The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the debate was delete. SushiGeek 08:42, 29 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Originally proposed by User:Gorgonzilla; fixing headling because {{afd2}} seems to be broken Elkman - ^(talk) 21:08, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Delete and redirect to Unlawful Combatant. This is simply a POV fork of Unlawful combatant. The only substantial edits come from one editor. The text here does not contribute usefully. Plurals do not get separate articles. The premise of this article is that the term is US army venacular, it is not, the use by the Bush admin is explicitly making reference to the Geneva protocols --Gorgonzilla 20:56, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep - Gorgonzilla has not made any good faith efforts to appreciate the rationale for this article. Please see Talk:unlawful enemy combatant and Talk:unlawful combatant for discussion. Merecat 21:01, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

No, I did look at the other article and it was clear that you are POV pushing. Now removing the afd tag as you did, that is bad faith --Gorgonzilla 21:05, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Mind WP:CIVIL you two. Moe ε 21:10, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Merge into Unlawful Combatant. Moe ε 21:10, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Weak keep contingent upon the editors growing it from a redundant stub into a quality article, else Redirect and merge as the subject matter is well dealt with in Unlawful Combatant. --Flawiki 21:35, 21 April 2006 (UTC) Delete/Merge with Gitmo in that it's Gitmo-specific, and also because the failure on the editor's part to make any effort whatsoever to improve the stub overnight suggests that the article will never become encyclopedic. --Flawiki 11:49, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That's a crappy complaint. On one hand, people complain that I'm the only editor. On the other, they say "edit more". Flawiki, why don't you help improve the article? Merecat 22:32, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Have you tried asking folks at the help desk for advice? If so and you're still unable to recruit volunteers to work on the article, perhaps it's best to just let it go. Wikipedia is a big place with lots to do. I appreciate your invitation to work on the article but I don't have enough time to do a proper job on it. It'll take a substantial effort to raise from a wee stub. Factoring out the redundant bits from the other combatant articles that'll wind up here and reorganizing all of them coherently would be a sizeable task even if there were more material to discuss than just Lindsay Graham's office's press release. --Flawiki 03:54, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I still think it's dumb that this is being pushed for deletion. The nominator has shown aggression towards my work and frankly, I feel, nominated this to be vindictive. This term may be a baby in usage, but it's a distinct term and deleting it does not help the wiki. Likewise, leaving it to stay, does not harm the wiki. This kind of AfD mania is basically bullying. If the others here don't like this article, they don't need to edit it - let them edit elsewhere. Merecat 05:17, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Edit elsewhere, yes that is the point. Your creation of this fork appears to be an attempt to create a separate area where you can peddle your own opinion without the invoncenience of having others edit or dispute your work. Thats not allowed. I see no reason why this should not be a sub heading under Unlawful combatant and it is certainly easier to find. --Gorgonzilla 12:50, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Gorgonzilla, if you had bothered to look into it, you would see that I do not have a dog in the fight at enemy combatant or unlawful combatant and am not editing those pages. I created this page unlawful enemy combatant so as to have a page for the designation which I understand has been applied to Gitmo prisoners. My research indicates this is a currently in-use term. It's you who are over-politicizing this, not me. Merecat 19:14, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Of course, these prisoners are never called unlawful combatant or enemy combatant. Who are those the press is talking about? Synonyms, remember! Nomen Nescio 20:17, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete or Merge if there is something worthwhile not already in unlawful combatant. I don't understand the "keep" votes, as I can't see what possible justification there could be for having both this article and unlawful combatant. --Saforrest 21:44, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Unlawful enemy combatant is a term which is peculiar to USA activities at Gitmo. But unlawful combatant is a whole big argument about the legalities of prisoners etc, from an international law view. Plus there is already a drive on to merge unlawful combatant with enemy combatant. This article Unlawful enemy combatant is only about the term applied to Gitmo prisoners. It's an important distinction, worthy of its own page. Merecat 21:48, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • I'm afraid I disagree. I just read the discussion on Talk:Unlawful enemy combatant, Talk:Unlawful combatant, and Talk:Enemy combatant. While I don't necessarily favour merging enemy combatant and unlawful combatant, I am even more convinced that unlawful enemy combatant should not exist as a separate article. Maybe such a distinction exists and maybe it doesn't, but even if it does, I feel it's too legalistic and technical a distinction to enforce in a page title to the uninitiated like myself. Anything to do with the Gitmo situation can be explained in unlawful combatant, possibly under a subheading. --Saforrest 21:55, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • My weak keep is tentative, and predicated on the hope that the proponent will use the brief amount of time and tabula rasa to fashion a useful, unique article from its current state, before the AFD discussion closes, otherwise like the carriage at midnight the "weak keep" turns pumpkin-fashion into a redirect and merge. --Flawiki 22:01, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
    • If that does happen then I agree that keeping may be in order. My concern here was that this article only has one editor and only presents a single point of view, a classic POV fork. The terms unlawful combatant and unlawful enemy combatant are used interchangeably and none of the references made actually attempts to make a distinction. It certainly is not a vernacular term, the administration has attempted to construct a legal interpretation of it, but the administration uses the terms interchangeably. They are claiming color of the Geneva protocols. --Gorgonzilla 22:11, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge into Unlawful Combatant. They are interchangeably used, and unlawful combatant sufficiently describes the recently develpoed concept. An article for every synonym is contrary to wikipedia policy. Nomen Nescio 21:59, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Merge per above. Keeping the two articles separate is more likely to cause confusion and/or misinformation for people looking at them. Hirudo 22:58, 21 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete/merge and redirect to Unlawful Combatant. --Philip Baird Shearer 02:20, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete and redirect to Unlawful Combatant. This is nothing more than a POV fork. --Hetar 02:22, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep The term is in widespread use in the American military -- if you have any doubts, see the U.S. Army Field Manual on handling of EPWs (http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/). Morton devonshire 06:32, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Apart from covering only half the parties in the term unlawful combatant how does it differ in meaning? I could not find the term "Unlawful enemy combatant"on the URL you have provided, have I made a mistake or has the URL chaged since you posted it? --Philip Baird Shearer 17:52, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Look for FMs directed at Enemy Prisoner of War and non-combatant handling, and Military Police operations. Morton devonshire 19:06, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Did that but still could not find the term please provide the URL. --Philip Baird Shearer 02:51, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That does nothing to demonstrate a difference. -- Gorgonzilla 22:26, 22 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete or merge It's a synonym split for POV only, and they'll both feed the same POV anyway. Readers will expect to find them both at the same place. The difference is much like POW and EPW that don't merit separate articles either. -- Randy2063 00:41, 23 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete or Weak Merge this seems to be covered in unlawful combtant. This seems to be rather redunant. Aeon 01:37, 25 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete and redirect to Unlawful Combatant as per others (POV). -- User:RyanFreisling @ 22:37, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Merge and redirect to enemy combatant, and make the recent controversy about the Bush administration's use of these terms more prominent in the intro to the unlawful combatant article. -- Karada 09:18, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

• Keep This looks like the beginning of an excellent article. The arguments for deleting it are based on air. for instance: "redirect to Unlawful Combatant. This is simply a POV fork of Unlawful combatant." I don't see any POV in here at all. Also, it is well documented. Also.. Enemy combatant is the word being used by the Bush Administraiton, under Patriot Act Legislation[1] Americans may be held as 'enemy combatants,' appeals court rules. Government welcomes ruling upholding presidential power, see [2] or [3] The term enemy combatant is not used the same way now as it has historically been used. Let's not confuse the reader and hide fact. enemy combatant is the term that is being used by the Bush boys, right now, not unlawful combatant I just documented this above. Please let's not waste all our time asking me to document this again. Get the article out of this deletion process. thewolfstar 22:16, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Delete and/or Merge - If any content can be salvaged for Unlawful Combatant or Gitmo then let it be so salvaged. Otherwise, I agree; this is a POV fork and should be deleted and redirected.Captainktainer 11:44, 28 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.