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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/American services and supply in the Siegfried Line campaign/archive2

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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 Gog the Mild via FACBot (talk) 2 October 2022 [1].


Nominator(s): Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:53, 5 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Second nomination. I previously nominated it back in April, but it attracted no reviews, and I asked for it to be closed to make way for another article. I hope things will go better this time. This article is about American services and supply in the Siegfried Line campaign. This campaign was part of the campaign that is officially called "Rhineland" and went from September to December 1945. In the first decades after the war, the strategy, operations and logistics of the campaign were controversial, and many of the issues covered by the article still exercise amateur armchair historians today: why was ammunition in short supply? Was the Sherman tank the better available? Why were there so many cases of trench foot and frostbite? Why did these crises occur when the US Army was the best equipped and supplied in the world? Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:53, 5 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Support from Iazyges

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Support Comments from JennyOz

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Got here. Non-milhist member comments...

Lede

Background

Supply depots

Winter clothing

Footwear

Medical

Ammunition

Rations

Liquid fuels

Solid fuels

Outcome

Notes

Consistencies

Misc

That's it. Learnt a lot, so thanks. JennyOz (talk) 10:35, 13 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Once again, thank you for taking the time to review. I keep telling people that logistics is not rocket science but the devil is in the details. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 02:11, 14 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

No more from me, looking forward to s'porting. JennyOz (talk) 14:11, 29 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Source review from Indy beetle – pass

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General comments

  • Just a point of curiosity, but I presume this isn't called "American logistics during the Siegfried Line campaign" to differentiate it from American transportation in the Siegfried Line campaign?
    Originally there was an article "American logistics during the Siegfried Line campaign" but I split it in two to avoid concerns about the article being too large. Several editors have opined that the readers would be better-served by one really large article than two fairly large ones, as readers interested in the subject will read the whole thing anyway, but ones looking for certain information will zap to the section they are interested in, and splitting may make it harder to find. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 02:11, 14 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • The US Army demonstrated its ability to learn from its own experiences and to adapt to changing circumstances.[121] Many of the problems encountered during the Siegfried Line campaign in October and November could have been anticipated, and time was lost as increasingly higher echelons responded and developed solutions.[120] These two claims appear to fall under WP:RSOPINION and thus should be attributed in-text accordingly, particularly in the second sentence. "Could have been anticipated" is always going to be a somewhat subjective claim.
    Attributed second claim inline. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 11:09, 16 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • They therefore acted simultaneously as base, depot and issue depots. Should "base" and "depot" be plural?
    They are fine. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 02:11, 14 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Spotchecks

  • Ref 18 - (Moses et al. 1945, pp. 33–38.) Appears to support both claims/paragraphs. I do note, you wrote Eisenhower directed that a maintenance area should not be established around Paris while source literally ascribes that decision to his office, Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (p. 36). I imagine you know more about how these official reports like to word things so I'll defer to you on whether it is best to say "Eisenhower" or "the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force". For citation clarity, I would also recommend breaking up the citations with expansive page ranges (33-38) to smaller page ranges attached directly to the sentences in these paragraphs which they support, if workable.
    Changed to SHAEF. Added a bit about Eisenhower. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 02:11, 14 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Ref 56 - (MacDonald 1963, pp. 411–412.) Both claims supported.
  • Ref 81 - (Gropman 1996, pp. 134–135) Good.
  • Ref 82 - (Gropman 1996, p. 95.) Good for the claim Munitions production peaked in the last quarter of 1943,, but it would be preferable if this was a point made explicitly in source text, rather than by looking at a line on a chart, due to WP:SYNTH concerns.
  • Ref 115 (Smithsonian Magazine) Good.

-Indy beetle (talk) 03:07, 13 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Support by CPA

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For now I'll keep it small but might do a full review in the future.

That's anything from me. Cheers. CPA-5 (talk) 12:46, 29 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Wehwalt

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I've made some hands-on edits where there did not seem to be doubt about what was meant. They should be reviewed though.
  • "The advance came to a halt in September.[10] This was not a result of inadequate supplies or port capacity—there were still some 600,000 long tons (610,000 t) of supplies stockpiled in the Normandy lodgment area two months later" If I read this correctly, this gives a figure for November to explain why there weren't problems in September?
    Yes. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:50, 18 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • "the medical annex of the Overlord plan did not mention cold injury,[37] and the medical manual issued shortly after D-Day gave them only a brief mention," Should them be it?
    Yes. Corrected. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:50, 18 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Backlogs remained even after the opening of the port of Antwerp in November and were not cleared until February 1945.[40] Between June and August 55,000 long tons (56,000 t) of cross-Channel cargo tonnage had been allocated to clothing and personal equipment, but only 53 percent of that had been shipped. Some 62,000 long tons (63,000 t) remained in the UK, but its priority was so low that it could not be shipped before October.[41]" I'd toss a 1944 somewhere in the second sentence.
    Tossed. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:50, 18 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for this. Your reviews both here and on the astronaut articles are greatly appreciated. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 21:50, 18 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Will resume with "Medical".--Wehwalt (talk) 16:10, 18 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • "and the Third Army had to call off the Battle of Metz owing to ammunition shortages." This isn't mentioned in the article Battle of Metz.
    It is alluded to. "Direct assault was forbidden against the holdout forts in order to preserve artillery ammunition". That article is poor though, especially considering that Metz was one of the United States most significant battles of the war. It seems that World War II is of little interest to Americans. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:38, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm not sure the discussion of the credit system makes it clear how this worked in practice, and how this discouraged building up reserves and the other matters complained of.
  • "ETOUSA asked for a loan of 75 tanks designated for the Mediterranean Theater of Operations, United States Army, (MTOUSA), but that had been unloaded in Marseille, on the understanding that they would be replaced from the tanks being shipped in January." Should the first use of "that" be "those"?
  • "105 mm howitzer" linked, I think, only on the fourth usage. You might want to go through similar usages.
    Corrected. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 20:38, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
That's it. Thanks for the kind words. An impressive piece of research.--Wehwalt (talk) 19:25, 21 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Support--Wehwalt (talk) 17:39, 22 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Support from John

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Great article! I made some small copyedits, here is the cumulative diff if you want to inspect. Mostly small typos and smoothing out the language. One query (so far): when the Arado Ar 234 attack on Liege took place, you have: "...and started fires that resulted in the loss of 900,000 US gallons (3,400,000 l)." This isn't present in the Smithsonian reference, and none of my sources mention it, e.g. Price, Alfred (1991). The Last Year of the Luftwaffe. Arms and Armour. pp. 114–115. ISBN 1854091891.. My understanding was that this historic jet bomber raid was aimed at the city's rail station and achieved little, in line with the Ar 234's somewhat disappointing war record. Can this be sourced? John (talk) 17:48, 25 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Ruppenthal says: "The Advance Section lost about 900,000 gallons of gasoline as the result of fires started by German planes on two successive nights". I'll dig into it a bit more. Hawkeye7 (discuss) 19:06, 25 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for digging in and for fixing the article. That makes more sense now. I support. Good work.John (talk) 22:54, 29 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Support from Ian

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Recusing coord duties, I came by to perform an image review but decided I wanted to learn something so read and lightly copyedited the whole article -- very well done. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 17:41, 27 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Ian, is that a general support? Gog the Mild (talk) 12:22, 29 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Sure -- organisation, comprehensiveness and supporting materials look fine as well as the prose, and I'm taking as read the source review above. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:50, 29 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Image review -- one certainly can't complain about the comprehensiveness of the imagery, and licensing appears appropriate. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 17:41, 27 September 2022 (UTC)[reply]


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