User talk:Patrickneil/NATO

NATO
Thankyou Patrick!! Please feel free give me your comments on my talk page or on the article talk page about ways it could be further improved - my cleaning up of it is not over, for such. Kind regards from Down Under. Buckshot06 (talk) 23:29, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Macedonia links
Hi, sorry, I just noticed I inadvertently re-did a change to a "Macedonia" link you had reverted in the meantime, at Adriatic Charter. Just as an explanation: I'm going through plain Macedonia links and changing them to pipes into disambiguated redirects (partly to Macedonia (country) and partly the other versions) just because the current naming of the Macedonia article doesn't seem very stable yet – even though I myself happen to support it and would prefer it to stay that way. We may well have to move it back some day, in which case all the plain Macedonia will again be technical errors, pointing to the dab page. There were a couple hundred of them, all technically wrong under the previous arrangement; right now more than half have accidentally become "correct" because like here they did in fact mean the country, but I thought it's not really safe to rely on it at this moment. Fut.Perf. ☼

Template:NATO relations
Why is Canada listed? Canada being a NATO member makes this strange. -- とある白い猫 chi? 02:48, 18 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The title of the template has changed more than once, but the idea is just for articles on NATO relationships to be able to easily link to each other. It just that most of the countries with articles on their bilateral relations with NATO are those that are (or were recently) on a schedule to join the organization. In theory, we should probably have articles on the relationship of all member states with NATO, there just hasn't been the effort so far on Wikipedia.-- Patrick, o Ѻ ∞ 14:32, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

NATO map
Back in December you suggested that we replace the cumbersome map/table setup on the NATO article with a hide/show structure. Today, I put up a new table with maps that try to accomplish this. If you have any comments, I've continued the discussion on the talk page. Thanks for the idea!-- Patrick, o Ѻ ∞ 07:02, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I replied to your post. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 19:55, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

GAR
NATO, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for an individual good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article.--FutureTrillionaire (talk) 14:04, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

US and U.S.
Hi. Just wanted to explain my edit to the NATO article. Please see Manual_of_Style "In American and Canadian English, U.S. (with periods) has long been the dominant abbreviation for United States. US (without periods) is more common in most other national forms of English. Some major American style guides, such as The Chicago Manual of Style (16th ed.), now deprecate U.S. and prefer US. Use of periods for abbreviations and acronyms should be consistent within any given article and congruent with the variety of English used by that article. In longer abbreviations (three letters or more) that incorporate the country's initials (USN, USAF), do not use periods. When the United States is mentioned with one or more other countries in the same sentence, U.S. or US may be too informal, especially at the first mention or as a noun instead of an adjective (France and the United States, not France and the U.S.). Neither use the spaced U. S. nor the archaic U.S. of A., except when quoting. Do not use U.S.A. or USA, except in a quotation or as part of a proper name (Team USA), because these abbreviations are also used for United States Army and other names. USA is correct, though, in the context of formal codes in which it appears that way, e.g. the ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 codes and FIFA country codes." Happy editing! — P. S. Burton  (talk)  12:01, 27 October 2014 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Enlargement of NATO
Hi there, I'm pleased to inform you that I've begun reviewing the article Enlargement of NATO you nominated for GA-status according to the criteria. This process may take up to 7 days. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you might have during this period. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Tomandjerry211 (alt) -- Tomandjerry211 (alt) (talk) 23:20, 26 July 2015 (UTC)

Your GA nomination of Enlargement of NATO
The article Enlargement of NATO you nominated as a good article has passed ; see Talk:Enlargement of NATO for comments about the article. Well done! If the article has not already been on the main page as an "In the news" or "Did you know" item, you can nominate it to appear in Did you know. Message delivered by Legobot, on behalf of Tomandjerry211 (alt) -- Tomandjerry211 (alt) (talk) 22:41, 1 August 2015 (UTC)

Compromise and Disruption
I just read your post on Volunteer Marek's talk page. I must say I am a bit disappointed to see that you describe me as a disruptive editor. We had almost reached consensus before VM's intervention. That editor is hellbent on thwarting me in every way he can, so that you can rest assured that he did not want to revert you. I think describing a person one disagrees with as disruptive should be avoided. They could reply in kind, and this is a recipe for perpetual war. My source? Human History. Againstdisinformation (talk) 21:47, 28 September 2015 (UTC)

"at a minimum, I don't understand why the removal of Wikilinks and Non-breaking spaces". You are right, I have no idea how that happened. If I am responsible for it, I apologise. Againstdisinformation (talk) 11:06, 29 September 2015 (UTC)
 * Patrickneil, before Volunteer Marek's intervention you wrote "I don't think its actually necessary for this section to specify. Its just as accurate to say "talks broke down on 23 March" period "bombing started 24 March" period. Would that work?" I agreed with you and the matter was almost closed. Are you still of the same mind? I don't want to argue forever with Volunteer Marek on the talk page. Againstdisinformation (talk) 00:34, 5 October 2015 (UTC)


 * No, I don't feel that way anymore. I was willing to compromise and add a sentence about the UNSC to the first paragraph, but I also respect the views of the editors that don't want any change there. I apologize if I called you disruptive, I suppose I meant it from Volunteer Marek's perspective, when I suggested that they try to find a compromise with editors they disagree with in general. If you do want to help out, I would say that the third paragraph in the Kosovo section on NATO, which is all about the UN, is only sourced to two articles, the NATO website, itself a primary source, and a 1999 CNN article written as the bombing was just starting. I had sourced a 2015 Oxford University book with the chapter title "Explaining NATO Decision to Bypass the Security Council" in the my edit, now reverted, and I still think that we can use that and other more updated ones to improve the section.-- Patrick, o Ѻ ∞ 03:45, 7 October 2015 (UTC)

Enlargement of NATO
Hi, is there a reason you reverted my edit of the Enlargement of NATO article? SchuttenbachPercival (talk) 00:54, 8 April 2021 (UTC)


 * I suppose it is because I think we have too much about the 2+4 negotiations and the Gorbachev promise already. I have some thoughts on this matter, and I guess your edit is kind of just adding more biased hearsay. Right now, we do have three to four sizable paragraphs on this he-said/she-said in the Enlargement of NATO article, plus mentions on NATO, and another whole section on the 2+4 Treaty article, and I'm just not sure any of it is factual based or even then, notable. I've been working on the NATO topic articles for 15 years or so, and I wonder if the focus some users put on this alleged promise is maybe part of a larger fantasy that NATO could just be undone, the decades of political agreements, elections, referendums on NATO, campaigns made moot because an unnamed negotiator whispered some assurances in Gorbachev's ear that he nor anyone else brought up for nine years. And the premise that "the west was expanding" is so binary, such a Cold War mentality, completely rejecting the democratic will of the people of say, Poland or Hungary to choose how they keep themselves safe. It's WP:UNDUE, it's just not how it happened, and I think these paragraphs take away from the actual history that the other sections try to focus on. That's my rant, I'm not going to edit war, I just don't think it adds to the article's topic.-- Patrick, o Ѻ ∞ 01:43, 8 April 2021 (UTC)


 * My motivation for the edit was not rooted in any fantasy to "undo" NATO. Rather, my opinion is that the oft-cited Gorbachev quote from the 2014 interview, supposedly proving from the man himself that Russian claims of promised NATO non-expansion are bogus, lacks context. Because in the same interview, Gorbachev still makes the same claim he's always made (in his memoirs, in the 2008 interview, etc.) that NATO expansion violated the "spirit" of the "assurances." So I don't think it's fair to call just that part of the interview "biased hearsay." Regardless, I don't wish to edit war either, and I appreciate your response. SchuttenbachPercival (talk) 14:36, 8 April 2021 (UTC)

Enlargement of NATO 2: repeatedly reverting edits + Baker-Gorbachev Pact
I see that SchuttenbachPercival has aso complained about you deleting things from this particular article Enlargement of NATO. Why would you erase once again and again a line about the promises that were made to the Soviet Union by U.S. Secretary James Baker when it adds a lot, mostly given today conflict between NATO and Russia? The line I have added is backed by two references, Der Spiegel and, most importantly, the very memorandum declassified by the US itself that confirms such promises, uploaded by George Washington University. Not only this, but you have proposed to erase the whole article of the Baker-Gorbachev Pact, calling it 'secret', with no argumentation behind this, while I have added two sources proving it existed Jasandia (talk) 17:36, 2 March 2022 (CET)
 * Hi Jasandia, I've been working on NATO topics here on Wikipedia for over a decade, and am aware of how important the idea of this "broken promise" is to many editors. I've read a lot about it over the years, and debated it many times here on Wikipedia, but there's really not much substance to it. There is no secret pact the way you're describing it. You link to this memorandum about a conversation, but that's all it is, a conversation. Not a pact, not a binding promise. Neither NATO nor the country Russia were even involved. The reason you et al know about this conversation is not because the conversation was important, but because Russian Presidents Yeltsin and Putin both found it useful to bring up as part of their opposition to NATO. I encourage you to make the argument for why I'm wrong about this at the AfD page, and I'm happy to keep discussing it there, or here, or on Talk:Enlargement of NATO, and I'm not going to edit war while we're discussing it, so I ask that you do the same. Thanks-- Patrick Neil, o Ѻ ∞/Talk 17:35, 2 March 2022 (UTC)


 * I see you will never allow any divergent point of view in the NATO enlargment article... It's funny you quote WP:UNDUE when the neutrality in the article is non existant and everithing is written from the Western point of view. You erase the line of the discussion of the conversations of Baker-Gorbachev despite:
 * 1. Being reference by both primary and secondary source. Yes the debate has been going for a long time, but it was always rejected as not having existed. In 2017 the NSA of George Washington University released the memorandum proving that it existed. The last update on this is an article in March 2022 by Der Spiegel and there are many more. I'm sorry, but if new information comes out, it must be included. Now we cannot say 'this secret pact didn't exist'. It did exist, and it was secret (tat's why a document was classified), I have to admit it might not qualified as a pact, I never argued against that, but it did exist, and have implications. The investigation by the NSA adiscusses it was not just a single conversation, US and Western leaders were aware of what they were leading Gorbachev to believe -the subheadline is: 'Declassified documents show security assurances against NATO expansion to Soviet leaders from Baker, Bush, Genscher, Kohl, Gates, Mitterrand, Thatcher, Hurd, Major, and Woerner'


 * 2. The previous line 'Whether or not Hans-Dietrich Genscher and James Baker, as representatives from NATO member states, informally committed to not enlarge NATO east of East Germany during these and contemporary negotiations with Soviet counterparts has long been a matter of dispute among historians and international relations scholars' being true but chronollogically being updated by a posterior fact: the release of an classified US Memorandum that proves this was the case, which would settle such a debate and should be included (the debate now would be if this matters or not, if it was informal or not... but not if it existed.
 * 3. Please, could you explain to me why a conversation on Nato Enlargement between top U.S. and Soviet leaders should not be on the Nato Enlargement article but yes in a German reunification treaty? Is there a reason why a primary and secondary sourced historical conversation should not be in a Wiki article which consists on the matter of such discussion? Jasandia (talk) 10:41, 21 March 2022 (UTC)

Good article reassessment of NATO page
NATO has been nominated for a community good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. Give us your invaluable opinion. Morgoonki (talk) 11:04, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Talk:Enlargement of NATO
I found several of the statements made in the Enlargement of NATO article misrepresenting what the sources say, as well as presenting synthesis, and stating a self-published point of view in wikivoice. As you've been a major contributor to the article, would like to invite you to the discussion: Talk:Enlargement of NATO PaulT2022 (talk) 11:43, 4 July 2022 (UTC)

Welcome newcomer
Welcome Patrick to wikipedia, I am so happy we have "gringos" among us. First, don't just delete paragraphs, improve them, NATO had existed before you were alive. Osterluzei (talk) 23:44, 23 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Right, so I have been working on NATO for well over a decade, during which I've worked hard to keep it at WP:GA status, which is pretty tough considering there's a literal cyber army and their sockpuppets who see topic of the article as their enemy. Let me break down this paragraph you added and why none of it is warranted on the article. "The expansion of NATO has been a constant irritation for the Russian Federation." One, that's not really the case, there's several expansions, like Croatia or Albania, that Russia didn't really oppose, but this sentence just isn't encyclopedic. When is "constant"? Since 1955? Since 1991? 1999? What does "irritation" mean, and who is "the Russian Federation"? Do you just mean irritation for Yeltsin and Putin, or for every individual citizen? "Russia consistently made the point, that it had assurances since the 1990s, the alliance would not expand into the former Soviet bloc, or Russia's sphere of interest." This is the part that is purely pro-Putin propaganda, relying on this widely debunked idea of "broken promises" and that "the West" is out take "Russia's sphere of interest", which ignores actual history and any sort of democratic wishes of eastern European countries. But again, who is "Russia", when is "consistently"? Next you say "In fact, at the Washington summit on May 31, 1990, George H. W. Bush went out of his way to assure Gorbachev that NATO would never be directed at the USSR, according to historical sources." Here it looks like you're equating the USSR and Russia, which is problematic for one, and while it's interesting that you put "according to historical sources" in the prose and then don't provide any, the bigger problem is that this is a WP:COPYVIO. Copying and pasting text from other websites, even if you did cite them, is never allowed on Wikipedia. "In 2021, after an embarrassing withdrawal of NATO from Afghanistan, Russia took advantage of a 'weakened' NATO, and Putin initiated a border war with the Ukraine." So again, there is this pro-Putin idea that his war in Ukraine is with NATO, which it isn't, but using adjectives like "embarrassing" or "weakened", or calling the war a "border war" are all WP:POV and totally unencyclopedic.-- Patrick Neil, o Ѻ ∞/Talk 00:53, 24 September 2022 (UTC)