Talk:Jägala concentration camp

Something Brewcrewer did
Regarding this edit by Brewcrewer: having obstinately introduced blatantly inaccurate material at Aleksander Laak, he's apparently now trying to paint his figures as 'equally valid' here. No! the figures are not valid. Scholars have studied the issue and reached conclusions on credible figures, and even the Soviet court estimates were closer to those modern findings than to the figures pulled out of thin air by some unsrupulous scandalist scribblers. If we really have to maintain obviously erroneous figures somewhere (say, the findings of Flat Earth Society in the corresponding article), then it goes without saying that accurate information must be pointed out, too. It's not about minor guidelines like weasel wording, when the matter is that an encyclopedia should contain accurate information. Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (t) 10:28, 18 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Wording that I removed: "Such figures contradict not only the findings of the....." is pure and unadulterated Original Research. If reliable sources find a contradiction it can be included if it's you that finds the contradiction it's original research. -- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 05:01, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Brewcrewer, please stop this POV-pushing. If you don't like other figures, well, basically "tough luck". We have multiple scientific sources which show that 100,000+ numbers are utter nonsense. Use common sense - and if you wish, participate in discussion about the number of Holocaust victims in Estonia here. As you can see, a Jewish historian reached a conclusion that in total, 8614 Jews were murdered by Nazis during their occupation of Estonia. -- Sander Säde 06:21, 20 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay, I thought it was just repeating one of the previous figures, and using weasel-wording as if it were correct. I have edited the article to remove the weasel wording and unsourced, but left intact the actual numbers. Thanks, -- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 15:57, 20 August 2010 (UTC)

“Forgotten Transports” film series
This is interesting film, NYT -- Petri Krohn (talk) 13:22, 18 August 2010 (UTC)

What is this camp?
What is this camp anyway? As I understand it this is where foreign Jews who arrived at the Raasiku railway station were imprisoned. However, most of them were taken directly to Kalevi-Liiva and shot. Only 450 are known to have survived the "selektion", many of these were taken to other prisons, like the surviving sex slaves, who were taken to Tallinn Central Prison. Did this camp ever hold any other prisoners? -- Petri Krohn (talk) 20:44, 21 August 2010 (UTC)


 * It apparently was a forced labour camp. I don't know if it held other prisoners. -- Martin (talk) 09:21, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Such figures contradict not only the findings of the.............
I will have to remove this again due to Wikipedia's WP:SYNTH policy. The source provided does not speak to the Jägala concentration camp, thus its inclusion directly violates the basic tenet of Wikipedia's WP:SYNTH policy, specifically: "do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources." Please don't revert with disingenuous edit summaries like "rv pov pushing" or "rv source removal". If you want to readd the material to the article you have the WP:BURDEN of proving that it is not violative of WP:SYNTH.-- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 01:13, 24 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I see no synth here - I think it is just a case of WP:IDONTLIKEIT. If several respectable international scholars give very similar numbers that directly contradict sensationalist books... Why should we lie to the readers and cover up contradictory data? Nevertheless, I will smooth the sentence over once again. -- Sander Säde 06:11, 24 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree that “Such figures contradict...” can be removed, but only in case the absurd figures are removed. Then there's no need to have a 'disclaimer' like that. As already explained, figures like 100,000 cannot be considered as equally valid. Per WP:V, we should use sources by specialists of the field. Political commentators are not as much WP:RS, as scholars are. When in doubt, the findings of scholars who have studied the matter in depth should be used. The guidelines also underscore this: In general, the best sources have a professional structure in place for checking or analyzing facts, legal issues, evidence, and arguments; as a rule of thumb, the greater the degree of scrutiny given to these issues, the more reliable the source. Brewcrewer's 'sources' do not satisfy any of these criteria, besides being patently false. Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (t) 10:43, 24 August 2010 (UTC)


 * You guys are talking about everything except the WP:SYNTH problem. We can't have an article making a personal analysis of different sources. Please respond to this specific point, not what I like or dislike or about other policy violations in the article. -- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 21:47, 26 August 2010 (UTC)


 * And you are refusing to use common sense. If Jägala camp was in Estonia - and it was - then the total number of killed there cannot be higher then the total of Estonia, no matter what sensationalist non-scientific books claim. It isn't really that hard to understand. -- Sander Säde 07:57, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Not to mention, according to Weiss-Wendt, Jägala camp was a processing camp, with never more than 200 prisoners in there. The murders actually happened in nearby Kalevi-Liiva camp. -- Sander Säde 08:02, 27 August 2010 (UTC)
 * These kind of sources should never even be inserted here on Wiki History articles. The use of such references is a typical abuse of sources on a formal basis. Simply the fact that someone has published a figure does not imply Wikipedia is obliged to publish it. Especially the history articles should apply a high level of scrutiny meaning that if a source fails to reveal its sources or methods, it will not stand as solid here in Wikipedia. I support the removal of any figures and other facts that have no clear documentation or method. --Jaan Pärn (talk) 08:41, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

There appears to be some misreading of the sources, doubtless inadvertent of course. Let's start with Fraser since we've only one sentence to read. How far wrong can we go with just one sentence? The relevant sentence reads: Mere was an Estonian who, according to the Russians, was in charge of organizing the concentration camp at Jagala and was responsible for the extermination of 125,000 civilians. Fraser tells us that this is "according to the Russians". That qualifier can't just disappear. If the quote shown on Google books is representative, Fraser (or rather the Russians) does not say that Mere was responsible for killing 125,000 Jews at Jagala. [Soviet historiography often aimed to minimise Jewish suffering by inflating total numbers of deaths, e.g. Auschwitz.] Quoting total numbers of Jews murdered in Estonia is comparing apples and pears, so why do it? Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:23, 2 September 2010 (UTC)

Next up, I am puzzled by the claim that reference number 1 supports the claim that In modern sources, the number 10,000 occurs. I am unable to find anything in the cited document which approximates to the claim in the text. I find the same problem in regard to reference 5, this webpage, which is cited to support the self-same claim. As for reference 6, here, in Estonian, I am unable to say if the claim is supported. Google Translate, for the little that it is worth, would suggest that we have the same problem again: the number in this source may, perhaps, be 6,000. Angus McLellan (Talk) 23:45, 2 September 2010 (UTC)
 * This kind of critical approach is a sight for my sore eyes. The conclusions of the History Commission cannot be cited as a source for 10,000 as these feature no such claims. --Jaan Pärn (talk) 12:14, 3 September 2010 (UTC)


 * The up to 10 000 is in full conclusions of the Commission, ie. the book. And Estonica.org has "During the whole occupation period, approximately 12,500 Jews were brought to Estonia from other countries. When the German forces left, about 100 Jews had survived; an estimated 7500-7800 died or were killed here, and about 4600 prisoners were transported to other camps in Estonia, where many died before the war ended.". -- Sander Säde 12:52, 3 September 2010 (UTC)


 * The solution appears obvious enough: the claim can be referenced to the printed report. Other problems can be resolved in the same way, by closely following WP:V.
 * Claims in sensational or non-specialist works, or works which do not purport to deal specifically with the subject, should not be treated as though they were of equal weight to claims in the Estonian report, Weiss-Wendt, Arad, Benz, &c. Freedland is a journalist with no experise here, Fraser's work clearly doesn't take the facts of the Holocaust as its thesis, the Edelheids produced a tertiary source, and so on. Alternate claims in less reliable sources may either appear in the text with qualification ("journalist Jonathan Freedland writes"; "in his work on Canadian right-wing extremism, commentator Warren Kinsella writes") or be relegated to a footnote.
 * While it is perfectly comprehensible that early drafts of an article will rely on whatever material is at hand, it is not acceptable to continue to use poor sources after one's attention is drawn to the matter. It is, I feel, equally reprehensible to base an article on the snippets produced by Google Books. It is impossible to say whether these are representative of the author's claims without access to the full work. In every case the next paragraph could, for all the editor using it knows, reject the apparently claimed position. The only way to know what a particular book or paper says on any subject is to read the whole book or paper. Angus McLellan (Talk) 15:13, 3 September 2010 (UTC)
 * I agree with your general approach to this issue. My position on the Friedland article has changed somewhat since I first placed it into the artilce. I found some discrepencies on other aspects of the article unrelated to the Jägala concentration camp and do not hold it in high esteem, thus I would have not have a problem if it were ommitted in the place of more solid sources. However, the SYNTH problem still has to be rectified.-- brew  crewer  (yada, yada) 18:57, 26 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Could you re-iterate what the SYNTH issue is for my benefit, I wasn't a party to the original discussion and I'm not sure if I'm reading the thread correctly. --Martin (talk) 04:23, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Sanders edit
Hi Sander,

I am afraid, one of us is wrong about this. Maripuu states explicitly that the camp commander was appointed by the Estonian Security Police, which also provided the guards and the food (p. 705ff.). --Supavollcheckabunny (talk) 11:51, 22 November 2010 (UTC)