Wikipedia:Peer review/Niedermayer-Hentig Expedition/archive1

Niedermayer-Hentig Expedition
This peer review discussion has been closed. This peer review discussion has been closed. Would love to have some feedback on this since wanted to nominate it for FA once done. This would also help to improve Hindu-German Conspiracy to FA standards, so all help will be appreciated. Particularly looking for help with prose, grammar, suggestions at condensing, etc. rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 14:06, 4 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Hemlock Martinis comments
 * Vague
 * Thank you for including a "Background" section an a "Influence" section (although the latter might be better renamed to "Aftermath" or "Impact").
 * There are a few instances where some of the sentences are excessively complex. Example: "The Niedermayer-Hentig Expedition, sometimes referred to as The German mission to Kabul was a diplomatic mission sent by the Central Powers to Afghanistan in 1915-1916 that sought to encourage Afghanistan to declare independence from Britain, draw her into World War I on the side of the Central Powers, and attack British India." A possible fix: "The Niedermayer-Hentig Expedition, sometimes referred to as The German mission to Kabul, was a diplomatic mission sent by the Central Powers to Afghanistan in 1915 and 1916. The expedition's primary goal was to encourage Emir Habibullah to declare independence from the British Empire and bring Afghanistan into World War I on the side of the Central Powers by attacking British India."
 * In the above example, you originally referred to Afghanistan as a "her". I would prefer to refrain from addressing countries with personal pronouns that ascribe a gender. While I don't know if such a thing is written down anywhere as policy, either for or against, I certainly don't like it.
 * Make sure you standardize the name you ascribe to the United Kingdom. In this case you've used "Britain" (which is fine) although 1) make sure you address it as either "the United Kingdom" or "the British Empire" in the first instance in which it appears and 2) make sure you use only "Britain" thereafter, not England (as you have in a few instances).
 * When discussing Turkey before 1922, refer to it as the Ottoman Empire unless specifically addressing the Turkish part of the empire.
 * Specific
 * "It may have further influenced policies of the nascent Bolshevik Russia to propagate socialist revolution to Asia and the western colonial empire." Do you mean "western" as in the direction or as in the Western civilization sense?
 * "Mehmed V, the Sultan of Turkey, was then regarded as the Caliph by a substantial part of the Islamic world." Do you have a citation for this? Also, see the Turkey-Ottoman Empire thing above.
 * "The Kaiser himself toured Constantinople, Damascus and Jerusalem in 1898 to portray solidarity with Mussalmans, who at the time were predominantly subjects of the British Empire." Kaiser who? Please specify. And although I personally disagree with Wikipedia's choice to refer to Kaiser Wilhelm II as German Emperor William II, I would be lax in my review if I didn't suggest that you change all instances to the latter.
 * "In this situation, Britain perceived Afghanistan as the only entity capable of directly destabilising India." Do you mean the British people or the British government?
 * "As the war started, advice from the foreign office, the military, and from Moltke considered using the pan-Islamic movement to destabilise the British Empire and begin a revolution in India as early as the first week of August 1914." Specify which foreign office and military.
 * "With the onset of the war, revolutionary unrest itself increased in India, and a number of Hindu and Muslim leaders left clandestinely to seek help of the Central power for an Indian revolution." No need for "itself" and specify where they left to go. "the Central power" should also be changed to "Germany" for clarity.
 * "The pan-Islamic movement in India (particularly the Darul Uloom Deoband) also made plans for an insurrection in the tribal belt of North-west India with support from the Afghan Amir, the Ottoman Empire and Imperial Germany." A few things here. Should "north-west" be hypenated? Please standardize Emir/Amir, the aforementioned Ottoman Empire/Turkey and Imperial Germany/Germany.
 * "Aware of the sensitivities of the Persian tribes, it was suggested that the Germans wear Turkish army uniforms but this idea was rejected by the Germans." Suggested by whom?
 * "Moreover, the aims of the expedition were far from clear, and this was expected to be confirmed only after it reached Constantinople." This should be clarified.
 * "Werner Otto von Hentig was a Prussian military officer who before the war had served as the military attaché to Beijing and Constantinople in 1910 and 1912 respectively." Is Prussian the correct term here or German? Also, you might want to check if Beijing was Peking at this time.
 * I'll have more later. Keep up the good work! --Hemlock Martinis (talk) 22:22, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Comments from
 * You said you wanted to know what to work on before taking to FAC, so I looked at the sourcing and referencing with that in mind. I reviewed the article's sources as I would at FAC.
 * Per the MOS, quotations shouldn't be inclosed with the graphical curly quotes. blockquote works fine.
 * Hope this helps. Please note that I don't watchlist Peer Reviews I've done. If you have a question about something, you'll have to drop a note on my talk page to get my attention. (My watchlist is already WAY too long, adding peer reviews would make things much worse.) 14:02, 24 August 2008 (UTC)