Talk:Police Regiment Centre/GA1

GA Review

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Reviewer: Chetsford (talk · contribs) 07:39, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)
It is reasonably well written. a (prose, spelling, and grammar): Everything looks fine and I was unable to find any errors. The only minor issue I had, and I don't think this is a reason to hold-up the review on this point, is that this sentence - According to the after-action report, "suspicious strangers" (Ortsfremde), that is "partisans", could not be found but the screening of the population revealed fifty-one Jewish civilians, of whom thirty-two were shot. - has a lot of commas in it that can make it a bit difficult to read. Everything is good. There are no unnecessary lists. No DAB issues detected. b (MoS for lead, layout, word choice, fiction, and lists): The lead complies with WP:LEAD as an accurate representation of the article that is of sufficient length for the body of it. The layout seems atypical for a military/police article, however, I think there is reasonable justification for using the approach the author has undertaken; the "Decrypts by British Intelligence" section does not seem WP:UNDUE due to its relative historic significance. Article does not use the Oxford comma, however, lack of use is consistent in compliance with MOS:SERIAL. I found no other issues with MOS. It is factually accurate and verifiable. a (references): Those books I've been able to access all check-out. I have not been able to access Massimo, Tessin & Kannapin, or Curilla and will, therefore, ask for a second opinion before final passage. b (citations to reliable sources): The sources are all books published by either academic publishers or reputable mainstream publishers. I've checked the author name of each and, insofar as I can tell, each is reputable, including Joseph E. Persico, Richard Breitman, etc. I cannot find credentials on Philip Blood and, I regret, I am not familiar with him, however, the book in question received a positive review in a reputable journal [1]. Everyone else appears to have acceptable credentials for writing on this topic. c (OR): Based on an initial and cursory check, no issues here. (Pending final review of sources.) d (copyvio and plagiarism): I checked this via Earwig which shows "Violation Unlikely". Quotation marks are used where material is directly quoted. No excessive quoting observed. It is broad in its coverage. a (major aspects): I feel like there is more that could (in a perfect world) be written, however, it also appears much of the operational history of the regiment is more appropriate for standalone articles on its subordinate units (largely redlinked in this article), which would be consistent with the general treatment of military units on Wikipedia. Further, based on my own research [a check on Google Books and JSTOR] it appears this article represents the essential bulk of what is generally available on this subject, versus what I might like to be available on it. Notably, the only treatment I could locate of this on JSTOR was a single article in Vol. 26, No. 3/4 of the Journal of Contemporary History that contains only a fleeting mention and does not have any further information than what is already contained here. I will green-tick this section, however, will ask for a second opinion on this criteria prior to a final pass. b (focused): article meets criteria It follows the neutral point of view policy. Fair representation without bias: There are some emotive phrases in here like "reports on the murderous activities" which would customarily, I think, be inappropriate for an article on a military unit. That said, this is obviously a unique case and this terminology represents the historical consensus. (Of course, even then, it would not be supported as a normative descriptive approach by Johan Galtung's theory of peace journalism which eschews atrocity verbiage in the chronicling of conflict no matter how flagrant the atrocities in question are, but I digress.) Everything looks good. It is stable. No edit wars, etc.: There is no evidence of edit warring. There was a discussion on the Talk page regarding a possible merge, but editors supporting that subsequently declared their neutrality / ambivalence. A minor outstanding question regarding the availability of a possible new source from the U.S. Library of Congress was last addressed four days ago with the note that access to it would be postponed indefinitely. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate. a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): There is only one image, however, my own search is unable to find additional free images that could be used, so this may represent the limit available. Obviously an image of the PRM itself would be ideal but we can't put in what we don't have. A unit badge, flash, or distinctive unit insignia in the infobox would also be ideal, but it's unclear what that is. An order of battle could also be used to supplement the paucity of photographs; again, however, it doesn't appear enough reputable information exists at this detail level to create one, due partly to the fact that this seems to have been an ad hoc formation with battalions attached and removed as the conflict progressed. The photograph we have is correctly CC 3.0 licensed. b (appropriate use with suitable captions): Image is captioned and has an ALT tag. It is relevant to the article.
Overall: Pass/Fail:
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This is as far as I can get at the moment. I will be going to the library this weekend anyway so will check the sources then and circle back. Chetsford (talk) 08:16, 18 January 2018 (UTC)

This is a very well-written, well-researched, neat and concise article that - in my opinion - represents a full treatment of the subject to the extent that such a treatment is possible without the nom himself conducting WP:OR. As mentioned above, however, I'll ask for a second opinion before passing as there were a couple sources I could not access. Plus, there are at least two other editors who seem to have an interest in, and greater knowledge of, the subject of the article. Chetsford (talk) 20:34, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Thank you for the review so far. If there are any questions about the sources, I'd be happy to answer them. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:05, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

@Chetsford: Hi there! Generally, if the source you are trying to access is a physical book or requires a paid membership to access, it is acceptable to assume good faith. Let me know if you have any other questions!--Dom497 (talk) 03:29, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

Dom497 - thanks so much ... this was my inclination but I wanted to get some validation that it would be a correct course of action which, I think, you've provided! K.e.coffman - since this is a somewhat complex subject, if you don't mind I'll let it sit with the second opinion tag open for another day or two (in case anyone has any issues I wasn't able to detect) and then, assuming there's no further feedback, promote it. Chetsford (talk) 05:25, 21 January 2018 (UTC)

Chetsford, my point (on the talk page) about the non-genocidal work this regiment performed has, I think, been addressed in terms of coverage. One thing I would suggest needs a little more explanation at the beginning of the body is what the Orpo was, its putative role, and how it was recruited. This goes to understanding that many of these atrocities were committed by what were ordinary public order police. A bit more context wouldn't hurt in that regard, and I don't think the link to Orpo suffices. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 10:27, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

K.e.coffman - would it be possible to add a background section that communicates a brief overview of the Orpo? Chetsford (talk) 18:10, 22 January 2018 (UTC)

Will do; please give me a couple of days to formulate it. K.e.coffman (talk) 03:10, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Additions

I added two new sections, with new and restructured material:

• Police_Regiment_Centre#Background and formation
• Police_Regiment_Centre#Aftermath.

I still need to add a bit on the purpose of the unit; I'll do this tomorrow. K.e.coffman (talk) 04:46, 27 January 2018 (UTC)

@Chetsford: I'm done with the expansion at this point. --K.e.coffman (talk) 03:44, 31 January 2018 (UTC)

I've checked the additions as far as they can be checked and see no issues with sourcing, MOS, grammar, etc. The only possible issue is this line - "ready to serve the regime's aims of conquest and racial annihilation" - seems a bit emotive. Could it possibly be toned down to something like "to serve the German government's strategic aims" or something? Maybe it's fine as-is, though. Since Peacemaker67 previously weighed-in here, I'll ping him for his thoughts. Short of this, though, I think it's ready for GA. Chetsford (talk) 00:51, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

I feel that in this case, the language is appropriate. Below are some examples from Westermann (I'm currently reading it so it's fresh in my mind, but that's pretty much the language in any book on Barbarossa). From the foreword by Dennis Showalter (pp. xiii–xiv):

• "...in what is arguably best understood as a racial war with military elements that began in 1933 and ended only with the regime's annihilation in 1945."
• "[By 1941, Orpo policemen] had become part of the organisational culture of genocide..."
• "The trail of atrocities that the police battalions left in their wake (...) was part of a premeditated campaign of annihilation, ordered from the Reich's summit, and privileged at all levels".

From Westermann proper, "Introduction" (pp. 3–5):

• "... the Einsatzgruppen entered the Soviet Union on a mission of conquest, exploitation, and extermination".
• "During Hitler's "crusade" in the Soviet Union, Himmler's police emerged as one of the primary instruments for the conduct of racial war, and the transformation of these men from civil servants into political soldiers offers a key insight on how men become murderers in support of an atavistic and malevolent campaign of destruction".

...you get the idea -- and that's only up to page 5. I thus prefer to keep the current language as I find it to be factual, rather than emotive. K.e.coffman (talk) 01:34, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

Okay, seems fine to me then. Passed to GA. Chetsford (talk) 02:07, 1 February 2018 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.