Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Battle of the Bismarck Sea


 * The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page.  No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Closed/promoted -- Ian Rose (talk) 12:31, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Battle of the Bismarck Sea

 * Nominator(s): Hawkeye7 (talk)

Continuing the series of articles on the war in the South West Pacific, which currently hasn't gotten very far into 1943. Hawkeye7 (talk) 23:22, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Comments
 * Should use dashes for all page ranges - some use hyphens
 * "The Allied Air Forces had developed a new techniques" - one technique or many?
 * Why link Madang in the third paragraph of Japanese plans instead of the LLsecond? Why link No. 30 Squadron two sections in a row? Check wikilinking throughout
 * What time zone are the given times got in? Nikkimaria (talk) 15:07, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I wonder if there shouldn't be some article or campaignbox on the "war in the South West Pacific"? Redirected to South West Pacific theatre of World War II. Should the campaignbox (Campaignbox_South_West_Pacific) be include in this article, or is the Guinea one enough? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; talk to me 19:50, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment
 * I have no idea. Added the Southwest Pacific campaign box. Does anyone know what the standard is? Hawkeye7 (talk) 06:16, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Support
 * No dabs (no action required).
 * External links check reports one dead link.
 * Bismarck Sea and Air Battle and Operation No. 81 (info) [awm.gov.au]
 * Images lack Alt Text (suggestion only).
 * The Citation Check Tool reveals no errors (no action required).
 * The images are all PD or appropriately licenced (no action required).
 * "Some 416 sorties had been flown with only two ships had been sunk, and three damaged...", consider "Some 416 sorties had been flown with only two ships sunk, and three damaged."
 * This is a little repetitive: "...while 22 RAAF A-20 Bostons of No. 22 Squadron RAAF...", perhaps consider "...while 22 A-20 Bostons of No. 22 Squadron RAAF..."
 * Maybe a missing full stop here: "Three Lightnings were shot down The fighter pilots claimed 15 Zeros destroyed, while the B-17 crews claimed five more."
 * "Due to miscounting of the Japanese force, General MacArthur...", should just be "Due to miscounting of the Japanese force, MacArthur..." per WP:SURNAME.
 * "General Imamura's chief of staff flew to Imperial General Headquarters...", should be "Imamura's chief of staff flew to Imperial General Headquarters..." per WP:SURNAME. Anotherclown (talk) 05:37, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
 * All done, except the ALT text, which I will get around to. Hawkeye7 (talk) 06:16, 20 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Comments This is looking really good, but I think it needs bit of tweaking before it's at A class:
 * The article should probably go into more detail on the results of the battle on the strategic situation in the New Guinea Campaign. Drea has a summary of this on page 72 of his book.
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Looks good, but you could also add a bit extra to the lead on this as well now you've expanded the last section. Nick-D (talk) 05:32, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Lae is linked twice in the lead
 * ✅ Unlinked Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The 'Japanese' in 'Japanese 20th Division', 'Japanese 41st Division' and 'Japanese 51st Division' aren't needed
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * "This time, a course was chosen that followed the north coast" - 'This' is used in relation to two different operations in two successive sentences, which is a bit awkward
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * "Allied air attacks would have to fly over the Japanese airfields on New Britain." - that's over-stating things given how under-developed New Britain was! I'd suggest changing this to "Allied air attacks would have to fly within range of the Japanese airfields on New Britain." or similar
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Can 'combat loaded' be linked to something? A red link would be suitable here if it can't be linked given that this is an important topic (Loading of assault shipping perhaps?)
 * ✅ It turns out that there is an article, which has has been uncategorised since 2006. Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * "the former was missing two squadrons" - how many squadrons did it have?
 * ✅ Four. Added. Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You could mention that the USAAF (and RAAF?) units involved in this battle practiced skip bombing near Port Moresby in preparation for attacking the convoy
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * The 'Tactics' section should be renamed 'Allied tactics' or similar
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * "22 RAAF A-20 Bostons of No. 22 Squadron RAAF" - one 'RAAF' too many here
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * "A6M3 Zerofighters," - you need a space between 'Zero' and 'fighter'
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * 30 Squadron RAAF and 22 Squadron RAAF are linked twice
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * "When the ships turned to face them, and the Beaufighters were then able to inflict damage on the ships' anti-aircraft guns, bridges and crews during strafing runs with their four 20 mm (0.79 in) nose cannons and six wing-mounted .303 in (7.70 mm) machine guns." - this could be worded more strongly. The aircraft could have damaged the ships by attacking from any direction. The point of attacking from the length of the ship was to maximize the damage caused by each pass. Gillison states that only "some" of the Japanese ships turned towards the Beaufighters.
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * You could mention that Oscar winning film maker Damien Parer was on board one of the RAAF Beaufighters (from where he took the remarkable footage used in this film).
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Can you provide a reference to a secondary source that states that the Hague Convention of 1907 was violated? This seems likely, but needs a supporting reference
 * Decided to remove it. There was a bit of argument about it early on. I don't know who put it in. Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Gillison 1962, p. 697 doesn't state that the killing of Japanese survivors was a war crime as is credited to it (he actually describes it as being the "terrible yet essential finale" of the battle on page 694). I have read this elsewhere though. Gillison and Drea discuss the disgust felt by the Allied personnel involved in these killings, and this might be worth mentioning.
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 01:48, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I've made other spot checks of references to Gillison and Drea and found no problems with accuracy or close paraphrasing (note: this is something I intend to do in all future articles I review where I have access to some of the relevant references, so please don't feel singled out - this is just the first review where I've made these checks - which I've been promising to do for ages). Nick-D (talk) 10:12, 26 November 2011 (UTC)
 * As another comment, I was initially concerned to see that Kenney's memoirs were used as a source, but everything referenced to it seems like simple statements of fact. Except for where it's Kenny's opinion or wording you're quoting, I'd suggest replacing these references if possible though - Kenney's memoirs don't have a good reputation for accuracy and there are some good books about him now which you could reference (I vaguely remember reading that Kenney wrote his memoirs entirely from his memory of the war and they were published without serious fact checking, but this might be mistaken). Nick-D (talk) 22:16, 26 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I only have the one good book on him, MacArthur's Airman : General George C. Kenney and the War in the Southwest Pacific (Modern War Studies)       by Thomas E. Griffith (1998). Let me know if you have any other recommendations. He is on my work list. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:33, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Wasn't there a biography on him published by an American university press a few years ago as well? I might be getting my USAAF generals mixed up though. Nick-D (talk) 05:32, 27 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Support My comments have now been addressed - great work Nick-D (talk) 05:32, 27 November 2011 (UTC)

Comments Kirk (talk) 22:42, 8 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The term 'Allied Air Forces' is in the lead and the prose more than once and based on the capitalization its a proper name for something - I think this should be a wiki-link (or red link but I think it exists already)
 * It doesn't. I have linked it to South West Pacific Area (command) Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:14, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
 * PT Boats should be linked in the lead.
 * ✅ Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:14, 9 December 2011 (UTC)
 * War games of the operation predicted losses... I don't like how this is phrased; I think you mean something like "Based on the results of war games of the operation, Allied commanders predicted...
 * ✅ No, it was the Jpanese. Re-worded. Hawkeye7 (talk) 02:14, 9 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Support Comments/suggestions: not a lot for me to comment on here, looks pretty good overall, IMO:
 * I'm not sure about the capitalisation here: "They held War games of the operation which predicted" (IMO probably should be "They held war games..."
 * the duplicate link checker tool reports possible overlinking of "Port Moresby", "No. 30 Squadron RAAF", "38th Bombardment Group", "Asashio" and "Finschhafen";
 * inconsistent presentation: "PT Boats" and "PT boats";
 * in the Aftermath: "The Allies lost 13 aircrew killed and eight wounded." But in the infobox: "8 killed"
 * this seems a little awkward: "Ordered back in January, it now received a increased urgency";
 * this doesn't quite work, I think: "Allied aircraft led to the development of a routes along the coast of..." (specifically "a routes");
 * in the References, this is slightly inconsistent: "New York City" and "New York, New York". AustralianRupert (talk) 12:35, 10 December 2011 (UTC)
 * ✅ All corrected. Hawkeye7 (talk) 23:11, 10 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment: Good job, especially on giving the Japanese side in the background section.  I think, however, you might want to give a little more background on the New Guinea campaign.  Weren't the Allied victories at Buna-Gona and Wau a big influence in the Japanese decision to reinforce New Guinea with the 51st Division?  If I remember right from working on the Guadalcanal Campaign article, the 51st Division was originally intended to go to Guadalcanal.  After General Imamura arrived at Rabaul and the forces in the area were reorganized as the 8th Area Army, Imamura and the General Staff decided, based on the Buna-Gona offensive, that Allied forces in New Guinea represented a greater threat to Rabaul than the Allies in the Solomons. Cla68 (talk) 05:12, 12 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Added a bit more background. Hawkeye7 (talk) 05:37, 18 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Supportive comments on sources fixits: Fifelfoo (talk) 00:04, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Watson, Richard L. (1946). has bibliographic information contained within the document, including a publisher (important!) and a series (less important).
 * We use "publisher" in the Wikipedia sense here of "put it up on the web". It was, of course, never published. Hawkeye7 (talk) 09:54, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Yoshihara, Kane (1955)'s chapter from Southern Cross appears to be miscited, its a book (even if manuscript translation) :) see here: http://www.awm.gov.au/firstopac/bin/cgi-jsp.exe/shelf1.jsp?recno=52958&userId=&catTable= for the bibliographic data.  citebook has an |other= parameter to handle translators etc.Fifelfoo (talk) 00:04, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
 * The Japanese version was a book. What we have is a (patchy) English translation. Hawkeye7 (talk) 09:54, 19 December 2011 (UTC)


 * Support. I think it is at A-class level.  You might check the TROMs at combinedfleet.com for the involved warships and submarines for additional information, but otherwise I think the article is good to go.  Good job. Cla68 (talk) 08:18, 21 December 2011 (UTC)


 * The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.