Talk:Russian invasion of Ukraine/Archive 15

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Also, why not list other Russian invasions?

By listing other times Ukraine was invaded ignores the many other times Russia invaded other former Soviet states. The title is "Russian invasion of Ukraine", a list of other countries invaded by Russia should be offered.2603:8000:2942:4A00:29C1:C6A7:60C0:5856 (talk) 18:24, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

For example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_invasion

2603:8000:2942:4A00:29C1:C6A7:60C0:5856 (talk) 18:26, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Wording of lead section, again

The lead section, the very start in particular, makes it sound like all this is primarily some sort of "refugee crisis". It is not. It is primarily a military conflict, a high-intensity military conflict at that. A conventional war with enormous amounts of artillery, minefields, machine gun nests, fortifications, trenches etc. as opposed to anything else. Stating however many civilians were "internally displaced", for example, is completely out of place being mentioned even in the first paragraph. Why and what exactly "has killed tens of thousands on both sides"? And what are the "sides"? Inside Russia's borders and inside Ukraine's?

The military casualties number in the several hundreds of thousands with hundreds daily as opposed to sporadic strikes on civilians that usually cause a dozen or so casualties. Are the lives of civilians more precious than those of soldiers who fight to defend their homeland, including defending the lives of those very civilians? (Or for that matter, of convicts who are forced to fight against their full free will, if you want to consider that). Due weight.

This is the "largest armed conflict in Europe since World War 2" ([1]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjInnRL-HUg (Fareed Zakaria, CNN)). It should be made very clear that this is not just some natural disaster or "humanitarian crisis" or any other seemingly vague or random occurrence. Rather it is very deliberate military action. That is what the lead should reflect. ShouldIHide (talk) 18:04, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

"larger than WWII" is such a loaded phrase, as if people somehow forgot the break-up of Yugoslavia. 184.189.163.229 (talk) 18:52, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't think it's a matter of anyone having "forgotten" that at all. However, things like number and type of weapons, munitions and troops involved are not comparable I don't think. Ukraine operates over a 1000 tanks, for example. The scale of fighting is not nearly the same. The total deaths of the Yugoslav Wars are presented as "c. 130-140,000" over a period of over 10 years.

This "special military operation" phase of the Russia-Ukraine war has now gone on for one and a half years and a similar number, going by "US estimate" (before May 24 2023)... 112,000 people are already estimated dead. Between 5-10 times the death rate. Without getting into too much specifics. The Yugoslav wars were deadly and horrible? Yes. The situation in Ukraine looks to be potentially even worse. That's exactly why it should be described on here as correctly as possible, so that people would understand.

Also, not "larger than WWII", obviously. The direct quote is "the largest armed conflict since World War 2." Coincidentally, it is also larger than the Yugoslav wars combined if you would prefer to put it that way instead? ShouldIHide (talk) 21:51, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

The largest armed conflict in Europe since World War II. It has passed Greece, but I'm not sure it has passed Yugoslavia yet. Has a long way to go before it ranks with Korea, Vietnam I and II, Iran-Iraq, or the civil wars in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Columbia, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Yemen or Zaire. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 23:04, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Yes, in Europe. The correct direct quote from the mentioned CNN piece is "the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War 2." ShouldIHide (talk) 23:34, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh, and I was actually going to mention Iran-Iraq as another example of maybe something similar in recent history (last 50 years). That can quite well be considered as a peer and high-intensity conventional conflict, both sides flying at the time modern fighter aircraft and so on.

And the point I would have made was that that conflict also went on for almost 8 years and in the end total deaths are estimated at 300,000-1,200,000. Again pointing out that the estimated 112,000 deaths in Ukraine occurred in just a little over one year.

So even considering everything outside Europe, you're not going to find that many post-WW2 conflicts with the same magnitude of death and destruction than in Ukraine right now.

This is not even considering things such as, unlike in practically any of those other mentioned conflicts, soldiers in Ukraine have modern "luxuries" like personal bulletproof vests that have saved many, many lives that would otherwise have been lost. ShouldIHide (talk) 00:00, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

I've added this fact to the lead and main body of the article, with references. – Asarlaí ^(talk) 10:54, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

I'm not seeing support for this, particularly as written. WP:ONUS applies. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:34, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

I added four references to support the claim, and many more could be found. I don't see the issue? – Asarlaí ^(talk) 12:41, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Please read WP:ONUS. The wording does not appear to have support here. Cinderella157 (talk) 13:17, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Biggest war in Europe since WW2

Following on from the discussion above, should the article note that this is the biggest military conflict in Europe since the Second World War? Or if not, why?

There are many reliable sources for the statement, but here are a few:

• "Not Since World War II: The Worrying Precedent Many Are Evoking For The Ukraine War". Forbes. 29 November 2022. - which quotes various organizations
• "Missiles rain down around Ukraine". Reuters. 25 February 2022.
• "Ukraine war: major developments since Russia's invasion". Reuters. 24 February 2023.
• "The ripple effects of Russia's war in Ukraine continue to change the world". NPR. 22 February 2023.
• "A Year of War in Ukraine: The Roots of the Crisis". The New York Times. 27 February 2023.
• "The Invasion That Shook the World". Council on Foreign Relations. 22 February 2023.
• "Biden: 'Ukraine Will Never Be a Victory for Russia'". US Department of Defense. 21 February 2023.
• "Russia's invasion of Ukraine plunged Europe into 'biggest land war' since WWII, says report". ThePrint (India).

– Asarlaí ^(talk) 14:10, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

How it compares to Greek Civil War; it seems that the number of troops involved is similar, while the deathtol is still lower in Ukraine. Marcelus (talk) 14:26, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

According to the numbers on their articles, this war has far more troops involved and a higher death toll (Greek Civil War saw 158,000 killed over 3½ years, Ukraine has at least 200,000 killed already). There's also the many sources saying it's Europe's biggest conflict since WW2. – Asarlaí ^(talk) 14:48, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

I don't know any sources that give 200k+ casualties in Ukraine Marcelus (talk) 18:29, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Here's one. Even if the death toll is half that, it would still be a higher death rate (the amount per month) than the Greek Civil War. Nevertheless, death toll isn't the only way to measure the scale of a war. Also, you're still overlooking the fact that sources say it's the biggest in Europe since WW2. – Asarlaí ^(talk) 19:41, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Casualties =/= death toll. As stated correctly in the BBC article: The most senior US general estimates that around 100,000 Russian and 100,000 Ukrainian soldiers have been killed or injured in the war in Ukraine. The actual death toll estimates are close to half of that. Mr rnddude (talk) 21:47, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

"Even if the death toll is half that, it would still be a higher death rate (the amount per month) than the Greek Civil War. Nevertheless, death toll isn't the only way to measure the scale of a war. Also, you're still overlooking the fact that sources say it's the biggest in Europe since WW2". – Asarlaí ^(talk) 22:15, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

If it’s helpful, here’s a more recent article that puts the number of dead on both sides combined as 190K: Battlefield casualties in the Ukraine war have surged to almost 500,000 killed and wounded, US officials say HappyWith (talk) 22:36, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

That seems useful to update the estimates table. I'd prefer to use the originating source by the NYT that's linked in the Business Insider article. It affirms the same numbers, though cautions that estimates vary widely and gives an example from leaked Pentagon documents a few months ago that have the estimate at around 60,000 troops killed (which is exceptionally low among available sources). Mr rnddude (talk) 23:09, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

Crimean raid

Reports say Special forces landed on the western shore of Crimea, near the settlements of Olenivka and Mayak, Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance group landed in the area of Cape Tarkhankut, shelled the camping on the seashore and fled in the direction of Odesa, Special units on watercraft landed on the shore in the area of the Olenivka and Mayak settlements,” HUR said, it is unknown what Ukraine goals was but it is said to be achieved,Unofficial Russian social media accounts have spoken of firing near a campsite at Cape Tarkhankut – the westernmost point in Crimea – before dawn on Thursday, also Ukraine has flew it flag over Crimea once again. HuntersHistory (talk) 06:31, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

You should maybe change the map to include this becuase it is unknown if they are still there. HuntersHistory (talk) 06:42, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

It been stated by representative of the Defence Intelligence, the special operation is still ongoing, therefore, the Defence Intelligence of Ukraine does not disclose all the details.[2]https://mil.in.ua/en/news/yusov-soldiers-of-the-defence-intelligence-landed-in-crimea/ HuntersHistory (talk) 14:05, 25 August 2023 (UTC)

The map used here is updated by @war_mapper on Twitter. They are gone on break until September 2. Jebiguess (talk) 02:30, 27 August 2023 (UTC)

Has there been any updates regarding the raid by the Defence Intelligence? I haven't found anything online so far. - MateoFrayo (talk) 23:52, 30 August 2023 (UTC)

International aspects

The sentence The European Union and other Western governments financed and delivered humanitarian and military aid to Ukraine. is inaccurate, because there are many non-western countries who also support Ukraine with aid. Marko8726 (talk) 08:50, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

Sources? Slatersteven (talk) 11:39, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

49 states and the EU listed with references in List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War.  —Michael Z. 18:58, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

Sometimes Western means democracies like Australia and South Korea, but often not. Should be clearer.  —Michael Z. 18:59, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

I changed it to: “Over seventy sovereign states and the European Union delivered humanitarian aid to Ukraine, and nearly fifty and the EU provided military aid.”  —Michael Z. 16:34, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 5 September 2023

This sentence in the existing article is a false statement : "...and falsely claimed that Ukraine was governed by neo-Nazis persecuting the Russian minority..."

Change to be made : Remove the statement. This was not a "false claim".

Source to justify : https://www.osce.org/files/f/documents/b/2/540581.pdf The OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe) is a valid source and has made shown several relevant accounts and claimed Ukraine committed war crimes against Russians in Donbass.

I request Wikipedia to correct this error. Thank you. TLS Rocketry (talk) 10:46, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

 Not done. I'm not sure if you couldn't be bothered to read your own source or if you were hoping that nobody would check, but that document states on its very first line that "The OSCE Secretariat bears no responsibility for the content of this document and circulates it without altering its content" and that it is "Distributed at the request of the Russian Federation". So obviously not valid to support the change you are requesting. --McSly (talk) 14:49, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Rediscussing the Arms Suppliers Infobox proposal

PROPOSED INFOBOX
Part of the Russo-Ukrainian War
Date 24 February 2022 (2022-02-24) – present (2 years, 9 months, 1 week and 3 days) Location {{{place}}} Status Ongoing (list of engagements · control of cities · timeline of events)
Belligerents
Russia  Donetsk Republic  Luhansk Republic Supported by (pending above Belarusian involvement RFC)  Belarus	Ukraine Arms Suppliers: Belgium Bulgaria Canada Croatia Czech Republic Denmark Finland France Germany Greece Netherlands Poland Portugal Romania Slovakia Spain Sweden United States United Kingdom

(Infobox references)

• References

So I did some research into the Q4 discussion, and found a proposal which placed the arms suppliers in a collapsible infobox list. Proposed by @Viewsridge, this gained a little bit of traction in the discussion which otherwise placed no consensus on listing the Ukrainian arms suppliers in a collapsible list, titled Arms Suppliers. I think we should have a separate discussion for this proposal since this gained a bit of traction but never quite a concrete proposal in the FAQ4 cited discussion. I personally support this as it's a more precise title than "supported by" (the US hasn't supported Ukraine in the same way as Belarus), and we are able to give proper credit to all nations which do more than pass joint resolutions or issue support statements. InvadingInvader (userpage, talk) 19:57, 31 August 2023 (UTC) InvadingInvader (userpage, talk) 19:57, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

Addendum: The proposed infobox seeks only to demonstrate the Arms suppliers section. It should not be used as a model for the unrelated parts of the infobox. InvadingInvader (userpage, talk) 20:00, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

I take it that Australia has been omitted from the list because it is not a NATO country. [3] Hawkeye7 (discuss) 00:42, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Also, (yet again) what about Iran or China? Why is it only we see NATO, and USA in these suggestions? SOrry, but lets not clutter up the info box.Slatersteven (talk) 11:41, 2 September 2023 (UTC)

“Arms suppliers” is selective.

Is it intended to include military financial aid (which often but not always buys arms). Is it intended to not include suppliers of dual-purpose and non-lethal aid, like training, medical treatment for soldiers, first aid kits, helmets, uniforms, rations, body armour, drones, radios, trucks, some types of armoured vehicles, combat engineering and mine-clearing equipment, etcetera? Of ammunition?

”Non-lethal” military aid, and “defensive weapons” were major issues of debate, especially early on. A lot of arms supplies are restricted in their employment, typically to “not in Russia.”  —Michael Z. 18:52, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War includes 49 states and the EU.

Obviously, Iran and North Korea would be included on the left, and possibly Armenia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan if the inclusion criteria includes dual-use or sanctions-busting items.  —Michael Z. 18:57, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

Oppose. This is an end run around the consensus not to include a write-in “Supporters” heading in infoboxes, and is contrary to WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE. Whether intended or not, the result supports those who want to portray this war involving soldiers of two states in the territory of three as Putin’s “civilizational struggle” of “USA-controlled NATO vs. poor innocent Russia” that’s only defending itself. Making this exception is not NPOV.

If “arms suppliers,” “Military aid suppliers,” “Humanitarian aid suppliers,” “Financial supporters,” or any other broadly inclusive heading is to be added to change the contents of conflict infoboxes, then please get consensus to add a new row or rows to {{infobox military conflict}}.  —Michael Z. 19:10, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

I should add, just like “Supporters,” suppliers are not belligerents as defined in international law and in the subject field of international relations, and should not be added as a subcategory of belligerents, as this is misleading and supports a non-neutral POV.  —Michael Z. 20:23, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

Oppose. Because (1) Mzajac's argument any such discussion should be at the template military conflict and not here (2) Given that truth is always the first victim of any war, the list will miss out on potentially many parties that provided weapons in secret creating a very biased (and therefore useless) listing (3) As mentioned above, what constitutes weapons? Would we include personal protection (helmets) and how about fridges that can be dismantled to harvest computer chips that be used in weapon systems? The list would be either biased or a hopeless original research nightmare (4) practically such listings may be unreadably long when, as the war grinds on, dozens (if not more) different countries supply weapons. Indiscriminate listing of facts (especillay long lists) is not providing information to the reader. Arnoutf (talk) 19:23, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose per arguments by Slatersteven, Arnoutf and Mzajac. And it would be a much longer and a disputable list. How about Turkey and China? Moreover, should not USA be included as a supplier for Russia? A lot of electronics in Russian drones were made in the USA. My very best wishes (talk) 20:42, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

  That is ridiculous. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 14:55, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

  The electronics were not just made in the US: US companies continue to deliver them. That US companies help Russia evade sanctions, often by shipment through Turkey and China, is well established. [4] Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:33, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

I am aware. It's still a twisted and stretched analogy that is always brought up whenever this is discussed in this talk page. No, we cannot say that the US is supplying military aid to Russia, we cannot compare it to weapon deliveries to Ukraine. Enough with the technially. I also remember someone saying that if we included suppliers of weapons to Ukraine in the infobox, why didn't we also include Russia because Ukraine captured so many Russian tanks after the counteroffensives last year. Really? Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 21:41, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

I actually agree with you. That was just an argument to show that providing weapons is not such a clear-cut criterion. I do not think this is outright ridiculous. For example, a private company in country X (let's say Turkey or China) provides components of weapons to Russia - despite to the officially declared policy by the state. This is a de facto delivery. It also well could be because some people in the country X government deliberately do nothing about it. My very best wishes (talk) 17:22, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose Looks to me too much like and end-around the spirit and intent of the RfC. There are still issues with inclusion criteria, infobox bloat not remedied by drop-downs for mobile users etc. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:24, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose per Mzajac's and Cinderella's arguments. Same inherent problems as "supporters", and dropdowns don't format properly on mobile, etc. If it's necessary for this information to be presented prominently, it can be put in the lead, not the infobox. HappyWith (talk) 15:46, 5 September 2023 (UTC)
• Oppose Per all the comments above Volunteer Marek 22:08, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Russian attacks against Ukrainian civilian infrastructure

there have of course been many strikes against civilian infrastructure, but this section is almost entirely about whether Iran is or is not supplying drones to Russia. While this is a worthy topic -- that deserves its own section or even article -- and the drones are no doubt used to attack civilian infrastructure, there is a mismatch between the header and the content, and apparently content is needed here on what the header says the topic is. Also the section relies heavily on what looks like a blog, called Militarnyi. Do we know that this is a reliable source? Elinruby (talk) 08:10, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree. This should be a brief summary of main page on the subject, Russian strikes against Ukrainian infrastructure (2022–present). My very best wishes (talk) 17:08, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

I have a lot going on RL but to follow up, consensus at RSN so far is that Militarnyi is not RS and in particular one editor said they misrepresent a video on the specific point in question, so I will remove those references when I come across them again, unless someone else does this first Elinruby (talk) 05:40, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

Ukraine war liberated klishchiivka

Ukraine war liberated klishchiivka 182.224.89.144 (talk) 22:41, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

As above, there are sources for this and detail already written at the article on the village or town or whatecer. Elinruby (talk) 23:13, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

Casualties section

In the table captioned "Estimated and claimed casualties", under "Russian forces (VSRF, Rosgvardiya, FSB, FSO, PMCs Wagner, Redut & others, DPR & LPR)" is an estimate of 69,600+ killed, 243,400+ wounded for 24 Feb 2022 – 23 June 2023 attributed to BBC News Russian & Mediazona.

In a separate row, under "Russian forces (VSRF, Rosgvardiya, FSB, FSO, PMCs Wagner, Redut & others)" the number given is 52,000+ killed, 183,300+ wounded for 24 Feb 2022 – 18 August 2023, also attributed to BBC News Russian & Mediazona and cited to the very same source.

I assume that the reason for the discrepancy is that the earlier set of figures includes the DPR and LPR but we should use one or the other it seems to me, for the figures to have any kind of validity. Perhaps My very best wishes or any other Russian speaker who happens to be around would be good enough to verify the numbers against the source. Elinruby (talk) 05:44, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

Good catch. Both lines refer to the same source (currently [496]) and provide different numbers! Focusing on the BBC source [5] and quickly looking, I do not see such numbers of wounded (183 or 243 thousand) at all. It does say 69,600 killed. It does not really explain where this number came from, but based on context, this appears to be a combined number of confirmed killed in action (i.e. something for the previous table) and expected to be much lower than any actual number. It also says: "С учетом раненых общие безвозвратные потери пророссийских сил за 16 месяцев войны могут превышать 313 тыс. человек.", i.e. "total number of irreversible losses" (including wounded) of more than 313,000. As about DLR and LNR "militias", I am not sure. All people mobilized on LNR and DNR territories and the former detachments of their "militias" are included to regular Russian army and counted as such for a long time, to my knowledge. I also doubt in numbers by ref [498]. This is Fox News, and they do not link to any source where such numbers could come from. My very best wishes (talk) 16:02, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

aha, I hadn't noticed the Fox news yet. I will tag it RS. I got the impression from Mediazona also that these were confirmed numbers. So I guess I should move this row to the table above? Unless there are better numbers out there, of course. but these are good sources even though poorly presented. And probably also delete the confusing mention of LNR and DNR in the caption? Finally, are these number through August or June, can you tell? Thanks for the Russian reading. Elinruby (talk) 17:04, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

I see you took care of it, thanks

Elinruby (talk) 18:31, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

Sorry, I do not have a lot of time to check this. There are wild discrepancies in these numbers. One way to check them is to look at the wounded to killed ratios (as appears in Table 1 here). But again, such estimates, i.e. 3:1 and 5:1 for Russian and Ukraine forces, respectively [6] are questionable. Some say that it is actually closer to 1:1 for Russian forces, due poor or delayed evacuation of wounded. My very best wishes (talk) 21:40, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

I wasn't giving you homework ;) just expressing a willingness to look at other sources. I am as always just grateful for the language help. Your NIH source looks pertinent. Reading it now. Elinruby (talk) 04:50, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

Here is the problem with data on Russian soldiers. The data in a typical source (e.g. [7]) are based on official Russian mortality data/statistics. However, in most cases, the bodies are left to rot, burned or placed to mass graves [8] and the soldiers are not registered as dead anywhere (they will probably became missing in action). This is done to avoid payment of money to relatives of killed soldiers. Therefore, the actual number of killed maybe several fold greater than in sources like above. My very best wishes (talk) 16:32, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

I have read that. I haven't gotten down to the nitty-gritty of the casualty section, but there is some discussion that follows the tables. Maybe I can find a source for why the numbers would be low. I think that to a lesser extent the numbers on Ukrainian civilians may also be low for systemic reasons. I seem to remember reading that in some cases there are still bodies in the rubble. The art school in Mariupol comes to mind. I don't think we can get the numbers to be truly truly accurate, but I do think they clearly total more than 100,000. But since I am verifying I may as well wait until I have had a better look to say that for sure.

Do you know why we are keeping the historical estimates in the table? Elinruby (talk) 16:44, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

Along the lines of what you said last night: [9] Elinruby (talk) 16:53, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

Just to be clear on this... Everyone familiar with this subject knows that a lot (probably a majority) of Russian KIA are not registered as dead anywhere. However, many sources (like Mediazona linked above) ignore this and present the derived data as true numbers: "To be absolutely precise, we can assert with a 95% probability that the true number of casualties falls between 40,000 and 55,000". I think this is an obvious misrepresentation, one that we unfortunately multiply here. My very best wishes (talk) 17:09, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

to whom it may concern: the table for *confirmed* deaths has been verified against its sources. I commented out the Mediazona source because come on, that's an estimate. If it isn't already in the estimates table I will put it there. Whether there are better or more updated sources is now the question, and in the next table, which I have not finished yet, under "estimates", as far as I can tell the most recent authoritative-sounding numbers are from the NYT on August 18 2023. But I guess somebody is going to oppose using one American source for everything, so do we have recent casualty figures from a source other than the military of a combattant country? British generals or German cabinet ministers? I have the Mediazona article as a source, for one, if it isn't already there.

TL:DR A suffusion of carnage. That NYT article says that Russian wounded often have to evacuate themselves on foot and are left behind if they cannot, so I would call that validation for your 1:1 ratio. I think they just took the paywall down for that article. In any event I just read it all the way through and it is worth the read Elinruby (talk) 22:54, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

The US estimates have also at times even lagged behind other ones. I remember quite a while ago, might've even been last year, Russian casualties were already estimated at 180,000 according to I believe the Norwegian chief of defence. This was months before the US (Pentagon, I think) announced figures in that general range.

Cross-checking this stuff might require some digging but probably not impossible at all. Unless there are people who will oppose French, Swedish, Australian intel or really whatever else as "just NATO propaganda", which unfortunately also is not impossible at all.

What's good about the current US estimates is that, at least for the military side, they cover both Russian and Ukrainian forces and they're for the same time period. So it's coherent.

As discussed previously, civilian casualty numbers are probably imprecise and outdated. I can't imagine there would only be X number killed, surely there are wounded on the civilian side as well. Bombs and flying shrapnel don't check whether anyones wearing a uniform.

ShouldIHide (talk) 03:02, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

feel free to post some sources here. Out of morbid curiosity I looked at the sourcing for what was there in the confirmed casualty table, and there were a lot of problems with incoherent numbers and I am pretty sure there is another big one in the table for estimates, which is why I am currently on some other sourcing. It looks like 8 million internally displaced Ukrainians was a total for 2022 and 5.1 is the number of currently displaced as of a couple of weeks ago but I am still not completely certain of that. I threw out the Euromaidan Press number because it was so much higher that everyone else's, but realistically they probably have better contacts in the local morgues. You are right to note that the NYT's 500,000 number is total military deaths and does not include civilians; I meant to come back and correct that comment. Meanwhile, don't mind me, I am just out in the weeds here trying to figure this out. We may wind up with a little more material than due in the casualties section while I work on this. Once we come up with good summaries we can always spin off some historical detail, but my plan is to finish checking what is in the casualties section, then update it as best I can -- which I am starting -- then propose something with the lede. It's actually an interesting case study in what's probably true and what can be demonstrated to the satisfaction of wikipedia. I added a number to the table from the OHCHR for Ukrainian civilians btw. It's the best updated number I have found so far. Elinruby (talk) 03:36, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Ukraine war liberated village of Andriivka

Ukraine war liberated village of Andriivka 182.224.89.144 (talk) 00:33, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

is this an edit request? Elinruby (talk) 07:15, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

Followup: I see. Ukraine claims it re-took Andriivka and Russia denies this. The strategic importance of the village is unclear to me, but the article on the village does mention this already, so calling this something for the purposes of this article should possibly be revisited in a week or so... Elinruby (talk) 16:10, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

Touching on this, as these sorts of announcements come up on here relatively often, I think it's worth mentioning (to everyone) that Ukraine is very big. It is considerably larger than any single EU member state (and many US states), Ukraine being for example about twice the size of Poland.

This of course has several important consequences... but one of them happens to be that liberating one "village" is not noteworthy unless indeed it is of some exceptional strategic (or other) importance. Off the top of my head there is something like 20 cities in Ukraine with population in the 100's of thousands. Now if one of those was liberated, that would be big news.

Also there are 17 (!) different places called Andriivka in Ukraine. Based on where the biggest fighting is now, I'm assuming whatever might've been liberated would be in Donetsk oblast. There, there are six different settlements with that name, the largest of them seems to have had a pre-war population of roughly 2500. Notable? I don't know. ShouldIHide (talk) 19:43, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes but I like to tell the people why. And I guess it's the one where they just had some fighting, and Ukraine said it won, and Russia denied it. It is documented in some detail on the page for a village that is smaller than you imagined. If the village (decribed in source as "destroyed village") turns out to be significant because of railway capacity or something we will expand on it if that turns into something, no? But it seems to be mostly taken care of at the moment, was my point. And yes, I realize that there are a lot of child articles of this article and this would probably be for the one on the Ukrainian counteroffensive, maybe.

It is mentioned in the counteroffensive article, yeah. HappyWith (talk) 20:57, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Nitric acid

In the environmental impact section, a photo caption says that an explosion is due to the shelling of a tank filled with nitric acid. I have questions about this.

1. How do we know this? (I am on a mobile where it is hard to switch screens without losing place. If there's a reference there, my bad and this question can probably be deemed answered)
2. Why would a tank be filled with nitric acid? Does this happen a lot?
3. If this is a deliberate booby trap, can we infer that soldiers are transporting this stuff with into battle with them?

It's a small point in the greater scheme of things, but if I am wondering this so are other readers probably Elinruby (talk) 16:03, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

Aha, never mind. I just realized that these are industrial holding tanks we are talking about here, not armored vehicles. May reword that a bit. I'll go re-read it and see Elinruby (talk) 22:05, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

I think I was the one who inserted that image - could have worded it better. Honestly, we should probably replace it anyway - plenty more iconic and relevant images to choose from, like the destroyed Kakhovka Dam. I think I just chose that one because it was the first one I could find that was somewhat relevant to the section. HappyWith (talk) 20:51, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

I remember the first says of the invasion as somewhat rushed also; that is sort of what I was trying to convey about the background section in the discussion about that. For whatever reason I read "tanks" as the armored vehicle, though; thank you for the confirmation about the counteroffensive article and I wonder if you can confirm that these were storage tanks for chemicals at industrial sites? I appreciate the comment about the image; I feel pretty much the same except about the Bucha massacre, which I would like to discuss if someone wants to remove it, since I've encountered denial of that event. Elinruby (talk) 21:42, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

The source for the image is this facebook post by the Ukrainian military. Plugged into google translate, they’re saying something like:

"WARNING! In the Luhansk region, the occupation forces carried out an airstrike on a chemical plant. As a result, hazardous substances were released in the city of Severodonetsk due to hitting a tank with nitric acid."

I don’t know if there's any independent confirmation - I just took the original caption from whatever source wiki article I found the image in, if I remember correctly. HappyWith (talk) 22:10, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Again with the tone, POV, especially in lead

This has been discussed at least twice before and an edit was even reverted for whatever reason.

The lead has for a long time said "The invasion has killed tens of thousands on both sides." This is completely vague statement, without a citation for any source. And just remove the "both sides", it's completely unnecessary and potentially misleading.

First of all, the estimated death toll from Feb 2022 to May 2023 is already 112,000. So forget "tens of thousands" and say it like it is. Well over a hundred thousand.

Total casualties, military only, during that same time: 380,000. Almost certainly over 400,000 now, three months later. Huge numbers.

Humanitarian concerns such as how many civilians were "internally displaced" or what kind of "refugee crisis" the invasion caused should be slightly further down. It should not read like "well, something happened and now there's a refugee crisis". People being "displaced" is quite a different type of crisis compared to people being killed.

In contrast to the above, there are several sources provided indicating this is "the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War 2." Please do change the lead to reflect that. If you have something against this wording, then please do tell what do you suggest instead. In any case, underplaying this conflict is not acceptable. Forget what-aboutism and other deflection tactics, it makes no difference if some other conflict also had possibly roughly similar numbers of casualties. That doesn't make this conflict any smaller than it is. ShouldIHide (talk) 16:14, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Again, source? Slatersteven (talk) 16:19, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

If you look at the Casualties section of the article, the US estimates of civilian and military deaths alone add up to 112,000, for example. The confirmed deaths add up to over 63,000, and all of those sources say there are certainly more. All analyses of war casualties say that the number of wounded is larger than dead, by anywhere from 1.5 to 10 times.

I think any reasonable reading of estimates must tell us that there are likely well over 100k deaths and hundreds of thousands of casualties. The article should say what the sources say is likely: that the number of casualties is not known with certainty but is likely in the hundreds of thousands.  —Michael Z. 19:40, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

When broadly describing numbers, we should use the appropriate order of magnitude. Accordingly, just because a number is (slightly) over 200,000 we should not describe it as hundreds of thousands. Its order of magnitude is still 10⁴ and it is appropriately described as tens of thousands. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:14, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Says who?  —Michael Z. 02:47, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Is it wrong to describe a number over 200,000 as “over 200,000”?  —Michael Z. 02:49, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Please read the linked article - order of magnitude. To say, tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands is describing an order of magnitude. There is a clearly defined and widely accepted basis for ascribing an order of magnitude to numbers. I did not say anything like [it is] wrong to describe a number over 200,000 as “over 200,000”. Please do not insinuate that I did, since it is a misrepresentation. Also, we have had this discussion before (changing to hundreds of thousands). What of substance has changed that we should revisit it again. Cinderella157 (talk) 03:41, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

I didn’t say you did. Your constantly being touchy and wilfully misrepresenting everything as an attack is disruptive.

Try to notice what I am contributing: I don’t know if your example is real or not, but there’s a clearly more precise way to rephrase it that completely sidesteps the argument and judgment call about orders of magnitude.  —Michael Z. 13:16, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

What was said, where it was said and when it was said is a matter of record. I would see your response here as gaslighting. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:21, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

I see other editors below are alluding to the exact same point.  —Michael Z. 13:18, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes. Arguing about the mathematical concept of order of magnitude, here is pointless. It is irrelevant, as you point out.

Saying "more than 100,000" instead would be very clear, it's more precise than the current phrasing and I see no reason why this change is not made.

Also this is not new information. The source for 112,000 deaths (between Feb 2022 and May 2023) is in the article already. The change I'm suggesting is for this information to be in the lead.

There have been 112,000 deaths in Ukraine, not tens of thousands on "both sides".

Do we need to have "consensus", and from "both sides", to state in the article a simple matter of fact? In a world where there are people whose day job is to oppose things (or deflect, or engage in what-aboutism etc.) online? ShouldIHide (talk) 07:31, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

I have not seen any discussion about changing anything specifically to "hundreds of thousands" which would imply many hundreds of thousands.

By the way, the mathematical concept of order of magnitude is not a matter of opinion. Things in mathematics are not "widely accepted", they are proven, they are fact.

The suggestion is to change "tens of thousands" to "more than 100,000". ShouldIHide (talk) 07:02, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

If you are asking, where has there been another discussion relating to "tens of thousans" please see [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine/Archive_13#Hundreds_of_thousands here. Cinderella157 (talk) 04:42, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

I'm not asking that. This is not about (however many) "hundreds" of anything.

The suggestion is to change the wording "tens of thousands" to "more than 100,000".

More than one hundred thousand. Is the suggestion clear now? ShouldIHide (talk) 08:35, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

The order of magnitude of any number 100,000 or larger is 10⁵. This very simply is larger than "tens of thousands" (10⁴), speaking either broadly or more specifically. ShouldIHide (talk) 06:44, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

Which is exactly what the problem was last time, sources do not support 100,000's of dead, they still only support 10,000's of dead. Casaulties and dead are not synonymous (as 63,000 is not even 100,000). Slatersteven (talk) 10:23, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Like said, the estimated ("US Estimate" in article) deaths add up to 112,000.

The moment a number exceeds 100,000 indeed the magnitude exceeds "tens of thousands". For numbers over 100,000 the order of magnitude is 10^5, not 10^4. It's not that wrong to describe it as "dozens" (or whatever, really) either but that certainly wouldn't be the most "appropriate" like discussed above.

So the term "tens of thousands" could simply be replaced with "over 100,000". The reference, in that sentence, to "both sides" should just be removed because as it stands you could get the impression there were significant deaths or casualties in Russia which is not the case. Thus the "both sides" is potentially very misleading. The deaths and casualties have occurred practically exclusively in Ukraine.

I suggest to simply change that sentence to "The invasion has caused more than 100,000 deaths." even if you won't agree on anything else.

Source for "largest armed conflict in Europe since World War 2" has been provided twice within the last month, along with many other sources by other commenters. This is certainly a very notable piece of information and worthy of mention. Not only because of number of casualties but other reasons as well. For example this is not a civil war, insurgency or just a local conflict. The UN cannot intervene because Russia has veto power etc. The stakes are a lot higher than most of us would like.

So in addition, I would change that sentence actually to "The invasion is the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War 2 and has caused more than 100,000 deaths." (a much higher number of total casualties could be mentioned if you like.)

I looked briefly at how to make an actual edit request but the syntax on how to do that was confusing and the help pages I could find did not explain how exactly to do any of that properly... so for now I'm asking more knowledgeable users to make changes.

ShouldIHide (talk) 12:21, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

Edit request (which will not be done without first getting wp:consensus) or RFC? Slatersteven (talk) 12:36, 6 September 2023 (UTC)

This is not an RfC question. RfCs are not appropriate for questions of fact since facts are facts regardless of the opinions of RfC respondants who may be trying to help but will almost never do any reading before opining. I agree that "tens of thousands" could be 30,000 and should probably change. On the other hand "hundreds of thousands" could be 900,000. So if the current number is 200,00, which I am taking on faith from the above discussion since it's been a while since I edited this article, probably the most neutral representation would be "more than (number) as of (date)". And +1 on minimizing the conflict. Elinruby (talk) 03:39, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

I'm quoting from the top of this page "...editors who are not extended-confirmed may post constructive comments and make edit requests..." (my emphasis).

I'm not requesting anyone's "comments" on whether or not 112,000 is a larger number than 100,000. I'm requesting someone to actually make this edit because I can not do it myself.

So if you don't mind me asking, who are you to say what "will not be done"? Best regards. ShouldIHide (talk) 08:56, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

My suggestion: note that the war has lead to more than a hundred thousand casualties (back up by the main body). Note high Ukrainian civilian casualties separately, as Russian civilian casualties are low. Cortador (talk) 06:56, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I think indicating the corresponding ranges of numbers ("estimated", rather than "confirmed") in the infobox would be good. My very best wishes (talk) 17:06, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

There is no simple "range of numbers" that can be reported or would be appropriate to report in an infobox. There is no consensus in sources we can rely upon. That is why a consensus was reached not to report casualties in the infobox while the conflict is ongoing. Cinderella157 (talk) 04:29, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

oh this is an infobox question. In that case I agree that this is too complicated for that format and we should send readers to an appropriate section where sufficient context is given. Elinruby (talk) 05:07, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

No, this is not an infobox question. I started this topic and I suggested making a change in the lead. I have suggested this twice before as well.

At least change the sentence "The invasion has killed tens of thousands on both sides." to "The invasion has caused more than 100,000 deaths."

There are further changes that should be made but seeing as this really simple matter of fact kind of change seems to be somehow controversial for some reason, I don't want to discuss anything else right now. ShouldIHide (talk) 08:44, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Elinruby, the thread is about the lead. I was responding to My very best wishes, who would also add information into the infobox. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:46, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

OK? Then leaving aside the infobox question for the moment, what is the issue with updating the number? Apparently there is a source that says it is more than 100,000? If that's an estimate, then we say so, no? If it's no doubt higher, it sounds like this can be sourced as well. Even though this is the lede we are talking about and we don't source statements in the lede, I am spelling out that according to the above discussion, there seem to be sources for this. I am not seeing the problem. Elinruby (talk) 10:08, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

It is not (however) the only estimate, and we can't imply it is. Slatersteven (talk) 10:23, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

/me stares: feel free to explain what you are talking about. Other estimates? Which, where, source? Elinruby (talk) 10:27, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Have you looked at the table "Estimated and claimed casualties"? Slatersteven (talk) 10:30, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

have you looked at the source you asked for? If you think it somehow isn't RS, there's a little thing we like to caLL attribution that should address your concern, ie "According to the New York Times, US estimates put Russian dead at x". I have closed the window now but I believe the number was 112,000. But as you should very well know. NYT *is* RS and we would be updating this in the body. But you asked for a source even though one is already there: here is another. You are welcome. Elinruby (talk) 10:40, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes, this is what I've been trying to emphasize in many of my posts here. The source for "more than 100,000 deaths" has been there for months now. In the previous discussions there were about ten additional sources supporting this claim.

There is nothing that I can see that would prevent this change from being made. I don't even honestly see that many counter-arguments here but still for some reason the change has not been made.

I urge anyone who can, to make this change. Still claiming "tens of thousands" is incredibly misleading when the real number of deaths according to RS is over 200,000 now. The scale of this conflict can not be allowed to be underplayed in what is it, the second sentence of the lead?

Please, make the change.

ShouldIHide (talk) 23:24, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

[10] seems to confirm over 100,000 dead Elinruby (talk) 10:23, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

These RS all believe the NYT report. But if there is another estimate, fine, we report that also.

• "Russia’s military casualties are approaching 300,000, the officials claimed, with as many as 120,000 killed in action." [11]
• "Russia is said to have 120,000 dead (out of 300,000 total casualties) and Ukraine 70,000 dead (out of 200,000)." [12]
• "Russia's military casualties are approaching 300,000, including as many as 120,000 deaths and 170,000 to 180,000 injuries, the newspaper reported. Ukrainian deaths were close to 70,000, with 100,000 to 120,000 wounded, it added"[13] Elinruby (talk) 11:11, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

In the lede? Slatersteven (talk) 11:12, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Scroll up Elinruby (talk) 11:16, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

We give a reage in the body, but "The invasion has killed more than one hundred thousand" is referring directly to the text in the lede, so what are we talking about? Discusions need to be focused, not discussing separate issues. Slatersteven (talk) 11:20, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

well yeah, which is why I don't know why you are second-guessing the sources. You have another estimate, produce it and update that too. But the RS are quite clear that its over 100,000, so why would we not say so? Specifics in body, summary in lede. That's how these things are done. Elinruby (talk) 11:36, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

I see no problem in adding an "estimated" qualifier somewhere in there, if you prefer.

The main problem is that "tens of thousands" is severely underplaying the real number of deaths that are now (according to the newer estimates) not just well over 100,000 but well over 200,000. (old to new estimates: 112,000 -> 232,000)

These 120,000 additional deaths in only about 2 months should also be a pretty clear sign to everyone about the magnitude of this war, and further supporting the (already reliably sourced) statement that this is indeed legitimately "the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War 2." which I also suggested to be added as a very notable piece of information.

ShouldIHide (talk) 00:28, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

No, I am saying it is not the only source, so we can't use it alone. This is about saying something in the lede as fact, its not its an estimate. Nor is 112,000 "100,000's" its is 10,000'S". So not I do not think it can be used to say anything more than "and higher estimate put the casualties at over 100,000". 10:45, 10 September 2023 (UTC)Slatersteven (talk)

ShouldIHide, you would clarify and narrow your OP. My understanding is that the sentence in the lead that presently reads, The invasion has killed tens of thousands on both sides would be amended to read, The invasion has killed more than one hundred thousand. Please confirm. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:14, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

I suggested changing "The invasion has killed tens of thousands on both sides." to "The invasion has caused more than 100,000 deaths."

ShouldIHide (talk) 00:10, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

Given the war is not over, and we do not really know how many have been killed maybe just remove the line from the lede? Slatersteven (talk) 10:47, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

why would we do that? Elinruby (talk) 11:12, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Because we are an encyclopedia, and this is not even vaguely encyclopedic, as it will (by wars end) be way off. Slatersteven (talk) 11:20, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Your argument would have us strip information from hundreds if not thousands of articles, starting with census and economic data. It is usual to add a date. We go by sources. Sources say over 100,000 and and probably higher. We update articles sometimes. It happens. Elinruby (talk) 11:31, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

And some say lower, we do not know, so either we remove it or we say "between x and Y", or we leave it unchanged as 100,000 must be 10,000's. I have no more to add, and so I oppose any chan get expect removal. Slatersteven (talk) 11:34, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Again, source? Elinruby (talk) 11:37, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

100,000 is indeed in the "hundreds of thousands" range by definition. Yes, it is "only" one hundred thousand but the range or order of magnitude is "hundreds of thousands". This is a simple fact.

There is however nothing preventing changing the "tens of thousands on both sides" to "more than 100,000".

We do know because casualties well exceeding 100,000 have been listed in the "casualties" section in the same article for a long time now, with accepted aka reliable sources. The estimates have very recently even been updated and they now add up to a total 232,000. What the sources imply is likely, is definitely "more than 100,000" because in fact it is now "more than 200,000".

More than 200,000 deaths. ShouldIHide (talk) 22:49, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

That is not a valid argument to remove something. Everything is always off. Every single casualty figure in Wikipedia is an estimate at a certain time with a certain precision. Including the best, latest figures according to reliable sources is encyclopedic.  —Michael Z. 20:01, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree with that. Like I said above, there is nothing wrong with providing ranges of numbers per multiple RS in the lead and infobox, just as on many other pages. Yes, the numbers must be based on most recent publications. Yes, there is no consensus about any single number, and it will never be. The numbers are estimated or claimed, but they are reliably published. My very best wishes (talk) 20:43, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

There is also a clearer picture of the magnitude in quotations like this: “According to the latest casualty estimates, Ukraine has lost 200,000 soldiers killed or wounded, and Russia a staggering 300,000.”[14]  —Michael Z. 21:31, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

No doubts, the losses by both sides exceed 0.5 million. That could be stated somewhere in the lead. Other than that, the numbers are highly imprecise to say the least. Perhaps it was a good idea not to show them in the infobox. My very best wishes (talk) 16:47, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

I also very much agree with this.

In this case, we should report the most recent numbers that are based on reliable sources.

Our own guesses or speculation don't even matter, what matters is what's published in reliable sources and thus can be verified. And we have that. ShouldIHide (talk) 00:36, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

I took a critical look at the Casualties section. The NYT article is already there but only for the Russian casualties for some reason. It was late in my time zone so I just added an update template for the Ukrainian and civilian deaths, though on reflection I am not sure if the NYT source covered civilians. However the total of the most recent numbers in each category still exceeds 100,000 afaict. I get that some may question American numbers, but this is a matter than can be discussed, no? I would be inclined to agree with My very best wishes. There are three categories; two sets of numbers (+British?) would be six figures and three (+British +German or Australian?) would be nine, which seems like too much for the infobox and maybe for the lede too. But if you throw out the top and bottom numbers and report a range, expanded on in the body, that seems doable to me. Question: there are rows in that table for numbers through January 2023. Is there a reason for those to still be there? In any event, I support updating the table. If people prefer a range rather than "more than 100,000" then I would support that as an improvement Elinruby (talk) 00:10, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

This is not as simple as some editors would present. Firstly, we are dealing with estimates. Estimates are not facts (ie confirmed). Despite what one editor would say, not [e]very single casualty figure in Wikipedia is an estimate. If we write into the lead something like what is proposed, it should explicitly include that it is an estimate. Anything written in the lead must be supported by the body of the article and be clearly supported and readily apparent to the reader. If the NYT report is the primary basis for asserting >100,000 killed, then the casualty section does not clearly indicate this, in that the tabulation splits this figure in three. In such a case, either the body should be amended and/or the statement in the lead accompanied by a citation. I also see some cofusion over the reliability of sources. While the NYT is considered "reliable" it is nonetheless within the context of WP:NEWSORG, which inherently sets limitations. The NYT attributes the report to a "US official". The report is reliable as to who said it and as to what they said. The information, however, is a primary source for what is attributed. I see there is presently only one recent report that gives an estimate for the total killed (NYT). I would not oppose an amendment to the lead reading The invasion is estimated to have killed more than one hundred thousand provided there is a citation accompanying this and/or the body of the article is edited to clearly support the statement. However, I do not see a need to change the existing wording nor would I oppose striking the existing sentence since all we can say with any confidence is that a lot of people have been killed. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:15, 12 September 2023 (UTC)

Which wars’ casualty figures are not either estimates or confirmed casualty lists which are known to be incomplete? We must accept that many or most facts have a level of precision that is not infinite.  —Michael Z. 04:11, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

For any war involving Australia, there are quite accurate records of casualties. There is a distinction between an estimation and a measurement. Cinderella157 (talk) 05:18, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

No Australian medical officer ever made a bad entry and no clerk ever made a transcription error. No Ozzie boo-boo remains unrecorded. Maybe they’re more precise, but your claim that they are perfect is likely wrong.  —Michael Z. 23:03, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

You would appear to miss the main point of what I have said, and that is that we should not conflate what is actually measured (counted) with an estimation that is based on inferences. Though yes, our MOs and chaplains are quite particular about who they consign to the ground, while our platoon sergeants are quite particular about accounting for where their soldiers are. Also, since we are dealing with what is a matter of statistics, precision and accuracy are not interchangeable terms. Please note the change to "quite accurate" which means, the accuracy has a high confidence limit. An estimate might have a confidence limit of tens of percent. Cinderella157 (talk) 06:22, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

So you are then now opposed to conflating estimates with "actual" casualties? Do I understand this correctly? Is this the basis for your opposition?

This is a valid point to consider. However for one this was not the reason people were previously opposing the change. Instead they tried for example to claim an incorrect order of magnitude for numbers in the 100,000+ range and argue about that. Stuff that had nothing to do with estimated vs. "confirmed" casualties.

However. Wikipedia is absolutely full of "estimates", in different forms. Basically verifiability on here is more important than "the truth". If we only reported what is simple scientific fact, this entire article couldn't exist. All of it is just based on what do the sources say.

There isn't now, and there is never going to be a source available that will with 100% certainty tell the exact sum of every single confirmed death. There isn't one for World War 2 either for example, those figures are also estimates.

Regardless, what we then do is go with the best information we have. We don't here, we don't ever have "the truth" available to us, we go with what the reliable sources suggest to be most likely.

When a casual reader reads the "tens of thousands" in the current article, they are left with an impression of the casualties that is 10 times lower than the actual current estimate. This is the core of the problem.

ShouldIHide (talk) 07:54, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

ShouldIHide, I think you have probably grabbed the wrong end of the stick. You have replied to my post that is immediately above yours (indenting tells us that). My statement you replied to was made in the context of what preceded that, which was a response to Michael. My views on the subject are expressed in the initial post in this sub-thread here based on the change that I understood you to be advocating. You have now clarified this in the new subsection. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:55, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

I am not against editing the body and have been doing so; it actually seems to need this very badly. I haven't so far in *this* section really because I have been hoping someone will answer this question: is there a reason why the casualties table includes for example figures for Sept 2022 through January 2023? Elinruby (talk) 04:12, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

I did some work on it back a little bit. My recollection is that there is/was a general reluctance to remove anything sourced and/or people have just not considered removing dated information. As for myself, you are welcome to take the razor to it. Cinderella157 (talk) 05:22, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

thank you for the reply. I think it would be less confusing to do so, but this should be done carefully due in part to some of the concerns that you have expressed. At the moment I am somewhat distracted a need to prepare for an important RL event on Thursday. I did just remove one row of one table that was cited to Fox News. I intend to come back to this but it may take a few days.Elinruby (talk) 05:35, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

In the current lead text, there is no explicit reference given to support the "tens of thousands on both sides" text, even though this has been very misleading for a very long time.

What I am proposing, the source for that is in the article, in the casualties table so any claim here does not need to be sourced a second time. They are already reliable sources, otherwise they would not be cited in the casualties table.

The basis for saying, in the lead, "more than 100,000 deaths" is very clear.

Especially now that the estimates have been updated. The new estimates say Russian military deaths alone exceed 100,000 by quite a bit. The estimates for 24 Feb 2022 – August 18, 2023 support 120,000 + 70,000 military deaths, and the 42,000 dead civilians from an earlier time range. That sums up to 232,000 total deaths. So far. ShouldIHide (talk) 22:36, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

I presume that does not include Wagner and other PMC, Rosgvardia, Kadyrovsty, FSB, &c.  —Michael Z. 23:13, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

Hmm, interesting point. Actually, mostly I think it's understood that "Russian forces" does imply everyone who fights on that side (aka against Ukraine). That's how I would understand it if they are not separated in the estimates.

I know this is not a general discussion forum but reputable sources (high-level military officers in outside countries) reported very high Russian casualty estimates, approaching 200,000 already about a year ago. People who have followed this conflict closely have understood a long time ago that the casualties are eventually going to be incredibly high. The current estimates are not surprising at all. Fortunately for this Wikipedia thing, these estimates are also done by professional military analysts and published in reliable sources so they can very well be used here. ShouldIHide (talk) 23:39, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree with what you are proposing. There is no need to add a second source if the table reflects figures cited in the article. It would be redundant and serve no real purpose or give additional value. Jurisdicta (talk) 00:49, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Make change in lead concerning death toll

The article (casualties section, "US Estimate") itself now supports a total of 232,000 deaths. (btw, on Ukrainian territory, not on "both sides".)

In the lead, change the sentence "The invasion has killed tens of thousands on both sides." to "The invasion has caused more than 200,000 deaths."

I repeat, the source for this is already in the article. This change can be easily made without any further arguments.

Thank you.

ShouldIHide (talk) 23:06, 15 September 2023 (UTC)

No, obviously. An estimate is not a statement of fact. We will not represent it as such. Mr rnddude (talk) 01:08, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

How do you suggest to represent it instead?

"The invasion has so far caused an estimated 232,000 deaths." is also fine by me.

ShouldIHide (talk) 01:27, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

I don't have a specific text ready as I have so far been concentrating on verifying the sources, but maybe the information is too granular for the lede. We could say something like "(source) has estimated x and y Russian and Ukrainian fighters killed , with confirmed numbers of a and b." However, that's going to impede readability and for the lede it might be better to zoom out and say something like "massive Russian and Ukrainian civilian and military casualties" THEN have some version of the casualty section that we currently have, spelling out high and low estimates, casualties versus deaths, and all the caveats about under- and over-reporting. A lot would depend on the quality of the sources, but I am verifying sources already, and now that I am past a RL distraction that was looming over my concentration before, I can put some time into this section also. To answer a question from above, I asked a Russian speaker to look at the BBC Russia source that is cited in the table and they improved the somewhat incoherent numbers. I believe that they said that that Wagner etc were included, I agree that it should be clear, if it is not, whether they are or are not.

ShouldIHide, I agree that we probably inappropriately minimize the carnage, but in order to say "over 200,000" or even "more than 100,000" we need those numbers in a source. If you want to increase the odds of an update you could compile some numbers and where you found them, and we could probably turn *that* into an actionable proposal, but much checking and discussion will have to happen before it is implemented. Elinruby (talk) 07:51, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

I got my suggested numbers from this article itself, currently 232,000 is simply the sum of all deaths currently listed in the casualties table (US Estimate). What is the problem with using this as the basis for the suggested change in the lead as well? I don't understand this, since obviously the reported numbers are already based on reliable sources, there doesn't need to be a separate source that would say "more than 100,000" verbatim. I wouldn't be surprised if there were such sources but again, why would this change need double sourcing it?

The current "tens of thousands" is simply stated there with no explicit reference at all, it has been there probably for a year, people are completely ok with that but some are strongly opposed to simply changing that to reflect more current estimates.

I don't know if you have read anything in the archives but this has already been discussed quite a lot over the last almost two months. Something like "consensus" is impossible because there is always someone who will oppose it no matter what. They will go off arguing about things that are not at all, or only tangentially connected to the actual matter at hand. That's what we're dealing with, unfortunately.

I thank you for your work and sincerely hope this issue will be resolved properly. ShouldIHide (talk) 08:22, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

ShouldIHide I understand what you are saying but I hope the people currently in the conversation can agree that we will proceed on the "best possible information".

That is certainly my intention, and while I haven't edited the topic area for a while, I spent about a year in various subpages of this one in the earlier stages of the invasion. I have faith that we will resolve any disagreements. I myself don't insist on a source that specifically says 100,000 (or whatever number) but having one would preclude the sort of thing you are describing. So no, you don't have to hide, ok? Thank you for your persistence. Elinruby (talk) 11:45, 16 September 2023 (UTC)

To put this in perspective the most recent really good number for total casualties in all categories is 500,000. That is the NYT August 18 and the article gets quite a bit more granular from there, including the high death rate amoung Russian generals. Elinruby (talk) 23:07, 17 September 2023 (UTC)

The numbers in the casualties table seem to add up to roughly 500,000 as well. 502,000 to 532,000 if my math is right. That is military KIA + WIA + civilians killed (no data on civilian wounded). Although the 42,000 civilian dead are only up to 21 May 2023.

Thanks for making the change, the lead is in any case definitely better now. One thing I would still also change would be to remove the mention of "both sides". That I see as problematic because the fighting and killing is taking place virtually exclusively on Ukrainian territory. The current phrasing can give the impression there were "tens of thousands" of people killed in Russia, which is definitely not true.

Indeed one might say that the entire war is about enforcing borders that are internationally recognized and changing them with force can't be tolerated or accepted. In fact, I'm sure someone reputable enough has said that.

ShouldIHide (talk) 02:31, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Actually I have been updating numbers further down the page; I have not changed the lede yet. I do see that another editor has made a change there, and slso a separate issue with it though; I just added something about 6.6 internal refugees to the humanitarian section, where it should have been mentioned if it was going to be in the lede, but I see now that the lede says 8 and I don't know where they got that number. Will look some more, but just because the lede is supposed to be a summary, that doesn't need references doesn't mean that the claims in the lede shouldn't be verifiable. I think though that given the date on my number and the one on the 8 million number that it is likely that they are both true. Elinruby (talk) 02:55, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

I would change specifically in the lead the part " tens of thousands on both sides" to simply: "more than 100,000 deaths". The more important part being to remove the "both sides" altogether for the reason provided many times now. People are dying in Ukraine, not on "both sides" (not in Russia).

Do the sources not support the "more than 100,000 deaths"? I was under the impression that they quite clearly do. Russian military killed alone are reported as 120,000 now. [thats [User:ShouldIHide|ShouldIHide]] (talk) 01:08, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

the question is whether the New York Times front page story for August 18 2020 is considered a reliablw source. As previously noted, the CBCGuardian and Le Monde have all written stories based on the numbers in that article, and that is just where I stopped looking, so *those [ublications rely on the NYT story, and they are each themselves all reliable sources with a long history of getting stuff right. I think peeople are leery of the number because it is so much bigger than the last one,but that was a long time agoandthey have had Bakhmut since then, and frankly if the NYT is not a reliable source for a big miliary story,it's hard to say who else would be. Yes I know they have messed up badly once or twice, but nonetheless. Don't we all. it's still themost reliabel thing that is like ly to be found to upWould there even still be such a thing as a reliable source? I am going to be completely sure of the sources in the casulty section before I express any opiniom about the numbers, but if you are impatient you can askabout it at the Reliable Sources noticeboard or even start an RfC. I consider it a really dumb question to have to get an opinian on butI can't imzge anyone at RSN saying that this is NOT a reliable source, even for an explosive little nugget like this. That is what I know and I am mostly interested in how far the go by sources people will go to ignore this source. If you have to go to RSN you should have a text already written out, because when they are doing theit job right over there they won't say anything without seeing the souce, tstatement it's sourcing and the article that this is for. This is what I can tell you about this. In my opinion, if the unimpeachable source says 500,000, we should say 500,000 and not 100,000. That is a total numwber for everyone involved with the UKRAININA ARMY PLAU EVERYONE INVOLVED WITH THE rUSSIAN aEMY TWe go by sources, right? I have already been to RSN a couple of times for Militarnyi (sp?) and Amnesty International press releases.

oh and by the way RSN said that while there was nothing wrong with Amnesty International's compiled data, a press release issued by one official in one office is not a reliable source, and good thing too, because that press release was being uawd to source an error of fact. Russia did not commit a war crime by invadng Ukraine, because a war ccrime can only be committed by an individual. This is why the lede to this article used to say that Russian committed a "crime of agression, byt that may not be the right word for everything that Russia does. Bombing a power grid would perhaps be a violation of the Hague Convention, maybe. iff the power plant was not a military target.I have not tackled that one yet, but it came up in the section on the section on strikes against civilian infrastructure, and I think I found "volation of the Hague Convention" in another source, but I wanted to look into it some more and get a better source. There are a couple of other statements about Russia committing war crimes, which would also be wrong and were also as best I can rememeber may also have been sourced to individual agency officials. Sorry to dumot this here, but it is something that remains to be done.Elinruby (talk) 07:27, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

First to touch on just this one point... I'm still confused why we can't (?) say in the lead what is in any case said later on in the article and is properly sourced enough to be stated there ('Casualties').

And that would be saying "more than 100,000 deaths" instead of "tens of thousands on both sides".

I personally would accept "more than 200,000 deaths" as well, or "more than 500,000 casualties". I would also accept having "estimated" in there because yes, they are estimates (everything is). The only reason I've so far stuck with the lower-end 100,000 is that some others don't seem to be willing to accept anything except "tens of thousands".

ShouldIHide (talk) 07:45, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

This is the relevant policy: Routine calculations

WP:CALC

Routine calculations do not count as original research, provided there is consensus among editors that the results of the calculations are correct, and a meaningful reflection of the sources. Basic arithmetic, such as adding numbers, converting units, or calculating a person's age, is almost always permissible. See also Category:Conversion templates.

Mathematical literacy may be necessary to follow a "routine" calculation, particularly for articles on mathematics or in the hard sciences. In some cases, editors may show their work in a footnote.

Comparisons of statistics present particular difficulties. Editors should not compare statistics from sources that use different methodologies.

That is why it is nice when a source keeps you from having to argue about this, becuae some -- not all mind you, but some -- definitely will arguw for the sake of arguing. Therefore I want to be very clear about the sources and the numbers

War crimes

Moving my list out of the section that was brigaded:

definition of a war crime

(referenced by the source provided in the other thread) A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostages, unnecessarily destroying civilian property, deception by perfidy, wartime sexual violence, pillaging, and for any individual that is part of the command structure who orders any attempt to committing mass killings including genocide or ethnic cleansing, the granting of no quarter despite surrender, the conscription of children in the military and flouting the legal distinctions of proportionality and military necessity.

Briefly, a war crime is something an individual does, not a country. There were at least a couple of instances of the article making erroneous statements about this in wikivoice, sourced to press releases that don't exactly say so. I plan to copy them here so people can discuss whether we want to make such statements in the first place since they betray our wiki-ignorance, and if we do how to phrase them better. Elinruby (talk) 13:19, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

References

wikivoice mentions of war crimes

• Lede section: "The International Criminal Court (ICC) opened an investigation into possible crimes against humanity, war crimes, abduction of children, and genocide, issuing an arrest warrant for Putin in March 2023." This was at the end of the lede. Somewhat misleading because it makes it sound like the warrant charged Putin with a war crime. Since he is an individual this is conceivable, but the term really applies more to situations like My Lai so more likely it was for a violation of the Geneva Convention, or something like that. Needs to be check and also War crimes in the Russian invasion of Ukraine. If the usage here is in fact accurate I have no objection to the text going back in. Elinruby (talk) 13:57, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

warrant for Putin is apparently under the Rome statute and is specifically for the abduction of children. Research whether this is usage for Rome. Elinruby (talk) 18:10, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• Not seeing how full attribution is putting it in our voice. Slatersteven (talk) 10:52, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

• under Kyiv and northern front: Our article says: ((tq|Ukraine said it had recaptured the entire region around Kyiv, including Irpin, Bucha, and Hostomel, and uncovered evidence of war crimes in Bucha.[135]}} If individuals have been charged (possible in this instance) then we need to get a source that supports that, because the one that is there (currently 135) does not.

it is a BBC reporter livetweeting and certainly ok RS for the retaking of Bucha, it says in its entirety In the town of Bucha, just outside Kyiv, the horror of what unfolded during the Russian occupation is finally coming to light.In the basement of a building that once housed a children's community centre, five bodies lay crumpled on the ground - five men dressed in civilian clothes, their hands bound behind their backs. Some were shot in the head, others in the chest. They were yet to be identified, but Ukrainian officials said the men were taken hostage by Russian soldiers and executed. "We heard them being shot," said Vlad, one of the volunteers who carried the bodies up from the basement. "We heard mines go off in the area. Around us there are mines. We are lucky we are alive."

However Amnesty International seems ready to The New York Times seens pretty convinced of the soldiers' identceec Russian paratroopers from the 234th Air Assault Regiment led by Lt. Col. Artyom Gorodilov.

could be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court and deemed war crimes under international humanitarian law. Because of their systematic and widespread nature, the killings in Bucha could also amount to crimes against humanity. Russia has not joined the I.C.C. and is unlikely to cooperate on any potential future cases that involve Russian soldiers "could be prosecuted by the International Criminal Court and deemed war crimes under international humanitarian law. Because of their systematic and widespread nature, the killings in Bucha could also amount to crimes against humanity. Russia has not joined the I.C.C. and is unlikely to cooperate on any potential future cases that involve Russian soldiers."[15]

• under Zaporizhzhia front: (source 246), cited to support Macron calling the shelling of a shopping mall a war crime, does not contain either "war crime" or "Macron". This would be an attack on civilian infrastructure, probably violates the Hague Convention, followup on specific details. Elinruby (talk) 17:39, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• I have changed 246 to failed verification. Slatersteven (talk) 10:49, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

  @Elinruby, I don’t quite understand what’s going on here. You say our article says “Ukraine said it had . . . uncovered evidence of war crimes in Bucha.[135]” The cited BBC source says “Zelensky accused Russian forces of killing and torturing more than 300 civilians in the formerly occupied city of Bucha, where evidence of alleged Russian war crimes have been discovered.”

  And you’ve started this thread saying “If individuals have been charged (possible in this instance) then we need to get a source that supports that, because the one that is there (currently 135) does not.”

  Whut? No, we do not.

  BBC is a generally reliable source. It is a reliable source on what Ukraine said. It says Ukraine says it found evidence of war crimes. We repeat that Ukraine said that. Done.

  We do not need to prove whether war crimes were committed to say what Ukraine said about evidence. If you want to second-guess past, present, or future war-crimes trials on your own time, that’s fine. Please don’t post your academic exercises here saying we need to second-guess the courts on questions that are irrelevant to what the article says. We do not.  —Michael Z. 00:21, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

• ICC section: some answers. Mild concern that these are press releases Elinruby (talk) 18:10, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• • They are also impeccable RS. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:18, 20 September 2023 (UTC) (refactor indent in attempt to keep list format)

sure. of what though, is the question. Elinruby (talk) 18:29, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

YouTube video: might be good but cannot verify from this device. Will come back to this

AP source mentions "barbarities", "crimes of war" and "crimes". All of these are true but not proof of "war crimes", which may be out there but this is not that. Elinruby (talk) 18:29, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Does say war crimes, without specifying under which law. Links to a prior story of theirs, which does not say war crime but did mention the Rome statute. Feels kind of synth; there must be a better source out there for this by now. All of the references in the International law section are newswire blurbs. Ok as RS as far as they go. Elinruby (talk) 23:15, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• Humanitarian impact section: References 527 and 528 cites for "The deliberate destruction and looting of Ukrainian cultural heritage sites in this way is considered a war crime."

EJIL not IJIL, sorry: still getting website not available.

European Parliament reference says The European Parliament will vote later today on a Resolution on cultural solidarity with Ukraine and for a joint emergency response mechanism for cultural recovery in Europe. In its Resolution, Parliament condemns Russia's deliberate destruction of Ukraine's cultural heritage and the looting and smuggling of cultural goods, and designates them as war crimes under the 1954 Hague Convention, to which both countries are signatories. Does this designation have force of law, is the question here.

• Environmental impact section: War crimes mentioned as being investigated, references 577, 578 and 30 cover use of the term "ecocide". Reference needed for Ukraine's investigation, and yes I know there is one. But if we are going to mention it we should cite it. Elinruby (talk) 20:38, 20 September 2023 (UTC).

@Mzajac: As you requested, because I was having trouble wadng through all that too. I am not certain, to answer your question to me, whether you did answer my question, looking at that now. Do you want me to bring it over here? Up to you.

Meanwhile, The question about individual responsibility is answered, as yes, the warrants are for named individuals. What I am still unsure of is whether a violation of the Rome statue would be a "war crime" in the legal, as oppsed to activist, sense of the word. I will add specific current reference numbers in next. Elinruby (talk) 19:51, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I already quoted the ICC indictment that refers specific articles of the Rome Statute, and I quoted those articles that refer to “Grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949,” &c.

It is not our job to correct the courts with our international law degrees. We report that the courts charged Putin with war crimes. If you want to check this, just find three reliable sources that say so. I think you are conducting WP:OR.  —Michael Z. 00:30, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

it looks like there is a quote from the court that uses the word war crimes, which probably enough for our purposes, bur I want to re-read your answer slower. I don't think it matters whether children are mentioned in the Rome statute. What I was saying was that this arrest warrant was for those abductions specifically as opposed to for example the Bucha massacre, which was certainly an atrocity or maybe a crime against humanity, maybe even a war crime, is as I seem to recall individuals have been charged.

Other question: does it matter that Russia has not signed the Rome Statute if we stipulate that the ICC is an expert on the subject of war crimes?

Thanks for applying some brain powerElinruby (talk) 20:19, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

We cannot prove whether war crimes were committed or not. Only a court can do that. We can only repeat facts from secondary sources, for example, “the ICC charged Putin with war crimes.” We don’t have to prove whether the ICC is legally right or wrong about it. I think this thread may be going beyond our mandate and verging into WP:OR. Correct me if I have this wrong. —Michael Z. 00:35, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

Bingo! Our job is so much easier when we don't engage in OR and second-guess proper sources. We just document what RS say. Period. End of story. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 00:49, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

I have to agree with Michael Z. on this one. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 05:47, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

I stopped responding in this thread abd started another one, because really guys, some of the comments Elinruby (talk) 21:50, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

Sources for casualties

General Eirik Kristoffersen, head of the Norwegian Armed Forces, said in January 2023 that there were "Nearly 180,000 Russian troops dead or wounded; -- 100,000 Ukrainian troops dead or wounded, plus 30,000 Ukrainian civilians killed." This is according to among others, AFP: [16](Twitter) . January 22, 2023.

So like discussed before, there are also other sources (besides "US estimates") that support very high casualties and have for a long time now.

ShouldIHide (talk) 03:47, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

In addition to this, like was discussed elsewhere, non-western sources would potentially be beneficial. I believe The Hindustan Times has been described as a pro-Russian or even "propaganda outlet", but regardless they have published this: [17] link. This supports a total of 354,000 killed and wounded, up to April 2023.

And this BTW is just with a 5 second web search. If someone wants to do a "deep dive", I'm sure there's much more to find. I mean especially with regard to "RS", which is something I'm not at all well versed in.

ShouldIHide (talk) 08:19, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Changing NATO to not be in the infobox ; Possible undo?

Ever since practically the start of the invasion, It has said that Belarus is supporting Russia. I think that NATO being in the infobox would be significantly beneficial to the state of this article, as it is relatively hard to find who supports who with just different sections and different articles. Lukt64 (talk) 20:50, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

Please see Q4 in this talk page’s FAQ: Talk:Russian invasion of Ukraine/FAQ.  —Michael Z. 22:54, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

I would very much like to hear what does specifically NATO have to do with this conflict. I mean specifically the organization called NATO.

Is it "NATO" that's supporting anyone because I don't think it is. Most countries that support Ukraine also happen to be members of the United Nations but that does not make UN a party to this conflict.

Belarus is a country, The UN and NATO are international organizations. That's one difference.

ShouldIHide (talk) 02:50, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

If anyone else is gonna be listed, it should be individual countries. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 09:57, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

It could be "receives aid from other countries" as well, or something like that. If it needs to be listed. But "NATO" in the infobox, a definite no.

I'm sure the semantics of "supported by" have also been discussed before many times. One thing is, other countries do not support Ukraine militarily on an official level. In fact, quite the opposite. They refuse to get involved.

Even NATO for some odd reason has a "no boots on the ground" policy even though Ukraine is none of NATO's concern (it's not a member).

ShouldIHide (talk) 11:04, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Remove "both sides" from the lead

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

---

The lead still says "...has killed tens of thousands of people on both sides."

This can give the false impression that there were "tens of thousands" killed in Russia. But in reality the casualties have occurred practically entirely in Ukraine. We should not mislead readers.

My solution: simply remove the "both sides" part of the sentence.

Change "The invasion has been described as the biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War and has killed tens of thousands of people on both sides." to "The invasion has been described as the biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War and has killed tens of thousands of people."

ShouldIHide (talk) 02:55, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

HOld on, you can't ask us to change this, then ask to change it again with different info, what change do you want made? Slatersteven (talk) 11:11, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

A change has now been made that removed this problem. Now it's good, or at least much better than before.

As for "what I want"... I have to ask for different changes at different times, since certain other changes are so fiercely contested and haven't gotten through in 3 months. So it's throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, unfortunately.

ShouldIHide (talk) 11:20, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

No, you ask for one change, you do not circumvent consensus by making lots of little requests. As such I can't support this, as it is not the final version, and I have no idea where this is going. Slatersteven (talk) 11:28, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

ShouldIHide, I agree with Slatersteven comment about making lots of little requests to change what is essentially the same passage. This approach could easily be seen as disruptive. As a non-ECP user, you should really be making an edit request in the format change X to Y. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:45, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I disagree. Editor's comments are constructive. A consensus should be reached before an edit request. Manyareasexpert (talk) 10:14, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree that ShouldIHide's comments have been constructive and generally well-founded. Elinruby (talk) 18:28, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Another user made an edit that made this particular request obsolete right after I had typed it is what happened here. I have no control over this nor did I "circumvent" anything, I can not do that.

Anyway, since that's what happened, I'm not asking for this change anymore.

ShouldIHide (talk) 11:35, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I also did not mean anything like making lots of little requests at the same time.

I did mean that when one suggested change is insanely argued over for two months and doesn't result in any change, then I eventually will have to think and suggest something else instead. What else would I do?

Best regards.

ShouldIHide (talk) 11:39, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

We can close this now. Slatersteven (talk) 11:43, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

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

Troop strength infobox for Ukraine

This article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2023_Ukrainian_counteroffensive#Strengths states with reference dated 10 Sep 2023 that Ukraine has "one million" active personnel. The current infobox number (700,000) is dated well over a year ago.

An update also in the infobox here is certainly worth considering.

ShouldIHide (talk) 01:40, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

The issue I have with reporting strengths in the infobox is directly comparable to why it has been decided not to report casualties in the infobox. This is an ongoing engagement. Strengths engaged vary significantly with time. They are either estimates (ie inferred) rather than concrete and/or are attributed to those engaged (not independently verified). Readers tend to view the infobox as fact. We should be presenting only good quality information in the infobox but what we have doesn't meet this standard. Such information is unlikely to exist until after the dust has settled. Even though there is somewhat comparable (by time) and relatively current figure in the ISW source, it would state [this does] not including Rosgvardia (Russian national guard) and other military units and structures; thus this number does not fully reflect Russia’s total forces involved in the war in Ukraine. There is nuance to what is being reported for which the infobox is unsuited. Existing material in the infobox under casualties is not supported by the body of the article and contrary to WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE. It contains a level of detail, for which the infobox is not intended. I suggest there is also nuance to these other reports which the infobox does not capture - eg, the 300,000 figure for Russia is ultimately attributable to Josep Borrell in this report. It is not a figure we should report without attribution. Such reporting is best dealt with in prose. What we should have is a section for strengths but we don't. Instead, we are trying to write the article in the infobox. I suggest that we could write such information into a suitably titled section that deals with both casualties and strengths; and the strength parameter in the infobox be left blank. It is an optional field. The TOC would then function to direct the reader to the text where this is dealt with. Cinderella157 (talk) 03:45, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Fair enough, so in short: you not only oppose updating, but suggest removing the existing figures.

This is off-topic, but: according to whom are Rosgvardia troops involved in the Ukraine operation, and I mean on the front lines? Off the top of my head the number of Rosgvardia members/operatives/soldiers is something like 900,000 so this would be let's say quite significant. Also would be notable because Rosgvardia are Russian internal security forces. And not just any internal security either, as far as I'm aware their purpose is to protect the President.

I haven't heard from any source anyone being involved on the Russian side except for the regular army/navy/air force (contract or reserve troops) plus Wagner, basically.

ShouldIHide (talk) 07:30, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

And on-topic: just to make it clear, I'm not debating whether or not something should be in the infobox or not.

I simply said it's worth considering updating an old number because a much newer number is now available.

ShouldIHide (talk) 07:33, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

At 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive#Strengths you linked see the paragraph On 10 September, GRU spokesman Major General Vadym Skibitskyi reported ... although, not all of these are taking part in the counteroffensive.[174]. I have quoted from the cited source here. Please read what I have written. I am certainly not opposed to updating the article. I thought this was clear when I suggested an amendment to the body of the article to include reporting of strengths. However, I am opposed to the reporting of strengths in the infobox for the reasons I have detailed - and to adding yet more information there. Since you clarify you are not saying that the infobox should be changed, there is no disagreement. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:39, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

I did not say that.

I pointed out there is a much more up-to-date number available to use in the infobox instead of the old one.

I am not opposed to reporting strengths in the infobox, that is a different matter and we're not discussing that right now.

ShouldIHide (talk) 09:08, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

I'm not debating whether or not something should be in the infobox or not. One can update the article without material having to appear in the infobox. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:46, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes, that is true.

But I specifically suggested updating the number in the infobox. I was not interested in discussing what should or shouldn't be in there. Troop strengths currently are.

You are welcome to start your own topic about whatever matter you are opposed to or are otherwise are concerned with.

ShouldIHide (talk) 03:05, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

What is written in the infobox should be supported by the body of the article per WP:INFOBOXPURPOSE. Neither what is there already nor what you would add is so supported. Amend the body of the article (or have it amended) and then we can talk about whether the infobox should be amended. Such proposals should be made in the format change X to Y. That way, we know what is actually proposed - whether something is being added or being substituted. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:24, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Violations of customary international law are not necessarily "considered war crimes"

No matter who thinks otherwise. Just a general reference for that statement, since as I recall some people do not want to believe that: [18]

but briefly, a war crime is something an individual does not a country. There were at least a couple of instances of the article making erroneous statements about this in wikivoice, sourced to press releases that don't exactly say so. I plan to copy them here so people can discuss whether we want to make such statements in the first place since they betray our wiki-ignorance, and if we do how to phrase them better. Elinruby (talk) 13:19, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• "The International Criminal Court (ICC) opened an investigation into possible crimes against humanity, war crimes, abduction of children, and genocide, issuing an arrest warrant for Putin in March 2023." This was at the end of the lede. Somewhat misleading because it makes it sound like the warrant charged Putin with a war crime. Since he is an individual this is conceivable, but the term really applies more to situations like My Lai so more likely it was for a violation of the Geneva Convention, or something like that. Needs to be check and also War crimes in the Russian invasion of Ukraine. If the usage here is in fact accurate I have no objection to the text going back in. Elinruby (talk) 13:57, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

warrant for Putin is apparently under the Rome statute and is specifically for the abduction of children. Research whether this is usage for Rome. Elinruby (talk) 18:10, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

That’s confusing, but I may have answered that question with quotations from the release and the Rome Statute, below.  —Michael Z. 18:40, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

possibly. I am setting up a rewrite of this list now that the edit conflicts have died down, because I am having trouble reading this section too. I will probably ask you a question about your answer shortly Elinruby (talk) 19:57, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Here is what we need, in an ICC presss release: "There are reasonable grounds to believe that Mr Putin bears individual criminal responsibility for the aforementioned crimes, (i) for having committed the acts directly, jointly with others and/or through others (article 25(3)(a) of the Rome Statute), and (ii) for his failure to exercise control properly over civilian and military subordinates who committed the acts, or allowed for their commission, and who were under his effective authority and control, pursuant to superior responsibility (article 28(b) of the Rome Statute).". I will amend the the body to reflect this once the new arrivals have caught up on their reading.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Elinruby (talk • contribs)

• The ICC issued arrest warrants for Putin and Lvova-Belova “alleging responsibility for the war crime of unlawful deportation and transfer of children during the Russian invasion of Ukraine,” according to the article International Criminal Court arrest warrants for Vladimir Putin and Maria Lvova-Belova. The cited source directly quotes the ICC release.[19]  —Michael Z. 15:54, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

  Elinruby’s quotation above speaks to Putin’s individual criminal responsibility.

  The question of whether these are war crimes is answered by this part of the same release:[20] the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation (under articles 8(2)(a)(vii) and 8(2)(b)(viii) of the Rome Statute). The relevant sections are from the statute:[21]

  • Article 8: War crimes
    • 2. For the purpose of this Statute, "war crimes" means:
      • (a) Grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949, namely, any of the following acts against persons or property protected under the provisions of the relevant Geneva Convention:
        • . . .
        • (vii) Unlawful deportation or transfer or unlawful confinement;
        • . . .
      • (b) Other serious violations of the laws and customs applicable in international armed conflict, within the established framework of international law, namely, any of the following acts:
        • . . .
        • (viii) The transfer, directly or indirectly, by the Occupying Power of parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies, or the deportation or transfer of all or parts of the population of the occupied territory within or outside this territory;
        • . . .

  The mention of children is not specific to these crimes. It does potentially tie them to Article 6: Genocide, (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group, if genocidal intent is found (of which there is plenty of evidence).  —Michael Z. 18:31, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

The removed content is established and referenced under the ″International arrest warrants″ section, where the sources also mentions the investigations of war crimes. So what is the issue? --TylerBurden (talk) 15:40, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Elinruby, what's the problem here? Are you seriously interposing your own OR understandings between what RS say and our ability to document what those sources say? This isn't even new information. It's from March. Putin has an arrest warrant hanging over his head. This is covered, with RS, in the body of the article and should be mentioned in the lead. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 16:32, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I am also a bit confused over the text removal. How, exactly, is it incorrect or misleading? Are the sources unreliable? Is the information wrong? What would you suggest be done to fix the issue? TechBear | Talk | Contributions 16:48, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I left a warning on her talk page. This is really shocking behavior. She already has a topic ban and block. Does she really want more? Now she made a huge error. Is something wrong? <redacted> I don't know, but something's wrong. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:06, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I don’t think it’s constructive to mention that, especially without clarifying what the topic ban was about (it reads like it was here). At least one other significant contributor here has received similar ArbCom sanctions in the Polish Holocaust case. Nobody has ever thought it proper to discuss that. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 19:13, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

I am not seeing what the issue here is. Slatersteven (talk) 17:17, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

(ec)(ec){ec)(ec) do you think you gentlemen could question my sobriety in your own section and let me compile this list?

• under Kyiv and northern front: If individuals have been charged (possible in this instance) then we need to get a source that suppports that, because the one that is there does not.
• under Zaporizhzhia front: source cited to support Macron calling this a war crime does not contain either "war crime" or "Macron". This would be an attack on civilian infrastructure, probably violates the Hague Convention, followup on specific details. Elinruby (talk) 17:39, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Elinruby, you're still behaving erratically. Please address the concerns about your deletion of properly sourced content. Here is what's in the "International arrest warrants" section:

The International Criminal Court (ICC) opened an investigation into possible crimes against humanity, war crimes, abduction of children, and genocide during the invasion. On 17 March 2023 the ICC issued a warrant for Putin's arrest, alleging that Putin held criminal responsibility in the illegal deportation and transfer of children from Ukraine to Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It was the first time that the ICC had issued an arrest warrant for the head of state of one of the five Permanent Members of the United Nations Security Council (the world's five principal nuclear powers).

Please answer these questions: Do you have problems with that section? Why shouldn't it be mentioned in the lead (which has been restored)? -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:53, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• ICC section: some answers. Mild concern that these are press releases Elinruby (talk) 18:10, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

• • They are also impeccable RS. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 18:18, 20 September 2023 (UTC) (refactor indent in attempt to keep list format)

sure. of what though, is the question. Elinruby (talk) 18:29, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

YouTube video: might be good but cannot verify from this device. Will come back to this

AP source mentions "barbarities", "crimes of war" and "crimes". All of these are true but not proof of "war crimes", which may be out there but this is not that. Elinruby (talk) 18:29, 20 September 2023 (UTC)\

Not sure what you’re talking about, as the only Associated Press article cited above says “war crimes,” and not “barbarities” nor “crimes of war.” This is frustrating to respond to.  —Michael Z. 18:43, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Fowler source (currently 476) is essentially a live tweet. Does mention that Rusia is not a signatory to Rome

Etkind uses the term "genocide". Abstract does not mention the term "war crime" will see if I have access later today.

IJIL currently a dead link, at least from here. Elinruby (talk) 18:41, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Okay I found “Etkind” cited in the article, and the citation supports a statement about genocide and democide, not war crimes. So what is the problem?

What is IJIL?

I don’t think this live-tweeting of poorly-defined “problems” is a good use of our time. Maybe you could write it all up more clearly and post once.  —Michael Z. 18:46, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

overall the issue is a matter of trying to correct some terminology and verify some sources. That is my issue. I am not going to speculate as to what the other editors think they are doing, but they are definitely making the list hard to read by repeatedly asking me if I am drunk, I agree. The organization is meant to be section, then text then citation then comment. Some prior editor has repeatedly conflated "war crime", which has a specific meaning, with "crime of war", "genocide" or "atrocitY". IJIL is a journal name btw. Elinruby (talk) 19:04, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

If IJIL is cited or mentioned in the article, then will you please tell us by what name, so we can identify what you’re talking about?  —Michael Z. 23:34, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Can we close this is it is confusing and unfocused? Slatersteven (talk) 10:41, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. This thread is far too confusing. Start a new thread if necessary. I have hatted this thread. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:04, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

For some reason it didn't work. Maybe someone else will succeed in hatting this thread. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 17:10, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

Unfortunately most threads here are or end up being too confusing, even for simple matters.

I believe what was suggested was that a "war crime" is something that is done by members of the military. A soldier shooting a surrendered and unarmed enemy for example is a war crime. Things organised by high-level civilian officials might not be. The Geneva Convention or something, I suppose is what we should check here. Better yet, Reliable Sources that have studied these international treaties.

But I don't know what was the specific change suggested here, if any, so no comment on that for now.

ShouldIHide (talk) 03:17, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I don’t think being a member of a military is required. There is a legal concept of control and responsibility. But Putin is officially supreme C-in-C of the Russian armed forces, the nominal top link in the chain of command, and therefore can carry legal responsibility for orders he gives or systematic crimes he allows.  —Michael Z. 13:24, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

As for that, Commander-in-Chief would no doubt be considered a "member of the military", especially in the sense of responsibility.

But (fictional example) something like a Minister of Public Transport committing "war crimes" is a bit more tricky, at least semantically. Someone like this might commit absolutely horrible crimes but how they would logically be war crimes might be somewhat complicated to explain.

Maybe we are just left with what "reliable sources" actually say a war crime is. Because I don't know whether what we're doing is "research" but it probably is "original".

Cheers

ShouldIHide (talk) 14:37, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Well look at Nuremberg trials, not all of those convicted were military officers. Slatersteven (talk) 14:40, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes. That was very "tricky". Much of that stuff was totally unprecedented and the prosecutors had to figure out what exactly was a "crime" of any kind. That is legally speaking, what law was broken, in what way and what should be the punishment for it.

I don't know if it's less complicated nowadays.

ShouldIHide (talk) 14:53, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

The president of Russia#Commander-in-chief commands the military, but is a civilian and not a member of it. If he “would no doubt be considered a ‘member of the military,’” then I suppose so could any local leader of military-civilian occupation administration appointed under his authority. The MH17 mass-murder trial made a legal finding that the illegal militias in eastern Ukraine were under overall control of Russia, meaning that responsibility for their war crimes is on Russia.  —Michael Z. 16:24, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Absolutely. People who are in charge of military units, regardless of whether they're technically civilians are responsible for what happens under their command. ShouldIHide (talk) 16:39, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

As discussed there, the finding was by a domestic court and is not binding outside Dutch jurisdiction. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 19:01, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Says who, and so what if? (Isn’t domestic court for family violence?) It is a precedent. I believe the court is a reliable source on war crimes and that is what it said in its legally biding decision. It also means that the entire chain of command above the convicted murderers could be liable for these war crimes, all the way up to the Russian head of state.  —Michael Z. 21:30, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

References

The section is indeed confusing, and got so heavily brigaded that I started over in another section. However, since people are still commenting here, let me see if I can clear up a couple of misapprehensions.

• Hopefully people will by now have looked at the source I provided and realized that I am not making this up. This is what the United Nations says.
• The distinction is not one of how bad a crime is. It is whether a specific individual can be charged in a court, as opposed to the international community taking measures against countries that keep engaging in crimes of aggression. The abduction of children is a crime of individual responsibility, with which Putin in particular is charged. But he is charged as himself not as the leader of Russia.
• "War crime" is used colloquially to denote an atrocity, so there are reasons why Macron for example might be using the term incorrectly as seen through a legal lens. We don't have to get into the distinction I am making here in the article, but it is out there, and specifically in the lede, I don't think the warrant for the war crime of abduction should be in the same sentence as the investigation into genocide, as these are different things. And elsewhere, does the opinion of Macron about the classification of a specific incident really matter? Unless we are going to make an issue of him using the wrong terminology and I don't see any point in that. We just should not perpetuate the misuse of the term, is all I am saying.
• The above is rather subtle and it was probably a mistake to bring it up at a time when the talk page was debating whether 500,000+ is more than "tens of thousands on both sides". But since there has been movement on that, perhaps there is hope.
• While I am clearing things up, I have a declared pronoun and it is "they" not "she". I usually ignore being misgendered, but hey, since we are here clearing stuff up,, your attention to this matter would be appreciated.

Thank you Elinruby (talk) 19:22, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Which sentence? If you mean about the ICC investigation, then they belong together because that’s literally its scope: “any past and present allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide committed on any part of the territory of Ukraine by any person.”[22]  —Michael Z. 21:41, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

References

The 'Background' section contains largely irrelevant or confusing content

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

---

For some reason, the 'Background' section talks, in great detail, about the Soviet Union, NATO and what may or may not have been unofficially talked about way back when. The Soviet Union has not existed for over 30 years.

The section seems to try to portray the "Russian viewpoint" to the extent that it seemingly gives it some amount of legitimacy (which it objectively doesn't have). This viewpoint typically portrays NATO as a country or NATO and USA being the same thing and portraying both of them (especially USA) as some sort of "threat" to Russia. None of which is founded in reality.

The problem is, Russia's own stated grounds for this "special military operation" were first of all things like alleged oppression of "Russians"/Russian language speaking groups and even "genocide" and "nazism", in Ukraine. This has absolutely nothing to do with NATO or what Soviet diplomats discussed with anyone in 1990.

Almost the entire 'Background' section could be removed, since actually most of the relevant information (to this conflict) is in the next section, titled 'Prelude'. This is again aimed at removing unnecessary both-sidesism.

Thoughts?

ShouldIHide (talk) 03:56, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

First off, if so, expansion and revision is the answer, not cutting or purging.

I’m gonna be the devil’s advocate here (as I not infrequently am) and say that while the current revision seems more or less fine, if anything it is a bit incoherent (and at one point the manner of selection of sources looks slightly irregular).

More importantly, the premise of the OP is highly flawed. Claiming “objective” statements or “reality”, when one isn’t talking about a hard physical fact, is unencyclopedic and rhetorical, or even polemical.

It’s easy through the lens of hindsight, after Russia has engaged in an unjustified invasion and pretty flagrant war crimes, to retroactively rewrite one’s understanding of everything that happened prior to 2015 or so. In fact, this would be a normal human psychological response (literally covered this in comm studies last week).

If the time frame covered in the background section is evaluated on its own, before the more recent cycles of increasing Russian escalation, the picture gets more complicated. Also, some things (including a few hard verifiable facts) pop out that may be uncomfortable for the side that in 2023 happens to be the victim of large-scale aggression and, correspondingly, enjoys overwhelming, even blind, support.

Also, and I sincerely wish I did not have to point this out, there is a…less than fully accurate narrative going around that both the 2014 and 2021–22 behavior were “senseless” and “unprovoked”. While WP shouldn’t take Russian mouthpieces at anything approaching face value, to throw the realist-school perspective out the window would be troubling and introduce a large yet subtle bias.

And it’s not as if there isn’t a wealth of independent, expert RS providing realist analyses. Some editors may (I think this did occur once or twice before) instinctively evaluate those, within the framework of their own personal views, as “sympathetic”, but most of them are nothing of the sort.

One way to go about it could be to actively seek out sources from among the billion or so Anglophones who don’t belong to a major power bloc that’s invested in the matter. And actually, the general demurral (in one case an explicit refusal by a single heavyweight editor, contrary to the guidance of the WP:PERENNIAL list) about this is more troubling to me than anything else, because of the wide-ranging implications such practices continue to have in general on WP.

RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 03:45, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

All that said, I do think there’s room for expansion about all the internal processes in Ukraine. The current revision hardly endorses the Russian POV, but sure, there is a bit of a spotlight on Russian actions and motivations, which to an extent might seem to devalue the agency of the Ukrainian people and government.

In fact, over this whole topic area, a lot of that is poorly documented. The operations of Ukraine’s democratic system, various bits of executive decision making, grassroots responses to the Russian menace, etc. is often treated rather opaquely.

RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 03:46, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

Ok, there's quite a lot there... I am not suggesting adding any kind of bias and I don't understand what do you mean by "premise" here. Premise for what?

My main point was that unofficial discussions from Soviet times are very far removed from what's happening now. This section is (was?) cluttered with information that would perhaps fit better somewhere else (such as in another article). I am not saying the information was "false", but that maybe it's not presented in the best way.

Yes, the Russian viewpoint and reasoning for starting their military operation should be explained. It should not be portrayed as being justified. Like I said in another comment, this should not read like an opinion piece.

I do not claim to know "the truth", I simply provided some of my own thoughts on the matter and you, all of you, are welcome to discuss this further.

ShouldIHide (talk) 09:53, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

Well, the full background is actually really skimpy. For one thing, the actual context of the whole NATO thing is not that well researched or covered. Just as an example, this isn’t mentioned even at Ukraine–NATO relations: [23]

I’m not necessarily saying it’s entirely practical to go further back, but starting in the 90s is actually kind of silly. I think both Zelenskyy and Putin would agree that that level of blindness to the past is absurd.

I can see how it might come off as undue weight if too much of a spotlight is thrown on Russia. In which case, the solution is expanding, not cutting.

Either way, the current revision appears to have changed significantly and although it’s hardly a finished product, would you say it’s better?

If anything I said came off as too abrasive, I really do apologize. When it comes to this topic area, I’ve gotten used to a…slightly different form of discussion.

Cheers, RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 11:32, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

I did notice the section has been edited since. Quick glance, difficult to say if it's better. I think mainly some sources were checked again and something small removed?

There's a problem with stating "In year (whatever), such and such country wanted to join NATO...". Like a random collection of trivia. It leaves the reader with "...so what?" So, 15-20 years ago, some countries joined some organization and then even the secretary general said something about some other countries. So what? Why is that important?

It's simply very unclear exactly what does NATO have to do with anything here (or yet). As for undue weight in a slightly non-wikipedia sense, being or not being a member of NATO is "slightly" different from being or not being a member of Russia. Thus my previous stress on "NATO is not a country".

In the next section, 'Prelude', there's a "Russia demanded that NATO sign a treaty ..." and in general it is this section that's more relevant and better explains why this military operation started.

ShouldIHide (talk) 02:41, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

In the first half of 'Background', there's a mention of Jaap de Hoop Scheffer issuing a statement in 2008.

In the second half of 'Prelude', it's clearly stated that, as per Putin, the reason for starting a special military operation was to protect the people of the Donbas, who had been facing humiliation and genocide "by the Kyiv regime", who are neo-Nazis under western control and are "developing nuclear weapons" (!!). Now here there is finally also a claim by Putin that NATO was building military infrastructure in Ukraine "to threaten Russia".

Now what is the relevance of Jaap de Hoop Scheffer and what he said in 2008? Putin's 2022 address was very detailed but I don't think he included Jaap de Hoop Scheffer in it, did he? So, why would that stuff not be in another article, perhaps in Ukraine–NATO relations and/or War in Donbas (2014–2022)? We can link to those here if need be.

This is just one example, but I hope you follow why I question the relevance of these things in the first half of 'Background'.

ShouldIHide (talk) 12:08, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Offhand I disagree, but I have been distracted for the past several hours by another issue that I came here to post about, and didn't re-read before I made this post (although I will do that if you or someone else thinks it would be helpful) The article began as an extension of the article and has been through some splits, spinoffs and reorganizations since then. It needed to, based on how hard it was to keep this article to a reasonable size while covering 2014 to the present. My point is that I may have read it too many times and possibly wrote some of the text myself, so it is entirely plausible that I do not see certain flaws in the explanation.

So please be fresh eyes. What seems extraneous or seems like it is making excuses for Putin? Or is unclear or irrelevant? I promise I will not argue with you about this; if you are still finding the explanation scattered and confusing after working on the article then you are probably right that a casual reader would think the same, and that is something that we should fix. So far I have been very focused on the references and am only now in some sections trying to improve on what was there. The referencing is light but that doesn't matter if the text is from an other article and we decide it isn't needed.

So, from memory: In 2014 the Ukrainians were pretty outraged at being called Nazis and all of the attendant gaslighting. Some of those quotes may seem tedious now, or overly strident. The endorsement of the President of Moldavia or foreign minister of France probably seemed a lot more important to a government fresh from a revolution that was striving for international recognition than it does today. almost a decade later when it is proving that it is worthy to join NATO.

The mind of Putin is important in this story though; if he and the Russian military sincerely believe, however irrationally, that the West is trying to destroy Russia and that they therefore are in an existential fight, then that has consequences and we should explain it, since, for example, that consideration would make it very unlikely that Russia would engage in good faith negotiation, as Germany was at one point suggesting to . If you have specific suggestions, go ahead and put them here or even just make the changes to the article. I am not sure how closely other editors are following but I would call this exchange a tentative agreement, and due notice that some edit to the section may happen that is less obviously necessary than the references I have been looking at. I will comment some more when I have refreshed myself on what is in the Background versus the Prelude section. As I recall Background covers 2014 to 2022, which I do think should be summarized, although probably not as exhaustively covered as it is now, with links to spun-off materials if appropriate. There may very well be leftover text that would be better used in the article about the 2014 to 2022 frozen war. Whereas "Prelude" was more about the 2021 buildups along the border as I recall, and also as I recall the referencing was spotty, as if those sections maybe came from the lede of another article. TL:DR Sure, sorta. Let's get specific. I disagree that material about Putin is necessarily undue -- that whole mythology about Kievan Rus' seems to have be central to his thinking, the same way Hitler's beliefs about the Aryans were to him. If you want to just get started, go ahead and do that. If you want me to do something staring from checking the sources that are there, that is the more inarguable approach and I will have some time to do that that after I get done auditing the Casualty section. I am tentatively in favor of a rewrite of the early history section(s)with the caveats expressed above and am ok with addressing it through either of the approaches mentioned above. Elinruby (talk) 18:47, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

We do have to give the Russian viewpoint and note (as we do) that it is flawed. Slatersteven (talk) 18:49, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

We give not give “the Russian viewpoint.” We should relate significant facts and analysis that reliable sources report about, Kremlin, Russian government and media domestic and foreign propaganda and disinformation, speculative Kremlin motivations, Statements by prominent Russian and Western pro- and anti-war figures, about Russian public opinion, &c. There’s a very important distinction.  —Michael Z. 20:02, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

In a nutshell, the "Russian viewpoint" is that Ukraine can absolutely not be allowed to join NATO and that it is justifiable to take military action, seize the entire country in order to not let that happen. Do you think we should at all give anyone the impression that this might be justifiable?

Anyway, like I said, what I meant was that these particular very long-winded explanations of the Russian or Soviet governments mindset and handshake deals in 1990 don't belong here. Most of it could be combined with what's in the 'Prelude', removed, shortened or moved to another article for anyone who's interested in that much more detail.

I do think having the Russian reasoning for starting the SMO is absolutely relevant, I simply think this current 'Background' section is too long and contains a significant amount of information of questionable relevance (and reliability).

ShouldIHide (talk) 00:28, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Without going into too much detail in one go...

What I think is that the text I was talking about, it doesn't necessarily belong in this article.

A lot of it is otherwise relevant and very interesting, but like said, for example alleged unofficial handshake deals in 1990 (!) are pretty far removed for what's going on now. ShouldIHide (talk) 00:04, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

after taking a look: Yes this is all about the actual start of the war in 2014, but tried to cram too much into the section and prove too many points imho. I was not around this article when 2014 was spun off but I remember length being a problem and trimming and trimmng as new facts were added. I assume we cover the leadup to Euromaidan somewhere? Also I am pretty sure that: "In 1999, Russia signed the Charter for European Security, which affirmed the "right of each and every participating state to be free to choose or change its security arrangements, including treaties of alliance"." was intended to prove the perfidity of Putin ditto the remark about it not being his business whether Ukraine NATO. I also think that Mink was important, especially the part about the parties believing that the agreement said different things but I think we should summarize that rather than define Normandy Format, Vladimir Socor, Sergei Glazyev, Viktor Yanukovych, Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, Bucharest Memorandum or Greater-Russia Irredentism necessarily. I also think that "the Russian government endorsed an article by former president Dmitry Medvedev arguing that it was pointless to deal with Ukraine, claiming it was a "vassal" of the United States.[37]" is rather pointy.

Should be covered: Seizure of Crimean Parliament, Donbas, frozen war, maybe minsk in passing if that seems like a good idea. Also irredentism, which we should define and probably spend fewer quotes to refute because by now a lot of people already know. Maybe the famine in the 30s in passing and occupation in an attempt to explain the whole deNazification claim but again, these comments assume that good explanations exist for the things I am saying we can do without. Maybe we can pipe the very long title of Putin's essay for greater readability also.

Since there appear to be strong feelings about this section I am not going to unilaterally change anything here except for reference problems. Gerasimov doctrine turns out to be a misnomer based on a misunderstanding or what he said, so we shouldn't use the word, but it's still important in that this is how a Russian policy maker understands the actions of Western governments. As always, all of this is discussable and I invite additions both to the list of what can go and what should stay. Going back to references and the casualties section. Elinruby (talk) 23:57, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

A simple method to determine the relevance of written material to the article subject is to assess whether the sources themselves are discussing the article subject. The first paragraph of the background section contains citations 11-16. Citations 11, 12 and 14 cannot be discussing this subject as they predate not only the invasion but the Russo-Ukrainian war itself. These should be removed. Citation 13 is focussed on the securing and dismantling weapons of mass destruction in the successor states of the former Soviet Union, so it too should be removed. Citations 15 and 16 may contain relevant material, but are being used for statements that aren't made coherently relevant. E.g. citation 16 is used for a statement by Putin in 2002 that isn't connected to the war or the invasion. The scope of an article or section is determined through sources, not through editor opinion. It seems quite clear that the latter rather than the former was consulted here. Mr rnddude (talk) 00:03, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

I've struck citation 11. That source is dated to and about the Russo-Ukrainian war. Mr rnddude (talk) 00:06, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes, generally what I see as problematic here is precisely "editor opinion" and things of that nature. "Journalistic integrity", if you will.

We should look at "both sides" and try to understand why they're doing what they're doing but we should not just put in the article whatever the Russian government says.

Or well, more precisely we should hope that Reliable Sources will do proper journalism on this stuff, because ultimately that's what we will have to rely on.

This should never read like an opinion piece, I'm afraid the subject matter is "a little" too serious for that.

ShouldIHide (talk) 00:40, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

And yes, your observation concerning the sources touches on exactly what I meant. Every single random statement made in 1990, 1994 or 2002, or whatever, are not connected to this military conflict.

Budapest for example is relevant but much of the other stuff is not.

Again, we need to be very careful to not give the impression there was some kind of legitimate justification for the Special Military Operation. If you all remember, it was quite universally condemned by the United Nations General Assembly.

Remember that the English Wikipedia is not read just by people in the US but around the world by both native and non-native speakers. The mainstream media landscape in let's say South Africa or India might not be dominated by CNN and NYT, it might be something very different. So we have a very distinct responsibility in what and how we represent things as objectively and truthfully as possible.

ShouldIHide (talk) 00:57, 19 September 2023 (UTC)

The last paragraph of this last comment is deeply misguided in my view. I think it speaks for itself.

@ShouldIHide, I would humbly and unironically suggest that you pause for a minute and really think deeply about why that situation might be that way. Have you considered the possibility that there might be points of view, widely held in parts of the Anglosphere, that, among other things, don’t fully embrace either side’s narrative? That those viewpoints have as much validity as your own? That they might even happen to be systemically underrepresented on WP as a whole? Many countries tend to interpret all this through the lens of their own experiences; if a South African newspaper talks of Great Powers and proxy wars, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a Russian mouthpiece (and to constantly reject it as such tends to simply deepen the South–West divide). Binary thinking is unhelpful (to be clear, I mean this bit as a caution; I haven’t noticed any clear signs of it anywhere in this discussion).

And the “we have a responsibility” line of thinking can often become an excuse for POV.

Also, ”quite universally condemned” isn’t quite accurate as a few dozen countries (including India and China) abstained, representing a large percentage of the world’s population, and of that of the English-speaking world.

RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 07:20, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

You think representing things "as objectively and truthfully as possible" is misguided? Or what are you referring to? I don't understand.

I especially don't understand what does this have to do with not having unnecessary fluff in this 'Background' section specifically.

Anyway, I pointed it out exactly as problematic that the primary sources for many things are American. After all, the conflict is taking place in eastern Europe. ShouldIHide (talk) 08:57, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

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

BBC "live coverage" items do not seem to age well

I just made the following post over on the Casualties subpage and am repeating it here since this article is also frequented by interested parties:

BBC is of course considered a sterling source but their live coverage items seem to frequently disappear or else move to other urls, which is a problem for verifiability. Sometimes they have merely been pushed further down the page but sometimes I cannot find them at all. Please use other sources to verify. Thank you. Elinruby (talk) 19:37, 30 September 2023 (UTC) Elinruby (talk) 19:37, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 1 October 2023

2600:1015:B117:4152:0:33:FCFF:CD01 (talk) 02:21, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

I want to add United States, Germany and Britain support for Ukraine and North Korea support for Russia

Use of supported by is deprecated. See also FAQ Cinderella157 (talk) 02:37, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

The term War in Ukraine shouldn't redirect here

News flash: there are other wars that occurred in Ukraine too during its history, and if anything, this redirect should be saved for the article covering the entire conflict (Russo-Ukrainian War). 2600:4041:55B1:E600:CD45:6023:DA03:8833 (talk) 02:01, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

 Done Redirected it to List of wars involving Ukraine.  —Michael Z. 02:25, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Macron's opinions on war crimes

The article says Macron has said that Russia has committed war crimes, but the reference given for this does not say that. I have since found several direct quotes in RS of him saying in different ways that there have been war crimes, though. So now my question is whether I should replace rhe uncited text with a cited direct quote, or should not.

Do we care what Francois Macron thought in 2022? Maybe somewhat; he tried to mediate ate one point after all, right? But in the summary article>

I am happy to go either way with this.

What are the other sources you found? Volunteer Marek 22:33, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

There are a bunch but sure, I can go get some. The only thing is, in one of these he is talking about Bucha or some other atrocity, not specifically about the shopping mall, but there are a number of equivalent quotes. Anyway brb, Elinruby (talk) 23:20, 20 September 2023 (UTC)

[24][25]he does say crime de guerre for a start. He also issued a statement on the one-year anniversary of the discovery of Bucha, There are a bunch more plus some where he says massacre. But you know, I don't think anyone disputes that it is was some kind of crime, or sho

Being discussed above. Slatersteven (talk) 10:50, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

mmm ok, you added a failed verification tag. I am NOW asking whether the statement should be replaced with one that can be cited. Personally I like: ""Massacres were carried out," said Macron. "We have the first traces of what are war crimes.""[26]. Alternately We could decide that we don't care what Macron thinks, and delete the statement, or instead quote the head of Amnesty International saying the same thing. But no, it is not "being discussed above". Elinruby (talk) 14:13, 21 September 2023 (UTC)

A BBC article dated 4 Apr 2022 and already cited in this article ([135])[27] says “Earlier, French President Emmanuel Macron called for further sanctions targeting Russia's coal and oil exports, telling French media there were “clear indications of war crimes”,” in relation to potential sanctions “in response to discoveries of civilian killings in northern Ukraine.” —Michael Z. 01:22, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

oh he has said that there have been war crimes on several occasions. I have already provided four links for that, and in fact just found this, which is specifically about bombing the shopping mall, the context for the link that failed verification. So probably my due weight question does not apply to this item on my list, and we can just substitute in a good citation for the one that failed verification without further rewriting, if that seems like the easiest or best thing to do. It *is* misleading however if it is framed in a way that implies that Russia has committed war crimes.

What I am raising is just a terminology issue. It is OR to say that such and such "is considered a war crime" when in fact a lot depends on the circumstances. Bucha for example would seem to totally fall under the Rome Statute, but afaik no individuals have been charged. And a war crime is a crime committed by an individual. (Or so says the United Nations [28]]. In the case of Bucha the New York Times seems confident that it knows what unit and who was in charge of the unit, so maybe that is good enough for us, but it seems like something we should discuss. On the other hand the Zaporizhzhia power plant, as horrifying as its bombing was, could conceivably be said by Russia to be a legitimate military target even if individual defendants were identified. The shopping mall was definitely not a military target and would certainly be a crime against humanity or some other violation of the laws of war -- I was hoping for help with the terminology -- but is not a war crime that Russia committed, since it if anything would be a charge against the individuals who called in the strike on that location, and I don't think we know who that was. So I suggest we go with "atrocity", for that and for Bucha, which would certainly be true. I am still pretty tied up RL but when I come back I will see if there are more questions about this. I am not suggesting that we refrain from saying that Russia did bad stuff, just that we get our terminology straight. It doesn't help that there aren't a lot of precedents for these prosecutions but we should try to use the correct wording.Elinruby (talk) 20:12, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

Mike, I think you are misreading something. To start: "War crimes are those violations of international humanitarian law (treaty or customary law) that incur individual criminal responsibility under international law." [29] is the United Nations saying it, not me. And yes the question about whether a violation of the Hague Convention is a war crime is answered; yes it is.) But there are still a couple of things: There is more than one and we should specify which one in the body somewhere, and number two I would like to change "issuing" to "issued" in the last sentence od the first paragraph to make it clearer that these are different things and it would be good to separate them out. Elinruby (talk) 22:17, 22 September 2023 (UTC)

While the shopping mail was not a military target and would "certainly be a crime against humanity or some other violation of the laws of war" - if the Russians had willfully targeted it. For, as the New York Times reported, there is good evidence that the blast was from a Ukrainian AA missile. Given this, is the French President Macron going to class this as a Ukrainian War Crime? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.147.153.61 (talk) 21:33, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Odd as the russians admitted it was them. So you need to actually provide either a link of full details of the source, not just a name. Slatersteven (talk) 09:45, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

I think you’re mixing up two different events. Anyway, the Russians have hit scores or hundreds of shopping malls, markets, bread lines, restaurants, schools, universities, clinics, and hospitals, so understandably it’s hard to pick the right one when arguing they didn’t commit war crimes.

BTW, the Russians have responsibility for all harm resulting from the war they started and refuse to stop, including the many, many instances of unintended harm that will continue to occur. Including any misfires of air defence or falling of intercepted Russian missiles that happen while Ukrainians defend themselves from them.

(And BTW, WP:GS/RUSUKR: non-extended-confirmed editors are not permitted to edit this talk page.)  —Michael Z. 15:59, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

Michael, that is not correct. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:29, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Michael, I think what you are saying is true of a crime of aggression or a crime against humanity. The event with the shopping mall could easily be both of those plus a war crime, if they are able to identify the person who called in the strike. I know it is hard to keep track of all the atrocities. By the way, I am not in any way justifying this war, although I see that the talk page is still plagued by people doing that, which has to be a grind after this long. I'll come back to my questions above. Meanwhile, IP starting with 95, it would be cool if you brought in a source and were very specific when you tell people maintaining a complicated page that something in the text is wrong because whatever. It was definitely an egregious breach of the laws of war. That it was Ukraine seems unlikely given the location, but say where you read it, you know? Elinruby (talk) 15:01, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

It might help if we knew what attack. Slatersteven (talk) 15:20, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Well over a year ago, in a German TV news report on alleged atrocities in the Kyiv suburbs, they tracked down the perpetrators down to the company or platoon level. They had identified the officer in charge, they had his name, his picture and that he was from the far east of Russia, 8000 km from Ukraine.

I don't know how relevant it is, but these kind of reports do exist.

ShouldIHide (talk) 03:33, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

There's reports such as this that do identify persons involved in possible war crimes: [30] by WELT, Apr 6, 2022. One person specially mentioned was this senior lieutenant who's said to be the brigade commander. Although the list of names they show also seems to have several colonels in it which is a couple of ranks above lieutenant so it's not exactly clear who's in command of what.

This information seems to originate from the Ukrainian Ministry of Defence or the intelligence services or something, from what I can tell but I wonder if it has been researched or verified further since they were confident enough to broadcast this on national TV for 100M people (plus online). It's also been more than a year since this report so there could be more info available now. Maybe someone else has access to better resources?

(This is in response to "if they are able to identify the person", not really sure if otherwise relevant but there you have it.)

ShouldIHide (talk) 10:21, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

If it is possible to back tract a little, it must be clear by now that - as reported in the New York Times - the blast in the market was most likely from a Ukrainian AA missile. Then again, earlier this year, there were other media reports that a Ukrainian AA missile downed a Russian rocket on to civilian building. Should not this article reflect such information, or do such MSMedia reports undermine claims that the Russians willfully target civilians? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.30.22.209 (talk) 17:44, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Link to the source please, as we do not know what market attack is being talked about. Slatersteven (talk) 17:51, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

The same market blast that Macron claimed the Russians carried out, and the (widely reported) New York Times article called into question.

It would be simple to link to it, or another story about it as it has been said above that there has been more than one such incident. Slatersteven (talk) 12:30, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

• Is there any conclusion to this? Can it be closed? Cinderella157 (talk) 10:13, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians

I don't see anything preventing us from stating this in the lead - It is estimated to have killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians ? Manyareasexpert (talk) 11:04, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

How about we keep the discussion about this passage centralised at one place - #Civilian casualties. It would also be good if you participated in the discussion and responded to questions such as was asked here. The response here: Please all, sources report these as civilian dead, really isn't all that articulate - particularly given the depth of discussion that has occurred both before and since. I have now replied to that comment. Would you close this section please or would you rather that I did? Cinderella157 (talk) 12:45, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

I can see the discussion there is shifted to if the lead should say "estimated" or not so I raised another specific question, again.

Please note that the lead should be written with common sense, is an introduction to an article and a summary of its most important contents. It gives the basics in a nutshell and should stand on its own as a concise overview of the article's topic. It should identify the topic, establish context, explain why the topic is notable, and summarize the most important points. Nothing in WP:LEAD prevents us to partially summarize article body together with sources given as It is estimated to have killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians. It is supported by sources, and it is supported by Casualties section of the article. I don't propose to change it to tens of thousands of civilians killed (that's what you are responding to in your comment), see the correct text of my proposal a few sentences above. I don't care where we discus this until we stay on topic and stay concentrated, Thank you all! Manyareasexpert (talk) 13:43, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

So look Manyareasexpert. It may seem like I am not responding to you, but Cinderella is correct to say that the lede should reflect the body. So fine, I went and looked at the casualty numbers and that turned out to be a rabbit hole, since I found an assortment of discrepancies ranging from the trivial to the bizarre. I realize that this may make me the holdup here from your point of view, but we all want what we are summarizing to reflect reality, right? Right now I have to put RL first and have already put way more time into this than I intended. If you want to advance this faster, maybe you could look at which of the Ukrainian casualty numbers include the Donetsk fighters, various volunteer units, or National Guard, as that is another confounding factor that has not yet addressed. There were also caveats in various sources about "territory controlled by Ukraine" at a given time, which I noticed but did not get into at the time because I had my hands full just getting the article to accurately reflect what the sources said without getting distracted by the footnotes. Back in a few hours. As far as I am concerned the section here can close and the discussion move to the other section. I am not asking for that, but am fine with it. Elinruby (talk) 19:42, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

The number of civilian casualties confirmed by UN is close to 10,000. However, many sources claimed that more than 20,000 civilians were killed only during the siege of Mariupol (there are such on the page). Hence, I think that saying "tens of thousands" would not be an overstatement. My very best wishes (talk) 18:45, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

Ok 42,000 is gone. For some reason this leaves us with only an estimate about Donetsk and Luhansk for civilians, which is of course unacceptable. The UN numbers My very best wishes is talking about are from Sept 25 2023 and also already verified by me on the Casualties page, so I am adding those. Side note on the subject of Luhansk: we don't deem to have any good sources for their casualties. Elinruby (talk) 21:33, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

never mind. I see now that we are considering those confirmed numbers. Hmm. Calls for coffee, then I am heading back into the weeds. Elinruby (talk) 21:48, 30 September .2023 (UTC)

(emerging again from the weeds at Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian War) this seems relevant to the discussion: [31]. I am nowhere near done over there and am taking a break. But there's your tens of thousands, in Mariupol alone, as My very best wishes said. If we aren't using that reference on this page we should be.Elinruby (talk) 04:53, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

• I think we can close this? Cinderella157 (talk) 08:46, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Not sure where you are with your editing ae nd your sleep cycle but if you are still asking for help substantiating 25,000 I'd like you to leave it up until say tomorrow as that is one of the places I'd be looking. I will try to come back and note that I am done. But otherwise I think we agreed above that we need a number for civilian casualties and that Mariupol matters for that. And now we are on to means of doing that. So yes, except for me wanting to be able to easily find that article a bit later tonight, this thread can close can close. Elinruby (talk) 23:04, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

@Cinderella157: The BBC source above uses the 25,000 number for which you are looking for a source. (confirmed)I am looking for that thread to tell you that here. The number isn't attributed. But the BBC apparently believes that the number is so self-evident that it doesn't need a source fwiw. I will keep looking. Elinruby (talk) 02:01, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

casualty numbers

I've been plugging away at verifying the references in the casualties section because, well, we say a quite about them and it should be accurate. I am currently experiencing some cognitive dissonance, however, in that the talk page watchers of an article with a possibly record number of failed verifications, which I am still collating, seem to be insisting that in order to be accurate har har, we can only use, for casualties, the number of confirmed dead. Surely I am misunderstanding that, and that is what is keeping me from sarcasm. A few thoughts, and I will return to wikignoming.

• I am not convinced that the handwaving about inflating numbers for the sake of morale is sufficiently documented except for 2015.
• Ukraine does not release any official mortality numbers.
• To dismiss statements from the mayor of Mariupol, the governor of Kherson, the Ukrainian National Police and assorted comments about Ukrainian intelligence based on the above hand-waving seems awfully dismissive
• all of the above is beside the point, since we have the New York Times estimate of August 18, 2023. I have verified the New York Times figures and am willing send the full text of the article to anyone who wants it and has email enabled.

So um... not sure what the obstinacy is about, if we have 25,000 civilians killed in Mariupol alone. Elinruby (talk) 07:06, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Oh yeah, can we please locate somebody who subscribes to the New York Times and have them archive the article? I think that would help unjam some of this. I am currently connecting to the internet with an assortment of unsupported hardware and obscure browsers that won't work the widgets. I have tried. Elinruby (talk) 07:20, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

Hi Elinruby, I am email enabled (even if you didn't find it before) and I would like to see a transcript of the article. It does look to be pretty important to our discussions and I would like to know what it actually has to say since, if I have this right, it is using an excess mortality analysis and is therefore somewhat different from everything else to date. Other than that, I think this section could be closed? Cinderella157 (talk) 08:43, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

It really doesn't help to have multiple sections opened discussing the same or very similar issues and fork discussions. If this is essentially a response to my post here, then it should be posted in that section. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:37, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

it's related in that it's about the same section but not really in answer to anyone, and I would like to not be see as on a given "side" here. Basically I am saying that all of these other numbers should be accurate because everything on wikipredia should be as accurate as possible, but we aren't going to do math with them, since a source has already done that for us. Why don't we just say "a conflict which the New York Times has described as having over 500,000 military casualties. While the confirmed mortality on all sides is considerably lower, those tracking confirmed deaths have all said that the actual numbers are much higher" or some other version of that? Elinruby (talk) 12:26, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

This is all being discussed above. Slatersteven (talk) 12:29, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

er, no it is not. Elinruby (talk) 22:33, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

This whole casualty discussion now is like a web tangled with a net, I can't make out which way to look at it.

Anyway, there's also for example this source [32] AFP (Twitter) that I've mentioned in previous thread. Mentioning again because as far as I can tell at least one of the other sources for civilian casualties was removed altogether. This one seems perfectly usable to me. ShouldIHide (talk) 11:03, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Which number? A number from FOX News was removed because it was the only news source using it, and its use is discouraged for sourcing facts in the first place per RSN. Also *their* source is primarily known for insisting that Trump won the last election. Another set of numbers, that wasn't in the table but just above it, was removed because it did not match the source that followed it, and the numbers reported by the source, which I would otherwise have used instead, were from a supposed intelligence leak that contained some documents that some were calling fabricated. The talk page section on this is titled "verification problem with casualty numbers" or something quite close to that.

All in all though, there has been a lot of talk about this, that is true, but agreement has been reached to use the NYT source for military deaths. Right? We are now trying to hash out what is the best number/source for civilian casualties, because the NYT article does not address them. That is what the whole discussion strips down to in a nutshell.

"Unknowable" may not have been well explained. It was intended as a reference to the mass graves and unburied dead in Mariupol in particular. And yes I meant thousands not millions, my bad for trying to multi-task. As for AFP on Twitter, we would use the article if anything but I don't know why we aren't using it. Possibly it got thrown out early on as obviously on the hight side. If so and it's recent then maybe we should revisit that.Elinruby (talk) 03:47, 5 October 2023 (UTC)I

for the record I feel that at least some of the confusion here is caused by too many discussions on separate sources being shoe-horned into one thread. But I love you all anyway<g> Please ask me questions if something I say is unclear. Elinruby (talk) 03:59, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

I note someone has changed the heading. Slatersteven (talk) 11:02, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

No actually. Elinruby (talk) 03:59, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

verification problem in casualty section

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

---

Well one of many. I will spare you the gory details unless you really really want to know, but I am here to say that in "On 16 April 2023, The New York Times reported that documents in the 2022–2023 Pentagon document leaks estimated 189,500 to 223,000 Russian and 124,500 to 131,000 Ukrainian casualties." the reference in no way shape or form contains these numbers. Am I missing something? Are they in a graphic? (my current browser does not support images). Suggestions welcome. There definitely was such a leak. A different April 16 NYT article maybe? The reference is good and I will probably use it, but I do not know where these numbers came from. Elinruby (talk) 10:23, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

The numbers, if real, probably come directly from the leaked documents. I can't find a NYT article that publishes those numbers, but there might be one. Mr rnddude (talk) 18:49, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

thank you for looking. Elinruby (talk) 20:24, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

btw I am thinking that apart from Russia and Ukraine both saying that the numbers the NYT *did^ report are inaccurate as to their own losses (of course), the leak itself seems sketchy. I mean, Minecraft and 4chan? So the leaked documents don't seem reliable for purposes of the casualties discussion. The fact that there was a leak may be notable enough to include in some other section. Not sure. The documents cover other matters besides this war, and we are not short of material. Comment is invited on this also. Elinruby (talk) 02:47, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

References

• I think this is resolved and can be closed? Cinderella157 (talk) 08:49, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

People have had a chance to disagree with my proposal and have not done so. So I think this can be closed, yes. Elinruby (talk) 23:12, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

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

Weapon stockpile oddity in 'Timeline'

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

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I noticed there's an oddity, possibly even a slightly dodgy bias where it says "On 18 April, ... , without adequate weapons in Ukraine's highly limited stockpiles of weapons."

Countless European countries delivered tons upon tons of weapons aid to Ukraine immediately in February and March. Not only tens of thousands of assault rifles etc., but actually everything from pistols to howitzers to surface-to-air missile systems. Check List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War. The Czechs alone sent 10,000 RPGs and loads of other stuff before April.

So that statement made in late April about supposedly inadequate weaponry seems dubious. The Ukrainians seemed to do a pretty good job of fighting 175,000 Russians for two months supposedly without proper weapons. This is a bit of conflicting information here. Maybe other sources would be useful to check against this PBS interview?

ShouldIHide (talk) 15:27, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Source? Also this appears to be an attributed statement, and not a statement if fact. Slatersteven (talk) 15:29, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

It is an attributed statement. And conflicting.

Source for what?

ShouldIHide (talk) 16:05, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

It not being true. Slatersteven (talk) 16:07, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War

Everything in there from European countries where it says it was delivered in or before April 2022. Contrast to the 'Timeline' text that implies "the US (and others)" only started discussing founding a coalition on 26 April. Which is several weeks after 10 or so countries already had provided significant amounts of weaponry (or decided to do so).

The statements are properly sourced to that PBS interview etc. I'm sure, but I'm not so sure the narrative is entirely correct.

ShouldIHide (talk) 16:19, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

That is when it was approved, not when it arrived. You need a source saying when it arrived. Un till you do so there is not more to be said.Slatersteven (talk) 16:25, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Are you suggesting the aid approved by the whatever, "coalition" that was formed some time after April 26th arrived before the aid that was approved in February or early March by several European countries? I don't see a source for that either. ShouldIHide (talk) 16:33, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Here's a source also from PBS [33] dated April 25th 2022, that says Czech Republic (and Poland) already had supplied artillery and even tanks to Ukraine.

That doesn't support saying the US (and others) only started considering starting a coalition to maybe provide military assistance on the 26th, which is one day later than the 25th.

ShouldIHide (talk) 16:29, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Read wp:v, this could be used to say "by Apr 25, 2022 the Czechs has supplied heavy ordnance" (for example) not to show that a statement talking about the situation 5 days before is inaccurate. I also see no mention of RPG's, not for the amount sent (so it could still be "limited stockpiles. Read wp:or and find a source that says before the 18th Ukraine was in receipt of large amounts of military equipment. I am not going to point this out again. So my last comment here until you find a source that backs your claim up (explicitly). Slatersteven (talk) 16:39, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Just to clarify, I was not suggesting making any specific change.

I was curious as to whether others might see the same problem I did and if so (or if not) discussing it here. It's about pointing things out and making you think about it, not specifics. Not always specifics. ShouldIHide (talk) 16:44, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

If you're interested in fixating on RPG's, read List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War. It's in the entry titled "Czech Republic". You're welcome.

Best regards, ShouldIHide (talk) 16:47, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I also don't understand why you require double sourcing things that are already on Wikipedia.

Anyway, since this was trivial to find: "By early April 2022, the volume of military aid provided by Czechia to Ukraine already approached some $430 million, making the country one of the largest contributers of military aid in NATO." [34]https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2022/07/bohemian-brotherhood-list-of-czech.html

Cheers ShouldIHide (talk) 16:57, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

This is not "general discussion", this is precisely aimed at improving the article. I don't know why you seem to have assumed otherwise. I said I think this section is possibly flawed and I welcome further discussion on how to improve it. ShouldIHide (talk) 17:11, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Here's yet another source [35] (The Irish Times) dated Feb 27, 2022. This reports that sending significant military aid was agreed upon by the EU already then, three days after the start of the invasion. It also notes 14 different European countries "increasing military aid to Ukraine". In February.

So implying in the article that this military (and "economic") help was only beginning to be planned on 26 April is quite misleading. Actually it does not even say that this help was agreed upon, it only says they were "discussing" forming a coalition. This "US+40" coalition also is different and separate from the aid from the EU and individual European countries. Or certainly was at that point in time, before the coalition was actually formed!

Just to be clear, the US had provided weapons to Ukraine even much before the invasion. But that's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about the response (and by extension, Ukrainian military capability) immediately after the invasion.

Thoughts? ShouldIHide (talk) 02:46, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I have tagged the text as failed verification for several reasons. The attributed text is misattributed (ie was not Lieutenant General Douglas Lute but another). References were made to stockpiles of ammunition in the case of Ukraine (not weapons) and equipment and ammunition for Russia (not just weapons). The Ukrainian call-up age reported was 18, not 16. To ... a new assault on eastern Ukraine which would be limited to Russia's original deployment of 150,000 to 190,000 troops for the invasion ... the figures were not given. This would be WP:SYNTH - relying on a second source that is not actually given. This text might be salvageable if there is a desire to do so but it would need to be substantially different. Cinderella157 (talk) 04:28, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I have not looked into this question but am glad to see this discussion, and the focus on what the sources actually say. Elinruby (talk) 16:45, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• I have deleted the passage that was tagged as failing verification. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:02, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

  Quick glance, the section reads just as well or better completely without the removed passage. Seems like an improvement to me. ShouldIHide (talk) 11:08, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

• This can probably be closed as resolved? Cinderella157 (talk) 09:04, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

  With regard to this specific thing, "inadequate weapon stockpiles" (March-April 2022), the article doesn't suggest that anymore. So yes I think so, resolved. ShouldIHide (talk) 11:15, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

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

Adding Tiers of Supporters to resolve disagreements on what Support should mean

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I understand that we've already had a discussion about this, but I think if we make it clear what level of support they are giving (Iran is but supplying the Russians drones, while the initial attack on Kiev because Belarus closed roads to allow troops to mobilize along its southern border), it will be fine to add NATO or Iran. "Supporters" could be changed "Active Supporters," while the new lower tier might be called something along the lines of "Inactive Supporters," exclusively providing military aid to one side and/or sanctioning the other. You could even add another infobox or paragraph about each country's or some such organization's opinion on the conflict, even if they haven't done the canonical actions that speak louder than words. RealNamesAreFineZ.E.O (talk) 16:26, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

see FAQ. Slatersteven (talk) 16:30, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

To answer your question, please see the article’s FAQ and search the talk archives to better understand the consensus on this. Be aware of WP:GS/RUSUKR before editing this talk page.  —Michael Z. 16:31, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I'm allowed to reask the question If I have something new to add. RealNamesAreFineZ.E.O (talk) 16:53, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes, so add it, as your OP is not anything new. Slatersteven (talk) 16:55, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

The use of "supported by" in the infobox is now deprecated so the proposal is rendered irrelevant by this. Whether Belarus is an exception to this is the subject of an open RfC (above). As a note, non-ECP users may not participate in an RfC under WP:GS/RUSUKR. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:51, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

• I think we can close this? Cinderella157 (talk) 08:47, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

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

Mariupol deaths failed verification

@Cinderella157, so first you remove a source [36] confirming the number, and then you put "failed verification" [37] instead. Manyareasexpert (talk) 11:35, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

The source I removed does not independently confirm the statements of the AP source but directly cites and reports the AP article. WP:NEWSORG is relevant to that removal. As I said in the edit summary removing it: This ref is just citing the one before. It is redundant and adds nothing of substance. The tag for failing verification gives the reason: What the source actually says is: "But at least three people in the city since June say the number killed is triple that or more, based on conversations with workers documenting body collection from the streets for the Russian occupation authorities" and referring to an earlier (May) opinion/estimate by the municipality of 25,000. The AP source is being misrepresented in what it actually says in respect to the figure of 75,000 being reported herein. It did not rely on investigation of satellite photos of Mariupol mass graves to give a number of up to 75,000 killed civilians in the Mariupol area. The text added to the article is an unconscionable misrepresentation of how the figure of 75,000 was arrived at and its reliability - particularly because the sentence was crafted to push a particular WP:POINT. The tag is more than justified and justifiable. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:55, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

But the AP investigation into life in occupied Mariupol also underlines what its residents already know all too well: No matter what the Russians do, they are building upon a city of death. More than 10,000 new graves now scar Mariupol, the AP found, and the death toll might run three times higher than an early estimate of at least 25,000. [38] Manyareasexpert (talk) 13:00, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Due to hardware/software issues my end (I guess, because you two apparently don't have them) I cannot open the AP link and am switching devices. Based on the discussion though I have removed the failed verification tag and rewritten as "25,000 but noted that the actual total could be three times higher". This is just a shot in the dark at a way forward on this and you don't need to consult me about any re-do of that text. I may have more to say about this later. Elinruby (talk) 02:46, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

OK so. I see my change here got swept up in the great revert ;) but just as a drive-by opinion: if the issue is that the text says 25,000 but it could be three times that high, that should be written out that way with a conditional verb. And this problem should be easy to solve. I will say I think we need to talk about Mariupol in terms of the sheer scale of the casualties to at least some point. One of the articles talks about big Soviet-style apartment buildings that were shelled and still hadn't been cleared.Elinruby (talk) 04:54, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

@Cinderella157 if there is no more "failed verification" objection to the text currently in the article, supported with two sources discussed, can we remove the tag? Manyareasexpert (talk) 09:11, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Manyareasexpert, I acknowledge your edit. I am framing a further edit to the subject passage and will remove the tag when I do so. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:41, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

The AP article refers to a figure of 25,000 from May 2022 attributed to the municipal government in exile stating that an estimated 25,000 people at a minimum had died. I am seeing not such report in a search of news sources and no such report at Siege of Mariupol. Any assistance in finding this?. Cinderella157 (talk) 13:15, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

I have been away all day and have stuff to do RL, but yes, I saw that number in that text, which did open for me with a different browser. I can look in about an hour to see if I can find a reference for it. I haven't specifically tried to find one for that yet. Elinruby (talk) 22:51, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Re 25,000: confirming that the BBC source [39] uses the number. That talk page section can be closed afaiac. Will try to say so there. CBC also uses the number: [40]. Still lookingat this. Elinruby (talk) 02:20, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

I am finding it extremely annoying to find remarks in the near-infinite scroll produced by merging all of the casualty discussions together, including the harassing re-readingcomplaint that I am supposedly arguing settled matters. Could somebody uninvolved please collapse that thread? Meanwhile, I looked over half an hour to re-find this thread, and that was with ctl-F at my disposal.

But anyway. BBC and CAC say that 25,000 comes from "Ukrainian officials" but here is an academic source that arrives at the number a different way. See Page 13: [41] (PDF) Elinruby (talk) 02:59, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

I see that I am still not in the section Cinderella is calling the "main" discussion. But it concerns Mariupol so for now I am putting Mariupol with Matiupol, the heck with it. Here is a book that says 20,000 [42] Elinruby (talk) 03:15, 4 October 2023 (UTC) The Google Books version doesn't seem to do page numbers but it does have "search inside: Try "Mariupol 25,000 Elinruby (talk) 03:19, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

• Politico citing 25,000 to "Ukrainian officials": [43]
• Guardian cites AP [44]

I understand that you are looking for the original use of the number, but these mentions do corroborate the number in that they are RS who at a minimum accepted the number as reported. Going to do something else for a while, back later Elinruby (talk) 03:43, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Just to recap, we are discussing this AP article dated 23 December 2023. Particularly at this point I am trying to confirm this statement: Back in May, when the city finally fell, the municipal government in exile estimated 25,000 people at a minimum had died by identifying the originating source, which is proving to be elusive. There are several articles that rereport the AP article (see this search).

Detailed review of sources trying to confirm the statement

This AP article of 10 April 2022 states: Mayor Vadym Boychenko told The Associated Press that at least 21,000 people were killed in Mariupol with bodies. This AP article of 10 April 2022 states: The mayor of the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol said Monday that more than 10,000 civilians have died in the Russian siege of his city, and that the death toll could surpass 20,000 Yuras Karmanau, is listed as one of the authors of both articles. The PBS here on 11 April 2022 states (reprinting AP): The mayor of the Ukrainian port city of Mariupol said Monday that more than 10,000 civilians have died in the Russian siege of his city, and that the death toll could surpass 20,000 ... We already use this source (see reference to mobile crematorium equipment). This CNN article of 12 April states: "The Mariupol situation makes it difficult to comment on the number of casualties, the city is under siege and blockaded," Pavlo Kyrylenko, the head of the Donetsk regional military administration, told CNN. "We are currently discussing 20,000 to 22,000 people dead in Mariupol." This is rereported here and here. This CNN article of 24 May 2022 stated: Speaking to CNN’s Melissa Bell [in Kyiv], Petro Andriushchenko [the mayor's assistant?] — who has fled to Ukrainian held territory — said that Mariupol town hall officials believe that at least 22,000 residents of the city were killed during three months of war — a figure that cannot be independently supported, with the free press now unable to get access to the city and those still inside too scared to speak openly. The figure of 22,000 is based, Andriushchenko said, on the many contacts he and other town hall officials continue to have with officials trapped inside. But he believes the actual figure could be much higher. This is rereported here with attribution to CNN on 25 May 2022. This AP article of 25 May 2022 states: At least 21,000 people were killed in the siege, according to Ukrainian authorities, who have accused Russia of trying to cover up the horrors by bringing in mobile cremation equipment and by burying the dead in mass graves. I am seeing other AP article reporting the same 21,000 figure (see this search). This article in the Indian Express dated 25 May 2022 (reprinting AP) states: At least 21,000 people were killed in the siege, according to Ukrainian authorities, who have accused Russia of trying to cover up the horrors by bringing in mobile cremation equipment and by burying the dead in mass graves. Burman, in Republicworld here on 30 May 2022 states: Mariupol City Council says the real civilian death toll in the occupied city of Mariupol could possibly be higher than the previously-estimated 22,000 people ... reports have emerged that the real civilian death toll in the occupied city of Mariupol could possibly be higher than the previously-estimated 22,000 people. Taking to Telegram, local authorities reported that the Russians have already buried 16,000 people in mass graves and communal workers have buried another 5,000 as of mid-March. ... "We estimated the number of dead Mariupol residents at 22,000. But more and more facts show that the consequences of racist crime are much worse. This needs special attention from the world community, as well as the terrible situation of the local population in the occupation," said Mariupol Mayor Vadym Boychenko. This AP article of 4 June 2022 states: In Mariupol alone, officials have reported over 21,000 civilian dead. The Politico report here of 9 June 2022 (I confirmed the date) and attributed AP states: At least 21,000 Mariupol civilians were killed during the weeks-long Russian siege, Ukrainian authorities have estimated. This working paper of 29 July 2022 states The mayor of Mariupol estimated that at least 22,000 residents had died there (Burman, 2022). I pencil in 25,000 for the number of dead in Mariupol. Burman is published in Republicworld.com (see above). This NYT article of 24 August 2022 states: Ukrainian officials believe that at least 22,000 people were killed. This BBC article of 7 November 2022 states: Ukrainian officials now believe that at least 25,000 people were killed in the fighting in Mariupol ... I was only able to catch a glimpse of this Times article of 8 November 2022. This DM article of 8 November 2022 states: Kyiv now believes at least 25,000 civilians died in the months-long Russian siege of Mariupol ... The CBC report here of 24 November 2022 states: Ukrainian officials estimate that at least 25,000 people were killed. This Forbes article of 25 November 2022 states: The 15,000 figure is conservative when considering that in the port city of Mariupol alone authorities estimate as many as 25,000 people are either dead or missing. This Reuters article of 25 November 2022 states: The 15,000 figure is conservative when considering that in the port city of Mariupol alone authorities estimate as many as 25,000 people are either dead or missing. The Guardian here on 28 April 2023 states: Associated Press has reported that at least 10,000 new graves are scattered across the city and the death toll is estimated to be at least 25,000.

The only source that matches the attribution Back in May, when the city finally fell, the municipal government in exile ... is This CNN article of 24 May 2022 where it actually stated: town hall officials believe that at least 22,000 residents of the city were killed.

In summary, here is what we can say of the AP article dated 23 December 2023. AP journalist were able to find three people in Mariupol (of no particular qualification save that they converse with body collectors and had been there since June) who apparently say "the number killed is triple that or more" in reference a figure of 25,000 allegedly reported in May by the municipal government in exile but the actual report would say they "believe [emphasis added] that at least 22,000 residents of the city were killed". What we have here is a case of Chinese whispers and some creative journalism. One should never let the facts get in the way of a good story. I think this falls to WP:VNOT. Their credibility is shot to pieces. Cinderella157 (talk) 03:50, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

Who exactly would you talk to if you were an AP reporter in Mariupol? I think the number of bodies in the morgue is at least a measure of something tangible. Also please chill with the remarks about journalists as I find them very insulting. Three AP reporters risked their lives to report Mariupol. As best I can determine, you are dismissing that because the number of confirmed casualties got larger with time? I don't see how that is surprising or is proof of some sort of breach of journalistic ethics. It would have been easier to not report this story, for sure. Anyway. I think you are conflating two things: the 25,000 number and the suggestion that the real number is three times higher. Let's start with 25,000. The fact that an academic reached it independently is something you don't include in your analysis. Also "ukrainian sources" could mean the chief of staff on background, which would make it a fairly considered number; the question is whether that means accurate. I take it you did not find a name in your looking is making me think that this is the case, but I am note ready to say that yet. ShouldIHide asks above why we aren't using the Norwegian general's numbers. Do you know?

re the Times; it's a one-paragraph blurb about a documentary. Elinruby (talk) 07:00, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

Please read what I quoted from the academic source. The 25,000 just got pencilled in. The issue is not that the figure grew with time but that the figure in May believed to be at least 22,000 became in May an "estimated 25,000 people at a minimum had died". The source for what is really a figure of 22,000 is the mayor's assistant. He is named. You might have missed all of the stuff in the collapsible box. I did find what I was looking for. There has been a misquote in the AP source.

To the AFP source, I have no intrinsic issue with using it except that we should be citing the actual article and not a tweet and, it is possibly dated for certain figures. Cinderella157 (talk) 07:27, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

Then I will take another look, because I am not sure where you saw a misquote. But what I think you are saying is that you think the number msy be correct-ish, but you want to use AP as the source. I have no problem with citing AP. As I recall there was a period when they were the only reporters in Mariupol. But ok, meanwhile I will take another look. Re email, np. We should take a look at our archiving procedures. Re ZMINA: seems plausible as one of the independent Russian journalists. We should maybe ask a Russian speaker to take a look. Re Mariupol, so you think the 25,000 comes from adding a bit on to the 22,000? It's not a static number, you know, they are still digging. Re BBC source talks about huge Stalin-era highrises where everybody died. Re academic source, is "pencilled in" not synonymous with "estimated"*? The only firm number is the number of bodies in the morgue, and you are poo-pooing that...so please explain what you would consider a reliable source for this? You're saying that the mayor of Mariupol doesn't have credentials, yet you're also not accepting a highly cited accademic source? Elinruby (talk) 01:14, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

Nomenclature

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NYT: The War in Ukraine

WSJ: Ukraine War

BBC: Ukraine War/War in Ukraine/Russia Ukraine War

The Guardian: Russian Ukraine War

TASS: Military Operation in Ukraine

A plethora of Ukraine media:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18006248 &

Radio Ukraine International (short wave): http://www.nrcu.gov.ua/

Ukrainian Wikipedia: https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%93%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BD%D0%B0_%D1%81%D1%82%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%96%D0%BD%D0%BA%D0%B0

Al Jazeera: Ukraine War/Russian Ukraine War

50/50, from what I can tell. (I myself prefer "Ukraine War". In any case, we need to move on from "Russian Invasion of Ukraine".) kencf0618 (talk) 14:36, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Russo-Ukrainian War, is the article about the war, this is an article about the invasion. Slatersteven (talk) 14:39, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

The escalation since 24 February 2022 is a whole 'nother war, one that stands on its own two feet. No one was calling the prior hostilities the largest land war in Europe since WWII. (Can't speak to the break-up of Yugoslavia.) kencf0618 (talk) 14:44, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

As you say, its an escalation, not a whole other war. But I am sure others have opinions too. Slatersteven (talk) 14:48, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Російське вторгнення в Україну (з 2022) translates as "Russian invasion of Ukraine (from 2022)"... https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A0%D0%BE%D1%81%D1%96%D0%B9%D1%81%D1%8C%D0%BA%D0%B5_%D0%B2%D1%82%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%B3%D0%BD%D0%B5%D0%BD%D0%BD%D1%8F_%D0%B2_%D0%A3%D0%BA%D1%80%D0%B0%D1%97%D0%BD%D1%83_(%D0%B7_2022)... Hmmm... What do official Ukrainian statements have to say? kencf0618 (talk) 14:53, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

Bad logic. You first declare they are two different conflicts, then argue that a characteristic only applies to one of them.

But nobody can deny that Russia started its war against Ukraine when it invaded in February 2014. “A whole 'nother war, one that stands on its own two feet” is meaningless nonsense.  —Michael Z. 16:18, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

I think it's one same war, myself, but the article had to be split someplace and I am content with the way it was dove. I oppose any attempt to remove "Russian" from the name however. Remove Russia from the story and there is no war. Elinruby (talk) 18:09, 23 September 2023 (UTC)

In any case, we need to move on from "Russian Invasion of Ukraine".)
Looks like the proposal is supported by sources.
We just need to properly rename other articles (Russo-Ukrainian War) as well. Manyareasexpert (talk) 20:43, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

Looks like people don't necessarily agree with you. Personally, You lost me at TASS, but let's look at this another way. Why is any change necessary? I'd prefer Russian war in Ukraine, myself, but I don't see what is so fundamentally wrong with the current title that a potentially very disruptive page move is needed. Maybe start by making that case. Elinruby (talk) 08:17, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

WP:CRITERIA Article titles are based on how reliable English-language sources refer to the article's subject. Note the proposal, as I understand, is not to remove Russian from the name, it's to change Invasion to War. Manyareasexpert (talk) 08:25, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

In other words "Russian War in Ukraine"? Elinruby (talk) 14:37, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Probably we need more sources and more analysis to decide but I don't see this particular name prevalent in sources. Manyareasexpert (talk) 14:40, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

ok, that's a good name if so, but I just look a look at the list of past move discussions and really, life is too short. I simply don't see the need for the proposed move, especially when it isn't really clear what the proposal is. Is this just a quibble over "invasion" vs "war"? Elinruby (talk) 14:57, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

I see War is prevalent in today's sources, and when I read back this article, feels like it needs to change. Manyareasexpert (talk) 15:00, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

I am not against "Russian War in Ukraine" and in fact I think that I changed the name of one of these articles to exactly that, at some point back in February 2022. But I've since taken a big break from the article and some of the stuff that has gone on in its subpages, so I don't know why the name has changed since then. I assume there were reasons; maybe somebody will tell us. Meanwhile, if that's the proposal, I am not against that name if a consensus develops for a change but I am not *advocating* a change either. Life is short and I personally would rather spend my time on the references. If you want to discuss a name change, your time is yours to spend as you wish.

I'm neutral on this proposal meanwhile. I will however add that my concern over disruption may be misplaced; the move I am thinking of was more of a split and a lot of incoming links had to be disambiguated by hand, but I don't think that would be the case here. In general I do agree that several sections of the article should be updated. Elinruby (talk) 15:37, 25 September 2023 (UTC)

Just to chime in, I think the current title is fine as it is.

It is a continuation or escalation of what started in 2014, but like others said above, it probably needed to be split in some way. I see no significant problem in this regard.

ShouldIHide (talk) 07:48, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

nod, on reflection I think my title was 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, or 2022 Russian war in Ukraine, and probably the reason was simply that it is no longer 2022. Which is a good reason.Elinruby (talk) 16:59, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

• I think this can be closed as falling at the start? Cinderella157 (talk) 10:15, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

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

Casualties section (again?)

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I see two US estimates for UA casualties, one until May, another until August, 2023 , should the older one be removed?
Add: same for RU casualties. Manyareasexpert (talk) 11:55, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I think so, but maybe hold off just a second. I was trying about a week ago to figure out if there is any point in keeping the historical figures. I didn't really get any kind of consensus back on that, but digging into the numbers, I found (as an analogy) that numbers for refugees and internally displaced civilians spiked at ~8 million in 2022 and the numbers currently being reported are ~5 million. Assuming there aren't big differences in tabulation methods, that's interesting. But we have a whole Casualties subpage, which was, when I went through it, rather more up-to-date and maintained than this one. So the nuance here is that while I think that *this* page should reflect the most up-to-date figures, I'd like to make sure that any sources removed from it are available on Casualties in the Russo-Ukrainian war, for the benefit of anyone who wants the statistical detail. A couple of other points to consider:

• I think the actual most up-to-date numbers are the Ukrainian numbers coming from the Kiev Independent, which has some sort of ongoing ticker, but there are a couple of problems with that.

• a) people tend to discount Ukrainian numbers as high, although they probably are the most grounded in official records like how many bodies are in the morgue.
• b) the numbers are displayed without attribution. It looks like they are coming from the Ukrainian military, yet the ticker seems to be a day or two ahead of the numbers on that webpage. There could very well be reasons for this, like (speculation follows) the numbers being released in a press release from the military but not making it to the webpage for a day or so. I have been meaning to get back to nailing this down. If you want to investigate this? Someone updates the Ukrainian numbers every couple of days. (I will follow this post up with one that has links and his user name).
• c) The August 18th New York Times numbers were calculated with the "excess mortality" methodology used for calculating deaths from covid, whereas the others were the result of compilation. I am not sure of the significance of this, but am inclined to think that if it is good enough for WHO it should be good enough for wikipedia. I am also fairly certain that anything the New York Times has that many reporters on is probably correct, myself.

But that is what I know about this, as an entirely separate issue from the deadlock over what numbers to use in the lede Elinruby (talk) 16:38, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

We really need to wait till the war is over, and any figure we give will be out of date a second after we post it. Slatersteven (talk) 16:57, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

No, no we don't. While we aren't ever going to reflect yesterday's casualties, this should not be an excuse for making statements using numbers that are a year or more out of date. I am going to ignore any further suggestions to this effect as mere trolling. Elinruby (talk) 17:46, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes. We absolutely do not "really need to wait till the war is over".

We will at any given time report the current latest numbers, estimated and/or "confirmed". The numbers most probably will change as time goes on. There is no problem with this, we will then simply update the numbers.

This principle applies in general. If the subject was "unified theory of gravity", we also do not wait until they have 100% figured it out, we go by what is currently known/reported about it. ShouldIHide (talk) 21:55, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

The May figure is from NY Times and is paywalled. Would be good if it could be archived so it could be seen. The August figure is unsourced and needs a source that is preferably viewable. Because I can't see either, I can't make an informed comment in detail. However, it is quite possible that the context of the reports may give good reason for keeping both at this time. Just because they are both attributed to the US does not mean that they come from the same source. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:55, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

have you looked recently? Because it was originally paywalled and then it wasn't, from my (completely different) location. I can't remember what the other source was, but it wasn't the NYT, and I will add that the NYT is using excess mortality calculations like WHO did for covid. while the others are compiling data points kind of like this article does. So no, they aren't the same thing. I am not sure that makes a difference though? It still seems like the most authoritative number. I'll come back to the rest when I have had another look at what is in that section exactly. Elinruby (talk) 03:38, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Tried looking at it just before I made the post above. Cinderella157 (talk) 09:02, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

OK. I might have an internet archive extension on some device. I will look tomorrow maybe. Meanwhile, I have problems in the casualties section and may not finish tonight. I think we are talking about different numbers. The unsourced figures were souced to Fox News. I removed that and tried pretty hard to find a better source for the numbers but there doesn't seem to be one. The Fox article quoted a Republican senator I had never heard of (ie probably not on any committee where he might have inside knowledge}, and I have not found those numbers anywhere else. I replaced it in the Russia section. More later, but apparently this section needs more work. I just came in to make a post about the one problem I found. The numbers from that leak must be somewhere -- I haven't looked yet -- but they aren't in that reference afaict Elinruby (talk) 10:38, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the message. The link still didn't work but the excerpt was useful. The issue is with the Fox source that hasn't been cited. I believe you are saying that a little known senator is the ultimate source and we have no good reason to treat them as credible. I will accept your assessment. WP:VNOT applies. If not already removed, it seems OK to me to do so. Cinderella157 (talk) 01:12, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

Had a closer look. The figures are not being attributed to the senator but attributed as: U.S. officials told Fox News. The data was based on the latest American battlefield assessment of the war ... Looking about, Fox has been cited for the same figures by other newsorgs but it would appear that these U.S. officials have spoken exclusively to Fox - something I do find curious, that these battlefield assessments by the US were not released more widely. Furthermore, it doesn't appear that there have been subsequent US figures released for civilian casualties. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:37, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

This is interesting and something I hadn't noticed yet: Furthermore, it doesn't appear that there have been subsequent US figures released for civilian casualties US officials who only talk to FOX News were actually pretty common in the Trump years. I am pretty sure I saw a name -- I mean, I got "Senator" -- but I didn't recognize it and though I don't edit in the topic area I follow US politics pretty closely and have for some years. I will probably be in the history in the next day or so looking for something else, so I will try to find that also.

I too find it strange.

I don't know why you are paywalled and I am not. Sure we are in different countries but I don't subscribe (?) The best way to deal with this is probably to get these archived somehow if possible, no? Maybe the resouce exchange can help with that. I am having the same problem with the Financial Times, which afaik also has a pretty staid and meticulous reputation, and is used a lot in the Ukraine articles. However I can't get past the headlines.

I have been taking these FT cites on faith, but I am not sure that I should do that any more. I only came in here to do some copyediting because I can't sleep, though, so I am calling this a manana problem. Elinruby (talk) 07:15, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

There is no issue with the NYT source, thought it should be archive so that it is generally viewable and I can't do this from my end. Perhaps somebody else can. WP:VNOT might apply to the Fox source. If nobody else is arguing for its retention, the material being attributed to it should be removed. However, the figure arising from it is the only thing in the casualties section that supports an assertion of tens of thousands killed, as might be written into the lead. I don't want to fork the discussion about the lead but flag it here as being a consideration. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:15, 29 September 2023 (UT

my goal here is accuracy not a particular total. Given the problems I found yesterday and the day before in the Casualties section I am no longer certain that it is accurate but it is the next thing I am going to work on, so that should change soon. What I am taking away from the discussion here is that we both at this point consider the August 18 NYT reference verified as accurately reflecting its source and the uncited US numbers in the estimated casualties table as some sort of random FOX babble whose purpose is unclear but whose accuracy is unlikely given that neither you nor I can verify them to anywhere but that one FOX News article. I will be back in a while.Elinruby (talk) 19:12, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

Elinruby, that is a fair assessment. Our goals are not dissimilar. I was simply pointing to a consequence - we should write the body and then the lead comes naturally. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:49, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

Cinderella157 right. I am just a bit confused about why you think you need to point that out to me. But no worries. I have a few hours for the casualty table now. The thing about a focus on the body count is that this is not that kind of war, and we know for a fact untold numbers of bodies are still in the rubble in Mariupol, for example. But I will work on getting what we are adding up to be as correct as possible and we can go from there. And, getting back to the original question, what do you think about the historical figures moving to the Casualties subpage, assuming they aren't already there? Granting that this question does not define "historical figure"? Let's just say "no longer current"? Elinruby (talk) 18:52, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

emerging from the weeds: I have been on the Casualties page and while I have seen worse garbage it wasn't often. The first five references I checked in the text under the "total casualties" table all failed verification, and not for trivialities. More like they were originally there to support some other text that has since been deleted. I am going to concentrate on comparing the two tables for a while. The 42,000 figure is one of the discrepancies I described as bizarre and I am going to remove it. It is *not* independent, as FOX frequently spreads Trumpist disinformation. The part I don't understand about it is what the purpose of saying that would be from their point of view. Elinruby (talk) 21:13, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

• Can this be marked as resolved and closed or is there something outstanding still? Cinderella157 (talk) 08:55, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

  The table still has an estimate from March 2022, who needs that? Manyareasexpert (talk) 09:17, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

  Manyareasexpert, yes, I agree. I am just about to make a post at #Recent revert of Elinruby that relates to this - that the tables should reflect the most recent information. Please remove it. This is the problem with having multiple discussion open on essentially the same issues. Given this, can we close this one? Cinderella157 (talk) 10:11, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

heh. I think we are in pet peeve territory. The problem with have big mega-sections is that usually come of the questions don't get answered ;) But to answer the actual question here: I asked about this back when I was thnking that maybe these estimates should move to Casualties in the Russo-Ukrainian War and didn't get an answer until last night. To answer my own question, I personally think that we should but trying to present the current situation. Cinderella seemed to agree and you apparently do also. So yay. The Casualties page however is trying to collate news agency blurbs; but yes, I would still like to remove those older numbers and since apparently nobody disagrees this sec

Elinruby, I think we are in agreement here as to what the Casualties section here should be doing - concentrating on the most up-to-date reliable figures from the two belligerents and independent assessments. I think you also wanted some feedback on Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian War#Russian invasion of Ukraine. IMHO, it could be, for the most, a carbon copy of what is here. It might be appropriate for it to add some additional detail. However, some of what is there is IMHO too granular, particularly the tabulated info for foreign civilians, foreign fighters and specific prisoner exchanges. Some of the info there is also too dated to be relevant. WP:NOTNEWS would apply to a lot of stuff. For myself, I have pretty much given up on that whole section. If you want to take it on, kudos to you. If you do, I would be happy to keep a watch on how it develops and engage in any discussions that arise. If that now addresses any thing that was outstanding, then we can close this now? Cinderella157 (talk) 01:29, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

Re Casualties page, the content in the tables themselves is in very good condition, actually, but the referencing is sketchy in places. Just wanted to put that out there. Almost entirely news-agency blurbs, sometimes just a headline. I was able to remove about three of the cites to TASS by finding other articles about the same thing. The remainder still there are for statements by the government of Luhansk about casualties in Luhansk. I think they are saying it's ABOUTSELF. Beyond that though, that will always be a very incomplete compilation, yes. But hey they are doing it. And in the hierarchy of articles they should be summarized here, right? Not today of course. At some point. Elinruby (talk) 01:52, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

Re closing this thread: ok with me Elinruby (talk) 01:58, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

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

No reference to Russia only targeting military targets during first strikes.

see title. 118.149.86.83 (talk) 05:06, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Please offer a reliable source that states this information. 331dot (talk) 07:37, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

There is very unlikely to be a source that would literally say this. The question is did they target only military targets or other targets ("infrastructure" etc.) also.

I say it is up to us to decide how we report this. In the absence of sources we should not report it was only military targets.

So unless you can find a source for only military targets, please go ahead and remove mention of this if it exists in the article. ShouldIHide (talk) 06:11, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

This source [45], france24.com, for example says Russia claims to have destroyed such and such number of military targets, but there is nothing saying it would have been only military targets. So we should also not say that. ShouldIHide (talk) 06:40, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

Read wp:v and wp:or, if RS do not say it we cannot. Slatersteven (talk) 10:08, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

"In the absence of sources we should not report it was only military targets."

You go and read my post above before you tell me what to read. Pretty please? ShouldIHide (talk) 19:48, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

What article text is this about? Manyareasexpert (talk) 10:26, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

'Background', former Eastern Bloc, NATO

The very first sentence of 'Background' currently talks about former Eastern Bloc countries joining NATO because of "regional conflicts".

Where should I start... well, which former EB countries did join NATO and when? Poland? Czechia/Slovakia? And when was this, late 90's and early 2000's, right. What "regional conflicts" were there in any of these future NATO countries at those times? I don't think there were any. There were List of conflicts in territory of the former Soviet Union conflicts all over Asia and the Caucasus, but not in European soon-to-be NATO countries.

What is the supposed significance of other countries (not Ukraine) joining or aspiring to join NATO? (especially if it happened in the 1990's)

And then there's quite a bit of dissonance overall, the narrative is hard to follow. First it makes many references to NATO this, NATO that. But in 2013, what Russia opposed was Ukraine joining the European Union, which is very different and has nothing to do with NATO. This should be made clear.

I think this section has been recently edited and some parts removed for other reasons, leaving the current revision a bit incoherent. There's room for improvement here. Thoughts? ShouldIHide (talk) 22:53, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Click on the linked article that will tell you, and it also says "and the security threat posed by Russia", so do not remove part of a sentence when quoting. Slatersteven (talk) 12:09, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Just stop harassing and deflecting from the actual topic. ShouldIHide (talk) 05:50, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

Anyone who wants to be helpful, or anyone who wants to understand what I'm talking about, want to chime in?

I'm emphasizing the point: what is, in this article, supposed to be the significance of "several former Eastern Bloc states" joining NATO? Is the article hinting that post-Soviet Russia should have or have had authority to say which independent countries are allowed to join NATO or other international organizations?

Russia seems to have been trying to assert this. So then we had a couple of quotes from people saying he didn't. Again, it is reasonable to ask whether this is still due in 2023. Elinruby (talk) 05:09, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Ukraine was never a "former Eastern Bloc" state, Ukraine as the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was part of the Soviet Union itself. Not everyone probably knows this. So there is an opportunity, possibly, to improve the article which is what I'm interested in. ShouldIHide (talk) 06:03, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

I answered this in another section, but briefly NATO is (maybe should be was?) significant in that had Ukraine been accepted Russia probably would not have invaded. Also. Putin claims NATO is trying to... something. Crowd him maybe. The content is probably there to say that other countries joined NATO because they didn't want to be next. Its semi-relevant but not a must-have imho, and besides, people know about Putin now, and the article should not bludgeon the reader with discrediting Putin. Whether this content is still due in 2023 is a reasonable question. Are we still talking about the background section? Because it is gone from there, isn't it? As for Eastern Bloc, I think you are right. Unless the context is early 2000s hth Elinruby (talk) 04:41, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

I think I understand what happened. I commented out some material to show a proposed cut to the material and Asarlaí uncommented it, presumably because they feel it is important. That editor needs to find their way to the talk page, but as of this writing the uncommented text is still there and protocol says the cut has to be discussed. I have a proposal. I agree that there is a lot of material possibly-uninteresting to the casual reader, impeding readability, but like Minsk it is history about the balance of military power. What if we move all this under International further down? I did remove the part about regional conflicts, because I agree that this seems to be uninformed handwaving. Elinruby (talk) 19:47, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Article idea: List of military aid to Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian War

Feels like there's a hole in our coverage: we have List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War, but not List of military aid to Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian War. I was surprised to find out the article didn't exist already. This article could cover North Korea, China, Iran, etc supply of weapons to Russia. HappyWith (talk) 03:08, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

I don't see any reason to object. Aside from that, of course, that will be a much shorter list (purchases of Shaheed drones isn't "aid", per se, for example). Juxlos(talk) 04:46, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

The "List" format is also limiting, curtailing analysis and other relevant information. The List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War#Military aid planning subsection shows that article trying to work around this. Military aid to Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian War, or if that might still be short even Aid to Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian War (which could include eg. sanctions avoidance), including lists where relevant, might be a better title to encapsulate analysis. CMD (talk) 06:25, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, I actually had noticed that too. I'll propose a move. HappyWith (talk) 19:50, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

How about we see what the potential article might look like and then decide what to do with it. It might warrant its own article. It might be largely covered elsewhere (eg Foreign involvement in the Russian invasion of Ukraine) or it might be incorporated into List of military aid to Ukraine during the Russo-Ukrainian War, with a change of name and scope. Cinderella157 (talk) 07:14, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

I had not seen that "Support for Russia" section before, thanks for finding it. That might basically cover exactly what I was suggesting. HappyWith (talk) 19:51, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

Where is the support for Russia section. I have about three pretty densely referenced paragraphs about whether Iran was going to sell drones to Russia, CNN believed that Iran was shipping drones to Russia, Russia was setting up its own manufacturing capability with the help of Iranian advisors, and so on. I get that a supply of drones is important for Russia, but it's taking up all the oxygen in the "strikes on infrastructure" section of the article. They're paying Iran for this as far as I know, so it isn't "aid" however. Anyway, this thread looked like a good place to ask what to do with that text, thanks for any suggestions. Elinruby (talk) 09:34, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

background section

Since I suspect this will be contested and links will need to be provided, I am opening a section for a rewrite of the background section. I would like to say something along the lines of "After the collapse of the Soviet Union Ukraine became an oligarchy with close commercial ties to the Soviet Union" and go on to mention the extensive Russian ownership of Ukrainian media.I am not certain whether it quite qualified as a puppet or client state, and am inclined to think no, not quite, but let's discuss that also. For those unfamilar with this, I will point out, for a start, the article Ukrainian oligarchs.Elinruby (talk) 17:52, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Do any RS say it was an oligarchy? Slatersteven (talk) 18:07, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

You meant "close commercial ties to Russia", right?

Also, the presence of business oligarchs doesn't automatically make a country an oligarchy, politically speaking. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 23:29, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

@RadioactiveBoulevardier: true, it would have been Russia by then. Good catch. As for oligarchs not proving an oligarchy, perhaps not? That bears further discussion, Do you know of a generally accepted list of criteria? I was primaril thinking of the effect of media ownership on the public discourse so I don't insist on oligarchy versus oligarchs. I guess the thing to do is see whether the articles are out there to be summarized. Elinruby (talk) 02:28, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

This touches quite a lot on what I've written above. My concern is that currently the 'Background' reads a little bit like the starting point was "NATO did this and that" (which is very much the current Russian POV). I've mentioned this before but what comes to 2013, Russia was opposed to Ukraine turning toward and wanting to join the EU, it was not about NATO specifically.

I'm not sure if it's relevant to go as far back as 1991 (in this article, specifically)... but it might be. I do think it's generally a good idea to look deeper and then see if there is something there.

Whether or not Ukraine being "oligarchy"... regardless of whether it technically is or was or not, what would be the significance? Whether the government and part of the population was/is Russian-oriented is the more relevant thing in my mind. ShouldIHide (talk) 06:32, 8 October 2023 (UTC)

The significance was in media ownership. And political influence on behalf of Russia. A quick review of sources leaves little doubt that this was the case; all sorts of concern being expressed by IMF etc. Interestingly, their influence has waned since the invasion. Since this would be for the background section yes it should be a brief mention, but the invasion also wasn't sui generis. You nention NATO again. That is no longer in the background section and it is^{someone put it back} a bit remote for 2023, but the significance of it was that if Ukraine hadhad joined NATO they probably would not have been invaded, and that Putin claims that NATO is trying to crowd him. I am not rushing to add this to the section even though I think the section should be built out some more. What do you think should be in background?

...So do we need some sources to demonstrate that Ukraine around say 2012 or 2013 had an awful lot of oligarchs and they pretty much determined the public discourse through their media ownership? Some of them had their own militias and their own political parties as well. Here is one I just found. The past few Ukrainian presidents have all been very rich, even Zelenskyy, although *he* won't make the Forbes list any time real soon. And he got an anti-oligatchs law into force. Elinruby (talk) 10:34, 10 October 2023 (UTC) [46] And others I just noticed: [47].[48] [49][50]][51][52][https://www.icij.org/investigations/fincen-files/ukrainian-oligarch-sanctioned-following-the-fincen-files-investigation-arrested-in-ukraine/

Obviously we are not going to explain all that in the lede, but this is important in Ukrainian policy matters and we perhaps should allude to it, and definitely try to avoid making it seem like it isn't there.Elinruby (talk) 23:57, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Current lead excludes most casualties

The current version of the lead, the beginning, is very problematic. Excluding military casualties completely dehumanizes soldiers, which is not acceptable. Men in uniform are men nonetheless and men are people.

By all accounts, military casualties are several times higher than civilian casualties. There are close to, if not more than 500,000 soldiers killed or wounded.

Please do note that "mass civilian casualties" are already explicitly noted in the very next sentence of the lead. Like they deserve to be.

I suggest changing "The invasion has been described as the biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War and has killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians." to "The invasion has been described as the biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War and has caused hundreds of thousands of casualties."

ShouldIHide (talk) 07:38, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

We can safely add "has caused hundreds of thousands of military casualties". Manyareasexpert (talk) 07:40, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree.

ShouldIHide (talk) 08:08, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Thank you.

ShouldIHide (talk) 08:22, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

I haven't looked at the current status of the lede but "tens of thousands of casualties on both sides" seems to have been from around April 2022. Since we have lo, this many sources, for numbers many times higher, I do not understand the adamant refusal to update the lede because "sources". The sources say that the casualties are much much higher. Caveat: If we use the NYT numbers, which I think we should, they are only for total military deaths and do not include civilians, so we'd need a second source and a mild rewrite for that.Elinruby (talk) 16:53, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

The issue was not "Casualties" it was "Dead". Slatersteven (talk) 16:56, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Because sources? That's not the way I remember it. But I don't have the time or the inclination to try to prove to you that you said what you said. In any event, the sources are better now and we are going on from there, no?

Here you go [[53]] [[54]]. Slatersteven (talk) 17:26, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I don't have the time or the inclination to try to prove to you that you said what you said.Elinruby (talk) 17:39, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

“Casualties” already implies “military”. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 18:57, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

:::No issue with changing it to caused 100,000's that is supported by sources. 11:09, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

What change do you want made, you seem to have asked for more than one ? Slatersteven (talk) 11:12, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

There was a change (a big one) made inbetween my previous request, that coincidentally removed the "both sides" problem but introduced another one.

The current revision I think is ok.

ShouldIHide (talk) 11:24, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Putting civilians before military casualties is not appropriate. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 18:58, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Civilian casualties

Procedural note This section relates to edits initiated by Manyareasexpert in consequence of the discussion in the main section. Initially made as a stand-alone section, I have moved it to be a sub-section of the main discussion to manage discussion forking. I see that some editors have made comments about the "current" version at the end of the main discussion. Elinruby, RadioactiveBoulevardier and ShouldIHide, you may wish to move (or restate) your most recent comments made above into this sub-section so that there is continuity in discussion of the current version. I trust this is reasonable. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:41, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

@Cinderella157, regarding your change [55] of killed to casualties. Sources report tens of thousands dead - [56] the true number is believed to be in the tens of thousands , [57] tens of thousands of civilians are believed to have died , [58] Kyiv said at least 20,000 Ukrainian civilians had been killed. In total, some 30,000 to 40,000 civilians have lost their lives nationwide in the conflict, Western sources say. Manyareasexpert (talk) 10:18, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

do not need another thread on this. Slatersteven (talk) 10:58, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, Slatersteven, but I think the problem lies elsewhere. Perhaps this one might be constructive and not WP:BLUDGEONed. The other related discussions can probably be closed because we are now discussing something concrete. Regards, Cinderella157 (talk) 11:39, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I think those are good references. I would prefer not to cite them in the lede, if we can agree on a wording, like we did with military casualties. I don't recall seeing those references in the Casualties section, but maybe that is the work that Cinderella did, or I simply don't remember it and it is there. If those references aren't already in the casualties section, though, I think they should be. And since the page is quite large, maybe we could have a short section right after the lede called Overview or something like that where we cite these things? The loss of human capital is actually quite significant. and especially given the migration as well, will have a marked long-term effect on the economy. In effect an abstract? Just a thought.Elinruby (talk) 18:01, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

The problem is that we have multiple discussions on the same issue that have sprung up all over the place. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:00, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

PS Elinruby, let's keep this thread quite narrow and confined to the text in question:

The invasion has been reported to be the biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War. It is estimated to have caused tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian casualties[11][12][13] and hundreds of thousands of military casualties.

I am not presently stating a particular issue with the sources cited, only that they should be integrated into the casualties section, so that the text of the lead is clearly supported by the body of the article. In dealing with this, it may be appropriate for this discussion to diverge slightly, to include the casualties section because it is intrinsically related. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:49, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree that they should be in the casualty section. I even volunteer to put them there. Is that focussed enough? Elinruby (talk) 01:04, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I could take a guess at what it is that you are actually raising here and which part or parts of the edit you disagree with but it would be much easier if you were more explicit and avoid any confusion. Since you raise the edits you have made, you added four sources to support the statement has killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians. One of these, I removed as being quite old. This appears to be a classic example of over-citing. The purpose of the lead is to summarise the key points of the article. As such, the points should be clearly evident from the body of the article. The only substantive reason for adding citations to the lead is to give weight to possible contentious statements that might be challenged - even though they are evident from the lead and duly supported by citation. In short, we don't try to write the article in the lead. These citations are made new. This indicates to me that they have not already been used. I have started to make amendments to the casualties section in respect to these sources. My point is, that this is a pretty dirty and forced way to express a particular POV in the lead that is not really an overall improvement to the article. If one writes the body of the article first, then the lead comes naturally. Perhaps you can help fix this. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:33, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Cinderella157 I am not certain what you mean by "main discussion" but I said the following today about what I believe is the current version of the lede, and it concerns civilian casualties, so I am moving it here as I believe you are suggesting. If not let me know. I am all in favor of what moves the page forward. :The current version of the lede is definitely an improvement, thank you to those that have been working on that.It is estimated to have caused tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian casualties[11][12][13] and hundreds of thousands of military casualties is the current version and "hundreds of thousands of military casualties" is a good resolution for that part, I think. A couple of quibbles:

• "is estimated" is pretty over-cautious in my opinion. The civilian numbers in particular seem to be backed up with actual names, which have been compiled on the Casualties subpage. Casualties != deaths, so maybe the estimate part has to do with wounded? In any event, I think we are in WP:BLUESKY territory here. It is also estimated that 1+1=2, and while there are areas where we work with real numbers, as opposed to integers, where we might have to call this an estimate, but is the lede of this article really one of them?
• Ditto for the part about "The invasion has been reported to be the biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War." This hasn't been one individual report that might be wrong. I have seen this in quite a few RS as I have been looking into the casualty numbers, and I sincerely doubt that this statement would be questioned, as it is clearly true.
• Also, I understand the urge to cite despite the general rule against it, given this talk page, but why cite the civilian deaths and not military? That's a procedural question, though, and I think it is being discussed further down the page.

All in all, well done, y'all. Elinruby (talk) 00:55, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

• To is estimated. In the sentence construction, it applies to both the civilian and military casualties. The reports of military casualties are largely intelligence estimates. In the earlier discussions about this, there was a willingness to use this qualification. The OHCHR figure of 26,967 is the only independently confirmed civilian casualty figure. We could quibble over whether we describe this as tens of thousands and I would cite WP:EDITORIALIZE. The common element in the reporting of civilian casualties is that they are believed to be in the tens of thousands [emphasis added] - ie they are estimated to be in the tens of thousands. Just because several sources say it is believed to be does not make it an unqualified fact. It is appropriate to be circumspect.
• To The invasion has been reported to be This comes from two contemporaneous WP:NEWSORG sources. How one defines the biggest is subjective, depending on the criteria used. It is not based on an academic analysis. It falls to editorialising, which is what news sources do. The validity of this statement has been discussed and questioned in previous related discussions. Whether the two sources have made this claim independently is another question. While it is a fact that two news sources have made this claim, this does not ipso facto make this true. I am not certain that we should be reporting this editorialising by news sources at all but we should certainly not be reporting it in the lead in a Wiki voice as an unquestionable fact. If we are retaining it, we should make it clear that this is an attributed opinion. Again, it is appropriate to be circumspect.
• I think we are in agreement with respect to the citations in the lead and that they should be incorporated into the body such that the body clearly supports what is said in the lead, without the need for multiple sources in the lead and extensive quotations within the citations to justify what is being said there. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:24, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

heh. To me it seems like you are saying that no, maybe one plus one does not equal two because of a roundind error. You have a point but it can be dealt with in the wording, no? As for editorializing - I realize that you just don't know that of course I know the difference between editorializing and news ;) But. One of the sources is the United Nations. Does that make any difference to your thinking? Elinruby (talk) 03:50, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Firstly, in the text as it stands, estimated applies to both the military and the civilian casualties. The military casualties are definitely estimates. We could reword such that estimated only applies to the military casualties but this would probably be clumsy. A broad description of tens of thousands (plural) is from 1 x 10^4.5 to 1 x 10^5.5 or from about (a bit over) 30,000 to 300,000. Only the OHCHR figure is based on confirmed casualties. It doesn't reach the threshold and it is but one source - granted that it is a good one. That it believes the figure to be much higher is an opinion, not a fact. On the basis of the OHCRH, we could state that the casualties exceed 26,000 but not that they are in the tens of thousands. The other sources believe that the casualties are in the tens of thousands. Again, this is opinion and not a fact. We can reasonably describe these opinions as estimates. But opinion one + opinion two ≠ one fact, let alone two. WP:EDITORIALIZE specifically cautions us against making such broad generalisations in a Wiki voice. Things can be dealt with in the wording, that is why it says estimated. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:35, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

civilian casualties
Please all, sources report these as civilian dead. See quotes above [59]. Manyareasexpert (talk) 10:48, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

Manyareasexpert, there is a rough consensus here and a broader community consensus that the lead reflect and be supported by the body of the article - that is its purpose. Given that the Fox source and the figure it reports of 42,000 is being questioned elsewhere, the casualty section does not support the assertion of tens of thousands of civilians killed. It does, however, support the assertion of tens of thousands of civilian casualties as an estimate - notwithstanding that this can be considered WP:EDITORIALIZEing. We need to focus on the body of the article and then the lead will come naturally. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:39, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

I respect the caution. I just wish it also applied to say, people editwarring to keep their OR in the article. But fine, focus you said. Ok, do you realize that following your logic Wikipedia would still not be reporting any mortality at all from covid? I can't, however I try, see this as a good thing. And who said anything about wikivoice? However.

I think the best way to deal with this is to actually work on a text. I just lost a bunch of work so I am grumpy, but as far as the Casualties section goes, the first of Manyareasexpert's references was already in the Casualties section. I added the second but depending on which version was backed up it might not be in the right paragraph yet. I made quite a few small improvements and found a lot of really ridiculous problems with the references. (so fewer lectures about accuracy please) I really gotta go and I probably can't come back to this until sometime Friday but I am on a mission to explain this, so I will. Oh and, if it was you that tamed those Luhansk numbers you deserve the Croix de Guerre for that. Elinruby (talk) 14:12, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

As I said above, I strongly believe it's important to give relative due weight to military casualties as opposed to civilian casualties. Regardless of the exact total(s), far more combatants have been killed and wounded than civilians. I don't believe an emphasis on civilian casualties is appropriate for the lead, especially when military casualties are not clearly discussed there. P.S. In my view the lead is still problematic in other ways, but it looks like incremental progress is being made. Cheers, RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 07:02, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

RadioactiveBoulevardier, the text presently reads: It is estimated to have caused tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian casualties and hundreds of thousands of military casualties. Would it resolve you concerns with this particular passage if it were reordered to read: It is estimated to have caused hundreds of thousands of military casualties and tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian casualties? Cinderella157 (talk) 10:25, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

Certainly. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 16:54, 29 September 2023 (UTC)

RadioactiveBoulevardier, we are still nutting out the detail of the passage. I don't see that it is appropriate to keep changing things back and forth while until there is a clearer consensus for how the passage should read. It is easier to discuss changes against a stable benchmark than a constantly shifting one (this bit is more for the benefit of others). However, it is to my mind reasonable to incorporate this change. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:02, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

In my mind this reordering would make the lead better than it is now anyway, so I would support it now.

I agree there should be further discussion on how it should read because it's not ideal, but if so, if it eventually changes to something even better then so be it. We can still now make the proposed reordering. ShouldIHide (talk) ShouldIHide (talk) 11:50, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

• Apparently, the objection being raised by Manyareasexpert (see #Killed tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilians) is that they want the text to read that tens of thousands of civilians have been killed. I would see at this point, that there are several reasons why we should not. The primary reason is that the lead should clearly reflect the body of the article. We don't try to write the article in the lead and there are still issues with the Casualties section. At present, the only independent information there that might support such a claim is an uncited figure of 42,000 that can be attributed to Fox news but is likely to be removed (see #Casualties section (again?)). Even if there might be adequate sources to support an assertion in the lead, it would leave our readers with an apparent inconsistency between what the lead states and the information in the Casualties section. There is also a question of why, in the same passage, we should refer to military casualties but civilian deaths. It would be more consistent to refer to either deaths or casualties but not to mix this up. Further, even if it could be argued that the body might support that an estimation that tens of thousands of civilians have been killed it is certainly a clearer and safer proposition that there are estimated to be tens of thousands of civilian casualties. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:05, 30 September 2023 (UTC)

• Manyareasexpert, dumping a sentence into the Casualties section verbatim that you want reproduced in the lead (see here) does not address all of the issues identified and has the appearance of being somewhat WP:POINTy. It really hasn't been integrated into the existing prose. An estimated hundreds of thousands of military casualties is reasonably evident from the tabulated information. The added text duplicates some existing references, albeit with quotes.

  • The OHCHR of 9,614 confirmed killed does not clearly support this, nor does the statement that it: believes that the actual figures are considerably higher.
  • The France 24 article states: The official Ukrainian toll counts at least 10,368 civilians killed - not tens of thousands. It continues: "We expect that, most likely, the toll will be five times larger - this is a Ukranian claim and the article already tells us that claims by the belligerents are likely inflated or deflated according to their propaganda value. The statement: the port city of Mariupol, where tens of thousands of civilians are believed to have died is speculative. It is also contradicted by the prose elsewhere in the section.
  • The NYT article is somewhat contradictory with respect to the assertion. It would state: 5,587 are confirmed dead, and the true number is believed to be in the tens of thousands. The headline, however, is more conservative, stating Thousands of Civilian Deaths - not tens of thousands. As I cannot view the article, I cannot determine the context or attribution of the former text but this clearly has a bearing.
  • The JT article does say ... a war that has killed tens of thousands of people ... Kyiv said at least 20,000 Ukrainian civilians had been killed. In total, some 30,000 to 40,000 civilians have lost their lives nationwide in the conflict, Western sources say. While other sources say exactly the same thing as this last sentence, there is no actual attribution for which source first printed it (that I can see) and only the vague attribution to Western sources. Do we hang our hat on this or is it a case of WP:VNOT?

Given what is presently otherwise written in the Casualties section, even claiming that an estimated tens of thousands of civilian casualties is tenuous, not withstanding that it can also reasonably be described as WP:EDITORIALIZEing. The edit is challenged. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:07, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

The France 24 article states: The official Ukrainian toll counts at least 10,368 civilians killed - not tens of thousands. It continues: "We expect that, most likely, the toll will be five times larger - this is a Ukranian claim and the article already tells us that claims by the belligerents are likely inflated or deflated according to their propaganda value. The statement: the port city of Mariupol, where tens of thousands of civilians are believed to have died is speculative
No, it's not only Ukrainian claim, there is a whole AP investigation on Mariupol deaths. France24 is reliable, we can't simply dismiss what it says with "speculative". Manyareasexpert (talk) 17:03, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

The statement: the port city of Mariupol, where tens of thousands of civilians are believed to have died is speculative. It is also contradicted by the prose elsewhere in the section.
Where? Manyareasexpert (talk) 17:03, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

The NYT article is somewhat contradictory with respect to the assertion. It would state: 5,587 are confirmed dead, and the true number is believed to be in the tens of thousands. The headline, however, is more conservative, stating Thousands of Civilian Deaths - not tens of thousands.
No, there is no contradiction. Thousands of dead, and the true number is believed to be in the tens of thousands. [60] Manyareasexpert (talk) 17:06, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

The JT article does say ... a war that has killed tens of thousands of people ... Kyiv said at least 20,000 Ukrainian civilians had been killed. In total, some 30,000 to 40,000 civilians have lost their lives nationwide in the conflict, Western sources say. While other sources say exactly the same thing as this last sentence, there is no actual attribution for which source first printed it (that I can see) and only the vague attribution to Western sources. Do we hang our hat on this or is it a case of WP:VNOT?
AFP, which is being reproduced by JapanTimes, is reliable and confirms numbers presented by other sources. Manyareasexpert (talk) 17:12, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

@Cinderella157: see post below with proposed new entries for estimated casualties. The Casualties subpage does not distinguish estimated from confirmed numbers. Unless someone finds a better one it looks like the most recent casualty numbers are all from Jan 17 because of Davos. Unless someone can find better it looks like those are the best/most recent. I am not sure how to handle Mariupol. My current thinking is that one of these plus the NYT numbers on militaedry casualties is the best number we have, although obvious MUCH understated and not including Mariupol. What that means remains to be discussed but that's my best contribution. RL calls. Elinruby (talk) 21:08, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

@Cinderella157, are there any objections still left unresolved? Manyareasexpert (talk) 09:13, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Manyareasexpert, you will see that there are ongoing discussions about the Casualties section, some of which directly relate to your response above. The issues are still unresolved. I think you will see that there are opinions (not just mine) that the Casualties section needs to support and be consistent with the lead. We are still working on "cleaning up" the Casualties section. When we have come to a reasonable conclusion on this, we can revisit the issue of the lead. It may not read the way you wish but it is not inaccurate. Cinderella157 (talk) 10:03, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

the Casualties section needs to support and be consistent with the lead - this is about edit to Casualties section [61] . Manyareasexpert (talk) 10:24, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

It is also about an edit that was specifically made to justify an edit to the lead and which duplicated the text that would be added to the lead. Cinderella157 (talk) 12:16, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

So, no other unresolved objections regarding this part ([62]) other than "there is a discussion regarding other issues still ongoing" and "it has been added to the lead previously" have been mentioned. Manyareasexpert (talk) 17:58, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

Manyareasexpert, I don't see where you are quoting from when you make this quote "it has been added to the lead previously"? Yes, there are ongoing discussions about the Casualties section that will probably affect that text you wish to add to the lead. Cinderella157 (talk) 03:31, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

With regard to relative weight, I agree. Casualties are casualties. I think it is at the very least unnecessary to put "civilians" ahead of "military". Hundreds of thousands of people are dead or wounded or injured as a consequence of this "operation", that is the most relevant point for the reader.

I think what I myself originally suggested did not include any differentiation between military/civilian, I would instead have just stated "hundreds of thousands of casualties" without further specification.

Agree on incremental progress. Cheers ShouldIHide (talk) 11:38, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Sources make clear distinction between military and civilians. They report those separately and so we are too. Manyareasexpert (talk) 12:36, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

Yes. What I was referring to, however, was that there's no need for us to imply that civilian casualties would be more important than military casualties. Like said many times before, military casualties are hugely larger than civilian ones.

I do not oppose making the distinction or mentioning them separately, but I also believe we don't have to do that. I'm talking about the lead specifically btw., in the lead I think we could simply refer to just "casualties".

A major part of why this is the largest armed conflict in Europe since WW2 is that there are (has been for about a year now as well) over a million troops in total involved in the fighting and an alarmingly high number are dead. The primary focus should anyway be on the military side of things. There are no civilians bombing each other. If there was no huge military conflict, there also wouldn't be that many casualties, military or civilian. ShouldIHide (talk) 21:35, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

I was actually thinking of proposing that the lede simply say "hundreds of millions have died" and go into the various categories of deaths. At that point in the article we are just trying to convey scale, right? not argue about who has taken more losses? I alsoo am uncomfortable with discussing whether military of civilian deaths are "more important" but I'd like to note that it is because of the civilian deaths that we are discussing genocide, crimes against humanity or war crimes. But getting back to my proposal, what do you think? I tlooks to be like the number of civilian deaths may currently be unknowable as even the most conservativw estimates Elinruby (talk) 23:28, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

"Hundreds of millions" ??? What? Did you mean "hundreds of thousands"?

Yes, in the lead I believe like I said before the point is hundreds of thousands of people are dead or wounded, not so much who's military and who's civilian.

I'd also like to say I believe the "crimes against humanity", actually the "humanitarian" stuff in general is simply a separate issue, it should have it's own dedicated section in the article if it doesn't already. But that doesn't stop us from improving the lead now.

I'm sorry I haven't been able to really follow the civilian casualty discussion, but what's wrong with for example this source (UN)? Over 27000 and they believe likely "considerably higher". Also the January report citing the Norwegian chief of Defence, saying 30000 civilians dead [63] (AFP). How is it "unknowable"? Cheers ShouldIHide (talk) 00:38, 5 October 2023 (UTC)

I see a notification but can't find the post and I really need to say this then go do something, so putting it at the end of instead of in answer to the person who was following up on this with a question in the middle.

I was under the impression that we had agreed to use the NYT article that said 500,000 military deaths (Ukraine + Russia + Donbar and Wagner fighters I think, but I haven't looked at that in a couple of days} The article does provde further detail we could use in the body, and come to think of it I believe we already do.

We had some back and forth about a casualty number for civilians and the last I saw the question we were hung up on was what to do about Mariupol, which is a huge unkown. ::::Euromaidan Press' says an estimated 86,000 sourced to the mayor's office and ~25,000(?) actual bodies, and then the BBC source in particular starts talking about huge apartment buildings that were shelled where everyone is presumed dead, but the bodies are thought to still be in the rubble. However the Russians are running things and who knows what they are doing. They brought portable cremation equipment with them when they entered the city, according to the mayor's office.

I want the lede updated to a more plausible number and that seems to be happening, so...I am reasonably happy as long as something happens about civilian deaths... what do you think? Elinruby (talk) 00:45, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

It can be difficult to keep track of all this information. Yes, we are using the NYT figures at the moment. The Euromaidan source would report 87,000 attributed to Mykola Osychenko, the president of Mariupol TV and civic volunteer and not the Mayor's office. It is also no longer being cited. There is a figure for 25,000 being used presently being attributed to the C.D. Howe Institute, when it should be attributed to the author Dan Ciuriak. The paper cited is a working paper and may not actually rise to be a WP:RS or reliable for this content. It is an economics paper that would attempt to estimate the cost of the war as a dollar figure between $ 9 - 14 x 10¹², where the cost of civilian casualties is estimated at $ 0.059 - 0.126 x 10¹². The methodology makes broad-brush assumptions to arrive at the casualty estimates for this purpose but are probably unsuited and unsuitable for reporting here. I don't think we are at a point where we can categorically say that there have been tens of thousands of civilian deaths - but casualties, yes. Cinderella157 (talk) 05:14, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

Casualties some more yet again but in a different way

The most recent numbers for casualties all seem to be from January, based on Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian War.

I am currently very tired, and extremely tired of the topic, but my best stab at this as of now is:

The following should be added to the estimates table:

• 7,000| 24 February 2022 - January 17 2023|UNHCHR
• 9,000| 24 February 2022 – 17 January 2023|Office of the President of Ukraine
• 16,502| 24 February 2022 – 17 January 2023|National Police of Ukraine killed (confirmed)

I still think for non-civilians the best numbers are:

• ~70,000 killed, 100,000–120,000 wounded | 24 February 2022 – 18 August 2023| US sources via NYT

I'm not going to try to write that up right now, or add it to the table, but other thoughts:

• Mariupol should be mentioned somewhere. What is in the article right now is fine; that is some of the text I thought got lost unsaved the other night. No opinion on whether it should be in the table.
• The Casualties section of this article currently starts with a non sequitur about satellite imaging. Either use the whole sentence and cite it or lose it altogether. People know this.
• Maybe because I also spent a lot of time at the Casualty page today, but doesn't more than half the text here currently consist of saying over and over and over again that estimates are not exact numbers?

Grumpily going away again. HtH Elinruby (talk) 14:14, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

PLease stop, this is being discussed above in multiple threads. Slatersteven (talk) 14:15, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

NO IT IS NOT and I really wish you would take the time to read the posts you are trying to police. This has nothing to do with the 25,000 vs 75,000 discussion nor whatever I was talking about yesterday. If it would make you happy you can close that as this post is that v2.0 but mainly an entirely new proposal for the casualty gap in the numbers that I am sure you aren't even aware of.

Have a nice day. Another post like this one from you and I'll break out the warnings for harassment again. Elinruby (talk) 14:31, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

You are asking "but in a different way" to update the casualty figures, this is being discussed above you say you "still think for non-civilians the best numbers are:", this is being discussed above. We can't have 15 different threads on casualty figures, as if one gets a consensus, what about the rest? This is my last word on this, you have been asked to keep all questions about casualty figures in one thread to make it easy to gauge consensus, please do so. Slatersteven (talk) 14:38, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Please *do* make it your last word on this, and heed the warning on your talk page. If you disagree with me, as you said on my talk page, the thing to do is to discuss.

What is not appropriate is for you to mischaracterize my remarks and rebuke me for them.

If you would like to participate in this discussion you are of course welcome but please process that "casualties" is a whole page that I have spent ~40 hours evaluating for summary and not a number I am pulling out of thin air. The templates will escalate from here if you continue. You are disrupting a constructive conversation that has already led to agreement on three sources. Elinruby (talk) 21:32, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

There are at least three+ different, active, discussions about casualties. This talk page is becoming a hazard, and just tedious to look through; which is what Slatersteven is trying to point out.

I get the feeling the next discussion will be about armoured vehicle casualties at this rate... 68.111.7.219 (talk) 21:49, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

maybe because there are three distinct topics being dicussed, mmm? You aren't rerquired to read them. Log in if you want to make a point. I am definitely not going to argue about whether there should be a discussion with someone that isn't brave enough to use their account. @Cinderella157: @Manysubjectexpert: more brigading seems likely. I will make these changes; as discussed above I am not sure what this does to the question about tens of thousands, but you can let me know in that thread if you have a problem with one of these changes. Elinruby (talk) 22:30, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

References

• To ref 1, we have used a more recent report (September) by the OHCHR and directly cited it.
• To ref 3, This source is used under confirmed civilian casualties in the tables, though the date is misattributed as to 17 September 2023. The article cites the original source as this, though the primary source is the National Police of Ukraine and a report obtained through FOI. We should be citing the original report or at least Zmina, assuming it is a WP:RS. The casualties cited are claimed to be confirmed deaths. However, both web sources refer to the casualties as persons/people not civilians. Zmina is reporting numbers of both civilians and soldiers found together in mass graves. The report is ambiguous as to whether 16,502 is exclusively civilians. We should be circumspect and identify this ambiguity. The figure is from from February 24, 2022 to January 3, 2023.
• To ref 2, it is attributed to Andriy Yermak, head of the Ukrainian presidential staff. It is a Ukrainian clam and should be reported accordingly. It appears to have been said of Tuesday 17 January 2023, the same date as the article was published. It states: "since Russia's invasion last February". It gives no clear statement of when it is until. The statement post-dates the Ukrainian police report which the president's office would reasonably have access to, yet there is a significant difference. There is no indication as to how the 9,000 figure was arrived at. It is a Ukrainian claim.
• In the past, both refs 2 & 3 were cited together as a range in the claimed estimated table.
• If the figures reported in refs 2 & 3 are used in the casualty tables, it is my view that this should be accompanied by prose that addresses the issues identified.
• To opening multiple sections dealing with the same or very similar topics, I have made similar comments to refrain from doing this. You are not the only one doing this either. It does make it hard to keep a track of what is being said where and that overlapping comments can arise in different sections. I for one am having trouble keeping up with all these pop-up discussions. The main discussion is occurring at #Civilian casualties. Can I suggest that if there is an absolute need to have a particular matter discussed as an aside to the main discussion, then it be opened as a sub-section of the main discussion. I propose that we move the relevant open discussions accordingly. At least that way, they are not spread all over the talk page. If a particular sub-section is resolved, then it should be closed. There should be some sort of mutual agreement on closing. Closing a discussion in good faith can be reverted if others participating in the discussion feel that it shouldn't be closed at present. I trust this is a reasonable way forward. Cinderella157 (talk) 01:55, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

I have no particular issue with you proposal. I simply wish to stay out of certain arguments. Move anything you need to -- so far I have not had an issue with your changes. I also don't want to have one giant discussion about "casualties" however because there many many casualty questions here, and one leads to another, but we are making good progress on discussing them. I believe we are discussing in good faith.

Separate section is separate enough, but I am not certain what you mean by that. I think by the time we've tied up the loose ends of the above there should be an example somewhere, probably, that I can look at. I came in here to note a change you may or may not agree with so I will come back to these comments, but overall oh really and yes. I am not sure what you mean by "accompanied by prose that addresses the issues identified" but in the abstract I agree with that, and it may become clearer once I look to see what what you mean by 2 and 3. I need a break and a change of seating. The National Police and Office of the President numbers I just added seem to have been statments made at Davos and I think it is reasonable to assume that they were the most recent ones to the Ukraininan executive at the time, but a report date would be ideal of course. That can be worked on. (side question of whether historical numbers have any utility. I don't think that got decided before). Yes there are discrepancies between the Ukrainian numbers. Possibly a matter of what is counted. I will answer further when I have had a chance to look. Elinruby (talk) 02:28, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Recent revert of Elinruby

Elinruby, to explain this revert, there was a lot going on with these edits but a couple of things stood out.

• The change of the table shape. The real estate being occupied really doesn't change with a change of aspect. However, there may be an optimum aspect, particularly for users of mobile devices. The only reason to change the aspect would be if there is a tangible improvement. We probably need to get some input from people that know about accessibility issues.
• My view is that the casualty tables are for reports of overall casualties and not for individual places or regions. I have no problem with information (two figures) about Mariupol being added to the prose. It is significant and prose allows us to state why it is significant.
• The Euromaidan Press source of "87,000 people killed" strikes me as an exceptional claim that is worthy of further discussion - hopefully involving more than just the three of us. It was already in the prose.
• The number of unidentified bodies in Mariupol isn't what I would call significant for this article.
• I'm not seeing any other changes. Let me know if there was. Cinderella157 (talk) 05:07, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

hey I'm not mad, If something I said made you think so. We are in the D phase of BRD right? I figured it would be just as well given that intelligent discussion was looking increasingly unlikely over where I attempted one.

• The table: It would be better if there was a stylesheet. That was a lot of work but yes it was kludgy. I am currently on a wide-screen, almost a dual monitor, not a mobile btw. But often on mobile, you are right about that. What I was specifically trying to fix with the labels was entries like (for example) Ukrainian National Guard and associated volunteers and the marines and the Border Police and the National Police pushing the first column half way across the page. Then the reference takes up a lot of vertical space because it is skwished all the way to the right. We can come back to this after we know what goes in the table, right?
• I hear you on regions but consider Luhansk. Crimea. Mind you I don't insist on Mariupol being in the table either for that matter. Definitely in the prose though but it doen't seem like anyone is arguing otherwise.

clarifying question: is the intent of the table to provide the best possible summary of the claims about numbers? That isn't intended as sarcasm: the prose in front of it really hammers the point that the true numbers can never ascertained, undue imho, but I've also been spending a lot of time over at Casualties of the Russo-Ukrainian war where there is a whole different set of problems so i might be wrong about that.

If the goal is to summarize then how about pick one from each belligerent plus whatever the "best" estimate is for that belligerent. We would of course need a definition of "best".

Euromaidan: That is true but those are some next-level specifics. I commented it out a while ago actually, because it was so much higher, and just uncommented it last night, actually. I believe Manyareasexpert reads Ukrainian at least somewhat? Perhaps they can see if there is substantiating press in the area. I have not no, checked that one to make sure it isn't like the Fox News reference, if that was the question.

• I noticed this section while looking for the one about sources. I hope you don't mind if I drop this here also -- going to go look for the other section again after this. But meanwhile, here is another source on the 9000 figure, which provides the additional detail that the number came from the head of the President's Office (chief of staff?) and he gave a speech atr Davos about setting up a special tribunal. So more information is out there if you really want a copy of the statement or something. [64] Elinruby (talk) 06:00, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

26,000 is a LOT Elinruby (talk) 06:12, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Just re:accessibility, I’m writing this from the desktop web version on an iPhone SE 3rd gen (2022). I don’t know how many readers prefer to do this, but I believe a sizable experienced editors use the desktop version on their phones for reasons of functionality. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 07:15, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Oh also, about the use of Euromaidan Press as a source for controversial claims…I’d err on the side of caution in general, for a few reasons:

• Ukrainian media is currently subject to martial law and censorship since, y’know, there’s a high-intensity war going on (and I think most of us armchair Westerners don’t fully grasp what that really means).
• Part of Ukraine’s struggle against Russia’s hybrid warfare doctrine necessarily involves the information space. Fire must be fought with fire. The ramifications for NPOV are obvious.
• Ukrainian media often directly quote government sources. These government sources don’t always get attributed when the media outlet is cited on WP.
• Just like we treat The Jerusalem Post and Al Jazeera as highly reliable on things like the Sudan conflict or migration crises (or RUSUKR), but weigh them more carefully on Israel–Palestine reporting, the same tends to be the case here. Besides, it’s in the name for Jimbo’s sake.

It doesn’t (yet) appear to be listed at RSP, but a discussion might be in order.

RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 07:30, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

Elinruby, the reasons for the revert were more complex than could reasonably be explained in an edit summary. I thought you could be a bit pissed-off but regardless, I needed to give a fuller explanation. I am glad that you weren't and see this as just part of the consensus building process. It makes things a lot easier. I will try to deal with all of the above.

• How the table presents to the reader is quite separate from its contents. I know that accessibility for mobile devices is an issue. There are people in the know that can guide us on this. Because how it presents is separate from the contents, we could post this as a separate discussion. Let's just focus here on the contents for now?
• To what the tables should present, it is my opinion (and observation from earlier discussions) that we should be aiming for the most recent information. It should not be an historical compendium.
• We would appear to be in general agreement that the tables should deal with total casualties rather than regions or particular places.
• The DPR/LPR were arguably separate belligerents. There was a rationale for reporting their military casualties. Whether that rationale continues to exist is a matter for discussion. I have no strong view on this. Crimea is not the same since it was annexed before the invasion and had no military force that was nominally separate. On civilian casualties though, we should try to capture the total, while at the same time, we should avoid trying to be too granular.
• On the Euromaidan source, I think we (including RadioactiveBoulevardier) are in general agreement that we should be circumspect in how we use this source. My feeling is that the existing text was/is probably suffucient. While the headline calls the "87,000 people killed" civilians, the actual report and the person being quoted (indirectly) is being more general. It would not be surprising if the morgue was full of both military and civilian dead (and irregular militia).

I may not have touched upon all of the matters raised. I am not dismissing anything but I think we should keep things to bite-sized chunks. I think we are going to cover more ground more quickly this way than grazing on a feast. :) Cinderella157 (talk) 12:06, 3 October 2023 (UTC)

I fell asleeep before I answered all of this last night. In no particular order:

• In general I prefer discussion to the BRD method; I almost never revert and prefer not to be reverted. However BRD is an alternative when discussion is being made impossible, and in this case nobody was going to get involved in a thread that starts with someone claiming that it is about matters that have been discussed to death. Apparently not, since you reverted based on a lack of discussion, mmm? So yeah, not mad at you for reverting, and here we are discussing.
• Re ZMINA: I was considering an RS thread and don't object to one. This is the one that talks about bodies of civilians and soldiers mixed together, right? I hadn't noticed that yet and it does give me pause. Is that the basis for their numbers, though. I need to re-read that article more slowly; for the record, the Casualties article uses it heavily, but they also objected to my removal of citations to TASS, which to my reading is not supposed to be used for matters of fact. (So there is another issue behind this one, of better coordinating thse two pages with respect to one another.)
• Re Euromaidan: There seems to be disagreement here. I consider it the rough equivalent of the Huffington Post, which I generally avoid. It has however been known to run an occasional very fine expose. I am a bit suprised to see that "It's a Ukrainian source" is in some people's mind a reason not to use it. We are reporting numbers from Luhansk primary sources after all. It is reasonable to have a local consensus on what an RS is in the context of this article, but it should be internally consistent. As I mentioned though, I added it to the Ukrainian section of the "estimated and claimed" table because hey, it's a claim and it's Ukrainian. I would suggest that I see if I can find another source for this number like I did with FOX and we go from there. Due diligence is a good idea here, yes. Perhaps Manysubjectsexpert, who apparently can read Ukrainian, would agree to help. Meanwhile, of course Ukraine is under martial law. I am not however aware that there is a censorship law analogous to the one in Russia. Nobody afaik goes to jail for reporting casualties in Ukraine. This needs some discussion. When I was editing the topic area some moths ago, there were quite a few editors running around saying that of course we don't believe the Ukrainians; the worst offenders imho were topic-banned, so thinks may have improved since. But. The claim should be looked into is all I am prepared to say at the moment.
• Luhansk and Donetsk: Yes. The keyword being "nominally".
• smaller bites: well yeah.Elinruby (talk) 00:18, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

btw I ran ZMINA past RSN. I've only had one answer so far but it pretty much said probably it should be attributed but otherwise appeared to really be a thing. Elinruby (talk) 12:47, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Can someone combine/stack some refs for me?

Hi all

I've been adding some more refs to the section on 'Environmental impacts' and to back up the claim in the lead that the environmental damage is widely described as ecocide (10 refs backing this up, plus ecocide is a specific crime in Ukraine). One things I've seen which should make the page tidier is someone has combined/stacked refs (sorry, don't know what its actually called) which back up the same claim eg this one:

The Ukrainian government, international observers and journalists have described the damage as ecocide..

Could I ask someone who knows how to do this do it to the other refs in that section so the formatting is tidier? Thanks very much

John Cummings (talk) 09:45, 9 October 2023 (UTC) John Cummings (talk) 09:45, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

I have been doing that. I also use it to show that I have verified a reference, so I would appreciate that you do that if you want to do this. But here is how to do it. It is tricky with named references but if you have, say, an AP news blurb and a Washington Post explainer, I put the better reference first, because it is the one that will display. The references have to be touching each other. You remove the close ref </ref> of the first reference and the open ref <ref> of the second reference. This makes one reference out of the two. Then you hit a carriage return between rhe two sets of curly braces, }}{{ so that the second citation is on its own line. Put an asterix in front of it, and it becomes a bullet point. I have grouped as many as six. Care should be taken to make sure all the references are about thee same thing, but yes, I find it unclutters the page and makes the material easier to read. I am glad that you like it. Elinruby (talk) 10:20, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

@JohnCummings: Probably I was unclear. The references should go in the Environmental impact section. Nobody is working on it at the moment so you can go to town there and expand if you like, bearing in mind that it is supposed to be a summary of Environmental impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Then we can talk about DUE, but I agree that the damage is probably significant enough to be in the lede. I am still questioning the neologism, but willing to see what you found. What was there was two references using the word, one of which was commmondreams, which is, let's face it, an activist site even if it is often accurate. On a more basic level, are these references not yet in the article? Because I don't see them. If you are trying to figure out the instructions above, feel free to ask a question. Elinruby (talk) 20:53, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

@John Cummings: hey there no rush on this but I think "widely" should be backed up or taken out. If I don't hear from you by say three or four more days, I am going to take the word back out again. Your call.Elinruby (talk) 09:39, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Elinruby thanks for the messages, sorry I didn't see them before. To respond to you in order (hope its clear):

1. Compound references: Thanks for the explanation of how to do the compound references (do they have a name?), I'll have a go at them and come back to you if I get stuck.
2. New refs for ecocide: Yes I added the new ones into the environmental impact section of this article, there are now 10 refs in the environmental impact section which refer to the environmental damage in Ukraine as ecocide in the title of the articles. I'm sorry if I've missunderstood what you're asking.
3. Widely: I think I'm a bit confused about the requirement here, what I'm struggling to understand is if I need reference that specifically says 'the environmental damage has been widely described as ecocide' or if I can demonstrate it using 10 refs which call it ecocide (there are at least another 14 available I could add but that's probably overkill). It would super helpful if you could point to the policy page that explains the requirement.
4. Alternatives: I think its super important to include the word ecocide in the intro, because the damage has been described as it at least 2 dozen times in reliable sources, because ecocide is a recognised national crime in Ukraine and also because it fits the recognised definition of ecocide (basically using the correct word to describe the events). If you have any suggestions for alternative wording instead of widely that would be easier to include please say.

Thanks again

John Cummings (talk) 19:04, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Re pings, I spelled your username wrong at least once so no worries. Thanks for the nicely organized answer.

#Compound references: This will break named references except if the named reference is the first reference in the stack. just to remind you. And I verify the references when I do that, by which I mean actually click the link, make sure that it goes somewhere and bears some sort of relationship to the text in front of it. I would appreciate it if you would do that too if you start grouping references.

#Environmental impact: aha, and they are in compound references then? It didn't look like the section had changed much but I didn't look at it in edit mode. "Widely" should be fine then, and I will let you know if it isn't or I have questions. I didn't realize you were that far along. But here is why it makes me uneasy, so you know. Elsewhere on the page is a discussion of whether we can believe the morgue in Mariupol about deaths in Mariupol. There is a tendency to dismiss Ukrainian claims, so to help preclude more such discussions I'm checking for exaggeration sooner rather than later. And am glad to not find it.

#Widely: It's a hard thing to prove, like "never" or "does not exist" or "most". I am not aware of a guideline specifically about such words, but the policy I am trying to enforce is called verifiability WP:V in the Reliable Sources policy. There is also a noticeboard for asking questions, WP:RSN, since sometimes this is more of an art than a science.

#Alternatives: You might not need any based on your answer above, but it would be much easier for example to demonstrate that ecocide is a crime in Ukraine. That's documented already with the links I have already seen. See the previous comment however. It would in my opinion be better to be more concrete, as in the density of landmine distribution maybe (5/m²? in places?), number of children killed by land mines? percentage drop of the wheat harvest? But I am open to discussion about any of that. TL;DR if there are currently ten references in the section, then nothing more needs to be done.

Also: I think the extent of environmental damage is fairly important in and of itself and could be expanded in the lede if you wanted. At least as far as I am concerned. Elinruby (talk) 22:00, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Hi Elinruby

1. Compound references: Thanks, I tried to make them but it just breaks, can I ask you to do them or alternative write some step by step instructions somewhere central? I think they're a really interesting idea which could be used more widely.
2. Environmental impact: I added them but they're not in the compound references since I can't make that work. Glad you're happy with the amount of references available for the claim now.
3. Widely: I think I understand you're now happy with the claim given the number of references, if not then I think we can ask somewhere for some help. I'm not sure its a question about reliable sources,
4. Alternatives: Thanks for the explanation, the impacts section already says that ecocide is a crime in Ukraine. I could possible expand the intro to say who calls the environmental damage ecocide, but I've had other editors tell me that space is extremely limited.
5. Also: See above

Based on your answers above I'm going to assume you're happy with this now and won't do anything else unless I hear back from you.

Thanks again

John Cummings (talk) 12:55, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

@John Cummings: They are called bundled references. The bulleted version (and unbulleted) are described here. Mathglot (talk) 17:07, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

References

Extended confirmed edit request oct 17

Hi! in the "Ukrainian revolution, Russian intervention in Crimea and Donbas" section, "after a a widely-questioned referendum." shouldn't have that second "a". Thanks! Aiue (talk) 15:25, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

 Done entropyandvodka | talk 15:47, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

RfC Archived Without Consensus

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

---

The recent RfC seeking a consensus to keep Belarus in the infobox did not reach a consensus, and I think was roughly split down the middle without reaching a consensus. Was there a close request or further action being taken with it? If not, per the broader RfC consensus about deprecating Supported by sections in the infobox, and not including them unless an affirmative consensus is reached to do so, Belarus and the Supported by section should be removed from the infobox of this article. entropyandvodka | talk 10:39, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Am I interpreting this correctly: there was no formal closure or written decision, a bot archived it automatically, and an involved editor has declared no consensus based purely on a WP:VOTE? If that is so, then I would ask for it to be un-archived and submitted for WP:RFCLOSE by a neutral editor.  —Michael Z. 14:19, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

You are not. I was asking for information. I was observing no consensus was reached, not making a formal declaration, and expressing concern as it did not appear to have been submitted for close. entropyandvodka | talk 15:08, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

But I do support your request to unarchive and close by a neutral editor. entropyandvodka | talk 15:36, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

"If not, per the broader RfC consensus about deprecating Supported by sections in the infobox, and not including them unless an affirmative consensus is reached to do so, Belarus and the Supported by section should be removed from the infobox of this article." That's a declaration.

But yes it should be added back, as it requires a more nuanced solution than looking at it as a vote, or looking purely at a decision made elsewhere in regards to the parameter in general rather than this specific case. TylerBurden (talk) 20:01, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Non-EC editors’ comments should be excluded per WP:GS/RUSUKR.  —Michael Z. 14:24, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

I reverted the bot. It archived the RfC and another discussion together, so if someone wants to manually archive that one, I’m fine with that. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 20:09, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

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

Extended confirmed edit request oct 17

Hi! in the "Ukrainian revolution, Russian intervention in Crimea and Donbas" section, "after a a widely-questioned referendum." shouldn't have that second "a". Thanks! Aiue (talk) 15:25, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

 Done entropyandvodka | talk 15:47, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

RfC Archived Without Consensus

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

---

The recent RfC seeking a consensus to keep Belarus in the infobox did not reach a consensus, and I think was roughly split down the middle without reaching a consensus. Was there a close request or further action being taken with it? If not, per the broader RfC consensus about deprecating Supported by sections in the infobox, and not including them unless an affirmative consensus is reached to do so, Belarus and the Supported by section should be removed from the infobox of this article. entropyandvodka | talk 10:39, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Am I interpreting this correctly: there was no formal closure or written decision, a bot archived it automatically, and an involved editor has declared no consensus based purely on a WP:VOTE? If that is so, then I would ask for it to be un-archived and submitted for WP:RFCLOSE by a neutral editor.  —Michael Z. 14:19, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

You are not. I was asking for information. I was observing no consensus was reached, not making a formal declaration, and expressing concern as it did not appear to have been submitted for close. entropyandvodka | talk 15:08, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

But I do support your request to unarchive and close by a neutral editor. entropyandvodka | talk 15:36, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

"If not, per the broader RfC consensus about deprecating Supported by sections in the infobox, and not including them unless an affirmative consensus is reached to do so, Belarus and the Supported by section should be removed from the infobox of this article." That's a declaration.

But yes it should be added back, as it requires a more nuanced solution than looking at it as a vote, or looking purely at a decision made elsewhere in regards to the parameter in general rather than this specific case. TylerBurden (talk) 20:01, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

Non-EC editors’ comments should be excluded per WP:GS/RUSUKR.  —Michael Z. 14:24, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

I reverted the bot. It archived the RfC and another discussion together, so if someone wants to manually archive that one, I’m fine with that. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 20:09, 17 October 2023 (UTC)

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

Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Working paper by Dan Ciuriak

Please see subject discussion. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:49, 20 October 2023 (UTC)

passive to active voice

Would anyone object to changing the casualty number sentence from "it is estimated to have caused" to it has caused an estimated"? Elinruby (talk) 20:39, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

The sentence would then read: It is has caused an estimated tens of thousands of Ukrainian civilian casualties and hundreds of thousands of military casualties. This wouldn't read right and would probably be grammatically incorrect. It would read OK if we were stating a figure or a range but we aren't. Cinderella157 (talk) 23:12, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

I don’t see what’s grammatically incorrect, and it seems more factually correct or specific to say that the numbers are estimated, as we know they are.

That casualties occurred is certain, and there is no reason to say “it is estimated to have caused . . . “ which appears to be a statement of likelihood of causation rather than the precision or source of the figures.  —Michael Z. 23:43, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Mzajac, right, the "estimated to have caused" seems somewhat awkward. Cinderella157 neither one is incorrect afaik, just slightly awkward imho, and I haven't ruled out that my non-standard english variant is at work here, but I don't think that's all that is. That "estimated"-->isn't it the numbers that are estimated, not the causing? The process might be in doubt in particular cases, but it still wouldn't be "estimated", would it? I think my way sounds better, and also more like a newspaper, which might be what you don't like about that wording. I've be accused of writing news-ese before, and there might be something to that.

But here is why I suggest the change or something like it, and btw I think people can understand the sentence that is there well enough, so there is no hurry on this. But in general for readability you make a lot of relatively minor changes like fixing the slightly-wrong prepositions or whatever, breaking up long sentences and putting the clauses into the order an english-speaking reader would expect: "Subject-->active verb-->object" sentence construction is usually easier to read than "object=>was=>some state".

TL;DR I think the proposed change would increase readability, which is a good thing in an article lede, and eliminate the construction of "estimated to have caused" that doesn't quite parse, even if it does convey its intended meaning. I am not in any great rush to do this, just suggesting it. Will check back on this in a few days. OH wait, are you saying, Cinderella, that the proposed structure doesn't make it clear both numbers are estimated? Elinruby (talk) 05:23, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

It is a fact that there are casualties from this war but the amounts (plural) being reported are both based on estimates. The existing sentence structure makes this clear, whereas, in the proposed structure, estimated only applies to the first amount that follows that word. The proposal is more direct but less precise. Cinderella157 (talk) 22:45, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

hmm I can see that my proposed wording might be open to misinterpretation. I may have another suggestion later. Just doing some light wikignoming right now, trans-titles for French sources and the like. Elinruby (talk) 10:21, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

"24 February 2022" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect 24 February 2022 has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 October 24 § 24 February 2022 until a consensus is reached. TNstingray (talk) 14:49, 24 October 2023 (UTC)

Q7: This is not an invasion. This is a war considered it the same as VietNam and US war.

Meanwhile we had US bringing boom, nuclear to Viet Nam and only marked as a war.

Now the same to Russia and Ukraine, it should be a war not invasion. 2402:800:59DF:54BA:603F:E0D8:390A:8E17 (talk) 05:43, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

At Wiktionary, invasion is defined as A military action consisting of armed forces of one geopolitical entity entering territory controlled by another such entity, generally with the objective of conquering territory or altering the established government.

However one feels about the US actions in Vietnam, the intent was never to conquer territory there. Russia's actions, regardless of Russia's stated intent, has to been conquer territory. Ipso facto, it is therefore an invasion. Peaceray (talk) 06:01, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

Like peaceray said this does qualify as an invasion however I'd like to add that renaming the article to use the word war would draw confusion with the article "Russo-Ukrainian war" which spans from the 2014 annexation of Crimea to today V. L. Mastikosa (talk) 09:33, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

Exactly, this should only be about the initial invasion. Slatersteven (talk) 10:58, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

Link to NATO

Can someone please add a link to the NATO wiki in any of the places NATO is mentioned? This article mentions NATO thousands of times and none of them is a link from what I saw, I think that's a useful small thing to add. ;) TIA 173.181.25.3 (talk) 21:08, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

 Done Cinderella157 (talk) 22:58, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

Ukrainian government casualties

@EkoGraf, can you please point me on the discussion regarding UA Govt casualties figures [65] thanks! Manyareasexpert (talk) 11:33, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

That was like a year ago, or something like that. I couldn't be able to find the time to look through the entire talk page archives. And since then, nobody has gone against that consensus and that's how we have been listing in the tables until now. I think @Cinderella157 was around back then when we discussed it (I may be mistaken). If you don't believe me you can start a new discussion on the issue here now. In any case, what was discussed back then when we talked how to distinguish between confirmed and estimated/claimed casualties is that any figures regarding self-admitted military losses by the beligerents (seen as a minimum confirmed) or figures confirmed by third parties (like civilian casualties confirmed by the UN) are listed in a "confirmed" table. While estimates by third parties, or claims by belligerents of their enemy's losses and of their own civilian casualties (which are regularly inflated in any conflict by the belligerents) go into the estimated/claimed table. EkoGraf (talk) 18:18, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

I would confirm the comments by EkoGraf. There was a consensus reached through discussion here that was implemented here, creating separate columns for estimated or claimed casualties and those that are/were confirmed. This has subsequently been split into two separate tables. Cinderella157 (talk) 00:26, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

Thank you Cinderella157. EkoGraf (talk) 00:38, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

Biggest attack on a European country since the Second World War

The article states twice that this is the biggest attack on a European country since World War II: in the first paragraph of the intro, and in the first paragraph of the "Timeline" section. The sources provided were published on the first and second days of the war. Can somebody please clarify what this means in the article? Kk.urban (talk) 03:24, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

The cited sources just say “biggest attack.” I can think of a number of ways in which this is the biggest or most intense attack since WWII, but I see no point in speculating on what the sources mean exactly. I don’t think there’s any debate over the attestation’s veracity, is there?  —Michael Z. 16:21, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, it's quite bizarre to be using sources from the first day of the war when they don't even say what this means. Kk.urban (talk) 17:13, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

It is a vague statement, I agree. entropyandvodka | talk 01:52, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

satellite imaging maybe? I didn't answer before because I saw one of the UN agencies say that and that's good enough for me, but I am not positive that they were the original source nor am I certain whether they meant square kilometers or manpower and equipment. I suspect the latter but either is plausible imho Elinruby (talk) 19:36, 11 October 2023 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the only candidate for a European war with a larger invasion force might be the 1968 Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia (I doubt it by now). But Ukraine announced full mobilization immediately, and its active strength is 700,000 according to our infobox, and I believe I’ve seen estimates of a 1,000,000 including paramilitary and territorial defence.

The invasion front and line of contact are probably the longest (2,300 km Russia–Ukraine border, 1,000 km Belarus-Ukraine border, 100s km southern front, Black Sea coast). The invaded country is the largest (600,000 skm), and the occupied territory at its zenith of 27% of Ukraine or 161,000 skm as of March 2022 may be the largest (that’s bigger than Czechoslovakia or Hungary, but smaller than all of Yugoslavia).  —Michael Z. 02:56, 18 October 2023 (UTC)

I'd like to note slightly more generally on this topic. Please note, I believe the original (couple months back) suggested wording was "largest armed conflict in Europe since WW2" as per CNN. Emphasis has also been put on that this is a very large-scale conventional peer vs. peer war, something that nowadays is exceptional probably anywhere but most certainly in Europe. Also of note is that one of the parties is the largest country in the world and successor to a Cold War superpower.

Because this article is about an armed conflict, the metrics used should be military first and foremost. Number of troops involved in combat, the scope, scale and amount of weapons and equipment used etc. This leading to number of weapons and ammunition destroyed/lost/expended and number of troops lost. Civilian matters like casualties, refugees, damage to infrastructure etc. are a consequence of this military operation.

So as for what is "biggest", we don't necessarily need to even consider anything much further than what Michael Z. said above. Thousands of km of frontline, more than a million combatants. Intuitively, it's all quite obvious.

However, regardless, we do not make this stuff up or debate the content of the sources. We look at what are reliable sources, we look at what those sources say and we use that. If RS supports the "largest since ...", we can say that. For this statement, there are available much more than two sources and they are dated much later than "the first day of the war." ShouldIHide (talk) 14:53, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Of note: both parties are successors of a Cold War superpower. One voluntarily gave up the word’s third largest nuclear arsenal for assurances from the other nuclear states, while the other is now the only state to have used nuclear threats for empire-building.  —Michael Z. 02:45, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

I was not previously aware that Ukraine seems to dispute some of this (Succession of states#Soviet Union). Interesting.

However, what I was referring to is that regardless of that, the generally internationally accepted successor state to the Soviet Union is indeed (only) the Russian Federation. It is them, the Russian Federation, that for example is a permanent member of and has the power of veto in the United Nations Security Council. ShouldIHide (talk) 15:40, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

In my view, putting the statement that early in the lead carries slight POV implications. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 17:29, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Are you referring to the wording (such as "attack") here?

Just noting, I was and still am a proponent of talking there instead about an "armed conflict". It is that that is largest since and so on. Some of the sources also I believe refer to "land conflict" which could also be fine. ShouldIHide (talk) 16:12, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

Related, in Plokhy 2023, The Russo-Ukrainian War, p 172: The Russian invasion of Ukraine produced the largest refugee crisis in Europe since the end of World War II. —Michael Z. 23:16, 12 October 2023 (UTC)

To claim this is the biggest attack is opinion and WP:EDITORIALIZING unless such is established against objective criteria. It is also a WP:EXCEPTIONAL claim. WP:NEWSORG sources are not generally reliable for opinion. At the very least, such opinion should/must be attributed - along with the criteria by which they would make such a claim. If criteria are not given, then this is an unsubstantiated claim. NEWSORG sources do not meet the criteria to support an EXCEPTIONAL claim. We should certainly not be making such a claim in a wiki voice in the lead unless this is the consensus of good quality sources. The statement is made in the body of the article: "has been described as the biggest". This is only supported by NEWSOG sources expressing their own opinion. Whether we should be stating this in the body of the article (anonymously attributed - it has been described as) is questionable per WP:VNOT. We should definitely not be making a categorical statement in the lead in a wiki voice that it is/was the biggest. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:16, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

We don’t need to reverse-engineer statements by officials and experts by coking up some “establishing against objective criteria.” There are sources that quote US officials stating the undeniable fact, and I believe there are expert opinion pieces that state it.

As I demonstrated, it’s definitely true based on any reasonable criteria. WP:BLUESKY app}lies: “all material that is either challenged or likely to be challenged must be cited,” but who really believes this can be challenged factually? No one here has said they doubt it or challenged it.  —Michael Z. 15:26, 19 October 2023 (UTC)

its definitely been described as "biggest since WW2" [66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73] Some of those are gold-star RS and I omitted the ones saying "record" or the like. However not all of them are using the same metric, and perhaps we should be saying "largest ground (or conventional) war in Europe since World War II" (Operation Barbarossa says "around ten million") or largest population displacement or biggest humanitarian crisis. I am not strongly on either side of this one; just noting information. I am not certain why some sources are specifying "ground war" -- possibly to distinguish from Iraq/Gulf War? I do find it difficult to believe that we couldn't agree that one of those sources is reliable and can be quoted, but I am willing to do the search again in French to see what Le Monde and Radio Canada have to say if that's the case. Elinruby (talk) 11:07, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

If it's talking about the number of soldiers who invaded, it should say that. Kk.urban (talk) 15:00, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

If by "it" you mean this Wikipedia article, that's a valid point. The pre-invasion force of "169,000–190,000" is mentioned in the infobox but I can't quickly find it in the article itself. And it should be in there if it's going to be in the infobox, or so I've been told.

Keep in mind this particular troop number alone doesn't mean anything with regard to "biggest". There are other factors. But again, we will not be the interpreters or judges of this. The sources do that. ShouldIHide (talk) 15:26, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

There are many reliable sources for the statement, but here are a few I posted on the talkpage a while ago:

• "Not Since World War II: The Worrying Precedent Many Are Evoking For The Ukraine War". Forbes. 29 November 2022. - which quotes various organizations
• "Missiles rain down around Ukraine". Reuters. 25 February 2022.
• "Ukraine war: major developments since Russia's invasion". Reuters. 24 February 2023.
• "The ripple effects of Russia's war in Ukraine continue to change the world". NPR. 22 February 2023.
• "A Year of War in Ukraine: The Roots of the Crisis". The New York Times. 27 February 2023.
• "The Invasion That Shook the World". Council on Foreign Relations. 22 February 2023.
• "Biden: 'Ukraine Will Never Be a Victory for Russia'". US Department of Defense. 21 February 2023.
• "Russia's invasion of Ukraine plunged Europe into 'biggest land war' since WWII, says report". ThePrint (India).

– Asarlaí ^(talk) 11:14, 23 October 2023 (UTC)

No. It is not "editorializing" because this is not our opinion. We are not claiming anywhere what we think is "biggest". That is not up to us.

As for the rest, do you think the claim in the article should be attributed to particular named individuals? Because that can be done. I don't think it needs to be. ShouldIHide (talk) 15:46, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

Readers are not going to learn from simply being told "this attack is the biggest". We can say this in the first paragraph and explain in more detail in the Timeline section. Readers will wonder "in which way is this attack bigger than the Bosnian War" (or some other war). The point of Wikipedia is to be an educational resource. Kk.urban (talk) 16:08, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

I'm not at all sure the point of Wikipedia actually is to be what you describe here.

Wikipedia is a type of Encyclopedia. One with very particular rules on how the articles are supposed to be written (compiled). ShouldIHide (talk) 16:15, 26 October 2023 (UTC)

They’ll learn it’s the biggest. (Incidentally, is there any way in which the Bosnian War or any other European war since 1945 could possibly have been bigger?)  —Michael Z. 22:08, 28 October 2023 (UTC)

My point is that biggest doesn't have a clear meaning. I don't know whether any other war could have bigger and readers should be able to learn this from reading the page if the page isn't going to include this fact. Kk.urban (talk) 05:47, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

This has been discussed several times and with different outcomes: see [74], [75], [76], [77], [78] and [79]. As I have said before: ["Biggest"] is a peacockish term that could be used in certain circumstances - ie, where it is the consensus of opinion in good quality (academic or similar) reliable sources and if the claim is supported by the body of the article. News reports do dot rise to the necessary standard. Whether this is the biggest/largest is an opinion and news sources are not considered reliable for opinion and are prone to editorialising (which this is). It has only been supported by news sources. This is also a WP:EXCEPTIONAL claim. Plokhy is now being cited in the lead but a single source does not represent a consensus of opinion in good quality sources. At least Plokhy would define the metrics by which they would form this opinion. Other sources have not and this has been a perennial issue with such a description. There have been assertions that there are other candidates for such a title such as the post-Yugoslavia Balkan wars and the Hungarian revolution. Mzajac, you yourself suggested the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia. Cinderella157 (talk) 02:08, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

No, I suggested that might be the closest in half of a single metric based on one side only, for comparison purposes. To suggest it might a comparable war is ridiculous.

Regarding consensus, I don’t suppose you have a list of sources that dissent with the view.  —Michael Z. 03:19, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

The exact wors were: However, the much larger Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia is a potential candidate. Cinderella157 (talk) 06:14, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

No, that’s an absolute misquote, of only part of my words omitting the context, combined with your absolute misinterpretation above.

My point was that I think that may have been the closest but there is clearly no comparison by any measure.

My point that you ignore was that the invading WP force was of a similar scale to the initial Russian force, but in Ukraine the defence was several times bigger than in Czechoslovakia and effectively resisted, and the attacking force has since grown by several times. So that invasion which was probably the closest comparison was significantly smaller. You may also notice that the resulting casualties are orders of magnitude greater.

It is just funny that you repeatedly misrepresent what I said to my own face. This is not helpful to the discussion.  —Michael Z. 14:01, 29 October 2023 (UTC)

The post in full is: That’s very likely wrong. About 31,500 invaded Hungary (the UN estimated 75,000–200,000), while around 175,000–190,000 are estimated to have entered Ukraine, so far (not to mention tens of thousands of Russian military already in Crimea and the eastern Donbas). However, the much larger Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia is a potential candidate. If what I quoted above was letter perfect, there can be no misquote. It is letter perfect, as is this quote of the post in full. Unlike some, I am not inclined to either misquote or misrepresent what others have said, since it is would be WP:UNCIVIL. However, [a]ccusations about personal behavior that lack evidence. Is considered a personal attack. Cinderella157 (talk) 06:49, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

Oh, now I see. You’re quoting something I wrote over nineteen months ago, instead of what I wrote on the same subject above, a couple of weeks ago. Sorry I misunderstood. My words still speak for themselves, in the respective contexts.  —Michael Z. 02:43, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

Well, I did provide the link! Cinderella157 (talk) 08:45, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

It has to be asked, why do we need this? Slatersteven (talk) 16:42, 30 October 2023 (UTC)

The WP:LEAD should explain why the topic is notable.  —Michael Z. 02:35, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

I think it it pretty notable without this, I am sure (in fact) that it would have been covered anyway. Slatersteven (talk) 12:30, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

Move notice

There is an RM taking place at Talk:Ukrainian syndrome to move the article to Trauma in the Russian invasion of Ukraine that may interest editors of this article. Thank you. HappyWith (talk) 21:19, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

Article idea: Kherson during the Russian invasion of Ukraine

The article for Kherson is having some problems with WP:RECENTISM, with the History section filling up with massive amounts of information about the city during the war. We have some articles like Battle of Kherson, Liberation of Kherson, and Bombing of Kherson (2022–present), but they don't fully cover the range of events, like the Russian occupation between March and November 2022, and non-bombing events after the liberation. I think this could all be covered in summary style in an article called Kherson during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, covering all the events related to the war in Kherson. Another option is just splitting off the History section into History of Kherson, and devoting a large part of that article to war events. Thoughts? HappyWith (talk) 17:24, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

My thoughts are that 200 years of history do not count less than 2 years. No we should not fork, we should reduce the recentism.Slatersteven (talk) 17:30, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

But then where should that info go? HappyWith (talk) 17:38, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

Why do we need more than a paragraph? Slatersteven (talk) 17:39, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean. There is a ton of important info about Kherson during the war that is surely notable and should be presented somewhere. Are you suggesting we don't cover these events in detail at all? HappyWith (talk) 17:42, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

What I mean is why give a period of occupation of less than a year more detail than an occupation that lasted 2 years? My last word, I do not see why we need to give so much detail to recent events. Slatersteven (talk) 17:49, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

We give so much detail to recent events because there's so much information and coverage. There wasn't much Western media attention at all on everyday events in Kherson in the 2010s, for instance.

What do you mean by "an occupation that lasted 2 years"? You mean World War II? HappyWith (talk) 19:11, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

WP:BIAS strikes again. The correct solution would be to improve coverage of pre-2014 Ukrainian history. I’m sure there are plenty of fluent Ukrainian-reading editors who would he more than happy to help. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 19:25, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

This is a good point. Now that I look more closely, I think a lot of the info is duplicated in the occupation articles that already exist. HappyWith (talk) 21:16, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

Please introduce me to some? Elinruby (talk) 17:58, 3 November 2023 (UTC)

I agree with Slatersteven and I also suggest that Russian occupation of Kherson Oblast might be a good place to shunt information. However, I think editors should of course keep in mind that WP:NOT an indiscriminate collection of information. RadioactiveBoulevardier (talk) 19:24, 31 October 2023 (UTC)

I think that information can easily fit into Kherson#In independent Ukraine or Liberation of Kherson. About the Russian occupation it should absolutely go into Russian occupation of Kherson Oblast. Super Dromaeosaurus (talk) 07:59, 1 November 2023 (UTC)