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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Arrest and assassination of Ngo Dinh Diem

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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 01:32, 14 October 2007.

Arrest and assassination of Ngô Đình Diệm

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This article covers the last hours of the life of the first President of South Vietnam, Ngo Dinh Diem, as he is captured at the end of a coup and then executed. It seems poised to pass a MILHIST A-class review, and I have just implemented a copyedit. Hopefully, I can get this featured before Nov 2 (the day of the assassination). Blnguyen (bananabucket) 09:32, 5 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • comment Article contains the following sentence: "they had ordered the construction of a three tunnel leading from Gia Long to remote..." What is a 'three tunnel'? Hmains 01:48, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • comment Article contains the following sentence: "The embassy informed Conein that Kennedy him to find Diem." Words are missing from this sentence, maybe 'ordered' or 'had ordered'. Hmains 02:01, 7 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment I think this article would benefit from a brief summary section to put it more into context. A few sentences on the lives of the Ngo brothers (How old were they when this happened? How long had Ngo Dinh Diem been president? How did he become president?) and causes of the coup might help (why were they so hated?). It might also be useful to give abbreviations after the first full use of the word (ARVN) and not to have abbreviations before the first use of the word (APC) (both in the lead). I would identify President Kennedy (not just as "Kennedy"). There are still some typos: "In anticipation of a coup, they had ordered the construction of three tunnel separate tunnels leading from Gia Long to remote areas outside the palace." "Nixon ordered an investigation under E. Howard Hunt into the murders, convinced that Kennedy must have a secretly ordered the killings." "The eight anniversary of Diem’s death in 1971 was the first time that memorial services had been held with government approval..." and finally semicolons should have a space after them (before the words that follow). I am not sure if this last point is because I do not speak Vietnamese, but I had some trouble keeping all the military officers straight - I'm not sure how to make all the names clearer, maybe keep their ranks with their names (so Colonel so and so might be easier to follow than jus his name)? Overall this is well done, but it needs a bit more polish. Hope this helps, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 01:56, 9 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Fixed typos. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 01:54, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
      • Update. I have filled in the first lot of background. Diem and Nhu were 62 and 53 respectively. I'm not sure where this is the most appropriate. Feel free to add in wherever it is appropriate. Teh backgrouwnd and abbrevaitions have now been fixed, and the background is mostly unreffed as it is reffed in the main article as per WP:SS. Finally with the names, I am not sure what is the problem. I mentioned their rank and full name and on repeat instances simply use their given name. In Vietnamese, their given name is their last name, family name goes first. Hence General Tran Van Don is called "Don". His last name is Tran, but in VN, people are known by their given names, else everybody would be Mr Nguyen, Mr Tran, Mr Le and so forth. thanks, Blnguyen (bananabucket) 04:27, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Support Well done and deserving of Featured Article status. The new summary is very good and helped me understand the rest of the article much better - thank you for adding it and for addressing my comments above. I am not sure where to add the ages, but here are two possibilities: a) What if Diem and Nhu's year or date of birth were added right after each is introduced (after the lead)? Or b) What if in the section describing their killings, you added a sentence something like "At the time of their deaths, Diem was 62 and Nhu 53."?

I have reread the article just now and took notes and have a few more comments that may be useful, especially some specifics that hopefully clarify my last comment about making names clearer, as well as some small puzzles I found. Puzzles first:

  1. Did Huynh Van Cao remain loyalist or not? The sentences "Minh and Don had invited senior officers to a meeting at Tan Son Nhut Air Base, the headquarters of the Joint General Staff (JGS), on the pretext of routine business. Instead, they announced that a coup was underway, with only Tung refusing to join." leaves it unclear.
  1. How did Diem and Nhu die in priests' robes? They are described as entering the church in business suits, then their bodies are seen in the photographs dressed in priests' robes. Did Diem and Nhu put them on as disguises? Did the army officers dress them that way? If so, was it as disguises or somehow to associate them more with the Catholic church before execution? Even if the reason is unknown, that should be stated (something like "It is unclear why they were dressed in clerical robes.")
    It is not discussed at all in the books. They might have known but not written it down, so I left it as is. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:37, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  2. The normal spelling is "Götterdämmerung", not "Gotterdammerung". Since it is a direct quote, the incorrect spelling may be wrong in the original (so perhaps it should be noted with [sic]?).
  1. It was in the book except I didn't have the marks on my keyboard. fixed. Blnguyen (bananabucket) 02:37, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  1. Duong Hieu Nghia is described as participating in the killings in the body of the article, but not the lead, so should he be identified in the lead as directly involved in the killings too (not just Nguyen Van Nhung)?

Names where a bit of clarification may be helpful:

  1. It might be useful to mention that Nguyen Van Thieu later became President, otherwise he is mentioned once as a Colonel in the section "Surrender and debate" and not again until the section "Culpability debate" as President. Perhaps "After sunset, the Fifth Division of Colonel Nguyen Van Thieu (who would later become President) led an assault on Gia Long Palace and it fell by daybreak.[4]" and later "When Thieu (who had led the assault on Gia Long as a colonel) rose to become President,..."
  2. Since there are two men named Tho (vice president and aide de camp), perhaps it would make sense to clarify that it is the aide de camp with Diem and Nhu in Arrest in Cholon.
  3. Also in the Arrest in Cholon section, would adding General to Khiem "Thao was told by General Khiem...." make that any clearer? Khiem is referred to as a general later in the same section. As he is only mentioned three times in the article, he is harder to identify without his rank.

Congratulations on a very nicely written and well researched article, Ruhrfisch ><>°° 15:41, 10 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support for featured article, historical, interesting, many images. Well done.--Sandahl 01:50, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Strong SupportAn extremely interesting article written about an important event in the Vietnamese history. Also, this is as best as you can ever get about this incident.Excellent use of images and deserve to be an FA.Iwazaki 会話。討論 15:34, 11 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Leaning towards support As usual, a well-researched, comprehensive, and well-written article. I just have a few, tiny things I would like to see spruced up before I support.
  • One or two more sentences at the beginning of the lead to provide an even broader historical context.
  • Dissidents, communist and nationalist, were jailed and executed in the thousands, and elections were routinely rigged. - Are these "communists" or "Communists"?
  • Opposition candidates were threatened with conspiracy with the Vietcong, which carried the death penalty, and in many areas, large numbers of ARVN troops were sent to stuff ballot boxes. - I don't quite follow - how do you threaten someone with a conspiracy?
  • The captain had hated Nhung before. Now he was charged emotion. - Is there a preposition missing or should there be a "[sic]"?
  • In the "Assassination" section, there are double quotation marks (""). Aren't quotes inside quotes supposed to have single quotes ("')?
  • There are some quotations without inline citations immediately after them. For the sake of clarity, I think it is best to cite immediately after the quotation.
  • I know that it is optional for wikipedia, but I always like to provide the city of publication for any sources I use. If you order a book or request it from interlibrary loan, you often need that information.

These are small details and I look forward to supporting the article shortly. Very nice work. Awadewit | talk 03:38, 12 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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.
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