Talk:Battle of the Dnieper/Archive 1

message: Infobox says 1.2 million soviet casualties and a high estimate of 1.5 million axis casualties. yet the article says there were more than 3 million casualties on both sides? Borisblue 10:37, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because somebody else edited it. I don't sleep enough at the moment <_< -- Grafikm_fr 15:58, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Bad math?

message: I suggest everybody partiocipating in this discussion to read WP:NPOV and answer yourself the following questions:
*Should WP represent the POV of Ukrainian (or any else) Government?
*Should WP represent only the POV of majority?
*Should it represent exclusively the mainstream POV?
*Should it represent the POV of autors of Britannica or any other encyclopaedia?
You will find that the answer to the all questions is NO. Therefore, all the arguments about "mainstream", what is recognized by Ukrainian Government and what is suspported by majority in the West are irrelevant.
The purpose of WP is to represent neutral POV, i.e.  the point of view that "neither sympathetic nor in opposition to its subject."  
*If one says "The Soviet Army liberated some territory" then one expresses one's sympathetic view about the Soviet Army and the kind of administration that was (re)established after the "liberation".
*If one says "The Soviet Army occupied some territory" then one represent one's opposition to the Soviet army and the Communist regime
Then both versions are not neutral even if the former one has more supporters.
I read Irpen's comment below aboud the negatrive flavor of the word "take" in English. It would be, however, nice to see a comment of a native English speaker.
In any case, nobody objected so far against "advance" or "enter". Why not  "Soviet Army advance to occupied territories" and "Soviet Army entered Kiev."?--AndriyK 11:41, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Dear Kuban kazak, please add your comments after other user's comments. Your numerous insertions make the talk page difficult to read.--AndriyK 14:27, 2 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sure!--Kuban Cossack  14:43, 2 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Your comments have more POV in them than any other ones do. What you are saying is that it be best if the Red Army did not liberate Ukraine from Nazism. It is pity for you that Ukraine never turned into "living room" for Aryans... I sm sorry but you are being rediculous. What about the millions of Ukrainians that fought in the Red Army have you forgot about them?--Kuban Cossack  09:00, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Millions of Ukrainians fighting for their land is my imagination. Bravo AndriyK. That really says just how much you are worth as a sourced neutral contributor. --Kuban Cossack  11:31, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Andriy sometimes you are so vague that it is impossible to see what is it you are trying to say. --Kuban Cossack  15:05, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Please read [[WP:NPOV]]

message: Because some people were removing the POV tag alleging that there was a consensus, I decided to review the discussion for the convenience of all parties. 
(If I unintentionally presented anybody's position inaccurately, please feel free to correct).
*Using the word "liberate" and its derivatives in the article is supported by 
*#Grafikm_fr
*#DMorpheus
*#Deng
*#Irpen
*#Kuban Cossack
*#MarcusGraly 
*#Telex
*#Habap--Habap 17:04, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: 11 against 5 is called absolute majority in all cases. We're in democracy here... -- Grafikm_fr (AutoGRAF) 18:49, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Grafikm, perhaps you might take some of your time reading this Russian Architecture, be sure to go into the archive of the talk page to realise just what kind of nascient person you are dealing with. --Kuban Cossack  19:16, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  I read it thoroughly KK, don't worry, since it was mentionned in his ArbCom file. That's why I locked this page in the first place. Obviously, without Russian occupation, Ukrainians would already colonize Jupiter satellites... :))) -- Grafikm_fr (AutoGRAF) 19:21, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

text: Grafikm, perhaps first of all you should read: Wikipedia is not a democracy. As well as "Wikipedia works by building consensus" (WP:DR) and "Decisions should be made by consensus decision making rather than a strict majority rule" (WP:STRAW). KPbIC 20:05, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well in that case the bottom line, as suggested nearly a month ago is for those who are unhappy, file a mediation. Mediation committee will decide wether its suitable for the tag to be reinstated. Untill the user who seems to do anything but the suggested good faith action above, the discussion is over. Unless someone wants to repeat it in circles again. --Kuban Cossack  20:17, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

text:  Then file that mediation, and try to explain your theory of "everyone is POV" and "I'm the only one to be right" to mediators... I'm sure it will be quite a show... :)))) -- Grafikm_fr (AutoGRAF) 20:56, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Intermediate summary of the discussion

message: Mediation makes sence if the involved parties recognise that there is a POV problem and would like to use assistence of a mediator to solve it and build a consensus. So far one of the parties pretended that there is no problem and was removing the tag. 
Before I request the mediation I would like to see whether there are people in the opposite party who is ready to participate in the mediation procedure and build a consensus. 
Please, everybody who is ready to take part in the mediation procedure add youre name to the list below.--AndriyK 09:48, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Mediation

message: Слова Е.Долматовского, музыка М.Фрадкина
 Исполняет: Л.Утесов 1945г.
 С боем взяли мы Орел, город весь прошли, 
 И последней улицы название прочли, 
 А название такое, право слово, боевое: 
 Брянская улица по городу идет - 
 Значит нам туда дорога, значит нам туда дорога...
 С боем взяли город Брянск, город весь прошли, 
 И последней улицы название прочли,                
 А название такое, право слово, боевое:            
 Минская улица по городу идет -                    
 Значит нам туда дорога, значит нам туда дорога...
 С боем взяли город Минск, город весь прошли, 
 И последней улицы название прочли, 
 А название такое, право слово, боевое: 
 Брестская улица по городу идет - 
 Значит нам туда дорога, значит нам туда дорога...
 С боем взяли город Брест, город весь прошли, 
 И последней улицы название прочли, 
 А название такое, право слово, боевое: 
 Люблинская улица по городу идет - 
 Значит нам туда дорога, значит нам туда дорога...
 С боем взяли город Люблин, город весь прошли, 
 И последней улицы название прочли, 
 А название такое, право слово, боевое: 
 Варшавская улица по городу идет - 
 Значит нам туда дорога, значит нам туда дорога...
 С боем взяли мы Варшаву, город весь прошли, 
 И последней улицы название прочли, 
 А название такое, право слово, боевое: 
 Берлинская улица по городу идет! 
 Значит нам туда дорога, значит на туда дорога!
 1945
This song was popular among Soviet soldiers in the end of the war. 
It uses Russian word "взяли" (wich means "took") with respect to Orel, Bryansk, Minsk, Lublin and Warsaw. So at least in Russian this word has no negative meaning with respect to Soviet soldiers that took the cities from Germans. Is it different in English?--Mbuk 22:56, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Once again, the soldiers clearely say that with battles we took, i.e. in combat details they did take the city, but in the larger scope of the war they liberated them. --Kuban Cossack  22:59, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Mbuk, yes, the word Taking has a different flavor. For example in the US law "taking" of property (by the state) applies to the cases when the state (or the Federal gov) takes posession of, say, land, belonging to the private owner with the latter having no right to refuse. Note that "taking" rather than "confiscation" is used. There are laws and laws that elaborate on what the "just" compensation should be and that the taking should be for a clear public benefit (like to make it a wild-life refuge or smth). In the combat detail taking is fine to use, in the overall estimate, liberation is appropriate. Again, I don't argue for exclusive use of this word. However, I oppose to the article-wide trollish purging and replacing like this, especially by the editor whose main contribution to Wikipedia is running edit wars. --Irpen 23:21, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: If we're going to be creative about this, how about "acquired"? Telex 23:57, 28 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm sure everyone here will be able to explain that the land which was "reclaimed" was Soviet land prior to the German invasion. In that case, they would have "reaquired" this land. Which, now that I think about it, would be technically correct (?).--tufkaa 00:17, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: What? Reaquired implies they aquired it once and then they aquired it again. That is on par with reclaimed, absoloute bollocks. Ukraine was the founding republic of the USSR. That is how it was internationally recognised. Besides like I said before I am not going to allow anyone to downplay the role of the Soviet Union in freeing the world from nazism. That is a fact that no one has the right to challenge. --Kuban Cossack  17:09, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: In the interests of neutrality, then, perhaps it would be best to explicitly state "liberated from Nazi occupation" or something very similar, as Piotrus suggested above. heqs 19:05, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well why state the obvious? Who else are they to liberate Ukrainian land from? I think in context of WWII articles that is excessive detail. Of course not being a native english speaker I cannot fully rate just how accurate/inaccuare such overclarification is, but in my opinion it is a form of weasel words.--Kuban Cossack  19:20, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ideally, every article should present a worldwide view (you can't assume that everyone who stumbles across this article is familiar with the context). The word nazi doesn't even appear anywhere in the article. Alternate suggestion: liberated from Axis occupation. heqs 21:11, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well in that case it is a sense of copyediting and improving the article, which actually has a good potential of being a DYK and an FA. However under no circumstances are we even touching the term "liberation", it remains. --Kuban Cossack  21:20, 29 April 2006 (UTC)

text: I fully respect your work and I think factually it is an excellent article. However I could not agree more on you what you say about the politics. This article was vandalised by a person who has been previously blocked by arbcom, by doing so he terrorised a bee hive, which despite, as always, after the original troll was shoowed away, the bees are still stinging. The article is neutral already. All it might need is clarification as proposed by Piotrus and Heqs, but that is minor detail that is irrespective of the overall stance on the word liberation. Also this is rather personal to me, my wife is Volhynian (btw from Rivne, ie the part that was annexed from Poland in 39) and ALL her family fought against the fascist occupiers in partisans and on the fronts and if anyone asks if there is an alternative to the word liberation when the Red Army entered Rivne and were recieved by thousands of locals in joy, you are going to have to put up with some very angry Ukrainians.  --Kuban Cossack  23:23, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Дорога на Берлин