Talk:Iran–Iraq War/Archive 4

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Chemical warfare

"Chemical weapons had not previously been widely used in any major war since the Second Italo-Abyssinian War." Chemical weapons were used in the 1957 war between Egypt and Saudi Arabian, with massive causalties, including civilians. I read this in the book "Six Days of War" (about the Six-Day War).--Tdkehoe 15:07, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Have you another, preferably online, citation for this? Which civilian populations were targeted, and why? The Israelis can be ruthless, but, certainly in that war, they threw everything they had into military attack. IIRC, when they first hit the Egyptian and Syrian airfields, there were four flyable combat aircraft left in Israel. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:53, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the correct statement would be that "Nerve agents had not previously been used..." However, I do not know what specific agents were used in the Italo-Abyssinian war or 1957 war (nerve, blood, blister?). The use of Tabun by Iraq was as far as I am aware the first use of nerve agents in a major war. Koyar 01:07, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Correct about nerve agents, which were developed by the Germans in the WWII period. The Japanese almost certainly used BW and CW against the Chinese in WWII, but didn't have nerve agents. Mustard (dichloroethyl sulfide, a blister agent/vesicant) was the major chemical used by the Italians in Abyssinia. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:53, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

from other talk page

Most analysts, while stopping short of asserting deliberate homicide, have blamed US military commanders and the captain of the Vincennes for reckless and aggressive behavior in a tense and dangerous environment. It was argued that neither Military Blunders Iran Air Shot Down - July 3, 1988 or the other cited source don't address this assertion. If you read the link, nobody says intentional murder was committed and it describes ...reckless and aggressive behavior in a tense and dangerous environment. As does the other source which among other things says: {{Captain Carlson added: "This event has to be put in its proper context. Less than two months earlier, half the Iranian Navy was sunk during operation Praying Mantis, and our government had been making strong statements about America's determination to protect neutral shipping...}} which to me also describes the general environment being operated in. Anynobody 01:48, 28 December 2007 (UTC) It is shocking that John Nevard seems to be aware of the fact and yet he demands silence on them --Babakexorramdin (talk) 07:06, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Captain Rogers should, IMHO, been court-martialed, but, after reading some of the detailed narratives involving the radar and computing systems on the Vincennes, I'd call it incredible incompetence, a failure of what is called crew resource management in aviation safety, and Rogers aggressively looking for combat. As you point out, the action in Praying Mantis attacked a wide range of targets, more in keeping with a deliberate attack.

If I may make a personal comment, I believe that neither Iran nor the United States is helped by the current fearmongering from the Bush Administration. Neither, however, is it helped by alleging homicide when Occam's Razor offers a much more straightforward explanation of the Iran Air incident. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 22:00, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Hardly a sockpuppet, but an RfC participant who believes RfA is needed.

This morning, I received a warning about 3RR and wikilawyering from Khorshid:

Do not revert due to your apparent anti-Iranian prejudice. Please read WP:3RR. You have been engaged in edit warring on that page for quite some time and I am dedicated to making everyone aware of what is going on. You and your friend Ryan cannot gang up on everyone else. This is WP and there are rules. Your bias is obvious. Khorshid (talk) 14:43, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

To reply to comments here, so others involved in the RfC (as I was) can see your observations, I first saw your commentary this morning. If you feel I am a sockpuppet, after extensive work on other subjects, please bring that up to an administrator. I don't know Ryan.

There is a continuing discussion on the US role. Rather than putting US flags into the disputed infobox, you might achieve more in a discussion on the talk page, or, in joining in a RfA on what increasingly looks insoluble. As far as anti-Iranian bias, I've stated before that I considered CAPT Rogers worthy of a court-martial for what the lawyers call "depraved indifference to human life," a criterion for the crime of willful manslaughter. On the other hand, I do not consider releasing floating mines in international waters to be much less indifferent. I do believe in freedom of navigation.

There's no question that Saddam was the chief aggressor, but, as in many modern wars, there are many nations that do not remain completely neutral. World War II is usually described as the Axis Powers vs. the Allies, but rarely are more than three Axis powers mentioned. The tripartite pact eventually had other members.

If I follow the history correctly, you are encroaching on 3RR with the infobox flags.

Administrator and arbitrator help needed Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 15:05, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Administrator help granted. Justin^Contribs_{User page} 16:13, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. While I am not familiar with all the appeal and arbitration mechanisms involved, I'd like to revise and extend my suggestion for resolution. First, much of the controversy surrounds the infobox rather than the article. Infoboxes, as I understand, are intended to help readability and article refinement. If they get in the way of the process, as this is clearly doing, I believe a ruling that it should not be used in this specific article.

Next, it's usually hard enough to assign roles and blames in a two-sided war. In a multipolar one, it is even more difficult. In this case, there is enough strong feeling that I see no way consensus will be reached. Rather, it would seem to me that the goal is to provide a structure in which each major position can be presented, and let the eventual reader make his or her individual decision on the merits of the arguments

Accusations that people are anti-foo or pro-foo, with responses of "No I'm not! You are anti-foo or pro-bar! Nyaah nyaah Nyaah" belong on a playground, not in an attempt to record history. I urge all to avoid not just outright personal attacks, but also the accusations of bias. Such accusations won't be resolved, and determination to have clear presentation of differing viewpoints -- and a general acceptance there are and will be multiple viewpoints -- needs to form among the editors.

While it might be more appropriate to mention this elsewhere, I believe substituting "belligerent" for "combatant" in all war infoboxes comes closer to the definitions in customary international law. A secondary point is that modern conflicts often are multipolar vs. bipolar, and describing conflict as A vs. B may not work when there is a C and D who might be opposed to either or both A and B, or, if opposed to B, unwilling to coordinate with A. If I dare bring up a specific point here, I have no problem with a discussion, in a separate and linked article, of US-Iranian conflict. There are aspects there that preceded the Iran-Iraq war, and there are continuing and even more multipolar accusations. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 16:35, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

For information, the Military History Project, which is responsible for the infobox, changed "Combatant" to "Belligerent" after discussion.

I am perfectly comfortable with an article discussing US-Iran combat and belligerency at the same time as the Iran-Iraq war, but I simply do not see grounds, in customary international law, for declaring the US a cobelligerent of Iraq. Indeed, since earlier in the war, US Special Forces teams assisted Kurdish rebels against Saddam, the US would have also had to be a cobelligerent of Iran. Presumably, Kuwait, in agreeing to reflag tankers, also would (incorrectly) be called a cobelligerent if a sweeping definition is used.

CAPT Rogers of the Vincennes, in my personal opinion, exhibited what the civilian lawyers call "depraved indifference to human life" with respect to Iran Air 655, and his actions were covered up. Nevertheless, I also consider releasing floating mines, which are not equipped with precise target identification mechanisms, also to represent depraved indifference. The US, and other countries, have carried out armed freedom of navigation exercises in waters other than the Persian Gulf, and such exercises have turned into combat. It would be far more NPOV to speak of the US' own political goals in fighting Iran that to force the US into an alleged alliance with Iraq. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 02:53, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

RfA Proposal

I won't suggest who have might what POV, other than to observe there is much emotion here. My proposal, which I suggest go to arbitration, is to remove the infobox from this particular article.

Does it really add much context to be fighting over line items in the infobox, when these issues can and should be discussed in the main article? The issues are complex, as would be the case in any war that is not strictly bipolar, and they need more explanation than is possible in an infobox.

Let me suggest some useful analogies on why an infobox cannot express all the detail in a complex war. The World War Two infobox makes a reasonable compromise, listing the sides as "Allies [and] Axis powers".

If there was a similar dispute for WWII, where would Italy go? A founding member of the Tripartite Pact, Italy joined the Allies in 1943. The infobox says "Axis Powers". Is that the (by definition) three members of the Tripartite Pact, or does it include Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Yugoslavia?

Sadly, I don't believe this will be solved here. This morning's sockpuppet allegation, coupled with the editor's restoral of the questionable material without talk page discussion, leads me to this conclusion. Again, I believe the simplest solution would be to decide not to have an infobox in this article. I might, for future infoboxes on war, suggest replacing "combatant" with "belligerent", which would be more consistent with customary international law.

Without that controversy, the role of the US, other countries that did not actually fight but provided supplies to one or both sides, and even such special cases as Kuwait, can be presented in the article, showing all sides.

Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 15:37, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I would argue that the U.S. should appear as a combatant since it supplied intel assistance to the Iraq side during the war. I would further speculate that this assistance was in some measure payback for the Iran hostage crisis -- very expensive payback in human terms given the number of Iran and Iraq casualties during the Iran-Iraq war. Erxnmedia (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 15:41, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Whether the US was a combatant, and even whether combatant is the right word for the infobox, was not the intent of my making this post separate from the RfC. I'm afraid you are repeating an argument in the RfC section. May I suggest this section is to discuss an RfA, not RfC, and try to find a position that will stop the squabbling? My personal recommendation is to get rid of the infobox and give adequate discussion, of complex issues, in the main article. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 15:55, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that I don't think an RFC will resolve this, I originally came here to attempt to mediate and now some people are trying to discredit me (you know who you are). This debate should stay on the article and not on user's talk pages. Ryan4314 (talk) 15:48, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Well this one just got interesting! I think any discussion of Iran-Iraq War should include discussion of any material third party allies of either side, identifying

• What side they were on (there are only 2 sides in the Iran-Iraq War)
• Who they are
• Why they contributed
• When they contributed
• What they contributed
• Where they contributed

and nothing beyond that! How about having a section called "Material third party contributers" subheads "For Iraq" and "For Iran" and below that by Country and then give the Why and then by Date and then by When What and Where? Note I say there are "only 2 sides" by you could also have a third category which is "For Iran and Iraq" for those countries that like to hedge their bets. Erxnmedia (talk) 16:48, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

• (add) There is, in fact there is a whole article for it, called the U.S. support for Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war article. Ryan4314 (talk) 17:08, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

In some wars, and I'd want to think about this one, there is a category of "against foo and bar", where a country variously might prevent both from getting supplies, or, speaking with a twisted mind that might be correct, sending supplies to both of them, because it is to that country's advantage that both foo and bar are weakened.

As I've said, wars are increasingly multipolar, especially in political climates like Iraq, Somalia, etc.

Consider, though, an example of a declared neutral, country C, that has its territory violated by country A, and takes military action against the intruder. Country A is in an all-out war with country B. Has C become a co-belligerent of B? Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 16:55, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

As a compromise, I've hidden all the boxes for now while this issue is worked out here. I myself tend towards the view that this is exactly the sort of complicated matter that infoboxes are lousy at expressing correctly. Moreschi ^{If you've written a quality article...} 18:39, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

The U.S. support for Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war page says "Other countries that supported Iraq during the war included Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and West Germany." It's clear US was a material supporter of Iraq. What were the other guys in it for? There is little analysis. Is the page correctly named? Shouldn't they be included? Maybe not: Personally I hold to the theory that if the embassy hostage crisis didn't happen, this particular war might not have happened. Erxnmedia (talk) 18:44, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

What was in it? In many cases, money, rather than policy. Contrary to some opinion, the US is not the only country where countries will run into various types of nonproliferation, including conventional weapons, where there is a profit to be have.

I have a reasonable professional familiarity with BW of the period, and I find a great many silly things being said. If one subscribes, as I do, to ProMED and Emerging Infectious Diseases, one will find outbreaks of anthrax, in the Middle East and Southwest Asia, every couple of weeks. In a BW program, the least difficult part, on the way to weaponization, is getting the cultures. Even with respect to the cultures, there is much silliness. The Senate Banking Committee, responsible for export controls, put out a report, apparently without having anyone, who had taken Microbiology 101, having read it. One of the organism lists, for example, was headed by a Saccharomyces strain, which is very good for biological warfare -- if you are waging it with massive amounts of fine Belgian ale. There are a number of cases where viruses are called bacteria, and vice versa.

While the most recent versions of the US Militarily Critical Technologies List, the guide to export controls, are classified, there are quite adequate older ones online. In going through the biological warfare section, there is considerable attention given to various production equipment, including continuous fermenters suitable for aerobes and anaerobes, refrigerated centrifuges, lyophilizers, and mills that are sealed to handle "hot" microorganisms, and can handle batches of 100 lites or more from the fermenters. These are the medium-hard parts of a BW program, as setting up the production line is not trivial, and has high risk. In 1979, Soviets had a major anthrax incident in Sverdlovsk, apparently due to improper maintenance of the air filters on their production line.

Iraq primarily got its BW production equipment from France and Russia. For the record, the hardest part of a military BW program is both the delivery system itself and a number of parameters that need to be tuned for the delivery system. These are mostly concerned with producing aerosols that:

• Stay cool enough so they don't heat-sterilize the organisms
• Can be held ready for use (the first US weaponized system, for brucellosis, had about a 48 hour shelf life)
• Produce an aerosol cloud that delivers enough organisms to the target area to have a reasonable chance of inducing infection
• Produce an aerosol cloud that has few enough organisms, as well as neutralizing the electrostatic charge on the organisms, such that the organisms don't promptly fall to the ground.

Countries that have done this typically needed both large open areas for testing (e.g., Dugway Proving Grounds and Johnston Island for the US, Vozrozhdeniye Island for the fUSSR, Gruinard Island (now decontaminated) for the UK), as well as large test chambers such as the One-Million-Liter Test Sphere for the US, and a multistory fUSSR facility at Biopreparat described by Ken Alibek. When there is much fear and loathing about the cultures, the reality is that someone in the Middle East, where anthrax is endemic could get a culture from the wild within a few months. It is easier to order one. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:41, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

In particular, let's vet CIA Activities by Region: Near East, North Africa, South and Southwest Asia#Iran 1980 in this context of assertions in this article and in U.S. support for Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war. Erxnmedia (talk) 21:16, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

In doing such vetting, remember that every US action is not the result of the CIA. Indeed, Iran-Contra was largely an effort by White House staff to circumvent Congressional bans on CIA action. It is less clear of Willam Casey's actions were on his own initiative, or to an appeal of either "Who shall rid me of this turbulent priest" or "Do what ya gotta do."

If there are well-sourced reasons to believe CIA did something, by all means, include them. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 02:24, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Hi Howard,

I'm not saying the CIA did anything or didn't. I'm just saying that the accounts of Iran/Iraq war and any CIA participation we have in CIA Near East page should be consistent with accounts in U.S. support for Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war and Iran-Iraq War. Let me shock you by saying I haven't even read the latter two pages through word for word. All I'm saying is that some angelic person with time on their hands should, and read for consistency.

On a separate note, some IP guy just put in a few words on Iran-Iraq War suggesting that it was actually the Russians that did most of the arming of Iraq. Did we forget about Russia? What we really need to do is summarize/diagram the roles and motivations of all the participants including Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and West Germany and now Russia.

See above.

But personally, having recently visited the graves in Iran (I may contribute a photo tonight, have to go to work now), my gut feeling is that the whole damn thing is payback for the Embassy Hostage crisis. Say there were about 100 people in the embassy, and Iran lost 1 million people -- that's 10,000 bodies for each American whose life was put on hold for 444 days. Fair trade? And then having punished Iran, for another $1 trillion, we foment a Shiite coup in Iraq, and then hand the entire country over to Iran. Logical! Erxnmedia (talk) 12:37, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I really don't know. It was Carter that was deliberately humiliated, but Reagan that would have been responsible for much of the arming. Did Reagan see this within his grand plan of destroying the USSR? In general, no, I don't see a direct linkage between the Hostage Crisis and the Iran-Iraq war. Too much indirection would have been involved to get Iraq to attack Iran.

Do remember that the Iran-Contra Affair was contrived to bypass Congressional restrictions on the CIA, was principally executed by people working out of the White House rather than CIA, and had both hostages and destabilizing the Sandanistas as its goal. I can see connections there that I can't see with the Iran-Iraq War. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:41, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I've moved on. Now I'm reading the F. William Engdahl quote you flagged and it has an amazing bouquet. Apparently the whole Khomeini thing was a plot by "London and the senior ranks of the U.S. liberal establishment" who were able to deploy the CIA without consulting President Carter, who they kind of didn't like anyway. Who knew? Erxnmedia (talk) 15:25, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

A request on citations/sources

Please have one source per footnote. Significant quotes belong in the article, not the footnote, where they can add context to the article.

There is a court case citation that needs cleanup; it doesn't seem to have all the elements that identify the matter in court. I can't figure it out. While I know some court documents do put things in all caps, I've found I have to convert to upper and lower case if I'm going to be able to read it on a screen. Others may have similar problems, and it's not too hard to do when creating the cite.

This is not intended to take any side. Indeed, while a George H.W. Bush quote was sourced to Ted Koppel on Nightline, when I followed the link, Koppel almost immediately called Bush a liar.

If I can be of additional help with citations, I'd be glad to do so. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 18:44, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

Iraq's objectives

"The objectives of Iraq's invasion of Iran were:...#Overthrow of the revolutionary regime in Tehran"

Very improbable. According to most authors, Iraqi objectives were limited to Khouzestan and some disputed territories in the central front. 195.248.189.182 (talk) 08:27, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the "1983-1985: Iraq battered, but not beaten"

Is there sourcing for the idea of seriously considering attacks spread equally across the front? That would certainly go against the doctrine of any military I know, but it might have been the concept -- if so, I'd be interested in knowing their reasoning. Given all the problems of editing here, you may have been correcting someone else's OR. Broad-front attacks, coordinated or not, were largely abandoned in the First World War, in favor of either infiltration or concentrated fire to make a breach, holding back the exploitation force, and then pouring it through the opening or openings.

Perhaps the coordination to exploit was what was missing?

Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 05:42, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

I hate the "battered, but not beaten" title, it looks so un-encyclopaedic. Can anyone come up with something better? Ryan4314 (talk) 18:49, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Wasn't that a tagline for Rocky 2? XD Justin^Contribs_{User page} 19:02, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

What about "This time there are two"? John Nevard (talk) 09:48, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Article is getting messy, what's with the oddly placed ref tags? Ryan4314 (talk) 18:27, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

If you are referring to refimprove tags, I wish there was something that formatted as well as "citation needed". I've been trying to check some of the references, and found, variously, dead links, an academic CV that mentions articles but no detail, and some citations at the level of "Smith & Jones, page 99" with no indication of this being a book, a journal or what.

I have been deleting links when the first 1-2 on a subject turned out to be reputable and informative. I'm afraid, for example, that putting in 6 or more links about the horrors of chemical warfare, following the same sentence, comes across as POV pushing.

Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 18:48, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Infobox again: the purpose is to add clarity, not fight battles. If it's this difficult to manage, it needs to be deleted.

There have been a long series of arguments about the content of the infobox, which was seen, by the Military History Project that created it and maintains it, as an aid to readers -- not a battleground. At least once, it has been hidden by an admin.

Without judgment as to who should be in the infobox, its capabilities are limited to putting major and generally recognized belligerents (not combatants; see discussion on the difference at MILHIST). It is not designed for civil wars or other situations where part of one group is on one side and part on the other. It is not designed for situations such as Italy in World War Two, when Italy started out as an Axis power but later became part of the Allies. It is not intended for countries that were not full belligerents, perhaps being neutral to one side and hostile to the other.

May I appeal, again, to put all these very relevant comments, such as what the majority and minority of Kurds did, whether the US was a cobelligerent of Iraq under international law, etc.? There was a time, for example, where US Army Special Forces assisted Kurds against Iraq, until Kissinger decided to have the US tilt to Iraq and withdrew the special forces. Ignoring the freedom of the seas issue, that last point means that the United States could legitimately be listed on both sides with respect to the Kurds, and perhaps as a neutral in other respects. These issues are too complex for a userbox, and if the userbox is distracting from good and precise writing in the main article, perhaps the consensus should be that the userbox distracts from this article and should not be used.

Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:19, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

I didn't like the change to "belligerents", seems like a move sideways to me. That part of the box should just be deleted, there has been disagreement not just over the U.S. involvement, but other parties as well. Ryan4314 (talk) 18:37, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

To me, it was more accurate to move to belligerent, which has a specific legal meaning that combatant does not. Nevertheless, the box is not helping understanding of the Iran-Iraq War, and should be removed from this page since it's causing this much controversy.Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 21:40, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

I concur with the latest version, done by User:Storm05. Inclusion of US is good as US was clearly a belligerent -- against both sides, see CIA activities in the Near East, North Africa, South and Southwest Asia#Iraq 1980-1988. Thanks, Erxnmedia (talk) 17:26, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Disagree. It would be perfectly appropriate to list the US as a belligerent in an "Iraq-US War" and an "Iran-US War" during this this period. Contrast this with the Korean War: the US clearly negotiated at Panmunjom, and the North Koreans and Chinese were present. While there were Soviet advisors and probably combat pilots, the Soviet Union was not a belligerent in the post-WWII sense. When I say post-WWII, that essentially is when declarations of war, and in many cases even ultimata about such things as a claim to free passage through disputedly international waters, have gone out of fashion.

France and the USSR provided extensive weapons and WMD components to Iraq, and, in the case of the Soviets, almost certainly engineering assistance with WMD factory construction. Iraq used Soviet military doctrine and principally Soviet equipment. As well as their primarily US equipment, the Iranians had Soviet antiaircraft weapons and multiple rocket launchers, and British Chieftain tanks. Why aren't France, the Soviet Union, and Britain listed as belligerents? The US cut off spare parts to Iran, but there's no reason to believe the Soviets and French did so. It would not surprise me if the Soviets continued to supply both sides.

If you are going to claim that officially deniable action makes one a belligerent, which is not completely unreasonable, than Kuwait has to be considered a belligerent. The reflagging operation was a rather transparent covert cover for Kuwaiti interests. Under your doctrine of covert action, either Kuwait and US are both belligerents or nonbelligerents.

All these nuances are perfectly legitimate to discuss in the main article, although I would suggest separate articles for US-Iranian combat. The discussion here is about an infobox, not a political analysis. The major belligerents were Iran and Iraq. Both were largely dependent on external weapons suppliers. As part of the sale of a complex weapons system, the default assumption is that the manufacturer will send technical representatives with them, for training, advanced troubleshooting, etc. I don't have an exact count, but a typical US carrier would sail with at least tens of technical representatives aboard, in a very different function than a "private military company". Are Northrop and Grumman and Raytheon and their merged entities cobelligerents or volunteers against whoever the carrier attacks?

Sorry, but I am finding this debate about the infobox generally silly, or representative of a blame-the-US attitude not being applied to other major suppliers and supporters of Iran and Iraq. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 18:27, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Let us not denigrate the lowly infobox! I concur that all nations that contributed arms, food, medicine, or expertise to either or both sides should be listed as belligerents. So yes, please, let's put USSR and France and Kuwait and U.S. in that box.

Using Korean War as precedent, you will see that USSR and China are indeed listed as belligerents in the infobox for that war (not my doing, it's just already there like that), along with 20 other countries listed under United Nations and medical assistance.

Thanks, Erxnmedia (talk) 19:46, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

For many years, I have denigrated "executive summaries" in technical proposals, as sections where all technical content is squeezed out, so a nontechnical executive can make a decision about the strategic technical direction of an enterprise. I regard the infobox in much the same way, since, for example, its inherent model is that wars are bipolar. That was already confusing in the 1940s, what with Italy starting out in the Tripartite Pact and ending up in the Allies. I suppose, therefore, Italy belongs in both columns, which might suggest it was fighting itself.

Ah! But it is the relatively simple civil war that has only two sides. How many factions fight one another, as well as foreign forces, in Iraq?

I suggest that the Panmunjom talks and the Paris Peace Talks were not atypical of modern wars. The parties around the tables were clearly belligerents. Some parties represented others, such as the US for the UN in Korea, and other parties were invisible, such as the Soviet Union. While the US and RVN were on one side of the talks in Paris, their interests were not necessarily the same, any more that were the Lao Dong Party and the non-Marxist elements of the National Liberation Front.

There is a story, which, if not true, ought to be, that came out of that comedy club, the Nazi Foreign Ministry. The staff were said to have commissioned a lovely presentation binder, to be presented to Joachim von Ribbentrop, containing copies of the treaties he had signed. Unfortunately, they were unable to find any that he had not abrogated. That, Sir, is a much more realistic model of the infobox -- in all too many conflicts, nothing really fits it. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 20:11, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

I will ask User:Storm05 to enter this discussion, since he is now effectively in a delete war with User:Ryan4314, who is now taking some pleasure in the number of different editors who have added US flag to Iran-Iraq war that he has deleted.

In any event, France should always be included on both sides of any confict.

Thanks, Erxnmedia (talk) 21:55, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

The first question, I suppose, is whether Storm05 and Ryan4314 are belligerents, and on which side(s) they should appear. Regarding France, further deponent sayeth not, although he is biting his tongue not to quote a funny but anti-French definition of diplomacy, from one of my International Relations professors.

As I understand, Chinese tailors provide the greatest number of American flags, so that variously raises the question if there could be any shortage, if this makes China a belligerent, or, for that matter, puts Betsy Ross in that role. (Actually, I don't know this about China. When GEN Eric Shinseki ordered all US Army personnel not otherwise qualified to wear a colored beret into black berets, the first contract awardee turned out to be Chinese. There is a persistent rumor that Shinseki ordered the universal beret when he, the top general in the Army, went into a meeting where he was the only general not wearing a beret) Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 22:36, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

All kidding aside I think I should issue an RfA for this because you have yourself and Ryan4314 who think US should not be listed as a belligerent (how about just "participant"?), and Ryan4314 has prevailed by virtue of hitting the delete key against the efforts of the following editors:

• Storm05
• Khorshid
• Pejman47
• Babakexorramdin
• erxnmedia

I think that's enough of an intractable dispute to request an RfA. And I don't agree that just deleting the infobox is a solution because that's just a bigger delete than the Ryan4314 deletes, i.e. it does not concord with the opinion of the other editors. Thanks, Erxnmedia (talk) 02:56, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't disagree that an RfA may be appropriate, but let me try, once again, to offer what I believe is a compromise that will improve quality. The crux of the problem is not the infobox per se, the nature of belligerency, and, more specifically, cobelligerency. If the problem isn't solved here, it will persist with other multipolar conflict.

Here, the real problem is not the infobox, but the desire to force multiple conflicts, with multiple parties, into one conflict: the Iran-Iraq War. In no way am I saying there wasn't fighting between the US and Iran, which is separable from the fighting between Iran and Iraq, and from the support by multiple nations to either or both sides. I am saying that the varied nations, not just the US, were not belligerents in the sense generally accepted in international law.

If, for example, there were an article about US-Iranian fighting, war, etc., in this time period, it could pull together the issues of freedom of navigation and mining international waters, the reflagging of Kuwaiti tankers, the Vincennes actions (more than just the Airbus), and US attacks on Iranian ships and oil platforms. Such an article could be introduced and linked from Iran-Iraq War.

Further, I would suggest an article tentatively titled "National Support to Iran and Iraq in their War", that could give a rational context to include, among others, US, Kuwaiti, Soviet, French, and British participation beyond direct fighting.

Let me also suggest looking at the talk pages of the Military History Project, which is responsible for the infobox template, and, I believe it fair to say, getting it misused. The relationships can be discussed rationally in text, but I do believe the infobox battle is the key of the Wikipedia problem, and Military History never intended it to be anything more than an optional summary.

Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 03:14, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Um, its pretty obvious that the United States, Iranian opponents of the Khomeni government, Arab Volunteers and the United Nations are belligerents as well (not just Iran, Iraq and Kurdistan and for those who deleted Ronald Regan from the commander section of the infobox, he's the commander in chief of the United States Military for peak sake!). If you guys dont believe me see the Iraq War article and see how many belligerents are in that conflict. Storm05 (talk) 12:58, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I appreciate your clarifications. None of us (well, I won't speak for Ryan) disagree that quite a few nations, as well as non-national actors, played various roles during the time period in question. My own feeling is the best way to explain this is with an "overarching" article for this period, with various subordinate articles that explore the nuances of who did what to whom, and when. My objections are in two main areas: an infobox is too simple to explain all the parties in a complex conflict, as, for example, the 1990-1991 war following the invasion of Iraq, or even World War Two. Further, if every kind of participation is called "belligerency", the term loses any more specificity than "somehow involved". There is a great difference among forces that throw large armies directly against each other, arms suppliers that may simply have shipped some weapons, arms suppliers that provided technical representatives to train and do advanced maintenance on weapons they shipped, and forces that provided intelligence and planning information. Even with the latter, there is a considerable distance between the supply of information without a joint operations planning system, and where, as in 1991, where there was an integrated command, control, and communications systems.

Further, an area that will continue to become more complex, and is now in a number of civil or separatist wars, is the involvement of non-national actors, or changes in policy among nations. For the sake of argument, assume Kurdistan was a belligerent, without defining belligerent. Would that mean, therefore, that the Seminole Nation, which its own declaration of war against the Tripartite Powers, although physically contained in the United States and all of whose volunteers served in US uniform, should get a separate entry in the World War Two infobox? If dates aren't added, consider where Finland and Italy should be listed in that same WWII infobox? Both had significant military forces involved, but, at different times, on both sides of the war. How about the Soviet neutrality toward Japan until the Potsdam agreements?

I'm not opposed to a RfA, but if it is needed, I see two areas for the need. The first is the infobox (or whether not to use it), and the second, which has much broader Wikipedia policy implications: must all military conflicts be force-fitted into a conflict with a single name? Take the WWII infobox as another example, which lists the dates as1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945, The Rape of Nanking was in 1937. Where does it go? Was it part of WWII? I think both the Chinese, and the realistic Japanese historians, think so. Using it as an example, there is a reasonable entry for Sino-Japanese fighting before 1939, as well as relevant Chinese civil war and revolution. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:55, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Hi Howard and Storm05 and Ryan4314:

1. As Storm05 has pointed out, both Korean War and Iraq War list tons of belligerents in the infobox.
2. Where it is not clear what it means to be a belligerents, how about using the word "participant" or "supplier" or "kibbitzer" or "side-better" or "player" or some other term of art which indicates the degree and nature of participation?
3. I don't know of anybody who died in the Iran-Iraq War besides Iranis and Iraqis. Do you have a body count for US, USSR, Kuwait and so on? If the body count is close to 0, I think it is OK to continue calling it the Iran-Iraq War.
4. Calling it the Iran-Iraq War doesn't mean that you can't enhance the Iran-Iraq War page to diagram the roles of the players in the text. You can even put them around a mini poker table to indicate that they were all playing against each other.
5. I'm still leaning towards RfA on this just because Ryan4314 is so comfortable with deleting other people's edits without consulting them.

Thanks, Erxnmedia (talk) 14:02, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I am not taking "pleasure" in this, believe me. I created that list on my user page, to keep track of everyone adding the US flag, so they can't make their numerous attempts look like a majority vote. I've have always attempted to mediate [1] (I actually started the RFC process, you'd know this if you did your research, having only been contributing to the discussion for a month!) and my view is that the "belligerant" box should be removed as it is far to blunt an instrument for such complex matters.

This goes for any other new guys as well; I don't engage in debate about the meaning of the words "beliggerant", "combatant" or what type of support the US gave Iraq, as this (as I have stated before) is original research. I always add an edit summary to my reverts, which is more than what some of the sneaky editors who try to slip the flag back in (amongst other mass edits) do. Ryan4314 (talk) 14:46, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

• As I've just reviewed with the dates of WWII wrt China and Japan, whether the Seminoles were belligerents, the alignments of Italy and Finland, and the relation between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan, the current form of the infobox does not mean it is informative or even correct. Depending on the estimates, that 1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945 date span doesn't cover the deaths of at least hundreds of thousands of Chinese, which do strike me as significant.

• I have never seen, in fairly extensive military reading, a set of terms of art, from reputable sources, that creates a coherent set of terms of art to describe what you suggest. Indeed, I believe it is significant that no major military historians or theorists have found it necessary or useful to create one, instead preferring to use at least a paragraph or two, at bare minimum, to describe participation. A WP committee could create one, but that would clearly be OR.

• I'd say there were no US casualties in the Iran and Iraq War. There were, however, Iranian, US, and third-nation casualties in combat between the US and Iran, in which Iraq played no part. For that matter, there was a body count and damaged ships caused by Iraqi forces attacking their ostensible US "cobelligerents:.

• Poker tables are original synthesis, at the least, except for poker. Seriously, I see that as another convoluted approach to find a way to keep the infobox to which a number of editors have formed an apparent emotional attachment, and as a way to oversimplify in a way that gets across POV. I believe that until I brought up Kuwait, France, the USSR, and the UK, no one was suggesting any group in the infobox other than the US and two non-national actors. If you want a non-military analogy, I suggest that the efforts to coerce everything into the infobox are more and more reminiscent of the repeated exceptions and changes to epicycles, rather than admitting to the elegance of the model of Copernicus.

• What would the RfA be asked to arbitrate? Some of this is simple edit warring. I believe other parts of the controversy are serious attempts to avoid POV, as well as confusing oversimplification. I don't agree that the extended (yet incomplete, as clearly demonstrable by the dates) WWII infobox is useful, so an RfA perhaps should examine the role of the infobox. If there is such an RfA, the Military History Project, responsible for the template, needs to be involved. I'm now going to put a link to this discussion on the MILHIST page. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 14:55, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Alphabet soup time: "RfA" is "Wikipedia:Requests for adminship". If you mean request for arbitration, that's WP:RFAR. But perhaps WP:RfC is what you really want. —Kevin Myers 15:38, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

What I really want is a cup of coffee. Erxnmedia (talk) 15:49, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Don't you mean you want to issue a RfCoff?

Seriously, see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history#Fundamental issues, perhaps MILMOS, coming out in Iran-Iraq edit wars. People with longer MILHIST experience than mine point out this is not the first time that infoboxes have been a source of conflict rather than clarification. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 16:13, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Hi Howard,

It all boils down to POV. In the MILHIST link above you are saying

the most invested in the infobox argument, are clearly pro-Iranian. The crux of their issue is they want the US listed as an enemy of Iran in the infobox, and some also want non-national groups under Iran and Iraq listed, such as Kurdistan. As far as I can tell, they simply don't want to hear about the role of Kuwait, Russia, France, Britain, etc.

With all due respect (WADR?) I think you are just as committed to keeping US out of the box as the Iranians are to keeping US in the box. By admission of serving CIA officers it was US policy to keep Iran and Iraq in a bloody cockfight. That alone merits some inclusion.

In general the point about infoboxes that has been made is that people who were directly involved like to see all of the material participants listed. So as in Korean War and Iraq War I think it is better to list all material participants -- state or non-state actors as long as they have some kind of flag seems to be the rule.

I think it's just a matter of fairness. And while all conflicts do tend to morph into one another ("history repeats itself" ... "a stitch in time saves nine", etc.), if you go by the simple body count rule, whoever has the most bodies in the ring gets to name the war. It's just a matter of imposing some order on the mass of detail. (A tree is just some cellulose that sprang out of the dirt: why call it a tree, why not just call it extended dirt with some sun and water mixed in?)

As far as the Rape of Nanking goes: With all due respect to WW2, the Japanese and Chinese do have some prior history, and at least one Wikipedia page distinguishes their war entirely from WW2, see Second Sino-Japanese War.

Which brings to mind the info box for the Soviet war in Afghanistan: Israel, Egypt and China are somehow omitted from the list of Belligerents in that infobox. This is a terrible error! China sold ammunition to the U.S. (at good rates, they work cheap!) for transport to Pakistan, and both Israel and Egypt supplied Soviet munitions for the same conflict. I expect someone to repair that infobox immediately!!

Thanks, Erxnmedia (talk) 16:53, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I do not have a POV about keeping the US out of infoboxes in general, including situations where the US was a primary aggressor. I do not have a POV about keeping the US out of an infobox about US-Iranian combat. I do not have a POV about keeping the US out of an infobox that would cover US-Iraqi combat during the period. I do have a POV about keeping other than Iran and Iraq out of the Iran-Iraq War infobox, and I have an equal POV that Kurdistan and the Peoples' Muj do not belong there. Again, it is a MILHIST consensus that non-national actors rarely belong in a listing of belligerents in a war principally between nations. Again, it is a consensus that suppliers don't belong there.

Your own statement about the US wanting it to be a "bloody cockfight" rather established the point that there was an Iran-Iraq war, a Iran-US war, and an Iraq-US war. Otherwise, you get into the absurdity of having the US in both columns. It is entirely possible, and not unique to this war, that a third country had interests in exhausting both sides in a different war, without being a cobelligerent of either.

Also, I would suggest you get a bit deeper into the history of US support, where I suspect you would find a good deal more US involvement through the uniformed military, rather than the CIA. Unfortunately, there is a widespread tendency to equate the US with the CIA, which is counterproductive in solving issues in US policy. In the case of Kurdistan, for example, the assistance was delivered by United States Army Special Forces.

As was observed on MILHIST, Spain and Vichy France were not in the Eastern Front infobox, which is in an article subordinate to World War Two. I see the US-Iranian conflict infobox as having much the same relation to the Iran-Iraq War as does the Eastern Front to World War II. You will note that the US, who provided immense supplies to the Soviet Union, and to the British who fought the Murmansk Run to get those supplies there, are not listed in the Eastern Front article.

I'd appreciate your reading the MILHIST discussion about WWII and other infoboxes. When I pointed out the dates for WWII only started with Poland, it was immediately corrected. MILHIST is quite willing to accept that some infoboxes are inaccurate or have too much information for clarity. Howard C. Berkowitz (talk) 19:13, 20 February 2008 (UTC)