Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/History of terrorist groups


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   merge to history of terrorism.  MBisanz  talk 05:38, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

History of terrorist groups

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Not a topic that can ever be completed. I know no wikipedia page is ever complete per se but it would be impossible to cover the history of every single "influential" (which can be highly subjective) terrorist group; that is better done by a list of the groups which links to their articles. In addition the content is highly subjective, badly referenced and in some cases completely wrong (the leaders of the Easter Rising were lynched by the British authorities in London now? Ignoring the facts that 1) they were shot and 2) it was in Dublin Lynching is an extrajudicial action taken by a mob). Ironholds (talk) 07:43, 27 February 2009 (UTC)

The page has a long way to go--and you have some good points to that end--but it serves an important purpose and should not be deleted. For those interested in the history of terrorist groups and how they have evolved--a very important topic--neither the "History of terrorism" page nor the "List of designated terrorist organizations" suffices. I have to disagree with your argument that the page should be deleted because it is "not a topic that can ever be completed....it would be impossible to cover the history of every single "influential" terrorist group." I disagree on the grounds that any history--history of England, history of the Roman Empire--has to select some events and leave out others. Yes, it is subjective. But a bunch of people discuss what they believe is or is not influential and should be included and it moves forward as a work in progress.

You argue that "that is better done by a list of the groups which links to their articles." I disagree: these lists do nothing to show how one group has influenced the tactics and goals of subsequent groups over time. Only a chronological, semi-narrative list such as the "History of terrorist groups" article can provide that.

"In addition the content is highly subjective, badly referenced and in some cases completely wrong (the leaders of the Easter Rising were lynched by the British authorities in London now? Ignoring the facts that 1) they were shot and 2) it was in Dublin Lynching is an extrajudicial action taken by a mob)." I agree that much of the content has errors in it. You obviously have a strong grasp on the subject matter: I think the wikipedia would be better served by you contributing your knowledge to this article and making it better than by it being deleted with no proper substitute.

As for the bad references, I'm currently working on it. Mcenroeucsb (talk) 07:57, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Describing who influenced what influenced why is best done in the History of terrorism article. A history of England, say, indeed leaves out bits, but those bits can be found elsewhere. The structure and format of this article would leave out entire organisations with no links to their articles. A good example would be this: A history of England has a short summary of the peninsular wars and links to a more detailed article. Your history of England would leave the peninsular war out entirely because, in your subjective opinion, it is "not an influential enough war". Note that this is an example; I'm not saying that is what you would do. How exactly do we select which organisation is worthy of inclusion? Whether they were successful? Organisations have failed and still been (pardon the pun) revolutionary. Whether they are "important"? In theory anything with an article on WP is "important". Whether they influenced other groups? Subjective, and subject to disagreements between academic sources. A quick note: it's "Wikipedia" not "the Wikipedia". Ironholds (talk) 08:09, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Part of me agrees with the idea of having this incorporated with the History of Terrorism article. I'm open to suggestions on how to do that.  Currently, the History of terrorism article is more of a narrative/list of major terrorist events rather than terrorist groups.  It's rather difficult to merge the two.  On the separate issue of whether or not all histories, for sheer lack of space, leave smaller details out, I would argue that there are some events which took place in England which a ten-page history of England just wouldn't have space to mention at all. (I say ten pages because that's about the size that the longer Wikipedia articles seem to be.) If there is a terrorist group that should be mentioned that's not yet on the page (I can think of several, including Lashkar-e-Taiba), then please put it in.Mcenroeucsb (talk) 08:40, 27 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Delete I can't really see any potential in this article; any addition is bound to be contentious and a NPOV/WTA violation Sceptre (talk) 11:31, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Any article on the subject of terrorism (or piracy or Israel or Islam or Christianity) is bound to be contentious. That doesn't mean wikipedia shouldn't have articles on terrorism or piracy or Israel or Islam or Christianity.  As for potential, terrorist groups come up in the news a lot these days--therefore I think a WP article that shows how these groups have evolved over time is very important and has a lot of potential.Mcenroeucsb (talk) 07:37, 28 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment: We have a lot of trouble deciding what exactly is a terrorist organization (see WP:TERRORIST). This is a major cause for edit wars, and as Sceptre more or less says, is something that is very hard to maintain NPOV on. In this article, how are we going to decide if an organization is a terrorist organization? By seeing if they are labeled as terrorist by a government? But even such groups are identified by some as freedom fighters or groups that are fighting for a just cause. Taking both these POVs into view, how do we determine if a group is terrorist 'enough' to be included here? Terrorist attacks are one thing, but a group is a different matter altogether. I'm neutral on the deletion of this article for now, until someone can clarify how this is handled.  C h a m a l  talk 13:38, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * (one of) the issues. A group comes up: are they terrorists? Freedom fighters? Much talkpage wrangling and arguing results and they determine that yes, they are terrorists. Are they "influential" terrorists? At what point do they become influential enough for inclusion? Surely all groups are notable enough for inclusion if they are notable enough for a WP article? And so on. Ironholds (talk) 14:00, 27 February 2009 (UTC)
 * These are all valid questions. I think the best way to approach the "how are we going to decide if an organization is a terrorist organization?" question is to choose one definition and use it as a litmus test.  One definition has been placed at the top of the article.  If someone else finds a better definition, I'm game to try that out.Mcenroeucsb (talk) 07:37, 28 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment. I don't understand why this should be a separate article from History of terrorism. Unless someone can clearly explain the difference between History of terrorism and History of terrorist groups, I will probably recommend deletion, but I will hold off temporarily. --Metropolitan90 (talk) 04:59, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Part of me agrees with the idea of having this incorporated with the History of Terrorism article. I'm open to suggestions on how to do that.  Currently, the History of terrorism article is more of a narrative/list of major terrorist events rather than terrorist groups.  It's rather difficult to merge the two.Mcenroeucsb (talk) 07:37, 28 February 2009 (UTC)


 * Keep. Groups which use propaganda of the deed are regularly discussed in the news, in universities, and in government policy.  On those grounds I think it is extremely important to have an article which traces how the goals and tactics of these groups have evolved over time, even if it is a difficult task ridden with POV obstacles.Mcenroeucsb (talk) 07:37, 28 February 2009 (UTC) note: keep !vote made by article creator, hardly of objective value

Two points:
 * Comment: I've looked over the Wikipedia deletion policy page. If we follow the guidelines laid out on that page, I think the page should be kept.

First off, the “Wikipedia:Articles for deletion” page instructs that one should “Note that stubs and imperfect articles are awaiting further development and so the potential of the topic should be considered.” This article is poorly sourced and that should be worked on, but because it has potential and is awaiting further development, it should not be deleted.

Second and finally, none of the thirteen main reasons for deletion on the “Wikipedia:Deletion policy” page apply to this article. These reasons are listed below.

1) Copyright violations and other material violating Wikipedia's fair-use policy. The article, so far as I can tell, does not violate any copyrights.

2) Vandalism, including inflammatory redirects, pages which exist only to disparage their subject, patent nonsense, or gibberish.  This page does not exist only to disparage its subject.  It exists to explore patterns in the history and evolution of groups which use terrorism.  I suppose that “history of groups which use violent propaganda of the deed” would be less inflammatory than “history of terrorist groups,” but it’s also wordy and confusing.  And although “foreign nonstate actor who commits criminal violence committed at sea” may have fewer pejorative connotations than “pirate,” I think it makes the most sense to continue calling Francis Drake and Henry Morgan pirates and to continue calling Aum Shinrikyo and Al-Qaeda terrorist groups.

3) Advertising or other spam without relevant content (but not an article about an advertising-related subject).  This page is not advertising.

4) Content forks (unless a merge or redirect is appropriate). If any of the reasons for deletion are applicable, this would be it.  I am not opposed to merging this article with “history of terrorism,” but I think that causes more problems than it solves.  The argument seems to be that merging the two articles would prevent WP from having two redundant articles.  But these articles are taking very different paths and are increasingly diverging as edits are added.  And merging the articles makes for a very confusing narrative owing to the fact that many of these groups are founded as political groups and then part of the group does a bombing or some other violent propaganda of the deed ten, twenty, or fifty years later.

5) Articles which cannot possibly be attributed to reliable sources, including neologisms, original theories and conclusions, and articles which are themselves hoaxes (but not articles describing notable hoaxes). There’s a lot of great scholarship on this topic, so I don’t think this is an issue.

6) Articles for which all attempts to find reliable sources to verify them have failed. There’s a lot of great scholarship on this topic, so I don’t think this is an issue either.

7) Articles whose subject fails to meet the relevant notability guideline (WP:N, WP:BIO, WP:MUSIC, WP:CORP and so forth). Terrorist groups have had great influence on the world and foreign policy for at least the past decade (if not the past century) and are often discussed, researched, and debated.  Therefore, I believe that this article’s subject “merits its own article.”

8) Articles which breach Wikipedia's policy on biographies of living persons This isn’t really the issue at hand.  Most of the persons discussed in the article are deceased.

9) Redundant or otherwise useless templates. Not applicable.

10) Categories representing overcategorization While there are differing opinions on how to define “terrorism” (or “piracy” or “war”), I think we can settle on a definition, apply the definition as a litmus test to groups as to whether or not they merit being mentioned in the article, and thereby avoid overcategorization.

11) Images that are unused, obsolete, or violate fair-use policy.  Not that I know of.

12) Any other use of article, template, project, or user namespace that is contrary to the established separate policy for that namespace. Not applicable.

13) Any other content not suitable for an encyclopedia. I think this article’s content is very suitable for an encyclopedia, despite its inflammatory nature.

Mcenroeucsb (talk) 08:28, 28 February 2009 (UTC) Delete Not a single, unified movement, hard to define, and could conceivably go back to prehistory. Will become the land of edit wars, and a hotbed for POV-pushing. Zazaban (talk) 00:38, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Plenty of terrorist groups have used propoganda, yes; I'd go with ALL of them, which links back to my earlier point about subjective inclusion. I'd argue this fails point five; you cannot have a standalone history of every terrorist group ever, and neither can you have a standalone history of those terrorist groups which you personally feel are notable. If there are particular propaganda related trends or influences then History of Terrorism is the place for them. A standalone fork like this would be divisive, POV-filled and cause more friction than it could possibly have encyclopaedic value. Ironholds (talk) 13:00, 28 February 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep: No reason to why the entire article should be scrapped. POV can systematically be removed. Article contains a considerable amount of useful information. --  李博杰   | —Talk contribs 03:59, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * *Merge then, with history of terrorism. Zazaban (talk) 05:57, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I think you mean smerge. Ottre 01:59, 2 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Smerge to history of terrorism. The article already exists, so improve.  Don't write a separate article on the same topic. -- Whpq (talk) 21:33, 2 March 2009 (UTC)
 * Keep or smerge to history of terrorism; I agree that an article like this has a role in keeping track of terrorist groups, but unless someone wants to have a full-time job of tracking and updating this page, I'd say it's future potential as it's own page is strained. Ks64q2 (talk) 04:46, 3 March 2009 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.