Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Assessment/Evacuation of East Prussia

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.

Evacuation of East Prussia

An article completely rewritten in the past month, which should meet all requirements for A-class in my opinion. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 13:24, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• Well Done, I commend your update of the article. A few questions though:
  • Why are there no causualties for the Soviet forces in the infobox?
    • Because there were no Soviet civilians killed during evacuation of East Prussia;
  • The caption for Image:3c13916v.jpg seems to be written in an odd font; it looks decidedly out of place with the other image captions. Is there any way to fix that?
    •  Done fixed;
  • In the section "Königsberg" you have the line "According to a NKVD report received by Lavrentiy Beria, the German civilians who left Königsberg and reached the Reich's territories, were not treated by far well, receiving only 180 grams of bread per day" Would it be at all possible to provide a standard unit measurement for this amount of bread?
    • What would be a standard unit measurement in your opinion??
      • I mean a measurement in pounds or ounces (a measurement in the standard system of measurement) to supplement the metric unit measurement. TomStar81 (Talk) 21:35, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
        • In the International System of Units the measurement unit for Mass is kilograme, which is 0,001 grames. I do not really know what "standard measurement unit" means.
      • What I mean is a unit of measurement that people living in the United States. I believe the U.S. doesn't adhere to the standards of the International System of Units, so I have no idea what 180 kilograms equates to in from a U.S. perspective. TomStar81 (Talk) 03:23, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
        • Please consider WP:UNITS. I'm sure that in this article we are supposed to use only metric system units of measurement. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 12:49, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
  • The first line in the section "Crimes" has the line "The mass rapes made by the Soviets in Königsberg, led to a severe psihological damage to the entire German population in East Prussia." Is "psihological" a misspelling?
    • Yep, correct.  Done
• Other than this, it looks like A-class material. Good Job! TomStar81 (Talk) 18:11, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

You'll find my answers after each point. Cheers, --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 19:44, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I have a couple of editorial items I'd like to bring up (I should preface, great job, overall just needs a tiny bit more work on English copy/style editing.)

1. re: the Nazis who "invited allegedly neutral observers" to bear witness to Soviet atrocities. This should simply list where the observers were from or who they were. Otherwise it reads as "invited likely sympathetic to the Nazis and who could minimally be expected to overstate the extent of alleged atrocities". If there's no further information on exactly who, then "invited observers" would be better.  Done
2. re: the "Crimes" section. The statement that Soviet acts of violence were essentially retribution for Nazi acts, while sourced (and I can't speak to the source), diminishes their impact. Soviets committed similar atrocities all over Eastern Europe whether they invaded first or invaded second. Same for the houses looted and burned, it's an overstatement to say this was a direct manifestation of propaganda. Both the Nazis and Soviets (once on opposite sides) used each other's atrocities for propagandist advantage. I think it would be more accurate to state events, state what reports/propaganda existed (on both sides), and that scholars have credited propaganda with having been effective to some degree.

Just some thoughts. Traveling the rest of the year so apologies I can't contribute more substantially. —PētersV (talk) 20:12, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• At the second point, I changed a bit there, but I would say I don't know if that actually needs anything else to be changed. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 20:31, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
• Support. Cla68 (talk) 21:26, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I do still find it a little bit confusing (crimes section) how Nazi propaganda provoked Soviet behavior (invasion is clearer of course). —PētersV (talk) 21:35, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• Strong Oppose-one sided, dominated by just one controversial book, lacks sources to confirm several claims, lacks vital background information towards the existance and activity of the German population in the area. I will list detailed list soon.--Molobo (talk) 22:42, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

For example:I am particulary interested in death toll estimate, and if there is any other estimate then Beevor's and if the word "killed" is proper one, or if the deaths were also made by famine, bad weather etc. --Molobo (talk) 22:50, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• • Why do you call it a "controversial book"?? Which claims do you believe they need sources? I also don't think that wiki is interested in your particular opinions. Please try to be more specific.. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 23:42, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I also don't think that wiki is interested in your particular opinions., it it wouldn't there wouldn't be an Assesment.Basically the whole article is about claims made in Beevor's book, perhaps it should be moved to an article about, while this article would be expanded with more sources ?--Molobo (talk) 00:33, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Please have look more carefully at the article and see that we have cited another 10 historians/authors besides Beevor. While Beevor has certainly written the best book regarding this issue, I see no problem citing him all over the article. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 01:10, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't believe there's any controversy that the German population of Königsberg was brutally treated and purged, that the territory was 100% Russified, and its Germanic heritage wiped clean. "Lacks vital background information towards the existance and activity of the German population?" There are doubts Königsberg was German? Would we need references to prove the French inhabit Paris?

   Denouncing authoritative sources as needing to be cited as the opinion of one sole author (which is what Molobo suggests) is getting to be quite lame on the part of editors who don't like what an authoritative source says. —PētersV (talk) 17:09, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

There are doubts Königsberg was German? Because it originally wasn't ? The place only became German due to ethnic cleansing and genocide of native population by Teutonic Knights and settlement of German colonists. The current version completely avoids mentioning the rather curious fact, that Germans removed from East Prussia weren't native people of the region and their existance there was result of ethnic cleansing and genocide.--Molobo (talk) 18:20, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

and its Germanic heritage wiped clean The correct sentence should be either 'heritage of German conquest of the region' or 'heritage of Germanisation of the region'. After all the Germans invaded, ethnicly cleansed and germanised the area later.

I don't believe there's any controversy that the German population of Königsberg was brutally treated and purged Brutally is POV-compared to what Germany was doing, the Geramn population was treated very humanly, neither was it target of mass extermination like Jews or Poles were for example by using gas chambers, nor was German population declared sub-human. Considering the circumstances it would be proper to name the treatment as "light under circumstances of Second World War and German attempts to exterminate whole nations, rather then face extermination and classification as subhumans like Jews or Poles faced from German hands, Germans themselfs were just moved or allowed to move to their new borders".--Molobo (talk) 18:25, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

That is your opinion. However, it is not supported by the literature on this topic, which makes it clear that East Prussia's civilian population suffered terribly during the Soviet advance and during the early days of the occupation. As this article is focused on the experiance of German civilians in East Prussia there's no need for it to include detailed comparisons with the experiances of other groups of civilians during the war. I'd suggest that you read WP:POINT as you appear to be disrupting this review to push your opinions about European history - there's no doubt that the Germans did worse things overall than the Soviets did in East Prussia, however this isn't the forum for a discussion of that topic. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:18, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

"That is your opinion"

Really ? Where can I find books claiming Germans originated in East Prussia and didn't arrive there due to earlier ethnic cleansing and conquest of the region ?

"which makes it clear that East Prussia's civilian population suffered terribly"

Suffered terribly ? Which books claim East Prussians were classified as subhuman as Germans classified other nations ? "As this article is focused on the experiance of German civilians in East Prussia there's no need for it to include detailed comparisons with the experiances of other groups of civilians during the war." The experience of German civilians is linked directly to German activity and goals in Second World War. And why the experience of Poles that lived in East Prussia during the war should be ignored ?

• Also from German exodus article:

"In The Volksdeutsche of Eastern Europe and the Collapse of the Nazi Empire, 1944-1945, Doris Bergen analyzes the immediate and long-term effects of population policy on the ethnic Germans of eastern Europe which, in her view, was disastrous. Bergen notes that the ethnic Germans of this area found their fate intimately linked to, and affected by, the German war effort and the regime's genocidal policy in more than material ways. Not only did Nazi resettlement policy cause a permanent shift of population transfers and ethnic boundaries, it also caused the erasure of ethnic coexistence. During the earlier years of the war, the Nazis emphasized racial hostility and competition, but at war's end, when it was fairly clear that the Germans would lose, ethnic Germans who had benefited from the earlier policy simply refused to abandon these ideas and found themselves, as a result, struggling to find a satisfactory place within their new communities.[17]" So it is clear the article has to be expanded on reasons of the conditions on the population and explain it under the context of WW2. -Molobo (talk) 02:35, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

• Support This is a good article and I think that it's A-class. If you're interested in taking it to FA class it would need a bit of work first, however. I'd suggest that you give the article a rigorous copy-edit and merge the 'References' and 'Further reading' sections. The proportion of citations from Beevor's book is perhaps undesirable, but it is a very well regarded and recent book and counts as a reliable source. Christopher Duffy's 'Red Storm on the Reich' is excellent and is a standard work on the military aspects of this topic you might wish to consult. --Nick Dowling (talk) 23:07, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

• Well, never expected I would support Molobo on anything. Sorry, but the language still leaves a lot to be desired: "also ... as well", "were ready in second half of 1944", "their houses putted on fire", "refugees trains", and no, I cannot correct them myself, because sometimes the error is not purely language-connected and I do not know what is meant ("This coupled with the panic caused by the speed of the Soviet advances, those killed in the cross-fire, and the inclement winter weather, resulted in the death of many thousands of refugees." - "Neisse region, of South Berlin"). Yes, there is a problem with Beevor (remember "every woman between 8 and 84 had been raped" - is straight from the Nazi propaganda about Nemmersdorf, and Polish and Russian women in concentration camps being raped, echoes the Nazi propaganda aimed at the inhabitants of Poland, warning them - before Nemmersdorf! - that the Russian soldiers would rape their women). The first map in the article shows the borders of Prussia in 1871, which are not coincidentally very close to the borders of Prussia inside Nazi Germany after the annexation of the corridor at the end of 1939: any use of such a map should be accompanied by at least a note that it was the Nazi view of things (East Prussia in its internationally accepted borders in August 1939 was actually a bit bigger than on that map). If you use Beevor to that extent, you must also make sure that you do not have him contradict himself: one reference has him say 8.5 million people left their homes in East Prussia (making the error worse by later stating that those were only the women and children), another one says "A population which had stood at 2.2 million in 1940 was reduced to 193,000 at the end of May 1945." In fact, both figurea are wrong: in 1940, East Prussia had 2.5 million inhabitants.--Paul Pieniezny (talk) 00:37, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

• Support nomination by User:Eurocopter tigre. Good job by all involved! The article is indeed much better than a month before, and has (almost) reached A-level: well illustrated, well documented, well referenced. Language and style still need some cleanup, and the constructive criticism and concerns raised above need to be addressed (especially if you want to take it eventually to the FA level), but this (I mean, the A-level tune-up) is surely solvable in the next few days, right? Turgidson (talk) 19:17, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Yep, all can be done after the holidays :). However, some of the points mentioned by Paul Pieniezny were fixed. Other comments are quite controversial, and if you think Beevor would be incorrect, you'll better come out with better sources. --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 09:51, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Tomstar, as all the points mentioned by you were fixed, would you support the promotion of this article now? --Eurocopter tigre (talk) 20:24, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

• Support I apologize for the extremely long delay in getting back here, I got a new PC for Christmas and have been working very hard to get programs I need onto the new tower. Fast work on the updates, BTW, I am happy with the article in its current form. TomStar81 (Talk) 05:21, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

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.