Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Occupation of İzmir

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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 No consensus; default to keep. MCB 06:11, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Occupation of İzmir

This article is a WP:POVFORK which was {{main}}ed out of Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) without any real reason:

  • Virtually all of the article serves to show the background and result (illustrated analytically in the mother article)
  • The summary section of this article in the mother article is almost identical to the actual content of this one. The only additional content is ONE paragraph, namely Occupation of Smyrna#Occupation! (not to mention about its selective content)
  • There is no {{main}} template in the mother article (for obvious reasons), despite the fact that the original edit stated "moved from Greco-Turkish War to have its own page" [1]
  • There is hardly any academic reference to this period (Google scholar: only 12 hits- some irrelevant)
  • The contents of this article are largely applicable also to the Great Fire of Smyrna

The article should be merged to Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), or the title should be expanded to include Ionia; not only Smyrna

Also, the title of the article, although a military term, is largely POV, because:

  • it is anachronistic since the city was officially named "Izmir" later; should be "Smyrna"
  • it is a paradox; an army does not "occupy" a city if the majority of population is of same ethnicity; it "liberates" it.

Compare the existing title to Temporary liberation of Smyrna to see the contrast of the two POV's. Either a more NPOV term should be used, to bridge those two extremes, or the article should be deleted under any name. •NikoSilver• 00:45, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

  • Delete per nom. Merge Actually, that was the initial argument. •NikoSilver• 00:50, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep I am quite annoyed that this article was tagged, covered in pov, then nominated for deletion within the space of an hour. I took the time to carefully research and cite the contents of this article, and i intended to return to it when time permitted. Firstly, this article is not a pov fork. There is no pov implied in the title or the article (and its content is not selective, i've tried to show the treatment of Muslims and Christians within this city), it is simply the most common term used for the Greek presence in Izmir during the Greco-Turkish war by historians. It is certainly more notable than Greek administration of Ionia, 1919-1922 as suggested by the nominator. Granted, Occupation of Smyrna may be even more notable, but i was prepared to rename it to this, this was not an issue for me. Secondly, as to its right to be separate from Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), that article covers the Greek campaign from the landings in Izmir, to the Greek incursion right across Anatolia. I intended this article to deal solely with the Greek presence in Izmir over the war and in due course would have expanded it from its current state. Put simply, is the title verifiable through third party sources? Yes. Is the subject worthy of an article? In my opinion I believe it is. --A.Garnet 01:26, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
    • The article was created 8 whole months ago, and since then, no notable fact or source has been added to it. As Hectorian pointed below, it would be more legitimate to have a possible article named Occupation of Smyrni 9 September 1922-July 24 1923, talking about the turkish control of the city until the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne. This article is a narrow POV selection, both geographicaly (should be Ionia), and as a timeframe. Those 3 lines of text should be part of Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), or Greek administration of Ionia, 1919-1922, or Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922). •NikoSilver• 10:08, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
      • It was not me who created it 8 months ago, i rewrote and sourced it only a few weeks ago. If your critcism is that it is not substantial enough, then this not a valid excuse for afd. That can be expanded in time, what is important is both the tite and the content be notable enough, and this is more than substantiated by third party sources. --A.Garnet 10:50, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
        • Mu! See also straw man. •NikoSilver• 13:11, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
          • I disagree with User:A.Garnet. It is possible that there might be more to say about the occupation of Smyrna/Izmir than is already covered in the Occupation of Izmir into Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) article but that has yet to be shown. I do think NikoSilver's argument is a valid AFD argument. If A.Garnet can at least outline how this article can be expanded, I would reconsider my vote to Merge this article into the article on the war. --Richard 17:41, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment NickSilver, you are the "nom", so voting again to say delete per yourself is excessively senseless. Imban 01:30, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
    • ? Don't count my vote double if that's what you meant. •NikoSilver• 09:33, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. The dispute here seems to be primarily about the section title and about the POV of the current content. There doesn't seem to be any dispute about notability or WP:V. The disputed matters can be resolved in due course. --Shirahadasha 03:57, 22 October 2006 (UTC) On reflection, Merge with qualifications: Merge present article or Expand, and Keep and Rename a significantly-expanded article. Deletion is not required by policy, since notability and WP:V are clearly sufficient and POV problems can potentially be corrected. However, I find myself persuaded by the need to avoid a POV fork given the opposing historical and national views that still resonate from these events. The current content of this article is not much more than in the corresponding section of Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), which is currently entitled Greek Occupation of Smyrna. There's currently little apparent value-added from a separate article to offset the POV fork potential. If the content were significantly expanded so that the value of a separate article could be made more apparent, I would be more inclined to support a Keep vote than I am now. If the article will be expanded, it would be reasonable to allow some time for this to occur. If kept, the title of this article should be the same as the title of the corresponding section in Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), so a Rename would be in order. --Shirahadasha 19:04, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Rename to Liberation of Smyrna per the above comments. Carlossuarez46 06:29, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. (comments below) Hectorian 06:51, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: The article deals with a specific event, part of the 'Greco-Turkish war (1919-1920)'. In its current state (under this title and with that content) the article serves as a POV-folk. Though it is claimed to refer to events connected with the city, it talks about Alasehir and Ataturk, not to mention that through hersays and selective usage of sources it has the place of a 'turkish pov-vehicle'... Concerning the title, it expresses the clear turkish pov, talking about 'occupation'... for the greeks, it was 'liberation' (having in mind that the majority of the population were Greeks). in addition, the Greek army landed in the city under permission of an international treaty (the one of Sevres), which had been signed by the then legitimate turkish government. Apropos, a possible article named Occupation of Smyrni 9 September 1922-July 24 1923, talking about the turkish control of the city until the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne, would be more legitimate, since the turks of Kemal took a city with Greek majority, without being legitimised to do so under any treaty... Furthermore, the city's name was 'Smyrni' that time, not Izmir (also have in mind about this how the majority of the city's population and the world, or even the Ottoman administration called the city). I would agree with NikoSilver in the creation of an article named Greek administration of Ionia, 1919-1922, since: 1. this is the most NPOV title, and 2. it would talk about the whole area under Greek control (roughly corresponding to the histori region of Ionia). Hectorian 06:51, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
We have been here before, Greece occupied izmir a whole year before the Treaty of Sevres was signed, that is why its presence is referred to as occupation by historians. Even George Horton uses the term "Greek occupation of Smyrna". So your claim it landed under the provisions of a treaty is false. Second, invading a territory with the same ethnicity does not make it a liberation. It is still the territory of another sovereign. But all this is pointless, the title of this article is the most commonly used term for the events and it can be verified through impartial third party sources. --A.Garnet 10:38, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
For some weird reason though the article doesn't discuss any of this. Why?--Tekleni 10:49, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
To Garnet: I've no idea if my answer will be pointless, but if u look in the historic facts, u will see that Smyrni, at the time of the landing of the Greek army was not territory of another sovereign... The Ottoman Empire had been defeated in WWI, and so had sovereignty nowhere... (unless someone would thing he is ready to talk about 'French occupation of Alsace and Larraine...' (again, prior to the signing of a treaty). but even if we accept that the Ottoman Empire still was sovereign, the Greece administered the area, did not conquer it.... (that's why the ottoman flags remained in their place and there was a committement for a referendum). moreover, saying that since the treaty of Serves was not yet signed, we are free to name the article occupation, i'll have to remind u that the article does not cover the period 1919-1920, but more... In addition, under this pretext i can create another article, 'Turkish occupation of Smyrni 1922-1923', where the 'Great Fire' will be also discussed (more or less it would be as povfork as this one). Hectorian 19:11, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
This debate seriously doesn't belong here, but just for the record: Being defeated in a war does not strip a state of its sovereignty over its territory, according to early 20th century international law. Your point is moot. Fut.Perf. ☼ 19:16, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
My point is that as much legitimate it may be to call the greek administration of Smyrni as 'occupation', the same validity could apply to the territories Germany, Austia-Hungary, or anyone else's who was defeated in WWI (early 20th cent.). But it seems that the Germans are not pushing any pov concerning Gdansk or Lorraine... (ο νοών νοείτο)... Hectorian 19:31, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
How can it be a Turkish pov when third party verifiable sources are using the term? --A.Garnet 10:44, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
For the same reason that you claim that Pontian Greek Genocide is Greek POV when when third party verifiable sources are using the term.--Tekleni 10:49, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Correction, you have 1 third party source who mentions Pontian Greek Genocide which makes it a minority pov. Occupation of Izmir/Smyrna can be easily verified through reliable third party sources. I even got an admin to have a look at the dispute and he agreed this is the most relevant title. --A.Garnet 10:58, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Comment: per WP:ANOT: an admin is just a normal user with a mop and a bucket, not an expert or a peer reviewer. I'm not denying that an admin is more likely to be cool-minded and neutral than the average wikijoe. I'm just saying that an admin's opinion is not in itself proof of anything. --Michalis Famelis (talk) 20:44, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
Correction, there are a lot more than one (as I'm sure you are well aware), and we have more sources endorsing it than denying it (makes you wonder what the minority POV really is). This article however remains a fork of Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922). Most of the information here is a copy of what is at that article - any further information would comfortable fit into a section of that article. If it is so widely attested in the literature, why can't you even give the names of the Greek military commanders?--Tekleni 11:03, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: I was the first to suggest a merge into the mother article, but that's not a matter of deletion and should preferably be discussed on the article talk page and not here. I'd be in favour of a merge because in principle I'm not a friend of splitting controversial topics up into a multitude of subarticles, as happens unfortunately far too often. I do not endorse the arguments made by the nominator in the second paragraph of his nomination; in my view, both "occupation" and the name "Izmir" are perfectly legitimate here. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:10, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
    • Well, this will definitely prop that merge, won't it... :-) •NikoSilver• 20:43, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete & merge into [[Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922). There's nothing that should not be there. This reminds me how [User:Kubura]] created Serbian expansionistic wars in the 1990s' to parallel the Yugoslav wars article, although that case far too more POV. --PaxEquilibrium 19:35, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: May I remind everybody that "delete and merge" isn't a valid option, for GFDL reasons. If anything is merged, the edit history and a redirect must stay (and will do no harm).
  • Keep or Rename as "Invasion of Western Anatolia".The Christian population (not only Greeks) of İzmir was 30% and also the treaty of Serves was never ratified by the Meclisi Mebusan so nobody can call this event as the liberation of İzmir.--Hattusili 19:56, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Temporarily keep per (IMHO) misuse of AFD process. Other possible solutions (renaming, merging, keeping & expanding) should be discussed at the relevant talk page. Apart from that I'd agree with either merging with GrecoTurkish War or renaming to something that would signify the fact that Greece was legally holding Ionia for the time, such as "Greek administration of Ionia". --Michalis Famelis (talk) 20:44, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
Changed vote to Merge and Redirect to Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) per Richardshusr. I voted to temporarily keep so as to have the conversation take place at the talk page and not on an AfD page. It seems however that the conversation took place here anyway, so, here goes. --Michalis Famelis (talk) 18:27, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep and Rename or Re-write under a suitable title. The occupation zone for 2 to 3 years extended from Bursa-Gemlik-Yalova in the north, to Aydın in the south, and Kütahya in the east. İzmir was only the western end of the occupation zone. Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) is one thing. The occupation was another thing. There are other examples of battles and occupations being treated under separate articles. There's enough material of international scope to develop an other editors above.
  • Merge and Redirect to Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), - Agree with NikoSilver, article does not have sufficient additional content to warrant a separate article. It appears that the occupation of Smyrna/Izmir was not just a single event in the war but rather the major focal event of the war. If this is not true, I would reconsider my position. --Richard 17:29, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Regarding the name, I think Occupation of Smyrna would be more appropriate. A move request should be made on the talk page. - Francis Tyers · 11:31, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Comment: I am willing to retract this nomination if I have unwillingly abused the AfD process. Please cite the relevant policy. I was inspired by a relevant application for another article, which indeed has a lot more unique content. The article should definitely be merged, and I would like to ask the participants to move this discussion, where applicable for that merge. Waiting for answer to this comment before I withdraw nomination. •NikoSilver• 09:54, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Deletion policy. - Francis Tyers · 11:28, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
Hmmm, more specifically that would be Wikipedia:Deletion policy#Problem articles where deletion may not be needed. It explicitly says:
Problem with page Solution Add this tag
Such a minor branch of a subject that it doesn't deserve an article
 Merge the useful content into a more comprehensive article and redirect. {{mergeto¦article}}
Article duplicates information in some other article
 Cleanup or propose merge and redirect.

If you can't figure out how to perform the merger, tag it and list on Wikipedia:Proposed mergers.

 {{merge¦article}}
Article is biased or has lots of POV
 List on Wikipedia:Pages needing attention. {{npov}} or {{POV check}}
Dispute over article content
 List on Wikipedia:Requests for comments. {{disputed}}
Therefore, I hereby withdraw nomination and I'm tagging the article with the above proposed tags by the policy. •NikoSilver• 12:45, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Rename and possibly reshape. It's a topic that's notable enough to deserve it's own article, but I guess we can change the title and/or content. Khoikhoi 05:37, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep Occupation of İzmir (an ottoman province that was not in war before the armistice, so it qualifies as the name occupation) was a sub article of Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) that explains what was happened from the first day to the last day within the PROVINCE of IZMIR. Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) covers much wider perspective. Province of Izmir was a big side of the war which some of the Greek/Turkish activities in that region wanted to be wiped out from the history. It seems this time Greeks are the ones who doing the deed. (a) The towns that is listed as UNRELATED is within the ottoman province of IZMIR. (b) The last day of war which is cowered "fire in the IZMIR" was planned to be merged to this article to make the name fire less POV and more appropriate. (c) There were multinational issues during the occupation, which is not cowered by the text. The content of the article is GREEK POV, same as fire in the IZMIR and whole article of Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922). Turkish point of is constantly deleted and article become biased, by representing only one side of the truth. With the deletion of Occupation of İzmir, whole text (distributed in many articles) become GREEK POV.--OttomanReference 17:01, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
In case all of you were still wondering, we have an explicit confession by the article creator above,[2] that the article is indeed a WP:POVFORK. •NikoSilver• 20:36, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, but the question is whether the article content is substantive enough to stand on its own or whether it should be merged back into the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) article. Most of the discussion so far has been around liberation/occupation and Izmir/Smyrna. The one really substantive comment has been the idea that the occupation extended beyond the end of the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) and thus deserves its own article. This argument would be valid if there were notable events that happened during the occupation but after the end of the war. I haven't seen evidence that this is true yet. --Richard 20:49, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
I see your point. To my knowledge, there weren't any events after the war. In any case, why should this article be separate until we see such evidence? •NikoSilver• 08:51, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
No, strike what I said. I misremembered what I had read. I don't think there is any claim that the occupation extended beyond the end of the war. Re-reading the above, it appears that the Turks retook Smyrna after the end of the war. In which case, the occupation COULD be part of the article on the war or it could be separate. The question remains... is there enough encyclopedic material to warrant a separate article on the occupatio alone? Based on what's in the article now as opposed to what is in the article on the war now, I think there could be but it's a judgment call. --Richard 09:04, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Could-should-would, but definitely isn't. When it will-shall-may, we see if we make it separate. We'll have more data for bitching on what to call it too. :-) •NikoSilver• 09:12, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Let me be more clear. The article on the war has only two paragraphs on the Occupation of Smyrna. The Occupation of Izmir article has much more than that and can stand on its own as an article. If the Occupation of Izmir article were only two paragraphs, it would be a definite candidate for merging into the article on the war. However, because the Occupation of Izmir article is as big as it is, it is a judgment call whether to merge all of that info back into the article on the war, thus expanding the two paragraph section into a much larger section. I could support the merge or the keeping of the article as a stand-alone. I lean towards the keeping of the article as a stand-alone but, as I said, it's a judgment call.
If the Occupation of Izmir article is merged into the article on the war, it might be considered to be taking up a disproportionate amount of space in the article on the war. This is a good argument for pulling out the details of the occupation and having it be in a separate article.
If the Occupation of Izmir article were much larger than it is right now, there would be no question that the article should be a stand-alone.
Thus, I don't see this as being a POV fork issue at all. IMO, it's only a question of whether there is enough encyclopedic material to warrant a separate article. I think the answer is "Yes, just barely".
--Richard 09:23, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Care to point out what else is unique content in that article apart from the 4-5 lines of text in Occupation of Izmir#Occupation? The rest is background and results, which are again analyzed in the mother article (only in a much more NPOV way...) •NikoSilver• 09:30, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
What, I'm supposed to actually READ the articles in question before expressing an opinion? Since when is that a requirement of AFD?  ;^)
Seriously, I confess that I am guilty of having looked at this question too superficially. I looked at the section in the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922) article and saw the section titled "Occupation of Smyrna" and read those two paragraphs. If I had read the whole article, I would have seen what you pointed out. To wit, most of the rest of this article is covered in that article. In my defense, that other text was not clearly identified by the section headings as relevant to Smyrna. I have added in section headings to help the reader understand the flow of the article on the war. At this point, I am sitting on the fence, leaning towards a merge of the two articles. I have changed my vote above accordingly. --Richard 17:29, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
The whole argument that it needs merging because of the lack of content is pointless. No one is disputing its relevance or notability, only the amount of content, but this is something which can be expanded in time, and which i did intend to expand (i only rewrote and sourced it a couple of weeks ago). If it is merged, then put simply, i will recreate and expand it when i have time to do so. But it is unfair that other editors will not have the chance to expand it, and the onus will rest on me to research and expand the article to a state which will survive another merge request. --A.Garnet 18:36, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
Also, there is a misconception here that the occupation of Izmir and the Greco-Turkish war were one and the same thing. The Occupation of Izmir was only one stage of the war. The others include, First Battle of İnönü, Second Battle of İnönü, Battle of Sakarya, and the Battle of Dumlupınar, and finally the Great Fire of Smyrna. These are all significant stages of the Greco-Turkish war. The current level of content should not detract from the fact that it is a notable part of the war which deserves its own article. --A.Garnet 18:55, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete per nom. How can an army (A) "occupy" an area (B) if the majority of the population in the area is of the same ethnicity (A) and at the time of the event under a foe? If the area had been occupied earlier by an expanding, attacking force then army (A) Liberates. Image:Ottoman small animation.gif

Aristovoul0s 16:36, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

  • That doesn't make sense, the greeks attacked and occupied Izmir which was part of Turkey, just because most of the people there were greek doesn't mean it doesn't count as an occupation. Armanalp 18:32, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Delete. I had posted a comment above, but had not voted so far.Hectorian 17:20, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Caution, Hectorian, you're voting for the second time. You already voted as "Delete. (comments below) Hectorian 06:51, 22 October 2006 (UTC)" See above. Regards E104421 21:24, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
Sorry, I forgot (having to deal with every day and real life stuff...). Don't worry, noone is so naive to count me twice, even if that was my aim... Hectorian 21:38, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Merge and Redirect to Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922). At the present moment this appears to be by just a fork, repeating material already present elsewhere.--Aldux 17:56, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep or rename it as "Invasion of Western Anatolia". E104421 02:27, 27 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Merge and Delete: POVFORK, OR and anachronistic usage of "Izmir". Miskin 14:56, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Strong Keep, it seems like a good article to me, Just summerise it on the main page and put a link here Armanalp 18:32, 31 October 2006 (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.