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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Operation PBHistory/archive1

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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 by Sarastro1 via FACBot (talk) 21:44, 15 February 2018 [1].

Operation PBHistory

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Nominator(s): Vanamonde (talk) 06:00, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about a CIA covert operation in Guatemala, one of many articles I worked on related to the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état, which became an FA in 2017. It's based on pretty much every scholarly discussing the subject. I feel it's comprehensive. Shearonink provided a detailed GA review. This is my second effort at FAC; the previous one was archived, essentially for lack of participation. At that FAC, it received an image review by Nikkimaria, a source review by Brianboulton, and comments from Dudley Miles and SchroCat, whom I am pinging to see if they have anything to add. The article has not changed significantly since that review. All feedback is welcome. Vanamonde (talk) 06:00, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The previous nomination is at Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Operation PBHISTORY/archive1. The article was retitled following a discussion there. Vanamonde (talk) 06:30, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Dudley Miles

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As I said in comments on the previous nomination, there are still two issues which you did not address. Dudley Miles (talk) 10:44, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Dudley Miles: I apologize for missing your comments: I was away for a few days and did not check the page thoroughly enough on my return. I have tweaked the wording in both cases to try and address your points. Let me know if that helps, or whether further clarification is needed. With respect to your second comment, I've simply removed the phrase referring to Castillo Armas "taking power", because I realized it was ambiguous in this case: Castillo Armas held power both as leader of the junta and as President. Vanamonde (talk) 13:39, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
My second query has been dealt with but I still cannot see what you are getting at in the last sentence of the lead: "Historian Max Holland stated that 'PBHistory ultimately could not repair the damage caused" by the fact that the US could not hide its involvement in the overthrow of Árbenz,[2] while Bevan Sewell wrote that it was an "ill-fated" operation, and that "the level of discord that US actions had caused in the region overshadowed any attempt to publicize [their] success."' In the first part you appear to say (or quote historians saying) that the US agents unsuccessfuly attempted to conceal their involvement, and in the second part that they attempted to publicise their success. Dudley Miles (talk) 23:26, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Note: I don't believe you've completed the nomination process, as this is not listed on the WP:FAC page Brianboulton (talk) 23:18, 2 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

My apologies, I have done so now. Vanamonde (talk) 05:01, 3 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Sources

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  • @Brianboulton: for the sake of completeness: two sources have been added following a conversation with Finetooth below [2], [3], and one has been moved to further reading. Any comments?

Images are appropriately licensed. Nikkimaria (talk) 13:53, 3 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Support on prose Comments by Finetooth

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This generally reads well. I made about 30 small copyedits here as I went, and I have a few other suggestions and questions.
Your copy edits look excellent to me.
Lead
  • ¶2 "The first phase of the operation began soon after Árbenz's resignation on June 27, 1954, with several agents being dispatched to Guatemala beginning on July 4." – Replace the "with plus -ing" construction? Suggestion: "After Árbenz's resignation on June 27, 1954, the CIA sent several agents to Guatemala beginning on July 4."
  • Done
  • ¶3 "In summarizing the impacts of the operation, Historian Max Holland stated that 'PBHistory ultimately could not repair the damage caused' by the fact that the US could not hide its involvement in the overthrow of Árbenz, while Bevan Sewell wrote that it was an 'ill-fated' operation, and that 'the level of discord that US actions had caused in the region overshadowed any attempt to publicize [their] success.' " – I agree with User:Dudley Miles that something here is not clear. I'd suggest recasting this paragraph as follows: "PBHistory documents were used to support the CIA's existing operations Kufire and Kugown, which sought to track Latin American communists and to disseminate information critical of the Árbenz government. Documents were shared with the Kersten Committee of the US House of Representatives, which publicized PBHistory within the US, and the documents helped Guatemalan intelligence agencies create a register of suspected communists. Yet Operation PBHistory failed to find evidence that the Soviet government controlled the Guatemalan communists or to counter the international narrative that the United States had toppled the Árbenz government to please the United Fruit Company." Then I would suggest moving the direct quotations to the last paragraph of the "Aftermath and analysis" section, and recasting them with clarity in mind, possibly omitting the Holland quote altogether since his point seems to be made adequately elsewhere in the article.
  • After reading your comments and those of Dudley Miles, I read the source yet again, and now I have come to the conclusion that the contradiction is in the source itself. I have copied the paragraph below, but in essence it seems as though Sewell is claiming that PBHISTORY was about publicizing the coup, which it was not: it was about justifying the coup. Accordingly, I've just removed the quote. If either of you see a way to salvaging a useful, non-contradictory, non-redundant quote, I'd love to hear it. Vanamonde (talk) 04:00, 9 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Further damage to Washington’s image would be done by the administration’s actual covert act of removing Arbenz from offi ce (Rabe, 1988: 42–64). While the inflexible stance taken by the US over economic issues had, undoubtedly, contributed to a deterioration in inter-American harmony, the role of the US in bringing about Arbenz’s downfall had an even greater impact. Paradoxically, this was in spite of the fact that Eisenhower and his advisors considered it one of their greatest successes in the region. Following the overthrow the US attempted to publicize it through the ill-fated Operation PBHistory (Osgood, 2006: 147–148; Holland: 323). The level of discord that US actions had caused in the region overshadowed any attempt to publicize its success. Such sentiments were, as Mark Stoler (2007: 662) has outlined, expressed with great vehemence by Oscar Waiss, leader of the Chilean Socialist Party. ‘It is certain that the United States has lost more than it gained [. . .] it has lost forever the friendship of the peoples of Latin America and the possibility of being considered [. . .] as a “good neighbour” [. . .] Latin Americans will not forget Guatemala so easily.’ And, as the decade wore on, this disconnection between the administration’s rhetoric and actions would continue to intensify. (Sewell, 2008, page 303)

First phase
  • Flip three sets of back-to-back citations in the first two paragraphs of this subsection to ascending order?
  • Fixed. I usually do a check of this, neglected to do so in this case...
  • ¶2 "...purchase of weapons from Czechoslovakia..." – Link Czechoslovakia?
  • Done
Second phase
  • ¶4 "750 photographs of this material..." – The MOS advises against starting a sentence with digits.
  • Done
Operation Kufire
  • ¶1 "Operation Kufire was a wide-ranging operations..." – To avoid repeating "operation", replace the second instance with "effort"?
  • Done, also fixed typo
Operation Kugown
  • ¶2 "...convinced American journalists such as Donald Grant..." – Can you identify him further? Who did he write for? Was he an editor, a publisher?
  • Done, but I'm not terribly happy about this. Holland describes him as "one of the most experienced and respected U.S. journalists covering Latin America at the time", but neglects to mention his affiliation. The cited article of Grant's is from a journal (which I've now cited), and it says he is with the St Louis Post Dispatch, which is a fact I've added. But, there's a slight possibility he was not with the SLPD during the time of the Operation: the source is only good for its time of publication. Nonetheless, an improvement, I think, so I've left it in for now.
  • Looks good to me. Via newspapers.com, I checked for and found Donald Grant articles published in 1954 for the SLPD. One that popped up almost immediately is a March 1954 article about Dulles, communism, and Guatemala. I could add a citation to it, if you like, to make the SLPD part of the claim airtight. Finetooth (talk) 22:47, 10 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
Kersten Committee
  • ¶1 "...the Kersten Committee held a number of hearings" – I'd either add the exact number or delete the vague "a number of".
  • Done
General
  • The mural has alt text. Concise alt text for the other three would be nice even though not required.
  • Done, but I'm terrible at alt text, feel free to suggest modifications.
  • No disambiguation problems.
  • No dead URLs.
  • The main text includes duplicate links for Dwight Eisenhower (3 links), United Fruit Company, psychological warfare, and Office of Intelligence Research. You could safely delete the duplicates.
  • Done: I like to use a link at the first use of a term in the body even if there's one in the lead, but I've removed the rest.
  • Switching to support on prose. I don't think you need the Sewell quote unless fresh eyes see something I'm missing. Let me know if you want me to add the Donald Grant (SLPD) citation. Finetooth (talk) 23:35, 10 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from SchroCat

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Background
  • "Philosophically conservative": neither our article on JJA nor the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état article, nor the one of the two sources uses this phrase, which is an odd one, and which raises more questions than it answers for what was a socialist/radical politician. Is there a way to re-phrase to give clarity?
  • Well, describing him as a radical is hardly accurate. To quote Streeter (2000): "Although he borrowed many of his ideas from Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal, he also spoke of “spiritual socialism,” an unfortunate expression that misled many U.S. officials to brand him a communist [...] In truth, Arévalo barely qualified as a social democrat. Spiritual socialism was a nebulous philosophy which asserted that a “harmonious society” could be achieved through psychological liberation rather than a redistribution of wealth. Arévalo rejected classical Marxism in favor of liberal capitalism, whose rough edges would be smoothed by legislative reforms." In other words, he's not particularly different from any mainstream European part today. He was also a staunch anti-communist. I think this is a bit much to get into here, so I've just removed the descriptor, and stuck to describing his policy.
  • It comes across as a bit of an Easter egg, so "under [[Soviet Union|Soviet influence]] would be better as " under the influence of the [[Soviet Union]] (it may be my background, but when I read of 'influence' in geopolitical terms, I think of Sphere of influence, which is confusing.
  • Done.
  • Done
  • Tweaked
  • Done through the article, linked as suggested
  • "Washington issued a series of statements". No it didn't. A city did nothing of the sort, but perhaps a government department or agency or "the American government" did.
  • True: this is just the tendency for the sources to fall into journalese. Fixed.
  • Any reason for the difference in capitalisation between the Britain's Labour party and the Swedish Social Democratic Party? I seem to remember that it was the Labour Party at the time
  • None: fixed.
  • "one observer stated" probably best to say who it was: "John Smith of the important government stated..."
  • This was Daniel James, author of Red Design for the Americas: Guatemalan Prelude; but though he may be notable in his own right, he's being cited more as a topic-specific authority: even the text of the source only calls him a "keen observer", his name is in the footnotes. I've added his name nonetheless, but I'm not too sure it's an improvement.
  • It's partly so that appropriate weight is given to the comment, and partly because at some point someone will come alone and put a [who?] tag against "one observer", so it's to 'future-proof' against the need for it to be re-addressed. - SchroCat (talk) 11:05, 24 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • "In addition, due to the quick overthrow": it's not 'in addition', because it's a continuation of the same point as the previous paragraph (so it should really be in the same paragraph as above, ('one point: one paragraph' is an excellent rule of thumb to remember). "Because of the quick overthrow" is much better.
  • Tweaked.

Done to the start of "Document analysis". More to follow. - SchroCat (talk) 23:41, 22 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@SchroCat: I've addressed all the points you've raised so far, I think. Vanamonde (talk) 06:22, 24 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Second batch

First phase
  • "arrived in Guatemala City on July 4, 1954": the year isn't needed, so close on the heels of the previous date
  • Done
  • Done
  • De-link Austrian – too common a term to link
  • I'm not sure the average reader knows of Austria, but okay.
  • "The initial targets of the operation were the personal possessions and documents of Árbenz and those of Carlos Enrique Díaz (who had been chief of the armed forces under Árbenz, and briefly his successor as president), as well as the headquarters of the Partido Guatemalteco del Trabajo (PGT), and the offices of trade unions, known front organizations, and police agencies". A bit lumpy, given the number of "and"s in the list: better if the "and" is removed from "and the offices of trade unions"
  • Tweaked: the "offices" refers to the front organizations and police agencies too.
  • "At Wisner's request, Tracy Barnes created a booklet": another candidate for a [who?] tag (and an invitation for readers to click away to see who Barnes is and never come back). A word or two of introduction works well: "At Wisner's request, Tracy Barnes—principal manager of CIA operations in PBSuccess—created a booklet"
  • Done
  • "and Árbenz's wife Maria Cristina Villanova's copy of a biography of Joseph Stalin": a bit bumpy. "and a biography of Joseph Stalin owned by Maria Cristina Villanova, Árbenz's wife"?
  • Done
  • "After the presentation, Frank Wisner": Wisner is fine without the forename
  • I agree: it was only added by someone else during the course of the review.
  • "bureaucracy and intelligence service but also": but implies a reversal of the first part: "and" would be more inclusive (and the "also" isn't needed)
  • Done
  • "However, the Guatemalan group": opening a paragraph with "however" is always a bit questionable, as it questions something in the previous words, but there are no previous connected words in a new para (some reviewers have a deep-seated dislike of "however" opening a sentence, but that's a moot point). Is "the Guatemalan group" the Comité? If it's a new para then best to give the full details for clarity.
  • Done
Second phase
  • I'm not sure we need to the quote in the training involved "screening, classifying, indexing, and carding of the confiscated documents [and] the rudiments of mail control, logging, abstracting, and cryptic reference": this can easily be rewritten to hold the same information without the need for a quote.
  • I've trimmed the quote: I'm not sure we can do away with it altogether because it's a bit of jargon which cannot be paraphrased
  • "the original copies of every document was to remain": copies is plural and as you've got "document" earlier in the sentence, you should reframe as "original copies of every one were to remain";
  • Done

Sorry this is all a bit piecemeal, but RL is somewhat hectic at the moment. More soon - SchroCat (talk) 11:40, 24 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

No problem: I appreciate the depth of the review

Batch 3

Document exploitation
  • Removed
  • You move from Comité to Comite in this section: I suspect the former is correct, but it should be consistent
  • The former is indeed correct. Fixed.
  • ("Later We Discover the Truth"): MOS:ITALICTITLE suggests we should have the translation as italicised as well. Although it's self-explanatory, it may be worth putting as (trans: Later We Discover the Truth), although I leave that to your choice
  • Done, left out the "trans"; seems clear enough
  • Done
  • "PBHistory documents were used by the officials of various governments": all the examples are of US use and "various governments" suggests other countries used them. Were there other countries, or it is 'officials of different arms of the US government'?
  • Primarily the Guatemalan. Clarified.
  • "Additionally, Congresspeople": No need for "additionally"
  • Removed
  • "Operation WASHTUB" to Operation Washtub
  • Done now: thanks for fixing the DAB
  • "Office of Intelligence Research": you've already shortened to OIR further up the page, so you could use it here too; you should certainly use OIR in place of "The Office" (which reminds me of farce, rather than political intrigue!)
  • I used the acronym the second time: I'm trying to avoid confusion by spelling it out again the first, as there's rather a lot of names floating around.

More to follow - SchroCat (talk) 16:57, 24 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@SchroCat: Sure, no problem. Done so far. Vanamonde (talk) 06:29, 25 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Final batch...

  • "the operation provided the CIA its first detailed look": this may be an AmEng thing, but in Britain we'd say "the operation provided the CIA with its first detailed look". I leave it to your better judgement as to whether the first is OK in the US.
  • I've changed it, as it seems to read better.
  • Would Kate Doyle be notable enough for an article? If not then the redlink can go.
  • I think she is notable as a historian of Central America, if only just
  • ' "intelligence goldmine", and the register': bit of a comma splice. Try ' "intelligence goldmine"; the register" for size
  • Better, done
  • " in an attempt to prevent Árbenz from moving to Mexico, where opposition to Castillo Armas' regime was coalescing" -> " in an attempt to prevent him from moving to Mexico, where opposition to Armas' regime was coalescing"
  • Done
  • "its version of the history of the Árbenz government and the coup were not gaining traction." – "the history" is singular, so it should be "was not gaining"
  • Yes, done
  • "on information that Schneider gathered" -> "on information that he gathered"
  • Done
  • "However" at the beginning of a para again
  • Missed this one, fixed now.
  • "A October 1, 1954, CIA report" -> " A CIA report, published in October 1954, ..."
  • Done
  • "Schneider's balanced account": "balanced" according to who? As that's in WP's voice, you need to be careful about giving what looks like an opinion
  • True. The description is from Holland: added.
  • "A scholar who was given access" -> "Political scientist Jeremy Gunn, who was given access"
  • Done
  • "when Castillo Armas was overthrown" First name not needed. You should probably spin through the whole thing to make sure the main players are only first named on the first mention – I may have missed some further up
  • Castillo isn't his first name; it's his patronymic last name. The full name is Carlos Castillo Armas. Spanish naming customs would usually mean that he would be referred to as Castillo, but for some reason, the sources tend to do "Castillo Armas", so I've stuck with that.
  • "Writing in 2008 author Jeremy Gunn compared" As you've now named him a little further up, "Writing in 2008 Gunn compared" will suffice
  • Done

That's it: an interesting piece on the power of what the 'man from Delmonte, he say' had behind them. Cheers – SchroCat (talk) 08:47, 25 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@SchroCat: Thanks again for a detailed review; I think I've addressed everything. Cheers, Vanamonde (talk) 10:01, 25 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support You still have to address one point - the "However" that begins a paragraph, but aside from that, this is in excellent shape and meets the conditions for FA from a point of the prose. Cheers - SchroCat (talk) 10:43, 25 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Closing comment: I notice that there a few uses of "however", which often attract criticism based on WP:HOWEVER. It isn't worth holding up over, but it is worth the nominator taking a look to avoid any problems further down the line. Sarastro (talk) 21:44, 15 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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