Talk:US intervention in the Syrian civil war/Archive 2

Requested moves

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Not moved; there is a clear consensus against the proposed move. bd2412 T 17:16, 10 December 2014 (UTC)

– 1. to make consistent use of wording in article Multi-National Force – Iraq 2. to recognise that a range of nations are involved. This is perhaps best presented in the content of Timeline of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant events. There are a number of strong willed member states of the coalition including many Arabic, European and other nations. In light of the content of the timeline I think that it is possible that the current titles of the articles may affected editing of contents to produce a misrepresentative exaggeration of the level of US involvement. 3. If anything the common Wikipedia terminology related to political and military affairs should relate to US-led. Others may disagree but I maintain that "American" is slightly ambiguous as the name is shared with two continents. 4. The current title content conforms to a tendency that I have seen in many middle-east topic articles to highlight the involvement of "America". Articles have had many piped links added so as to display other titles with a link that has displayed America or the US in the title. I personally interpret this as a political agenda that is being followed in Wikipedia editing and I think that a previous prevalence of this type of content may have influenced the early creation of the article title at a time when there was a proportionately higher level off American involvement. coalition is another term that could swap with multi-national. Gregkaye ✍ ♪  09:14, 30 November 2014 (UTC)
 * American-led intervention in Syria → Multi-national intervention in Syria
 * 2014 American-led intervention in Iraq → 2014 multi-national intervention in Iraq.
 * Should there be a hyphen? Red Slash 01:11, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Oppose for reasons I'm sure I stated elsewhere. If we go to multinational Iran and Russia and Hezbollah will get brought in and over represented in the article. The point on US vs American are not correct either. Multi-National Force – Iraq refers to a different group of nations in a different war without the Iran/Russia/Hez involvement problem. Legacypac (talk) 03:07, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Legacypac what do you mean over represented. I see no justification for an article about interventions in Syria that gives less than a complete picture of the situation.  Gregkaye  ✍ ♪  06:10, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * I mean that when the original article about the American-led military intervention was renamed 2014 military intervention against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant there was a successful push to include Iran, Russia and Hezbollah which are clearly outside the American-led effort. That is why this article and its sister were created and why the Iranian-led intervention article exists - to deal with each unique group of countries acting in concert within an appropriately named article for that group of nations. If we widen this title and its sister article title as proposed these article will quickly turn into the 2014 military intervention article (the current overview article) there will no longer be articles about the topic of the American-led intervention, unmuddied by what non-allied parties are doing in this complex war. We already have an overview article and I see the proposed title changes as fundamentally altering the topic, not just clarifying the topic. I don't believe and you do not state your intent to be to include Iran etc but that will be the effect. Iran will easily get disproportionate weight vs actual activity just because it will need to be dealt with separately here, is already the case in the overview article. Also there are all kinds of Foreign involvement in the Syrian Civil War covered by an appropriately named article, so no need to defocus this article.  Legacypac (talk) 08:48, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Also if you look up at the last RM the closer correctly noted that a very similar title would not gain support because it is too imprecise, a point I made in that RM. Legacypac (talk) 09:14, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Legacypac, what's the point of these articles? It seems to me that their contents would be better merged into 2014 military intervention against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant as mentioned.  This article presents a part of a bigger picture that is presented in a way that may be mistaken by readers to be more representative than it is.  The article includes info on : Bahrain, Jordan,  Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, United Kingdom, and "Coalition forces-ground": Iraqi Kurdistan, Iraqi Peshmerga, "Local ground forces", Syrian Kurdistan, YPG, the Free Syrian Army and Local guerrillas.  These groups are not American-led.  The current title for this grouping of information fails WP:AT. pls ping if replying Gregkaye  ✍ ♪  17:53, 6 December 2014 (UTC)

Support Its a multinational effort and the article title should reflect that.Casprings (talk) 19:08, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Gregkaye because these two article deal with 2 halfs of a 60 nation group that finally has a name  "Global Coalition to Counter the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant". This group has partners on the ground that exclude Assuad, al-Nusra, Iran, Russia etc. It doers not fail AT because anyone can find thousands of news references to this effort being American-led. Thats what the RS call it, and it is reality. Legacypac (talk) 20:28, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Casprings, What do you think of Global coalition intervention in Syria and Global coalition intervention in Iraq as per WP:OFFICIAL? Legacypac to say with certainty that countries with strong Islamic and local cultural agendas such as Bahrain and Jordan are best described as "American-led" would express extreme POV (or just a press desire to push a sound bite type phrase).  I think that a more likely interpretation is that there are partner nations.  I am still dubious on the validity of a an article on a slice of the full picture of intervention.  Gregkaye  ✍ ♪  00:18, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
 * While some countries clearly took steps unilaterally, you will find it very difficult to source that the US is not leading the group militarily or politically. Legacypac (talk) 16:21, 7 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Oppose – Yet another frivolous request by the same editor. Reliable sources call the intervention American-led. This article is only about the American-led intervention. The sources were provided in the last discussion. There is no reason to leave this request open. RGloucester  — ☎ 17:55, 7 December 2014 (UTC)
 * RGloucester I have presented rationales for a revised change.  Please strike your frivolous request comment which was uncalled for.  As noted by Casprings, its a multinational effort.   gregkaye  ✍ ♪  13:48, 8 December 2014 (UTC
 * Gregkaye, do you understand the concept of frivolity? The last move request was only closed thirteen days ago, and it had the exact same rationale. It was rejected resoundingly. That's the definition of frivolity. "Multinational" doesn't mean anything, because it doesn't indicate who is leading the effort. It simply isn't precise, nor is it a commonly used descriptor. Sources refer to this intervention as "American-led", because it is "American-led". You can't change the facts to suit your own interests. RGloucester  — ☎ 16:16, 8 December 2014 (UTC)


 * Oppose per Legacypac's reasoning. - SantiLak  (talk) 03:25, 8 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Oppose America has contributed the most to the intervention, so the name should remain. David O. Johnson (talk) 03:57, 8 December 2014 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Timeline section
Much of the detail in the Timeline section could be mergred into Timeline of the American-led intervention in Syria. Whizz40 (talk) 19:41, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

Page Title misleading Request change to US-led
The intervention in Syria is US-led not American-led, the title of this page should be changed. There are lots of "Americas". North America, South and Central comprising many different nations. The major intervention in Syria is by the United States and not any other "America" entities or governments. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Montoya44 (talk • contribs) 15:32, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
 * It's not misleading, the use of 'American' in reference to the United States as compared to its use in reference to the other Americas generally in WP depends on context, and in this context it is very clear. No one is being mislead and thinking that the Americas are intervening in Syria. - SantiLak  (talk) 16:52, 5 October 2015 (UTC)

Requested move 1 November 2015

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: no consensus. Good arguments from all participants, but it's now been over two weeks and we are split. I'll create the proposed title as a redirect. Jenks24 (talk) 09:17, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

American-led intervention in Syria → American-led intervention in the Syrian Civil War – This proposal comes in the aftermath of discussion on the etymology of Russian intervention. I have to emphasize that currently all parallel articles are named "intervention in the Syrian Civil War" - Jordanian intervention in the Syrian Civil War, Russian intervention in the Syrian Civil War, this American-intervention being an exception. Furthermore, all Foreign involvement in the Syrian Civil War articles are named "in the Syrian Civil War" - Turkish involvement in the Syrian Civil War, Russian involvement in the Syrian Civil War, Iranian involvement in the Syrian Civil War, Hezbollah involvement in the Syrian Civil War, Qatari involvement in the Syrian Civil War and Saudi Arabian involvement in the Syrian Civil War. Finally, there is much more logic to name it "intervention in the war", rather than "intervention in the country", as US-led coalition is largely targeting ISIL, both in Syria and Iraq.GreyShark (dibra) 20:56, 1 November 2015 (UTC) --Relisted. Natg 19 (talk) 02:02, 9 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Support – This is a sensible proposal. I believe this article predates the others, hence the out-of-order title. Might as well follow the WP:CONSISTENCY criteria. RGloucester  — ☎ 04:36, 7 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Strong Oppose - Title needs to be consise and direct, like American-led intervention in Iraq (2014–present), Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen (2015–present), and 2014–15 Russian military intervention in Ukraine. The proposed title would make the title unnecessarily long, and since this is the only actual American intervention in Syria so far, the current title works just fine. LightandDark2000 (talk) 08:07, 8 November 2015 (UTC)


 * Oppose: Conciseness and naturalness. No current need for further disambiguation.  Create redirect for requested target for readers who might search for "American and Syrian Civil War". --Mike Cline (talk) 15:35, 17 November 2015 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

How to count American Casualties?
The DoD does measure casualties for all of OIR, but they do not breakdown who died in Iraq, and who died in Syria. (http://www.defense.gov/casualty.pdf)

I would propose that we list the DoD numbers, but say (includes casualties from Iraq). Juno (talk) 02:09, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
 * We know generally from news reporting by RS where they died, so we can just continue on with that unless something happens where we can't tell. - SantiLak  (talk) 09:35, 16 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Certainly when we do have reliable sources, but for many of them we do not, particularly with regard to the wounded. There is also the question of deaths that occurred outside of either country, but still inside of OIR (and very much inside of the conflict) like the Americans killed in Jordan. Juno (talk) 03:01, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
 * Which ones are you referring to when you say in Jordan? - SantiLak  (talk) 03:40, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
 * How about that, they were both contractors. (who I assume we are not counting in with the US stats?) Still, not sure which side of the line all of those US 10 deaths happened on, not sure which side any of those US wounded happened on. This problem will grow over time. Juno (talk) 04:22, 18 November 2015 (UTC)
 * I see what you mean but I still really don't think that we should change it to the way you are suggesting. Some of those non-combat casualties we do know occurred far away from the actual battlefield, in crashes and such. Also on the Jordan note, those contractors in no way qualify as casualties in this. - SantiLak  (talk) 18:00, 18 November 2015 (UTC)

Inconsistencies between articles
In this article the strength of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant is around 100.00 (according to Iraqi Kurdistan Chief of Staff)[58]. However, in the article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_intervention_against_ISIL, the strength of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (abbreviated as ISIL)is 200,000 fighters in Iraq and Syria (according to Iraqi Kurdistan Chief of Staff.)[166] Different figures for the same force. Just wanted to bring that up — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.210.14.58 (talk) 16:49, 19 November 2015 (UTC)

NPOV
The text reads like a Defence Department press briefing. The number of times I read "the United States and coalition forces" became unacceptable. Why does the US stand out from the other members of the coalition? This should be more specific and less hagiographic. A more objective phrasing should be "Coalition forces from the US, Saudi Arabia, and...", in order of contribution to the force.

Another useful detail would be the addition of the Operation name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 176.25.132.145 (talk) 00:07, 25 November 2015 (UTC)
 * When there are Saudi airstrikes, they are listed, Jordanian ones, they are listed, you should also factor into this that Gulf and other Arab coalition partners have very drastically reduced their contributions with their changeover to the intervention in Yemen. Also the US does stand out from other members of the coalition as they contribute the vast majority of airstrikes. When it is just the US carrying out strikes then it should just say that, when it is just Jordan it should say that, when it is the US and Arab coalition members, it should say that. - SantiLak (talk) 03:21, 25 November 2015 (UTC)

American-led?
Where does the lemma choise of a coalition led by the USA come from? Are there sources about the leading, e.g. headquarters with US generals or something similar? -- Amtiss, SNAFU ? 06:29, 1 December 2015 (UTC)
 * The intervention is being led under the command of CJTF-OIR and US Central Command, other participants may not always fall under the command structure of that but also the fact that the U.S. is overwhelmingly the largest contributor to airstrikes in Syria and this specific article covers an intervention started by them, the term "American-led" is appropriate. - SantiLak  (talk) 06:40, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

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Contributing countries
A lot of entries come without any **verification** e. g. link to documents or similar that confirm that country xyz is part of the "coalition". For example, Austria is listed. This is absolutely illogical since Austria is a neutral country by the constitution; neither is Austria part of the NATO. I have thus removed the entry. For anyone who wants to re-add the entry, please CITE THE SOURCE for when it is claimed that Austria is part of any US-led intervention in Syria. It is just illogical because of the constitution of Austria. Without citing a source, it just becomes a lie. 2A02:8388:1641:4700:BE5F:F4FF:FECD:7CB2 (talk) 15:51, 10 April 2017 (UTC)


 * I don't see Austria anywhere in the infobox. You're probably mistaking Australia, a country which is contributing to the operation, to Austria. Editor abcdef (talk) 00:25, 11 April 2017 (UTC)

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Requested move 7 September 2017

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The result of the move request was: Moved to American-led intervention in the Syrian Civil War – unopposed, WP:CONSISTENT with the category and similar articles. No such user (talk) 15:16, 21 September 2017 (UTC)

American-led intervention in Syria → American-led intervention in the Syrian Civil War – The intervention is logically in the Syrian Civil War, which is also specifically said in the lead section, while "intervention in Syria" is quite ambiguous in terms of timing and location, especially considering that Syria generally means Syrian Arab Republic, which currently controls only half of its former territory, whereas Syrian Civil War takes place all over; it will also match parallel articles Jordanian intervention in the Syrian Civil War and Russian military intervention in the Syrian Civil War. GreyShark (dibra) 17:43, 7 September 2017 (UTC)


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RfC on Foreign involvement in Syrian Civil War
Hello, there is an RfC on Foreign involvement in the Syrian Civil War which editors are invited to weigh in on. Thanks, GPRamirez5 (talk) 17:10, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

Request for Comments on White Helmets controversy
Hello, there is an RfC on the White Helmets page, and you're invited to participate.-GPRamirez5 (talk) 14:49, 6 June 2018 (UTC) GPRamirez5 (talk) 14:49, 6 June 2018 (UTC)

Invasion?
Is there support for this edit? The body of our article says there are a small number of US ground troops in Syria, mainly training Kurdish forces, and that the US has a garrison on the Jordanian border at al-Tanf and possibly an unpaved runway in Raqqa governorate. Does that constitute an "invasion" and "occupation"? Seems like pretty non-neutral language to me. BobFromBrockley (talk) 17:27, 17 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Looks like they have more troops in Syria than the Russians have in Ukraine.GPRamirez5 (talk) 20:21, 17 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Not totally sure how that's relevant, but our Russian military intervention in Ukraine (2014–present), which does use the word "invasion" in the hatnote but not in the lead, and doesn't use "occupation" in the lead, says that Russia deployed between 60,000 and 90,000 troops in Ukraine - does US really have more than that in Syria? BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:41, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, that page really could use some fact-checking. Most of the sources on the issue come exclusively from the Ukrainian Defense Dept. US sources can't confirm the number of Russians inside Ukraine.GPRamirez5 (talk) 14:06, 18 December 2018 (UTC)

Anyway, does anyone besides the two of us have any views about the words "invasion" and "occupation" in the lede of this article? BobFromBrockley (talk) 23:37, 19 December 2018 (UTC) I note since I ask GPRamirez has added two sources for the claim in the lede: an opinion piece in the neocon The National Interest claiming that it is an occupation, written in a contrarian tone indicating this is a minority position, and a WaPo article which says that US troop numbers are higher than often thought but doesn't speak about an occupation except to quote a tailor who things there's an occupation; neither article uses the word "invasion". This seem tendentious to me. The National Interest opinion piece say the US occupies "a third" of Syria, which is I think what Wikipedia calls an extraordinary claim, so I really don't think that's a good source. BobFromBrockley (talk) 23:58, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
 * From neocon National Interest to neolib Washington Post seems like an impressive range of mainstream judgement. I'm really not feeling the classism implicit in dismissing an eyewitness because he happens to be a tailor. And how would one have an occupation without a prior invasion? GPRamirez5 (talk) 03:19, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
 * My point about the neocon magazine is that it's not an RS for a factual claim; it's an opinion, and a contrarian opinion. The WaPo tailor is not wrong because he's a tailor; it's just his opinion being reported in the article, so again not a source for a factual claim. Do reliable sources themselves describe this as an occupation or invasion? Wikipedia has an article on invasion: the lead talks about aggressively entering territory controlled by a rival entity, which didn't happen with the US in Syria who have only deployed ground troops in areas controlled by their Kurdish allies, and it talks about scale, which is not the case here where the scale has been limited. I think a word like "incursion" would be more NPOV. We also have an article Military occupation, whose lead talks about control over territory, but what territory does the US control, apart from a couple of airbases? BobFromBrockley (talk) 14:20, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

Well, this is why the Ukraine is relevant, as the Russians would claim to be there at the invitation of their "allies" in Donbass and elsewhere. The US has engaged in repeated raids and bombing against other entities both unrecognized like ISIS, and recognized, like the Syrian government.GPRamirez5 (talk) 19:49, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
 * I changed the body to its former with some changes as I feel the apparent "invasion" and "Occupation" is biased and inaccurate as no Coalition personal have operated in land controlled by the Syrian Government. Ian peay (talk) 09:30, 29 December 2018 (UTC)

Timeline
The largest part of this article is the "timeline". This is within the section on the multi-national airwar. however, it seems to include a few things that are not to do with the air war, but rather to do with ground support for Kurds/SDF, or with US presence more generally. Can I propose that we EITHER change the heading hierarchy to make it a timeline of the whole American-led intervention OR move out the non-airwar related items to the relevant sections? I think either of those is simple enough and have no preference, but think it is a bit confusing in its current form. BobFromBrockley (talk) 09:28, 4 January 2019 (UTC)

Timeline for ground operations and air operations should be one, in order to stop confusion and to make article somewhat shorter. Ianp18 (talk) 22:45, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

I agree its confusing. The timeline makes up a large portion of the article and should be either: A. Merge the "Ground Operations" section into the timeline as neat as possible. B. Take out all ground operations related info in the timeline and put it in the correct section C. Change the heading hierarchy or (my personal preference) D. Give the timeline its own article. Thelovelyconch (talk) 22:01, 7 March 2019 (UTC)


 * I think A and C could be the same option, as changing the heading hierarchy to take the timeline out of the airwar section would require it to properly include ground stuff properly. I'm happy with any option apart from (B) as there's no reason to separate air and ground.BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:32, 11 March 2019 (UTC)
 * Ah I see you've already acted Thelovelyconch to do (C). Looks much better. I guess now we can also either merge some ground material in here, or take the timeline out into its own article, which might be a good idea as it is pretty long. BobFromBrockley (talk) 12:33, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

Merger proposal discussion happening on another page
ration. This can be seen with the operation title given to it and the fact they set up a new HQ that deals with both states under one command. (See:Combined Joint Task Force - Operation Inherent Resolve). I think this reflects the reality of US led operations and would be more informative for the reader. I also think you can drop "2014" as it is not needed and some events predate 2014. You also don't need "military" as there will be other types of intervention.

Who is ISIL? From an American perspective, isn’t the short hand ISIS? Or are they a JV Team? Thanks for clarifying. PS: including “The Levant” in the enemy’s nom de guerre seems a little ambitious at this point FactsFactsFactsNotFantasy (talk) 02:16, 10 October 2019 (UTC)