Talk:Timber Sycamore/Archive 1

Progress of article
I'll continue to find sources discussing this operation in the coming days. Suggestions welcome. -Darouet (talk) 22:24, 20 September 2016 (UTC)

Phasing out of program
Will hope to add material on this topic in the next couple days. -Darouet (talk) 02:25, 20 July 2017 (UTC)

Il Giornale
I've reverted this one edit of yours because the text you removed:

In Il Giornale, Fausto Biloslavo has reported that despite the program's secrecy, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden was photographed at the center of Zarqa in March 2015.

Is nearly identical to the text of the article being cited:

The training and equipment program is shrouded in strict secrecy, but US Vice President Joe Biden was photographed last March in the center of Zarqa.

Let me know what you think. -Darouet (talk) 20:21, 31 January 2018 (UTC)


 * regarding this edit, and in part because I don't believe I'd originally added the content, I didn't have time to review the issue (I'm quite busy right now, sorry). Will look into it more if there's a dispute. -Darouet (talk) 00:04, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Yes, I am not sure the claim is sufficiently supported by the quoted sources. Fixed for now.My very best wishes (talk) 01:56, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * MVBW, that is hardly enough of an explanation to be distinguished from "I just don't like it." Can you elaborate? -Darouet (talk) 12:52, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * Just for starters, one of cited sources was this. What is it? I have no idea. My very best wishes (talk) 15:54, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * That's a declassified August 2012 U.S. Department of Defense document stating that the goal of "The West, Gulf countries, and Turkey" in supporting the Syrian opposition is to create "a declared or undeclared Salafist principality in eastern Syria ... in order to isolate the Syrian regime, which is considered the strategic depth of the Shia expansion." (Note that that is exactly what occurred.) The document was used to brief Congress and has since been widely discussed in serious secondary sources; it was also "debunked" in a laughably incoherent "fact check" by the Washington Post's Glenn Kessler—who misquoted the memo while dismissing its significance, denied that the U.S. was directly arming Syrian rebels at the time (on the half-truth technicality that the U.S. was merely "facilitating" Libyan arms across the Turkish border!), and even had the chutzpah to assert that the memo actually proves that "The Obama administration, in fact, drew sharp distinctions between the rebel groups."TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 21:02, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * OK, thanks. I do not have time for that, so leaving this to you, guys. My very best wishes (talk) 00:20, 2 February 2018 (UTC)
 * The key question about that source is whether it has anything to do with Timber Sycamore. Also, as MVBW asked in an edit summary, I linked the names of the people in the commentary section as I assumed if they were notable enough to be in the commentary section they'd be, well, notable and therefore have WP articles. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:02, 2 February 2018 (UTC)


 * The text in the WP article was indeed faithful to the Il Giornale article, but I don't see what it adds to a WP article on Timber Sycamore, because, despite Biloslavo's cryptic comment, it has nothing to do with it. Our article does not mention Zarqa, so the text is confusing rather than illuminating. I checked what Biden was doing there, and he was at a joint US-Jordanian training camp where Jordianians are trained, and made a speech about ISIS, which Timber Sycamore doesn't combat. I think it confuses our article and adds nothing to it. BobFromBrockley (talk) 13:43, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * I can see where you're coming from, but I think Biloslavo's point — in an article about Timber Sycamore — is pretty straightforward: it would be unlikely for the U.S. Vice President to appear in the middle of a town where rebel soldiers are being trained and equipped by U.S. forces for the Syrian Civil War, and for that VP to be simultaneously unaware of the CIA program that is supporting that operation. Sorry, long sentence. But it's not the reporter's job to spell all that out explicitly for an educated readership, and this kind of terse language is common in newspapers when discussing complicated international (and military) affairs. -Darouet (talk) 17:17, 1 February 2018 (UTC)
 * , I agree, and I'm not criticising Biloslavo, but I don't see how his terse point is helpful here, as it would require our readers to do the work of understanding its relevance to the article, unless we explain it, which would immediately become synth/OR. I think it is just much safer to keep it out, as it doesn't add anything usefully encyclopedic.BobFromBrockley (talk) 09:56, 2 February 2018 (UTC)