
The ships were intended to defend the Mississippi River.[2]
What part?
The vessels of the River Defense Fleet were intended to be used as rams,[8] and were known as cottonclads.[9]
and they were known
Their conversion into warships involved adding 1 inch (2.5 cm) of iron plating backed by 4 inches (10 cm) of oak planking, on a framework of one-foot-square timbers to the bow.
Why the comma between oak planking & on?
The engines and boilers were protected by an inner bulkhead of one-foot-square timbers, with an outer bulkhead of six-by-twelve timbers.
Why the comma after timbers?
General Earl Van Dorn was placed under the command of Captain Isaac Fulkerson,[11] and left New Orleans for Memphis, Tennessee, on March 25.[7] Defense Fleet.
and it left
The Confederate States War Department desired for [that] the ships to serve in the Tennessee, Kentucky, and Missouri area to protect [this] that portion of the Mississippi River, while [but] local interests pushed for the ships to remain at New Orleans.
Suggest the above changes
Rather than sending all of the ships upriver, the Confederate commander at New Orleans, Major General Mansfield Lovell[,] held part of the fleet at New Orleans , after a river barrier defending New Orleans failed.[12]
Suggest the above changes
General Earl Van Dorn was armed with a single cannon on her bow – a 32-pounder cannon,[14] which was a common naval gun that was smoothbore and muzzleloading.[15]
Suggest: General Earl Van Dorn was armed with a single 32-pounder cannon on her bow, which was a common naval gun that was smoothbore and muzzleloading.
Conspicuously absent is anything on the machimery that powered and propelled the Side-wheeler.
Plum Point Bend and Memphis
On May 10, [add year] the Confederates attacked , bringing on the Battle of Plum Point Bend.[7]
Suggest the above changes
Seven of the Confederate vessels [envolved] were arranged in order of speed , with the fastest vessels at the front; General Earl Van Dorn was fourth in the column.[18]
Suggest the above changes
Mongomery's ships reached Memphis on June 5, but there was a shortage of coal for their fuel.
Mongomery's -> sp
At a council of war, Montgomery and his captains decided to fight the pursuing Union forces, rather than scuttle their ships and retreat overland with the army or scuttle a portion of the fleet and use the remaining coal to escape with the rest.[26]
Drop the comma after forces and add a comma after aarmy
Montgomery arranged his ships in three rows of two vessels, with General Sterling Price in the rear and CSS Little Rebel not having an assigned position.
Why the comma after vessels?
General Earl Van Dorn was in the third row, along with General Bragg.[27]
Why the comma after row?
The heavy guns of the ironclads and the ramming tactics of the United States Ram Fleet had been decisive at Memphis.[29]
Replacae had been with was
The cotton cladding on General Bragg caught fire and that vessel had to be abandoned.[30]
Replace that vessel had to be with it was
The wreck was removed by the United States Army Corps of Engineers in 1878 and 1879.[35]
I am nominating this article for A-Class review because HMS Sardonyx was one of only a few Royal Navy destroyers designed in the First World War (albeit launched shortly after the Armistice) to serve at the Normandy landings in the Second. She had a career rare amongst ships of her class, finally being broken up in 1945. simongraham (talk) 11:43, 16 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It's good to see such a detailed article on a destroyer. I have the following comments:
The lead is a bit short for the size of the article: 2-3 paras is the norm
That sounds a very good idea. Which aspects would you recommend including please? More from the specification or more from the service?
The service history, mainly, but I'd suggest noting the ship's role and key features (especially the 1940 refit that probably resulted in a different role) Nick-D (talk) 10:19, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. I have expanded the lead as you suggest.
The first para of the 'Design and development' should note what the role of these ships was at the time they were ordered.
Added.
The last para of that section should be tweaked to note that this was the armament upon completion.
Added.
"Sardonyx was commissioned into the Reserve Fleet" - what does this mean? (e.g. does it mean that the ship was put into reserve straight away?).
I believe so.
If possible, it would be good to note why the ship was completed and retained after the end of the war given the RN would have ended the war with vastly more destroyers than it needed
The year referred to in the first para of the 'Interwar service' is unclear.
Added.
Can more be said about the ship's service in the Baltic? There have been some recent works on the RN's activities in this campaign.
That sounds very interesting. I have referenced Dunn but if you have any other pointers, I would be grateful.
What happened between 1920 and 1925 when the destroyer is active again?
It seems that she was laid in reserve.
Likewise, when was the ship decommissioned following this period in service ahead of returning to service in 1931? What was the destroyer's role from 1931?
It seems that the 1925 mission was a one-off. I have altered the paragraphs to match.
The last para of the 'Interwar service' section is a bit repetitive and confusing
Amended.
"updated for the escort role" - not sure that 'updated' is the right word, given these modifications tended to involve reducing capabilities associated with front line fleet service to improve their usefulness as convoy escorts. It should also be noted that this was part of a larger program of modifying destroyers in this way.
Amended.
"The destroyer reentered service" - when?
It is sometime in the middle of 1940, but the sources are not clear.
What was the destroyer doing in 1943? This was the crisis of the Battle of the Atlantic. Had she been relegated to other duties by this time?
It seems so. There is no record of any duties after 20 May. Added some more background information.
"On 8 June 1944, the destroyer escorted the troops that took part in the Normandy landings" - this is a bit confusing. Was she escorting convoys taking reinforcements to the beachhead? The wording also makes it sound like she was the only destroyer involved in this. What the ship's role at this time was should be made clear.
Clarified
Can anything be said about the experiences of the ship's crew? I imagine that Atlantic convoy duty in an elderly destroyer wasn't much fun. Nick-D (talk) 07:09, 19 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I cannot find anything explicit. There is some generic material in books like Brown's Atlantic Escorts: Ships, Weapons & Tactics in World War II but it seems to relate more to corvettes than the S class. Any guidance would be gratefully received. simongraham (talk) 02:46, 24 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Nick-D: Thank you for all your comments. I believe that I have made the changes you suggest, but would value any guidance on additional sources. simongraham (talk) 21:40, 31 May 2024 (UTC)
Support My comments are now addressed: nice work with this article. Nick-D (talk) 08:37, 18 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Consider expanding the lead section by 1-2 paragraphs with material from the body?
Expanded.
Link to John Brown & Co. in the infobox? Also, is the Curtis here Curtiss-Wright?
Linked.
"Sardonyx ws": "was"?
Corrected.
Link to sister ship at mention Sabre instead of Scimitar?
Linked.
Link to superstructure?
Linked.
Link to British 18-inch torpedo?
Linked.
Per NOFORCELINK, specify that the Dumaresq was a fire control computer?
Clarified.
Is the pennant numbers caption for the table necessary? We already have the section heading.
Removed.
Provide links for the following news articles?
"The Lost Submarine"
"Little Hope for M2: Officers and Crew"
"The Great Gale"
"Stories Of The Gale"
"News in Brief: Destroyer Aground"
Added, thanks to the Times Archive.
Provide a link or identifier for Head 2009? If you received this paper via resource request, you should specify this in a hidden note so that future reviewers do not consider this source to be invalid.
Added a JSTOR link.
That's all from me, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 06:28, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"21 in (533 mm) torpedo tubes. Launched": Consider rephrasing to avoid Wikipedia:SEAOFBLUE? Also, link to J. J. Colledge and Jürgen Rohwer? Matarisvan (talk) 04:52, 1 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
According to an 1986 article in Warship (Brady, Mark (1986). "The Old 'S' Class Destroyers". In Lambert, Andrew (ed.). Warship Volume X. pp. 12–23. ISBN0-85177-449-0.), Sardonyx was a tender to the Signal School in 1938 - there is a photo of her during this time (p. 14). The 50 cm radar trials also appear to have been carried out under the Signal School (p. 22), and eventually led to the development of Type 282 radar. Incidentally, in this case 50 cm is a wavelength, so should probably be converted to a frequency.
According to Brady, it was planned in the late 1930s to send Sardonyx to the Far East to join the S class destroyers already there, once she had finished her duties and been refitted, but the refit was still underway when France fell, which generated a great need for more ships in Home waters.
Sardonyx does NOT appear to have been fitted with Type 271 centimetric radar - Whitley and Brady says this was only fitted to Shikari, while Friedman p274 only refers to the ship's close in armament, not radar. Please check your sources to see that nothing else like this has slipped through.
re. the question about what Sardonyx was doing in 1943, there is more in Denis Rayner's Escort: The Battle of the Atlantic - by this time the S-class survivors were concentrated in the 21st Escort Group - in the early part of the year they were employed (when they weren't broken down) on escorting fast convoys of troopships from Iceland, where they could put their high speed to good use. In the summer, the 21st EG was employed in Operation Rosegarden, an attempt at a joint operation with RAF Coastal Command to interdict U-boats between Iceland and the Faroes. This failed, partly because of the inability to cope with the weather conditions. In autumn 1943, the group was used to provide training for submarines, simulating enemy escorts. Brady notes that they didn't have the range to take part in the major mid-atlantic convoy battles in 1942–1943.
There is more on how the ships coped with Atlantic convoy duty in Brady and Rayner. Basically not well - they were very badly overloaded and overcrowded, and probably unfit for the North Atlantic when short of fuel but still carrying a full depth-charge load. They appear to have been popular with crews, however, as they spent much more time ashore as the ships were having weather damage repaired.Nigel Ish (talk) 18:50, 1 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Nigel Ish: Thank you for these comments and sources, which have been very helpful. I have made changes based on both Brady and Rayner. simongraham (talk) 12:21, 5 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The article/list is consistently referenced with an appropriate citation style, and all claims are verifiable against reputable sources, accurately represent the relevant body of published knowledge, and are supported with specific evidence and external citations as appropriate.
Bibliography:
Brady (1986): location? publisher?
Added.
Dietrich-Berryman & Hammond (2013): location should be Annapolis, Maryland
Corrected.
Jackson (1997): You don't need the page number in the bibliography
fn 31: I am not convinced that "the need for ASW escorts was, of course, pressing as the prospect of another U-boat campaign against shipping in the North Atlantic became a reality" equates to "the Royal Navy required all available destroyers to be made available to combat the German submarine threat".
If you travel to Saratoga National Historic Park, you will probably come across this somewhat bizarre monument of a boot. Its honoree's name is never mentioned on it, and it would take some research to figure out that it's actually honoring Benedict Arnold. I am nominating this for A-class because I'd like to take this to FA and so I would need to see what further improvements need to be made to it to get it there. Thank you! Relativity ⚡️ 00:47, 1 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This is all way outside my area of expertise. I presume that Benedict Arnold was rehabilitated long ago. Article looks more like a GA than an FA. Some comments:
Can be have a consistent date format? Three different ones are used. (Recommend using dmy and adding a {{use dmy dates}} template.)
Done
"Arnold's betrayal to the British" implies that someone betrayed him.
Changed to "Arnold betrayed the Continental Army for the British Army"
Do we know what Arnold's actual, rank was? (Same for Clinton, Gates and Lincoln)
Yes, and Done
Is there any reason why the town of West Point was worth twenty thousand quid?
According to Nathaniel Philbrick's Valiant Ambition, the Hudson River was a large and strategically important river. The fortifications at West Point were on an "S" bend at the river and whoever controlled West Point essentially controlled the Hudson River itself. Since capturing the Hudson River would mean a huge military success to the British if they could capture it, which meant capturing West Point, that meant it was worth a lot of money. Should I add that to the article, or something shorter, such as "for the capture of West Point, a fortification that was important to the control of the Hudson River"?
The lead says he "attempted to give crucial information about the fortification of West Point to the British" but the body says "offering Arnold £20,000 for the capture of West Point. Arnold met with British Major John André, who Arnold had solicited communication through, and André was later captured on his way back to New York with the plans for West Point being discovered"
Good catch, reworded in the lead to "He later attempted to help the British capture the fortification of West Point but was discovered and fled to the British army."
"solicited communication through" sounds awkward to me.
Reworded to "Arnold met with British Major John André so he could pass on information on how to best attack West Point,". Let me know what you think.
"College boys on a trip stole the toe and spur from the Boot Monument,[21][22] and they were only discovered when an anonymous informer informed the battlefield official that the toe was stolen by "a graduate of a New York State educational institution."[23] The monument underwent restoration after Adolph S. Ochs, publisher of The New York Times, financed it." Do we have dates for these events?
Unfortunately no. All of the newspapers used as citations are from around the same time but there is no actual specified date when this happened.
"The monument is made of white marble[2][43] and is four feet tall." Source required for the height. And add a conversion for those of us living in the twenty-first century instead of the eighteenth.
Added a conversion. And it does have a source already?
@Hawkeye7: Thanks for the review and your time! I addressed most of your concerns, although I have one question about your fourth point. Relativity ⚡️ 21:19, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Provide a link or identifier for "The Shrine of the Memorial Museum"? If you received it via resource request, specify that in a hidden note?
That source was there before I started extensively editing this article. I tried to find it, but couldn't. Since there's another source there, I've removed it.
Here is a link for Leopold 1994: [1]. Consider adding?
Added, thanks for finding that. Hopefully, I've done it correctly.
Link to Lawrence Journal-World, The Lewiston Daily Sun and Boca Raton News as done for the other newspapers? Also I guess Ration is a typo, should be Raton?
Done, and yes, that was a typo. I fixed that as well.
Provide a link for Duffus 1930 and MacIvor 1954?
For the MacIvor one, I found it off of the Wikipedia Library, and can't seem to find a way to add a link to it other than having a link go directly to the Wikipedia Library. Here's the permalink: [2]. I added an ISSN though for it. As for Duffus' source, I found the link, but there's an error page saying that there are technical difficulties with it showing up. I've added it for now, and I'll see if I can do anything else about that.
Link to Social Forces, McFarland, The New England Quarterly, University Press of New England, NYU Press, Regnery Publishing, The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, Casemate Publishers? You've already linked to Random House so to be consistent you will have to link everywhere else. Otherwise you could consider removing the links for publishers altogether.
Add a date for Brumwell? The website provides one.
Done
What is your policy on linking to authors? I can understand if you do not wish to in order to avoid SEAOFBLUE. If you do wish to, however, consider linking to Alexis Coe, Gary Alan Fine, Donald W. Linebaugh, Richard M. Ketchum, James Kirby Martin, Dave Richard Palmer, Nathaniel Philbrick, Willard Sterne Randall?
Done Not a huge fan of the SEAOFBLUE, but I think that it's better this way.
To be consistent, you will have to decide to include the locations of publication or not. For most sources you have them, but for some you don't.
Done
That's all from me, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 05:29, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Matarisvan: Thanks so much for the review. I think that I've addressed all of your concerns above. Cheers Relativity ⚡️ 21:09, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Relativity, you should consider changing the references from ref tags to sfn tags, because that will be required at FAC. Also you should add the Wikipedia Library link for MacIvor 1954 which you have. Matarisvan (talk) 05:06, 4 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Saving a place. Could you ping me once the review above has ended. Thanks. Gog the Mild (talk) 16:11, 1 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Gog the Mild: First off, thank you for taking the time to review this article. Just so you're aware, I am going to be unable to be active on Wikipedia for about two months, give or take a week or two, so if you add any comments starting tomorrow, it is very unlikely that I will be able to address them. My apologies for the inconvenience. Cheers Relativity ⚡️ 04:02, 13 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Oh, and I hope that the Scottish Highlands were nice! Relativity ⚡️ 04:03, 13 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The Highlands were good, thanks. I hit a narrow weather window just right. If you are going to be off-Wiki for more than a couple of weeks it seems - donning my FAC coordinator hat - that this nomination is certain to be archived. It may be best to withdraw this nomination and renominate once you have the time to allocate to it.Gog the Mild (talk) 18:26, 14 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thinking further, at ACR time is not that important. So I shall comment when I can and you respond when you can. Gog the Mild (talk) 12:42, 15 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you. I might be able to come here occasionally to respond to any comments. Relativity ⚡️ 20:37, 15 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
One of the most successful cavalry commanders of the First World War, Sir Henry Macandrew would probably be more widely known if he hadn't accidentally killed himself in a petrol/pyjama-related explosion a year after the war ended. A career officer of the Indian Army, he saw service in several campaigns and the Boer War prior to the FWW. A follower of Haig, he saw quick advancement once the war began, initially on the Western Front and then in the Middle East where he made his largest impact in command of a cavalry division of the Desert Mounted Corps. This is one of my first largescale dabbles into FWW content and I would appreciate any and all comments. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 15:13, 29 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I had heard of Macandrew, as commander of a division in Chauvel's Desert Mounted Corps, but knew nothing more about him. His death reminds me of Brigadier General John Royston, who was invalided out of the service after deliberately inhaling poison gas. Another chapter in the great deeds of the British cavalry. Looks good; some comments to prove I read it:
I don't think so. Going by the the school's website it has been called the Inverness Royal Academy since 1793.
"Macandrew's position as a brigadier-general was a temporary rank, and he was still a substantive lieutenant-colonel" Well yes, but for some weird reason, all brigadier-general appointees were temporary.
Possibly a left-over from the older appointment of brigadier-general, from which the holder would revert when no longer commanding a brigade? Am aware this was how it worked in the Napoleonic Wars, at least
Still the case today, with the practice inherited by the post-Great War rank of brigadier. Hawkeye7(discuss) 22:42, 29 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Commas annoyed me, so I made some changes. Also corrected two typos. ([3]) Revert anything you disagree with.
All good, thank you for the edits
"Macandrew's commander, Lieutenant-General Harry Chauvel" should be Sir Harry Chauvel
@Hawkeye7: Thanks for correcting those spelling errors that slipped through the cracks. I've responded above. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 20:49, 29 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"before in 1916 he assumed command of the 2nd Indian Cavalry Division" seems a little clumsy. Maybe 'before he assumed command of the 2nd Indian Cavalry Division in 1916'?
Done.
"Battle of the Somme and Battle of Cambrai." Is there a consensus among RSs to have those upper-case B's?
Sources vary but I think the majority are with the upper case here.
Infobox, rank: Why the upper case G?
Changed.
"Macandrew was educated at The Inverness College". See MOS:INSTITUTIONS: "The word the at the start of a name is uncapitalized in running text, regardless of the institution's own usage".
Changed.
"he was assigned as the Deputy Assistant Adjutant-General Intelligence (DAAGI)" and "as DAAGI Army Headquarters Staff in May." Why the upper-case initial letters?
Likewise: "was appointed a Station Staff Officer, 1st Class"; "becoming a Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General"; "as a General Staff Officer Grade 1"; "as his Brigadier-General General Staff (BGGS). I shall stop, but a trawl through the rest of the article seems in order.
My sketchy understanding of MOS:OFFICE led me to this. I'd be happy to be directed otherwise if I've understood it wrongly?
MOS:OFFICE is what you want. If discussing an office (or rank or title) in general terms it is given in lower case, as you do with "He was instead appointed brigade major" or "Macandrew was subsequently promoted to lieutenant-colonel". And as you should with "becoming a Deputy Assistant Quartermaster-General" or "He brought Macandrew with him as his Brigadier-General General Staff". If an office is, to quote the MoS, "followed by a person's name to form a title" it takes an upper-case initial(s); eg "replacing Major-General William Walker". Does that work for you? I could just about grit my teeth and let this go at ACR - "does not require substantial copy-editing to be fully MoS-compliant". But if this is aimed at FAC it may be as well to make it MoS compliant now.
Always happy to receive constructive criticism! Have changed all those I could identify.
"Macandrew was promoted to substantive major-general on 1 January 1917". Just checking, this was directly from brevet colonel?
If we ignore the various temporary ranks, yes.
"with Haig singling out an action of Macandrew's division". Singling it out for what?
Reworded.
"In many cases the infantry had not pushed back the German defenders as expected and the cavalry were too cumbersome to react to new weaknesses in the enemy lines." Optional for ACR, but this could be phrased more felicitously.
Reworded.
"impacted by the failure at Cambrai". Impacted seems an odd word, perhaps 'influenced'?
Done.
"As such, in the same month, Macandrew travelled to Palestine with the Indian portion of his division and the 1st Indian Cavalry Division, which had since been renamed 4th Cavalry Division ... In an attempt to continue the legacy of the Indian cavalry from the Western Front, on 23 July the two divisions were respectively renamed the 4th and 5th Cavalry Divisions." I assume that the 4th cavalry wasn't renamed twice.
The renaming referred to here is from "1st Mounted Division".
No, I am still confused - this happens regularly. You have "renamed 4th Cavalry Division ... renamed the 4th and 5th Cavalry Divisions." Either two separate divisions were renamed 4th Cavalry Division, or you are repeating the same information, or the prose has befuddled me.
I'm not too sure how this could be reworded. 1st Indian Cavalry Division becomes 4th Cavalry Division. 4th and 5th Cavalry Divisions are moved to Palestine, where their troops are used to create the 1st and 2nd Mounted Divisions. These two divisions are then renamed the 4th and 5th Cavalry Divisions. The earlier 4th/5th do not have the same unit composition as the later 4th/5th.
Should the last two paragraphs of Divisional reforms not be in Palestine campaign?
Moved.
"The three Indian regiments killed around ninety Turkish soldiers and took a further ninety-one prisoner." Are the Indian casualties known?
Added, although the source doesn't differentiate wounded and killed.
I'm not sure why Amman would be relevant? Added Megiddo, although the Sharon article covers most of it. Our articles for this campaign are very intertwined!
"the rate of the attack was increased". What does this mean?
Changed to "rate of the advance"
It may just be me, but I find the repeated references to "Macandrew's division" jarring. Other formations are referred to by their names.
Removed a clump of these.
Any chance of giving a reader an idea of the strength and make up of a cavalry brigade and division?
Added a detail for the number of regiments in a brigade, I think the number of brigades in a division is covered.
I meant tell a reader the number of men in a cavalry brigade and division. Eg, in 1914 a British cavalry division had an establishment of 9,269 men, 24 guns, and 24 machine guns. Is similar information available for the formations Macandrew commanded?
I think I could provide some general statistics for the size of cavalry units, but I'm not sure these would be very useful, as the actual numbers fluctuated drastically. See for example the size of the 15th (Imperial Service) Cavalry Brigade, which fought at Haritan with a total of 500 men despite our (GA) article stating the nominal size was 1,700.
'Twas ever thus in war. I think it would be helpful to give the establishments. If necessary note when formations were greatly under strength (as you do at one point), or give their actual numbers for particular engagements. I think it would be very useful to give a reader some sense of scale. Otherwise they will have little idea of the level of Macandrew's responsibility. Even a knowledgeable reader may be aware that in WWI full-strength infantry divisions varied from <8,000 to >28,000; or that in 1914 British, French and German cavalry divisions had 9,300, 4,500 and 5,200 men.
@Gog the Mild: I have totally failed to find sources that provide accurate establishments for Macandrew's commands. There are plenty of orders of battle available for the Somme, etc, but none seem to provide numbers to go with the formations. I don't know if you had any particularly sources/direction in mind?
"He sent his armoured cars forward first, leaving Homs the same day. I am unclear about this. Do you mean that the armoured cars left on 20 October, the same day Chauvel told them to halt?
Correct
"a force of Ottoman soldiers that outnumbered them, with around 3,400 men". How many men did the 15th Brigade have?
Added. They were very outnumbered!
Cite 46: what does "p. supp." mean?
Awkward I know. Basically there's a supplement stuck on the end of the Army List in which the page numbers start afresh.
Then I think it needs listing separately, as you would if there were separate chapters, each contributed by a different author. What do you think of how I have tweaked it?
That's much better, thank you.
A splendid article. Get it to FAC. Gog the Mild (talk) 20:51, 25 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Gog the Mild: Just to note that I haven't forgotten about this, I'm just struggling to find the right sources to do unit numbers justice. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 11:43, 28 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I will review this soon. Hog FarmTalk 03:42, 3 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Two years later he transferred to the Lincolnshire Regiment on 10 November 1886" - "Two years later" is a bit of a duplicate statement, since you're already giving the exact 1884 and 1886 dates
Removed.
Is it known how he ended up with the army in Bengal? Was the Lincolnshire Regiment stationed there, or was this a transfer of some sort?
The 1888 Army List has Macandrew serving in the 1st Battalion, which was in Dublin, while the 2nd Battalion was in India. The 1889 Army List removes his battalion designation and has him on "probation" instead. He may have done a quick transfer to the 2nd Battalion and then to the Indian Army, or it may have been a straight transfer from Dublin. Unfortunately sources don't clearly say.
"Macandrew was still well thought of by Haig, and the latter quickly appointed to a new command. - is this missing a word? "the latter quick appointed to a new command" while the context suggests this is something involving Macandrew, the grammar suggests this was a new appointment for Haig
Yep, missing word!
The infobox lists him as being part of the main British Army until 1899 and joining the British Indian Army that year, but would his 1898 probationary assignment in the British Indian Army count as when his service switched over to that unit?
It's made slightly confusing in that when his probationary period ended his Indian Army seniority was set to when he was promoted lieutenant in 1886. For the sake of keeping the infobox sensible I think it's probably best to keep the dates as official as possible, so 1889 is when he ceased to be a member of the British Army.
HiPickersgill-Cunliffe, some comments on the sources, will comment on the main text later.
Refs #105, 106 and 110 need links, future reviewers would require them for spot checks. You will be able to find them on the British Newspaper Archive or Newspapers.com.
Have added links but am awaiting the response of another editor who helped out before I can add the exact newspaper reports (they don't appear on either of those websites). The link for #111 would need to be provided by someone with a BNA subscription, which I do not have and has lapsed for the editor who added it
The Cavalry Journal 1923, Pitman 1923, Rowcroft 1923, Robbins 2001 need links, if you received these via resource request then you should add a hidden note to that effect.
Links for Indian Army Lists are available here, since you haven't specified the publication month I couldn't provide the exact links.
Here's a link for The Risings on the North-West Frontier 1897–1898: [4].
This link has all the issues of the Gazette of India, consider adding?
That's all for now, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 10:40, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, some more comments:
"promoted to become": remove the "become", instead use "the rank of"?
The "become" refers to the role of BGGS rather than the rank of BG, so I think it works as is
"Brigadier-General General Staff": you will have to somehow rephrase this occurrence of WP:SEAOFBLUE, but I can't think of how.
SEAOFBLUE does say "When possible" and I'm not sure what else to do in this circumstance. I don't think I can logically introduce the links for either BG or GS any earlier in the lede to avoid the need for one or other of the links there
The lead is great but a little short, consider expanding to 3 to 4 paragraphs?
Link to Inverness College?
We don't have an article, or really any content, on the college. I've linked to the building it was once housed in
Link to Delagoa?
Linked the full Delagoa line
"appointed to a": "appointed him to a"?
Yep, HF also caught this error
Link to Ghorniye (Ghoraniye)?
Done
For FAC reviews, I've been asked to remove the Dates of Rank section. I think these are OK at A class but you might be asked to remove them at an FAC review.
I'm aware these aren't a fan favourite and haven't used one before. This is by way of an experiment to see what people think. If I get pushback that's fine
That's all from me, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 18:01, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi @Pickersgill-Cunliffe, congratulations on becoming an admin! If you have some free time, could you check out these comments? Matarisvan (talk) 16:38, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've just come back from a very busy work period and have responses for this on my to-do list. I promise they'll be actioned soon! Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 16:40, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
No issues. If it is OK with you, I will do the source and image reviews too. Cheers Matarisvan (talk) 16:46, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Please do! I'm not one to look a gift horse in the mouth. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 17:04, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
After the Battle of Saipan comes the Battle of Tinian. It isn't as well known as Saipan, but it was an important part of the Mariana Islands campaign. It was mostly a US Marines show, but the other services were heavily involved. The battle is a good case study of the process of command decision making. The island eventually became an important base for B-29 bombers and in August 1945 the atomic bombing missions were launched from there, which is what it is best known for today, if at all. There is plenty written about it though, and the article could have gone much deeper into the fighting.
This article is in good shape. Please see my comments below:
The first para of the lead should establish which countries the battle was fought between. " the island joined Saipan and Guam as a base for the Twentieth Air Force." is also unclear given readers may not know that this was an American unit or its significance
Added who it was fought between. Re-worded. Hawkeye7(discuss) 09:14, 3 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thought I had better mention it in the body. Hawkeye7(discuss) 19:20, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The lead could also be clearer about the purpose of the invasion - e.g. that the island was a key element of the plans for the air attacks on Japan
The purpose of the invasion was to cut the Japanese line of communications. Tried to make this point more clear. Hawkeye7(discuss) 09:14, 3 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Another rationale for the capture of the Mariana Islands emerged with the development of the long-range Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber." - this is a bit unclear. I'd suggest noting in this para that B-29s could reach almost all worthwhile targets in Japan from the islands, which is why they were so strategically important
The 'strategy' section should start with a para or so on Tinian's status at the start of the war and by the mid-1940s. Readers don't learn until the next section that it had long been Japanese territory and that it had a largish civilian population.
Added a paragraph on this. It is of course covered in detail in the article on Tinian. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:51, 1 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Added a couple of sentences about this. Hawkeye7(discuss) 09:14, 3 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Do modern historians use the term 'comfort women'? It seems an awful euphemism.
Yetch. I'd personally use something else anyway. Nick-D (talk) 10:24, 11 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
What was the condition of the Japanese garrison? E.g. had any of the units seen combat before, were they well supplied, etc? My understanding is also that the Japanese attempts to reinforce the islands were greatly disrupted by submarine attacks - did these reduce the intended size of the garrison? It might be worth noting somewhere that the Japanese were well aware that the US wanted the islands as strategic bomber bases and regarded their defence as a top priority.
The submarines attacks did not affect Tinian. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:16, 3 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Can anything be said in the second para of the 'United States' section about the condition of the Marines? I imagine that while the troops were worn out by the fighting on Saipan they would have almost all been combat veterans
This is covered in the second paragraph of "United States". I have added a bit about their previous service. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:16, 3 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The 'Counterattack' section is written from the perspective of the Americans. Can anything be said about the Japanese decision making here and/or the experiences of the Japanese troops?
Ditto the 'Tinian taken' section. This section raises the question of why the Japanese garrison didn't surrender and fought it out to the last against an obviously vastly superior force
The 404 Japanese who were captured is also a fairly high ratio for Japanese forces in the small island battles - 5% or so of the garrison. Can anything be said about the circumstances of their capture and who they were?
Only a little bit. My opinion is that the island was not that small, that many Japanese became isolated and left to their own devices, and the presence of civilians may have been a factor. Hawkeye7(discuss) 19:20, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
On Saipan, 1,780 prisoners were taken. This was more than the United States had taken in all the battle of the war up to that point. Hawkeye7(discuss) 20:01, 11 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'd suggest checking the sources, but my understanding is that 'Marines' is usually capitalised in US works when referring to groups of individuals serving in the USMC
"Between 1 August 1944 and 1 January 1945, the 8th Marines lost another 38 killed and 125 wounded; 542 Japanese soldiers were killed" - can more be said about this fighting? The number of Japanese killed after the island was secured is startling high.
One of the many horrific elements of the fighting on Okinawa was the mass rapes of Okinawan civilians by Japanese troops. The article notes Japanese troops killing civilians on Tinian, but do the sources also discuss sexual assaults?
Astroth has a whole chapter on the subject, but it lacks any specifics. Hawkeye7(discuss) 19:20, 4 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The last para of the article should note that the air units on Tinian represented a high proportion of the force that attacked Japan.
It would be good to add material with historians' assessments of the battle. From memory, some consider it the best-conducted amphibious operation of the war. Nick-D (talk) 22:33, 1 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
You're remembering Howling Mad Smith's assessment, from Coral and Brass. I will add a paragraph on this. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:51, 1 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Nick-D: All points addressed. Hawkeye7(discuss) 19:20, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
Support My comments are now addressed. Nick-D (talk) 10:24, 11 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Great article! I must say, I feel awkward reviewing one of the most veteran and skilled editors in this section of Wikipedia. I also know my style is not in line with the more typical style; most are probably too long. Getting a sense of your experience, I can have confidence you'll be gracious about them though. So here they are:
Geograph
¶ 1. I may be wrong, but I think Magellan only landed on Guam. He may have informally claimed it, but not Tinian. I think the islands were not formally claimed until 1565 by López de Legazpi.
¶ 3. For the beach descriptions, the white beaches are saved for last, but only its location is given. The beaches in ¶ 2 are the best beaches, and the yellow beaches are bad because of cliffs and surf, but the properties of the white beaches are not given. Given their importance, shouldn't that aspect which made them unappealing as invasion sites be mentioned?
Last paragraph. Consider replacing "it" it had a population with a more definite noun as it is the topic noun of the paragraph. I was unsure of what "it" was. (For instance, a reader may think it is Tinian town until it was mentioned. Perhaps "Tinian" or "the island"
(Note added a bit later) As I was working through the pre-assault bombardment section, I thought it may be worthwhile to mention the distance of Tinian from Saipan. This is relevant in terms of the pre-assault bombardment. It also gives the reader a sense that the logistics of the invasion was more of a hop, (unlike the invasion of Saipan.) (Maybe it can go in the last paragraph of the previous section, Strategy?
¶ 1. Minor suggestion only. I understand why Kakuta gets first paragraph. He is the most senior officer, and in order of battle he'd go first. But I think his relevance to the rest of the narrative puts him later. It seems to me that the actual defenders should go first. Mention of Kakuta seems like he should be more of an afterthought as he mainly spent his time avoiding the fighting. My own thought is he should go after ¶3.
¶ 2. The information on the 135th infantry is unclear because the invasion of Saipan has not been made explicit in the article. The reference to an 11 June amphibious landing making the unit available on Saipan would be clear if the reader knows that this was the beginning of the aerial attack on Saipan which froze the Japanese forces in place.
¶ 2. Minor suggestion only. The total number of forces, their readiness and moral seem like the topic of this paragraph, this go in the first sentence or after a sentence explaining that Ogata is in command? (And in line with my earlier suggestion, maybe this whole paragraph should be the first.)
¶ 4. The opening of this paragraph is unclear because the article has not mentioned that the Saipan invasion preceded the invasion of Tinian. It should be clear if this point is made explicit.
¶ 4. Comment only- no action requested. The sentence and point is fine and it can stand. But to me, this page reads like Morison's personal opinion (note comparison to the revolution. I wouldn't challenge Morison as an authority, but I'm not sure I agree with his opinion. I think other sources may come up with other reasons why the Japanese fought. I think Ogata, like a good soldier following orders, had no choice. The "fight to the death" was Japanese government policy, not that of the soldiers–many of lower class with probably little sense of being samurai– or Ogata per se. Also, in the Battle of Saipan article, I was going to reference the code of bushido too, but digging in, the fact that Japanese soldiers fought to the death seemed more complicated than following the code of bushido. It seems the rank and file had a militarized education of the 1920 and 1930s played a role with what most Westerners would call brutality played a role, The enculturation of the importance of social face, the Emperor cult, and the religious aspect of being deserving of memory in Yasukuni Shrine all could be argued for.
¶ 4. There's a lot of detail and information in this paragraph, so I'm not sure adding more would be useful. But another reason intelligence about Tinian was excellent was because the Grasshopper observation planes had been scouring the Island for the 531st Artillery and XXIV Artillery Corps. (Consider Crowl, p. 271)
¶ 5. Consider rewording What the intelligence reports revealed was that the best landing beaches were around Sanharon Bay but they were also the most heavily defended. to "The intelligence reports revealed..."
¶ 6. I find the discussion a bit confusing. I'm pretty sure that the northern beaches include both Yellow and White beach. But then it sounds like the Yellow Beaches because of the exposure to weather, but most likely both Yellow and White were thought to be too small to land forces of the size contemplated.
¶ 8. Minor suggestion only. Consider putting the detailed challenges of White beach up in the Geography section, and in this section it just summarize the challenges and how they would be surmounted. I think moving some of the measurement details to the appropriate area in Geography would help the reader keep more focus on the narrative, which is focusing on solutions to the problem.
Bombardment
¶ 1. I think it is important to mention that the artillery bombardments were taken place even as the fighting on Saipan continued. This is implicit to those who know in discussing the 531st.
¶ 1. Minor suggestion only. I think the XXIV Corps Artillery began shelling around the time they were first deployed around 22 June (see Crowl 133). It might be useful to let the reader know that the XXIV had also been constantly bombarding Tinian long-term.
Y Added that the XXIV Corps Artillery began commenced firing on Tinian on 20 June. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:05, 16 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
¶ 3 or thereabouts. You are very thorough in your description of aerial bombardment, you may want to also mention the USAAF's 19th Fighter Squadron on Aslito Field that started bombarding Tinian on its first day on Saipan on 22 June (consider Crave and Cate, p. 690–691) again highlights that it might be useful to note that the bombardment and recon by forces on Saipan was ongoing even as Saipan remained an active combat zone.
¶ 4. I think damage to the Colorado and Norman Scott may need context. Readers may like to know they were damaged as part of a fairly major diversion on the South beaches.
Minor suggestion only. The diversionary section on Saipan may merit more discussion. Unlike the Battle of Saipan where the diversion was almost token, the diversion on Tinian was substantial, involving warships, and has been argued to keep the main Japanese forces focused on the southern beaches.
Y The feint is covered below. I have moved the paragraph up to give it more context. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:05, 16 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
¶ 5. It might be helpful to the reader to clarify why the Doodlebugs were needed. Ideally United States ¶8 or Geography ¶3 might help. As currently written United States ¶8 is ambiguous that the beaches were unfriendly for vehicles to get off the beach.
"The Doodlebugs allowed the Marines to scale the low cliffs around the White Beaches."
¶ 5. Shouldn't the damage to the Colorado and Norman Scott be included in description of the feint?
Y Moved the information on the feint up to this section. Hawkeye7(discuss) 01:27, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
¶ 5. Minor suggestion only. Consider moving the feint to the first paragraphs of this article. It would put the ship action together with this paragraph, and would allow a less interrupted flow of the White Beach material.
¶ 1. Minor suggestion only. For Moving north along the coast Consider "as they moved north"...makes it clear the move was in progress when it was held up. ("Moving up" feels to me like the hold up occurred after the action was completed.
¶ 1. charaterized misspelled. (I could've corrected it myself, but experience with negative experience with reviews makes me hesitate.)
Y I don't mind. Some reviewers like to keep at arms length. Words like this get misspelt because I expect the spell checker to flag them. Hawkeye7(discuss) 01:27, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Weather Break
General Comment on section. This has lots of details on damage, repair and supply. Did it have any effect on the advance of the troops in the field?
Comment only- no action requested. I would agree that Tinian was an outstandingly executed invasion, particularly the outflanking of the Japanese forces with the assault on White Beach. But, I think quoting the opinion Holland Smith is problematic. The quote comes from his memoir account, which seems full of justification. In this case, implying that an operation he played an important role had achieved perfection just before he was taken out of direct combat command, in part as fallout from the Smith vs. Smith mess on Saipan. This bias makes the reliability of his opinion questionable. Though Hoffman p. 122 cites Smith, Hoffman's following paragraph carefully qualifies Smith's superlatives a bit. Prefer's analysis on pp. 169–173 seems more balanced and less POV. Yet, it is a famous quote, one that has become part of the Tinian story, and so is reasonable to put in a Wikipedia article.
I followed the same reasoning. I am accustomed to the upbeat tone characteristic of American accounts. What is really unusual about Tinian was how accurate the intelligence was. I've gone over campaign after campaign where despite, or possibly because, of Ultra, the Japanese strength was grossly underestimated. Hawkeye7(discuss) 01:27, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Mopping up
¶ 1. sector, two days later delete comma. It makes remainder a bit clearer.
¶ 3. Minor suggestion only. Would you consider a substitute for cater? It has strong connotations of a professional social event and "catering to someone's demands" has the negative connotating of unnecessarily giving in to an unreasonable demand.
I'll try to get to this over the coming days, but I'm less familiar with this operation than the ones around Guadalcanal, so I should be considered a non-expert reviewer for this one. Hog FarmTalk 01:30, 6 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The Guadalcanal campaign is the only part of the Pacific War that is well-covered. Unfortunately, the editor who did it was indef'ed back in 2016.
"Nimitz and his Deputy Chief of Staff, Rear Admiral Forrest P. Sherman a meeting of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington, DC, on 7 March 1944, and were questioned by the Chief of Staff of the United States Army, General George C. Marshall, and the Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief, Admiral William D. Leahy." - this sentence is missing a word
"Roads were approximately 18 feet (5.5 m) wide and surfaced with crushed coral." - per the source, this is referring to the primary road network; I would recommend clarifying this
Ready for the Landing section; will hopefully continue tomorrow. Hog FarmTalk 02:18, 7 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"At Saipan, aerial photography had been restricted in fear that the Japanese would be alerted and the element of surprise would be lost; Tinian demonstrated that this was not the case" - this seems a bit strongly worded. This wouldn't really conclusively demonstrate that aerial photography wouldn't alert defenders of upcoming attacks because the Japanese knew the attack was coming and just guessed wrong on which beaches it would hit
Y Re-worded to "Aerial photography of Saipan was restricted through fear that the Japanese would be alerted and the element of surprise would be lost; whereas aerial photography of Tinian was unrestricted but surprise was not sacrificed." Hawkeye7(discuss) 04:17, 8 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The first Youtube external link makes sense to me to include as an official military production, but I'm less convinced about the value of including the other two as external links
There are, by my count, twenty-six images in the article. A lot of these are very clearly simple {{PD-USGov}} works, and I don't think there's much point listing those here unless there's a problem in documentation (though, honestly, there's only a few images I had nothing to say about in the end). The only one not some form of USGov is File:Map of the Battle of Tinian (1944).svg, which is user-made (and a featured picture). CC-licence (perfectly fine)
Thank you, that sorts the issue. While there are points below, A-class does not generally cover images at the level of detail I do, so I think at this point, we can say it Passed image review. Now, if you want it to pass image review with a higher grade, the rest of the points are valid, but they're probably beyond the A-class and even FA-class criteria, because article editors aren't expected to be image experts. Adam Cuerden(talk)Has about 8.8% of all FPs. 02:01, 18 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Not great reproductions, but that's a quibble[edit]
File:White Beach 1 on Tinian.jpg and File:White Beach 2.jpg are not great reproductions. The article would be improved as a resource if we could find the originals, but if this is what we have, it's fine. It seems a shame to have what are probably the two worst images in the article right away, though.
We don't have the originals, but there are alternative versions at [5]. I uploaded the White Beach 1 image from there. I am unsure if the one of White Beach 2 is better or not. I found other images of White Beach 1 and White Beach 2. Maybe replace them with these? Hawkeye7(discuss) 22:16, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think File:White Beach 2 on Tinian.jpg isn't contemporary to the battle. At a guess, I'd say that was around the year 2000 or later. Probably not particularly relevant. Adam Cuerden(talk)Has about 8.8% of all FPs. 02:03, 18 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The U.S. Navy has very high resolution copies of their images readily available; we're using medium -res ones for unclear reasons. I don't think this matters for A-class, but if we can do better, we should.
I'll get this when I next have a chance, especially as some of these are potential featured pictures. I can't see how this would change the copyright status, though. That said, since you upload a lot of the images for these articles yourself, Hawkeye, talk to me sometime and I'll walk you through this. The TIFFs will display fine on pages, so there's not much reason not to just upload them as opposed to a lower-res JPEG, and if more work is to be done, well, it's still better to have the original uploaded.
I uploaded the jpegs because in the distant past I had trouble with really large tiffs. I also trimmed a couple of of them. The tiff versions can always be uploaded. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Repaired link rot. I uploaded another image taken shortly afterwards. Let me know if you think it would be better. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I believe that's actually a zoom-in of the exact same photo. On the whole, I like the cropped version better, though. Adam Cuerden(talk)Has about 8.8% of all FPs. 02:05, 18 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Found the image at the Truman Library. It appears that there were multiple copies of this photograph. It may have been handed out to aircraft to help them identify the island. It would be nicer if there were a better scan though. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Absolutely no reason to think they're problematic images, but this is something to at least attempt to fix before FA attempts.
File:Doodlebug portable ramp.jpg is sepia in the source. I'm not sure why it was greyscaled - it was eating a LOT of visual detail. See, the thing about sepia is that the combination of saturation and level makes fine detail more visible. I've changed it to the original.
Mea culpa. I changed it to greyscale when I downloaded it. I was not aware of the advantages of sepia. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I will say this image is one of the least-well documented of the images. It doesn't appear elsewhere on history.navy.mil - I think it's detailed enough, though; it's from the Seebee Museum and no indication is given by the US Navy that it's not a U.S. Navy picture.
-Adam Cuerden(talk)Has about 8.8% of all FPs. 19:58, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Adam Cuerden: Also: if you think that one of the other images is a better choice for the infobox, let me know. Hawkeye7(discuss) 23:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
There's a lot of good images in this article. Now, there's two ways I like to choose an infobox image:
1. If people are looking for an image of an article's subject, the first one they're likely to click on is the infobox image. If it's very bad, they may stop using Wikipedia as a source for images for that subject. So there is a case for leading with a high-resolution image.
2. That said, it's also important that the image draws the reader in who's not interested in image reuse at all. The first image is going to get used widely; for example, it's likely to get attached to any TFA or On this Day run on the main page - they don't generally go digging deeper down the article. So a low-resolution image that's exciting can readily win out over a dull high-res one.
"The Seabees turned the island built six 8,500-foot (2,600 m) runways for": if I am correctly understanding this, do you mean "The Seabees expanded the six runways on the island to 8500 feet (2600 m) for"?
That's all from me, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 10:08, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi @Hawkeye7, one last minor comment: In Olsen 1950 and Taylor et al 1950, the correct surname of James C. Olsen is Olson, consider changing? Other than that, happy to support for promotion to A class. Matarisvan (talk) 15:03, 31 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'll get to this sometime over the next week. Hog FarmTalk 22:07, 17 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I have no reliability concerns with the sources and formatting is acceptable. Searching in various places brought up no major literature that I could find that isn't used here. I'll do some spot-checks; hopefully tomorrow or Friday. Hog FarmTalk 02:24, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Spot-checks
[15]b, Hoffman p. 5 - OK "Ushi Point had a hard-surfaced runway 4,750 feet (1,450 m) long"
[83], Hoffman pp. 69-71 - OK "The nighttime actions had depleted the 4th Marine Division's ammunition, so Cates delayed attacking on 25 July until 10:00 to allow time to replenish. In the meantime, the rest of the 2nd Marine Division began landing."
[102], Hoffman p. 107 - issues. Article has As they advanced, the marines encountered civilians and Japanese soldiers waving white cloths. The latter had to be approached with care, as sometimes one of their number might decide to suicide and take Americans with him. while Hoffman has occasional enemy riflemen and numerous Japanese civilians who advanced waving white cloths signifying their desire to surrender. The latter had to be carefully watched lest one of their number turn into an enemy soldier bent upon destroying as many Americans as possible before meeting death himself. So the article has the soldiers as the suicide mission threat, while Hoffman has that as the civilians
[57], Raines p. 251 - the source text is referring to an aircraft deployment during the battle for Saipan - how do we know that this state of affairs still existed for the Tinian fighting?
Y It's in the next footnote. Four new airplanes were received on 20 July making a total of nine planes available for assignment (one plane was lost 23 June). Moved the footnote back a bit. Hawkeye7(discuss) 04:49, 22 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
[7], Cate p. 547 - OK "From the Mariana Islands, the B-29s could reach all the most significant industrial targets in Japan, and they could be supported by sea."
[126], Melson p. 32 - OK " It departed for Okinawa in April 1945, but the 17th and 18th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalions remained to defend the airbases"
[139], Harwood p. 31 - OK (image caption)
[44], Moore p. 82 - page range should be expanded to include p. 81, where the 10 May date is found.
This is an article that Gog and I worked on some time back. It is unusual in that it is about the American Army in the Normandy campaign. While the Brits and Canadians have subjected Normandy to exhaustive study in the last few years, the Americans have not shown much interest, preferring to produce yet another book on the Battle of the Bulge. To say that the battle described in this article is not well known would be a major understatement, but I feel that it deserved one. Hawkeye7(discuss) 18:54, 23 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Support from Wtfiv
I thought I'd give a try to help out with this article. I'm coming as a reader who knows nothing about this aspect of the Normandy campaign, so much of what I'm bringing up is requests for clarification. So many of the comments are more organizational.
Lead
First paragraph reads more like the beginning of the second. Shouldn't first paragraph give a brief summary of the battle: its purpose and significance?
Y Reorganised the lead along these lines.
In the first paragraph (even if it is moved to later) what was the purpose of straightening the line? Should that be made clear to the casual reader?
Shouldn't casualties be given, both in the infobox and in a later section?
If I can find some. Both the German and American casualty figures I have include those from other actions occurring at the same time. Hawkeye7(discuss) 00:41, 30 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Shouldn't the background section be setting the stage for the battle? At the end of this section, a reader who is not already familiar with Normandy would not know why the battle was being fought or how this would involve Middleton's units.
Background is high-level strategic, but opposing forces moves immediately to equipment and context. The article jumps from high-level strategic to squad-level tactics. It seems a smoother transition would be to set up in (Background) Why Middleton's Corps would need to move forward, then this section would move down to a strategic oveview within the scope of the battle, explaining the units that make up Middleton's Corps and then, the German forces opposed to them. The following comments will assume that Opposing Plans follows Background. Opposing forces could go just before Battle, giving context to the issues faced in the battle.
I suggest moving up Opposing Plans to follow Background. This would make the flow of description from larger strategic to fine-grained tactical more smooth.
Since the initiative is with the United States forces, they should be covered first.
The first paragraph of the United StatesinOpposing forces seems like it is well suited to being integrated as the last paragraph of Background. The second paragraph seems like it is the start of the battle, so would begin the next section following background.
¶ 2. Mentions three division and then only discusses two. All three could get brief mention in the first paragraph as part of the VIII, placing their relative geographic position and objectives. final sentences of ¶ 3. with the mission of the 82nd could be part of the previous paragraph that outlines the mission of all three divisions in the corps. It would help the reader get an overall sense of how the three divisions were orchestrating the advance.
If ¶ 2. Were restructured, ¶ 3. Could discuss the problematic nature of the 90th and the experience of the 82nd. It could also note that the 82nd was scheduled to be taken out of the line once it was pinched out. Might want to mention why it was being moved out.
Also, this would make a good place for discussion of it being replaced by the 8th Inf. In ¶ 3. The discussion of the 8th Infantry Division was a bit confusing. On the first read, I was unsure how it moves the narrative forward. It was described as not yet deployed on the continent and it isn't playing an active role in the upcoming narrative of the battle. Reading later in the article, I find out that it does play an active role in the battle, though that's not clear here. If the 8th Infantry is going to be mentioned, maybe it could be mentioned mentioned later or reintegrated a bit more smoothly.
¶ 3. The penultimate sentence starts Its mission, would that be the 82nd or the 8th? Context says 82nd, anaphor says 8. I think a rewrite explaining all four divisions would be good. (Maybe giving 8th's expected time of arrival? And it might help readers if the order of the units described is the order of the units described in the battle.
¶ 3. 82nd is described as most experienced of the three divisions, but the description of the VIII corps as a three Corp division had not yet been introduced. It enters unexpectedly. Also its geographic position relative to the other two is unclear. (The map shows it has the middle position between them, it wasn't expected to take la-Haye-du-Puits, but just the hills due north.
As mentioned, German subheading might be better following United States. It seems to me to make for a smoother narrative as the Germans are responding to American initiative.
Consider integrating first sentence of the first paragraph integrated into background. It's a higher-level strategic point that not about the immediate front, but the British front. It is important information that lets the reader know that German options were already restricted by issues outside the immediate scope of the battle being described.
¶ 2. begins with the discussion of the Seventh Army and then goes into detail about the terrain it held. I think the last two paragraphs would be a bit clearer for readers if it paralled the American description: (1) Seventh army was deployed in depth with counterattack reserves. (2) Description of LXXXIV Corps (3)Description of the terrain that it held. It would make the introduction of the Mahlmann line and the 353rd more clear.
¶ 3. By accident or design, the position was held in great depth Doesn't the description of Haussner's echelon-in-depth deployment for the army suggest it was by design?
¶ 3. Suggest rewording last two sentences to make the reserve status of the 15th parachute Division and 2nd SS the topic of the sentence. (Making it clear they weren't initially part of LXXIV's command structure.)
Consider starting starting from east to west: 79th first, as it is introduced first, 82nd second, 90th last. At the end of the section on the 90th,
it might be worth mentioning that the 82nds pinch out wasn't complete. The 90th was still three miles from the 79th. (This is in the next section but it seems worth noting that the objective wasn't obtained, as it sounds like it was one of the criteria for moving out the 82nd. It'd be a good summing up of what the 90th had (or hadn't) accomplished.
Somewhere in here it might be worth noting the 82nd was taken out of the line. In the narrative it, just disappears in the next section. It might also make the introduction of the 8th Infantry more clear to a reader.
8-14 July
Casualties
Would it be worthwhile having a section summing of casualties on both sides, if at all possible would help clarify total losses. German losses are unclear. There is mention of 578 casualties, but it sounds like that was just one day's fighting. One of the key points in the lead is the cost to both sides, so it would help give a sense of the fighting. The strain of the casualties on the Germans is also given as part of the significance of the battle in the lead, so it would help to illustrate this point.
Aftermath
I may have missed it, but I'm not sure how the aftermath directly addresses the impact of this battle on the subsequent campaign. Is there anything that can be added. What goals were met by the Germans? What goals by the Americans? That would inform the final bit of the lead.
Would it help to mention it was the XIX Corps that struck St. Lo, since the First Army is in the midst of this battle too? Did operations here have any impact on the attack on St. Lo?
Hawkeye7, I was waiting for a ping on this one when you were done. Should I take a look again or should I wait?
Thanks for reorganizing the material. For me, the context of this battle is becoming more clear. I have a second round of comments as I feel I get dive a little deeper into the details.
Opposing Forces- German
First paragraph feels like background involving the higher-ups focused on larger strategic issues—Rommel and Rundstedt—, larger entities beyond the scope of the article—Army Group B— and operations outside of Middleton's operation—Epsom and Caen—seem more appropriate in the background section. The "American" section begins with the actual forces, it'd be good if this does too, and German strategic concerns can be moved to background. (Minor suggestion follows) the second paragraph already mentions depth, so maybe a bit of the first paragraph can be integrated into it to make it clear what defense in depth means.
This may not be an issue, but the earlier narrative was that the 82nd was to be pinched out. Once it obtained its objectives, did it remain static for the remainder of the campaign or was it withdrawn for refitting? As the narrative is written, it is not mentioned again, so as a reader, I'd assume it remained in position until 14 July. If that's not correct, a final sentence describing its fate would help readers.
The Germans were dealt with. How? Were the tanks destroyed or retreated? "Germans" sounds like there were more than three AFVs.
Y There were only three. The source says: "Because artillery and antitank weapons reacted effectively, the disruption to the attack proved only temporary". Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:25, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
A task force consisting. Sentence is a bit long with two conjunctions. First blames slow progress on terrain, second artillery. Suggest deleting "and" and using new sentence. Consider final clause with following section on counterattack using "and", as both address German action. And is the "too" needed?
The last sentence has me a bit confused. I think it is meant as a summing up of the section, but it isn't clear. The paragraph focuses on the 314. It mentions the 315th that was discussed in ¶3.
I'd suggest something like shifting the mention of the 315th after the second sentence: Here's one suggestion: start the paragraph "On On the morning of 5 July, Wyche". Then add the bit about the 315th, as it would continue the narrative of the previous, then shift to the travails of the 314th, ending with the failure of the envelopment, which should be obvious to the reader from the repulse of the 314th.
¶6 Consider rearranging first sentence. One of the key points of the sentence includes that the mortar and artillery fire was hard to suppress. The following sentence appears to be referencing the artillery and mortar fire as well. The sniper fire feels like a tack on. Consider putting the sniper fire first or separating some other way.
Y Done. You had me confused because there was no reference to snipers. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:25, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
¶7 Paragraph is implying that Hausser brought up the 15th Parachute due to casualties. If it is in the sources, it'd be good to state this explicitly, as reserves can be deployed for other reasons. This ambiguity may be resolved by moving the Hausser sentence after the point about troop losses.
¶1 This paragraph is still a bit unclear. I can get that the 8th was suppose to relieve the 90th, but it takes a bit of figuring this out. Sentence 1 describes how the 8th was intended to be deployed. Second two is a bit confusing, as it seems to be describing the present state of affairs. Or is it describing why the 8th was originally going to move to Foret de Mont Castre? Or is the 3 mile gap a disruptive aspect of the decision. For the last two sentences: The first sentence states the 8th would disrupt the German attack, but doesn't make it clear it was intended to be deployed for a spoiling attack. (It's deployment could have disrupted the attack by filling a gap, for example.)
Reading further, I think this section could be strengthened by reorganizing. Current structure looks like this:
¶1 Intended deployment of 8th, state of 90th, shift of plan for spoiling attack, failure of deployment
¶2 Introducing 8th, discussing its greenness, the German counterattack
¶3 Officers being killed or relieved.
Would it be possible to rearrange this? Here's one suggestion, but you may be able to do better:
¶1 Keep the first sentence of intentions, and maybe the second sentence up to the clause link up with the 79th Infantry division. then introduce the division.
¶2 Discuss the situation in one smooth flow: Problem of original plan due to 90th being behind schedule, german plans, 8th to be used for spoiling attack, plan failed, German attack failed, 8th not advanced
¶3 Discuss the change of command structure. Beginning with MacMahon relieving two commanders for failure, Walker's death (how? seems important given he gets a service cross.) Ultimately, MacMahon's relief? (Explicitly why?)
Y Changed as suggested. Walker had a ship named after him, but no Wikipedia article.
Eisenhower "recognized that while McMahon was unsuited to a combat command he had his uses as a staff officer and used networking knowledge to place him with Lieutenant-General Mark Clark, commanding general of Fifth U.S. Army in Italy. Clark had been McMahon's roommate at West Point, and the two had been good friends ever since. Eisenhower initially contacted Devers, Clark's superior officer, playing down the reasons behind McMahon's relief."
In my opinion this division was well trained by McMahon before going into action but due to certain rather unusual conditions and to inexperience throughout the division, a considerable confusion resulted which was at least partially traceable to him and which necessitated his relief. I think McMahon still has real usefulness either in command or in a staff position but I think it would be difficult for him to function successfully in this theatre at this time.
McMahon was accepted as Fifth Army's deputy chief of staff, G-1, Personnel. Eisenhower then explained McMahon's case to Marshall:
McMahon has been relieved from the battle line by his corps commander, fully concurred in by Bradley, for failure to lead his division effectively. His division had been in action only four days but both corps and army commander felt that his test had been sufficiently conclusive to demonstrate that he is not, repeat not, a good division commander in spite of acknowledged qualifications along other lines... I know he has many fine qualifications, and in my opinion it was tension and over anxiety that caused his poor performance as a division commander.
The discussion of Eisenhower's key factors seems like a summing up. Do you think it would have more context after the discussion of the casualties in ¶2 and ¶3?
Would the sentence beginning On 11 July, the First Army began... in the article's pentultimate paragraph be appropriate as the start of a new paragraph as it now introduces Saint Lo offensive and broadens out to the entire First Army? Looks good...support. Wtfiv (talk) 03:24, 10 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I should have been all along. A bug with the Firefox browser caused the paragraphs to run together. Hawkeye7(discuss) 22:29, 10 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
By the way, I did't comment on them as the goal is to just get through the review, but thanks for the expanded explanations. Those moments, like when McMahon gets relieved but nobody wants to say why, are fascinating side point though best left out of the article. The conjectures come easy, but more interesting is that the generals "took care of their own." I appreciate them. Wtfiv (talk) 20:20, 11 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hawkeye7 just letting you know, to be on the safe side. Wtfiv (talk) 17:01, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The site says the image was taken from the US National Archives. Unfortunately, archivesnormnadie has gone dark and the Wayback machine has done its usually poor job of archiving. But you can tell it was taken by a US reconnaissance aircraft. I found another copy hereHawkeye7(discuss) 21:49, 5 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
File:American howitzers shell German forces.jpg - one source link is to a general home page, and the other is for the photographer (and doesn't work at least for me). Additionally, since the file is post-1929, a more specific PD tag will be needed than the one being used.
Added Flickr as an alternative. It is a PD image according to the National Archives [8] I don't know why the Commons template is malfunctioning. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:49, 5 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I still don't think that the CC 3.0 tags are appropriate. The archivenormandie website may be distributing that under the CC 3.0 license, but we need something to indicate why that website is/was able to freely distribute the image, which would be a PD tag indicating the status of the actual work itself. Hog FarmTalk 18:07, 6 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
All the images were taken from the US National Archives. Switched the CC 3.0 licences to the PD-USGov-Army one. Hawkeye7(discuss) 20:44, 6 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Lieutenant General Omar Bradley's US First Army": consider rephrasing to "the US First Army commanded by Lieutenant General Omar Bradley" to avoid WP:SEAOFBLUE? Also consider rephrasing in the body and for the Dempsey Second Army sentence?
"the American troops of Major General Troy H. Middleton's VIII Corps": change to "the American troops of VIII Corps commanded by Major General Troy H. Middleton" to avoid SEAOFBLUE?
The numbers for troop strengths and losses should be added to the infobox.
The problem here is that the figures for both sides include casualties not part of the battle. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:16, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Consider listing these non combat casualties separately, either on another line or somewhere else in the infobox? Matarisvan (talk) 12:37, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I mean they include casualties incurred in other actions on the American front and in the case of the Germans, in some actions against the British, because detachments fought all over Normandy. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:44, 3 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Do no sources give these numbers separately? Matarisvan (talk) 05:57, 4 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Consider adding a caption for the army movements map?
I am nominating this article for A-Class review because The Battle of Saipan was one of the major battles in the 1941-1945 Pacific War, it's 80th anniversary is on 15 June 2024. I started with this article cleaning up references for one issue, and realized this article could use a major overhaul and expansion, particularly with sources, maps and images. I think it has come far enough for a peer review. To those who take a look, thank you. And I hope I have helped to make this topic interesting to you and other readers. Wtfiv (talk) 16:23, 29 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
It's good to see this article on a key battle of World War II here. It needs a fair bit more work to reach A-class status though, and I have the following comments:
The sentence starting with 'The speed with which the Marshalls were occupied' is a bit over-complicated, and it would be good to note when the invasion was brought forward.
Sentence broken into two. This diff addresses adding original time of invasion. This diff adds the date when the Joint Chief of Staff brought the invasion forward to June. Wtfiv (talk) 07:24, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This section should also cover the assembly of the invasion force
Moved assembly of forces out of footnote and added a bit more in new section. Wtfiv (talk) 04:23, 11 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The background section should also cover the pre-1944 history of Saipan
Added background as first paragraph of the "Military Geography" section. Wtfiv (talk) 02:32, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
The 'Japanese defensive preparations' section doesn't really capture the importance the Japanese assigned to Saipan: they knew that it would become a dangerous B-29 base if captured.
A sentence on B-29s is added in this larger reworking. Interestingly, most sources do not focus on this. My guess is because the Japanese were focused on reacting to the action around Biak and assuming a strike into the Carolines.
This section should also cover the overall Japanese plan for the defence of the Mariana Islands, including the plans to use aircraft and the IJN to defeat the US invasion fleet - this appears much later in the article.
The background section now includes a subsection on Japan's defensive plans.
The 'Saipan's military geography' should note the climate
Added climate as first two sentences of second paragraph. Wtfiv (talk) 02:32, 9 April 2024 (UTC)
The Opposing forces section needs to be referenced, and there's inconsistencies in how the names of various senior officers are presented here.
Reworked whole section I disliked this section when I started editing, but thought it was a kind of template for the Pacific War island battles as I find it everywhere. As per Hawkeye7's Battle of Tinian, I just put the command structure of the major units into the prose narrative and deleted the section.
"The attack took out nearly one-third of the 435 planes in Vice Admiral Kakuji Kakuta's 1st Air Fleet, which had been deployed to defend the Marianas" - this is the first time this force has been noted, despite there being a section focused on Japanese defences.
Kakuta's 1st Air Fleet has been added here in the Japanese strategic plan heading. Further modifications to Kakuta's role in the article include a change and a later update in Japanese Naval Response, and an update to Preparatory Attacks. I didn't give specific numbers as the various sources wildly disagree. What is clear is the land-based airpower was devastated. I used Toll's estimate of 100, as it was more conservative.
The grammar in the sentence starting 'It was had a wide gap just north of Charan Kanoa' is a bit off, and the sentence as a whole is over-complex
fixed grammar. Made sentence slightly longer, turning it into a list of three problems, but grammatical complexity should be reduced. If you'd like me to break it up, let me know.
It's confusing referring to the US divisions as the '27th Infantry', '2nd Marines', etc: these terms are usually used for regiments (especially in the USMC).
"Division" added to each unit when named: diff, (and minor diff to fix spelling error in first mention of "Division" in previous diff.)
The 'Aftermath' section should be reworked to avoid single paragraph sections
Aftermath section has been reworked to avoid single paragraph sections and other issues raised below. Wtfiv (talk) 20:51, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The 'Naval air dominance' section doesn't seem to add anything
Section deleted in latest reworking. Wtfiv (talk) 20:51, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The material on the use of Saipan as a B-29 base is confusing. This was always one of the main goals of the operation, reflecting long-term plans (the overarching strategy was to develop B-29 baes in the Marianas, with the operation in China always being a stop-gap until airfields in the islands were available). Reflecting this, airfield construction crews arrived fairly early in the piece. The article presents all of this as being a bit of an afterthought rather than central to the entire operation.
Material has been reworked as follows:
(1) Strategic bombing is now early in Aftermath to reduce perception of afterthought.
(2) As suggested, added information on when aerodrome construction started, Emphasizing its earliness.
(3) Reorganization into three paragraphs. Logic of tentative organization:
¶1. Shift to strategic bombing; Yawata synchronized with invasion symbolizing this.
¶2. Explanation of role of Marianas in being a well-suited site for strategic bombing.
¶3. Saipan's specific role in the initiation of Marianas-based strategic bombing.
(4). Removed discussion of China-based B-29s, except for explaining the origination of the Yawata Steel Works raid. The relation of China bases vs. the Marianas is a complicated issue that evolved over time. For example, China-based bombing, supplemented by bases in the Aleutians-based bombing, was conceived as a sufficient project in its own right at the First Quebec Conference in 1943, though one of the justifications for the strategy was lack of available islands. (see C.C.S 323 on pp. 995–1000). Wtfiv (talk) 20:51, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Interestingly, Arnold didn't see the value of using mandate islands as bomber bases even as late as the Quebec conference, stating most were atolls. (see pp. 861-862) Wtfiv (talk) 04:41, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The material presenting one view of the importance of strategic bombing in the Japanese surrender is out of place, and this is a famously complex and debated topic so it's not NPOV to present only one view and not the others.
Deleted the two quotes, reworked material for perceptions of Japanese.
The intended point wasn't to get into the controversial and charged issue of what caused the Japanese to surrender (e. g., strategic bombing, submarine warfare, the Soviet declaration of war, the atomic bombs, and more.). My intention was to emphasize the effect B-29 bombing had on Japanese morale and perceptions. I'm hoping the rewrite makes this more clear. One of citations points towards quotes from ten Japanese leaders in addition to the two that I left in the text. (The remaining two were inherited from the original article.) Wtfiv (talk) 20:51, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Are any of the links in the 'See also' section really needed? If these people played a significant role in the battle, they should be linked in the body of the article.
The number of photos seems excessive, and it would be good to left justify some of them.
Deleted many, shifted a few. The original presentation was an experiment in presenting many images, each illustrating a topic in the text but avoiding MOS:SANDWICH; it didn't look too bad on a mobile.
I may have to rework again to avoid sandwiching once more maps are added. Maps added...I think sandwiching is okay.
More maps could be added Nick-D (talk) 06:01, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For this comment, I'd like to get a bit more help from you about the maps. The Battle of Saipan map has the frontlines at each section of the narrative, and labels all the places mentioned in the narrative. (Except Tanapag plain, which is mentioned in context as between Makunsha and Tanapag.) But I can see a reader may not want to keep clicking back to that map. I could certainly add more in the sections. Where would would you like to see them, How many is reasonable, and what level of focus (whole island, or zoom in to the front?) would you like to see? Wtfiv (talk) 02:50, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'd suggest adding maps (where available, from the US official histories and similar) to illustrate the key engagements. A map of the landing/lodgement phase of the operation would be very useful, for instance. A map showing the 'Smith vs Smith' phase of operations would help to illustrate the issue here. Nick-D (talk) 00:40, 13 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for the reply, Nick-D. Please see my comment at the bottom of Hawkeye7's review. Wtfiv (talk) 01:52, 15 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've done a set of maps. If you go to the page for each map Wikimedia Commons, the pages where the frontlines were derived are linked there. Wtfiv (talk) 05:56, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Just to note regarding Hawkeye's great comments below, it's common for articles on battles of the Pacific War to need a surprising amount of material explaining how they fitted into each protagonist's strategy and the strategic situation. This is because most of the battles were essentially small stand-alone campaigns given the geography of the war (e.g. in comparison to the European theatre of the war where battles tended to occur in fairly rapid succession as part of general offensives and don't need as much introductory material). Nick-D (talk) 00:52, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks Nick-D. When first working on this article, I could see that authors quickly got caught up in the MacArthur-King tension. My goal is to keep discussion of it to a minimum: acknowledging it and getting the facts right but focusing on the invasion. Both you and Hawkeye have provided with more guidance to help me better navigate these complexities. I'll do my best to address your concerns without being enmeshed in the details. I'm sure you two will guide me where I need to work it out more. Wtfiv (talk) 02:50, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Support Those changes look great. Nick-D (talk) 08:11, 20 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This is excellent work by a skilled content creator, and I am surprised that I haven't encountered you before.
Thank you, Hawkeye7, for both the compliment and the feedback. I'll be one the road this coming week, so a bit slow in addressing most of the points raised until I get back. I'll first address Nick-D's. In particular, our bullet points 1, 2 and 4 look like they may take a bit more thinking through. Wtfiv (talk) 22:29, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Reworked and expanded paragraphs 2–3 attempting to first four bullet points. (Major diff and minor cleanups here and here.) Intended logic of presentation:
¶ 1. (Mainly unchanged), sets up situation at beginning of 1944; defines King's support for Plan Orange and its relation to the Central Pacific offensive.
¶ 2–3. Global overview of Marianas status as strategic objective. Steps back to 1943 with focus on three conferences: discussing through King's advocacy for the Marianas and the CCS decisions. Also note MacArthur's concerns.
¶ 4. Shifts to operational implementation by Nimitz in 1944. Wtfiv (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The second paragraph is not incorrect, but it is misleading, because this decision to give priority to the Central Pacific drive was taken in May 1943, before the Admiralty Islands, and the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaigns referred to in the previous paragraph. For the record, CCS 417 (at Cairo) said: "The advance in the Pacific shall be simultaneous along both axes and shall be mutually supporting, that when conflicts in timing and allocation of means exist, due weight should be accorded to the fact that operations in the Central Pacific promise at this time a more rapid advance toward Japan and her vital lines of communication." (Hayes, p. 550) So priority, yes, but the acceleration of MacArthur's timetable under Reno IV undermined the rationale for it.
Issue of priority has been deleted. Paragraph 3 mentions only that CCS supported the Southwest Pacific drive and the Central Pacific Drive. Wtfiv (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
The third is even more misleading. King had decided that with the capture of the Gilberts and Marshalls, the Marianas would be the next objective. This goal been formally endorsed by the Allies at the Cairo Conference in November 1943, which set their invasion for 1 October 1944. This is incorrect. The Marianas were added to the objectives list (CCS 387) at Cairo,[9] but not immediately after; Ponape and Truk were to be secured first. (see Matloff, p. 377)
Deleted conflation of grand strategic decision making (CCS) with more operational decisions. Section omits mention of Gilberts and Marshalls. Rewords CCS statement at Cairo to adding the Marianas as an objective for the Central Pacific offensive
The invasion the Marianas, codenamed Forager,[22] was originally scheduled for October–November 1944. You have already said this in the previous paragraph.
Fixed. This was an artifact of addressing a concern by Nick-D, moving information without deleting the original. Latest reworking integrates this in the context of Cairo.
The debate over the schedule in March 1944 is covered in Matloff pp. 455-459. The SWPA and POA staffs debated the issue at a conference in Pearl Harbor on 27-28 January 1944. Kenney, Kinkaid, Sutherland, Towers and Sherman all expressed reservations about the Marianas operation. Sherman felt it would be costly, and there were concerns about their suitability as a base given that they had no harbours. (see Hayes, pp. 545-548) Another conference was held in Washington in March, but there was still no decision on the Marianas vs Truk. (Hayes, p. 555) Sherman argued that the Marianas could be used to neutralise Truk. (Hayes, p. 556) As noted, JCS the decided on 12 March to invade the Marianas on 15 June. (Hayes, p. 560)
I've kept the narrative at a high strategic level, focusing on King and the CCS in paragraphs 2 and 3. Mention MacArthur's concerns note the SWPA concerns regarding POA operations.
I know if we move down to the finer grain of the JCS, SWPOA, and POA discussions, it gets more complicated. As you mention, the Pearl Harbor and Washington conferences continued the back and forth about the Marianas. The debate constantly shifts: a number of the individuals took different sides of the argument at different times. (e.g., Nimitz being willing to forego the Marianas as a result of the Pearl Harbor discussion, and King having to him of the Cairo decision.)
I'm hoping that the two paragraphs focused on King and the CCS make the main point about King's insistence while getting the reader quickly to Saipan. It would be nice to have an article that got into these gnarly details that could be linked. I find it fascinating, and appreciate the deeper dive in terms of understanding the complexities but trying to reflect them simply that your comments have led me to. (The Granite II article?)
Is overall form of the current edit okay with you? Wtfiv (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Although King was nominally CNO, this was an administrative role. His authority derived from being CinC US Fleet (COMINCH) and should be referred as such.
Although Nimitz was CinC Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC), in this context he should be referred to by his other role, as CinC Pacific Ocean Areas (CINCPOA).
Done, see diff above. May want to check if links are appropriate.
Recommend moving footnote b into the body. This is an important part of the campaign.
Done, Nick-D noted that I needed to add that information, so it may have been missed. (Or perhaps it wasn't enough.) It's now in main text under American invasion force and its been expanded slightly. Wtfiv (talk) 22:10, 14 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Reworked sentence in second paragraph to make it more clear that the capture of the Marianas the central theme of the paragraph.
"Other soldiers were stranded survivors headed to other islands when their ships were sunk" I Had difficult parsing this. I think you mean that they had been headed for other islands, but wound up on Saipan.
reworded Many soldiers were stranded survivors of sunken ships headed to other islands.
"the timing of the invasion surprised the Japanese, who thought they had until November to complete their defense" If you have the book, I would be interested in knowing what footnote 43 refers to.
I checked the convenience link the the citation, and it looks like it works. I'll put it here: p. 139 The Lacey sources a G-2 intelligence report from 11 July 1944 interrogating Major "Kiyoshi Yoshida". (see footnote g for questions regarding his reports during and after the war, which are used widely in reliable sources to describe the Japanese side of the battle.) The date can be argued for: It's at the end of the monsoon season and closer to the original date set at the Cairo conference, but that'd be WP:OR. Other sources make the same point, but none give a reason.
" after the Japanese government had taken over Saipan from Germany in 1914." full stop instead of comma
Done
"Saipan was the first island of the war " Can you rephrase this?
Reworded: Saipan was the first island during the Pacific war
" large urban centers" Seems a bit of an exaggeration to me.
"civilians lived on the island primarily serving the sugar industry" comma after "island"
done
Opposing forces
Deleted format and replaced with narrative section I didn't change this because I thought this was an informal "best practice" for Pacific War Island articles, as so many of them have this.
I really, really don't like the use of abbreviations for ranks. Are bits that expensive?
Section deleted, all named officers are given their full ranks without abbreviation.
Kelly Turner commanded TF 51, of which TF 52, which he also commanded, was a part. This should be added.
Kelly's dual role already mentioned, parenthetical addition of TF 52.
Source?
Narrative descriptions are now sourced.
June 15: D-Day
Recommend moving the map in the Opposing forces section down to this section.
Suggestion is a good one. Not implemented yet, please see response at end.
Most suggested changes from here until "Logistics" is in this diff
Link moved to first instance. Most suggested changes from here until "Logistics" is in this diff
Suggest moving the first paragraph of "Japanese naval response" back into the "Japanese defensive preparations" section, and the other two into the "Battle of the Philippine Sea" to reduce disruption of the narrative.
Material rearranged. New section Japanese Strategic Plan now has material from first paragraph and additions. Material on Submarine Admiral Takeo Takagi and his relevance added. Remainder moved to Battle of Philippine Sea.
June 16–20: Southern Saipan
First image is a red link for some reason.
Fixed (in some previous edit).
"on June 20" should be "on 20 June"
Corrected that, and many other date reversals.
"To prepare for the upcoming naval battle, the American transports continued to unload supplies and reinforcements throughout June 17." This is wrong; they would have done this anyway. Move the first phrase to the next sentence.
Reworked as per suggestion.
"On June 19-20" -> "on 19-20 June"
done
Suggest making "Battle of Philippine Sea" a separate section, as it is not part of Southern Saipan (or rename that section)
done
June 17 -> 17 June
done
21-24 June: Central Saipan, initial attack
"Frustrated by what he saw as lack of progress by the 27th Division, Holland Smith relieved its commander, Major General Ralph Smith" 27th Division -> 27th Infantry Division, delete "Major General" Is it more American to use their middle initials as well?
I used their middle initial when introducing them, but here I'm using first names to distinguish the Smiths. If you think I should include their middle initial, let me know.
"On 11 July, the Americans found the body of general Saitō." -> "On 11 July, the Americans found Saitō's body"
done
"Though many civilians were able to surrender early in the battle.[269] surrender became more difficult as the battle moved into the northern mountains." Replace full stop with comma.
done
"The places they jumped from would become known as "Suicide Cliff" and "Banzai Cliff". You have forgotten to say that many committed suicide in this manner.
Reword Many died by throwing themselves off cliffs at places that would become known as "Suicide Cliff" and "Banzai Cliff"
Delete the "Further resistance" heading; it is only one paragraph. (Consider moving the paragraph into the "Aftermath" section.)
Make "Casualties" its own section. Readers often go looking for this
Done
Aftermath
"The capture of Saipan, along with MacArthur's victory in Hollandia, pierced the Japanese Exclusive National Defense Sphere." Except that on your map, Hollandia is not within it.
Yes, it had been moved to the west of New Guinea in April 1944 following the Take Ichi convoy disaster. Nick-D (talk) 22:03, 10 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
deleted point about Hollandia. Source is incorrect. Three other sources– Tanaka, 2023, Willoughby 1994 (The Reports of MacArthur, map on p. 227) and Smith 2006 (Carrier Battles to be added to sources soon)– put the line to the west of Hollandia. Wtfiv (talk) 08:41, 12 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
fn 289, 308: page number?
Both fixed
Nothing on logistics. Sigh.
**See note below.Logistics section added after casualties.
Hawkeye7(discuss) 22:15, 9 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hawkeye7 and Nick-D I have finished a first pass through your thoughtful comments. I particularly appreciate your kindness as you wade through the typos and errors.
:*I have attempted to address the core comments, so if you feel it is productive I could address second-round comments. But, I still have a couple of more secondary tasks I'd like to try before I feel I have addressed your comments in full, so if you think we should wait and I can ping you when I feel they are done, that works too. Here's the remaining tasks I see:
Nick-D's challenge with the maps. Tracking all the references in the narrative can be a terror. Nick-D has given me an easy solution, which is to take the best from Hoffman, Crowl and Shaw et al and use them. I may. Before going that direction, I'd like to experiment with creating a set consistent with the .svg, but that requires some care and they'd require review. If it gets overwhelming, I can try Nick-D's suggested default.
I'd like to build a modest logistics section as per Hawkeye's suggestion. I considered logistics. I deferred because I'd have to think about how to keep it simple. The complexity of detail could risk overwhelming an article that is already on the long side. But I like the challenge. Logistics is the bedrock of the campaign. Section created.
I need to run through a couple more rounds of minor copyediting.
All this is done (well, copy editing is endless.)
Nick-D, I feel I owe you a special apology. I recently read your Bugle article on doing a review, and saw I did one of your "don'ts" when I let you know I'd be delayed in responding just after you took the time to review. An unfortunate mix of the article catching interest two days before I had to head out and the resulting real life situation require a lot more care than I thought.
Nick-D and Hawkeye7 I've attempted to address all the concerns for this round. Logistics section and maps I mentioned as final items have been drafted. Wtfiv (talk) 15:11, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Great work! Some final points:
I copy edited the Logistics section to remove a series of typos. (Pet peeve: "ordinance" instead of "ordnance")
Morison says that the Marianas were claimed in 1565, as does the CIA. [10]. Your source says Saipan was occupied in 1564. I looked at Quimby, Frank J. (2017). "Spain in the Mariana Islands, 1521–1898". Historical Archaeology of Early Modern Colonialism in Asia-Pacific: The Southwest Pacific and Oceanian Regions. pp. 146–194. doi:10.2307/j.ctvx07b3c.13. and it says 1565 too. Can we re-check?
I put 1565Morison (thanks!) as he is already given as a source. Three other sources I looked up. One gave an exact date 3 Feb 1565. Wtfiv (talk) 23:08, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Tojo was succeeded as prime minister by Koiso, but Tojo was also Minister of the Army and Chief of the Army General Staff; he was succeeded in those posts by Hajime Sugiyama and Yoshijirō Umezu respectively. (Suggest just adding "as prime minister")
added "as prime minister". It helps keeps the article focused, but I will be looking up the other two. I'm curious. Wtfiv (talk) 23:08, 17 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Chapin (1994) has location, but nothing else does. Personally, I prefer locations as it is the usual academic style and therefore aids someone lifting the source, but removal is easy and will make the references consistent.
Craven and Cate is volume V, not volume VI
Coakley and Leighton (1987) "United States Army n world War II" Typo.
Crowl (1993) is not volume 9; the series has no volume numbers
Dod (1987): is also part of the United States Army in world War II series.
Wetzler, Peter (2020): Formatting; need an asterisk
Done. here Except that I kept the Hiroyu OCLC to the English language version I had. I hope that's okay.
Journal articles, reports and theses
Hemler (2018) and Kaune (1990) are master's theses. WP:SCHOLARSHIP: Masters dissertations and theses are considered reliable only if they can be shown to have had significant scholarly influence. (Annoying, I know. My own master's thesis gets more citations than the PhD.)
Use degree= rather than type= for theses
Plung (2021): use title case
Sullivan (1995) is a book chapter from The Mechanism for Strategic Coercion: Denial or Second Order Change?
Why is Defense Technical Information Center only linked once?
Donediff Swapped out Hemler Masters for doctorate. Lost the Kaune, though I do feel badly as it is a publically accessible work focused on the 27th Infantry divsion
I'm so glad to hear it. I think I get the original policy. In contentious issues, a Master's may not be a reliable source for making an argument. But in historical reviews like this, I find that master's theses can be great sources for giving an overview, particularly when they are web accessible. For example, the acknowledged history for the 27th Infantry is Edmund Love's book, which is hard to get hold of, and has the additional problem of getting POV'ed into the Smith vs. Smith controversy. Kaune's overview has the advantage of being written from a historical distance, and the DTIC thought it was good enough to post (which doesn't mean it was closely review, of course.) It sounds like the discussion is appropriate and I'll take a look. Wtfiv (talk) 20:23, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
fn 97 is dubious. Text says: " moved closer to shore because the sea was found to be free of mines". Source says: (on pp. 74-75, not 75) "none of the ships was allowed to move closer than 10,000 yards (five nautical miles) from the shore for fear of mines"
Y I think the problem is it should be page number 76, which now corrected. This references Oldendorf's old battleships, not Lee's newer one's, which pp. 74–75 are referring to.
fn 160: page number for Morison?
Done
Consider consolidating fn 287-289
Done mainly concerned that only Sheeks emphasizes the point made in the middle citation.
fn 295-296: Strange formatting with square brackets
fn 316 is dubious, considering the next sentence, which says that bombing started from China.
Kept the citation, but consolidated it and expanded it to page 4. Qualified the point with dependent clause mentioning Chengdu with link that mentions the airfields. IF you feel I'm still not capturing the point made by Craven and Cate, let me know. Wtfiv (talk) 21:04, 6 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think these have all been addressed. Wtfiv (talk) 17:02, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I have had a go at getting the books into alphabetic order, correcting a couple of typos and adding some more author links. Hawkeye7(discuss) 19:45, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you Matarisvan. I made most of changes in this edit. There's a few I didn't do, but if you feel they improve the article, I will
"range of United States Army Air Forces B-29 bombers": consider changing to "range of B-29 bombers of the United States Army Air Forces" to avoid WP:SEAOFBLUE?
Y reworked paragraph and removed sea of blue.
"resignation of Prime Minister of Japan Hideki Tōjō": change to『resignation of Hideki Tōjō, the Prime Minister of Japan』for the same reason as above?
Done Part of paragraph reworking
"Ships personnel": Wouldn't "naval personnel" be better?
I inherited this from the article, but I think the intention here is to distinguish naval personnel killed on ships from those who were killed on the island.
Link to line of communication?
Y
Consider moving left aligned images to right alignment per MOS:IMAGELOC?
Originally, I had right-aligned all images, but Nick-D recommended the variety in image placement. I think the suggestion makes the page look a little better. I did set up the images to avoiding MOS:SANDWICH
Link to Rota?
Y
Use the [convert: needs a number] template to provide Celsius temperatures for the Fahrenheit values?
Y
Link to Magicienne Bay (Laolao Bay)?
Y
Link to Kagman?
I didn't link Kagman because the text refers to the peninsula, not the village. The article on Kagman is also bare at this point. But if you think the link would help readers get a geographic sense of the location, I will.
Link to Tanapag?
Y
Link to Marpi?
I didn't link this as it references the point, not the village, but will add if it will help readers.
Link in the biblio to John W. Dover, Thomas Havens, Daikichi Irokawa, Noriko Kawamura, Michael Kort, Yuki Tanaka, William T. Y'Blood, Richard P. Hallion, Preston Cloud, Vincent O'Hara?
Y
Consider converting the Y'Blood 1981 reference to an sfn tag?
That alternative format is to prevent a cite error. (There are two citations to the same page, but one has a ps and the other doesn't.
Miller 1991 is the only source which uses the Citation template instead of Cite book, consider using the latter?
Y Fixed.
Overall, a very fine article, there were some very minor grammatical errors which I corrected, I hope you do not mind. That's all from me, cheers Matarisvan (talk) 18:49, 28 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I appreciate yout taking the time to look over the article. Wtfiv (talk) 05:16, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
On second thought, the links to Kagman and Marpi aren't necessary, and the sfn conversion is also not required. There's a minor correction needed, though. The link for Yuki Tanaka points to a volleyball player, the article we want is Yuki Tanaka (historian). Otherwise, happy to extend my support for promotion to A Class. Matarisvan (talk) 10:15, 29 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Done Thank you! Wtfiv (talk) 04:02, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi @Wtfiv, one minor comment I somehow forgot to post: These sentences "This battle sealed the fate for the Japanese forces defending Saipan. Though they did not know it, they could not expect expect further assistance." are great for a research paper or article, but are not encyclopedic. Something like this would be much better: "As a result of this battle, the Japanese troops on Saipan could not be reinforced, resupplied or provided military support anymore." Also consider replacing the word "doomed" with something neutral. Matarisvan (talk) 06:45, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Reworded sentence incorporating suggested ideas, but kept sense from the Morison quote that the defenders weren't aware of their situation. Removed word "doom". Wtfiv (talk) 16:00, 30 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
@Matarisvan: Please clarify whether you are in full support of promotion of this article to A-class in view of the previous edit. If so, it appears ready for promotion and I will make the necessary change to the assessment. Thanks. Donner60 (talk) 06:07, 22 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah I am in support of promotion to A class. Matarisvan (talk) 06:47, 22 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Henry Biard was an early British pilot - aviator's certificate number 218 - and flew in both world wars, but became a national hero for his victory in the 1924 Schneider Trophy seaplane race. He was a close colleague and friend of R. J. Mitchell at Supermarine, where he served as chief test pilot between 1919 and 1928. A colourful character of the old school -- fond of a tall tale (not least his own autobiography, which imposes some interesting challenges of sourcing), not shy of speaking his mind, and every ounce the dashing airborne daredevil. Perhaps ironically given present company, Biard never seemed to take much to military life: he fairly literally crashed out of the Royal Flying Corps just before the First World War, had a fairly uneventful time with the Royal Naval Air Service, and seems to have spent the Second World War doing communications flights. Having recently passed GA, this article may be bound for FAC at some point, and I'd be grateful for some MilHist expertise on the military and technical side of it: almost none of this subject-matter falls into my usual areas of expertise. UndercoverClassicistT·C 20:31, 21 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I'll try to review this over the weekend. Hog FarmTalk 17:39, 2 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Do we know anything about his reasons for initially joining the military in 1913? Or anything about why he resigned the next year?
I'd imagine he says (or makes up) something in his autobiography (but see final point below) -- I've failed to find a copy, sadly, and it's out of print. If you take his story about being crashed by Trenchard as true (I must admit that I don't think I do), that probably played a role in it! UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
just fyi, there is a copy in the National Library of Australia, and there is a possibility to order a digital copy for 19 australian dollars per 25 pages. Artem.G (talk) 14:48, 21 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Cheers - probably a bit rich for my blood (it's 288 pages, and doing the maths on that made my wallet hurt), but I do periodically keep an eye out in case one turns up second-hand online for a reasonable amount. Could give it another go at WP:RX too. UndercoverClassicistT·C 14:57, 21 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
" On 2 December 1917, Biard was commissioned into the Royal Naval Air Service" - is it known if this was a volunteer decision or conscription?
I don't: do the dates suggest the latter? My thought would be that it's pretty late to volunteer, but then equally I can see how his work training civilian pilots (presumably, who often then enlisted) could have been seen (at least by him) as war work of a sort. UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"He is believed to have undergone training at the RNAS's flight school in Vendôme, France." - is this a generally held belief, or that of a specific author?
Bertram gives it as "it is believed" -- I don't suppose you know anything about RNAS flight training? I failed to find much background information; I assume this was simply what usually happened? UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"Passaleva suffered from vibration caused by his propellor, which was beginning to delaminate after being immersed in water the previous day: however, the competition rules forbade him from changing it" - I tend to think this would read smoother if split into two sentences at the colon
We have "The 1926 competition was for aircraft under 176 pounds (80 kg) that could fly with the greatest load-to-fuel ratio carried over courses that totalled 2,000 miles (3,200 km)" in a footnote, but then later, describing the aircraft entered into this challenge, we have the statement "The aircraft, 130 pounds (59 kg) heavier and 7 miles per hour (11 km/h) slower than the Sparrow I,". Did the Sparrow I really weigh 36 pounds or less? This seems unrealistic
Pegram messed that one up a bit: it's engine weight, not total weight, and it was 170lb. Fixed from another source. Good spot -- I'd missed that, but it was a bit silly! UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Is it known when he married?
I'd assume it's in Wings, but I only managed to find indirect references to his being married: I couldn't even find the wife's name. UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
For FA status, you're going to need to be able to defend what makes The Channel Islands and the Great War pass the higher bar of high-quality reliable source
It's a tricky one: Bertram's a local historian and seems to be a good one, but he isn't a "proper" university-based academic. My sense is that the Ur-source for these pages is Biard's autobiography, Wings, which is out of print (and has its own problems!): in an ideal world, I'd like to get hold of a copy and cross-reference everything, and would probably be able to get rid of this website that way. I think everything cited there is relatively pedestrian and the sort of thing that we assume could be easily enough found out and verified by a local historian (e.g. the dates at which he was at school: we'd expect that to be in a school archive, even if we can't ourselves easily access it). Not an ideal situation, granted: there's an essay somewhere about how we sometimes have to fall back on the best available sources, and that feels like the situation we're in here. UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
My biggest concern here is not related to article quality so much but more placement of this in A-Class review. See note #3 at WP:MILHIST - Military service does not in and of itself place an individual within the scope of the project—particularly in the case of service in modern militaries. To qualify them, an individual's military service must have been somehow noteworthy or have contributed—directly or indirectly—to their notability. and Biard's military service seems rather incidental to his primary notability as an aircraft tester for private industry. Hog FarmTalk 21:35, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Honestly, I wouldn't have any disagreement with that -- I hadn't clocked it when going through the instructions. Appreciate your time so far: if it's felt that the article is ineligible for review here, I'm happy to withdraw it. On the off-chance, though: I wondered if you could give me a sanity check for the Second World War paragraph in the later life section? In particular, I've found that he was briefly moved to the General Duties branch of the RAF (shortly after the Battle of Britain), but am not sure if we can say anything useful from that about what he was doing. UndercoverClassicistT·C 22:20, 4 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, I'm not familiar with 20th century UK military systems either - I'm mainly familiar with the mid-19th century United States. Hog FarmTalk 01:26, 5 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Zawed might be able to shed light on some of the RAF stuff. Hog FarmTalk 23:38, 14 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Chipping in here, it is my understanding (note that I don't profess to be a specialist on the RAF so may be wrong here) that General Duties were 'frontline' personnel - pilots, other flying personnel, ground crew, staff and admin people whereas the Administrative and Special Duties Branch were older personnel fulfilling an admin, e.g. payroll, or a research role. That doesn't quite fit in with him being a communications pilot for the first 12 or so months of the war though. I wonder if the source is confused, and the period in the GD branch was when he was in that pilot role. Zawed (talk) 09:05, 15 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Hi Zawed -- thanks for chipping in with this. His service (see Discussion on the project page) has this kind of sequence:
Starting off in "admin duties"
Then moving to flying duties in the "Ferry Pilots Pool" (I assume that means flying people/things around the place?),
Then a few posts with the refuelling section (presumably what it says on the tin?),
Then some work as a "permanent duty pilot" at Northolt (could that be combat service?)
A short post at Bridgenorth for "No. 21 Fly: Control Course" (training or being trained?)
PDP at Penrhos (again seems to have been a training base: instructing?)
Two posts at different AGS (Air Gunners' School or Aircrew Grading School) -- presumably instructing in some capacity.
A couple more admin duties from late 1943, which would chime with an imminent departure for health reasons.
Any thoughts on any of that? There's no indication from his later life that he was physically disabled (though equally there's no record of him flying professionally after the war): do you have any idea of what it would have taken for an officer to leave the RAF in 1944 for health reasons? UndercoverClassicistT·C 09:49, 15 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Magnificent on the marriages -- one of his service records has the date of his marriage, but no name. We can probably do something like "Biard married on 1 July 1914. In 1936, he divorced his wife, Simone...", which doesn't definitively say that they were the same person. I'd imagine the date of marriage is on the document: I'm not in a position to get to Kew in the near future, unfortunately, but I'll try to get a look at it if I'm ever there. UndercoverClassicistT·C 07:25, 1 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This is always frustrating. If he were an Australian, his service record would be online, as would the newspapers and the registry of births, deaths and marriages. Hawkeye7(discuss) 21:03, 1 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've got the service record, usefully, but the "wife's name" field is blank -- despite there being a date entered for his marriage! One thought that hadn't yet occurred to me: I might see if there are any local newspapers around that date: it wouldn't be unusual to post an announcement in there. UndercoverClassicistT·C 09:12, 2 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Why do you believe "File:Supermarine Sea Lion II L'Aerophile October,1922.jpg" to be PD?
The source page gives the "rights" as PD. Coming at it from another direction, it's published in a magazine but not claimed by the author, so the copyright for that publication presumably belonged to the publication itself (so PMA starts at the date of publication): for a 1922 publication, it's therefore out of copyright in both France and the US.
"Schneider Trophy 1922 Course Map.svg": it would be helpful to have full details of the source, perhaps in the same format as used in Works cited. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:03, 1 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Lazy oversight on the part of the Commons author. I've fixed it for them. UndercoverClassicistT·C 08:29, 2 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
"was organised by the Blackshirt leader and future marshal of the Italian Air Force, Italo Balbo": consider changing to "was organised by Italo Balbo, the Blackshirt leader and future marshal of the Italian Air Force"? The former phrasing could be seen as WP:SEAOFBLUE, only a comma is separating the links to Balbo and the IAF.
Thanks for those details: agreed, that source is pretty much certainly straightforward copyright infringement, as the magazine is less than 20 years old and this is clearly not an authorised open-access release by the copyright holder. Downloading it and uploading it somewhere else would, therefore, also be copyright infringement. UndercoverClassicistT·C 06:25, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I had somehow forgotten about that due to the age of the subject matter. But now at least you won't have any issues with the spot checks. Also, I will do the source review here as WPMH requires one, the image review is already done. Matarisvan (talk) 16:24, 20 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I am nominating this article, originally promoted in 2006, for A-class reassessment. As User:buidhe pointed out on the talk page two years ago, there are outstanding verification issues. Nine citation needed tags. Schierbecker (talk) 22:54, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I am nominating this for reassessment. This article has longstanding issues with unverifiable information that was present in the article at the time it passed ACR in 2007. Eight citation needed tags. Schierbecker (talk) 18:56, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Delist - Duty was not entirely idyllic, however. Due to the fort's proximity to Georgetown, clashes between soldiers on leave and civilians were inevitable is original research, sourced only to an old letter; Due to Fort Corcoran's large size and proximity to Georgetown, duty as part of the fort's garrison was less of a hardship than it was at many of the more isolated forts in the defenses of Washington, such as Fort Greble needs a source other than the Official Records of the War of the Rebellion, there's heavy uncited content, and much of the article is sourced only to primary source records. The Historical Marker Database source is user-generated and I don't think the ""History of Battery C, First Rhode Island Light Artillery". Archived from the original on 2007-07-26." tripod website is reliable for A-Class either. I don't have the sort of sources that would be necessary to resurrect this. Hog FarmTalk 19:07, 22 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Delist and Comment - I am not likely to be able to do more with the article than I did in the past few hours. It is not enough to avoid a delist. I have reduced the number of citation needed tags to three. My guess is that a source was used for the two comments about life at the fort for which there are no citations but it may be difficult to find it and thus determine whether it is reliable. I have removed the reference to the Historical Marker Database and replaced it with a citation to a JSTOR article which says the marker was placed by the Arlington Historical Society; I added at the "approximate" location. Although I think the Official Records are probably reliable enough for some of the routine facts for which they are cited, I think the use as a source for so many of the facts in the article is problematical and not appropriate for extensive use in an A class article. It is not reliable in the example(s) provided by HF. Donner60 (talk) 08:34, 22 June 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Done
Added, thanks for finding that. Hopefully, I've done it correctly.
Y Reorganised the lead along these lines.
