Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Guantanamo detainees missing from the official list

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was merge to List of Guantanamo Bay detainees. Even though the list may be acceptable with regard to WP:OR, the introductory prose needs heavy sourcing if it is to be included in the merger. Sandstein (talk) 06:39, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Guantanamo detainees missing from the official list (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (delete) – (View log)

• Delete - This is a clear example of original research and perhaps POV fork. There are no sources that focus on this claim. The inclusion of this article in Wikipedia is WP:SYN - by using this original research as the basis of the page, the implication is that the process is flawed, illegal, or something else. It may or may not be,　but Wikipedia is not the forum for making these claims based upon original research. BWH76 (talk) 08:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Regarding nominator's concern that the article implies "that the process is flawed, illegal, or something else." The deletion policies are quite clear on this -- a perception that the current version of an article contains bias is not grounds for deletion. The deletion policies are quite clear on this. Wikipedians who are concerned because they perceive a bias in an article are supposed to state their concern on the article's talk page; or make good faith changes to the articles. Geo Swan (talk) 13:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
  • What the nominator is concerned is "original research" are merely collation and correlation, it is no different than looking up any information available on a reliable, authoritative source, and quoting it. It is no different than looking up census data from the census bureau, or baseball statistics from the baseball musuem at Cooperstown. The names are either present on one or more of the official lists, or they are not. I do not see how this constitutes "original research" as defined in the wikipedia's original research policy. Geo Swan (talk) 14:49, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Comment -- Regarding merging to List of Guantanamo Bay detainees (LoGBd). Several people have suggested merging this article into (LoGBd) I did the lion's share of the initial work maintaining (LoGBd), up until about two years ago. On April 20 2006 and May 15 2006 the DoD published its first two official lists of captive's names. Ideally this article should have incorporate the information in those two lists. Doing so would represent significant work. I didn't do it. I was working on other articles. And no one else has done it either. The reason I am bringing this up is to suggest that this merge would not be trivial, as has been suggested. I predict it would require at least twenty hours to do even a half-assed job. Here are the two lists from 2006:
  • OARDEC (April 20, 2006). "List of detainee who went through complete CSRT process" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.
  • OARDEC (May 15, 2006). "List of Individuals Detained by the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba from January 2002 through May 15, 2006" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.

The DoD released nine further lists in September 2007:

• • OARDEC (July 17, 2007). "Index for Combatant Status Review Board unclassified summaries of evidence" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (September 4, 2007). "Index for testimony" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (August 8, 2007). "Index for CSRT Records Publicly Files in Guantanamo Detainee Cases" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (August 9, 2007). "Index of Transcripts and Certain Documents from ARB Round One" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (August 9, 2007). "Index to Summaries of Detention-Release Factors for ARB Round One" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (July 17, 2007). "Index to Transfer and Release Decision for Guantanamo Detainees" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (July 17, 2007). "Transcripts and Certain Documents from Administrative Review Boards Round Two" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (July 17, 2007). "Index of Summaries of Detention-Release Factors for ARB Round Two" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.</ref>
  • OARDEC (August 10, 2007). "Index of Transfer and Release Decision for Guantanamo Detainees from ARB Round Two" (PDF). United States Department of Defense. Retrieved 2007-09-29.— Preceding unsigned comment added by ] (] • ])
• Delete As above. George D. Watson (Dendodge).Talk^Help 08:11, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Delete original research, with a bit of WP:SOAP thrown in for good measure. Doc Strange^MailboxLogbook 09:29, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Merge into the main article List of Guantánamo Bay detainees or Keep. People seem to have done serious work that deserves to be preserved in some form. There doesn't seem to be serious OR in the making of this list of those perhaps not on the official list, only perhaps in the (implicit) claim. The explanatory statements in the article could be rephrased. Some kinds of "OR" are allowable - e.g. simple arithmetic, this "claim" is close to that. The issue is confused by other factors, but if there were say two clear lists, a USGov list of 50 and an ICRC list of 80, it wouldn't be serious OR to have a "list of people on the ICRC list, not on the USG list" although it might not be too sensible. But sometimes it could be sensible - List of unrecognized countries is a similar convenient way of presenting clearly encyclopedic data. Does NOR dictate that is necessary to append it to a bigger article most of which is taken up by fascinating facts like Uruguay recognizes Mongolia? A sensible way to keep this data and be a stickler could be to have a USG list in the main article and a section with (possible) additional names. Another way would be to have a big list with notations. The "possible" - much of the confusion comes from translation problems, translation being another kind of allowable "OR." Aside from such unavoidable, translational "is this name/person the same as that name/person?" problems, it's just a question in how to best present data, not really policy violation, although perhaps we should try to avoid even the appearance of violating policy. John Z (talk) 09:46, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd certainly have no problem if this was merged and made less soapy. Doc Strange^MailboxLogbook 10:36, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• Merge per above. As a stand-alone article, it's not sourced to any published source that identifies these as missing names. Mandsford (talk) 13:57, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Merge. Per JohnZ's comments. Renee (talk) 14:11, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep or Merge, Depending, if it's going to be merged, I'd like to see BWH do the work of ensuring no information is lost, and simply transferred over to the main article. For the past six months he has been consistently nominating one of Geo_Swan's articles for deletion every week, as soon as the last AfD ends (sometimes keep, sometimes NC, sometimes delete)...looking at Geo_Swan's talk page it's difficult to not see some form of user harrassment going on with the constant "I've nominated X, Y and Z for deletion". Nominator has a very long history of trying to have all Guantanamo-related articles deleted, even those ones that are clearly notable - I would suggest that these AfDs form a WP:COATRACK of their own, an attempt to purge as much collected information about the US prison camp from the internet as possible, with a minimum of effort (an article that requires twenty hours of work to create, can be deleted with thirty seconds of BWH's effort, so simple numbers mean he can effectively keep nominating every new article created) - so it would actually do quite a bit to sway my opinion if the nominator says he is willing to take the time necessary to merge these two articles himself, perhaps showcasing a User:BWH76/gitmoDetainees attempt? If I'm shown that, I'll vote Merge, but otherwise I'll vote Keep simply to stymie what seems to be a personal vendetta and agenda. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 17:56, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment Let's try to stay civil here. BWH is under no obligation to "do the work of ensuring no information is lost", particularly since he/she nominated the article for deletion. There are several hundred of the Guantanamo Bay detainee articles, and there's nothing to suggest that each one required "twenty hours to create". GeoSwan and BWH are both entitled to their opinions concerning creating or nominating for deletion, articles about the Gitmo detainees. One could say, I suppose, that both of them have an "agenda". I think it's more likely that both of them have strong feelings about the articles. Certainly, I don't think that either Geo or BWH is waging a "personal vendetta" Mandsford (talk) 01:40, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Yes, but if one user "has an agenda to create articles about World Cup players", and another user has "an agenda to delete all articles about World Cup players", I'm going to view those two "agendas' differently. If you have "strong feelings" about Guantanamo detainees, go make sure their articles are neutral and don't give any sympathetic bias...don't try to remove all mention of them. Sherurcij ^{(Speaker for the Dead)} 05:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Keep or Merge. I don't see a POV problem with the title, as many details surrounding Guantanamo are not released to the public, and instead come out in dribs and drubs in the press. As far as "original research", the names are either on the official list or they're not. I don't see any new facts being derived. That said, the main article, List of Guantánamo Bay detainees, already draws on multiple sources and this article could be merged there without too much trouble. Squidfryerchef (talk) 18:45, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Delete/merge. POV fork, and OR concerns per BWH76, although I do believe it should be kept. MrPrada (talk) 07:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Merge. Yes, may be alot of work but worth it for the project. Mikebar (talk) 11:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Merge as above XCharltonTilliDieX^Talk/_Contribs 16:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Note: This debate has been included in the list of Guantanamo Bay detainment camp-related deletion discussions. —Geo Swan (talk) 21:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Merge or Keep -- disclaimer, I started this article.

I believe the perceptions of "original research" are based on misreading of the original resarch policy, as I explained above.

As I noted above perceptions of bias are not grounds for deletion.

• There are some passages in the article I wrote in good faith, but which I now think should be toned down. The DoD claimed that three individuals, "Mullah Shahzada", "Maulvi Abdul Ghaffar" and Abdullah Mehsud were former Guantanamo captives, among the first captives to be released, who lied and tricked their way out of Guantanamo. They weren't named on the official lists. These three men were described as Taliban leaders of company, battalion, or brigade sized units. If they were really held at Guantanamo it would be highly significant. But they weren't on the official lists.
• Finally I wrote to the DoD, asking for clarification on these three guys. A public affairs officer explained that all three really had been held in Guantanamo. He offered me their official ID numbers. I explained that the wikipedia's policies did not allow me to cite his private email as a reference. I asked him to put their ID numbers up on the DoD website. Maybe he didn't get approval, because their ID numbers have not been made public. I didn't feel I could make corrections based solely on private email, no matter how authoritative the source would be, if it were public.
• When I looked at the article yesterday I realized I could take four other names off the list: Murtada Ali Said Maqram, Musa Ali Said Al Said Al Umari, Sofiane Haderbache, Ghallab Bashir. They weren't totally missing from official lists. The summary of evidence memos published in 2006 had merely named them using names that couldn't be reconciled with the names on the official lists. When the DoD released nine more official lists last September, which less obfuscated than the first two lists, it became possible to figure out who they were.
• I explained, above, why I regard List of Guantanamo Bay detainees as a poor target to merge this article with.
• Approximately one fifth of the captives were named inconsistently. I think this should be the list the article should be merged with -- the list of captives who have been named inconsistently.
• Cheers! Geo Swan (talk) 15:46, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• Comment - The WP:OR upon which this article is based is used to push a point, be it implicitly or explicitly. The inclusion of the article itself on Wikipedia is a WP:FORK and synthesis of facts.

No sources cover this subject. The only source that lends any weight to the fact that some detainees were left off of this list is Wikipedia itself. There are no other sources that lend this subject any weight or importance. I've tried to find even one reference; so far, no such luck.

Giving importance to this subject with an encyclopedic article without any sources making the claim that this is important is WP:OR (specifically WP:SYN).

The inclusion of this article itself is the example of the WP:NPOV error (and the WP:FORK) and is the basis of my nomination of this article for AfD.

Also, out of curiosity, have we done away with the guideline of writing comments underneath the previous entries in chronological order?

Lastly, I responded on the editor's talk page of the ridiculous accusations made against me in this AfD. BWH76 (talk) 16:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Challenger writes:

The only source that lends any weight to the fact that some detainees were left off of this list is Wikipedia itself.

The DoD was under a court order to publish all the captive's names. The article clearly stated this. I suggest that a consistent pattern of failure to comply with this court order is notable, without regard to its cause.

The wikipedia is not a hagiography. I suggest it is not the role of wikipedia contributors to clean up the record of their favourite cause, favourite band, favourite politician, favourite nation, by suppressing information they regard as embarrassing, when that material is well referenced, written from a neutral point of view, and otherwise complies with all policies. Geo Swan (talk) 17:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Delete. A WP:NOT#ORIGINALRESEARCH if there ever was one. And to boot - WP:COATRACK, WP:NOT#MEMORIAL, WP:NOT#SOAPBOX, and WP:NOT#BATTLEGROUND. --brewcrewer (yada, yada) 21:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
• Very Weak Keep I'm inclined to agree with the author that this doesn't fall under the definition of synthesis work. I would compare it to box scores in baseball in an article about notable baseball records. An external source is necessary to make some sort of superlative claim ("This was the first time any team did X") but not ANY claim ("More runs were scored in the last 5 innings than the first four").

However, the lack of outside sources that reference the article topic in its entirety is disturbing. I'm not suggesting that such an absence is a sign that the article need to be deleted on face. but it is a sign that caution should be used. Protonk (talk) 07:08, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

• Comment - I re-read what I've written in this discussion and realized that I may not have clearly explained why this is a WP:FORK. The content of the article is not actually about the detainees that are not on this list. The article is WP:OR on how this list was released - not about the detainees. The only information about the detainees is the bullet list.

And again, why is this WP:OR? The importance lent to this subject is the WP:SYN. Saying that this is important based upon a court order again is OR and SYN. The importance given to this subject only appears on Wikipedia. I think that the baseball box scores are not an accurate comparison - creating an article based solely upon what didn't happen in a baseball game (without any references) would be much more similar - and similarly an OR and POV issue. BWH76 (talk) 07:38, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

• Merge with List of Guantánamo Bay detainees. This is merely a subset of that list; perhaps the unofficial detainees could be listed in colored cells. There should also be a single section added to the article to discuss this issue.

This clearly is not WP:OR - we have a source for the official list and we have a source for these other detainees. Nor is this WP:SYN - the sources about the detainees establish their detention, and the official DoD source establishes that they are not listed. Michael 134.84.96.142 (talk) 18:03, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

• Keep It's a long list, and can appropriately be divided. The sources are reliable for the purpose. The concept of those not on the official list is relevant as a special aspect of the situation. Those who do not like some of the individual GB articles should like this way of doing it instead. I hope this is not a situation where people feel more comfortable with as few articles as possible on the topic. DGG (talk) 22:28, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment If this is in fact relevant, why are there no sources that claim this relevance/importance? There are no sources (and nothing referenced in the article) that make this claim. The article makes the assumption that this is relevant - which is WP:SYN since there are no references establishing this as being something important. BWH76 (talk) 04:02, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment The fact that the detainees are being held at Guantanamo is the thing of relevance/importance. The listed/unlisted classification simply indicates the source. And this classification needn't be notable itself per WP:N#NCONTENT. Michael 134.84.96.142 (talk) 06:38, 19 April 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.