Talk:Committee of Secretaries-General

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Committee of Secretaries-General/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Tomobe03 (talk · contribs) 11:54, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

I'll review this article shortly. --Tomobe03 (talk) 11:54, 15 October 2013 (UTC)

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  • I'm not quite clear what this (a part of the October 1940 proclamation photo caption) means: "The Secretary-General of the Interior and Public Health is named for decreeing the publication of the poster, but not for assisting in the decree." I understood the "decreeing the publication" part the Secretary-General of the Interior and Public Health was named as official promulgating the proclamation - please correct me if I'm wrong - and I assume this information comes from the proclamation text itself. Still, I have no clue what "...but not for assisting in the decree" means. Could you please clarify what that means?

I see your point, but I'm not sure how to. What I mean is that the Committee said that all offices had to put the poster up, but the content of the poster (legislation persecuting Jews) was entirely done by the Germans with the refusal of the Committee. If you could suggest how to make this clearer, I'd be grateful! You're correct that the information is contained in the smaller print in the middle of the poster.

I'd replace the assisting bit with something along the lines of "Militärverwaltungsstab implemented the decree, while the Committee refused to do so." (assuming the Militärverwaltungsstab did that, of course). Such a statement would require a reference to Gotovitch (10).--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:20, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

• The article appears to be stable (no action required)
• Prose sourcing appears to be generally in order, except:
  • What is the source used to back up claims in the first paragraph of the "Purpose and role" section? Y
  • What is the source used to back up claims in the note number 1 (the only note right now)?

I can't work out how to attach reference to notes, could you do it? It should be < ref name=NHdB20-26/ >. Every time I do it the note breaks up.

Reference added as indicated above.--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:14, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

• • In the trilingual proclamation image caption, what source is used to back up claim that "Most such directives would be implemented after discussion with the Committee of Secretary-Generals."?
• The note 1 is currently linked in the lead only, which seems to be in violation of WP:LEAD (indirectly though) because the lead should be a summary of the material presented in the prose - i.e. no material should be found in the lead only. Besides, wouldn't the contents of the note be better off explaining the "lesser evils" in the "Policies" section (incorporated into the main body prose instead as a note)? Y
• Please specify ISSN number and publisher information for Journal of Military History

I can't find it - 1 is the Jstor text though. Brigade Piron (talk) 09:24, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

It's here: 0899-3718

• Please specify ISBN or OCLC number for Van den Wijngaert

Again, I can't find them, though I have put the volume that they can be found it (didn't know before).

Here you go: ISBN 9789002214400

• Please specify Alexander von Falkenhausen's rank at the first instance of his name in the prose per WP:SURNAME Y
• Ditto for Eggert Reeder Y
• Perhaps it would be wise to provide a direct translation of Militärverwaltungsstab (in brackets like this) at the first instance of the term Y
• The first paragraph of the "Purpose and role" section appears to belong to the "Background" section - it provides background info and not a peep on the topic of the article itself N while it is background in the strictest sense, it is used to explain the purpose of the body and therefore I'd prefer to leave it where it is.
• Not being a native speaker of English, I might be wrong on this one, but shouldn't "depart" in ...after the depart of the government... be "departure"? Y
• The only paragraph of the "Secretary-Generals" section speaks of "the original committee of five" and then of "other ministries". Still the prose fails to identify those ministries, let alone Secretary-Generals. The information is found in the tables, which is fine, but it should be presented in the prose as well.
• There's no need for one subsection for each table in the "Secretary-Generals" section. In fact, the current subsection titles appear to be intended as table captions. If so, I'd definitely recommend use of captions per WP:DTAB instead. That would also permit placement of the sourcing ref next to the caption instead of the empty first column header, which appears quite odd Y
• Galopin doctrine should be linked from the prose and the link removed from the "See also" section per WP:ALSO Y
• Quotation marks are not needed for "Greater Economy" or "National Office for Work" N - they're direct translations of French, not English terms, so they're best left in quotes - particularly "Greater Economy" which sounds rather odd.

Per WP:SCAREQUOTES such use implies falsely or contentiously named terms and the policy advises against use of the quotation marks in such a way. If those terms are indeed originally French, I'd strongly advise presenting them in English with no quotations and then in French, presented in brackets and italics (like this) or (French: like this).--Tomobe03 (talk) 20:07, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's a correct interpretation of SCAREQUOTES. It seems to concern expressions of doubt (for instance in the phrase the "organization" responsible) which is not how it sounds when the term is removed from the sentence and put in brackets. If you look at WP:QUOTEMARKS, I think you'll find it more relevant, but I'd prefer to keep it consistent with other editors, and my other articles if possible. The lang-fr template is, I believe, only really intended for use in the lead, while italics risk confusing it as the original name. Brigade Piron (talk) 07:02, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

You're quite wrong on this one - WP:QUOTEMARK has nothing to do with the quote marks you employed here.--Tomobe03 (talk) 07:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

• Since ONT abbreviation is not used twice in the prose, I believe it would be better to remove it altogether N that's its universal name, so it isn't complete without it.
• Ditto for PSC-CVP N This is about distinguishing the Christian Social Party (Belgium, defunct) (PSC-CVP) from the later Flemish only party called CVP, or later Walloon only party called PSC.
• The "Policies" section seems to have a chronological order in place, until the penultimate section begins with "In October 1940, the Committee had announced ..." - Is that a typo (should it be 1942)? N it's currently thematic, which shouldn't be a problem. October 1940 is correct, why?

This makes the section presentation choppy. You seem to start in 1940, go to 1942 then back to 1940. If you insist on "thematic" organisation (resulting in a super-short two sentence paragraph being out of chronological order) the theme should be in a separate subsection to prevent readers from getting disoriented (I was convinced that was a typo of 1942). What's worse, I was led to this conclusion not only by order of the prose presentation, but also a sentence such as "From 1942, collaborationist members of the Committee were able to further their policies." and mention of both 1940 and 1942 in the same two-sentence-paragraph which seems to be out of sequence only served to confuse and reinforced this impression.--Tomobe03 (talk) 07:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

As I see it, the fifth paragraph of the "policies" section would be better off added to the end of the third paragraph of the same section. I don't think anything would be lost in terms of quality there, a chronological order would be achieved and there would be a nice transition from 1940 to 1942. This would also remove any impression of a choppy presentation of the timeline there.--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:25, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

• Information that Romsée was the Secretary-General for Internal Affairs is introduced in the last paragraph of the article. I trust such information would be better off in the section containing all the tables, together with similar prose on other Secretary-Generals

I'm not sure I understand you? It's just restating information already in the tables. I can remove the second reference if you like?

This is not a dealbreaker at GA level, but consider restating the table contents in the prose (perhaps with less detail, as you see fit). This would improve accessibility of the article to readers using screen-reader software.--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:27, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

• What happened after October 1942? The article says nothing on committee activities after October 1942 and the end of the war, nor on its dissolution or whatever else happened to the committee. The lead specifies it was active until 1944, but nothing on the period is to be found in the article.

This is a very interesting point. I cannot find anything in my fairly decent reading (or google books) on the committee between 1943 and 4. But you're welcome to have a look too if you don't believe me. I guess that, since the administrative reforms that the Germans wanted them for were complete, they didn't do much? Honestly I don't know, but I don't think that means the article fails the completeness criteria.

Frankly, yes it does. If the committee did nothing at all since October 1942, there must be some source saying "they did nothing throughout 1943 and 1944" or something to that effect.--Tomobe03 (talk) 20:09, 20 October 2013 (UTC)

Well, if you look 1 (same source in further reading, which comes from the official 9-volume treatment of Belgium in WWII) - I don't know if you speak any Dutch, but just search for the words "1943" and "1944", and you'll see what I mean. I didn't actually use this source, but it illustrates my point nicely. Brigade Piron (talk) 07:02, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

That's all very well, but you should at least find something saying the committee was less involved in actual government of Belgium since October 1942 (or another date) or something like that. Gaston Schuind was dismissed by the committee in 1943, therefore I think your research is clearly missing something - somehow I doubt that the committee did nothing for two years except fire a secretary. --Tomobe03 (talk) 07:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

To clarify the issue at stake here: If you omit any mention of committee's activities in 1943-44 and claim that it "formed an part of the German occupation administration of Belgium between 1940 and 1944" (quoted from the article) you are either saying "the committee was inactive in 1943-44" yet you offer no references for this making the article WP:OR in part or you're completely overlooking the period failing WP:GACR 3a.--Tomobe03 (talk) 07:39, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

Another thing that is missing from the article is an account of relationship, if any, between the committee and the Zivilverwaltung established in 1944 ([1], p.216). If the two had no relations, it should be noted.

Yet another thing leaving readers to beg for more information is initial (1944-45) relationship of the committee and the Allies after the Germans were driven back. That seems to be quite an important (not to mention interesting) aspect of the topic, which is completely overlooked right now.--Tomobe03 (talk) 07:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

• The lead should provide a summary of the entire article and it should itself be capable of acting as a standalone article per WP:LEAD. Right now, the lead appears to be a summary of the first two sections: "Background" and "Purpose and role" only. Y - very good point, done!

Nice work overall. While most issues raised above are fairly minor, the largest problem I can see is the complete lack of information on the period following October 1942 - making coverage incomplete. Cheers --Tomobe03 (talk) 22:40, 18 October 2013 (UTC)

Some changes made, more to come Brigade Piron (talk) 09:24, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Responded to.Brigade Piron (talk) 07:07, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

I appreciate your responsiveness, but the comprehensiveness (per WP:GACR 3.a) especially in terms of events beyond October 1942, seems to be quite lacking. I appreciate that it may be hard to find sources but I do not think this absolves editors from noting at least very basic information - such as that the committee was completely inactive or did only day-to-day work in the period - and referencing it to reliable sources. Improving of other aspects of the article noted above, while welcome, will not remedy this shortcoming specifically.--Tomobe03 (talk) 07:31, 21 October 2013 (UTC)

How would this be as a compromise: "the last significant legislation enacted by the committee was... in 1942"? Brigade Piron (talk) 17:12, 22 October 2013 (UTC)

It would be a step in the right direction. What would you reference the claim to?--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:04, 23 October 2013 (UTC)

I've made some changes in this area, can I have your comments? Brigade Piron (talk) 11:33, 26 October 2013 (UTC)

There seems to be few things left over:

• Improper use of quotation marks (see above)
• One caption which needs some work (see above)
• Reordering/merging of one paragraph to avoid choppy presentation of the prose (see above)

Otherwise, the article seems to be quite close to meeting GACR quite fine.--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:32, 28 October 2013 (UTC)

There has been no activity related to this nomination or the nominated article for two weeks now. Do you plan to address the remaining issues or not?--Tomobe03 (talk) 10:24, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Done. Brigade Piron (talk) 14:38, 12 November 2013 (UTC)

Thanks!Brigade Piron (talk) 17:55, 12 November 2013 (UTC)