Talk:Joseph Stalin/Archive 12

message: User Lysy and User:Encyclopaedia Editing Dude recently removed from the article links to a reliable archival source related to deportations, i.e. the State Defense Committee Decree No. 5859ss. They placed links several BBC articles instead, which clearly do not meet the WP:RS criteria as well as neutrality policy. I tried to revert these edits, but had been blocked by a POV sysop.
My version:
Shortly before, during and immediately after World War II, Stalin conducted a series of deportations on a huge scale which profoundly affected the ethnic map of the Soviet Union. Over 1.5 million people were deported to Siberia and the Central Asian republics. Separatism, resistance to Soviet rule and collaboration with the invading Germans were cited as the official reasons for the deportations. During the deportations of Crimean Tatars and other minorities from Crimea during the World War II, the property of the deported was mostly shipped to the new place of living with other property bought by the state. Each deported family was given a loan of about 50000 roubles for 7 years without charge for interest to startup in the new place State Defense Committee Decree No. 5859ss (International Committee for Crimea)Resolution of State Defence Committee №5859ss, May 14, 1944, Moscow, Kremlin [Russian State Archive of Social-Political History, ф.644, оп.1, д.252, л.142-144]. 
Their version:
Shortly before, during and immediately after World War II, Stalin conducted a series of deportations on a huge scale which profoundly affected the ethnic map of the Soviet Union. Over 1.5 million people were deported to Siberia and the Central Asian republics. Separatism, resistance to Soviet rule and collaboration with the invading Germans were cited as the official reasons for the deportations. Deportees were forced to leave their property behind, many died or were executed on their way to deportation destinations. Those who survived were forced to work for free in the labour camps. Many of the deportees died of hunger or other deadly conditions.  
-- Nixer 19:56, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: As there are no objections in two weeks, it would be better probably to return the version with souces back.--Nixer 11:55, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, right. I see more sources are needed indeed .//Encyclopaedia Editing Dude 12:33, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Please stop deleting archival sources.--Nixer 17:01, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

text: The archival source does not say anything about numbers. It is just official order how the deportation should conduct. The 1,5 million figure is from the pre edit-war part of the subarticle.--Nixer 17:30, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

text: So that's way you are deleting sources how it was in reality? //Encyclopaedia Editing Dude 17:48, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

text: In fact, in Nazi Germay they were supposed to go to death. Please stop inserting your propaganda and deleting archival souces. You will not succeed.--Nixer 18:04, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

text: Primary sources are typically not acceptable for an Encyclopedia. I have substantial doubt as to the reliability of documents produced by the USSR at that time, unless they are substantiated by Reliable Sources. Documents produced by the USSR at that time have been demonstrated to be innacurate. Additionally, Primary Source documents can be used only to make purely descriptive claims. I do not support their inclusion. JBKramer 18:28, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: How an official order can be unreliable?--Nixer 18:48, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Orders written down in the USSR were not always the orders carried out. JBKramer 18:50, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, but that is not the excuse to remove the order from the relevant section. Seeng this order one can conclude what did Stalin ordered (which is important in an article about Stalin). We of course can add that some people contest that the deportations were conducted preciesly according the order.--Nixer 18:56, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Can I ask you a question with no ill-will intended, and not as a personal attack, I swear? Are you a Stalinist? The questions you are asking appear to either be incredibly naieve or that of a believer. JBKramer 19:08, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

text: I need not identify a motive in this case. It falls apon the individual who wishes to include primary sources to find reliable secondary sources that support their assertions. JBKramer 20:11, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This is getting ridiculous, its not article about deportations, its article about Stalin and we only need to give short overview of deportations not detailed explanation. So that how crimean tatars should had been deported officially is quite irrelevat as this article is not place for describing how one certain nation was deported. About 18 or so nations were deported, there is no reason why we should give so much attention to crimean tatars(or any other ethnic group).--Staberinde 07:22, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

text: The document is not only related to Crimean Tatars.--Nixer 14:01, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Its mainly related only to crimean tatars. Practically all second paragraph should be deleted as it goes into details of deportations of certain nations, that clearly doesn't belong to the article which should be short overview.--Staberinde 18:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please do not delete other points of wiev saing the article is too long. If you want it to be short, please treat all POVs equally.--Nixer 15:21, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Yes, but what left after the deletion? One point of view was deleted completely while the other remained in the article.--Nixer 16:09, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Deletion was based not on POVs but on the fact that about 20 nations were deported and to the article which is meant to be short overview doesn't belong descriptions of separate deportations. In this article needs to be only general information not small details(both POVs were equal in front of deletion). Btw, i would say that paragraph what I deleted could be also called anti-Stalin. But what do you expect, its the deportations, they are generally one of the most condemmned of Stalin's actions.--Staberinde 20:33, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removing archive sources. 

message: This is a very fine line we are treading here. Are we arguing history or historiography? It is impossible (IMO) to seperate the two and come out with a complete understanding of an issue. For example, historian Eric Hobsbawm discusses ad length Soviet Communism, and in his work "The Age of Catastrophe," he mentions that "The years of 1942-45 were the only time when Stalin paused his terror." even though he is a believer in communism himself. The difficulty with history is facts and figures don't necessarily refelct the actuality of a situation. The historiography of the first world war is immense and leaves more than a few with divided opinions. Fritz Fischer can be drawn upon here, as he has been accused by several historians that he used citations as actual fact or took them out of context (Ritter, Jarausch on Fischer's thesis "Germany's War Aims in the First World War"). Thus not all citations are unequivocal in history. Another point is that it doesn't give the necessary scope to the issue. To touch upon the first world war again, the July crisis is listed as a simple, linear series of events that triggered the war. It focuses on what can be seen internally than externally. It disregards what can be seen as facts and possibilities (that Germany egged Austria-Hungary for war, that Bethmann-Hollweg took a calculated risk in war, that isolationism influenced German reactions to the arms race)
This is why I think it is important to attempt to come up with as close to a synthesis as possible regarding history, or cite what can be generally agreed upon by historians. In this case at the very least Stalin would be classified as Totalitarian.  
Merriam-Webster dictionary cites historiography as "the writing of history; especially : the writing of history based on the critical examination of sources, the selection of particulars from the authentic materials, and the synthesis of particulars into a narrative that will stand the test of critical methods." Therefore, although scholarly historiography can be seen as a point of view, it poses theses based on historical reference and attempts to factualize the less concrete examples of history. It is the problem that history is not always unequivocal, that we need to find organized and scholarly correlations between events, statistics, peoples etc. 
Further, according to Merriam-Webster dictionary the definition of Encyclopedia is: "a work that contains information on all branches of knowledge or treats comprehensively a particular branch of knowledge usually in articles arranged alphabetically often by subject"  thus isn't the point of an encyclopedia, in the context of history, to try and grasp all historiographical perspectives? Some see the interwar years as an attempt to stablilize europe. Others see it as "Thirty-One Years' War." Should we not give examples of both? Both which could be factually true in different contexts? Could this not extend to historical figures as well? 
I'm just throwing ideas out there.
64.231.65.246 07:31, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  History or Historiography? 

message: I can't edit the page right now, but someone should add Anti-Stalinist left in the "See also" section. Thanks !--Inbloom2 22:02, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  See also 

message: Britannica says Stalin was paranoid. Shell we add this into the article with a link to Britannica?--Nixer 20:35, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Britannica