Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Terrorism/Archive 2

Capitalist Terrorism
There's a link to capitalist terrorism, but it only goes to operation condor, which is clearly not the same thing. Even if it were to be classed as an example of capitalist terrorism, it isn't the apropreot page for such a link. Presumably, if Capitalist Terrorism doesn't exist to the extent that it warrants a page, it probably shouldn't be on the template. Could someone remove? Larklight (talk) 20:30, 17 January 2008 (UTC) Wrong place, now on the correct page. Larklight (talk) 20:44, 17 January 2008 (UTC)


 * It's a POV redirect and should be speedily deleted. Jtrainor (talk) 05:33, 7 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Wouldn't captialist terrorism be, by definition, white terror? 24.32.208.58 (talk) 22:59, 9 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Central America is littered with exampels of capitalist terrorism - the CIA became experts at it. Damburger (talk) 20:47, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Omar Osama bin Laden
It seems like your project keeps a fairly tight focus, and I'm not sure this article would be covered under it, but if you could give any feedback on it it'd be appreciated - especially about the mystery of "Omar Awad bin Laden" who flew out of the U.S. on 9/19/1. Wnt (talk) 14:32, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Anarchism terrorism
I think it will be fair to creat an Anarchism terrorism article. Anarchists made a lot of terrorism in the past, in France, Spaine, and Italy, especially at the end of the XIX century and the beginning of the XX. An easy research can give you everything ;) Kormin (talk) 21:30, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Omagh bombing
It's the deadliest single act of terrorism in Northern Ireland history, but does it merit being rating 'High' in importance for his Project? Also, it's currently at 'start' quality while Wikiproject Ireland has it at 'B-Class' so this should be fixed. If possible, I think that a registered user should list it up for peer review as well. 24.32.208.58 (talk) 22:58, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

There is no evidence that Sheik Osama has done any of these things at all. AbdulZayed3432 (talk) 10:20, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

request for comments
I've made a request for comments (re history) for this talk section: &#151; Xiutwel ♫☺♥♪ (speech has the power to bind the absolute) 23:37, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
 * Talk:September_11%2C_2001_attacks

1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack on FAC
FYI, I have nominated the article 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack for consideration at WP:FAC. Your comments at the FAC discussion page would be appreciated. Cirt (talk) 09:10, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

POV?
Can someone please explain to me how words like terrorist/terrorism/perpetrator are NPOV? One person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter. In the infobox specifically, wouldn't a phrase like 'Groups or individuals involved' be more appropriate than perpetrator(s)? Jerkface03 (talk) 03:34, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

CIA, FBI, et cetera.
Hi, guys.

The aforementioned groups have created a substantive degree of terrorism, as well as partaking (especially the CIA) in subsidizing and funding terrorist organizations. Shouldn't they be listed somewhere on this page? —Preceding unsigned comment added by OakenThrone (talk • contribs) 22:31, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Beslan school hostage crisis
Copy edit and then new ratings needed. --84.234.60.154 (talk) 01:03, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Peer Review of Omar Khadr

 * WikiProject Military history/Peer review/Omar Khadr could use some constructive criticism, as I'm aiming to make it a Featured Article within a month :) Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 18:23, 26 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I would also appreciate knowing people's opinions on whether this represents "too much seeding" of the article (The article already discusses his father's role), in my opinion it doesn't need to say "the terrorist father" every chance it gets, that would be like inserting "the Neoconversative warhawk Dick Cheney" into every mention of Cheney in Bush's article. The same user has also changed dates in the article to incorrect dates and insists on using POV-laden language that suggests the family "took advantage of Canada, whose virtues include free health care", isn't it enough to say that they used the Canadian medical system? We wouldn't refer to "Tie Domi broke his nose in the fight, and then took advantage of Canadian taxpayers, using their free healthcare system to heal himself" or anything ridiculous like that - in my mind, this is the same argument. Am I right to keep this user from adding his POV statements to the article, or not? (NOte that the user only has 21 edits on Wiki, 18 of which seem to be edit-warring) Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 20:37, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
 * I tend to think that mentioning the father so early in the lead is inappropriate. This is a biography of the subject, not a genealogy. While his connections to his father clearly are important, I don't think that there's any real cause to have it mentioned even before mentioning what the subject himself as an individual is notable for. John Carter (talk) 21:20, 31 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Promoted to Good Article status today! Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 18:29, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

AfD Deletion Attempts
Articles for deletion/Michael A. Moon for anybody who would like to offer their opinions on whether to delete the article. Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 17:04, 27 April 2008 (UTC)

group symbol
Hello there. what kind of symbol has this group come up with? Why does it say "RAF" on your symbol? Just wanted to ask.

I have just checked the entry for RAF uses. there is no mention there of any terrorist organization with those initials. I did find one minor military organization in the UK with those initials, which some of you may have heard of. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 13:23, 2 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Welcome to the group. Our current logo is the symbol of the Red Army Faction, the image was chosen because it is seemingly Public Domain (we can't use copyrighted images), and refers to a "past" terrorist group rather than a current one (since we don't want to tread on Neutrality issues by using Hamas or something as our symbol). Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 23:24, 2 May 2008 (UTC)


 * is there an official position of the group on Hamas? I for one, would most definitely consider Hamas a terrorist organization.WacoJacko (talk) 15:58, 11 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The project doesn't really have "official positions", just common sense. So Common Sense says that al-Qaeda and Hamas are "considered to be terrorist groups", while the FBI "is not". However, as I said, for the symbol of the group - I think we're best avoiding any "freedom fighter" controversy and going with a group that was glad to call itself terrorist. Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 16:01, 11 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I see what you are saying. It wouldn't be worth the fight. WacoJacko (talk) 16:09, 11 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Just came back and read these replies. thanks for your responses. sorry I didn;t stay in the discussion. appreciate the replies though. thanks. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 22:11, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

New list
List of people convicted under Anti-Terrorism Act in the United Kingdom, would appreciate help with this list - especially from UK members! Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 19:16, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Insurgency in Sa'dah
Shouldn't the Insurgency in Sa'dah be count as a part of the War against terrorism. See Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi, anti-American and anti-Israel The Yemeni government accused the Iranian government of directing and financing the insurgency.

There is no reason to doesn't count it like a part of the War against terrorism.Kormin (talk) 17:09, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Someone ? Kormin (talk) 16:18, 2 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I haven't seen any media outlets or governments reporting the Yemeni uprising as part of the War on Terrorism, and few sources seem to suggest it represents "Terrorism" - so that's my opinion, but there are of course others. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 16:27, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

Centralized discussion
Per request, I've created Centralized discussion/Terrorism to centralize discussions on this topic which cross multiple articles. -- Kendrick7talk 01:38, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
 * I've watchlisted it, but I'm not sure it's any better than directing the parties here to discuss it - why have two "discussionboards for people interested in discussing/solving terrorism-related quandries on WP"? Perhaps I'm just missing something. Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 02:26, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Logo
Just a note, since a spat seems to have arisen over the logo to use on our banner. Currently it is; I feel the RAF logo works because it represents the most clearly-defined, non-controversial terrorist group in modern history. Using something like Hamas, Hezbollah or the Tamil Tigers is likely to upset ethnic groups that view them as "freedom fighters" and such - but history is pretty much unanimous that the RAF were "terrorists", and they have an instantly-recognisable image as well.

Spylab, on the other hand, has argued that we shouldn't include any image at all, since there is no "one" type of terrorism.

(backgrounder here if you want)

So, let's get some opinions?

Personally, I've argued for quite a while that we shouldn't use any images from the "War on Terror", since the project should be avoiding focusing too narrowly on current events and failing to bring attention to the "history" of modern terrorism, so I strongly favour the RAF image. Sherurcij (Speaker for the Dead) 16:59, 26 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Nowhere have I written that the template "shouldn't include any image at all, since there is no "one" type of terrorism". However, if a suitable one cannot be provided, the current one should be removed until an appropriate one can be found. The image should represent the act of terrorism, and should not be the logo of one specific group with one specific ideology. Using that logo violates Wikipedia's standards for neutrality. The template is about terrorism in general, not about one specific far-left organization. After I replaced the Red Army Faction logo with a photo of a terrorist attack (from the terrorism article), you reverted that only based on your personal opinion, not any consensus or Wikipedia rules. Spylab (talk) 22:06, 27 May 2008 (UTC)


 * it's funny cause wiki's Red army faction article states that they were just militants but not terrorists —Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.164.231.68 (talk) 12:42, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

What something neutral about an explosion, blood and a skull? Xufanc (talk) 14:32, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

September 11th
Please comment on the September 11th WikiProject proposal at WikiProject Council/Proposals - September 11th. GregManninLB (talk) 02:27, 25 May 2008 (UTC)

Merge proposal
There's been a merge suggestion on Talk:Celebrations_of_the_September_11%2C_2001_attacks.  Jaakobou Chalk Talk  19:15, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Hezbollah GA Sweeps Review: On Hold
As part of the WikiProject Good Articles, we're doing sweeps to go over all of the current GAs and see if they still meet the GA criteria and I'm specifically going over all of the "Culture and Society" articles. I have reviewed Hezbollah and believe the article currently meets the majority of the criteria and should remain listed as a Good article. I have left this message at this WikiProject's talk page so that any interested members can assist in helping the article keep its GA status. In reviewing the article, I have found there are some issues that may need to be addressed, and I'll leave the article on hold for seven days for them to be fixed. I have left messages on the talk pages of the main contributors of the article and several other related WikiProjects. Please consider helping address the several points that I listed on the talk page of the article, which shouldn't take too long to fix if multiple editors assist in the workload. If you have any questions, let me know on my talk page and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. Happy editing! --Nehrams2020 (talk) 09:36, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Terrorism Knowledge Base dead
I just realized that the MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base has ceased operations and its website has shut down. It looks like much of the information will be replicated here in the near future. In the mean time, according to the External Linkfinder, there are hundreds of pages which link to tkb.org. //  Chris  (complaints) • (contribs) 16:57, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Talk:Osama bin Laden
It would be interesting to have some further input there; an editor feels it important that we refer to bin Laden as an "Islamist terrorist" in the lead, in place of more NPOV language. As I understand it, WP:TERRORIST prefers not to use this sort of language but perhaps there is a productive debate to be had. --John (talk) 13:41, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Changes to the WP:1.0 assessment scheme
As you may have heard, we at the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial Team recently made some changes to the assessment scale, including the addition of a new level. The new description is available at WP:ASSESS.
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Communish terrorism
Just reading the following http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Terrorism/list#Individual_Projects I saw all sorts of religious terrorism. But what about communist/marxist/maoist terrorist? We ought to have a listed category for that too. As a South Asia specialist, I can say the naxalites are pretty strong there. As recently as this year they were labeled the greatest internal security threat to india. (ironically ahead of kashmiri seperatists, but im not in the govt) Lihaas (talk) 23:15, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

Nelson Mandela
Should his article be added to the Terrorism project? I think article related to terrorism should also be included. It is me i think (talk) 16:26, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Articles flagged for cleanup
Currently, 1154 articles are assigned to this project, of which 461, or 39.9%, are flagged for cleanup of some sort. (Data as of 2008-07-14.) Are you interested in finding out more? I am offering to generate cleanup to-do lists on a project or work group level. See User:B. Wolterding/Cleanup listings for details. Subscribing is easy - just add a template to your project page. If you want to respond to this canned message, please do so at my user talk page. --B. Wolterding (talk) 08:36, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

N. Ireland
According to the 18th IMC report (http://www.independentmonitoringcommission.org/documents/uploads/18.%20Eighteenth%20Report.pdf) there is a new group styling itself as the Irish Republican Liberation Army (IRLA). Of course it's not extensive just yet as it's, apparently, a new band but should we create something of this sort on wikipedia or wait it out for a bit? Lihaas (talk) 00:01, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I can't tell if it's a real group, a poorly-handled red flag operation or what - most Google hits seem to turn up forums and Irish borderline-conspiracy sites...but I do see it mentioned in the Hansards, apparently they shot a police officer and sent 16 death threats. I'd help out if you were to create an article, but hopefully it's just a passing craze, eh? Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 01:36, 26 July 2008 (UTC)
 * I'll try and get something together in the next few days. Ill get in touch with at the time. Lihaas (talk) 00:51, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Indian Mujahideen
This article could certainly use a revamp to make it better. Becoming kind of important/big now. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Mujahideen Lihaas (talk) 01:46, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Turkestan Islamic Party
Like the above there's another political grouping that just go active (albeit china denies its role). Shouldn't we have this on wikipedia as well? (I just added the terrorism project banner here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Kunming_bus_bombings)

This article could certainly be revamped http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Turkestan_Islamic_Movement Lihaas (talk) 04:22, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Terror attack template
is there one that exists in this regard? Certain articles are quite poor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Istanbul_bombings) and others have grown, but without a set pattern (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Ahmedabad_bombings). Bit of mumbo-jumbo categories in there. Lihaas (talk) 15:30, 28 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Infobox civilian attack Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 16:18, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Alleged plot to overthrow FDR
Why not mention the terrorist Prescott Bush? Or does this Wiki have an biased agenda behind it?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescott_Bush

Exerpt;

"On July 23, 2007, the BBC Radio 4 series Document reported on the alleged Business Plot and the archives from the McCormack-Dickstein Committee hearings. The program mentioned Bush's directorship of the Hamburg-America Line, a company that the committee investigated for Nazi propaganda activities, and the alleged 1933 attempt, supposedly led by Gerald MacGuire, to stage a military coup against President Franklin D. Roosevelt aimed at forcing Roosevelt to resign (or, failing that, to assassinate him) and at installing a fascist dictatorship in the United States. [5]"

--216.119.191.24 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.119.191.26 (talk) 07:17, 22 August 2008 (UTC)


 * I certainly don't see any bias; coups are certainly not terrorism, and even assassinations are typically not terrorism either, but crime. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 05:54, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Irish Republican Liberation Army
This article is not that great at the moment (Irish Republican Liberation Army). Can make it better. If someone can help it'll be great. Lihaas (talk) 18:57, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Please participate in a discussion over whether Bernardine Dohrn headed up a group many have called "terrorist"
Bernardine Dohrn is well known because she was the leader of Weatherman (organization) (1969 to about 1976) a group for which there are many sources identifying it as "terrorist". There is an objection that it is a BLP violation, an NPOV violation and even a WP:TERRORIST violation to state that she headed up a group that many have called terrorist. Editors with some experience in this area would be very welcome at that discussion, now taking place at Talk:Bernardine Dohrn. There is a similar discussion at Talk:Weatherman (organization), which continues a discussion from the previous two sections. I think it would also be a good idea to add the Dohrn article to the Terrorism project. -- Noroton (talk) 19:28, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Discussion has been centralized at Talk:Weatherman (organization)/Terrorism RfC -- Noroton (talk) 19:33, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Stub Domestic terrorist (United States) could be expanded
Any Roger Wilcos? $\sim$ Justmeherenow     04:52, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia 0.7 articles have been selected for Terrorism
Wikipedia 0.7 is a collection of English Wikipedia articles due to be released on DVD, and available for free download, later this year. The Version 1.0 Editorial Team has made an automated selection of articles for Version 0.7.

We would like to ask you to review the articles selected from this project. These were chosen from the articles with this project's talk page tag, based on the rated importance and quality. If there are any specific articles that should be removed, please let us know at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.7. You can also nominate additional articles for release, following the procedure at Release Version Nominations.

A list of selected articles with cleanup tags, sorted by project, is available. The list is automatically updated each hour when it is loaded. Please try to fix any urgent problems in the selected articles. A team of copyeditors has agreed to help with copyediting requests, although you should try to fix simple issues on your own if possible.

We would also appreciate your help in identifying the version of each article that you think we should use, to help avoid vandalism or POV issues. These versions can be recorded at this project's subpage of User:SelectionBot/0.7. We are planning to release the selection for the holiday season, so we ask you to select the revisions before October 20. At that time, we will use an automatic process to identify which version of each article to release, if no version has been manually selected. Thanks! For the Wikipedia 1.0 Editorial team, SelectionBot 22:39, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

added 1993 wtc bombing to list of past terror attacks
I think i did this all right, i added the 1993 WTC bombing to list of past terrorist attacks and added the project template to that article's talk page. Let me know if that is incorrect. Bonewah (talk) 18:48, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Please contribute your opinions on new proposals Talk:Weatherman (organization)/Terrorism RfC
There is a Request for Comment on whether the articles Weatherman (organization), two of its former leaders, Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernardine Dohrn and Obama-Ayers controversy should mention the word "terrorism" and discuss the relationship of each subject within it. -- Noroton (talk) 17:49, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Wiki Project emblem
Why this wiki project uses communist symbols as emblem, while the most terrorists were islamists, not communists?--Certh (talk) 01:16, 26 October 2008 (UTC)

Template:Terrorism category definition
Additional input is requested at Template talk:Terrorism category definition. The discussion there concerns these 2 category templates:
 * Terrorism category definition
 * Terrorist category definition --Timeshifter (talk) 06:57, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

"One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."
Anyone know the origin of this phrase? We have the claim at Gerald Seymour that the author invented the phrase in Harry's Game (1975). I feel it may be older than this and have marked the claim as requiring citation. Can anyone help? --John (talk) 19:07, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

FA or so?
29 September 2008 western India bombings and Islamabad Marriott Hotel bombing could be upped in ranking. How does one motion it for so? Lihaas (talk) 00:27, 15 November 2008 (UTC)

American Airlines Flight 587
There is a dispute at Talk:American_Airlines_Flight_587 over whether a man saying that he shoe bombed the flight counts as "al-Qaeda did later claim responsibility" WhisperToMe (talk) 13:59, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
 * Other than Zubaydah and KSM, Jabarah has been one of the most consistently "honest" prisoners to give up information on AQ -- he did not claim he shoebombed the flight, he stated that AQ high command, including KSM, believed that 587 was their work, and later, AQ did indeed claim responsibility in a "press release" they issued in 2004 listing their successful attacks since 9/11. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 16:14, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
 * But that doesn't mean "Al Qaeda claimed responsibility" - first the statement is about the group saying it is responsible; does Jabarah "represent" the group? Can he be considered a part of it? Second you need sources stating that Jabarah is unanimously reliable. Who considers Jabarah reliable? Since when does what he say represents Al Qaeda? Third you need sources that explicitly state that Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for AA 587. It has to be obvious and explicit. Right now your argument sounds like Original research (based on Jabarah's perceived credibility and assuming that whatever he says = that represents Al Qaeda) and that is not allowed on Wikipedia. WhisperToMe (talk) 16:35, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

Lists of terrorist incidents
The List of terrorist incidents pages have a rather bad usability problem... You cannot search them by country. At least none of my browsers allows me to draw a flag into the search box. &mdash;ZeroOne ( talk / @ ) 23:00, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

Please remove RAF logo
The RAF logo represents a defunct movement, that is becoming increasingly obscure. It is not fair to the more well-known Royal Air Force, which is not a terrorist organization. Please take off that logo and put something neutral.Xufanc (talk) 10:25, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Using a defunct movement is the purpose of using it; to show that we are adopting a historical approach to Terrorism, not just focusing on the current War on Terror. It also avoids the problems of "Is the Taliban terrorist? Al-Qaeda? LIFG?" -- it uses a defunct group that largely defined Terrorism, before disappearing. I don't understand your comments abou the Air Force. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 04:13, 2 December 2008 (UTC)
 * To most people when they see "RAF", the Royal Air Force comes to mind, and that where RAF redirects in Wikipedia. Since "Extremism" and "terrorism" are pejorative terms, I can't believe that you "don't understand my comments about the Air Force." Please remove that logo. Besides, it is not neutral at all: it is "Western" as opposed to Islamic terrorism which is the form of terrorism most prevalent today. The purpose of that logo seems to be to cover up that fact intentionally, as if making the point that "the West has had its share of terrorist movements" too, which violates neutrality policies. What is the difficulty in putting just a neutral symbol?, like a bomb exploding? - Xufanc (talk) 10:25, 6 December 2008 (UTC)
 * If the FLQ had a well-known logo, it would also be appropriate, because again it was a non-religious-and-thus-less-controversial group that considered itself terrorist. The fact Islamic terrorism is "most prevalent today" has no bearing on history - we are an encyclopaedia, not a newspaper. A Wikiproject on American Presidents wouldn't need to have GWB or Barack Obama as its image, it could have Hoover, Lincoln or Adams. That's the beauty of encyclopaedias, reminding people that history existed before they were born. A bomb exploding is not undeniably terrorism, lots of armies plant bombs for example, and unless you want a cartoon-y image - then it's going to be very difficult to decipher at that size. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 11:29, 6 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Thank you for responding so swiftly. Yes, a cartoon-y image is a good idea (doing away with a drawing altogether would be another, more drastic, option). It will be neutral then. As it is, despite the (forgive me, but somewhat trite) "not a newspaper" and "beauty of encyclopaedias" arguments, it is not neutral. - Xufanc (talk) 04:02, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Newsletter
It's been six months since we had a newsletter, resulting in a decrease of activity. Anybody want to help me put together a new one for December? Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 04:13, 2 December 2008 (UTC)

Ongoing discussion concerning WP:TERRORIST
We seem to have reached an impasse; you are welcome to participate, as it seems to be of some relevance to the topic of this project. RayAYang (talk) 16:24, 4 December 2008 (UTC)

Assassination
I'd like to suggest that for the purposes of this project, we try to separate "assassination" from being labelled "terrorism". Now it can be labelled terrorism following thorough discussion by article-editors on an article's talk_page, but we shouldn't be tagging random assassination articles as "terrorism". The purpose of terrorism is to paralyze (or provoke) the targeted population through fear of the violence incurred. The purpose of assassination is almost exclusively to create a better environment for the group that killed the person. Whether it's the President of Uganda, Pakistan or Abraham Lincoln, we shouldn't work on the theory that assassinations are terrorism unless clearly decided so by the community. Does that sound fair? Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 02:32, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Piracy in Somalia
I've tagged List of ships attacked by Somali pirates as being covered by this project. There are other article in the Category:Piracy in Somalia which may also fall under this WP - will leave it to members to decide this. Mjroots (talk) 22:24, 27 December 2008 (UTC)

NIMBY???
On the talk page of Camp Ashraf, the template for WikiProject Terrorism was removed by User:Sherurcij with the comment: "On behalf of Wikiproject Terrorism...NIMBY". I looked at the users contributions and noticed it was done on 11 other pages. In my neck of the woods, NIMBY is an acronym for "Not In My Back Yard", so I don't understand the comment and was thinking of reverting the edit but decided to check here first as this comment suggests that the user is fulfilling the wishes of this project. In this particular case, Camp Ashraf is where members of the People's Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) live, a group that was once on the US State Departments list of terrorist groups. The PMOI talk page has the WikiProject Terrorism template. Hardnfast (talk) 14:56, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
 * That may have been an error on my part, I was looking through a list of articles tagged with WP Terrorism and removing (largely) ones related to legitimate military conflict in Iraq and such - and making sure they were tagged with Wikiprojects MilHistory and Iraq; I think I probably just read the first line of "Camp Ashraf" being a military base in Iraq, and assumed it was related - and thus better served outside our project. But if it's the PMOI's base, a stronger case can be made, so feel free to re-add it! Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 16:12, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Okay, I will replace it. Thanks. Hardnfast (talk) 18:29, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Scope of terrorism
"acts of violence against civilians by organized, non-state actors for political gain"

one really managed to come up with a reasonably well-defined line of separation to justify that the attack on the Munich Olympics is on the side of the "bad guys" and the invasions of Iraq, Afghanistan and Gaza on the side of "good guys", by saying that the first is terrosism and the second is not.

The french resistance movement against nazi included non-state actors and also included acts of violence against civilians.

Creativity Movement
I'd like to propose removing the Creativity Movement from the list of terrorist organizations. While individual members have commited terrorist activities, the "movement" itself is not engaged in any such activity in the same way that, for example, Al-Qaida is. They are both religious organizations, however, the Creativity Movement is not a terrorist organization.

--129.71.73.243 (talk) 17:26, 26 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I've gone ahead and removed the project banner from its talkpage since a quick perusal of the article does not define the group as terrorist in nature, but rather White Supremacist; which often engages in acts of violence, but I'm not sure if consensus among this group would be to include something like the Birmingham church bombing as a "terrorist" article we want to look after ourselves. If anybody disagrees, they can feel free to re-add it. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 00:05, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

Political Violence as a euphemism for Terrorism
Is this required for NPOV? Currently Zionist terrorism redirects to Zionist Political violence. Given that all parties concerned, including the world zionist council, the Government, and the terrorist groups themselves, described the actions as terrorism, I can't understand how it is neutral to call it zionist political violence93.96.148.42 (talk) 05:49, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

TfD nomination of Template:Campaignbox al-Qaeda attacks
Template:Campaignbox al-Qaeda attacks has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for Deletion page. Thank you. --Aude (talk) 16:01, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

When should we rename articles?
I'd like to have a discussion about the pros and cons of giving articles on individuals with Arabic or Pashtun names shorter article names.

Here is an example:

Yussef Mohammed Mubarak Al Shihri was recently moved to Yussef al-Shihri. And recently a number of sources have started publishing references names that could be simply other transliterations of this name, or to namesakes or homologues.


 * A "Yusuf Al-Shihri" is said to be Sa'id Ali Jabir Al Khathim Al Shihri's brother-in-law.
 * A "Yusuf Al Jebairi Al Shahri" is on the recently released Saudi most wanted list.
 * According to the right-wing think tank Long War Journal the name on the most wanted list is "Yousuf Mohammed Mubarak Al Jubairi Al Shahri".

Is the guy on the most wanted list also the Guantanamo captive? At this point we don't really know. It seems likely. I think it would be easier to decide if we had stuck with the longer name.

It is easy to make mistakes with Arabic names, and mistakenly conflate two individuals who are simply namesakes. Or, we could be correct, and two similar names really do specify a single individual. But, if we are just making an educated guess who knew something about the individual would be correct to resent to be concerned about our conflatition. They could accuse us of original research. If we have an RS that says name-variation-1 and name-variation-2 specify the same individual, then there is no problem with conflating the names. Or, if we have two RS, one which says name-variation-1 did X, and the other says name-variation-2 did X, it is safe to conflate those two names -- depending on what X is.

I think if the X "was held in Guantanamo" -- that is not enough -- not at least for the Afghans, Saudis, Yemenis and Pakistanis. I think these names are too likely to be confused.

Who should decide whether these names specify the same individual anyhow? If we don't have an RS to back up a name conflation, I think we should leave it to our readers to decide for themselves whether two different names identify a single individual.

If multiple RS refer to an individual under different names, my preference is to have the least ambiguous be the base name. That is generally the longest name. Redirection makes it transparent for readers to find the article through the shorter names.

I think casting out components of individual's names, and picking a shorter name, that is not backed up by an RS is more of a mistake. Are the shorter names less alien looking to first time readers? Maybe. But our readers aren't usually children. That famous old Greek, tasked to tutor the King's son in Mathematics, told the recalcitrant prince, "there is no Royal Road to Mathematics". If these names really are innately confusing to readers I would prefer those readers just being expected to overcome that initial confusion, without this kind of help.

Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 20:26, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Jewish terrorism -> Neo-Zionist political violence ?
There has been long discussion and disputes around the article Jewish terrorism. According to the different points of views in different talk pages : The article Neo-Zionism explains the origin of these wording used by different scholars working in the field of sociology and study of nationalism... What would you think about the move from Jewish terrorism to Neo-Zionist political violence ? Ceedjee (talk) 10:50, 7 February 2009 (UTC)
 * "Jewish" dimension should only be religious and not ethnical, and therefore Jewish is not clear
 * the "zionist" dimension in the causes of Jewish terrorism should be emphasized
 * "terrorism" still remains a wp:words to avoid and political violence is more neutral.

Guantanamo weigh-ins
I have been doing some work on the Guantanamo height and weight records. I'd like to invite discussion of some issues that have arisen at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Terrorism/Guantanamo weigh-ins. Geo Swan (talk) 18:17, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

State-sponsored terrorism
Please see the following edits by User:Yousaf465 concerning inflammatory and WP:SYN content placed in retaliation to Pakistani state terrorism. Also see this talk page discussion regarding consensus to remove said edits which he seems to doggedly ignore.Usualitems (talk) 04:27, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Casio F91W
This article, about a popular watch model, currently emphasizes the fact that it is popular with terrorists, even above the fact it is even more popular with the general public. I have made my point, on its talk page, that no more than 25% of the total length of that article should be devoted to its use as a terrorist's tool, even if that means removing information. Currently, the article goes deeply into specifics about which terrorism suspect is alleged to have ised one of these watches as a time bomb. Because I doubt very much that most people going to that article are interested to know that Osama bin Laden's great-grand-nephew three times removed blew up an abandoned gas station with a Casio F91W when they were not looking for anything that has to do with terrorism to begin with, I suggest cleaning up the article and reducing the mention of terrorism to a short summary, and the detail should go into an entirely devoted article.

If I were the CEO of Casio and I saw the article in its current state, I'd have a rather strong libel case against the Wikimedia Foundation. The article as it currently stands gives the impression that this particular watch model was made by Casio specifically to suit Al-Qaida operations. Am I going to get arrested at US Customs just because I wear a F91W on my wrist? --  Blanchardb - Me•MyEars•MyMouth - timed 16:25, 16 February 2009 (UTC)


 * I believe you are completely mistaken that the CEO of Casio would have any case against the wikipedia.


 * WRT to your impression that the watch was made by casio specifically to suit al Qaeda operations... I suspect you are exaggerating to try to make a point.  When we comply with WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, WP:VER, and other key policies, we are not responsible for the perception of our readers.


 * I did a survey of the watches that had individual articles after this article got some challenges about two years ago. There weren't many.  No mundane watches had articles.  Each watch that had an article about it had something special about it.  And those articles did not talk about the mundane aspects of those watches.  They talked about the things that made those watches unique.  You may not like it, but the most unique thing about the Casio F91W is that ownership of one is considered an indicator that you might be a terrorist bomb-maker.


 * Your argument about OBL's distant relatives is a red herring.


 * Would you be arrested by US border guards for wearing this watch? Highly unlikely.  If you fell under suspicion at the US border for some other reason, and you were wearing a Casio watch, could you find your ownership of the watch being advanced as an additional justification to consider you a terrorist threat?  I dunno.  The record shows that, as late as 2007 ownership of a Casio watch was still being used as a justification for holding Guantanamo captives.  So, yes, it is a possibility.


 * If you are arguing this material should be suppressed from the wikipedia to reduce the risk of innocent watch owners falling under the suspicion of US border guards and counter-terrorism officials, I have two responses. First, shouldn't our articles be written to present neutral, balanced, referenced, verifiable coverage of topics, with no regard to how those articles affects public policy?  Having said that, I strongly suspect that neutral, balanced, referenced, verifiable coverage of the counter-terrorism link is more likely to lead to the introduction of some sanity checking into the activity of counter-terrorism officials.  Geo Swan (talk) 21:54, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Attributing and contextualizing minority 9/11 theories
Review of Talk:September_11_attacks would be appreciated. The debate here is not about whether the existence of non-mainstream "conspiracy" theories should be mentioned at all, but rather about whether they should be put in context. By "context," I mean the fact that "conspiracy" approaches have been both rejected and accepted by notable entities. In other words, I mean that which is being removed here and restored here. My position is that the National Institute of Standards and Technology and "the community of civil engineers" (both of which have opposed non-mainstream theories) and a third of the American public (which supports these theories), as reported by Time magazine (which even goes so far as to call them "mainstream," but not so far as to voice its own support of them) are all notable enough to mention. My position is that this balance is fully in accord with the spirit of WP:NPOV, and especially in accord with its WP:DUE section, which states that "If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents" and therefore, as far as I can tell, encourages the attribution of the minority perspective, regardless of how true or false that perspective may ultimately turn out to be. Indeed, in this debate I have cited WP:V, which states that "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth." Those who oppose the contextualization of these theories have also pointed to WP:DUE, but in a way that I view to be mistaken--namely, by suggesting that reliable sources should back a theory, while WP:DUE emphasizes the extent to which theories are held, regardless of their veracity, rather than "backed" by any particular types of evidence. Thanks, Cosmic Latte (talk) 01:42, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Note: For those who do not share my position (although the spirit of it also applies to those who do), I've made what I feel to be a basic--yet an important--suggestion in this diff on the 9/11 talk page. Cosmic Latte (talk) 03:01, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Coordinators' working group
Hi! I'd like to draw your attention to the new WikiProject coordinators' working group, an effort to bring both official and unofficial WikiProject coordinators together so that the projects can more easily develop consensus and collaborate. This group has been created after discussion regarding possible changes to the A-Class review system, and that may be one of the first things discussed by interested coordinators.

All designated project coordinators are invited to join this working group. If your project hasn't formally designated any editors as coordinators, but you are someone who regularly deals with coordination tasks in the project, please feel free to join as well. &mdash; Delievered by §hepBot  ( Disable )  on behalf of the WikiProject coordinators' working group at 06:44, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

context for CSR Tribunals...
Yachtsman1 thinks this is better wording than the existing context providing text for CSR Tribunals. Geo Swan (talk) 19:27, 4 March 2009 (UTC)

Article alerts
This is a notice to let you know about Article alerts, a fully-automated subscription-based news delivery system designed to notify WikiProjects and Taskforces when articles are entering Articles for deletion, Requests for comment, Peer review and other workflows (full list). The reports are updated on a daily basis, and provide brief summaries of what happened, with relevant links to discussion or results when possible. A certain degree of customization is available; WikiProjects and Taskforces can choose which workflows to include, have individual reports generated for each workflow, have deletion discussion transcluded on the reports, and so on. An example of a customized report can be found here.

If you are already subscribed to Article Alerts, it is now easier to report bugs and request new features. We are also in the process of implementing a "news system", which would let projects know about ongoing discussions on a wikipedia-wide level, and other things of interest. The developers also note that some subscribing WikiProjects and Taskforces use the  parameter, but forget to give a link to their alert page. Your alert page should be located at "Wikipedia:PROJECT-OR-TASKFORCE-HOMEPAGE/Article alerts". Questions and feedback should be left at Wikipedia talk:Article alerts.

Message sent by User:Addbot to all active wiki projects per request, Comments on the message and bot are welcome here.

Thanks. — Headbomb {{{sup|ταλκ}}κοντριβς – WP Physics} 09:45, 15 March, 2009 (UTC)

Terrorist warnings
There's been a long-running dispute in King David Hotel bombing about the warnings prior to the explosion. Today we've entered a new phase where an edit was made implying that the intent of warnings was to trigger an evacuation (implicitly to safety). My understanding is that often the warnings can be for other purposes including exposing more people to the blast, tryign to blame the authorities for casualties for not responding to a warnign that is in some way deficient or untrustworthy or bringing bomb dispopsal staff into a position of danger. Am I writing in believing that a claim as to the intent of a warning needs to be specifically cited and to a neutral source? An attempt has been made to source to a book by Menachem Begin, the mastermind behind the bombing, when I think a neutral source who has evaluated Begin's claim is needed.--Peter cohen (talk) 19:30, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

RFC regarding WP:TERRORIST
I wanted to let you know I've set up an RFC to get some outside discussion going regarding this guideline. This project seemed a natural place to find people who might be interested. Ray Talk 17:58, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

Experienced opinions on ETA
I wonder if a few experienced editors would mind offering their opinion on the appropriateness of adding the terrorism template to articles such as ETA. There are some differences of opinion, expressed at Talk:ETA, which could probably be settled with some outside input. Thanks. Rockpock e  t  23:12, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

terrorist categories
Hello all, I was wondering if anybody sees a need to create a subcategory 'Leaders of designated terrorist groups' to the Terrorist category. I think there should be some differentiation between those who call on others to commit terrorist acts and those who commit such acts. An example would be Ahmed Yassin, who as a leader of Hamas certainly called on others to commit such act but never himself committed an act of terrorism. Any opinions would be appreciated. Thanks, Nableezy (talk) 00:22, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

2009 Lahore police academy crisis
More attention is required at 2009 Lahore police academy crisis, a rapidly developing story.  JSR   0562  06:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Oklahoma City bombing A-class review
Hello, I have worked on Oklahoma City bombing to help it attain GA status in the past. After cleaning up the references and adding additional sources, I am now nominating Oklahoma City bombing for A-class review. Since this project doesn't have a formal A-class review, I've looked to the guidelines of the A-class criteria. For the article to reach A-class, two uninvolved editors need to support the nomination. I'm welcoming all comments on how to improve the article further, with the future goal of making the article a FA at some point. I'd be happy to take as many reviews as possible as each one could help to improve the article further. If you have any questions, please let me know on my talk page. Happy editing! --Nehrams2020 (talk) 08:24, 3 April 2009 (UTC)
 * A little over a month later, and this is still open if anyone is interested in taking a look at the article. The article needs two supports to attain A-class status. I would appreciate any assistance in reviewing the article. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 05:16, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Category:Terrorists has been nominated for deletion
Following on from the RFC discussion about WP:TERRORIST linked further up this page, Category:Terrorists has now been nominated for deletion. Interested editors are invited to comment at Categories for discussion/Log/2009 April 27. Robofish (talk) 05:16, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

GA Sweeps invitation
This message is being sent to WikiProjects with GAs under their scope. Since August 2007, WikiProject Good Articles has been participating in GA sweeps. The process helps to ensure that articles that have passed a nomination before that date meet the GA criteria. After nearly two years, the running total has just passed the 50% mark. In order to expediate the reviewing, several changes have been made to the process. A new worklist has been created, detailing which articles are left to review. Instead of reviewing by topic, editors can consider picking and choosing whichever articles they are interested in.

We are always looking for new members to assist with reviewing the remaining articles, and since this project has GAs under its scope, it would be beneficial if any of its members could review a few articles (perhaps your project's articles). Your project's members are likely to be more knowledgeable about your topic GAs then an outside reviewer. As a result, reviewing your project's articles would improve the quality of the review in ensuring that the article meets your project's concerns on sourcing, content, and guidelines. However, members can also review any other article in the worklist to ensure it meets the GA criteria.

If any members are interested, please visit the GA sweeps page for further details and instructions in initiating a review. If you'd like to join the process, please add your name to the running total page. In addition, for every member that reviews 100 articles from the worklist or has a significant impact on the process, s/he will get an award when they reach that threshold. With ~1,300 articles left to review, we would appreciate any editors that could contribute in helping to uphold the quality of GAs. If you have any questions about the process, reviewing, or need help with a particular article, please contact me or OhanaUnited and we'll be happy to help. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 06:47, 20 May 2009 (UTC)

2009 Zahedan attacks
Hey, I just recently made an article on the mosque bombing in Zahedan. It's still in work, so any help will be appreciated. 2009 Zahedan attack. Thanks in advance. Deavenger (talk) 21:11, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

WikiProject Terrorism/List of Templates/doc
The above sub-page makes reference to various discussions about a series of templates. As I can't find anything on this page, I'd be glad if you could provide me with links to these discussions, possibly adding them directly to the above subpage. I left a note to the creators of the page and one of the templates. -- User:Docu 13:24, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Is Wikipedia being used by Terrorists or Terrorist Apologists?
This is a serious question, you may have noticed that Wikipedia cannot stop an editor, no matter how aligned to terrorist activity, from editing articles, while usually insisting that most of the media is against their cause every time you try to document and reference terrorist events either from Media press sources or research, this DOES have a negative effect on the quality on such a very important area that is of importance in a post 9/11 world to many of us

I'm not making any criticisms of any political wing, left or right, BUT many people of certain religious faiths do try to cover up known terrorist activities, by manipulating information using poor biased sources, giving endless warnings even threats, while propagating their cause(s) but should Wikipedia should have a panel to look into the habits of those editors who manipulate Wikipedia rules to suit their extremist agenda(s), thanks Morbid Fairy (talk) 22:50, 2 June 2009 (UTC)


 * It's a strange question, imagine replacing "Terrorist" with "Criminal" - I hold the belief "Criminals are made, not born" (as evidenced on userpage), does that make me an "apologist"? What if we replaced it with "Christians or Christian apologists"? As long as they are adding legitimately-sourced material, do we really care whether somebody is a soldier, an irregular militant or building a time machine or nuclear bomb in their garage? You could be Karla Homolka for all I know - but as long as you don't vandalise anything or try to remove valid information...why would I care if you want to go write about the Mazda Miata? Or even if you wanted to write about serial killers, and were adding sourced information?
 * That said, I think you are overhyping this "post-9/11 world" thing...more people have died of bee stings and lightning in the last 50 years than terrorist attacks, and that includes 9/11. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 00:54, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi, just because x amount of people may have died of natural causes, should not distract the issue of terrorism or the right to kill another in the name of religion, religious theocracy, or radical fundamentalism. The issue raised here is, should people propagate fundamentalist beliefs to manipulate wikipedia? Such editors with extremist wp:POV are hardly expressing any wp:NPOV - it has been argued that people who do not approve of terrorism also cannot express wp:NPOV, but it remains a gray area on wikipedia, unfortunately there does not seem to be any wiki rules on radicalization Morbid Fairy (talk) 14:38, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

As for terrorists being criminal or vice versa, its not mutually exclusive, of course a terrorist can be a criminal or have the same psychological traits, indeed criminals are often recruited to radical causes Morbid Fairy (talk) 14:43, 3 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I notice you are editing articles to do with Sikh extremism, which is a topic I know little about beyond the shooting of Indira Gandhi and that Sikh terrorists appear in The Satanic Verses. There are a lot of articles on Wikipedia related to ethnic and religious strife on Wikipedia and many of the contributors to these articles are supporters of one side or the other. In such areas the definition of who is terrorist can be subjective and this can result in the same editors wanting, say, to describe Hamas and Hezbollah as terrorist and remove any use of those words from Irgun and Lehi while their opponents may hold the reverse stance. The policy in Wikipedia is to indicate who describes a group as terrorist. For example, in the case of Hezbollah, we note that four Western states have formally done so with two others designating part of the organisation and that some others have considered doing so. In the case of Sikh extremism, the Indian government could well have designated such groups as terrorist and they may appear on lists made by the US or UK.


 * Now WP:NPOV is based on reflecting the balance of opinion in WP:Reliable sources. There are various conflict resolution approaches in Wikipedia, such as WP:3O or WP:Mediation which can be used in the event of disagreement. If the preponderance of evidence in reliabel sources is that certain groups carried out certain events and others keep on removing that evidence, then you may have to seek help. Administrators' noticeboard/Geopolitical ethnic and religious conflicts might be a good place to start as that could bring in individuals who have experience in dealing with similar disputes. WP:AN/I is where a lot of conflicts eventually reach, but you do need to prepare a case to show how policies are being broken or people are just going to see it as a content dispute. I hope this helps.--Peter cohen (talk) 16:23, 3 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Hi Peter, thank you for your response, my concern is that while there will always be disagreements between pro-terrorists and anti-terrorists, mediation may well be a good problem solver, the terrorist, or lets say, the pro-terrorist won't always care to consult his 'adversaries' and you are correct; sikh extremism and sikh extremist groups are monitored and banned by United States, British, Canadian, EU as well as the Indian Government just as Hamas or al Qaeda are. As you can see from one editor above I face constant rhetoric, bias, vandalism, and being blocked temporarily by the occasional admin who fall for the view of the pro-terrorist simply because of lack of knowledge and and a feeling that I'm wrong simply because to many extremists have collectively asked the same admin to block me. If you look at the article, many were vehemently opposed to the articles existence, while a few admins voted to keep it. The same people who wanted it deleted then almost altered the whole article (watered down) - into something that didnt even resemble any reality to sikh extremism. I am currently going through WikiProject Citation cleanup and in the past discovered that the citations usually ISBN refs have absolutely no bearing on their edits. Morbid Fairy (talk) 18:56, 3 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Dear Morbid Fairy aka Satanoid see here, you have been previously reprimanded for this type of behaviour under the Satanoid account and on your WPOuting violation here. People are assuming Good Faith on your new account so I suggest you do the same. Your behaviour towards Sineed is very bad.--Sikh-history (talk) 17:09, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

When award winning journalists like Kim Bolan get death threats for their reporting on religious terrorism as she often does from Sikh extremists, they often get the death threats and her article on here has had to undergo many a transformation. Morbid Fairy (talk) 19:49, 3 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I think adding legitimate links from International media press reports such as the New York Times, Reuters, The BBC, Rediff, on Sikh Terrorism is hardly gaming the system irrespective of how desperate or protective you may feel (That the events do not matter) after the recent terrorist violence in Austria or elsewhere for that matter.


 * As you can see, I do not wish to hide or remove these facts or divert sections to other articles as has been done by Sinneed in an effort to water down the article, (for reasons he knows to himself) but if that is your agenda along with Sinneed, I am aware that you were both demanding WP:AFD when the article was created, this is still reflected in your edits/deletions/removing sections. Morbid Fairy (talk) 11:35, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Proposed redirect from Institute for Conflict Management to South Asian Terrorism Portal‎‎
This page (Institute for Conflict Management) is presently deleted and protected due to apparent vandalism. The admin that seems to be responsible for the protection responded to my request for the redirect here, and sent me to this page. This is not something I feel strongly about, but there are red links for the Institute, and this seems a good place to point it.

I propose leaving the article protected, as it seems to have been vandalbait, with just the redirect to the SATP, which has been recently improved by another editor. - sinneed (talk) 23:37, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

Oklahoma City bombing FAC
I have nominated Oklahoma City bombing at WP:FAC which can be found here. Please consider leaving comments at the nomination to determine if the article meets the featured article criteria. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 23:53, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Lord's Resistance Army insurgency at FAR
nominated Lord's Resistance Army insurgency for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Remove" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here.Cirt (talk) 00:48, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

GA reassessment of The CIA and September 11 (book)
I have conducted a reassessment of this article for the GA Sweeps process and have found one minor concern which needs addressing. You can find the review at Talk:The CIA and September 11 (book)/GA1. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 21:12, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Turkish Airlines Flight 1476 GA Sweeps: On Hold
I have reviewed Turkish Airlines Flight 1476 for GA Sweeps to determine if it still qualifies as a Good Article. In reviewing the article I have found several issues, which I have detailed here. Since the article falls under the scope of this project, I figured you would be interested in contributing to further improve the article. Please comment there to help the article maintain its GA status. If you have any questions, let me know on my talk page and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. --Happy editing! Nehrams2020 (talk • contrib) 00:46, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

LOT Polish Airlines Flight 165 hijacking
Should this article really be under WikiProject Terrorism? Sure this was a hijacking, but not terrorism by popular definition (and a hijacking does not automatically equate to terrorism). Terrorism is an act of extreme violence utilized for political gain. According to the page, these two individuals were neither violent (leading to injury or death) nor acting under a certain political dogma. They were not terrorists.JanderVK (talk) 03:18, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I would tend to agree with you, hijackings were often used traditionally by "Defectors" to take them to a "safe" country; I don't think that meets any of the criteria of terrorism; it's a slippery slope from that to carjacking - I'm all in favour of removing the template. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 03:40, 31 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I'll delete the tag if no one rejects to it.JanderVK (talk) 18:48, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

GA reassessment of Idi Amin
I am posting this here as the project banner appears on the article talk page. I have conducted a reassessment of the above article as part of the GA Sweeps process. I have found some concerns with the article which you can see at Talk:Idi Amin/GA1. I have placed the article on hold whilst these are fixed. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 17:24, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

GA reassessment of Jean Charles de Menezes
The above article has this project's banner on its talk page. I have conducted a reassessment as part of the GA Sweeps process. I have found a large number of concerns with the article which you can see at Talk:Jean Charles de Menezes/GA1. I have de-listed the article. This decision may be challenged at WP:GAR or the article may be improved and re-nominated at WP:GAN. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 19:04, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Talk:Joseph MacManus
Could I ask for some input on this emerging problem, concerning the use of the term "killed on active service" in a few IRA articles. There are two viewpoints. One, that this is a term "used by PIRA and supporters/apologists to legitimise their actions as being on a par with military actions" to quote Mooretwin. The other, that this is a NPOV term used by other non-IRA sources.

Personally, I think that stating "MacManus was killed on active service during a shoot-out after an ambush in Mulleek" is presenting the facts from a Republican perspective. I feel that Words to avoid applies here, as well as the "Volunteer" usage mediation. Could you reply at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ireland, to avoid having two concurrent conversations. Thanks. Stu  ’Bout ye!  18:06, 10 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Disagree the term is used in neutral reliable sources. BigDunc  11:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Use of military infobox for paramilitary/terrorist-group members
Similar to the above, the issue of military infoboxes being used for paramilitary group-members has also arisen at Talk:Joseph MacManus. Again, it is felt that the infobox is inappropriate in such articles, supporting as it does an Irish-republican POV that the Provisional IRA was a legitimate "army" on a par with recognised state armies. Mooretwin (talk) 23:16, 11 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Well you have shown your anti-Irish republican POV on many page so I will ignore much of the rhetoric that you have used. The use of that infobox is widespread across all incarnations of the IRA from its inception, to those involved in the War of Independence, the Civil War right up to modern times. Because it is not a "recognised state army" does not preclude its members from being military men. Infact members of the IRA have pretty much always because leaders of the government - thereby proving its legitimacy. To state otherwise would simply be POV.--Vintagekits (talk) 08:43, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I have not shown any "anti-Irish republican POV on many page [sic]" - my only concern has been to remove POV, whether that be Irish republican POV or any other. This is why we have clashed before: because of your insistence on seeking to further Irish republican POV. Recognition of PIRA and other paramilitary/terrorist groupings (RIRA, CIRA, etc.) as "military men" is pure Irish republican POV. These organisations are recognised as terrorists by the Irish government and the UK government and internationally. The status or recognition of previous IRAs is irrelevant. Mooretwin (talk) 09:01, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * This type of pointy behaviour is typical of Mooretwin with his loyalist agenda. Agree with Vintagekits above. BigDunc  11:21, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't have a "loyalist agenda", therefore any behaviour cannot be typical of it. It does not follow that because one objects to articles being written with an Irish republican POV that one must be a loyalist. I would equally object to an article written from a loyalist POV, and this subject, indeed, applies equally to loyalists as it does to republicans. Mooretwin (talk) 13:17, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Go push your POV elsewhere please.--Vintagekits (talk) 13:41, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm not pushing POV. On the contrary, I'm seeking to avoid it. As noted above, opposing POV in an article does not mean one is pushing an alternative POV. That is a logical fallacy. Mooretwin (talk) 15:49, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Quote: Infact members of the IRA have pretty much always because leaders of the government - thereby proving its legitimacy.....Beacause leaders of the Government have done what? Over.
 * A rename of the infobox might be better, or just a /doc explanation that it applies to soldiers and militants; because I don't think we want the edit-wars of people going "No, Ahmed Shah gets the military bio infobox, not the militant bio infobox!" when they'd contain essentially identical information. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 16:00, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

This is just the latest in Mooretwin's loyalist agenda pushing crusade. Sad really, but what can you do? -- Domer48 'fenian'  18:26, 12 August 2009 (UTC)http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Terrorism&action=edit&section=116
 * I don't have a "loyalist agenda pushing crusade", so it is not possible that this is the "latest" in it. It is a logical fallacy to argue that because one opposes the pushing of an Irish-republican POV that one must therefore be pushing a "loyalist" POV. On the contrary, the objection to the military infobox applies as much to "loyalists" as to "republicans".  Mooretwin (talk) 22:49, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * You do have a blatant Loyalist POV and imo are only on wikipedia to disrupt.--Vintagekits (talk) 22:55, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't. On the contrary, my interest is to avoid POV in line with policy. And your opinion of why I am on Wikipedia is irrelevant. Please do not engage in personal attacks - it reflects poorly on the attacker moreso than his target. Mooretwin (talk) 22:58, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I first brought this up here, mainly because - in my addition of categories to many jailed Irish paramilitaries - I have never seen the use of a military infobox until now. My concerns are largely as follows:
 * Regardless of any personal bias, Mooretwin has not shown any in starting this conversation, he has opened a topic for discussion. Let us discuss the topic, not the person. Sherurcij (speaker for the dead) 03:16, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Years of service is difficult if not impossible to verify. Armies maintain records, paramilitary groups do not.
 * Ranks are, again, difficult if not impossible to verify for paramilitary groups. In the current example, we use Volunteer (Irish republican). That article makes it perfectly clear the term does not have any definite meaning and in this context can be verified to mean little more than "member" - which isn't a rank. This is also at odds with a past consensus that the term should only be used as a descriptor ("volunteer") rather than a title ("Volunteer").
 * Units are, again, difficult if not impossible to verify for paramilitary groups. In this case we have an unsourced assertion he joined the "Sligo Brigade" (which is linked to the city only). The text itself says he was part of "a Ballyshannon-based active service unit". So which is it, and are these so-called "service units" sufficiently defined to be listed in a info box?

Taken together, then, I'm wondering whether that particular infobox is uniquely suited for the recorded careers of military personnel, and whether we would be better off creating a specialist box for paramilitaries. I welcome discussion, but please leave the tired, asinine accusations out. I have also drawn the attention of WikiProject Military history to this discussion. Rockpock e  t  07:04, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Funny how you turned up here isnt it! All of the above just highlights your limited knowledge with regards the subject and what has any of that got to do with the info box?--Vintagekits (talk) 08:31, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * More personal comments. Mooretwin (talk) 08:58, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I know, I'm so nasty arnt I! sheesh!--Vintagekits (talk) 09:07, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

(od) I cam here as requested from the MILHIST wikiproject. Firstly, I'd like to ask again that certain users stop making personal attacks, as they are unwarranted and simply poison the atmosphere. As to the question of the infoboxes, it is a difficult question. However, Rockpocket does make some good points above; many of the areas that would be filled in in the infobox of a soldier belonging to a recognized state military (rank, unit, and especially years of service) would seem to be extremely difficult to know, even more to source reliably. But I do think some kind of infobox would be required, if only to standardise things. I'd recommend creating some kind of 'Militant' infobox with more suitable fields. Name and age, of course, but also fields like 'Affiliated group' and whatever else might be needed - my knowledge of paramilitary and militant groups is rather limited in that area. Skinny87 (talk) 10:29, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I think that's a good compromise. Mooretwin (talk) 10:35, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * There's nothing necessarily that indicates to a reader that this is especially a "military infobox" when it's displayed on the page (depending on how the parameters are filled out), so it hsouldn't necessarily be seen as pushing a POV to use this infobox. However, allegiance is normally used for a state party (which is problematic in the specific case queried), branch is used to indicate the force they belonged to, similarly, if there has been consensus that volunteer is a description not a rank, then there is perhaps an issue there too.  I have used this box in the past for non-military personnel, such as firemen and air raid wardens awarded the Geroge Cross during WWII in lieu of any better box.  On th issue of citations, it's not usually required to cite in the infobox itself, but it should be possible to find the info cited in the article text.  On balance, there's probably scope for sufficient usage to create a more focussed infobox for paramilitary groups that are not foramlly state-sponosored (as opposed to things like gendarmeries which might be considered as eitehr military, or law enforcement, depending on situation).  David Underdown (talk) 10:36, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * From a logistical standpoint, I think it would be easier to add the necessary "militant-specific" fields to Infobox Military Person rather than creating an entirely new infobox (which would nevertheless have considerable overlap with the existing one); the fields are almost all optional, so there's no problem with individual articles using only the subset that's best suited for their subject. The only thing that's really needed is for someone to come up with a list of the missing fields. Kirill [talk] [pf] 12:57, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Now all you have to sort out is who are militants, who are armies, who are terrorists etc. I know that a lot of us have significantly different ideas about this. Seems like a lot of POV here to be honest.--Vintagekits (talk) 22:43, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * A much easier, and less subjective, way of dealing with it is sorting out which fields contains verified, or verifiable, information. It doesn't really matter what the infobox is called, what matters is whether the info for each field can be verified. Its not clear to me that is currently the case. Taking Joseph MacManus as an example, can you (or anyone) verify the information currently listed under the field headings? Rockpock  e  t  23:44, 13 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree, information that doesnt comply with WP:RS should be in any article let alone an infobox. But like I have said WTF what has that to do with the infobox itself?--Vintagekits (talk) 10:32, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Coming here via miltary history as the others above. Although I can understand the distaste some have with giving a "military" infobox to any "paramilitary/terrorist", I too agree that providing optional fields in the military person infobox is probably the best way to address this issue. However, as Rockpocket points out, when the infobox is used in such instances it is vital that the fields chosen are very carefully thought out to ensure a) NPOV and b) referencing are up to scratch. It is important that the irregular nature of that person's activities is made as clear as possible - after all the sole point of an infobox is to provide a rough outline of a person for a quick reader. Therefore it should not be used as an attempt to legitimise or denigrate the person, but simply to provide basic facts.

As with this article, alliegence should avoid suggesting any national government and simply give the name of the paramilitary organisation instead. Years of service, Branch of Service and anything else related to their paramilitary activity are easily open to contention and so must be given references in the infobox itself, especially if they are not referenced in the article (as here). In my opinion, rank should be avoided entirely in these cases unless there is a clear term in use and a reference for it. In this particular case, as it has already been established at a previous discussion that "Volunteer" is not considered a rank in this context on Wikipedia, it should not be used in this infobox.--Jackyd101 (talk) 13:35, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm content to agree with that in the interests of finding consensus, and it looks like the above suggestion by Jackyd101 accurately summarises the conclusion of the discussion, viz.
 * It is appropriate to use military infoboxes for paramilitary/terrorist personnel, on condition that:
 * there should be no suggestion of national government/nationality/country, but instead the "allegiance" field should be used to denote the organisation to whom the subject belonged;
 * years of service should be avoided unless these are verified with references (either in the article or infobox);
 * branch of service should be avoided unless these aren verified with references (either in the article or infobox); and
 * rank should be avoided (and in the case of Ireland/Northern Ireland "volunteer" should not be used to denote a rank in a republican paramilitary grouping).
 * Mooretwin (talk) 14:15, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Nah, your way off there!-- Domer48 'fenian'  14:57, 14 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Does that comment actually help at all? To the point, given Kirill thinks it's simpler to maintain a single infobox, and maybe add a few additional params, I'm happy to shift my stance.  On this issue, perhaps add a field called "role".  In this context it could be used to hold "volunteer", adn also things like "Commander of PIRA's Derry Brigade" or similar, and it could actually be useful in the wider milhist context too, eg for RAF personnel to indicate if someone was an air gunner, fighter pilot, bomber pilot etc.. David Underdown (talk) 15:09, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Was that addressed to me Domer48? And if so, in what "way" am I "off"? To David, I think that is a good idea, and certainly does have wider applications beyond this specific issue.--Jackyd101 (talk) 15:12, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Whether editors like it or not, the Irish Republican Army is an army. It has a military command structure, and it soldiers are governed according to those structures. It is also a recognised military organisation according to the British military, who described the conflict in operation Banner as “one of the most important campaigns ever fought by the British Army…” I agree with editors above however, if its not referenced it should not go in. The only problem I have is the name for the conlict i.e. "the troubles." -- Domer48 'fenian'  20:29, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
 * The consensus here appears to recognise the distinction between lawful/legitimate state armies and self-appointed paramilitary groups. That the PIRA is an "army" in the conventional sense is Irish-republican POV. Neither of your links demonstrates otherwise. Mooretwin (talk) 20:32, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

It appears to recognise nothing of the sort. -- Domer48 'fenian'  20:36, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Every editor here, excepting the Irish republicans, who come with an Irish republican POV, recognises it. Mooretwin (talk) 20:46, 14 August 2009 (UTC)


 * Reply to Domer: I'm afraid you are wrong.
 * The Wikipedia article on army says in the lead that "An army (from Latin Armata "act of arming" via Old French armée), in the broadest sense, is the land-based armed forces of a nation" and "By definition, irregular military is understood in contrast to regular armies which grew slowly from personal bodyguards or elite militia." This quite clearly indicates that the IRA was not, by the conventional description, an army. In any case it is irrelevant as it has been established that it doesn't matter for the infobox whether the IRA was an army or not.
 * I can't see anything on the link you provided that suggests the British military recognised the IRA as a "recognised military organisation" - certainly those specific words do not appear anywhere on the link and in the very same paragraph that you quoted to me, Mike Jackson uses the phrase "the armed forces of a developed nation against an irregular force". I think you'll find that the British military has always been of the opinion that the IRA were a terrorist organisation (indeed the second link you provided uses the word repeatedly in reference to the IRA), even if it was one they fought in the "one of the most important campaigns ever fought by the British Army"
 * What does any of this have to do with the infobox issue or with my summary of the debate above?
 * Please therefore explain in what way my summary was "way off there".--Jackyd101 (talk) 21:57, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
 * These all seem very reasonable guidelines, aptly summarized by Moortwin. I don't see them being particularly contentious, since it basically comes down to reliable sourcing, which we all appear to agree on. A "role" field (which could be used for "volunteer" or any other sourced description such as bomb maker, quartermaster etc) would be a good addition. Would someone more familiar with template formatting be willing to add it? Regarding the name of the conflict, that was something that I didn't consider to be problematic. Could you explain why, and what you would consider a reasonable alternative, Domer? Rockpock  e  t  06:43, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

It seems clear that we have a consensus here, with all NPOV editors appearing to assent to the summarised guidelines. Unfortunately, however, Irish-republican POV editors are insisting on including "volunteer" as a rank and "Troubles" as a "battle" in the Joseph MacManus article. How can we avoid an edit war at this, and other, articles? Mooretwin (talk) 10:32, 22 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Hello? Mooretwin (talk) 19:41, 23 August 2009 (UTC)
 * I have asked for further objections before adding a "role" field (since it is a high visibility template). Once that is resolved, I will go ahead and edit the template according to this discussion. In the meantime, I will query the verifiability of the rest of the fields. Rockpock  e  t  00:58, 24 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks. This needs to be pinned down. Mooretwin (talk) 18:53, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

The IRA is a military organisation, whose origins can be traced to the volunteers of 1916, and are cited in numerous books, one published by Osprey Publishing who specialise in military history on the Volunteers up till 1923. There are a number of books which give the various ranks of IRA members so to suggest that they are not a military organisation, and not provide one source to suggest otherwise is bordering on the ridiculous not to mention going against WP:NPOV. -- Domer48 'fenian'  19:34, 24 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Military organizations represent States, the PIRA is a paramilitary organization. Would you like some sources for this? Because there are literally thousands, as well you know. Rockpock  e  t  19:50, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

military infobox = military organisations. Provide a source that says the IRA is not a military organisation. -- Domer48 'fenian'  20:28, 24 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Why? It is perfectly sufficient, for the point at hand, to demonstrate that it is considered by neutral sources to be a paramilitary organization. It doesn't matter what the name of the box is, what matters is the verifiability of the content. You say there are a number of books that "give the various ranks of IRA members". If you could quote those for us, particularly demonstrating that "Volunteer" is considered the rank of MacManus in the context it is used for a military organization, that would be most helpful. The reason I query this is because the Volunteer_(Irish_republican) section provides sources showing the ambiguity of the term. We have "IRA memorials refer to the dead only as "Volunteer", "Vol." or "Óglach" rather than giving a specific rank. (the clear implication being "Volunteer" isn't a specific rank), ..the term is used to refer to all IRA members (again, equivalent to "member") and Joe McCann, killed in 1972 was referred to in commemorations by his rank "Staff Captain" but also as a "Volunteer" (If his rank is Staff Captain, what is Volunteer?). All of these statements contrast with the assertion it is a specific rank (though there appears other situations where it is used to be the equivalent of "Private"). How do we know when it is being used in a general sense vs. specific sense? Rockpock  e  t  22:20, 24 August 2009 (UTC)