Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Imperial Japanese Navy

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[edit] Imperial Japanese Navy

An overview of the development of Japan's Navy, and somehow a case study of one of Japan's most central effort at modernization. Essentially self-nom. PHG 13:09, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

  • Support PHG
  • Object, for a number of reasons:
  1. Qualitative judgements (for example, "the best naval fighter plane of the era" or "of high caliber as compared to their contemporaries around the world") must be directly cited. Inline citations for other items couldn't hurt, either.
  • Done. Added several in-line quotes, including the two specified ones above. PHG
  • I meant citation rather than direct quotes (and the quotes you added don't include page numbers, making them somewhat useless. In addition, there are a variety of statements in the article that also need better referencing. The more essential ones that I noticed (listed by section):
  • Medieval origins
  • "At the peak of Wakō activity, circa 1350, fleets of 300 to 500 ships at a time, transporting several hundred horsemen and several thousand soldiers, would raid the costs of China (Nagazumi)"
  • Done. Source: Nagazumi Red Seal Ships, p21 PHG
  • Warring States period (15th-16th century)
  • "Around that time, Japan seems to have developed the first ironclad warships in history"
  • Facts, rather than qualitative comment. Please check Ironclad article. PHG
  • And that article has no references either ;-) It can't be turtles all the way down, unfortunately—at some point that claim has to be tied to a specific source. It certainly doesn't qualify as common knowledge. Kirill Lokshin 13:49, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
  • The references I have are in Japanese ([1], [2]). There are also a few Western sources ([3] "Iron clad ships, however, were not new to Japan and Hideyoshi; Oda Nobunaga, in fact, had many iron clad ships in his fleet."). In Western sources, these ships are described in CR Boxer "The Christian Century in Japan 1549-1650", p122, quoting the account of the Italian Jesuit Organtino in 1578. The first Western ironclads date to 1859 with the French Gloire ("Steam, Steel and Shellfire") PHG
  • You should just note those references in the article, then. I wasn't suggesting a comparison with Western ironclads, incidentally, but rather with the more well-known Turtle ships; the two develop during the same period, so a source is needed if we're to claim Japan got there first. Kirill Lokshin 18:30, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Influence of the French "Jeune Ecole" (1880s)
  • "the 1887 Kotaka, considered as the first ever effective design of a destroyer"
  • Done. Source: Evans, Kaigun, p17 PHG
  • "the Yoshino, built in Elswick, the fastest cruiser in the world at the time of her launch in 1892"
  • Done. Source: Evans Kaigun, p17 PHG
  • Russo-Japanese war (1904-1905)
  • "One of these battleships, Mikasa, the most advanced ship of her time"
  • Done. Source: Evans Kaigun, p60-61 PHG
  • "the Mikasa led the combined Japanese fleet into what has been called "the most decisive naval battle in history""
  • Done. The quote if from Corbett Maritime Operations in the Russo-Japanese War, 2:333 PHG
  • Towards an autonomous national Navy
  • "Following a strategy of "Copy, improve, innovate", foreign ships of various designs were usually analysed in depth, their specifications often improved on"
  • Done. Source: Howe, p284 PHG
  • "The Japanese Navy was the first in the world to use in combat a wireless communication system, used during the Battle of Tsushima"
  • Done. Source: Evans, Kaigun, p84 PHG
  • World War I
  • "After the conflict, the Japanese Navy received seven German submarines as spoils of war, which were brought to Japan and analysed, contributing greatly to the development of the Japanese submarine industry"
  • Done. Evans Kaigun p212 PHG
  • Interwar years
  • "The Imperial Japanese Navy was faced, before and during World War II, with considerable challenges, probably more so than any other navy in the world"
  • Done. Source: Lyon World War II warships p34 PHG
  • "A consistent weakness of Japanese warship development was the tendency to incorporate too much armament, and too much engine power, in comparison to ship size (a side-effect of the Washington treaty), leading to shortcomings in stability, protection and structural strength"
  • Done. Source: Lyon World War II warships p35 PHG
  • World War II
  • "Consequently, at the beginning of World War II, Japan probably had the most sophisticated Navy in the world"
  • Done. Source: Howe, p286 PHG
  • "she should also have been able to protect her long shipping lines against enemy submarines, which she never managed to do"
  • Done. Source: Lyon World War II warships p39 PHG
  • Submarines
  • "Other submarines undertook trans-oceanic missions to German-occupied Europe, such as I-30, I-8, I-34, I-29 and I-52, in one case flying a Japanese seaplane over France in a propaganda coup"
  • Done. Source: Japanese submarines (潜水艦大作戦, p70) PHG
  • The small number of references is somewhat unusual as well, but isn't necessarily a problem if everything in the article can be tied to them. Kirill Lokshin 20:29, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Done. Added six more book references connected to the article content (10 book references overall) PHG
  • Great! You might want to look at putting the references in a standard format; as things are, they seem to have mis-ordered author/title combinations, etc. Aside from that, my only concern is the citation for the ironclads at the top. Kirill Lokshin 13:49, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
  1. The "See also" section is rather long; some of the items should be mentioned within the text, or not at all.
  • Done. Eliminated redundant "See also" links. PHG
  • I still think the links are excessive, even split into sections; but it's possible this is merely a matter of taste. Kirill Lokshin 20:29, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Done. Transfered Weapons and Admiral into the IJN banner. PHG
  1. A number of sections in the first half of the article are only a paragraph long (the worst is "Boxer Rebellion"). These should be either expanded or merged with neighboring sections; alternately, you can drop the headings a few levels. At the very least, a heading-2 section needs to be more than two sentences.
  • Done. Integrated "Boxer Rebellion" as a later development of the Sino-Japanese war.
  • Some more merging here would be helpful. It's not really necessary to have a separate heading for every incident (e.g. "Invasion of Korea", "Invasion of the Ryukyu", etc.) Kirill Lokshin 20:29, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
Done PHG
  1. The images should be more balanced between the right and left margins. As it is, only one image is on the left.
This is a good article, but some more work is needed before it's ready. Kirill Lokshin 15:41, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
Support now that the changes have all been made. Kirill Lokshin 00:09, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
I agree, it is looking better though. I did some work on the first few sections. Mostly wording to try and make some of the more awkward sentences less so. It does have promise. With a bit more work it should reach FA.--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) 08:06, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

PS THIS is what has become of the once, mighty Japanese Navy! :>

  • Thanks for this amazing video!! PHG
  • Object for quite a lot of reasons:
  • Too many minute sections and sub-sections, especially relating to history. I recommend writing in broader strokes, every century doesn't need its own sub-section and "World War II" doesn't need separate sub-sections on various types of weaponry (especially not "Fuel").
  • Done. Moved "Fuel" to sub-article PHG
  • Only four sub-sections to go, then. WW II is still divided into four ship classes, which is definetly over-indulgent. You also have the three-sentence "Boxer Rebellion", many quite tiny paragraphs (this is subjective, I know) and some very odd structure going on in "Medieval origins". I'm hesitant to even use the term "medieval" outside of European history, and I'm very skeptical to letting it run right up to 1840, even if Japan was pretty feudal. / Peter Isotalo 00:51, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Changed "Medieval origins" to simply "Origins". I think this sections has a better flow as well (thanks for the improvements). Dropped "Boxer rebellion" heading as well. PHG
  • Plenty of one-sentence paragraphs that need merging.
  • Done, at least mostly done with I thinkPHG
  • Too much kanji, romaji and macrons. Not that many people can read or understand it and most probably just see annoying white boxes or question marks. In-prose usage of it should be limited to names of the navy and the likes. In general, just don't use macrons in prose at all. And, yes, I can read and write Japanese fairly well, so I'm not complaining just because I can't understand it. Is there really a point in linking to Japanese Wikipedia articles, by the way?
  • Done. Unlinked the Japanese Wikipedia articles. Removed macrons. PHG
  • The amount of pics should be cut to about half. There's simply not enough text to make them fit properly right now.
  • Done. Removed a few images where there was an issue with insufficient text space. PHG
  • I don't know if the article is supposed to cover the modern navy or not, but if it is, there's not enough info. If it's not supposed to be included, try to make the reasons for this a bit more obvious in the lead.
  • Done, added a comment in the intro: the Imperial Japanese Navy was dissolved at the end of World War II. PHG
Peter Isotalo 19:46, 14 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment, I'd like to see a longer lead that gives a bit more detail. The links section at the bottom of the article is a bit too much, major actions are all listed in the text and on the template, the same is true of admirals- why is there a separate list of them at the end of the article? Also the lists of weaponry etc could probably be confortably added to the Imperial Navy template.--nixie 02:29, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
  • All done. Thanks for the suggestions PHG
One more thing, the in text citations are kind of jarring, I think innote or footnotes would work better.--nixie 11:10, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Right. I re-incorparated most of the inline quotes into the text, but kept the references. Thanks. PHG
  • Comment Title does not match article content. Article is much broader in scope, and includes extensive coverage of naval forces not responsible to the Emperor or Empire. What would you say to "Naval history of Japan"? Fg2 12:18, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the comment. 4/5th of the article is actually devoted to Imperial Japanese Navy (formally created at the time of the Meiji restauration). The remaining1/5th, at the beginning of the article, is the "Origins" part, reduced to the minimum, and the "Bakumatsu Navy", which actually provided the first step in the modernization of Japan's Navy. This is roughly consistent with the treatment of the Imperial Japanese Navy in books such as "Kaigun". A whole "Naval history of Japan" would have to devote much more space to Medieval evolutions in particular. PHG
  • Support. Article is plenty long and detailed, with lots of pictures and involved history of the naval forces. I agree with Fg2 that it needs to be pared down to the Imperial Japanese Navy proper, i.e. just Meiji and beyond, since nothing in the Sengoku period was the official Navy of the nation. However, overall, a quality article; while there is some information that does not necessarily belong, it is valid information, and relevant to the historical background of Japan's naval technology and organization. LordAmeth 15:02, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
    • I somewhat disagree about the scope. The section is clearly labeled "Origins", establishing that it's a pre-history. A suggestion for a compromise would be a (reasonable) shortening of "Origins". / Peter Isotalo 15:58, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
      • It's a pre-history ... of the entire naval history of Japan! The entire "Origins" section needs to be reduced to a sentence or two if this article is truly to be about the "Imperial Japanese Navy" instead of something broader. Personally, I think this would be a waste--please see my comment below. CES 16:57, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment I agree with Fg2 and LordAmeth, the article seems to be in between "Naval history of Japan" and "Imperial Japanese Navy", closer to the former than the latter. Honestly, if I didn't know what the title was, I would've thought it was a complete naval history of Japan--and I think this is a good thing; the breadth is nearly the same as Military history of Japan and the depth puts that article to shame. It goes without saying that the scope is much larger than the corresponding article at the Japanese Wikipedia. Personally I think this article would be better served if it were expanded into a complete "Naval history of Japan" (really, I think this article is about 90% of the way there--just expand a bit on the "Origins" and Self-Defence Forces section and you've got it), but if you want the article to be limited to the Imperial Japanese Navy, the "Origins" section needs to be pared down closer to what we have in the Imperial Japanese Army article. But I think that would be a waste. I recommend turning this into a full-fledged Naval history of Japan. CES 16:57, 18 November 2005 (UTC)
  • I think indeed there is indeed room for a Naval history of Japan article, so I created it, to be expended further, especially in the Medieval area. In the meantime, I reduce the "Origins" in the Imperial Japanese Navy article, to an amount of information which I believe is present in most books on the Imperial Japanese Navy. PHG
  • The article links to Yokosuka, which redirects to Yokosuka, Kanagawa; do you prefer that or U.S. Fleet Activities Yokosuka? Fg2 01:10, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
    • I changed a lot of spelling. Note 1 has a title that looks like it should be Port Arthur but I didn't change it; it's worth checking. OED hyphenates "battle-cruiser" and MW writes it as two words; you might make a choice. Fg2 02:09, 19 November 2005 (UTC)
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