Wikipedia:Peer review/1st Filipino Infantry Regiment (United States)/archive1

1st Filipino Infantry Regiment (United States)
This peer review discussion has been closed. I've listed this article for peer review because I am seeking the article to nominate it for GA state, and hopefully higher levels in the future. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks, RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 11:21, 27 May 2011 (UTC)


 * Comments by Dana Boomer


 * Background, "after a conflict between Philippine independence forces and the United States, Filipinos as U.S. nationals were able to freely immigrate to the United States." For people not very up on their Philippine history, the relationship between a conflict and free immigration is rather ambiguous. It would probably be good to expand this a bit to explain this relationship.
 * Background, "In 1934, their national status was withdrawn." Why? If they weren't resident aliens or citizens, what were they?
 * Background, "Some who volunteered to serve were refused due to their age." The source also says "and/or the need for them to continue to work in the fields harvesting the crops to feed the armed forces." - why not include this information as well?
 * History, "something that was barred in 1924." What was barred in 1924? People from the Philippines becoming citizens?
 * History, "due to anti-miscegenation laws, those soldiers who wanted to get married to non-Filipino women were transported to Gallup, New Mexico," What do anti-miscegenation laws have to do with Gallup, New Mexico?
 * History, "soldiers of the regiment, also faced discrimination in Marysville." Why?
 * History, "with Carlos Bulosan there to witness it." Why is this important?
 * History, "who were not allowed to enlist until 1943," Why?
 * History, "and soldiers of the regiment that were reassigned back to the regiment." What?
 * History, "Others took the time to find wives due to the War Brides Act," Why?
 * History, "and younger soldiers connected to a culture that they only had tacit connection to." Connected, connection...repetition.
 * History, "Soldiers of the regiment who did not qualify to return home," Why? I thought they had had a mass naturalization ceremony while still in the US?
 * Legacy - Be consistent with 442d vs 442nd
 * Legacy, "was documented in documentaries" - repetition
 * History, "soldiers of the regiment were then assigned to the Alamo Scouts[33] and the 5217th Reconnaissance Battalion." What did they do there?
 * History, "Finally in the Philippines, the regiment conducted "mopping up"[38] operations on the island,[39][40] Samar,[1][3][41] and other islands in the Visayan islands group.[10]" Is there any more detail on these operations? Prisoners taken, enemy killed, ability in battle, etc?

Overall, I think the biggest issue is a lack of detail. There were a lot of spots in the article that felt like they made huge jumps from point A to point C, while completely skipping point B. The article is nowhere near breaking size limits, so if more details can make the article more accessible to the average reader, go for it! It is a nice little article though, and I don't think you should have much trouble going for GA. I made a few edits to the article; feel free to revert anything you disagree with or don't like. Dana boomer (talk) 14:53, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Post review reply from RightCowLeftCoast
 * I have made a change to an edit of yours, that is more consistent with the reference provided.
 * On the first two background points, the articles which are linked in the wording fully explains the sometimes difficult to understand 1898-1913 relationship of the United States and then-insular territory of the Philippine Islands. I had thought that delving to far into that complicated era would distract readers from the primary focus of the article, being the article's subject, the regiment. If you feel it should be expanded upon, I would like to hear your suggestions, on how to due it in a neutral tone, due to the politically contentious arguments/POVs surrounding that time period.
 * I have expanded the statement regarding Manongs (second wave Filipino immigrants) as you suggested. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 21:12, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
 * As suggested I had changed the wording regarding the barring of naturalization, and added an additional reference.
 * As suggested I expanded upon the reason for the busing to New Mexico.
 * Expanded, and gave "reason" for discrimination, as suggested.
 * Expanded upon reason why Carlos Bulosan's presence was important.
 * Expanded on reason why Hawaii Filipinos were not allowed to join the regiment (or create the planned third regiment). --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 22:52, 7 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Copy edit and expansion regarding concerns about reassignment, War Brides act, and re-connection.
 * Regarding the sentence about soldiers who were not qualified to return home, on 1200 of the more than 7000 soldiers of the regiment participated in the mass naturalization ceremony according the the references provided. I have provided expansion, with references to the latter fact.
 * 442d to 442nd. Recent changes in military abbreviation have began to drop the n, however historically the usage of nd was more common.
 * Reduced redundancy regarding documentaries.
 * Statements about the activities of the Alamo Scouts and the 5217th, IMHO is better left on the articles regarding those units. That is why I originally didn't include the numbers on the combined strengths of the two Filipino Infantry Regiments (the latter later downgraded to enlarged battalion) as I wanted to be as focused on the subject as possible. But I can see where the lack of context can have readers who aren't as familiar to the subject a bit confused.
 * Regarding expansion on combat history, see the comment I made here. Unfortunately, there is no reference in the extensive research that I have found that specifically talks about the results of the regiment in combat. It appeared that those states were rolled upwards to the Division was assigned to. There is a statement in table 4, page 368, found here that mentions casualties of the "1st Filipino Division" which I believe is a typo and is meant to refer to the regiment which is the subject of this article, however, without independent proof of that, it is only speculation on my part, and cannot be included per WP:OR. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 23:47, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Overall, it looks good. A few points:
 * For the first two points of the Background section, I do think that a few extra sentences of explanation are needed to not leave readers completely baffled. For instance, I'm not suggesting a full paragraph on why their natural status was withdrawn, just something like "In 1934, their natural status was withdrawn because they were determined to be little green aliens" or something simple :) I realize that there is not much that is simple in the history between these two countries, but a little bit more background is needed for readers who have very little knowledge of the relationship.
 * Stateside, "This was later remedied by the regiment's commander." How?
 * As much as possible, I try to work the links in the See also section into the article itself, rather than having them in this separate section. For the "broadness" criteria of GAN, it doesn't really matter, but for the "comprehensive" criteria of FAC, many reviewers will wonder why these terms/people/groups are not included in the article body, if they are important enough to be listed in the see also section.

Nice work on this article. Again, you should be good to go for GAN (I see now that you have already nominated it), although another editor is most likely going to catch things that I have missed. Dana boomer (talk) 12:45, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

Second reply following secondary review Thanks for the continuing comments, this is very help full. Let me show you a few more of my recent edits I hope this fulfills all the necessary changes needed for a GAN and possible FAC in the future. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 17:55, 8 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I have expanded on the reason why naturalization was barred, with an additional references; is this sufficient? I understand that the legal matters surrounding this subject are complicated given that the status changed a number of times from 1899 to 1946.
 * Expanded on actions by Colonel Offley.
 * Integrated the Wikilink found in the See also section.


 * Comments by Dank
 * I did some copyediting down to 1st_Filipino_Infantry_Regiment_(United_States); These are my edits. You may want to run this through Milhist's A-class review either before or after GAN. - Dank (push to talk) 20:15, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * My understanding that under the MILHIST order of precedence, GA was below A-class, and thus why I nominated the article for GA first.
 * When I had ran the article's content through Microsoft Word, it didn't highlight any significant issues, prior to your edits. That being said, let me thank you. Anything that can be done to improve the article so it can eventually become a FA, is greatly appreciated. --RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 21:43, 22 June 2011 (UTC)
 * Sure thing. Either order is usually fine, although occasionally reviewers will ask nominators to go to GA first. - Dank (push to talk) 21:53, 22 June 2011 (UTC)