Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Franco-Mongol alliance (1258-1265)

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Delete all Nakon 04:26, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Franco-Mongol alliance (1258-1265)

Franco-Mongol alliance (1258-1265) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

I strongly believe that this controversy should be settled before the article is split. It's hard enough keeping track of the debate as it is, in my opinion. In addition, splitting the article before consensus is reached may result in subpages that contradict each other or place undue emphasis on a particular POV. It's sloppy and makes the encyclopedia look bad. Kafka Liz (talk) 21:47, 17 January 2008 (UTC) For the same reason, I am nominating these related pages:

Franco-Mongol alliance (1265-1282) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Franco-Mongol alliance (1297-1304) (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

• Delete all. These pages were created as POV forks, as an attempt to dodge consensus at Talk:Franco-Mongol alliance and push a POV about the existence of a Franco-Mongol alliance. They should be deleted, and discussions should then continue at the one talkpage, as to how best fix the main article. --Elonka 22:15, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete per nom. Splitting controversial content to multiple pages is a bad idea. There needs to be a consensus at the source article (Franco-Mongol alliance) about how to present this period in an accurate on neutral manner before the content spreads to more articles. WjBscribe 22:18, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete per nom. The disputes must be settled first then subpages may be created. I personally think Franco-Mongol alliance (modern interpretations) ought to be taken out as well. We should make sure, though, that no information has been lost to these subarticles and that it all remains at the main one before they are deleted. Srnec (talk) 23:02, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete all these POV forks. Wryspy (talk) 03:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Keep This article was created after multiple requests from other users (especially Elonka) to split the main article Franco-Mongol alliance. The objective was to reduce the size of the main article, which was about 190k before the split. As the name "Franco-Mongol alliance" for the main page has already been accepted through a formal consensus (see Talk:Franco-Mongol alliance/Archive 2#Requested move), and as the split was specifically requested by other users, accusations of POV fork are quite unfair. PHG (talk) 03:39, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete All - One article on Franks and Mongols is probably more than enough. This series constitutes a walled garden of original research. See WP:BALLS. The creation of these article appears to be an attempt at circumventing the consensus at Talk:Franco-Mongol alliance. Jehochman ^Talk 15:06, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of History-related deletion discussions. -- -- pb30<talk> 18:09, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete - splitting the article up in this way is a terrible idea, and implies even more certainty to these supposed "alliances" than the article did before. john k (talk) 20:50, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete - lets see if there is a need for an article split AFTER the issue is resolved on the orignal page. Let's try pruning the original article of unneeded information/quotes/etc to get it to a more manageable size first. Plus, keeping the dispute to one page makes it easier for others to follow the discussion, and have input. When the article is split into too many POV forks, some can slip through the cracks. Ealdgyth | Talk 23:41, 18 January 2008 (UTC)
• Keep. AFD is not for content disputes; please use dispute resolution to discuss mergers and splitting of articles.Biophys (talk) 00:47, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Strong Keep I gather that the controversy is whether the relationship between the Franks and the Mongols in this period can be properly called an alliance; I do not see how it and the main article differ in POV. They both at present consider the nature ambiguous. There seems to be general agreement that the subject demands separate articles for the different phases, because of the amount of relevant material. There seems to be consensus that more than the original article will be required, and present discussion seems to be about whether these should be deleted first, the main one written appropriately, and separate ones reconstructed, or whether they should be brought in harmony all together. That makes this entirely an editing dispute--we fix articles for POV problems, not delete them, unless it's inherent. I do not see that it is inherent in the subject, though the title may be disputable, in which case its a requested move, not an afd. And deleting these specifically makes no real sense to me, since the same form of the title is used for all. (Personally, I think it is inevitable that in general historians always differ on questions like this, and both contemporary and later writers will describe it in different terms. What the academic status may be of this particular dispute I do not know, nor can i say what the est wording would be). But Biophys and I, as editors previously uninvolved in this, both think these unacceptable deletions. An Rfa on the name would seem the appropriate course. DGG (talk) 18:38, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
  • DGG, thanks for the comments, let me try and explain. It isn't that this article and the main article differ from POV at the moment, it's that the main article is under dispute for being biased and a violation of WP:UNDUE. Each time consensus has developed at the talkpage to change the article, the main editor, PHG, has responded by either edit-warring, or creating another fork with his version of the biased information. I won't bore you with the historical details of the situation, but it's basically a case of the majority of modern historians saying "A", and a very small minority saying "B", but PHG is trying to create articles that say that the majority opinion is "B", and, oh-yes-there-are-a-few-historians-who-say-"A". As for whether the main article needs to be split or condensed, it most definitely does need to be decreased in size, but there is no consensus for this "by year" split. For a different version that does have consensus, see User:Elonka/Franco-Mongol alliance, where instead of splitting into multiple "alliance" articles, the information is instead split into existing articles such as about geographical areas and Mongol leaders. In short, this Franco-Mongol alliance (1258-1265) article is biased, a violation of WP:UNDUE, and a duplication of biased information that is already in other locations. It should be deleted. --Elonka 23:17, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete all - the only proper use for a fork is an article providing detail linked to a more general one by a "main" template. Having two separate articles covering the same ground is bad in principle, because they tend to get altered in differnet ways, withe the result that WP starts contradicting itself. We seem here to have a historiographic dispute. It is legitimate for the main article to set out both views, unless one side of the argument consists of a small group of mavericks (whose views are not worthy of discussion). It is possble the detail of the historiographic arguments should be kept out of the main article and set out in a forked article (being a sort of appendix). I am a historian, but not a specialist on this area. I suspect that all this is built on the interpretation of a handful of medieval chronicles. Accordingly, there is a legitimate disagreement among historians as to the course of evetns and how they should be interpreted. WP should provide a WP:NPOV setting out all arguments. However this should not be done by producing duplicate articles, so that they can contradict each other. Peterkingiron (talk) 17:13, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Elonka and peter, this is not the way to handle editing disputes. It is relatively difficult for someone coming to a long dispute from outside to know what the actual root of the matter is--am i right that the question is whether to describe the relationship as a/an alliance b/independent parties acting occasionally in cooperation or c/the complete subject and vassalage of some of the crusader kingdoms to the Mongols? It is quite obvious that people on the spot will describe matters differently. As I understand it in general, the Mongol conquests operated by terrorizing local populations and rulers into cooperation by the threat of total extinction. The Mongols characteristically called them allies, in order to justify the expected total willingness to assume whatever excessive demands they placed on them, and to discourage rebellion in their rear. "Of course we're putting you in the front lines next time- you are enthusiastic about supporting our war, aren't you? Wouldn't you rather risk death there than meet it by immediate decapitation of every adult in your city like so many of your neighbors?" Like most conquerors, they treated hem like vassals if not slaves. It worked very well. Obviously historians of the subjected nation will make of it as best they can--and horrifed people a little out of the path of danger will report it very differently. And the Mongols themselves will say something to their own glory. And the Western writers furthest from the action will understand this imperfectly, in their familiar vocabulary.

so there is no point in multiplying quotations--there are enough sources that one can find as many as one wants fro whatever point of view one wishes to take. Like many similar WP controversies, this focuses around terminology: is country X an invader or liberator? the answer is that is is rarely describable exactly in a single sentence.

But the way to deal with a difficult series of articles is not to delete most of them. Historical topics can be divided by both region and chronology, and I dont see any reason not to use both ways if the topic is important enough, or why they must always be in perfect agreement: its not as we had a mission to propagate the absolute truth, and must avoid all heresy. At the moment, you are trying both to shorten the main article and delete the subsidiary chronological ones, and i dont think that's a sensible course to follow. I tend to agree the main article in its alternate form was much too long, and the current version is better. But that should be a reason for keeping the others, not for deleting them/.

Closing them all with no consensus at this point is usually considered premature, but I think it would be justified as the only way likely to find a solution. If there could be a moratorium on the need to defend video, RPG, and other popular culture articles, and if we could agree on any sort of compromise solution at WP:FICTION and WP:EPISODE, I'd have time to give it a try as an informal mediator. I'd much rather learn more about the Mongols than about RPGs. I'd much rather work on history than on television series..DGG (talk)

I strongly disagree with that proposal.Jehochman ^Talk 19:27, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

My comments above were directed to the Fork issue. I was expressing no view on the merits of the articles, as I am not qualified to do so. My view is that the subject should all be dealt with in one article. If there are multiple valid POVs they should all appear with discussion of their respective merits. These are interpretations, and may well all be valid views of the facts. However historiographic arguments tend to be boring to the general reader, and may thus be banished (in effect) to a specialists' appendix. Perhaps my view should have been merge back to main article which is the usual answer to POV forks. Peterkingiron (talk) 01:00, 21 January 2008 (UTC)

• Keep A content dispute is not a proper reason for requestion a deletion. Particulalry when the articles(s) in question are very well referenced and linked within Wikipedia in addition to having the potential for further expansion.-- Ευπάτωρ ^Talk!! 00:54, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
• Delete all It's clear from size the article will need splitting, but the cleavage lines PHG has chosen, while convenient from one point of view, seem not to be supported by page consensus. Better to fix POV fork issues first, as suggested by several editors above, then find a more organic division. BusterD (talk) 04:08, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.