Talk:History of Russia/Archive 2

message: We are adding fact tags to all relevant sections. From there spotlight is going to give it a shot to reference this. —— Eagle101Need help? 22:49, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  {{tl|fact}} tags 

message: Where is the POV? Remember having multiple viewpoints is fine, just we have to represent them all in the article. First off once the whole thing is mostly cited, we can lop off anything that is not cited, and we can't find sources for. Then we can figure out if there any excessive problems with points of view. —— Eagle101Need help? 18:27, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I've seen some of the pov in the statements as I was going along - especially in some of the latter sections.--danielfolsom 21:04, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Then lets go ahead and make an attempt to fix it. :) —— Eagle101Need help? 21:08, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV 

message: I looked the article over, concentrating on my speciality - history of Poland. Some comments:
* 'Peter the Great' section: "the reconquest of Kiev" - consider linking Eternal Peace Treaty of 1686 somehow
* same section: I would add a note to the Silent Sejm, which marked he beginning of Russian Empire increasing influence and control over the Commonwealth
* 'Ruling the Empire' section: I'd merge the references to Catherine growing control over the Commonwealth and partitions of Poland into one paragraph
* same sections: "she incorporated the Ukrainian and Belarusian territories..." - and Lithuanian too; one may also discuss whether any of the territories incorporated in the Russian partition could be Polish or not - I'd suggest dropping the enumeration of 'whose territories' were incorporated altogether
* general comment: I see quite a few places individual wars could be linked - thanks to the WP:MILHIST we have articles on almost every war by know :)
* 'Imperial Russia since the Decembrist Revolt' - linking November Uprising and January Uprising should be easy
* Would-be revolutionaries were sent off to Siberia - Sybiraks...
* 'Ideological schisms and reaction' section: see Talk:Slavophile for some possible POV spilling of here
* 'World War II' section: "following which Germany and Poland occupied Czech territories" - and Hungary, if we want to mention all participants
* Soviet invasion of Poland (1939), a FA since a few days, has some good citations for that period, including on Soviet diplomacy before the invasion and various issues mentioned in the paragraph here. There should also be a pic for the section, there are quite a few to chose from. Maps, too :)
* there is an entire para on Soviet losses during WWII. A notable subject, certainly, and nobody can deny Soviet Union suffered greatly in that war - but to be neutral, shouldn't we mention losses inflicted by the Soviet Union on other nations (Poland, Baltic states, Romania, Germany...) during that period? Their human losses also go up to millions. Yes, this is a sensitive matter, but also an issue to address.
* 'Cold War section. Yalta agreement should link to Yalta conference, not Yalta. Sure, sofixit, and I may, but this indicates (per my comment about individual wars) that there seem to be quite a few unlinked terms, or pipes that should be made more detailed.
* the section seems to be missing any comment on how Soviets terrorized people in countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia or the Balkans, supporting local communist parties with the Red Army fist and helping to eliminate (kill) all opponents. Lack of the ilink to Stalinization is a major omission.
* the latter sections should note that the fall of communism meant not only the break-up of the USSR, but also end of the Eastern Bloc, with Eastern European nations (Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc.) regaining full independence
* the history virtually stops with the 21st century. Some expansion is needed.
* Comments by -- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  22:00, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Various comments

message: ====Ivan IV, the Terrible====
The development of the tsar's autocratic powers reached a peak during the reign (1547–1584) of Ivan IV ("Ivan the Terrible"). He strengthened the position of the monarch to an unprecedented degree, as he ruthlessly subordinated the nobles to his will, exiling or executing many on the slightest provocation.  Nevertheless, Ivan was a farsighted statesman who promulgated a new code of laws, and reformed the morals of the clergy, and established the diplomatic and trade relations with the Low Countries and England.
—— Eagle101Need help? 03:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hard sources to find 

message: The development of the tsar's autocratic powers reached a peak during the reign (1547–1584) of Ivan IV ("Ivan the Terrible"). He strengthened the position of the monarch to an unprecedented degree, as he ruthlessly subordinated the nobles to his will, exiling or executing many on the slightest provocation.  Nevertheless, Ivan was a farsighted statesman who promulgated a new code of laws, and reformed the morals of the clergy, and established the diplomatic and trade relations with the Low Countries and England.
—— Eagle101Need help? 03:46, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Ivan IV, the Terrible

message: I have little interest in what happens on WP:FAC and WP:FARC these days, since I know that most users I hold in high esteem chose to abandon these pages after they became subjected to serious trolling and incivility. But I do care when the FARC activity impacts mainspace negatively. Today I stumbled upon the FARCed page History of Russia, which - although it contains 137 inline citations - was intentionally made unreadable by further addition of 283 {citation needed} tags. I have almost infinite resources of good faith, but they are not sufficient to persuade me that 283 identical tags could have been added to an article in good faith. 
Most statements that were marked as unsourced are fairly trivial, such as, "Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812". It seems to me that every sentence was systematically tagged in a bot-like fashion or semi-automatically, although there is no requirement to source every sentence, even in a featured article. I find this approach to editing highly objectionable. With almost 300 identical tags, we are heading nowhere: not only they are annoying, but they make reading the article virtually impossible. 
At best, the current tagging spree results in addition of perfectly random citations generated by Google Book search, which serve no useful purpose. An elaborately sourced article is not always a good or even reliable article. Every fringe claim may be sourced - and it would pass unnoticed in this mess of tags. I would welcome a new essay along the lines of Wikipedia:Tag trolling to discribe this particular form of disruption. --Ghirla-трёп- 17:59, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: wrong dif. This provides a better picture of what happened.Geni 18:15, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  No, the diff is correct. I removed the "no inline citations" tag, since the article has 137 of them, and was rudely reverted, with addition of a fringe claim. The tag does *not* reflect the content of the page. If Danny is still working on the referencing, he is welcome to continue the work in his user space. Adding so many tags to mainspace is disruptive. If he plans to work in mainspace, he is expected to lock the article with {inuse} tag, to make it clear that the overtagged version of the page is temporary. --Ghirla-трёп- 18:33, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Well, I basically agree with you (though this probably isn't an admin issue). I removed the tags but got reverted with a reasoning I don't quite follow. Haukur 18:23, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What I did was simply revert your removal of *all* the tags. I don't mind if someone goes through and prunes the un neded tags out. Please note that the person that added all those tags, is also the same person that found 80 citations. As of about 1 week ago that page had only 4 inline citations, now it is over 100. —— Eagle101Need help? 18:26, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: And yet the article is much harder to read than it was a week ago. Doesn't that strike you as a weird sort of improvement? Haukur 18:28, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text:  (edit conflict) The tags are meant to tell people when sentences that need citations don't have one - you've mentioned one tag that might not be there, but one in 272 (by my count it's 272) isn't reason to remove all 272 --danielfolsom 18:27, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: If you see something that has been tagged wrongly (such as the napolean example above) go ahead and remove the tag, but please don't call what has happened trolling, this was a good faith effort to improve that article. Again I'm sure that some of the tags are not needed, but there are some places were some inline cites would be useful. —— Eagle101Need help? 18:31, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: They've all been tagged wrongly, because they were tagged systematically. The fact that you might happen to get lucky sometimes does not justify the process undertaken. Christopher Parham (talk) 18:43, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text:  We have a general {unreferenced} tag. There is no added benefit in adding {citation needed} to every sentence in the article. --Ghirla-трёп- 18:30, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Other then the fact that [citation needed] tags tell you exactly where and what needs cited. —— Eagle101Need help? 18:31, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Except that in this case they don't. The point of those tags is for isolated statements that particularly need citation, not for use after every sentence or (as was done here) in multiple places in many sentences. In many cases, an entire paragraph or section comes from one or two sources, so there is no reason to expect every sentence "needs" a citation. This isn't trolling, I agree, but it is inappropriate. — Carl (CBM · talk) 18:35, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Since I suppose Wikipedia was originally intended for reading rather than for referencing, ca. 300 citation tags distract the readers and make going through the page next to impossible. --Ghirla-трёп- 18:41, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the one editor who, for whatever reason, is working very hard to provide sources for every sentence might be better off accumulting those references in a sandbox or in a subpage of user space. The hundreds of tags distract the general reader and call into question the validity of a high quality article.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 18:38, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: I also stick to 1RR, so I did not revert "again". I don't agree that the statement that "Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812" desperately needs a citation. If you think about some specific assertions that need to be cited, you should remove excessive tags and leave those which you think are helpful. Restoring all 283 of them does not impress me. --Ghirla-трёп- 18:39, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I have reverted - seeing as i have yet to revert that specific edit, but CBM no one's saying every sentence needs one - however many (easily most) of the sentences do, so clearing everything out because of a few issues is insane - and Ghirl... clearing it all out during an active discussion is asking for an edit war. Fine- if you are just willing to clear everything out rather than go through yourself fine, Eagle and I can go through and remove the ones that shouldn't be there, but there's no point in removing all 272 of them - especially since many of those do need tags.--danielfolsom 18:41, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Many sentences have multiple fact tags. The name of the template may be misleading you into thinking that every fact needs a separate tag, which is not true. Put one tag per sentence, at most; if the citation provided doesn't cover something, you can add another tag later. — Carl (CBM · talk) 18:44, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: What makes you believe that many of these facts require citation? Christopher Parham (talk) 18:49, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: We agree on that then :) "Napoleon invaded Russia in 1812" does not need a citation. However there are some parts of this article that are still in need of some inline citations. I would estimate propery done there might be a total 5-10 requests for a citation. As there is one editor working hard on this, I might, if you agree, go through and add in citations needed tags only where they are needed. (should be net total of 5-10 tags) —— Eagle101Need help? 18:43, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I tried editing this page yesterday and I gave up. I added a few inline cites before I realised the futility of what was being demanded. There are a few problems with this article but the tagging is excessive. Let's save the citations for the following: statistics; statements of opinion; quotations; facts or interpretations which are likely to be challenged as controversial and need bolstering with reliable sources. Frankly, Russian victory in the Great Northern War or the establishment of Saint Petersburg as the new capital in the early 18th century don't come into those categories. As it stands, the page is a total mess which is getting harder and harder to load, let alone edit. Some of the inline citations already in place for obvious facts need removing.  --Folantin 18:46, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreeed, so lets step back for a second, make sure everyone is ok with this proposed way forward. Remove all tags, but allow for people who are interested to re-add tags that are actually needed. Its probably better this way as removing 150 tags is harder then adding 10 or so. —— Eagle101Need help? 18:49, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Also a small note, can we move this to the talk page? (of the article?) —— Eagle101Need help? 18:52, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That's a good idea. --Folantin 18:53, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, well as this is the admin noticeboard, and this is already here, I'm going to request that the article be unprotected, so that one of the following actions may take place on it. 1) Remove all tags, and re-add specific tags if there really needs to be a cite. OR 2) Allow people to go and remove specific cites, to prune down the number of citations. It seems if all parties agree to that, and it does seem the crux of the matter. —— Eagle101Need help? 18:57, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text:  Yeah I was about to say ... it's been agreed that a lot of the  tags should be removed (trivial  tags should be removed, the full sections without a lot of facts should be changed to  and the rest of the s should be left) - so why was it protected?--danielfolsom 18:58, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I protected it because of the rapid reverting between the two versions . I put the expiry at six hours because I didn't think it would take long to settle, but the discussion here seems to have settled down even faster. I'll unprotect it once I get this discussion moved over to the talk page. — Carl (CBM · talk) 19:08, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: It's simply a bit easier if you remove tags rather than add.--danielfolsom 19:13, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I understand, but sometimes it’s best to clear the deck and then resume work, especially when everyone is fussing over who sweeps and who mops. Askari Mark (Talk) 19:16, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The need is simply to remove extra tags. (these were added by user danny mostly, who added more then 80 citations himself). There are some sections that can use the tags, but some that don't need them. I think that has been agreed upon. —— Eagle101Need help? 19:19, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: I don't really see how it's easier, and it creates the undesirable situation that if 50 people find a statement doubtful, and 1 does not, the tag is removed and the no citation is requested for the statement. The best policy is that if someone has reason to doubt the accuracy of a statement, they should add a tag; that way, editors can contact that individual to get an idea of what about the statement drew his concern. Christopher Parham (talk) 19:21, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Ok - I forgot it was taking a while to load b/c of the temps - give me 15-20 minutes - however as you can see I've removed a good number--danielfolsom 19:33, 27 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  283 citation tags in an article 

message: I wonder how this article managed to satisfy FA criteria with four inline references only.Colchicum 19:15, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It hasn't. It wouldn't. Not anymore anyway. I suggest a FAR immediately unless about 100 more inline citations appear asap (or begin to appear). Okiefromokla•talk 20:23, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I think there are citations in the forcast for this article's immediate future :). —— Eagle101Need help? 22:49, 20 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  FA 

message: Citations are useful and no one is attacking the need of citations where needed. The question here is where is the line between putting citation requests "where needed" and putting them everywhere. Any article, no matter how comprehensive one, can be tag-trolled with citation requests and saturated with "fact" tags to an extent of making it unreadable. Citations request for the sake of citation requests is nothing but disruption. The facts that Napoleon attacked in 1812 and Hitler in 1941, the fact that the Soviet Union was devastated in the WW2 being tagged with "fact" is merely ridiculous. And even if one disagrees with the last statement, there is no doubt that somewhere there the line exists between the contributive tagging and disruptive tagging. Adding 300 tags to an article is nothing but a disgrace.
No one doubts that the article was undercited and FAR was useful. I did not vote there to keep the FA-status and work on the article's improvement and referencing together with all others who are interested. But I condemn in strongest terms the rabid saturation of good text with "fact" tags senselessly. Where goes the line between the senseless and sensible  citation requests is a question to discuss but there is no doubt that the recent events with this article was an example of excessive and disruptive tagging. 
That said, I will do my best to fill in the needed citations and further develop the article. While this is going on, the FAR is best to be put on hold. --Irpen 18:30, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Citation requests can be useful. They can also be disruptive

message: *Slightly rosy portrait of Ivan the Terrible (no mention of Oprichnina): "Nevertheless, Ivan was a farsighted statesman who promulgated a new code of laws, and reformed the morals of the clergy". Reforming the morals of the clergy seems an odd way of describing what happened to this man. 
*There's no mention of Chechnya in the post-Soviet section, which is a very odd absence.
*More later... --Folantin 12:58, 30 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: In the "History of England" I have seen rosy portrait of Henry VIII, executed tens thousand person, and Cromwell, responsible for the bloody bath in Ireland, and also Warren Hastings responsible for the catastrophic famine in Bengal. The article is not a verdict of guilty. I assume, usual readers don't know  (or know not a lot), that Ivan IV established the first Russian parliament of the estates (Zemsky Sobor), reformed legal proceedings, introduced local self-management, which electives participated  in, and struggled for access of isolated Russia to sea trade and western technologies. But there is no place  for this detailed information in the article. Ben-Velvel 18:14, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some POV and other problems 

message: Many  facts refer to the classical academic works of Russian historians, such as "History of Russia from the Earliest Times", () by Sergey Solovyov, "History of the Russian State" () by Nikolay Karamzin etc . In these cases the multiple inline citations are absurd and the tag "fact" should be removed. (It is possible to spot a article about history of any country, England, Poland or USA, with infinite amount of the tag "fact".) Ben-Velvel 12:25, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  The cardinal resolve of a problem of inline citations 

message: Whatever hypocritical and deplorable the practice to trade with non-human regimes is, in the cynical business of international politics everyone was (and still is) doing this. As every single major country continued to trade with Nazis supplying them with fossil fuels, ore and high-tech (IBM controversy comes to mind), there is nothing notable in Soviet doing what the rest did to single them out. Let's stick to facts that say:
*Soviets did trade with Nazis
*Soviets support of anti-fascist movement in Spain was their state policy
*Soviets were the only major power to oppose the disgraceful Munich deal and offered to intervene militarily.
These are facts. Whether this constitutes the "controversy", should be left to the reader. As for finding some ref whose author says something and including it into the Encyclopedia, we can go far with such approach. As far as interpretations, not facts go, many personal opinions may be "referenced". Please, let's stick to facts. --Irpen 20:22, 5 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: And Soviets signed alliance with the Nazis (Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact). Yes, for most 1930s Soviets were notable opponent of the Nazi regime, but then for nearly 3 years they were their best allies. Those are the facts. There is also the Soviet-German cooperation article. Of course, you are right that many countries traded with the Nazis - but in the period 39-41, Soviet trade was an important lifeline of the Nazi regime.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:25, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

text: WP:NOR. According to Ericson, Edward E. Feeding the German Eagle: Soviet Economic Aid to Nazi Germany, 1933-1941. New York: Praeger, 1999.  (available via Questia, if you are interested), Soviet economic aid played the crucial role in German successes during World War II. As to controversies, well, literally: There are few unresolved questions concerning the origins of the Second World War that have provoked as much disputation as the issue of Soviet policy toward Nazi Germany. (Haslam, Jonathan (1997). Soviet-German Relations and the Origins of the Second World War: The Jury Is Still Out. The Journal of Modern History 69: 785-797.) Don't open this can of worms. Colchicum 21:34, 6 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Controversy" of having trade relations with Nazis 

message: Is missing and would be welcomed, right now there is only text about internal issues then it jumps to Second World War.  That leaves over a decade of interesting information-the relation to Versailles Treaty, cooperation with Weimar Germany, attempts break diplomatic isolation and attitude towards communist movement in other countries.
--Molobo 22:46, 7 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Section on international activity of Soviet Union till 1933 

message: Why is data from 1891 used to reference claims about 1772-1795 ? To source claims about structure in 1772 we need data from that time period. A over century of changes is to long to consider it reliable time period to make claims about situation in 1772.--Molobo 11:37, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This article should use up-to-date reliable sources in the English language (see WP:V). It's not as if there is a shortage of general histories of Russia available in English. References to foreign-language works (especially archaic ones) should be removed and peer-reviewed books should be preferred to websites. --Folantin 12:16, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why is data from 1891 used to reference claims about 1772 ? 

message: Mainly the territories incorporated into the USSR in 1939-1940 were inhabited by Eastern Slavs who have been reunited with parts of their peoples on the Soviet side. Poles and Romanians made up a minority.
#-Seems dubious-we could count all the people, I have a suscipition Balts, Poles and Romanians combined be more numerous.
#-Eastern Slavs ? Akward wording, Ukrainians and Belarussians had national identity and such word belongs more to describe events from pre-history
#-The sentence sounds like justification or some propaganda piece. I don't think its valuabe to be included. What do you think ?
--Molobo 11:50, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It is too easy to use related argument to justify of vilify Soviet invasion of Poland. This is discussed in details at FA Soviet_invasion_of_Poland_%281939%29 and I don't see the need to discuss it further here, at 115kb this article is already too long. It's enough to simply mention that on 17 September 1939, SU invaded Poland. Any further details are too much for this article.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  13:21, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Cut it right back. It should say something like "In 1939 and 1940, following the secret protocol in the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union invaded eastern Poland, the Baltic States and Moldavia. The Soviets also fought a costly campaign against Finland, known as the Winter War". --Folantin 13:31, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Sounds good; with the link to Soviet invasion of Poland (1939) of course. As I said, at 115kb - which is going to grow with more and more refs - we need to scale down the level of detail. That said, whatever we remove should not be deleted but moved to relevant subarticles.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  13:58, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Akward sentence 

message: A general point: this article badly needs cutting. It's getting seriously out of proportion, with all kinds of strange "bulges" in coverage. On the other hand, Russia's involvement in the Napoleonic Wars apparently began in 1812 and the Crimean War is dismissed in one sentence. And there is still no mention of the recent wars in Chechnya.--Folantin 13:56, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Some suggestions how to do this:
*Stop adding any more information (except a bit about the Chechen Wars and maybe some more about Napoleon).
*Slash a lot of the recently added stuff.
*Link to more sub-articles rather than giving lengthy accounts
*Use more "summary style", especially in the Soviet era sections. Maybe we can put the expansion of the Russian empire in the 19th century into a single para rather than piecemeal. --Folantin 14:16, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Conciseness 

message: References should not be confused with notes; currently we have statements that look like they are referenced with inline citation when in fact they only have an unreferenced note. Please see Soviet invasion of Poland (1939) for how notes should be split from citations.-- Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus | talk  21:35, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  References confused with notes 

message: Are removed under name "they are Time of Troubles", but later revenge massacres are quoted ? Decency would suggest full coverage or full cutting back to Time of Troubles.--Molobo 01:23, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: OK, fair enough. I will remove the second massacre by Polish troops too. I hope you or Piotrus will restore it to Times of Troubles from where he removed it as well some time ago. --Irpen 01:38, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

text: Yeah, let's cut down the Time of Troubles section and stop it becoming a list of massacres. This is a highly involved topic and it's inevitable we can only give it the most superficial treatment in an article this size. --Folantin 08:15, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why massacres of wedding guests at Moscow 

message: Detailed information and making a narrow summary of HoR.--Molobo 01:35, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That's my aim too. We should probably remove some of the excess referencing as well. --Folantin 08:16, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  I suggest removing 

message: What about images? Is one image per section a bad idea (if the good image exists that will significantly illustrate the text)? --Irpen 02:03, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah I think that's a great plan - maybe 2 if it's a really long section - but we do have to work on finding the balance that makes it not text heavy but not overloaded with pics.--danielfolsom 02:05, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Images 

message: I am still illustrating the article and I can't help notice that the structure needs to be modified. Here are some examples:
*Rule of Boris Godunov is given within the Times of Troubles section. All things aside, his rule is never considered to belong to the Tot. A separate section is needed to be created and written. His rule was by all means noteworthy to be totally skipped. 
*The WWII. This is really ridiculous that the equal amount of text is allotted to the 1939-1941 events and 1941-1945 events. I don't think we need to explain why.
There are other issues, please add them to this section. I understand the concern about length. But making the article short should not be our goal by itself. The length of the article should be "adequate" rather than "short" and periods and events need to be covered adequately in accordance with their importance and the amount of information we have on them. Obviously it becomes natural that the remote years that are relatively less known receive less space.
The shortness of the article by itself is a poor choice for the primary goal of further editing. The topic is huge, wikipedia is not paper and if the reader is lazy to read a long article, s/he can read the lead and go elsewhere. I am not calling for unlimited expansion but trimming for the sake of trimming is as harmful as the incessant tagging that we have seen in the previous wave. 
Please add your thoughts on the section structure changes. --Irpen 05:40, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: he WWII. This is really ridiculous that the equal amount of text is allotted to the 1939-1941 events and 1941-1945 events. I don't think we need to explain why.
Agree-1941-1945 deals mainly with military campaigns, and can be shortened to a couple of brief sentences. The forming of cooperation between Soviets and Nazis as well as policies of Soviet terror in conquered and annexed countries are much more complicated and involve many issues-they should receive extensive coverage. The same can be said about the period 1944-1945 when Soviet Union re-occupied and added territories to its sphere of occupation extending the Stalinist rule over further territories. Also not that the text jums forward by over a decade ignoring 20s and early 30s regarding Soviet presence in foreign relations(rearming together with Germany, Comintern, opposition to Versailles etc) --Molobo 05:52, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

text: Molobo I asked you many times before your wikivacation to please format your entries at the talk pages. That said, I don't even know whether I have to respond to this blasphemous escapade. You want to shorten to "two brief sentences" the event where the country lost half of its net-worth and a little less than a half of the able-bodied male population. Just please cut it. --Irpen 06:59, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article organization 

message: The images are good, but I am getting worried that the article will be dominated by beautifull paintings, propaganda posters and photos. Some real life pictures and paintings showing reality of Russian life should also be present to present a balanced view-pictures perhaps from famine in Soviet Union, paintings of villagers life in Russian Empire, some photo showing terror of Soviet opression. Right now the pictures are starting to look too much like tourist folder rather then encyclopedia portfolio portaying all aspects of Russian history.--Molobo 06:39, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Molobo, worry not. The very next image I am uploading now is about peasant life.  Please moderate your desires on how you want the articles to look. I mean, in general. --Irpen 06:54, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Images POV problem 

message: It's nice people have added a few more pictures, but there are probably too many now. I'd suggest cutting the ones that depict events not referred to in the text (e.g. we have nothing about Peter the Great's suppression of the streltsy and our Napoleonic Wars coverage is too scanty to have an image of Suvorov on his Italian campaign). --Folantin 08:53, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pictures 

message: Reign of Godunov is not generally considered to be part of the Time of Troubles, like the positioning of this in the article's section suggests. 
Maybe Grozny's section can be renamed to smth like "Ivan Grozny, end of Rurikids and dynastic crysis" and Godunov's time moved there. Or a separate section can be started. --Irpen 20:00, 20 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Chronology of ToT 

message: Sounds like a horror movie. --Sandycx (Talk) 10:43, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Hahaha, you're right, sounds like Jigsaw from Saw. And you can barely make out what is been said.--Miyokan 06:15, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah... --Taraborn (talk) 08:41, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  The audio is so scary... 

message: ]]  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.113.116.10 (talk) 07:11, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Good point, mr. 88.113 --Taraborn (talk) 17:11, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Russian History 

message: Has anybody listened to the audio file? Apparently just another user (User:Poobread) and me have checked it and... well... it sounds like if Skeletor was the reader. --Taraborn (talk) 08:40, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Keep it, it fits the nation so well. That coming from a Russian. --217.172.29.4 (talk) 20:21, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Audio file 

message: Actually, the Mongols didn't force Michael to worship Tengeri and leave his religion. Instead, he was made pass between two fires accordance with ancient Turco-Mongol tradfition, and ordered to prostrate himself before the tablets of Chingis Khaan. --Enerelt (talk) 02:50, 24 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Michael of Chernigov 

message: New category created.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk  12:21, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[:Category:Political history of Russia]] 

message: so how russian retards will explain Goliats/Galindians the Lithuanian tribe mentioned in 10-12th centuries and which was situated 50 km west and nwest-north and west-south of moscow???? the last Goliads uprisal was in 18th century led by Pugachev moreover why Galicia in Lithuanian language means Ukraine??? and why russians made 'eternal piece agreement' with Lithuania and not poland or serbia??? why petr 1 Minsk and Kiev kept Lithuanian cities and not slavian cities???? later after the occupation of Lithuania russian created separate provoslav country Belarus out of Lithuania and abolished Lithuanian language at all even in todays Lithuania...why all names in former Lithuania is of Lithuanian origin and not slavian???? even before Kiev Rus Kiev had a name the same as todays second Lithuania's city Kaunas. WHY BEFORE KIEV RUS IN THESE LANDS WAS ANOTHER KINGDOM OF GARDARIKE WITH A CAPITAL CITY OF GARDINAS IN NOWADAYS BELARUS, BUT BY 1920 TREATY WITH CCCP THIS LAND WAS ACKNOWLEADGE AS LITHUANIA'S TERRITORY...WHY ONLY IN LITHUANIA (till moscow and Oder, it stetches for 2000 km) THERE ARE 6000 man made hills for fortresses (Gardinas in Lithuanian language means a fortress)...why Herodotus in 500 BC said that russians live on the other side of Don and at Volga, while Baltic tribes were the same as Scitians, had the same language and the same religion...that is why Lithuania was the largest country in Europe in 15th century, that is why we had with slavs eternal piece agreement with lands till Don and upper Volga and Oka...SO STOP CALLING LITHUANIAN TRIBES AS SLAVIC TRIBES  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.176.242.36 (talk) 11:30, 5 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  RUSSIA'S IMPERIALISTIC LIES 

message: A map or maps showing the expansion of territory over the centuries would be helpful to visualize the extent of the country. -- Beland (talk) 06:06, 6 April 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Map request 

message: Russia's prehistery doesn't extend far back enough. No mention of the Siberian Traps or of the first Americans? Or of Europe coming together and meeting Siberia and the Kazakh landmass and thus throwing up the Ural Mountains? Or of the Neanderthals who apparently lived in the Caucasus Mountains? Or the idea that modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens or Cro-Magnon man) moved into what is now Russia about 37000 to 35000 years ago and found their way to Russia's northern coast by 30000 years ago? (Source of that idea, as expressed in maps: Currat, M. & Excoffier, L. (2004): Modern Humans Did Not Admix with Neanderthals during Their Range Expansion into Europe. PLoS Biol no 2 (12): e421. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0020421)(Note: a Wikipedia map, of disputed accuracy, suggests modern humans came to Russia sometime between 40 to 50 thousand years ago and 13 to 15 thousand years ago, although an exact time period is not arrived at. At least part of the problem is that glaciers covered much of Russia during the Ice Ages.  —  Rickyrab | Talk 03:07, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You are free to start the "Prehistory" section and put all those things there, preferably with references. GreyHood Talk 21:41, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Prehistory 

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thread_title:  File:Ussr0466.jpg Nominated for speedy Deletion 

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thread_title:  File:Katiusha Rockerlancer.JPG Nominated for Deletion 

message: The current material about the prehistoric era in Russia in this article is very bare. It amounts to a single mention of the first Humans 45,000 years ago, then it skips forwards to the Iron age and briefly mentions the Scythians and Greek colonists and then the rest is really just about middle ages with the Slavs and Kievan Rus. This is really not very good, where's all the information about stone age hunter-gatherer groups? (archeological finds of arrowheads, etc, there must be some...) Where's the Neolithic? The first farmers and pastoralists? Where's the stuff about the Indo-Europeans (Kurgan hypothesis, etc)? The Copper and Bronze ages? Where's the stuff about the Uralic peoples, rein deer herding?, etc, etc... This is the most basic stuff that a history article should have and this article currently lacks it all. Surely Russian and Soviet history and archaeology cannot be silent on all these important topics. In fact, I know they aren't because there are hundreds of articles throughout Wikipedia about the subject, they just aren't being brought together here as they should be. Someone needs to write a comprehensive prehistory section, or indeed a whole separate Prehistoric Russia article. I've do it, but really my knowledge of the subject is fairly minimum and I only know bits and pieces of Russian history, but there must be people who can do this. --Hibernian (talk) 04:26, 19 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  This badly needs a real Prehistory section 

message: Nevertheless, reversion to a socialist command economy seemed almost impossible, meeting widespread relief in the West. Just out of curiosity: what harm 'reversion to a socialist command economy' in Russia could do to the West? Why it was 'relief'? Thank you. - 92.100.177.241 (talk) 03:23, 12 August 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  A question 

message: This map () falsifies history. Kievan Rus disintegrated before the advent of cities Moscow, Nizhny Novgorod. The name " Belgorod Dnestrovsky" appeared in the Soviet Union (1944). The name "Vladimir Volynsky" -1795 year. ... ...  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Michaila vnuk (talk • contribs) 08:00, 17 October 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Falsification 

message: As a result, the Belarusian and Ukrainian Soviet republics' western borders were moved westward and the new Soviet western border was drawn close to the original Curzon line - the annexation was illegal. The new border was accepted (by a puppet government) in 1945. Xx236 (talk) 08:59, 6 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV 

message: large-scale Polish and Lithuanian revolt in 1863 - under Alexander II. Xx236 (talk) 10:44, 11 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nicholas I 

message: This article has been revised as part of a large-scale clean-up project of multiple article copyright infringement. (See the investigation subpage) Earlier text must not be restored, unless it can be verified to be free of infringement. For legal reasons, Wikipedia cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or printed material; such additions must be deleted. Contributors may use sources as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously. Mkativerata (talk) 20:13, 18 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Possible copyright problem 

message: Nothing here. Xx236 (talk) 11:44, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Old Believers]] and [[Raskol]] 

message: Геллер, М., Некрич, А. История России. Т. 1.-4. Xx236 (talk) 10:42, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Heller - only one quotation 

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thread_title:  External links modified