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Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Dennis Gorski

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The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Dennis Gorski

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Nominator(s): TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM)
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I am nominating this article for A-Class review because. It just passed at WP:GAC and the reviewer thinks it need some attention with regard to flow.TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 21:01, 17 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Quick Comment The article is very well written in my humble opinion, however, the only fault i can find is of the lack of photos, especially one of the subject himself. If you can find one, that would be great. I have a feeling that if you want to go for FAC that this may be a hindrance. ṜedMarkViolinistDrop me a line 19:39, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I would love to add a photo of the subject, but am unable to find one. Any assistance would be greatly appreciated in this regard.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 20:00, 20 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments: Not really a subject I've got much knowledge of, so I am focusing more on technical points and mainly around the military career section:
    • there are no dabs, alt text is present, however, the tools had some complaints about the links, but none of them were dead (no action required);
    • there is some overlinking of terms which you will need to cut back on, e.g. in the Military career section the term Vietnam War is linked twice;
    • citations # 5 and 7 should be consolidated as they are the same (Will the Real Dennis Gorski Please Stand Up")
    • the images (as mentioned above, and apologies for continuing the pain with this one) are probably not the best. I think the Dept of Navy image in the Military career section does more harm than good. I suggest removing it as it serves to highlight the lack of appropriate images more than anything. Stands to reason that if you could get one, an image of Gorski while serving would be best (perhaps he has a PR person, or maybe you could write to him, just a suggestion);
    • the military career section is a bit light and leaves the reader wondering what happened. Why did his career come to an end? I take it that he'd served his IMPS or ROSO or whatever it was called back then? This could be spelled out in a single sentence.
      • I am a non-military guy. What do these acronyms mean? Basically, the article is well-cited. So you may be able to point to something in an original secondary source and say Can you include more detail about subject X, which is mentioned in ref #Y. I don't know how to find any more content regarding his military career without direction from you guys.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:24, 30 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
        • Sorry for the FLAs (four letter acronyms...). IMPS stands for Initial Minimum Period of Service and ROSO for Return of Service Obligation. Basically (while not the same) they simply refer to the length of time a serviceman or woman is required to serve before seeking discharge (notwithstanding extenuating circumstances). To be honest one doesn't have the time to pour through all the sources on this, but what you are looking for is something that actually states when and if possible why Gorski left the military. I'm assuming that he probably joined with a two year obligation and this was completed, hence he left, but it should really be stated. AustralianRupert (talk) 12:15, 1 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • the first sentence in the Military career section discusses the subject's motivations. As this is a BLP you need to be careful doing this, so is it possible to include a citation beside this sentence (even if it is the same as citation # 8, it just covers you to include it directly beside such a point)? I think ultimately it would be great if you could get a direct quote for this, if possible.
    • did Gorski act as a platoon commander, or was he actually the platoon commander? In the military these words mean specific things, i.e a sergeant (who is usually not a platoon commander, but sometimes is, but that is an aside point...) might "act" in the role in the absence of a lieutenant, but the lieutenant serves as the platoon commander, or is "appointed" to the role. This, of course, is a professional nitpick for which I hope you'll forgive me...
    • what unit did Gorski serve in while in Vietnam? You mention a battalion headquarters, but what battalion, do you know?
      • Suggest removing the bit about serving in the infantry, because it seems to me like this line is just journalist hyperbole (the Warner article). What they are saying is that while he served in a motor transport battalion, during Tet the situation got so bad they were used as infantry, however, it is not the same as serving in the infantry which is in itself a different corps or branch of the service. AustralianRupert (talk) 12:15, 1 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
    • how or why did he earn his promotions? He went from second lieutenant to captain in two or three years, that would be considered "accelerated" in today's military (but maybe not in a larger, wartime Army)
      • I am sourcing from general newspaper clippings as opposed to military sources. I don't have any further detail.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 22:27, 30 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
        • Yes, its difficult and in this case I can't really offer any solutions unfortunately. The sources, in my opinion, are the root of the problem as I see it for the military career section. As you say, they are newspaper clippings, and in my experience such sources do not cover subjects in the detail that a book might. They also sometimes have a tendancy to gloss over things in favour of sensationalising things, thus sometimes giving the wrong or slightly incorrect impressions about things. In regards to where you could go to improve the sourcing for the military section, I don't really know. In Australia we have the National Archives that often allows online access to military service records, which can help fill in the gaps. Also there is the Australian Dictionary of Biography Online, however, I'm not sure if there is anything like these two sources in the US, though. Perhaps someone from your neck of the woods can help with this question. AustralianRupert (talk) 12:30, 1 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • (outdent) Okay, I've struck the comments that you've fixed. I still believe that you need to remove the bit about Gorski serving in the infantry as I don't believe it is correct. As I stated above it seems like the journalist who wrote that was just being flippant in their terminology. Also some of the wording in the military career section is a bit unclear, for example "stationed at United States Marine Corps Gia Le battalion headquarters near Da Nang" is not correct as it implies that it was the Gia Le battalion whose headquarters he was stationed at (i.e. implying that was the name of the unit). From what I can see the sources are saying his battalion was headquartered at Gia Le (whatever battalion that was as they don't identify it), but this is different from how it is currently worded. Although I feel that the article is well written and MOS compliant, I do not feel that I can really support it for A class in a Mil hist A Class Review. To be honest, I don't really think it is within the project's scope as the subject of the article is not really notable for his military career, but rather his political career. This shows in the depth of the military career section and is, in my opinion at least, the reason why the sources don't go into much detail on it and are in many regards infuriatingly indistinct on many points that a mil hist biography should contain. AustralianRupert (talk) 09:23, 3 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Anyway, that is it. Good luck with improving the article. Cheers. — AustralianRupert (talk) 10:23, 30 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your assistance.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:02, 4 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support.
  • "As of February 1990, he and Mary Jo with whom he had been married for 15 years had 5 children ranging in age from 1 to 7 with the oldest two adopted." Please rephrase this to make it more clear when he married her, and the children's ages. More recent information than 1990 would be nice too.
This is the only remaining problem - a picture would be nice, but if there aren't any available there's nothing that can be done. – Joe N 01:36, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Even a google image search comes up empty.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:24, 5 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments
    • No problems with the dab links or the alt text.
    • There are a disturbing number of websites flagged as suspicious, please check and advise.
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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