Talk:Battle of Pearl Ridge/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Anotherclown (talk · contribs) 06:14, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Progression

• Version of the article when originally reviewed: [1]
• Version of the article when review was closed: [2]

Initial comments

• "The Battle of Pearl Ridge (30–31 December 1944) was a battle..." - is a little redundant, suggest minor reword
• "... Japanese targets as they advanced towards Japanese enclaves..." - this is a little repetitive. Is it necessary to use "Japanese" twice?
• Typo here I think: "...replace them on in the Aitape–Wewak area..."
• Repetitive wording and longish sentence here: "...although intelligence reports and estimates on this matter varied greatly and indeed after the war it was found that there had been more than 40,000[6] at the time—and although..." (2 x "although)
• Is there a missing word here? "... Two Australians were killed or died of wounds, while, before taking part..."
• "The Australians spent Christmas Day patrolling forward in concert with Royal Australian Air Force Boomerang..." Perhaps add which squadron the Boomerangs were from?
• "...after 40 minutes of airstrikes from Royal New Zealand Air Force Corsairs..." Do we know which squadron the Kiwi Corsairs were from? Might be good to add that detail too if available.
• Is there a typo here? "...side of the ridge also dug-in and with the intention..." (and with?)
• Wikilink Gavin Long.
• Repetitive wording here: "...Having been put in against a force of roughly equal size, against a force..." ("against a force" x 2)
• "...who were significantly more experienced than the Australians, Long argues that the battle highlighted the effectiveness of the training the 25th Infantry Battalion had undertaken prior to deploying to Bougainville." This is an interesting point which I think might warrant some expansion / clarification. The casual reader might wonder why the Japanese were considered more experienced than the Australians (when the 2nd AIF had been fighting for the last 5 years). Specifically the fact that the 3rd Division and 11th Brigade were Militia should probably be mentioned in some way at least.
• "...the Australian divisional commander, Savige..." - Savige needs to be formally introduced here with full name and rank.
• Minor inconsistency in presentation of isbns (most are hyphenated, one is not). Anotherclown (talk) 06:51, 17 April 2016 (UTC)
  • Thanks for these comments, I think I've gotten them all. These are my edits: [3]. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 09:38, 17 April 2016 (UTC)

Technical review

• Citations: the citation check tool reveals no errors (no action required)
• Disambiguations: no dabs - [4] (no action req'd)
• Linkrot: Ext links all work - [5] (no action req'd)
• Alt text: Some of the images lack alt text, so you might consider adding it for consistency (although its not a GA requirement) - [6] (no action required)
• Copyright violations: The Earwig Tool reveals no issues with copyright violations or close paraphrasing [7] (no action req'd).
• Duplicate links: no duplicate link to be removed.

Criteria

• It is reasonably well written.

  a (prose): b (MoS):

  • Prose looks fine fol initial changes above.
  • No MOS issues that I could see.

• It is factually accurate and verifiable.

  a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

  • No issues.

• It is broad in its coverage.

  a (major aspects): b (focused):

  • James The Hard Slog covers this action quite well and there are a few points I think might be relevant:
    • "Pearl Ridge dominated the high ground across the Empire Range" (p. 88) - you do mention the importance of the feature but mentioning the Empire Range might add context.
    • "The Japanese had developed the ridge into one of their strongest positions along the Numa Numa trail." (p. 88)
    • "Heavy weapons could not be brought forward, and the Japanese were restricted to just three mortars." (p. 89) - this is in contrast to Long which states there were 20-30 mortars. Interestingly the Japanese ascribed their loss to lack of limited artillery and mortar support so I wonder if James is more accurate than Long (or perhaps I'm misinterpreting Long)?
    • James includes a bit on McKinn's plan which might be useful: "Previous assaults on Little George and Arty Hills were made on a narrow front by a single rifle company rushing forwar, with air and artillery support, to capture the feature. McKinna, however, planned to employ all four of his rifle companies to isolate the ridge, then capture it in a pincer movement moving in from the east and the west.(p. 89-90)
    • "McKinna established his own advanced headquarters on Arty Hill" (p. 90)
    • You write "In doing so, McKinna ordered the assault to aim for Pear Hill..." Some clarification of where Pear Hill fits into the battle would help the reader. James The Hard Slog p. 90: "A platoon tried to move around to the left of the crater, but they soon became pinned down by Japanese machine-guns and snipers firing from the trees on a neighboring feature called Pear Hill (a pear-shaped feature running up to Pearl Ridge)."
    • James devotes considerable space to a Japanese counter-attack which occurred on the night of 31 December / 1 January - i.e. after B Company cleared Baker's Brow (see p. 93); however, from reading Long this doesn't seem to be mentioned (he mentions the one the night before only it seems). This earlier action is covered by James p. 92 in the following terms: "During the night the Japanese made a small attack against C Company's postion that the infantrymen repulsed with the artillery's assistance". To me this is a little at odds with Long's description (and that currently adopted in the article) which makes it sound a bit more extensive.
    • This later (more extensive) action is covered by James (pp. 93-94) in the following terms though:
      • "The Japanese counter-attacked that night and in the early hours of the New Year. They struck out against A Company, but their main efforts a again fell against C Company... The Japanese began probing along C Compnay's perimeter during the night and at 10 pm began throuwing grenades and firing rifles... The Japanese were harassing the Australians, trying to draw their fire so as to reveal the specific location of the defenders' weapon pits and machine-guns... The Australian did not take the bait. The main offensive came at 3 am, with the Japanese attacking from the south and southeast, falling against the strongest area of the Australian defences. Bruce was able to call in artillery support..." (p. 93). "At one point the Australian briefly had to abandon two of the foremost pits... The Japanese got so close in some areas that the battle became a grenade fight... After more than an hour, the Japanese finally abandoned their attack. It had been a very near-run thing for C Company... This Japanese counter-attack had been their last attempt at trying to hold Pearl Ridge. With both attacks repulsed, the Japanese abandoned the ridge. It was New Year's Day, and the first Australian patrols went out early in the morning. The battalion's companies soon met up along the ridge. Patrols discovered some scattered weapons and found the remains of several dead soldiers, but there was no other contact with the Japanese." (p. 94)
    • IRT Japanese dead James notes "Thirty-four bodies were counted and buried. More dead were seen down the steep sides of the razorbacks". (p. 94)
    • You write "This was a product of the lack of defensive construction undertaken following the Japanese capture of the island in 1942." This is a good point and is borne out further in James' book The Hard Slog to (as opposed to the cited article from James which is presumably abridged). But I wonder if the wording you use here is a bit too economical? Specifically it wasn't just "defensive construction" but the failure of the Japanese to construct "infrastructure or improve the lines of communications between various outposts." (p. 95) This is important as it seems to me that the main reason for the limited support the defenders received from artillery and mortars was because the terrain prevented the Japanese from bringing them forward. Where as "defensive construction" to me implies weak defensive positions.
    • James' account includes a number of references to Japanese snipers, "Juki" heavy machine guns, and pill boxes and I couldn't help but think that this would add some context to the narrative. Do you have enough info on these or do you need me to provide some examples from The Hard Slog?
      • All these points have been addressed now. Anotherclown (talk) 10:02, 21 April 2016 (UTC)

• It follows the neutral point of view policy.

  a (fair representation): b (all significant views):

  • No issues.

• It is stable.

  No edit wars etc.:

  • No issues.

• It contains images, where possible, to illustrate the topic.

  a (tagged and captioned): b (Is illustrated with appropriate images): c (non-free images have fair use rationales): d public domain pictures appropriately demonstrate why they are public domain:

  • Images are appropriate for article and are PD and most seem to have the req'd documentation.
  • Captions look fine.

• Overall:

  a Pass/Fail:

  • This article is looking good to me, but I think there is probably a bit more that could be included from James' The Hard Slog. Hopefully I've summarized the main points well enough above. If you need any more extracts please let me know. Anotherclown (talk) 10:41, 18 April 2016 (UTC)
    • G'day, thanks for these comments. I think I've addressed them all now. These are my edits: [8] Thanks for your time. Regards, AustralianRupert (talk) 12:32, 20 April 2016 (UTC)
      • No worries, good work. Passing now. Anotherclown (talk) 10:02, 21 April 2016 (UTC)