Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/3rd Battalion 3rd Marines

The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 16:58, 22 May 2007.

[edit] 3rd Battalion 3rd Marines

I've been working on this article on and off for over five months now and I think it's ready for prime time. It has undergone both a general and a military history peer review and been rated a "Good Article". In addition, it was the featured article on the Marine Corps Portal for the month of March. While there are still a few small bugs here and there, I don't see anything major standing in the way of a proper FA review. Side note: I'm preparing for a deployment to OIF sometime in the near future, so I may not be able to respond to your comments right away. My apologies. Palm_Dogg 07:55, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

There's some misunderstanding; GA is not conferred by MilHist. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 11:45, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

• Support Comment — A nice piece of work. The only issues that really stood out are the inconsistent date formats (either "1942-06-01" or "June 1, 1974" formats used) and some excessively long paragraphs. (For example, the "1951–1965" section is one long paragraph.) With some judicious paragraph breaks (in those long paragraphs) I think the article would read more easily. Also I'd like to suggest inserting a chronological table of the unit's commanding officers, if that is available. Thanks. — RJH (talk) 15:30, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Tried to fix the date formats and broke the paragraphs up. There have been something like thirty commanders of 3/3 over the last few decades and I think that would totally mess up the flow of the article. As it is, I've tried to include the more interesting ones. Palm_Dogg 16:56, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
    • It looks better, and that makes sense regarding the commanders. The other issue you will likely get dinged on is the format of some of the citations: notes 11, 22, 37 and 38 are just vanilla links. It would be a good idea to replace those with cite templates so you get a consistent look. Thanks. — RJH (talk) 19:16, 10 May 2007 (UTC)
• Oppose Changed to Support after most issues addressed. It is a nice piece of work, but in places it does seem to be written from a pro-Marine point of view (not too surprising, since I gather the main author is a Marine, but still). When you're writing about an active military unit, still involved in Iraq, that's a big deal. There are also a number of less important nitpicks. Fix all or almost all of these, and will support.
  • Lead says it is now based in HI, was reformed in CA, but not where it was originally formed. (NC, I gather from later.) Probably should for consistency.
  • Do we have an article that explains this process of activating/deactivating? We could use a prominent link to it. Is there any continuity from the former units besides the name? For example, are many (or any) of the same people in it, is there a continuous unit history, memorabilia, symbol etc.? When did the company motto show up? How about continuity from when it was the 5th Training Battalion?
  • "800 Marines and Sailors" - is it common to count Sailors in a Marine battalion? The United States Marine Corps article says the Navy carries the Marines around, but implies they are counted separately. Explain in a sentence or two somewhere in the article body, or wikilink to an article that has an explanation.
    • Thanks, that helps. I think you want corpsmen, the plural.
  • Kaneohe Bay, Hawaii - wikilink, we've got a perfectly fine article on it
  • Lebanon ... civil war - wikilink, we must have an article
  • Haditha Triad seems to link to the article on Haditha. That article doesn't use the word Triad, or say anything about the 3/3 Marines that I could find.
  • "The rest of India Company managed to clear the village and route the VC. However, during the fighting Captain Bruce Webb was killed when a supposedly-dead VC threw a grenade into the India Company command group. India then had to fight its way back to the rest of the battalion." - If the VC were routed, what did India have to fight its way through, and why did it have to retreat anyway?
    • A little bit better, but I wouldn't say it's completely explained yet.
  • Enemy death figures like "During the night, the Viet Cong retreated after suffering 600 casualties, versus 52 American dead." tend to give the article a pro-Marine slant, since presumably they are from only one side's reports. Unless they are highly reliable (from reports by both sides, or from a neutral source, for example), I would avoid them, as they don't add that much. Citing how many 3/3 Marines died is relevant, and reliable, same for how many 3/3 got awards, but Vietnam War officially reported enemy death figures were notoriously unreliable.
  • "during the Vietnam Years" - lower case Y, or rephrase to "during the Vietnam War".
  • 1610 days in country - explain, rephrase, or wikilink "in country", not obvious what that means. In Vietnam, perhaps?
  • IED - wikilink
  • machine guns and Forward air controllers from - lowercase F
  • "to deter further Soviet expansionism" - POV statement. Just remove those words, and the rest of the sentence should do.
  • Nintendo war - explain or wikilink
  • reconaissance -> reconnaissance
  • Our article on Khafji makes a big deal of friendly fire casualties. Any effect on 3/3?
  • February 27 - WP:DATE
  • "the enviable record of none killed and none wounded by enemy action" - that's leading the question: so how many were killed or wounded by friendly fire?
  • "first Marine serving in the Vietnam War be awarded" - to be awarded
  • "and Howard V. Lee (1959–1960) would" - comma before would
  • "Hero of the Bridge at Dong Ha" - lower case Hero and Bridge, it's not a formal title
  • Item CO; L Company; Lima Company; Company K; Kilo - be consistent in the way you refer to companies.
  • In fact, how about giving a list of constituent companies? Our article Battallion says "two to six companies" so it should be useful and not overwhelming information. Did 3/3 always have the same companies?
    • Well done! "three rifles companies" should probably be "three rifle companies" though
  • ""America's Battalion" originated in the mid-Eighties" - I'd specify 1980s. Not a big deal if you disagree.
  • "Interestingly, 3rd Battalion is only one of two " - remove Interestingly and only, just give the fact, let the reader decide if it's interesting or not. I personally think the earlier sentence about how it got the name is more interesting. :-)
  • Forward Operating Base - lowercase, perhaps?
  • "the War on Terrorism" - not an official name, and highly POV. How about Operation Enduring Freedom (Not that that's much better in terms of POV, but at least it's the official name of our article)? War in Afghanistan (2001–present) is possibly even better - less specific, but less slanted name.
  • Are the training exercises 1951-1965 that important?
  • "Luther Skaggs, Jr., was critically wounded in the leg" - what does "critically" mean here? Did he eventually die of it? Was he unable to walk?
  • "for this gallantry" - strike gallantry. The fact should speak for itself.
  • Many of the footnotes are bare links, for example "37 ^ http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=54880", "38 ^ http://www.duprel.com/usmcgeocitiespaid/franktejeda.html", and "35 # ^ MARADMIN 074/07 AWARDS UPDATE" isn't much better. Please expand them. "33 Sgt. Roe F. Seigle. "'America's Battalion' wraps up six-month Iraq deployment", Marine Corps News, October 6, 2006. Retrieved on April 28, 2007." is much more what they should all look like.
    • Better, but MARADMIN could still be expanded. Presumably it's some kind of Marine Administration notice about awards? Say that in English, add date of event, and a date retrieved.
  • What's the difference between the References subsection and the External links subsection? I'd combine.

--AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 15:53, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

• • • How's that look? I tried to take most of your suggestions (which were EXTREMELY helpful). Calling my article POV cut to the bone, but I suppose it's a natural concern. If you think I'm omitting some sources, please direct me to them. Palm_Dogg 06:34, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Much better. You got most. Opposition struck, will support when you get a few more. :-) I won't insist on all, but I do think you can get a few more of these points. I'm still slightly worried that there isn't much that could be considered critical of the US armed forces, except a single off-hand mention that they once accidentally shot at the commanding officer of a fellow battalion (whoops). No negative incidents in 60 years of service in 3+ major wars? How about more on that friendly fire bit - any info on how many were wounded, if none killed? Do we have an article on what it means when a unit is disbanded & reformed? --AnonEMouse ^(squeak) 16:59, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
        • I know there was some bad karma that went down in Vietnam and am trying to find some references on it. For Khafji, those friendly fire incidents happened way up on the Kuwaiti border, while 3/3 played only a supporting role in the battle. Regarding Iraq, even the Jihadi websites I went to didn't talk about atrocities. All they did was inflate the number of Marines killed. If there are some sources you know of, let me know and I'll try to include them. I'm trying to be as fair as I can, but there are only a limited number of resources available at my disposal. Palm_Dogg 04:54, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
          • Good enough. Supporting. --13:54, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

• Comment, attention is needed to the footnotes. Examples: An AOL personal website is not a reliable source (Otto Lehrack. 3/3/History. Retrieved on November 26, 2006), and this source is not correctly identified: Richard Duprel (1998). Frank M. Tejeda. 3/3 Web page. Retrieved on April 25, 2006. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 03:22, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm working on getting a better source for Vietnam, so I will try to replace those with something more authoritative. Palm_Dogg 04:54, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

• Support, but get someone else to run through it and polish the prose. Here are examples I picked up at the top.
  • Why are Marines and Sailors with initial caps?
  • Overlinked. Why not remove the state and country links (Lebanon is linked on second appearance rather than first, I see), so that it's less spattered with blue and the valuable ones are not diluted. Keep "Camp Lejeune", for example, but delink "North Carolina". Keep "Vietnam War" but not "Vietnam".
  • "3rd Battalion deployed off the coast"—insert "was", here and subsequently?
  • "It deployed again in 1990 as part of Operation Desert Shield and saw action at the Battle of Khafji and again during"—Remove the second "again", and the same word in the next sentence. Heck, it gets laboured.
  • "over twenty Navy Cross winners"—Don't you know exactly how many? Suggest "more than 20", anyway.
    • I thought I did, but apparently I forgot corpsmen. I'm have to go through the historical records again for Navy personnel. Palm_Dogg 04:54, 19 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Unreferenced quote at the end of the lead. It must be on a website somewhere.
  • "Prior to 1956"—Why not "before"? Tony 23:57, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.