Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of attacks by the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia


 * 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 keep. Any potential tensions aside, the main concern here appeared to be sourcing through unreliable or extremist sources. This was most certainly a valid concern, however, it appears to have been addressed. Any potential merges are up to editors. Seraphimblade Talk to me 10:22, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

List of attacks by the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia

 * – (View AfD) (View log)


 * Delete The article is a very specific, unencyclopedic list, which may have been created with a POV agenda. Links to articles that use explicitly racist language. Augustgrahl 04:28, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * How on earth can you call a users first (and last) edit an agenda? -- Cat chi? 10:36, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The fact that this article was created using extremist racist sites as its main sources strongly implies that the article was made with an agenda inappropriate for Wikipedia. Honestly, if an article was written based on sources that said the opposite, that Turks are raised from birth to hate Armenians, or that the United States kisses Turkish ass, you'd probably want it removed. It's no different with TallArmenianTale. The links have to go, regardless of whether this article stays or is deleted. -- Augustgrahl 14:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Please read WP:AGF and WP:BITE. Also read WP:NPOV, WP:NPA. -- Cat chi? 13:43, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. This list is encyclopedic and is a list of diplomats killed as a result of ASALA attacks. This list is similar to those serial murder/killing related articles. These individual attacks are notable enough to have articles on them. -- Cat chi? 04:32, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom, with the addition that it is a typo, "members" is typoed as "mebers" &rArr;    SWAT Jester    On Belay!  04:42, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Page was renamed right after nomination. -- Cat chi? 05:18, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete horribly cited, tallarmeniantale major hate site etc doesn't deserve a article. Artaxiad 04:47, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete (striking, see below in thread) only one apparently primary source...? Delete unless someone can heavily source this in five days. - Denny 05:27, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * *Sigh* it comes from ATAA probably one of the most hated by Armenians for there "works". Artaxiad 05:29, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That is not a deletion criteria. Wikipedia is not censored based on "hated by Armenians" (whatever that means). -- Cat chi? 05:56, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Why are you setting time tables? The page was started just 7 days ago. You can't possibly expect a featured list in a course of 13 days now, right? -- Cat chi? 05:55, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * my 5 days comment is based on how long AfDs 'typically' run, is all. I'm looking at the sources you posted and mentioned on my talk page now. - Denny 06:39, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * this source talks about "230 armed attacks, killing 71 innocent people, including 31 Turkish diplomats, and seriously wounding over 520 people". The scope of this list is restricted to attacks by ASALA on turkish diplomatic personnel. -- Cat chi? 06:08, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That source is from a Turkish site, I can find alot of dirt on other ethnicities if I look up Armenian websites but I don't because its POV, offensive and not a third party not even reliable you can't base it on that site. Artaxiad 06:47, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That source is from army.mil in other words US Army domain. Nothing Turkish about the site. -- Cat chi? 08:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment/update: Looking at the sources provided now I don't doubt that the article is encyclopediac and valid (i.e. these people were killed), but the sources themselves are extremely... extremist on one side. I am not taking sides, I don't know Armenian history from Turk history. But when one page is quoting Batman Begins to make its point about genocide... I can't take it totally seriously. That said, changing to Keep for the article, not particularly the title. This will need huge clean up and way, way better sourcing than just pro-one side sources. That is, the material is fine (in that the attacks happened), but using just anti-Armenian or anti-Turkish sites would be horribly bad. maybe UN pages, and actual media sources? I think this will be more of a content rather than Afd Issue. - Denny 06:49, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * It is very hard to find a completely neutral source (I would welcome one however). Non-Turkish entities do not seem to care much about Turkish diplomats. I am certain there are newspaper entries for individual attacks but due to the age of the attacks these entities do not seem to be available online. -- Cat chi? 06:55, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Aren't there lots of similiar articles for attacks by x group vs. y group like this? I seem to recall... seeing them. Maybe see how/what they did? I'm not sure, unfortunately (I seriously don't know much about either, and don't think I even know anyone that I know to be of either ethnicity IRL). - Denny 06:59, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * There are few examples I found at random: List of Hamas suicide attacks, List of ETA attacks. Hamas attack article relies on Israeli Government sources. ETA one doesn't have that many sources and the ones it is from Spanish Government. -- Cat chi? 08:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep. There's no reason to delete a perfectly encyclopaedic article. Where else could these names be listed if not in an article specifically dedicated to them? Parishan 05:35, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * None, if the attacks are so notable they should have articles on the people even, which barely theres only two and the sources are not third party and very POV. Artaxiad 05:37, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The external links are very inappropriate, Armenian butt-kissing France comments like that from a site should not be include in a article. Artaxiad 05:41, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * POV is not a verb. Sources are not expected to comply with wikipedias NPOV. Neutral sites are preferred but not required. -- Cat chi? 05:53, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Still doesn't matter these are not reliable sources, they are not third party, especially from the ATAA there main page, shows Anti-Armenian context, this article is no where near finished, or deserves a article its self, plus the people who died don't even have articles. Artaxiad 06:04, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Weather you like the sites or not is not a part of deletion criteria. Please take it to articles talk page. -- Cat chi? 06:09, 17 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Delete This material appears to be covered adequately at Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia. Not every attack or name needs to be listed; most of the casualties were minor embassy employees, not ambassadors. Brianyoumans 05:43, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * It is a shame for humanbeings; minor embassy employees?????.. Must TC 18:10, 19 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Any attack on any embassy is notable, maybe not notable enough to have a complete article on them. These are diplomatic installations. I intend to reformat the list on a "list of attacks" format in due time. -- Cat chi? 05:53, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Why do we need an additional article? The major attacks are all listed in the ASALA article, and the overall numbers of attacks, casualties, and injuries. This looks like just a POV fork, or an attempt to have just yet another article on the subject. I don't see that this article adds much to our coverage of the issue. At present it doesn't even link back to the other articles. Brianyoumans 07:02, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * It is merely a chronological activity of ASALA. Many such lists exist. See: List of Hamas suicide attacks for example. I just started working on it, don't expect a featured article to pop out from a few edits.... -- Cat chi? 08:09, 17 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Keep and improve I am having a very hard time understanding why this article has to go.-- Doktor Gonzo 08:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Should be obvious, we do not creat articles for the pleasure of creating them. Tell me what justify the existance of this article, when the subject has a main and far from being over 40 Kb. It still can be expended, no one is preventing you to do that. It is not an article, it is just a list, and not a list that can be updated by adding more to it, as the organization does even not exist anymore. Fad (ix) 21:39, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * It is a very informative list actually. And I thought Wikipedia was about giving information, not censoring it cause it is 40Kb.-- Doktor Gonzo 14:49, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete. Per Augustgrahl. -- Aivazovsky 12:15, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep and improve Nothing unencyclopedic about this list. –mysid☎ 13:12, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete unless WP:ATTributed to reliable sources. There's a perfectly good section on attacks in the well-referenced Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia article. POV fork anyone? Angus McLellan (Talk) 15:19, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * These are reliable sources. No one is disputing that the people described has died. Multiple sources say the same thing. -- Cat chi? 16:48, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * We'll just have to disagree. Anything worth saying can be said in the article that doesn't rely on belgenet, ATAA, or TAT. Why you'd want to hide this information away in a trainwreck like this escapes me. I'd have thought you'd want it to be given due prominence in the ASALA piece. I suppose the idea of finding books to use as references, rather than polemical self-published websites, is rather too alien to be considered. Angus McLellan (Talk) 18:05, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * If you feel the cited sources are not neutral/reliable you are more than welcome to find better sources and actualy help the article. -- Cat chi? 13:47, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete and add the information to the ASALA page. Thats where it belongs. --Vartanm 16:28, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep I don't see what the problem is as long as it's sourced (which it seems to be, albeit not fully, at this moment). Yonatan (talk) 16:56, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Merge to Armenian_Secret_Army_for_the_Liberation_of_Armenia, Wikipedia is not the place to start creating lists, when there is a main page just about the event which could cover it. Either way, this page was created by a member who just registered an account for the purpouses of creating it. And I suspect that member to be related to the Arbcom case involving Armenia-Azerbaijan and would hope a checkuser on it. Also, I am sorry to say, if any other ethnic group X can accept links to sites to tallXtale or Xmyth.com etc., I would welcome those racist sites to stay, until then those have to go. Also, I have a work published in Israel which gives a good historic of the events, a work which could be qualified as neutral, some in the list are not included in that work, that work could be cited, but again, this goes in the main. Justifying such a page by claiming it shows chronology is bogus, lets creat such lists for every articles on Wikipedia. Shall we? What happened to "Wikipedia is not a list?" Did we lost it, and since when? Fad (ix) 21:31, 17 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That rule never existed and will never exist. Lists of events and etc has been on wikipedia for ages. See: Category:Lists and List of military engagements of World War II. WP:AGF and don't WP:BITE. -- Cat chi? 04:32, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I must have missed it, but I don't see anything similair, show me. Relevant cathegories, but I don't see any such article with a name by itself, when the main already covers it and is far from achieving 40kb. Fad (ix) 14:47, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The recommended action for pages with a size above 32 kilobytes is to break them up for older browsers. This rule was relevant in 2001 when these older browsers were in heavy usage. There was never a rule to require 32 kilobytes from the parent article. ASALA article may be expanded, the point of this list is to simply list ASALA's attacks. There are 4 pages worth of attacks on the MIPT database. I haven't even begun dissecting that source. -- Cat chi? 14:59, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I know this all right, but this page does not bring anything new, and the term POV Fork does qualify, as some in the list are not included in the work I have, published in Israel. Escaping a sourced article, to created another one with different level of established work is doubtfull. Tell me what in this article is not well covered in the main, if you can not source each events individually, than it is not sourced enough to go on Wikipedia. Fad (ix) 15:38, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Every incident is sourced individually at the moment. Each of the 7 external links (one being from Turkish Culture Department") agree with each other. The list is incomplete, it currently only features diplomat assassinations. Other activity of ASALA is on MIPT database and takes up about 4 pages of entries (each entry is about a page long). I do not believe there are any views in this article. ASALA also admits killing these people. -- Cat chi? 16:07, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That you consider tallarmeniantale, anarmenianmyth and armenianreality as sources which could go anywhere in Wikipedia beside the article about anti-Armenianism is enough for me, at this point I see no point in adding anything at all. I guess you would have kept sites named tallturkishtale, aturkishmyth and turkishreality and consider them worthy of any mention. I had proposed you to add a neutral source published in Israel to expend the main article, I don't care keep the article, won't change the fact that it would bring nothing new, while encyclopedic articles are actually meant to bring something new. Fad (ix) 16:50, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * tallturkishtale, aturkishmyth and turkishreality (I do not believe I have used this one in the article/list) and other "hate sites" are not my preferred sources. I merely am referencing them as an external view/site. You would know this had you actually checked the citation. Lists aren't supposed to bring anything new, a list does not contain a lot of information. A list is for organizing data much like a category. -- Cat chi? 05:26, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * This page is unencyclopedic you know it this article should be deleted with accordance to Wikipedia standards and rules, all this nonsense comes from POV, and ethnic hatred websites including all Turkish with no other parties present, it definitely should be deleted as we can see a weak attempt from Cool cat to improve the article nice job but no reliable sources. Artaxiad 04:46, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I wouldn't consider my edits as a "weak attempt". Here I found a 7th source, . Now thats official Turkish Government publication. -- Cat chi? 05:51, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I can find thousands of things like this from the Turkish government what do you expect? there not third party nor reliable thus references like this should not stay its still a weak attempt from my view. Artaxiad 17:05, 18 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep Don't see why listing of facts shall be removed. After all attacks did happen, people did get killed. Why delete the article? Most of these incidents are documented at MIPT Knowledge Base, here is just one example . Atabek 10:10, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Yeh, and there is already an article about it, it is called Armenian_Secret_Army_for_the_Liberation_of_Armenia Fad (ix) 15:47, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That is a general article about ASALA, individual attacks should not be listed there. -- Cat chi? 05:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Why not? Fad (ix) 05:17, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Because in article lists are problematic. They occupy too much space. Very rarely do we see in-article lists. -- Cat chi? 05:30, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Why should it be presented as a list? Fad (ix) 05:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The same reason why we have some 1,600,000 articles. Please see Category:Lists -- Cat chi? 05:53, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * "Why should it be presented as a list? Fad (ix)"
 * That summarizes the argument for "Delete" really. Because as Cat pointed out there are hundreds of thousands of them, because it is a very deep list, because every attack has its own story, because it is important, because it is informative.-- Doktor Gonzo 16:20, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Fadix pseudo-arguments don't work well in deletion discussions. Lists in Wikipedia explains why we have lists on wikipedia. -- Cat chi? 13:40, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete, all the content is in the cover article already. But copy the references to the it. --Tone 16:45, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete Relevant info is already at main ASALA article. Many of the sources fail WP:RS. --Folantin 17:39, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete - apart from the big RS problem, as already noted the relevant info is already in ASALA article.--Aldux 18:01, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * RS? You call "Turkish government" and "MIPT Knowledge Base" an unreliable source? -- Cat chi? 05:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep independently or Merge to Armenian_Secret_Army_for_the_Liberation_of_Armenia. If kept, should be improved. --Ulvi I. 22:02, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete per nom, and I agree it forks information from the ASALA article.--Domitius 23:07, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep, and Strong Keep if anyone here would revert it when someone adds more(1 to 70) attacks on the ASALA page. There are at least 80 attacks and many of them if not all of them should be important. This list is a good idea, we can also give more details for each attack. It will also be a good reference for Wikipedia visitors. Similar articles exist as well. We still have more than 20 dead (diplomats, their spouses, children and coworkers, etc.), and hundreds of injured not listed on the ASALA page. I am the one who recently added those 'some other attacks', we can maybe add a 1 or 2 more, the rest I am not sure. Wikipedia is not on paper, no need to have a very large main ASALA page. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Denizz (talk • contribs) 04:51, 19 March 2007 (UTC).
 * Deniz, if we add details to this list, it will be a text on the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia, which already has its own article. If you want to add information, the main page is there for you to expend it, this article is needless. Fad (ix) 05:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Not at all. A lot of the insidents not covered in the main ASALA article are to be presented here. There are 4 pages worth of attacks on MIPT database. -- Cat chi? 05:33, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * MIPT is relevent then, delete the rest of the sources and keep that one(MIPT). I don't see why all the attacks can not be presented in the main which is far being too long, but at least now if the community decide to keep, we have a relevent reference to work on. Fad (ix) 05:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Turkish Government is a very reputable source on the matter as well. If Kurdistan Workers Party links to pkk.org (a hate site), this should link to that. Believeing or even visiting the external site is upto the reader. I would add an external link ("hate site") in support of ASALA had I found one -- Cat chi? 05:56, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The Turkish government is not a credible source in anything that concerns the Armenians. A list is not like an article, it is a statment of fact, it does not represent positions, it says this happened. For this the source provided should be very credible, in this case the Turkish government does not qualify here. Fad (ix) 17:04, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * As a Wikipedian, I would very much like to have detailed knowledge of every attack by ASALA. This article promises to do that. And please keep your POV concerning Turks to yourself.-- Doktor Gonzo 17:14, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * This is going nowhere, Gonzo, please check what all neutral contributors here except one have voted. I agree with you, a detailed desciption of what happened should be writen. This is not where my opposition lies. My opposition is as following: Why can't the main article do that? If we start adding texts and desciptions, it doesn't become a list anymore, but rather more of a detailed article, which the main article is meant to be. This is the reason why I said that the relevent stuff should be merged to the main article. Who prevented you to expend the main article? Fad (ix) 17:30, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The ASALA article can't carry all this, it is a very long list. And I don't want no summary, I want details. These are attacks affiliated with the group, a long list, they can be examined under another article such as this, there are such other examples in Wikipedia.-- Doktor Gonzo 15:10, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Fadix, this AFD discussion is way too early, we should give time to everyone who wants to expand this list. There are more than 80, possibly more than 200 attacks, we should not put them on the ASALA page, otherwise the ASALA page will become 'lists of attacks by ASALA' page that you guys want to delete. Again, you all know this better than me, Wikipedia is not on paper, there is no reason not to have a relevant page. I don't want to do this right now because of this AFD discussion (not to affect people), but I am planning to use this list as the main article for the some other attacks part on ASALA, people who are interested can just take a look at this list. By the way, by details I did not mean the whole details, just 1-2, maybe 3 lines (the current list is fine). Also Turkish government can be used a source for Armenian related matters, we might not want not choose it as the main source for a general Armenian related thing, but this matter is not just an Armenian matter, it is a Turkish matter as well, the embassies attacked were Turkish embassies, most of the people who died were Turkish diplomats, their family members or coworkers. We are not going to put opinions of the governments here, but the events. It's like using US government's documents for incidents of Iraqi insurgency or Al Qaeda, etc deniz 23:20, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Fine, but don't you think that the expension should have been done before creating the article, when it was obvious that the article will creat a controversy? You are right about we should not exclude the Turkish government. The problem with a list is that it exploit one weakness with Wikipedia, perhaps I should work on a guideline about that. The problem is that a list will usually make a statment of fact, not position. With a list it is difficult to say:"According to X, but Y does not..." since it will defy the purpouses of it being a list. This is why I always had a problem with lists, we have the same problem with categories, we should be careful with categories, because we will not start footnoting them and justifying their uses. Having said that, for those reasons, it is best to not use the Turkish government as a source, because we are presenting "facts" rather than "positions." But Coolcat has presented another source which is more complete and neutral, which rander the use of the Turkish government source as useless. Had he presented that source a priori, and excluded the biased sources, the result of the votes could have been different. But another problem remains, is that all acts were not perpetrated by the ASALA, and filtering them will creat more controversies, as many other lists will be created. This was also one of the reasons I requested merging, since I found that it would fit better if each acts were discribed in their relevent mainspaces. I guess we have to see what the community decides. Or else, you could start working with the article and improve it, by addressing the issues raised by the critics and see what the reaction will be. Fad (ix) 23:41, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * It appears to me that the reason of controversies (and most delete votes, possibly some keep votes as well) was the usage of the 'bad sites' as references, now it is fixed (maybe we should inform the voters(delete'rs or keep'ers), they might reconsider, it has a new title as well) Also if you are talking about general articles, they don't start as featured article candidates, they usually start as stubs and get expanded. If you are talking about lists, it would be better if they had a good head start, but I don't think this is necessary for lists either. The problem with lists you mentioned is a general thing, and I don't think it applies here. To have a person in this list, a) that person must be killed/injured in an attack, b) that attack must be claimed by ASALA (it might be co-claimed by other organizations, that is fine). If we are going to use governments as references, we will only take the 'statements' not say opinions of some politicians. Statements of governments are reliable sources, and here we need only statements, a) and b) above. I agree that the usage of Turkish government as reference is so far rather useless, but having multiple references is not a bad thing. Back to 'bad sites' aka Tallarmeniantale (don't know much about others, is ATAA the American Turkish society?), I believe Tallarmeniantale might be worthy of having an article about (similar articles can probably be found on the Armenian side). deniz 06:18, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment The point is the one Angus McLellan made: how come it was possible to create the main ASALA article using reasonably reliable sources but not this one? As Angus said: "I suppose the idea of finding books to use as references, rather than polemical self-published websites, is rather too alien to be considered". The first source used is a chronology presenting an incredibly one-sided account of Turkish-Armenian relations. It doesn't even mention the initial Turkish invasion of Armenia. So is this a reliable source? No. I thought the idea of Wikipedia was to "make the Net not suck", not to bring all the suckier parts of the Net together in one place. It should be perfectly possible to create a list like this, but if people really want it so desperately how about making the effort to go and find some neutral, third-party sources? Until that happens, this page should be deleted without prejudice to recreation. --Folantin 09:28, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Folantin, any source for a list can be used as a source for the article was well, so there will be more possible sources for the main page than the list. Also all the references are reliable now, tallarmeniantale and likes are not used, Angus' comments are not that relevant now. And, what do you mean by Turkish invasion of Armenia, what do you mean by 'not even mentioning Turkish invasion of Armenia'? Please don't make me ignore you. Also, a website of a list of attacks don't need to have a thorough analysis of the attackers' motives, and it can be used as a source, it can be very good source indeed. Thorough analyses are usually commercial. Anyway, its almost morning, back to my coffin. deniz 11:09, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * They aren't reliable. Have you actually looked at the chronology I mentioned which claims to give a complete account of Turkish-Armenian relations since the 11th century, yet doesn't even mention the Seljuk invasion? I'm not even going to go into the many other omissions. Would any reputable historian think this source was trustworthy? It's simply a polemical advocacy site. Getting a bunch of these things off the Web and collating them doesn't add up to reliable sourcing - as I point out below, they even contradict one another. The ASALA did carry out attacks in the 1970s and 1980s. The job of editors here should be to find out factually accurate information about them, ideally using academically respectable books. --Folantin 11:38, 20 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep Must TC  06:16, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. Quite informative. Grandmaster 08:51, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Strong Delete Unencylopedic and pov.--  Ευπάτωρ   Talk!! 18:13, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Comments First, the list needs pruning because the affiliations of the perpetrators doesn't seem to be limited to the group identified in the title. Second, I assume the good faith of those wanting to keep the list that they would also wish to gladly vote keep for a List of attacks by Turkish terrorists or some such thing that is sourced primarily from Greek, Bulgarian, Arab, Russian, Cypriot, and Armenian sources. Carlossuarez46 19:21, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * List of attacks by X, where X is a terrorist organization consisting of mostly Turkish people, yes, but not list of attacks of Turkish terrorists, and why is this military related? deniz 22:10, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Carlossuarez46, you seem to be the one failing to assume good faith with such a distasteful comment. And yeah, I second deniz, why is this listed under Military-related?-- Doktor Gonzo 15:10, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Because the group has "Army" in its title? Good one.-- Doktor Gonzo 15:31, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Doktor Gonzo, I talked with Carom, here is what he said:
 * " Heh, well, given the relatively small number of military AFD's, I doubt editors will become enraged if they have to scroll past one or two discussion which are only peripherally related to the military. At any rate, Wikipedia in general takes a pretty broad view of the scope of the term "military," so I don't think it's stretching a point too much to include this one. Carom 22:54, 19 March 2007 (UTC) " deniz 17:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Military-related deletions.  -- Carom 19:27, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Turkey-related deletions and list of Armenia-related deletions.  --deniz 22:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
 * General comment I've just noticed this list doesn't even use its own sources accurately, regardless of how reliable they are. Take the first incident listed. Source 1 says that Mehmet Baydar and Bahadir Demir were assassinated by "Gourgen Yanikian"; yet Source 2 says they were killed by "Migirdic Yanikyan". So which is it? More importantly, what is this incident even doing here? It took place in 1973 but according to Source 2, the ASALA wasn't even founded until 1975. Come on, please, this is supposed to be an encyclopaedia. Factual accuracy is paramount, especially on controversial subjects like this. It's also worth noting that for many of these attacks, several groups apart from the ASALA also claimed responsibility. It's not very encyclopaedic to put them on a "List of attacks by the ASALA" unless a neutral source has determined who was behind them accurately. --Folantin 10:57, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * There is a fine line between improving an article and getting rid of it.-- Doktor Gonzo 15:10, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * This list doesn't even live up to its title. It doesn't provide a list of ASALA attacks. It provides a list of attacks on Turkish diplomats which were actually or allegedly carried out by persons with an Armenian background between 1973 and 1984. We already have a greatly superior article on the ASALA which can be expanded with information from reliable sources. What is this poor duplicate's reason for existence? --Folantin 16:34, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Let's not itemize these comments, it would be like voting multiple times. Yanikian, Georgeu (or Gourgen) was born around 1895 in Ottoman Empire, did you stop a while to think that these Georgeu or Gourgen might be his adopted names after he migrated to USA, and Migirdic Yanikian might be his name in Ottoman documents most of which are in the possession of Turkish government now (hence Turkish government might feel obliged to use this name)? We certainly need to look into this, it will be a way to improve the list. All sources say that ASALA was established in 1975. I think we should move the first attack to the introduction, ASALA and JCAG founders were inspired by this attack and founded ASALA, this attack may be the reason why mostly diplomats are targeted, but it is not necessarily part of ASALA attacks. I am going to do that now. Lets improve the list, not delete. deniz 17:57, 20 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Merge and then Delete. Any relevant information cited by reliable sources, should be merged to the ASALA article. --JavMilos 15:31, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Are you for having 80 maybe 200 attacks listed on the ASALA page? As I said earlier, I think this AFD is too soon, let the people improve it. The reason that this AFD started this soon is probably the fact that back then undesirable references were used, which enraged people; this was apparently the reason of many delete votes back then. Now the sources are reliable, definitely no tallarmeniantale or similar site is used. deniz 17:38, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * It is not necessary or desirable to list every single attack. Does an article on a war list every engagement in which a few soldiers died? Does an article on the streets of a city list every street - or just the notable ones? If there were only 10 attacks, we would want to list every one.  Since there are dozens or hundreds, we should list those that were more significant or notable and summarize the rest. Just because this whole affair is part of a blood feud between Armenians and Turks, in which they want to obsess over every real or imagined injury, is no reason that we should write bad articles on this subject. Too much niggly detail means that an article is less effective and interesting - no one is going to want to read through a list of 200 attacks. Brianyoumans 18:13, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I disagree, attacks on embassies are certainly notable. If a terrorist organization attacked 200 World Trade centers, we would list all 200 of them and make an article for all 200 of them (in which case a category would be enough). Attacks on embassies are notable, maybe not as notable as something of caliber of attack on World Trade center, so that each would require an article. This is not a bad article on this subject. When we have more than 50 attacks listed, we can reorganize things to make it more easily readable. The current format is good for a shorter list, in my opinion. deniz 19:01, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The article still links to tallarmeniantale and armenianreality. -- Augustgrahl 18:18, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Ooh, I was checking and referring to the references. I am going to edit that page, move them to a Notes section, make a remark there. If you want to, we can comment out that. deniz 19:01, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep -- The attacks took place. Therefore writing about the attacks is neither propaganda, nor POV. Second, the list format is appropriate as in a general article about ASALA there would be no breadth for a list this large. Third, in response to article's citation quality: This should not seriously be considered a valid reason for AfD. The article was created a few days prior to AfD, which really begs the question why the concerned authors are not helping out providing better sources. The article can provide better sources and a little amount of effort should be able to find them - here is one from the Turkish government:, but asking for deletion of this article so soon after its creation really brings questions of good faith to my mind. --Free smyrnan 18:28, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The references back then were some websites that were disputed by the (Armenian and maybe other) users for its other content. I think that was the reason for such an early AFD of a list. Keep assuming good faith deniz 19:09, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep or Merge. ASALA is a recognized terrorist organization, and as such, there must be a list of attacks. Especially in an encyclopedia. So as long as the list of attacks is verifiable, it should be part of the record. --adil 19:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - Sourced, meets WP:LIST. Matthew 20:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep - but find better sources --A.Garnet 20:42, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete The references are from a racist website and many of the information is POW. It also forks information from the ASALA article. ROOB323 23:08, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I do not believe any of that is a part of deletion criteria. -- Cat chi? 11:28, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep, notable, referenced (although at least one of the sources may warrant being replaced). Everyking 09:08, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Tally by nationality (Updated through Penwhale's vote below) For the closing administrator, for general amusement, for anyone who might have thought that people vote based on the merits of the article and not whether they like its political implications: I did a tally by nationality, based mostly on voter's userpages, although in a few cases I classified them based on comments on their talk pages (Armenian Barn Stars, for instance) or by what articles they principally edited. Here is the tally.
 * Turks (Cool Cat, A. Garnet, free smyrnan, Parishan, Doktor Gonzo, Atabek, Denizz, Mustafa Akalp, Baristarim) - all voted to keep (9 Keep votes)
 * Azeris (Ulvi I. Grandmaster, adil) - all voted to keep (3 Keep votes) (for those who don't follow the region, Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a war recently)
 * Armenians (Eupator, ROOB323, Augustgrahl, Aivazovsky, Artaxiad, Vartmm, Fadix) - all voted to delete or merge (6 Delete votes, 1 Merge )
 * Greeks (Domitius, Yannismarou) - 2 Delete votes
 * All others - 8 Keep, 5 Delete
 * On the whole, a sad day for Wikipedia. (I had commended Domitius for voting contrary to expectations, but it was a bookkeeping error, and I have revised the totals above appropriately.) Brianyoumans 21:28, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I am really offended by this, I am a mergist and deletionist by nature. I voted merge and justified my argument. I also answered to Deniz that there was still time for him to convince the community to keep it, by improving the article. I did not only vote, but also provided a descriptive reason for my decision and settled on the middle by voting merge. It isn't bad at all, as you claim 6 keeps and 6 deletes, which place me on the center. Fad (ix) 21:41, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I of course am not accusing any particular editor of voting solely on politics. As the "neutral" votes show, opinion is split on this. However, it is certainly against the odds that all Armenians would vote to merge or delete, and all Turks would vote to keep. Brianyoumans 23:01, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I agree with you and it is really sad, the whole idea of the afd should be reviewed, on the Armenia Azerbaijan RfAr, one of my proposal was to restrict involved sides to vote for a period of 3 months. I have few ideas to prevent abuses of this system, if you are interested we could talk about it in your talkpage. We are at a point that the closing administrator has to view who voted what and what uninvolved parties have voted. Members should reverse the roles in their mind and see if they would have still voted the same thing. Fad (ix) 23:23, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Was I just being "accused" of being azerbaijani? -- Cat chi? 07:53, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I was just gonna say you can add that to your list then realized you alread did. Congratulations.-- Doktor Gonzo 11:47, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I take it you were joking about Domitius-- Doktor Gonzo 21:32, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Er... sorry, bookkeeping error. I'll have to plead the old "I wrote the last bit with an unhappy 6-month old on my knee" excuse. I'll correct my text. Brianyoumans 23:01, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Brianyoumans, you are not the 'mighty outsider' either. I checked your userpage as well. denizTC 23:38, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Hehe, I guess ou got him. :) Fad (ix) 23:47, 21 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure exactly what you mean. I tend to be a "deletionist", but that means that I tend to bring a lot of articles up to AFD; I don't necessarily vote "delete" on other editors' AFDs. As to ethnicity, I qualify as a "white bread American". Brianyoumans 00:14, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * If being the "Armenian", "Turk", or "Azeri" affects the votes, why not being deletionist? Also, it might have had an effect on your decision to create a 'tally of votes by nationality' here. Do you usually do that when the plurality of votes are 'delete'? No need to kinda 'accuse' Armenians, Turks and Azeris to be the Armenian, the Turk, the Azeri. A better tally of votes would be based on date, in my opinion. This AFD was started and many votes were based on the fact that 'some' websites were used as a reference back then; I hope a lot of people had to a chance to take a look at these again. I am not going to make that tally of votes based on date, as I might be biased. If we want to tally the votes, another option would be a tally of votes based on the nationality and the date. This might be better.denizTC 00:50, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * All I was pointing out was how ethnically political this discussion was, how nationality was in fact a 100% accurate predictor of how someone voted. I don't normally tally votes that way, because I am rarely involved in such discussions. I'm sure there are other ways you could split up the voters, but you aren't going to find any more valid than this. I was kind of saddened, frankly. Brianyoumans 03:32, 22 March 2007 (UTC)


 * I know you had good intentions, but I wanted to say that that we can all be biased. The eye does not see itself (just made up :) ). denizTC 04:10, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

Also, people did not say anything about whether they would object adding the gazillion attacks to the ASALA page (which was represented as an alternative of having this list, and yes they are needed), I object that. Also, many thanks to Coolcat (Catchi), the 'Azeri', who has been improving the article a lot lately.denizTC 00:50, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Several of the "Azeris" also had Turkish language userboxes and might actually identify as Turks. I don't think this changes my analysis any. I don't personally mind adding some of the info to the ASALA page, if it is missing from the list of attacks there, and if the attack is significant enough to be mentioned. Brianyoumans 03:32, 22 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Brian, I think you are violating the WP:AGF massively. I voted Keep because I strongly believe this article can stay and be improved.-- Doktor Gonzo 19:35, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm sure you did. I'm not accusing any particular editor of anything. I'm just pointing out that all the Turks and Azeris came to the same decision, and all the Armenians and Greeks came to the opposite conclusion. Many of them gave perfectly good arguments for their positions. If you feel that your vote was based on a rational consideration of what is the best way for Wikipedia to present this information (for clearly at least some of it needs to be in Wikipedia somewhere - and much of it is in Wikipedia, in other articles - then you have absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. However, let's be reasonable - it is obvious that politics is influencing people's decisions here, and I am just pointing that out. I don't really have a personal axe to grind; breaking the votes out by ethnicity doesn't really help argue for deletion, which is what I recommended. I just thought it was sufficiently remarkable to be interesting to point out, and that it might help people re-examine their decision processes. --Brianyoumans 19:55, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes we all should help, no matter what the nationality. There can be very good Armenian sources about these attacks. denizTC 04:10, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Comment: When I nominated this article for deletion, it was entirely referenced to sites like tallarmeniantale and armenianreality, and had a title that wasn't even written in correct English. At that time it was an blatant POV fork. Although the fact that links to those virulently racist sites have been retained is troubling, subsequent work has improved the article vastly. -- Augustgrahl 01:03, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * If you hadn't nominated it, more people would be working on it now. It is generaly the better side of valor to give articles a month to develop before nominating it for deletion. -- Cat chi? 19:13, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * That's another point. Why not give articles some time to develop before hurrying towards an AfD, really? Baristarim 19:37, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * As I said, the fact that it began as something referenced to hate sites and not even written in grammatically correct English gave every appearance of a poorly and hastily constructed POV fork. -- Augustgrahl 19:59, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Keep. It could be kept really, if it has potential for expansion. Clean up should be done, but all articles start as a mess, so no surprise there :) I see the logic of Fadix that it could be merged to the main ASALA article, so the question is: Does this article have potential for more expansion as a list that can be mained out from the ASALA article? If not it could be merged. But there are shorter articles so I don't know. If it were kept as a strict list, it shouldn't become a FORK. If analytical stuff is added, then it can become so. So how much potential for expansion does this article have? IBaristarim 04:04, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Delete (at least as it is now) and merge any usefl information to ASALA article. Since I see in the ASALA article two sections named "major attacks", and "some other attacks" I fail to understand what this article adds to the subject. It does not fulfill WP:SS (attackes are already listed in the ASALA article, and the prose is longer there), and the list doesn't add anything new. So, why couldn't it be just a template included in the ASALA article? If this article is to be saved, its editors must concentrate their efforts on making it useful and informative enough to stand on its own. As it is now, it doesn't. It looks as a fork, even if this is not your intention.--Yannismarou 19:11, 22 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I'd for keep some info, but this list in its current state needs a cleanup/delink at the minimum. - Penwhale | Blast him / Follow his steps 06:05, 23 March 2007 (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.