I have been encountering articles that I feel have been prematurely promoted to B-class. Many are Hero of the Soviet Union articles. Examples: Kadi Abakarov and Akhsarbek Abaev. It could be that there is just not much to go on but that seems dubious. Pavle Abramidze is somewhat of an improvement but I suspect there is more that could be written. Hero of the Soviet Union articles are a noble thing but if that is the only thing a person has done then the notability might be questionable. At least the article should contain more content and a better lead before being promoted to B-class. Others are military deserters like Larry Allen Abshier with an unsourced section. Articles like Roy Chung, with the one sentence lead, and enough content to possibly fill the criteria for Start-class. Another is Agus_Suhartono. I did not dig into any specifics, because I have been under the weather, I just thought I should mention this. -- Otr500 (talk) 19:59, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

B class is the minimum acceptable standard for Wikipedia articles. The B-Class criteria requires that "it reasonably covers the topic, and does not contain obvious omissions or inaccuracies." Larry Allen Abshier was assessed back in 2008, when criteria were less strict that they are today. Today it would be rated C class. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:42, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, what about a large amount of material possibly copy/pasted from the London Gazette such as in the Thomas Alderson article? -- Otr500 (talk) 04:24, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

It is out of copyright, hence PD. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 03:27, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Still needs to be attributed, though. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 03:36, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

• In the Thomas Alderson article, the text before the quoted paragraph in the "Second World War" section lists The Gazette as the source. There are no other Gazette references used there (uninvolved user comment). -Fnlayson (talk) 04:07, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

Your Military History Newsletter Project news: From the editors; awards and honours; contest results Articles: Last month's new featured and A-class content Book review: Pickersgill-Cunliffe and Nick-D look at Germans in the Flanders Campaign and 50 years of Australian military history Op-ed: Hawkeye7 on the state of the Wikiproject

Hello to everyone. I have just created Draft:FNSS ZAHA MAV, however my article needs review before it moved into article namespace. I would be thankful to who reviews it. I would be open to any suggestions for improving my article. MaxentiusNero (talk) 20:03, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

The article 126th Armed Police Mobile Division (People's Republic of China)(currently it is known as the 2nd mobile contingent of the PAP so I added a redirect) is completely out of date(simply by switching to the chinese wikipedia article there is much more info lol) and is lacking in tonnes of information that other articles have sources on; heck even the People's Armed Police section on it has more information than the article itself.

Prior to me editing it and adding that it is currently the 2nd mobile contingent, the page was lacking anything about what happened to if after 1950, with it literally saying "As Of 1970-1980, it is currently a PAP unit" when tonnes of info can be found to update it

Another issue is that the Snow Leopard commando Unit article claims it is part of the beijing contingent when almost all sources(including but not limited to chinese wikipedia) i can find online claim it is part of the 2nd mobile contingent. Thehistorianisaac (talk) 01:36, 6 January 2025 (UTC)

Never mind, I finished fixing it already Thehistorianisaac (talk) 03:00, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

@Czech98006: Request scrutiny of an editor changing the Infobox despite dialogue and pointers to Template:Infobox military conflict Thanks ####

Neither of you are referring to sources in the talk page discussion. Quoting the relevant sources (and considering the balance of sources in cases where there isn't a consensus, as might be the case here) is always a good way to resolve these types of debates. Nick-D (talk) 10:38, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

Please join the RM discussion. Talk:John Alexander (VC)#Requested move 14 January 2025. -- Necrothesp (talk) 16:56, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

I am currently making a wikipedia page for William of Orange's invasion of England and such a list would be valuable. DavidDijkgraaf (talk) 17:25, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

DavidDijkgraaf, I found a comparison of Dutch, British and French warship strength by decade from 1650-1700 at Dutch Warships in the Age of Sail 1600-1714 (p. 33), if that helps. Alansplodge (talk) 13:43, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

A more comprehensive table is at Talking about Naval History: A Collection of Essays (p. 54). Alansplodge (talk) Alansplodge (talk) 13:44, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

And another that includes Spain and Russia, at The Oxford Handbook of the Ancien Régime (p. 66). Alansplodge (talk) 13:48, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Personally I like Rodger's appendix II in The Command of the Ocean: Ships of the line and cruisers for the six main European maritime powers every five years from 1650 to 1815. I can't find an on line version, but would be happy to photo and email it. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:14, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Thank you guys. Luckily I found Rodger's book on the internet archive DavidDijkgraaf (talk) 18:24, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

I have been working on Draft:List of attacks on the United States for several weeks, and I have a lot of summaries already written, but still a lot to write. The lead is still incomplete, but it is on the docket to do at the very end (to help clearly define the scope and such). The scope will eventually be any attack or overall campaign (like the Gettysburg campaign) which is against the U.S.. Large scope, I know, but my vision for the article will make it extremely good and extremely useful.

Anyway, if anyone wants to help me write some summaries (1942 to 2025) or do some accuracy and grammatical checks on the already written summaries (1776 to 1941), feel free to help out. I started it in November 2024, so probably only a couple more months of work to do on it to get it ready for mainspace. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 19:45, 15 January 2025 (UTC)

http://eng.mod.gov.cn/xb/News_213114/TopStories/16278919.html

This source from the chinese MOD uses the CNS prefix for Nanchang(101), meaning that it is official that the chinese navy uses the CNS prefix. Chinese navy ship articles should not use names like "Chinese destroyer Nanchang" but be replaced with CNS Nanchang per norm(e.g. USS, HMS).

More reliable sources(some third party) uses CNS:

https://news.usni.org/2024/09/18/chinas-liaoning-carrier-strike-group-deploys-to-philippine-sea - US naval institute

https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202407/12/WS6690f94ea31095c51c50dd2d.html - Chinadaily, with ties with chinese goverment Thehistorianisaac (talk) 00:29, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

PRC MOD is republishing something from the China Daily, which is not quite the same as PRC MOD using it themselves. China Daily is also, at best, inconsistent in its application of "CNS". Take a browse through the first couple pages of results in:

• https://newssearch.chinadaily.com.cn/en/search?query=frigate
• https://newssearch.chinadaily.com.cn/en/search?query=destroyer

Most references to Chinese warships are not using CNS; foreign ships, on the other hand, typically have their prefixes. Interestingly, "CNS" (https://newssearch.chinadaily.com.cn/en/search?query=CNS) seems to be applied by CD to the aircraft carriers than anything else.

PRC MOD also republishes articles from China Military Online (http://eng.mod.gov.cn/xb/News_213114/OverseasOperations/EscortMissions/index.html). Here, too, there's a distinct lack of usage of CNS.

Overall, the form <ship type/function> <ship name> predominates in the above. - RovingPersonalityConstruct (talk, contribs) 02:19, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

And the important question is why would China officialy use the English term Chinese Navy Ship for a prefix? - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 02:26, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

In chinese there is no prefix but in english I mostly see CNS or no prefix instead

Might be inconsistent overall(maybe translation problems?) but I think since the Chinese MOD used it(even though it was a republished article people have reviewed it and decided not to remove the prefix), and it is one of the more common prefixes used for the PLAN(other than PLANS, which is used on wikimedia commons however not much anywhere else) so i think if we get any more official sources we should move chinese navy articles to start using CNS. Thehistorianisaac (talk) 02:52, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

As for the inconsistency, I have a theory for this

Articles with CNS were written originally with english(which is why they added the prefix), articles without CNS were translated from chinese; there is no prefix in Chinese which is why the translated version has no prefix Thehistorianisaac (talk) 03:09, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Very long-standing practice is to only use prefixes when the navy in question officially uses them. The top source linked is a republished article from China Daily, not an official government publication, so there is no evidence that the PLAN uses prefixes (and it's highly unlikely that they do, given that prefixes are more or less a Western thing that don't exactly make sense in non-alphabet languages). As far as I can tell, "CNS" falls squarely into the category of invented prefixes. Parsecboy (talk) 13:05, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Even though it is republished, the fact still stands it is on the Chinese MOD website which means they had no problems with publishing an article with that prefix; However on the chinese MOD website seems that most articles do not use a prefix, as they seem to be direct translations from Chinese Thehistorianisaac (talk) 13:45, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Just because they "have no problems" with the prefix doesn't mean they use it internally. That is the bar you need to meet. Parsecboy (talk) 13:52, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

I know, however in Chinese prefixes are never used; in the end CNS is the closest thing we have to an official prefix for the Chinese navy(the link I put, and the fact that many external sources, though likely made up, also use it), so until any more sources come out, articles using CNS should only be redirects

However this still is a huge leap in the search for more official prefixes to use. Thehistorianisaac (talk) 14:34, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Concur with Parsecboy - it's an invented prefix and we should never use it. Similar to multi national agencies using ITS, FS, ESPNS, FGS etc Lyndaship (talk) 15:13, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Please note there is an ongoing discussion about including countries other than the United States. I'd appreciate input from other editors. Thanks. – Asarlaí ^(talk) 22:11, 16 January 2025 (UTC)

Does anyone know how to fix the table at the above location? It's currently showing zero pages in most non-article categories. Looks to be the result of a recent move of these categories eg from Category:Disambig-Class military history articles to Category:Disambig-Class military history pages - Dumelow (talk) 15:36, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

Hi all. Recently the infobox to Angolan Civil War has been amended to include a long list of the various nationalities that served as foreign mercenaries or volunteers during that conflict. This results in the respective nations essentially being listed under the "combatants" heading of the infobox. I think this is highly unusual, and most of the other conflict-related articles I've read or revised do not have this feature, even those in which foreign fighters took part, whether as mercenaries or otherwise. As is it seems to make the infobox rather bloated, and I'm in favor of restricting the use of the "combatants" section solely to national governments which participated directly in hostilities. Thoughts? Katangais (talk) 00:27, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Agreed. "From that country" =/= "That country was a combatant". - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 00:36, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

@SpinnerLaserzthe2nd:: Please explain why the listing of different nationalities of mercenaries is necessary in the combatants section of the infobox. I've yet to see this in any other conflict-related article, so I'm genuinely puzzled at its inclusion at Angolan Civil War. --Katangais (talk) 05:18, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Look at the Iran–Iraq War article for example. You can see under volunteers. We could either:

• • • A. Place the mercenaries under the “units involved” section since the infobox had a Units section
    • B. Keep it as it was SpinnerLaserzthe2nd (talk) 05:50, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Iran–Iraq War lists general foreign fighters as combatants (ie "Shia volunteers" and "Arab volunteers"). The equivalent would be adding "foreign mercenaries" to the combatants list for Angolan Civil War. There's no need to list the individual nationalities of all the mercenaries as separate combatants in the infobox, especially alongside state actors. --Katangais (talk) 07:45, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

We could still list the indiviual nationalities under "units involved" section. SpinnerLaserzthe2nd (talk) 10:34, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Nationalities are not units. That’s the type of information that would be useful in the body of the article, but too granular for the infobox. --Katangais (talk) 17:29, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

• Mercenaries do not represent their country of origin and should not be presented in a way that suggests they do. They are not state players or a faction in a civil war so they do not belong under "belligerents" in the infobox. They are not a "unit" unless they are organised into a specific unit. Per MOS:INFOBOXPURPOSE, the infobox is not the place for nuance or detail. An extensive list of units would be inappropriate. WP:OTHERCONTENT arguments have no substance unless the other stuff represents best practice - ie two wrongs don't make a right. Cinderella157 (talk) 04:03, 19 January 2025 (UTC)

Please see Talk:Polish–Ottoman War (1620–1621)#RFC: How should the war be characterized in the infobox? WhatamIdoing (talk) 08:49, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

Why is orig-year being replaced by orig-date? Thanks Keith-264 (talk) 13:07, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

|orig-date= is the canonical form and |orig-year= is the alias.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 16:19, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, as far as I know, 1925 is a year not a date, hence orig-year or am I under a misapprehension? Regards Keith-264 (talk) 17:39, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

As 23 January 1925 is a date, so too is 1925; both |orig-date=23 January 1925 and |orig-date=1925 are semantically correct. The reverse is not true: 1925 is a year date, but 23 January 1925 is not a year date. |orig-date= became the canonical and preferred form because editors complained about the dissonance of |orig-year=23 January 1925.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 20:49, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Why not both? Regards Keith-264 (talk) 22:34, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't know what you mean by that question.

—Trappist the monk (talk) 14:03, 24 January 2025 (UTC)

This page hasn't been updated or properly sourced in 15 years. Please, rescue it or go to WP:AfD. 2025 is a year of decisive action. Bearian (talk) 06:50, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Another military article unsourced 15 years. Time for us to decide what to do: add sources or discuss deleting it. Bearian (talk) 17:34, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

List of wars involving the United States could use some attention from experience editors. Despite the accessibility concerns and lack of sources...there seems to be a little criteria for the list. Not sure how something like Operation Ocean Shield is a war. Seems to be confusion between military assistance, military interventions and military deployments etc. Moxy🍁 23:02, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Not sure if this is the right place to respond, but I'll do it anyway. The reason for this is because in reality it's meant to be a list of armed conflicts, not just specifically wars. Every "List of wars involving" page does it this way. Obviously the title doesn't exactly correlate to the topic, but at this point I feel like you either just have to deal with it (either way they are very simple and recognisable titles) or go out of your way to try and rename hundreds of pages like this. Setergh (talk) 12:34, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

@Setergh: @Moxy: Why do not move these articles to lists such as List of armed conflicts involving the United States? Eurohunter (talk) 20:00, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Up to you, but once again, you'd be forced to do this to hundreds of pages. You might as well just leave it, it's quite a recognisable title anyway and gets the point across. Setergh (talk) 21:20, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

Many articles (narrowly artillery, but we also do this for aircraft engines) include a list under their 'See also' section for a list of Howitzers of similar caliber, role, era, and capability, i.e. 155mm towed artillery of the '70s. Is this redudant [sic] ?

I reverted this, prompting a comment here. But then realised that they'd blanked a whole bunch of them too: Special:Contributions/Eurohunter (20 Jan 2025). I would support restoring the lot. It's a useful section for a comparison and pointer to related articles. Very far from "there is no point in doing this."

Thoughts? @Eurohunter: Andy Dingley (talk) 18:09, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Me and other people already removed similar redundant lists from articles about tanks. This is just a list of other howitizers unrelated to this one. The whole point of see also is to add links to articles which haven't been mentioned yet in the article, so once they are mentioned in the article you remove them from see also - in this case there are just unrelated articles which will never be described in the text as it has nothing to do unless you have sources for some kind of comparison. Eurohunter (talk) 18:14, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

I think you ought to read WP:SEEALSO, which does not support your argument, Eurohunter. Parsecboy (talk) 18:16, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

@Parsecboy: Are you sure? "A "See also" section is a useful way to organize internal links to related or comparable articles and build the web". Eurohunter (talk) 19:44, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

What are other, similar howitzers of the same period if not "comparable articles"? Parsecboy (talk) 20:22, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

@Parsecboy: How it makes it comparable? There should be direct source which clearly indicate comparison in some way - some kind of professional review, opinion from forces etc. Eurohunter (talk) 22:27, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

Because that's what the the word "comparable" means? There are no sources required to identify articles that meet that basic definition. Parsecboy (talk) 23:40, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

Now you're just shifting goalposts in the hope that something will stick. You first claimed that these comparisons were redundant. Now you're claiming they're so significant that they must be easily sourceable. Which is it? Andy Dingley (talk) 00:08, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, "See also" exists for a reason, and it's not the reason Eurohunter apparently thinks it is. - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 00:11, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

@Andy Dingley: I don't know for what or I'm not sure what do you want to say by "Now you're" - so simpy the answer is both answers are correct. These lists (SPAM) were redundant to these articles, as there was no any criteria to add them - they were just random - why do not add 3, 4 or 15 more yet? There is no reason to cancel edits and they should be restored. If they are comparable then they shoud be mentioned in text with sources - this is far connection to these articles, so if you add them to section see also without any description it's very not clear why they are there. For this reason I didn't removed some see also as there was reason provided why they are there. Eurohunter (talk) 21:08, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

The see also section is expressly for similar or related articles that do not warrant being included in the prose. You need to revert your edits to the affected articles, as they are entirely without merit or basis in policy, procedure, or precedent. Parsecboy (talk) 00:37, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

@Parsecboy: "The see also section is expressly for similar or related articles that do not warrant being included in the prose" - yes but it's not reason to add whole lists of unrelated articles (SPAM). There is no any description after link. Eurohunter (talk) 15:45, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

Except that they are related based on weapon type, caliber, and function. You would have a case if someone added a 20mm antiaircraft gun to the 155mm howitzer article being discussed, but the weapons in the list presented are all similar in caliber, type, and function. These lists are quite helpful if a reader wants to see what other kinds of howitzers were used during the time period in question. Calling them SPAM is ridiculous. Intothatdarkness 15:51, 23 January 2025 (UTC)

@Intothatdarkness: There was no any description after link. Anyway, I could understand if these would be previous or next models of this same manufacturer, just not mentioned yet in the text or artilerry of other manufacturers but with something especially relted to be written in the articke in the future. Article should explain all related articlery, not see also sction. In this way we could focus on making see also lists than writting articles. If 100 countries would have comparable own artillery, would you add all of them? There are lists such as List of artillery by country or more lists at List of artillery by type. Why not just them? Eurohunter (talk) 19:58, 26 January 2025 (UTC)

As far as I'm concerned it makes more sense to deal with this as is being done now. Your argument is not persuasive. Intothatdarkness 02:21, 27 January 2025 (UTC)

Has ru, pl and bg interwikis at https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4154317 - but I was surprised to find nothing on en or in most other languages. Seems like a basic and notable military topic. _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 13:18, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Possibly covered by articles on such topics as Proving ground, Bombing range and perhaps various types of test and training facilities? Donner60 (talk) 07:35, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

@Donner60 Related topics, but missing the red linked parent article, no? _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 08:11, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

It could be easier for some readers to find under the weapons range title with links to the other articles for further information. Perhaps a redirect to proving ground might not be comprehensive enough to cover it all. I didn't further scrutinize it, however. Donner60 (talk) 06:01, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draft:Battle_of_Rey_(1059)# Kartal1071 (talk) 14:50, 28 January 2025 (UTC)

You are more likely to get a review of a draft article (especially as you are a relatively new user) at Wikipedia:Articles for creation. Since this is a new request, I suggest that this request not be removed for several days, at least, to see if any experienced editor who regularly reads this page nonetheless is willing to review it. Donner60 (talk) 06:37, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

Thank you Kartal1071 (talk) 18:11, 29 January 2025 (UTC)

• I moved punctuation before the references per Wikipedia's Manual of Style and other spacing/formatting fixes. -Fnlayson (talk) 19:52, 30 January 2025 (UTC)

Over at this aircrash article talkpage, there is a (trio? I think it's a trio...) of editors who already labelled one of the army helo pilots as "racist" because of where he went to school as a kid. They're just itching to get all three helo crew id's (literally screaming for them, like a newsroom editor in a drama flick), so they can post this in the article. And why? Becuase apparently we're competing with Trump, and this will somehow counter his comments about DEI...? (can't make this stuff up).

They literally just died hours ago, in uniform in service to their country, and now their families, friends, and service colleagues are to see this; the latest from WP's new tabloid division. Is there an admin here that can go there and bring a little sanity to article and tp? Thank you - \\'cLf 01:02, 31 January 2025 (UTC)

This is not the place to report conduct issues. See AN, ANI, etc, as appropriate. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 01:10, 31 January 2025 (UTC)

Please see Template Talk:Army Center of Military History#Dead links. --Altenmann >talk 02:42, 31 January 2025 (UTC)