Talk:Malaysia Airlines Flight 17

Comment from Cadwallader [partially redacted by other user per NOTFORUM]

Acceptable sources for this story are subject to the [Wikipedia Reliable Source Policy|Wikipedia:Identifying_reliable_sources].

"Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published sources, making sure that all majority and significant minority views that have appeared in those sources are covered (see Wikipedia:Neutral point of view)."

"Wikipedia articles are required to present a neutral point of view. However, reliable sources are not required to be neutral, unbiased, or objective. Sometimes non-neutral sources are the best possible sources for supporting information about the different viewpoints held on a subject."

Cadwallader (talk) 22:27, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

I deleted an unsourced paragraph that claimed that "propaganda" was being produced by "both sides", that Ukraine was being fought over by Russia and the USA, and that opinions as to what happened were being made prematurely. All of that is POV. We can add some Russian views, but those views only appear to have traction inside the Russian Federation, and they should be presented as such (ie, not on equal terms). The Chinese are not commenting, and the rest of the world seems to be saying that Russian-trained separatists shot it down with a Buk missile. If we find out this is wrong later, we'll just change it. Geogene (talk) 23:05, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

I would submit this to WP:arbcom if you would like to make an official statement stick, it would help if you could point out what sources you disagree with rather than give a warning in general. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 23:06, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

GeoGene is a brand new editor (March 2014) who just reverted my paragraph without talking about it FIRST. I will revert his/her changes manually. Cadwallader (talk) 23:13, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Being a bit aggressive, aren't you? Geogene (talk) 23:17, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia policy is that you must talk about changes on the talk page before just deleting someone else's edit. So, Geogene is the aggressive one here.Cadwallader (talk) 13:02, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia generally does not require users to get permission from others before making any specific edit, nor are new users subject to any probationary period. Furthermore and most importantly, the material which you added (and which Geogene properly removed) was manifestly inappropriate unsourced editorializing. Please don't add it again. I have also partly redacted your comments here, as the Talk page is not a place for editors to spread homebrew conspiracy theories. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:15, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I disagree with this whole procedure. We do not remove others' comments. Cadwallader only tried to focus on objectivity... Geogene's attitude was not neutral. Fakirbakir (talk) 09:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I did not say Geogene needed to "get permission". I said that Wikipedia editorial policy is to TALK, ie, give reasons, in the talk section BEFORE deleting or reverting edits. And I agree with Fakirbakir, you do not have permission or authority to redact other editors comments on the TALK page. Furthermore, Geogene removed the material within minutes before I could add references. It would have been better to ask me to remove it, or source it - you know the little tags we insert to point out where sources are needed. As for "homebrew" conspiracy theories - I simply reported on claims made by the Russian Deputy Minister and reported in mainstream media outlets in both the USA and Russia, without commenting on the accuracy or veracity of the claims. [another redaction, NOTFORUM] Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 23:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC) ---- This page SHOULD be objectively reporting both sides of the story as printed in their respective news organs without taking sides. If we can't agree to move this page to [Neutral Point of View|NPOV] I will file a complaint through the arbitration procedure. NPOV is one of the most important tenets of Wikipedia editorship. Cadwallader (talk) 21:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

This comment is a textbook case of assuming bad faith.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Read the opening section of the article - it reports Ukraine's assertion that Russians shot down the aircraft, while failing to report Russia's assertions that a Ukrainian BUK battery stationed near Donetsk shot down the aircraft. The article is heavily biased in favor of assertions by Ukraine/USA, while not telling the other side of the controversy. So, I am not assuming bad faith, I am weighing biased non-NPOV editorial content. Cadwallader (talk) 22:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Putin didn't do it. It might be much simpler if he had. But isn't it Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle?? Martinevans123 (talk) 21:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't care if Putin personally rode the missile on the way up to intercept the plane. The point is to publish and NPOV article about an international incident. This crap currently looks like it was written by the US State Department - a neutral source if ever there was one.Cadwallader (talk) 22:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Maybe sources which support the US State Department's view are just easier to find? Martinevans123 (talk) 07:11, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

A NPOV way to introduce this subject would be like this:

Both Russia and Ukraine have blamed the other for firing a BUK missile that is believed to have destroyed the aircraft. No objective investigation with access to the crash scene has yet concluded which party shot down the flight.Cadwallader (talk) 22:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That would be unsourced editorializing. No. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 23:33, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Just because there are two opinions on something doesn't mean each should be given equal prominence or weight. The evidence available to date points to this incident occurring as a result of actions taken by the rebels (possibly aided by Russia). This article should be bold enough to point that out. To give equal weight to unfounded allegations that this was caused by something else is inappropriate, at least until more information emerges. -- anonymous user

There is no evidence, because there has been no collection of it on the ground, no examination of the plane black boxes, no non-neutral investigation commity having put together results. A compilation of statements from ukrainian and american officials is not "available evidence". As per today the article is a pile of crap. Men alt dette er ikke begyndelsen. (talk) 02:28, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I think you're saying that the article is prone to contain a lot of speculation, claim and counter-claim before the crash site is properly examined and the black box data analysed. Martinevans123 (talk) 07:15, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Why not add the Korean Air Lines Flight 007 to the “see also” section?

It is the most similar incident that occurred (Asian civilian airline passager plane caught in a tense region of the Soviet/Former Soviet Union), even if we go along with the Russian official theory that the plane was downed by a Ukrainian missile…--MaGioZal (talk) 02:55, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Because OPPAN:GANGNAM STYLE 24.201.213.251 (talk) 03:02, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I don't see why it isn't included. United States Man (talk) 03:05, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't get what the IP editor was talking about. Dustin (talk) 03:10, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

@Dustin V. S.: Ignore him. He is about halfway a vandal, and has been acting rudely to some people on here, including me. United States Man (talk) 03:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

@MaGioZal: - KAL007 was shot down by the Soviet Military (a legal entity). MH17 was shot down by "rebels" (not a legal entity). There lies the difference. A more comparable loss is the Ukrainian Air Force Ilyushin Il-76 shoot-down. Mjroots (talk) 05:14, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Talk about about being semantic/pedantic, this is ridiculous the KAL incident needs to be included in that section. 175.110.222.144 (talk) 05:36, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I totally agree. I introduced it yesterday on the wiki:it article, and they thanked me to have done it. Alex2006 (talk) 05:50, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

@Mjroots. That distinction doesn't mean that Korean Flight 007 shouldn't be listed. From Wikipedia:See also (emphasis added): "The links in the "See also" section do not have to be directly related to the topic of the article because one purpose of "See also" links is to enable readers to explore tangentially related topics." I think the similarities between Flight 007 & MH17 are enough to be listed:

1. A large number of passengers (there are many incidents listed at List of airliner shootdown incidents, but most were under 60 deaths),
2. was is the cruise phase of flight (not shot down while descending/landing or take-off/climbing, many other incidents were around these times of the flight),
3. involves a major airline (the lower boundary of what can be considered a "major" airline is debatable, but many other incidents were small/regional airlines),
4. both involved a "Russian" region (that's not a reference to Russia the country, but both flights were shot down by/in an ethnically Russian area). While, of course, the incidents occurred several thousand kilometers apart, in the public's mind, the incidents both involved Russians. Also, both involved an Asian aircraft.

Once again, the purpose of the "see also" section is not that the other article is exactly or almost exactly the same, but similar. I think Korean Air Lines Flight 007 is similar enough to be mentioned. I think the other shot-down flights that should be mentioned, because they were in the cruise phase of flight (except the Il-76, because it was nearby/part of same conflict) and involved a large number of deaths are:

• Siberia Airlines Flight 1812 (already listed in article)
• Lionair Flight 602 possibly worth mentioning, also in a conflict zone, although cause not determined
• Iran Air Flight 655 climbing (not really in mid-flight cruise), but noteworthy because of death toll and being shot down in the middle of a conflict zone (during course of Iran-Iraq War & targeting of ships in the Persian Gulf)
• Libyan Arab Airlines Flight 114 mid-flight cruise, shot down over militarily sensitive area, large number of casualties
• Korean Air Lines Flight 902 maybe worth mentioning, nearby (relatively speaking) and involves Russians shooting down an Asian aircraft, only 2 casualties
• El Al Flight 402 maybe worth mentioning. Happened a long time ago and there aren't as many similarities, except it was in mid-flight cruise. Low casualty figure.

Thoughts?? I'm going to be Bold and add the Iran Air & Libyan flights to the article.AHeneen (talk) 05:55, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

All shoot down incidents should be listed in there, be it accidental by a kid playing with a gun on his balcony.175.110.222.144 (talk) 06:16, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

We have List of airliner shootdown incidents in the Seelso section, this is more than enough in my opinion. No need to take all the incidents from the list separately to the same section.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:30, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

But there is the need to browse through dozens of accidents to find similar ones. Having only the one link is like only linking to List of civil aircraft from the Boeing 777 page...it helps the reader to navigate to similar incidents (more specific than just shoot-down incidents). See the quote above from the Wikipedia:See also page. AHeneen (talk) 02:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

OK, so I’ll add the link.--MaGioZal (talk) 16:18, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

That is an interesting turn of the discussion: (1) All shootdown incidents should be listed on this page (2) They are indirectly through the list of shootdown incidents (3) But that list would require a reader to look at all shootdown incidents.

Arguments 1 and 3 are almost direct opposites but both are made by editors arguing we should list the other shootdown incidents.

For what it is worth - I would have no objection to add Surface to Air attacks on civilian aircraft in the last ten year in the same region. But that would limit it to the IL-76 and Siberian 1812 flights. These are similar enough to be of relevance in my opinion. Arnoutf (talk) 07:59, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

More on Russian government edits Wikipedia on flight MH17

Yes this is interesting... Russian government edits Wikipedia on flight MH17. A political battle has broken out on Wikipedia over an entry relating to the crash of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17, with the Russian government reportedly removing sections which accuse it of providing "terrorists" with missiles that were used to down the civilian airliner TheAirplaneGuy (talk) 06:29, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Indeed. I wonder if a look at IP edits, before this page was semi-protected, might reveal some interesting Who is? results.--220 of ^Borg 06:49, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Calculate what is it is much chiper

A to put IP entry in sql database

B to fund 5 bilion to ukrainian revolution. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 09:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Even if true, which country gov is free of they V-column ?

Sorry, ip99, which column is that, V for Vikipedia? Martinevans123 (talk) 09:43, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Perhaps the Fifth Column? Spartaz ^Humbug! 10:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

phew! what a relief, I almost thought we had someone using a mask here. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:08, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

(redacted)

I think there already was such a topic in this talk page (was it archived?). This is first of all. Second, the source doesn't state which Wikipedia was subject to censure: English or Russian? Or maybe even Dutch? Since I speak Russian, I went to the Russian Wiki and the only thing closest to being acts of censure I saw there was the constant removal of the section regarding who shot the Buk (that was yesterday). This lasted all the way up to this morning when it was clear the rebels made that shot. Goes to say similar behaviors are common on the Russian Wiki, since the edits aren't monitored there the same way they are here, and multiple articles seem to suffer from original research, for instance. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 17:17, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

And who made it clear ? And for who? Your sentences are basicaly antisemantic. Usuly the method of 'making it clear, setling the content is to threten to or block semiprotect kick or ban. Imo the w-organ is part of blowing machine. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 00:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I'm not looking for idle chit chat. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 00:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Hrabove, Donetsk Oblast

Also keep an eye on this article. Thanks. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 09:52, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Your post has no RS mentioned, no value to the improvement of the article. Please don't WP:FORUM, etc. etc.HammerFilmFan (talk) 12:26, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I'll spell it out to you as you're a bit slow. Look at this edit I made. Can you see it now? Give me a shout when you've caught up. Lugnuts ^{Dick Laurent is dead} 16:51, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Talk page is for carefully explaining complaints, not insulting others for failing to read your mind. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 19:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Bodies

Now reports that "Pro-Russian rebels 'stole bodies from MH17 crash site'": [1]. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:05, 19 July 2014 (UTC):

Just taking it to a new low... TheAirplaneGuy (talk) 11:06, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Surely there is justification for moving bodies, as quickly as possible, to a secure central location? It's just common decency. I'm not sure how this counts as "stealing". Martinevans123 (talk) 11:14, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Gazeta Wyborcza (in Polish, you can use Google Translate): According to Ukrainian government, the rebels have transported 38 bodies to the morgue in Donetsk and declared to carry out autopsies themselves. Local sources claim that the rebels do this to hinder the investigation. They also reportedly started to look for large vehicles to transport the wreckage to Russia. http://wiadomosci.gazeta.pl/wiadomosci/1,114875,16348805,Rzad_Ukrainy__rebelianci_wywoza_ciala_ofiar_katastrofy.html
My comment: If the wreckage is indeed moved across the border, don't expect to ever see it again. Poland is still waiting for Russians to return us the wreckage of our presidential plane which crashed in April 2010. Mayast (talk) 11:24, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, obviously not as simple as just moving bodies to a morgue. But such a deliberate move would, I'm sure, be seen internationally as an even greater outrage. I wonder where the black boxes are by now. Buried even before the passengers, I wouldn't be surprised. Martinevans123 (talk) 11:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, all Russians are evil, aren't they? FFS, drop the anti-anybody conspiracy crap. Concentrate on finding excellent sources of information that can improve this article. HiLo48 (talk) 12:07, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying that point for us, HiLo48. But the black boxes have already been given to Russian "investigators" haven't they? Or that was the intention of the separatists in the area? And since then? Not exactly very visible, are they. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:11, 19 July 2014 (UTC

TECHNICAL NOTE - two military/flight experts on the national news this morning - two diff networks - said the 'black boxes' will be useless as far as determining if the plane was hit by a missile. They could determine the time of impact in that the telemetry would suddenly cease. FYI. HammerFilmFan (talk) 16:28, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Other experts (such as David Learmount if Flight International for example) will tell you that the FDR and CVR can at least rule out other causes of aircraft loss, like mechanical failure, hijacking, aircrew incapacitation, etc. etc. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

How does that post contribute to improving this article? There's far to much POV on display on this page. HiLo48 (talk) 12:18, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Can we please go back to the original topic (the bodies being moved) and look for more ref sources on this? — Mayast (talk) 12:30, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

[2] - 'Second black box recovered' from crash site. I think this should be added. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:04, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

In the spirit of WP:NPOV, a few minutes ago TVP Info cited the separatists on air (more precisely, I think they cited Alexander Borodai), saying that they are moving bodies to the morgue just to prevent them from decaying in the sun. Mayast (talk) 12:48, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

BBC NEWS 24 have reported the same. As I said, I'd say that was just common decency. They also said they have been moved only to the side of the road (presumably from the middle of corn fields etc.). Martinevans123 (talk) 13:42, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

They very well might consider it common decency, however that place and bodies are technically part of the crime scene, I doubt this is helpfull in solving this. SeraV (talk) 14:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Our opinions here are irrelevant of course. I am unable to find any firm written source for the movement of bodies. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:42, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Common decency would be allowing OCDE experts into the crash site along with a free access to the Ukrainian government experts to secure the crash site and move the bodies instead of threatening them and forbidding any access to the crash site for families or international experts. SkywalkerPL (talk) 09:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The bodies are now on refrigerated trains: [3] Martinevans123 (talk) 21:42, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

SBU

On a side note, the is an Internet hype about SBU wiretaps of the separatists being forged. The version I saw was about upload/record date being earlier than the plane crash. Any information on that?

Yeah, it's Youtube bullshit.Volunteer Marek (talk) 13:45, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Is YouTube really of any relevance as a source in this case? Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 14:38, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I think it is, because it can serve as almost trusted time-stamp source. --Mykhal (talk) 20:40, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

What I meant is that WP can state a YouTube video for sources, but I don't think it can affirm the case with such a video. I mean, it's different from real trusted news sources. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 23:26, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Yutube is good if High commisioner to refuges confirmig this is her voice (abot who kill who). Or Mecrekel say *f* UE nicht gut, commenting VF Nulland insight in future 'election' results. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 14:31, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Your argument is not wholly convincing, alas. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:20, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

UPDATE: the youtube-generated timestamp is the upload time (UTC), but of the previous day (-24h). Obviously, youtube servers are generating the creation date like it was taken 24 hours before the upload. --Mykhal (talk) 08:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The time diff was -21 hours. Timestamp is UTC. Cadwallader (talk) 22:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

locations of the crash site and missile launch post

the crash site map on the New York Times centered at about (48.127, 38.620). there is no contradiction that can be found in photos and videos I have seen so far. there is no photo of the launch post but it's said near Snizhne or somewhere between Snizhne and Torez (as found in the same page see link below). a reference site might be (48.055, 38.762), the rocket engine may have fallen near Stryukove. source: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/07/17/world/europe/maps-of-the-crash-of-malaysian-airlines-flight-mh17.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.111.176.89 (talk) 12:08, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

And there is only one misile flying there since 3/3 ? Why it have to be surface to air and not aa misile? Or box cutters in cocpit? Also if Ukrainian Army shoot down the airliner how we know the army units where not infiltrated by agents disobeing Jacyniuk orders and working against  ? One source is not sufficeint. But two another copies usually are OK 99.90.196.227 (talk) 14:13, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Can you provide any sources for your wild and outlandish theories? WP:FORUM applies. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:20, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Don't we all wish we did? =) Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 14:39, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Would detailed analysis of the wreckage ever determine the direction from which a missile was fired? Martinevans123 (talk) 15:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Alas, probably not. It's a missile, not an artillery shell, so no matter where it was fired from, it's last turn is to come up on the plane from behind. A missile doesn't carry a shaped charge for precisely this reason, so the explosion is isotropic (equal in all directions). So that won't give any clues either. Finally, given the great height of the plane (11km), where the missile exploded in relation to the plane (ie, left, right, front or rear) is not all that relevant.

101.161.75.79 (talk) 08:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Actually, there's a chance the location of the launch could still be determined. Because a) the missile was assisted by a radar which could be read both ways at the time of the crash, so NASA only has to check its satellite archives from the area, b) the angle at which the airplane felt corresponds to the protrusion force angle of the missile, so whether it was front or rear, its protrusion can still be calculated (of course, providing the remaining parts of the plane weren't looted) and c) the missile itself bore serial numbers on its tail, if the tail survived the fall it would be the best evidence they could ever get. However the real problem here isn't finding the location of the launch (like I said below), it's understanding the sequence of events leading to it. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 13:23, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Probably, but I think it's hard to tell at this altitude. I find it weird that some bodies present signs of intoxication, although it might have come from the smoke. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 15:44, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

How is that determined without a post-mortem examination? Do you have a source for that claim? Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:49, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I said "might", didn't I? Besides, we can't rule anything out without thorough investigation here, be it for the missile launch or for the intoxication. DPR is clearly doing anything possible to prevent the investigation. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 15:51, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The "might" you have used applies to the smoke. Are you just making this up? There was a report that the rebel gunman who shot into the air was intoxicated? Martinevans123 (talk) 15:57, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Okay, please stop it. We're clearly speculating. And I'm guessing you don't have the proof of the "rebel" shooting the Buk, do you? Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 16:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Stop what? Wrong gunman: [4]. So you are making it all up. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:15, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I wasn't even talking about that. I was talking about the serum presumably found in several corpses. We were both at the ends of the discussion. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 19:48, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Serum? sorry?? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:34, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I welcome you to read the reference before we talk about it. I'm not going to explain the whole thing, but if you have questions thereafter I would be glad to answer them. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 13:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

You have provided a reference? Sorry, which one is that? Martinevans123 (talk) 20:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I have removed the map as it is pure speculation at this point. The source is not from the NYT, if you look closely you can see "Source: Ukrainian Council of National Security and Defense" as in this is what Ukraine says and while I can agree to that it has not been confirmed. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 18:06, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Well spotted. Thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:17, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I restored this highly relevant, impeccably sourced map. Please state a policy objection before removing it again. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 18:18, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The policy here is WP:REDFLAG I believe, the information in the source is not verified or confirmed. We can all agree that the NYT is a reliable source but it is where they are getting the information from is the issue. The claim by Ukraine is contested and without a confirmation it cant be included here as being true. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 18:23, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I hate to break it to you, but The New York Times is an exceptional source. Furthermore, a quick read of the relevant guideline language reveals it to be utterly inapplicable here. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 18:28, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The NYT is just parroting what Ukraine says, it does not make it confirmed . The policy says "challenged claims that are supported purely by primary or self-published sources or those with an apparent conflict of interest" The claim is challenged it needs more than a source from the Ukrainian Council of National Security and Defense. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 18:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Not the kind of "conflict of interest" the policy guideline refers to, as is clear from the footnote offering examples of possible conflicts. It's simply not the place of WP editors to question material published in utterly reliable sources, based on the WP editor's belief that the RS is simply "parroting" suspect information. Any valid neutrality concerns can be addressed via judicious attribution. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 18:41, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The image is in the "The Ukrainian Case" section. It's totally acceptable to add images here which were made on the base of the Ukrainian data--Alex1961 (talk) 19:15, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Economist blog notes speculation about Buk theft booty

I know, blog. I am not saying "on the basis of this blog the article should be changed". With that out of the way, a blogger for The Economist wrote here that:

Previously, there had been reports about separatist rebels boasting of having captured Buk missiles from a Ukrainian army base near Donetsk. The reports first surfaced on June 29th and were mainly carried by Russian state news agencies. According to sources, the story first ran on TV Zvezda, the news agency of the Russian defence ministry. A major question is whether the missile system was really stolen or whether the story was planted to provide cover for the Russians providing the rebels surreptitiously with advanced weaponry.

I'm unsure of how broadly this speculation has been made or whether it has been made by any sources more reliable than the above blog. I feel this would need more and better sources if any mention were to be made on our article.

At present, the article notes reports of the theft without mention of these claims being (speculatively) disputed. This may well be the correct handling, depending on who has been speculating to this effect/how strongly/etc. I just wanted to draw attention to the fact that such speculation exists and may warrant inclusion in the article if it has broad or high-level incidence. Vague | Rant 15:09, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I had a quick look around for some reliable sources on this and found an editorial piece from Foreign Policy with the following:

The Buk may have been stolen from Ukrainian government stocks, as they and Moscow claim. Or it may have come directly from Russia. It makes little difference.

The speculation doesn't appear to have been addressed in any mainstream news articles that I found, only editorials such as these. PJ Media engaged in some skepticism over the source of the missiles in a piece called (perhaps a little sensationally) "Did the Russians Plant a Cover Story to Hand Separatists the BUK Missile System?" This article largely cited reporting from a live blog by the Institute of Modern Russia's The Interpreter:

In the report above they mention that the rebels were bragging about capturing Buk missiles. On June 29th there were articles published to this effect, but the stories seem to only be carried by Russian state-operated news agencies. The original source for the story appears to be TV Zvezda, the news agency for the Russian Ministry of Defense. It's not clear that the separatists ever captured Buks from the Ukrainian military or whether these stories were a front to explain how the rebels obtained such advance weaponry.

So such speculation does seem somewhat common (at least in online sources), but I'm not sure whether any of this adds up to something worthy of noting here. Vague | Rant 15:57, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

It seem contextually highly antisemantic to to use words still , theft, most frequently connotated to silent clandestine operation; Imagine during wartime to take posesion of diesel propelled caterpillar vehicle, and what? Push it slowly or harness horses? Not to mention to take it from presumably armed guards. If the above equipment takeover is true use terms booty or at least armed robery. I know the editorials push they bias siding with Jacyniuk Junta but enemy should be respected to preserve humanity. Otherwise is the shambles of war crimes, similar to what they are penning elsewehre. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 03:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

With respect, this is a talk page, not an encyclopedia article. If you object to a talk page's word usage, then you're welcome to express that, but there's no pressing need to go in directly and alter other users' English usage to your preference.

In addition and without meaning any offense, it doesn't seem that English is your native language, so I'm not sure your generalizations about the connotations of English words are fair to make. I don't believe most native English speakers would infer that theft or stealing (which I assume is what you mean by "still", do clarify if I am mistaken), in particular during wartime, refer to clandestine efforts.

I do see, however, that a word like "capture" may be preferable to some as it skims over issues of lawfulness. Yet either choice could be seen as editorializing, the latter if only by omission. Regardless, the article at present reports that separatists "had access to a Buk after taking control of a Ukrainian air defense base", so this discussion at present seems irrelevant to the quality of our article. None of the words you object to appear in the article, so I see no further need to debate them. Vague | Rant 11:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, IP does have a point IMO. I believe it's not customary to refer to deaths in a war or civil conflict as "murders", nor would it be appropriate to refer to captured military equipment as "stolen". Whatever the moral underpinnings of this conflict, we can be sure that ordinary criminal terms don't quite apply. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:27, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Malaysian actress

She may not be a big celeb nor matter to western audience but Shuba Jaya http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/malaysian-actress-dutch-hubby-and-baby-die-with-mh17 was a known actress in her country and region, and needs to be included as notable people onboard. inspector (talk) 15:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The measure is that she already has a wikipedia article or would be notable enough for a stand-alone wikipedia article to be named here. MilborneOne (talk) 15:41, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

It would seem that she should have an article. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 16:05, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Nationalities

I am not understanding this table, If Dutch-Belgian is included in Belgium dual-citizen section, why isnt the passener along with Dutch-Israeli,-Ducth-Vietnamese,-Dutch-Malaysian, Dutch-American listed in dual-citizen section of Netherlands, same for UK and New Zealand where the UK-South African and a UK-New Zealand citizen should be in the dual-citizen section of UK and New Zealand. How does one know that the people have kept ther own former nationalties and not renounced them in favour of the new ones, should they then be identified with their former countries? no other passenger tables in such articles have the dual citizen section, there was an Indian on Malaysian 370 who took up Canadian citizenship he isnt listed amongst the Indian passengers, only as Canadian. inspector (talk) 16:43, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Are you certain this person was a dual citizen of India and Canada? Being born in India doesn't guarantee they are a dual citizen. As I understand it, Indian nationality law doesn't really allow dual citizenship. You can be an overseas citizen of India (which some countries consider dual citizenship but India does not and doesn't really confer the exact same privileges as citizenship) and a citizen of another country, but not a dual citizen. And our article suggests the loss of citizenship is automatic, so it seems likely it's impossible that this person could have been a dual citizen (since even if India wasn't aware, as far as they are concerned this person already lost their citizenship if they took up citizenship of another country).

In the case of Malaysia, there are people listed as dual citizens. There's often confusion over this but although Malaysia disallows dual citizenship after a certain age, it's not automatic. The constitution allows the government to cancel Malaysian citizenship of any dual citizen which they nearly always do, but it requires the government to actual find out and carry out the cancellation (you're supposed to inform them) so it's theoretically possible for people to be dual citizens. (This is also why most Malaysians would be travelling under their Malaysian passport when travelling to Malaysia, I suspect even if they didn't intend to go through passport control. Of course it's fairly common anyway for those with multiple citizenship to choose the citizenship of their destination if they have it, and in some cases even when it's allowed it's expected.)

AFAIK in the existing cases, they have been reported as citizens of two or more different countries. It has little to do with where they were born but what passport they were travelling under and whether any other countries has said they were a citizen of their country. (Although there seems to be some confusion over the inclusion of non citizen residents.

Nil Einne (talk) 19:44, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Cargo manifest shows L-ion batteries

Wonder if these had a role to play as well http://www.malaysiaairlines.com/content/dam/malaysia-airlines/mas/PDF/MH17/MH017%20-%20Cargo%20Manifest%203.pdf there was also live cargo consisting of two dogs and nine boxes of birds.inspector (talk) 17:37, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

It would be virtually impossible for you to cite that document in a useful way without committing OR. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:45, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The birds and dogs are already mentioned, with a source? Martinevans123 (talk) 18:53, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Not anymore; removed pointless OR. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 18:58, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

It may be trivial, even pointless. But why is that OR? Martinevans123 (talk) 19:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

"All interpretive claims, analyses, or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary source, rather than to an original analysis of the primary-source material by Wikipedia editors."

Deciding what facts or aspects of a topic to emphasize requires editorial judgment, which is something WP generally outsources to reliable sources. By mining a primary document for factual tidbits to put in an article without any guidance by reputable secondary sources, an editor is implicitly performing analysis and interpretation — that is, he is analyzing the primary source and concluding that those specific factual tidbits are noteworthy and relevant to the article topic. If the noteworthiness or relevance were obvious, this might not be an issue. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 19:31, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

International Business Times, Daily Mail, Borneo Post, ITV, ABC13, etc., etc? Martinevans123 (talk) 22:20, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Confused, what is your question exactly? Are you asking whether those sources look like reliable sources? Yes, they do. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I was suggesting that using any of those sources would avoid the charge of WP:OR. I think most editors would agree that the fact there were dogs, birds, cut-flowers and machinery, or whatever else, in the cargo, is quite irrelevant. Just as it was (very probably) for MH370 (although there were questions about lithium batteries over there as well causing lots of excitement). There were certainly no dead bodies in the cargo. It's not that any particular part of the cargo was notable - my point is that that readers may simply want to know that there was nothing hazardous. The article makes it clear the aircraft was shot down, but it may still be useful to point out that the official contents of the cargo were fully known and documented. Martinevans123 (talk) 08:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

So you no longer see a need to use the primary source, I assume? Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I wasn't really ever arguing that the primary source had to be used. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Talk page should be semi-protected

Desperate times, y'all. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:57, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Or may be some IPs should be blocked for trolling.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:05, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't agree. Don't think it would stop people from foruming to such an event of worldwide importance. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 18:14, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

It would reduce what threatens to be a very large volume of improper WP editing and discussion unfolding over the coming months. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 18:25, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Notice at the top of this talk page:

The Arbitration Committee has permitted Wikipedia administrators to impose discretionary sanctions on any editor editing this page or associated pages. Discretionary sanctions can be used against an editor who repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Wikipedia, any expected standards of behaviour, or any normal editorial process.

I would suggest that we let the admins handle any issues that may or may not arise, rather than trying to prematurely stifle discussion.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 19:00, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Talk pages are rarely protected, especially not when the article is protected. Semi-protection seems to be working well here. The article has matured really quickly and is of a good standard. Thanks to the many editors who are watching and editing it. It's a "hot topic" both on and off Wikipedia, so some disruption is to be expected, but nothing that can't be handled. Mjroots (talk) 20:47, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

What I don't see is an edit war going on. The protection can serve its purpose, but what "edit war" are we talking about here? Really, I just don't see any. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 23:32, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Ukraine Accuses Russia of Providing Missiles

NYT July 19 KIEV, Ukraine — The Ukrainian government said on Saturday that it had proof that Russia had provided the surface-to-air missile system that shot down a Malaysia Airlines passenger jet over eastern Ukraine on Thursday, killing all 298 people aboard. ... At a news conference in Kiev, the capital, Vitaly Nayda, the head of counterintelligence of the Ukrainian State Security Service, displayed photographs that he said showed three BUK-M1 missile systems on the road to the Russian border. Two of the devices, missile launchers mounted on a self-propelled armored vehicle, crossed the border into Russia about 2 a.m. Friday, less than 10 hours after the jet, Flight 17, was blown apart in midair, he said. The third weapon crossed about 4 a.m. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Keith McClary (talk • contribs) 18:30, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

And how it is related to MH17? Local time wrap 10 h back in time. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 03:52, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Flight 17 or Flight MH17

Some sources, such as the BBC, are referring to this flight as Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 (see here for example). Should we move the article to reflect that, or is Flight 17 the correct title? This is Paul (talk) 18:49, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

MH is just a shorthand code for "Malaysia Airlines Flight" so no need to change it. MilborneOne (talk) 19:31, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Also the current title is consistent with virtually all WP articles about airliner crashes (all that I'm aware of), including Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 and Delta Air Lines Flight 191. There's nothing like tradition. :) Mandruss (talk) 21:52, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I agree. Consistency is best here. Dustin (talk) 21:58, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Bias in Referring to Russian News Outlets

It is well known that the Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg News loyally follow Washington's lead when reporting on foreign policy, particularly when it comes to ramping up for war. Yet we do not refer to them as "Washington-backed news outlet".

This article refers to Russia Times (rt.com) and Itar-Tass as "Kremlin-backed outlet". To refer to Russian mainstream media as "Kremlin-backed" but not to say the same about American media, or UK media is bias. I suggest such bias be removed from the article.Cadwallader (talk) 18:58, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

RT is widely viewed as a government propaganda outlet, American media outlets generally are not and the specific publications mentioned are quite highly regarded. So your suggested course of action would not be appropriate. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 19:08, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

What a pointless, POV discussion. We have two posts. One says "It is well known that..." The other says "...is widely viewed as..." That's not good enough folks. Sources, please! Not just opinions. HiLo48 (talk) 19:17, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

This isn't article space. Check out the Russia Today article if you wish to read the extensive notable opinions regarding RT as Kremlin propaganda. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 19:34, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Even with reliable sources documenting or claiming the biases of other reliable sources, I don't see the point of including these as adjectives in front of all the reliable sources we use. The system of Western mainstream media biases is well-documented, and it looks like RT's very strong links to the Russian government are well-documented (I haven't checked in depth, but it's highly credible). But I don't see the point of overriding the consensus in the WP:LEAD of the articles about those journals. The WP:NPOV approach, given Radio Today and Washington Post could be, e.g.

• "according to the international multilingual Russian-based television network Radio Today ..."
• "according to the widely circulated United States daily newspaper The Washington Post ..."

where we take just the first few adjectives considered most important by the Wikipedians editing those articles. (The lack of mention that the Washington Post represent the US military–industrial complex POV in the lead there is presumably related to WP:BIAS, but the place to NPOV that is in that article or justify modification of the RT article lead, not here.) But aren't these descriptions distracting the reader from the main issue? All sources have biases (e.g. Wikipedia is biased towards reliable sources, NPOV, no original research, and structured content), but giving a source should enable the reader to search for more info or make a judgment based on his/her previous judgments of the source.

Another way of saying it: if the reader wants to know what biases to expect from RT or the Washington Post, the MH17 article should let the reader go to those articles to decide for him/herself, rather than imitating biases from reliable sources. The policy on WP:RS is about using the factual type of information from the sources, not the sources' style of hinting to the reader what to think.

Boud (talk) 22:18, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

You neglect most obvious line of reasoning here: RT, ITAR-TASS, et al are owned by the Russian government. The examples given of the American press are not. --Simfan34 (talk) 23:31, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

In any event, NPOV essentially requires us not to lend equal weight to Russian media claims, precisely due to their lack of credibility. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

You have nothing but your mainstream American POV to tell you that Russian media are any less reliable than mainstream Anglophone media. This has been gone over and over. Many more examples can be given of the NY Times having to retract stories with major foreign policy implications than Russian media have ever had to retract after the breakup of the USSR. That means that when it comes to the Ukraine, Russian media are significantly more reliable than Western media. – Herzen (talk) 04:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Not quite; we've got out mainstream American POV telling us that Russian media are less reliable than Western media, but there's also the crushing weight of world opinion; an oft-underestimated force of nature. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Look, it's not the media's job to be neutral - that's our job. Assuming that American, British and Russian sources are biased, there's still plenty of sources out there in English we could use. including Al Jazeera, The Times of India and the Straits Times to name but three. It's just a question of finding the and using them. Mjroots (talk) 04:59, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

" RT, ITAR-TASS, et al are owned by the Russian government." And the BBC is owned by the British government, and ABC is owned by the Australian, etc., yet I don't recall ever seeing anything like "the British government-owned BBC News reported..." printed on this article. Russian sources should not be singled out this way. --Tocino 06:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

BBS already replied your concerns in the past: "Although the BBC is funded by the UK government... a fundamental principle of its constitution and its regulatory regime is that it is editorially independent of the UK government.". RT meanwhile became famous for having journalists quit their job over propaganda lies pumped by the television. I hope you see the difference now.

LOL. BBC reports they may be funded by the government but they are editorially independent. Ha ha. I'm sure the Russian Times has an equally rosy view of their own neutrality.

For the record, I have no doubt that Russian mainstream media are just as much in the pocket of their government as the America, British and Ukrainian media are in the pockets of their respective governments. My point was that prefixing "Kremlin-backed" prior to the Russian media outlets is a deliberate device to sow distrust in the mind of the Western reader, and thus fails NPOV. Cadwallader (talk) 22:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC) SkywalkerPL (talk) 10:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That is another biased conclusion, because other stations (like Al Jazeera) also had journalists quit their job. How is a journalist decission to quit her/his job a sign that a certain news station should be treated differently? Western media outlets (CNN, BBC, etc.) should be treated on equal footings as the russian media outlets, I don't think that factually speaking their reports are any less dependent and objective as those of for instance RT. Let's not be doing childish games here and pretend western media outlets are on a higher footing and standing as russian news agencies. Of course RT has a certain bias, but that does not differentiate it from western news sources that also have a certain bias, wether they admit it or not, wether they have written constitutions or not. So I agree with the statement that we should not make such differentation towards Russian news agencies. Robheus (talk) 21:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

List of 'keeps' and 'removes'

I thought it would be useful to keep a list of consensuses on the top of the talk page in order to calm down the edit warring and confusion. Here's what I can gather so far (please correct me if I'm wrong): Flagicons in responses: KEEP Flagicons in passenger list: KEEP Condolences in reactions: REMOVE Timeline of flight: REMOVE Nathan121212 (talk) 19:01, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Sounds like a sensible idea. There's a lot of editing going on here so anything that clears up potential confusions has to be good. This is Paul (talk) 19:27, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I suggest a FAQ section like there is on Talk:Chelsea Manning. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:29, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

• Good idea. Not sure there is actually a consensus for the flag icons though. --John (talk) 20:18, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm a bit busy, feel free to implement a Q&A on the top of this page (see example provided above by User:Knowledgekid87) Nathan121212 (talk) 21:44, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

TELAR can't engage a target independently?

The article states "A single BUK missile launcher cannot acquire a target without the radar and target support provided by the other vehicles." Logically this makes no sense, as the whole point of a mobile system is to be able to protect attacking forces as the edge of the battlefield changes. Other sources (e.g. ) state that the TELAR itself can track and fire on targets independently but lacks the increased range and global situational awareness that integration with one or more higher levels of C&C provides, including awareness of commercial traffic from civilian ATC sources.

67.173.128.39 (talk) 20:08, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Good find, every reliable media source I've seen says that a single BUK launcher can down a plane, but that without the second radar vehicle, it cannot do things like differentiate civil and military aircraft by transponder signal. Since there was no reference for the statement you mentioned above, I deleted it. Poindexter Propellerhead (talk) 20:55, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

So which variant of BUK was this alleged to have been? From the article the "Gang type" appears to have the non-cooperative threat classification system installed, "allowing targets to be classified without IFF via analysis of return radar signals." So maybe the airliner wasn't even challenged by IFF (which might have saved it)? Martinevans123 (talk) 23:03, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

What is the actual evidence the masked men at the debris field are separatists?

If Wikipedia is going to assert that the masked men at the debris field are separatists and not anti-separatists what is the evidence? We're told this is a separatist-controlled area, so why are they masked? Are they fakes or is the area not so separatist-controlled after all? A neutral tone is needed. Silent Key (talk) 21:27, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

The separatists have been wearing those masks for months. The reason behind them is undoubtedly the same as why some Russian and Ukrainian security forces wear them - to protect the anonymity of members, so that they or their families do not face retribution (or other consequences). I've seen no claims from Donetsk, Luhansk or Moscow claiming that they're fakes, so I think you ought to consider accepting them as genuine. Poindexter Propellerhead (talk) 22:04, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Saying "Because he wears a mask, he's a separatist" is the worst piece of logic and, obviously WP:OR, on this page. HiLo48 (talk) 22:09, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Borodai was there. YOMAL SIDOROFF-BIARMSKII (talk) 22:20, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

One of the Russian who is leading the "rebels" said, that the debris field is in the rear of their controlled territory and therefor a ceasefire is not necessary. So that should be proof enough first. Furthermore Russia has GRU units operating in Ukraine - so Masks are used in order to conceal the identity of their troops so that they are not identified by the media or Western Intelligence Services. Or perhaps they are masked because they are in fact aliens... :rolleyes: 46.7.56.247 (talk) 22:15, 19 July 2014 (UTC) M.

I would say that asking for evidence in this case is like asking for evidence that black is black, and white is white. All parties involved (Ukraine, Russia, separatists, rest of the world) seem to agree that the area is controlled by separatists, and there have been no reports of any "anti-separatists" present in the area. As for why they need the masks, Poindexter Propellerhead and 46.7.56.247 provided some logical reasons, like protecting anonymity of members and their families, also from other intelligence services. — Mayast (talk) 22:33, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, wearing a mask provides anonymity, for anyone. That's the point. If, purely for example, the Ukrainians wanted to try to smear the rebels, they too would wear masks, wouldn't they? I would. Once someone is wearing a mask, you simply cannot be certain who they are. HiLo48 (talk) 23:01, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Don't those YouTube videos show them also in uniform? Not sure how one would ever get a reliable secondary source to verify the identities of these individuals. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:10, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I can't see how either. Wikipedia cannot claim certainty based on someone wearing a mask in a YouTube video. That really is silly. HiLo48 (talk) 23:18, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

What difference does wearing a mask make? Even if they were not you could make the case they were pro-government forces "pretending" to be dissidents, which, well, that requires citation, not what is being said by every semi-reliable source (including RT et al) on the ground and as of now not contradicted. They are saying they are separatists, the onus is on one alleging otherwise to make the case. Mind you, I fully expect people to start claiming this- that the "rebels are not in Grabovo. The rebels were never in Grabovo". --Simfan34 (talk) 23:21, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't see a point in discussing hypothetical scenarios, like Ukrainians posing as separatists by putting on some masks. So far, I haven't seen any reports of this actually happening, or that any side of the conflict disagrees that those men we see on the photos are indeed pro-Russian separatists. However, I'm not saying that such a scenario isn't possible – if and when it happens, sources/evidence might be needed. — Mayast (talk) 23:34, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

There exist methods to determine if black being black. For example use white light to see what is intensity and spectrum of reflection; if the reflection is zero ,it is perfect black if equal iluminance is perfect whithe betwen are shadows of gray (given no difraction etc). Bsicaly this simplistic thoght reject whole spectrum of possibilities and thus is max-blind POV.

For not color blind: The initial question is IMO somehow valid. Is like to devise in set of red and blue the other is black (Donbas) or not white, and the search for surces why two preceding can be rather sino-zolte or blue on white flags? The first casulty of war is truth so logical falasy is predictble modus operandi here. However i doubt if one can so late sale it out. It may lag like powel sale of gas in Syria. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 23:44, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for this lecture in optics, as a student in electronics and photonics I'm a little familiar with those concepts ;) The point I was trying to make was a bit different: so far everyone agrees that those masked men are separatists, including Ukrainians, Russians, and the masked men themselves. So, personally, I'm pretty certain that they are indeed separatists, and not anything else. ("If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, ...") And I'm not sure I understand the need for any hard evidence supporting that (like I don't need to measure light intensity to determine if I'm wearing a white T-shirt, and not black). That being said, I cannot completely rule out the scenario I described earlier, and so I'm not saying that such evidence won't be needed in the future. — Mayast (talk) 00:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Unfortunately, Rene Descartes has been indefinitely blocked from Wikipedia, due to tendentious editing. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Here is one piece of "evidence" indicating that these are rebels, from the OSCE observers. [link]. --Simfan34 (talk) 06:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Donation of a news report

I give a piece of news to those dealing with this article:

Ukrainian rescuers find two black boxes at crash site, but their location is secret – Donetsk authorities

RGloucester — ☎ 21:37, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Okay, thanks. Dustin (talk) 21:40, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

"The Russian Case"

I started going over the cites in this section, and found that several were things like Facebook pages, and one was a hate-filled blog by an anonymous party who asserts that the MH17 downing was a false flag operation by the Mossad. Finding some reliable sources for this section might be good! Poindexter Propellerhead (talk) 22:56, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

If one assumes that a pro-Russian or Russian force shot down the plane, you are going to have a hard time finding reliable sources to the contrary. --Simfan34 (talk) 23:16, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I think the entire section "Assigning responsibility" is highly problematic right now. First, dividing this to "Russian" and "Ukrainian" causes is problematic. The "Ukrainian" cause is actually the one described in vast majority of sources (basically in all non-Russian sources). This section now includes a lot of statements by rebels. Second, this section is full of WP:OR. For example,

After the crash, Ukraine immediately blamed the separatists, while Russia blamed Ukraine for failing to agree to a cease fire, and has gone on to suggest that a Ukrainian anti-aircraft battery shot down the aircraft. Much of the evidence presented by each side relies heavily upon unverified social media accounts.

No, it does not "relies heavily upon unverified social media accounts". This is OR.

Ukraine claim that pro-Russian separatists shot down the aircraft using a BUK missile launcher is based upon an alleged set of phone intercepts that were released in a YouTube video shortly after the crash, in which the voices of two alleged pro-Russian separatists are heard discussing the shooting down of a plane.

No, Ukrainian claims are not based on this. They are based on their intelligence data (not YouTube!), the admissions by rebels (yes, that were published on YouTube, but then republished in multiple RS), and circumstancial evidence, such as another plane recently downed by missiles from rebels etc. My very best wishes (talk) 23:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

It is unclear whether Strelkov had actual knowledge of a BUK battery firing a missile, or whether he and his men saw the crash and simply assumed that their forces had downed another Ukrainian military aircraft and took public credit for it. This is OR.

And so on. My very best wishes (talk) 23:19, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Corrected your indent for better reading. Sorry if anything. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 23:23, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I concur. The "Russian Case" section is appallingly cited and written, and the assembling of the two cases establishes a false parity from the perspective of a lay reader. It should immediately be pared down to a small paragraph, if that.Gareth E Kegg (talk) 01:01, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Part of the Russian case was based upon the [MH17 crash: 10 questions Russia wants Ukraine to answer] publicly asked of Ukraine by Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov and reported in the Russian media as referenced above. One of the 10 questions refered to "Carlos" the alleged Spanish ATC in Kiev with the @spainbuca Twitter account which has since been deleted. This necessitated linking to other sites that had preserved or translated that twitter feed prior to its deletion. Cadwallader (talk) 21:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Fully protected

Following a discussion at the administrators' noticeboard (section "Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, TheAirplaneGuy and John" at the moment), I've levied indefinite full protection onto this article. This is not an attempt to prevent people from editing: it's meant to prevent the edit-warring that's been happening and to ensure that this develops as an encyclopedia article, not a news story. Please continue to discuss changes; I'll be happy to implement changes that are agreed here if you let me know when something's been agreed. Of course, I'm not appointing myself the ruler of this article; any other administrator can do it, so please use the {{editprotected}} template if I don't respond or if you want input from someone else.

Note that the protection is indefinite: this is because I have no clue how long we normally protect such high-profile pages in this situation, not because it needs to be protected long-term. I ask for help from any editor familiar with protections in this context: let me know how long we normally make these protections if you're not an administrator (I'll be happy to reduce the duration), or if you are an administrator, please modify protection yourself. Nyttend (talk) 23:17, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Rather surprised. The only real dispute here was over that map in the NYT article which was attributed "Source: Ukrainian Council of National Security and Defense". Martinevans123 (talk) 23:29, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Second that. I don't see any edit war whatsoever going on in the article... Maybe we're talking about several people editing the same information in and out i.e. constantly conflicting their own edits? Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 23:36, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I would leave it to Nyttend to implement the changes, for a while, I will try to help here on the talk page only. The key is to make proposals that are clear and ready to be inserted, and be clear about here it should go. Everyone can vote it up or down, preferably in a concise way. Lets keep it simple so changes can be made quickly. Protection is just for a limited time, so help by contributing, not complaining. Please. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 23:37, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Why not just keep the two editors who caused the mess away from the article for a bit, I don't see why two should have to impact this article so much. Anyways even if we go by consensus on choices it will still take longer. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 23:39, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, and wasn't that dispute like twelve hours ago or something? Dustin (talk) 23:46, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) With new information being revealed rapidly, I don't think full protection is the best idea. I wish that an administrator could just block the disruptive editors from editing this article without a need for further discussion here (sadly, the MediaWiki software does not permit this sort of specialized block). Meaning, they could edit anywhere on Wikipedia except for the article for the time being. Dustin (talk) 23:54, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. Current section link is Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17.2C_TheAirplaneGuy_and_John.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 23:52, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Full protection is a very bad idea, and is doing more harm than good here. The article will quickly become outdated and inaccurate. With this many edits and this big an event, some editwarring is inevitable; deal with those users individually if they can't use the talk page. The article was developing nicely overall before it was protected. It will be impossible to get changes needed through talk page requests, so potentially useful edits will simply be lost. 9kat (talk) 00:26, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

As I said over at WP:ANI I think a topic ban for the editors for like a week would do better. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 00:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• There is no deadline on Wikipedia. We need to avoid WP:RECENTISM, and holding off until the picture becomes clearer is an excellent idea. Allowing the article to become slightly outdated is better than it constantly changing based on every piece of tabloid drivel. RGloucester — ☎ 01:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• As I said here, part of the reason is to ensure that the article not become a news story: we need solid, better-reasoned sources rather than simply the latest breaking news. Nyttend (talk) 01:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Dr. Entropy (talk) 03:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC) Nyttend, thank you. For the full protection, that is. I was about to request that somebody do that, but you beat me to the punch! :) The reason I'm bringing this up is that there is now a news report about the Russian Government editing the Russian Wikipedia page about the incident. (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10977082/Russian-government-edits-Wikipedia-on-flight-MH17.html )

Again, thank you, and happy trails! Dr. Entropy (talk) 03:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

While I agree that full protection will help to keep out a lot of what comes with recentism, I also think that this protection should not last for too long. Being a recent event, information will rapidly be introduced and continue to change, and there are obviously not that many editors willing to submit edit requests. (Only two so far from what I can tell). Dustin (talk) 03:27, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Exclusion of Russian view. It's unfortunate this has been blocked for editing after a very summary and hasty conclusion as to the cause of the disaster being a surface to air missile, according to the US, and excluding the Russian POV. http://politikus.ru/events/24720-strasti-po-boingu-pervye-priznaki-rakety-vozduh-vozduh-sbival-ne-buk-m1.html A Russian newspaper has posted photos showing a wing or tail of the plane was hit horizontally by an air to air missile. There have also been reports, I believe this may have been on RT, that eyewitnesses saw Ukrainian fighters tailing the airliner. JPLeonard (talk) 06:10, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 19 July 2014

Please expand the first ref (for the map) in "The Ukrainian case" section to: "Maps of the Crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 - NYTimes.com". The New York Times. 2014-07-19. Retrieved 2014-07-19. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help) Cites National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine as Ukrainian Council of National Security and Defense.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 23:25, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Maybe you'll find a friendly admin to help you. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:31, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

That would be nice.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 23:34, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

• I would consider that completely uncontroversial and appropriate. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 23:41, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Done. Everyone, please remember that uncontroversial requests (like this one) can be fulfilled without discussion. Nyttend (talk) 23:53, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Thank you.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 23:57, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

Siberia Airlines Flight 1812 in 2001 Ukraine

There was a similar incident s in 2001. At the time Ukrainian military shot down a passenger plane using one of its old missiles systems https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siberia_Airlines_Flight_1812 . It probably is worthy of mention. --MyMoloboaccount (talk) 23:51, 19 July 2014 (UTC)

I think Siberia Airlines Flight 1812 is worthy of mention.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 00:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Please also add Iran Air Flight 655. Supersaiyen312 (talk) 00:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The incident described by that article did not happen in or near Ukraine, and did not involve alleged Ukrainian or Russian missile systems or personnel. I don't think it's similar enough.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 00:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Note: replacing blank link with plain text, as it was an uninformative link that we do not want for talk pages.   — Jeff G. ツ (talk) 00:10, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Also 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash by who benefit in this. The in the leaked tape R Sikorski PL-minister reveal who benefit blaming Rusia on this IMO perhaps false flag crash. Definietly not the people who he swear to represent. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 00:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

99.90.196.227, I don't understand what you are trying to say here [regarding Sikorski]. Could you please rephrase it somehow? And in what way does it relate to incidents that are similar to MH17? — Mayast (talk) 00:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Do you mean that MH17 and Polish Tu-154 are connected because in both cases Russia benefited somehow? I haven't listened to the leaked tapes, so I don't understand the other part, and also what that "false flag crash" means. — Mayast (talk) 00:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

"False flag" refers to a technique in information warfare or counter-espionage wherein clandestine agents commit some act while disguised as members of another faction, to confuse or deceive others. You can bet that any comments referring here to a "false flag" and not pointing to any reputable published analysis are inappropriate for the talk page. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the explanation.
As for the similar incidents, the only similarity I would see between MH17 and Tu-154 is that separatists might be making the investigation difficult, just like Russians did four years ago. But it's far too early to say that, and so I would oppose adding that crash to the article, as all its other circumstances are completely different. — Mayast (talk) 01:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

For an example, see Gleiwitz incident, part of the beginning of World War II — German agents damaged a radio station and posed as Poles in order to make things look like a Polish attack on Germany. Nyttend (talk) 01:01, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• To make this easier, if there is a consensus in theory, can someone propose an exact sentence/paragraph, including cations, and where it to be placed, so the community can vote it up or down. As admin, we do NOT want to interpret what you mean here, we want only to implement exactly what the community wants, verbatim, so there is no misunderstanding. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 00:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• Note that there is a section above on which excatly incidents should be added to the See also section.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 19 July 2014

I request the removal of the "dubious — discuss" tag from the map showing the crash site and approximate launch location published by the NYT. There are some editors who feel, roughly speaking, that published accounts based on information or claims made by the current Ukrainian government should not be treated as reliable sources. My understanding is that part of WP's proper role is to report, not question, mainstream discourse. Thus any NPOV concerns about lending too much weight to Ukraine's claims could be addressed by attribution (e.g., "approximate area of missile launch according to Ukrainian Council of National Security and Defense") — personally, I question whether even that much is warranted — and by properly weighted reflection of opposing published views. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I have gone ahead and done this. Also see here. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:22, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Voting: Full protection of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17

There is a voting about the full protection of this article. Enjoy. Normalgirl (talk) 00:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

We don't vote here, particularly where POV pushing is rife. HiLo48 (talk) 00:52, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, we discuss. But the discussion on ANI was closed... My personal opinion: if people who actually edit this page want it unprotected and there is no too much damage to content (I do not see much damage), the page should be unprotected. If there is a couple of troublemakers around here (I am not sure), then an appropriate "boomerang" would be to sanction these troublemakers. My very best wishes (talk) 01:58, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Nyttend's protection was a good idea. With topics like these, with many editors making many changes very quickly, and on a topic with real-life consequences, it's better to be safe than sorry. So sanctioning the troublemakers is a great idea, but in some cases it's better to head them off at the pass. Drmies (talk) 02:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, this is much easier for admins, but usually does not improve content (which is the goal). I think the content of this article was quickly expanding/improving. Now, speaking about "not news", I believe it is important to have updated versions of our pages for high-profile events. But this is easy to say. I personally do not have much time to watch this page and discuss. I can only occasionally edit something... But if others want to contribute (and they do it in a good faith here), let's make it easier for them.My very best wishes (talk) 02:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I second Nyttend's decision to make this article fully protected, not only because right now it is possible that unwanted or inappropriate changes would be made, but also for any future possibilities of inappropriate editting. I understand a most recent as possible picture is preferred, but my personal opinion is that it is better to play it safe, especially considering the conspiracy theories that have started popping up. (The Mail Online had a good article on that.) Consensus can always decide whether or not an edit should be put through.AnnaOurLittleAlice (talk) 04:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

FYI, I made the decision, but only because several other people had already suggested it; I basically implemented a consensus that was in the process of forming. Basically it was partly my decision, partly a community thing. Nyttend (talk) 04:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I personally think we ought to keep on the protection for another twelve hours then go from there, but that's just me. If vandalism occurs frequently after that, then we can have another discussion. Dustin (talk) 04:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Again, I don't think indefinite protection a good idea, and I still wish some other admin would come around and impose an ending time. I picked indefinite so that it wouldn't end too soon (as opposed to something like a six-hour protection) and so that it would be obvious that we needed to change the time; imposing it for a month, for example, might not convey that necessity. Nyttend (talk) 04:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

If you didn't think that indefinite protection was a good idea, then you probably shouldn't have done it. There was no consensus established at the discussion over at ANI for full-protection. In fact, more editors opposed it than supported it.— Isaidnoway (talk) 04:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Not in that sense: I believe that indefinite protection is better than the one-week semiprotection that it had. My point is that it definitely isn't ideal and that it really should have been given an end time/date some hours ago. Unless you're trying to convince me directly (and I'm quite open to that), discussions about the end of protection ought to be held at WP:ANI (where this whole matter arose) or at WP:RFPP, which is in general the venue where we discuss the increase or decrease of protection. Nyttend (talk) 05:13, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Is there something that is specifically preventing you from removing the protection, or giving an end time/date to the protection?-- Isaidnoway (talk) 05:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It is best for the encyclopaedia that there is protection. He took a brave and proper move. RGloucester — ☎ 04:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

With a very current event, information will rapidly become outdated or possibly even be found to be incorrect. Like I said before, I would not support any more than a twelve-hour continuation of the current full-protection. Dustin (talk) 05:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It is impossible to tell whether anything is incorrect or not, because we are too close to the event in time. If people want news, they can go to the pages of some yellow rag. We're here to write from a historical perspective. Not to be a news aggregator. WP:RECENTISM has been destroying the project in many ways as of late. We have no deadline. We write for an encyclopaedia. RGloucester — ☎ 05:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

For the time being full protection's fine. But please be conscientious about implementing changes and fixing existing problems. And yes, it will have to be removed after 12 hours or so (it can be re-protected again if problems come back).Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I should add that I too do not think that indefinite full protection should be implemented, however, given that especially in the first days after a disaster there tends to be a lot of people coming up with the euphemistic "alternative theories" and the still hectic situation around it, it is probably for the best to keep it on for at least 12 hours and at most 72 hours - then it will remain to be seen whether or not vandalism occurs/persists, and another possible full protection can be implemented based on the results of that.AnnaOurLittleAlice (talk) 08:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

After about three days, I don't think this article should be fully protected again. Any edit warring users who have been warned should be blocked and/or banned from editing this page. Just because two editors have problems with each other doesn't mean it should rub off on everyone else. Dustin (talk) 15:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Abbott's Quote

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I hope someone will add this quote by Australian Prime Minister, I think it is one of the best;

"Russian controlled territory, Russian-backed rebels, quite likely a Russian supplied weapon - Russia can’t wash its hands of this"

–Tony Abbott

One of he best for what? Political point scoring? HiLo48 (talk) 01:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

HiLo you are well known in the Wikipedia community for you far-left and anti-Abbott views, I understand that. But put aside your politics like Labor and Liberal have done. I'm not a fan of Abbott either, but I think this is one of the clearest and most condemning quotes used against Russia over this tragedy.--Empire of War (talk) 01:13, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Empire, that is very presumptuous and is just asking for a fight. You need to retract that statement and keep your discussion on the merits, not your personal opinion of other editors. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 01:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

He has told me himself so it's okay, but in my personal experience HiLo has always tried to derail my messages, even on this one. By posting that message he tries to start mini-fights with me. I retract the statement, we should stick to the tragedy and real facts and leave the derailers to their own being--Empire of War (talk) 01:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Empire of War - Three things: Firstly, maybe you should just stick to trying to answer my first question. Secondly, this may not please your ego, but I attack nonsense when I see it, not the posters of nonsense. I am not consciously aware of ever trying to derail a message specifically of yours. Your name does not even ring a bell. So I'm not aware of ever having told you anything, such as being "far-left". I think such labels are useless. Simple labels to please simpletons. Thirdly, please read WP:INDENT. HiLo48 (talk) 01:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Empire, do not remove other people's comments again or you will be blocked. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 01:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I removed my comments as well Brown? I did it to stop an argument forming, I want to stay on topic here stop derailing it--Empire of War (talk) 01:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Please read WP:INDENT. HiLo48 (talk) 01:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Separatists were expecting Ukrainian cargo plane

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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According to Oleg Kashin (independent journalist), separatists were expecting a Ukrainian cargo plane at the same time at the same place where MH17 crashed. They have a source of information about cargo flight details in Ukrainian military. That's why separatists were sure that they shot An-26.

I think this info should be added to the timeline section of the article.

Yozh (talk) 02:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

As mentioned above, please propose precise wording that you'd like to see added. Of course, if you don't have precise wording in mind, and you just want us to know about it, that's completely fine, and you have my thanks. Nyttend (talk) 02:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Precice words to be inserted in the end of "Crash" section after "An-26 had been shot down by the militia near Torez at around 16:00 local time." and before "U.S. analysis of the launch plume and trajectory suggested": According to sources of Oleg Kashin separatists had a source in Ukraine military, and they expected an Ukrainian cargo plane, that's why they were sure that they shot An-26. <ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.facebook.com/oleg.kashin/posts/10152616292098112 |last=Kashin |first=Oleg |accessdate=20 July 2014}}</ref> Yozh (talk) 12:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And NATO can't wash its hands of bloodbaths in Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen. 92.40.250.86 (talk) 02:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

WP:NOTFORUM Dustin (talk) 02:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Not a reliable source. Drmies (talk) 19:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Please fix this redlink: I originally fixed with this edit, but it was broken again by Simfan34 with this edit. Dustin (talk) 02:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Done; thank you. Nyttend (talk) 02:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

My apologies. --Simfan34 (talk) 03:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Images of Debris?

Would it not be appropriate to have images of the debris? JDiala (talk) 03:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It would be nice, but we would need pictures that are not subject to copyright. There's been plenty of such pictures shown in the media, but that means those media outlets, or their sources, own them. HiLo48 (talk) 03:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

What you write is oxymoronic because you state that many pictures not subject to copyright are in the media but we cannot use them because they are subject to copyright. Logically “such” reference to not subject to copyright. Please write clearly when editing articles. I might as well fix your statement for you:

“It would be nice, but we would need pictures that are not subject to copyright. There’s been plenty of copyrighted pictures shown in the media, but that means those media outlets, or their sources, own them. HiLo48 (talk) 03:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)”

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.102.233.65 (talk) 2014-07-20T04:20:51

My apologies. I try, but I am not yet perfect. Sorry. HiLo48 (talk) 04:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

But a copyrighted image may be used under WP:FAIRUSE rules if a strong enough case can be made. Would suggest that any image is proposed and discussed here before it is uploaded and added to the article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mjroots (talk • contribs) 2014-07-20T05:08:37

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that a hard case can probably be made for the fair use of a copyrighted photo of the debris. The main question would be which picture from what media outlet should be used.AnnaOurLittleAlice (talk) 08:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• It isn't required to understand the topic, and it is reasonable to think a free version will eventually become available. Fair Use does not apply here and would be in violation of policy. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Problems with the "Assigning responsibility" section

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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While the article is in a state of (enforced) peace, I'd like to raise my concerns about the section titled "Assigning responsibility". It largely contains highly predictable allegations, presented as "The Ukrainian case" and "The Russian case". There are no final facts about who did what. There cannot be yet. Time will (hopefully) deliver facts, but for now we don't have them. I would like to suggest that those subsections at least, and a fair bit of the surrounding wording, simply be removed from the article for now. Once the truth is known, they will be replaced anyway. Why not get rid of them now? HiLo48 (talk) 04:33, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I was just going to write something about that section as well, though probably not what you had in mind. First NPOV does not mean "giving equal weight to different points of view". The weight, per WP:UNDUE, is based on how reliable source treat the subject. As such, the very organization of the section into "The Ukrainian case" and "The Russian case" is idiotic (and against policy). An encyclopedia article is not a high school debate match. Get rid of these headings, just freakin' report on what is known and what has been said.

Additionally, here's a list of specific problems:

• Several unsourced "citation needed" statements which need to be either sourced or simply removed. Pronto.
• The Vitaliy Yarema quote in the "The Ukrainian case" part is sourced to RT News. Putting aside that that's not a reliable source for anything but basic facts, in this particular instance RT doesn't even support the text. The current text makes it seem like Yarema is being quoted. Yarema is not even freakin' mentioned in the RT piece! Somebody's been engaged in blatant misrepresentation of sources (if someone feels like trawling through edit history of the article and finding out who, I'll be happy to take this to WP:AE) Remove this shite per WP:BLP immediately.
• All that crap about this "Carlos" is just idiotic rumor mongering, again sourced to junk sources and twitter. Junk this too.
• The sentence beginning with "On the ground near Lugansk,..." needs to be sourced or it needs to go.
• The paragraph beginning with "DPR representatives reported seeing that a military ..." repeat info that's already elsewhere in the article. The last two sentences of that paragraph are probably fine.

I'm fine with full protection and on balance I think it's a good idea. But please fix this quickly.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Volunteer Marek - don't worry about the "probably not what you had in mind" thing. I think we're both in furious agreement that something needs to be done. You have just been less lazy than I was when I suggested deleting the whole mess. So good on you! Does one of our attending Admins who is watching want to tackle these concerns now? Or do we wait for more input here to find a consensus for when the protection is lifted? HiLo48 (talk) 04:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I think I'll wait until one more person comes along to support (assuming no dissent in the mean time), but with two caveats. (1) I'm going to bed soon: it's 1:15AM here, and church starts at 10:45AM. (2) As always, my decision holds sway only if nobody else comes along to make a decision first, whether "it should be done now" or "we should wait for more than just one additional supporter". Nyttend (talk) 05:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Given the number and severity of problems in this section (falsely attributing a quote to a (B)LP!) I'm fine with "deleting the whole mess", or at least a good chunk of it. I expect the admins who fully protected the page to be on the ball about this since this is probably one of the most viewed Wikipedia articles right now.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:58, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I also agree with deleting the "whole mess". It is a mess, and a product of the recentism that I hope the protection will stop. It is in total violation of policy. We don't report a large pile of allegations. We are not an allegation aggregator. RGloucester — ☎ 05:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

On the 18th this page had over 400,000 page views, on the 19th it was down to 179,420, which is still a significant amount of readers looking for reliable and sourced material. I agree that any unsourced or poorly sourced material needs to be removed immediately, especially the "crap about Carlos" and the rest of it that is currently unsourced or is questionable. This is policy people, content must be sourced to a reliable and verifiable source.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 05:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And the falsely attributed quote. That's bordering on WP:HOAX right there. And it's a BLP issue. The rest can wait but these two things (the quote and "Carlos") should be done immediately.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

My "wait a little longer" was made before I saw Isaidnoway's comment. I'll remove the whole section except for the external audio and the images, which I'll move somewhere else (probably an inconvenient spot, given my history...) of course. You'll have to wait for me to figure out whether I'm breaking any reference names before I do anything. Nyttend (talk) 05:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Okay, removed the whole "assigning responsibility" section, plus the missile launcher photo and the Infrared Space Systems Directorate logo; I hope you don't mind that I removed them, because if I kept all of the images, there would be too many, pushing the moments of silence and Obama-on-telephone images into the notes and references. If you can think of a good place to put them, go ahead and request without waiting for consensus, because I would have kept them if I'd seen a better place to put them. Bedtime now for me. Nyttend (talk) 05:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And what about the material you deleted which was reliably sourced? Did you even consider that? Dustin (talk) 05:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I may have misunderstood the action which was just taken, but I still find it hard to believe there isn't any significant, reliably sourced information within those 20,000+ bytes of info which were removed. Dustin (talk) 05:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. Most of the article's glaring problems just vanished without requiring rewriting, but I think most of its substance went along with it. Poindexter Propellerhead (talk) 06:04, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

(ec^2) Thank you! One thing though, the part on the alleged phone conversations is pretty important so the following text:

The [[Security Service of Ukraine]] (SBU) published what they said were wiretaps of separatist commanders reporting that a civilian airliner had been shot down.<ref name="sbu">{{cite web|title=СБУ перехопила переговори терористів: І.Бєзлєр ("Бєс") доповідає своєму куратору полковнику ГРУ ГШ ЗС РФ В.Гераніну про щойно збитий бойовиками цивільний літак |trans_title=SBU intercepted terrorist negotiations: I. Byezlyer ("Byes") reports its curator Colonel CPD Armed Forces V. Geranin just shot down militant civil aircraft |language=Ukrainian |date=17 July 2014 |work=Security Service of Ukraine |url=http://www.sbu.gov.ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id=129035&cat_id=39574 |accessdate=17 July 2014}}</ref><ref>[http://www.novayagazeta.ru/news/1684798.html Над Донецкой областью разбился пассажирский Boeing, 295 человек погибли], by [[Novaya Gazeta]].</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVAOTWPmMM4 | title=Боинг БУК М eng1 | publisher=[[Security Service of Ukraine]] | date=18 July 2014 | accessdate=18 July 2014}}</ref> According to one of the recordings, Flight 17 was shot down by a group of pro-Russian separatists manning a checkpoint near the village of [[Chornukhine]], [[Luhansk Oblast]], some {{convert|80|km|mi|abbr=on}} northeast of [[Donetsk]].<ref>[http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/separatists-admit-downing-a-civilian-plane-in-tapped-conversation-full-transcript-356545.html SBU intercepts phone conversations of separatists admitting downing a civilian plane (FULL TRANSCRIPT; VIDEO)], ''Kyiv Post'', 17 July 2014.</ref> Ukrainian authorities said another recording indicated that the weapons system had arrived from Russia with a Russian crew.<ref>[http://www.sbu.gov.ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id=129071&cat_id=39574 Obtained by SBU: talks amongst terrorists acknowledging receipt of the Buk-M anti-aircraft missile system with Russian crew] ''[[Security Service of Ukraine]]'' 18 July 2014</ref>

should be in the article. Possibly in the "Cause" section or the "Aftermath".Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Being sourced is never enough reason on its own to justify inclusion. HiLo48 (talk) 06:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Well sourced and widely reported. This is obviously a key part of the story.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The problem with anything like that is the words "what they said were..." Until it's verified by someone independent and well outside the Ukraine/Russia propaganda battle, it's not safe to include it here. HiLo48 (talk)

No, that would only be true if we were stating that these recordings are genuine in Wikipedia voice. We're not. We are merely reporting that multiple noteworthy reliable sources have covered the fact that Ukrainian authorities have released these alleged conversations. Come on, every major newspaper has written about it, it's a big part of the picture, it needs to be in the article.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Having said that, I agree that the above text needs some more non-primary sources. Which are plenty available, and if the article wasn't fully protected it'd be easy to add these.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:19, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

However it is fully protected for obvious reasons and I warn that propaganda may soon end up on the page if we do use more non-primary research. TheGRVOfLightning (talk) 07:26, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Given that this is an encyclopedia and not a research paper, we actually want to avoid primary sources and use secondary sources. See WP:PRIMARY.Volunteer Marek (talk) 07:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Though in this case secondary and primary should be even. Furthermore we do need to point out what the IAC says about this aswell as the NTSB, AAIB, ATSB and Others. TheGRVOfLightning (talk) 07:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

To respond to everyone up above, I removed the whole section because that was what people in this thread were saying, that the "whole mess" of the section ought to be removed immediately; I would have waited longer (or not done it at all) if people hadn't thought it basically an emergency. On sourcing, everything here is primary, for as the situation's still ongoing, it's impossible by definition for secondary sources to exist; this is why a just-happened and/or ongoing event cannot be considered to be notable, since secondary sources can't exist. Of course, rigourous enforcement of that would sometimes be counterproductive and harmful. That's why we have the ignore all rules policy, and heavily publicised air crashes are definitely a situation in which it's being employed, just like ongoing hurricanes, major elections, etc., because all of these situations will invariably get coverage in the future. Nyttend (talk) 12:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I would consider the removal along the lines of WP:TNT. It was flawed beyond possibility of repair, and hence needs to be built from the ground up. I recommend someone here write a draft and propose it as an edit request. RGloucester — ☎ 15:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

ARBCOM sanctions query

I noted the template on the top of this page saying:

”The Arbitration Committee has permitted Wikipedia administrators to impose discretionary sanctions on any editor editing this page or associated pages.”

Am I allowed to put that notice on the Malaysia Airlines talkpage? There is a fair amount of activity on that article page, including un-sourced or poorly sourced edits from IPs about who/what brought the aircraft down. I have been removing statements that it was 'definitely' a missile. As the article page infobox here says:

"Summary

Suspected of having been shot down by a Buk surface-to-air missile; exact cause is still under investigation"

Over there text related to this 'crash' is on the page in about 3 2 places (lead, "2014 aircraft losses" and "Accidents and incidents" sections) so there are inconsistencies occuring on the page itself.--220 of ^Borg 05:58, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

To note that Tony Abbott stated that this was not an accident but was a crime. As noted by [Tony Abbott's response to MH17] I ask it be noted in the Reactions by Country under the section of Australia. TheGRVOfLightning (talk) 06:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

@TheGRVOfLightning: As per the template I think you need to be much more specific about the change you want: ie. what it says now, and what you want to change it to, or exactly what you want added and where, ie. "Australian PM Tony Abbott said "..." --220 of ^Borg 06:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

TheGRVOfLightning - What makes Abbott's assertions more meaningful than all the other claims floating about that Russia is evil and it was all Russia's fault? Do you have evidence that he knows things the rest of us don't know? Or might he just be making the sort of political noises he thinks his voters might like? That's what politicians do, you know. HiLo48 (talk) 06:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

HiLo48 - I was merely requesting to add to the section to give it some more context and I believe you arn't holding a neutral point of view. I further request to you HiLo48 if you take issue that you raise the issue at my talk page. TheGRVOfLightning (talk) 07:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Why should we do that? This is the place to discuss what goes in the article. HiLo48 (talk) 07:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Would like to point out that this is not a matter of whether Mr Abbott PM is proclaiming to speak the unfallable truth, but that just the inclusion of his response be considered and taken care of under "reactions". Whether or not Mr Abbott is actually speaking the truth about the situation is an entirely different matter that stands separate from the reaction itself. AnnaOurLittleAlice (talk) 08:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

@AnnaOurLittleAlice: Yes. That was exactly what I was intending. TheGRVOfLightning (talk) 08:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• • Regardless, 220 is correct. These requests need to be very specific or they aren't actionable. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 11:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I was explaining the situation explicitly to HiLo48. Indeed, I am aware that a more complete quote must be given in order for it to be added. AnnaOurLittleAlice (talk) 17:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Little need to expand in such detail on every comment made about the case; section on Australian response pretty much covers those allegations already. Drmies (talk) 19:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Given that there has been no investigation of the crash site yet, I think it is highly premature to include the "reactions" section at all. The majority of the parties "reacting" lack any objective intelligence to react to at this point other than the self-promoting blather coming out of US and NATO. These are the same intel agencies who told us that Iraq had chemical weapons in 2003 and that Assad used chemical weapons on his own people in 2013 - and later turned out to be lying to advance the political objective of invasion. Is this a voting contest based on knee jerk reactions? That isn't exactly encyclopaedic material. So until an intel agency releases hard data, like the GPS coordinates of the plume they detected, these world leaders are talking off the tops of their heads, and don't really know what they're talking about. Cadwallader (talk) 21:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Novorossiya is now a country, and Girkin's their national spokesman

Really? 173.228.54.18 (talk) 06:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes. But Girkin being the national spokesman would in my view happen to be incorrect. TheGRVOfLightning (talk) 06:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, this needs to be fixed as well.Volunteer Marek (talk) 06:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I suggest adding a footnote next to 'Novorossiya', stating that 'Novorossiya is a state with limited recognition that has declared independence from Ukraine' in order to prevent confusion. EDIT: I take this back as I realise that instead of clarifying that Novorossiya is not a country, it would likely have the opposite effect on readers. OakleighPark 08:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Woa!! Oppose. Novorossiya is absolutely not a 'country'. It is a part of the Ukraine over which an illegal and, so far, completely internationally unrecognized claim has been made by the rebels. Or do you propose that Wikipedia be the first to give them credibility? Ex nihil ^(talk) 08:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It is recognized by Russia, and so far as I remember, Russia has recognized Nagorno-Karabakh, Ingushetia and South Ossetia, all of which are now distinct countries. If Novorossiya is not a country, then why would people be dying for nothing? Stupid claim. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 22:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, I didn't mean to suggest that the article should recognise Novorossiya as a country; in fact I was trying to suggest that it be clarified that Novorossiya is in fact not a country. OakleighPark 10:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I agree, we should definitely either removed "Novorossiya" or move it to the very end and place it under unrecognised entities.Jeppiz (talk) 08:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, Novorossiya is not a country. Arnoutf (talk) 08:49, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Novorossiya deserves to be listed, somehow, since they are a direct player in this crash (they control the territory), regardless of their disputed legal status. Maybe Novorossiya should not be listed under "countries" with the rest of the UN member states, but rather under a new category, such as "disputed entities". See the Response section of the Shelling of Donetsk, Russia article as an example for the correct way to treat Novorossiya. --Tocino 08:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Or as a sub section of Ukrainian response? Arnoutf (talk) 08:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

"Novorossiya" does not exist, and thus should not be listed in any way, shape for form alongside legitimate nations. What should be done is create another section for the non-nation opinions deemed relevant. There you can list NATO, the UN, the ICAO, alongside the statement of the terrorist/separatist/whatever group. Tarc (talk) 11:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Without commenting on whether we should seperate them, Tarc has a key point here which seems to have been missed in this discussion. Novorossiya is listed alongside NATO, UN, ICAO and the EU in the "by country section", and the last 4 are definitely not countries. I believe it's been like this for a while since I recall seeing it about a day ago. I considered fixing it at the time but was lazy and thought someone else would, it seems it's still the same now. Nil Einne (talk) 15:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC) Edit: (The Novorossiya thing is new, IIRC when I saw it at the time the rebel response was under the Ukraine one.) Nil Einne (talk) 15:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I added the rebel response in the first place, so maybe to indicate that it is not an actual country, could you list them like this? –

• Ukraine – Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko vowed support for a Dutch probe into the crash, which he called an act of terrorism. He offered condolences for the air disaster in a telephone conversation with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte. Ukrainian citizens brought flowers to the Dutch and Malaysian embassies in Kiev in support.
  • Novorossiya – Pro-Russian rebel commander Igor Girkin was quoted as stating that "a significant number of the bodies weren't fresh", although he stated that he could not confirm the information. He followed up by saying "Ukrainian authorities are capable of any baseness"; Girkin also said that blood serum and medications were found in the plane's remnants in large quantities.

Dustin (talk) 15:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't even think you should link New Russia in this case. It makes more sense to link Donetsk People's Republic, or perhaps Donbass People's Militia. The existence of Novorossiya on the ground is almost nil. It is more like a concept, then a reality. The DPR and the LPR continue to operate independently, Girkin has no involvement with the LPR that I can see. RGloucester — ☎ 15:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

So like this maybe?

• Ukraine – Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko vowed support for a Dutch probe into the crash, which he called an act of terrorism. He offered condolences for the air disaster in a telephone conversation with Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte. Ukrainian citizens brought flowers to the Dutch and Malaysian embassies in Kiev in support.
  •  Donetsk People's Republic – Pro-Russian rebel commander Igor Girkin was quoted as stating that "a significant number of the bodies weren't fresh", although he stated that he could not confirm the information. He followed up by saying "Ukrainian authorities are capable of any baseness"; Girkin also said that blood serum and medications were found in the plane's remnants in large quantities.

Dustin (talk) 15:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It is hard to tell. There has been a lot of inter-insurgent conflict lately. Girkin's forces, after having retreated from Sloviansk, fought armed battles against the existing DPR leadership in Donetsk city. Supposedly, the DPR is now under Girkin's control. Fundamentally, though, his position is that of Supreme Commander of the Donbass People's Militia. I recommend using the Donbass People's Militia flag, just to be safe. RGloucester — ☎ 15:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request: 20 July 2014

Please add to ICAO's reaction in order for flag usage to be consistant, thanks. Nathan121212 (talk) 07:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It can not be done via template and reuires some technical solution. If someone suggests the solution I can add the flag to the article.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Remind me, what do the flags add to the article? --John (talk) 08:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

But I guess we should either have all the flags, or none, it does not make sense to have only several of the flags.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

None would work. As has been discussed, this mish-mash should be written out as a paragraph and all the little flags removed. Adding more would be a retrograde step. --John (talk) 08:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done, per Ymblanter, all or none. For the moment, all is better than nearly all. Mjroots (talk) 09:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I was sleeping, else I would have said "none". Outside of international competitions, I find the flags are usually overused and ugly clutter. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 11:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Per Dennis, the flags are ugly clutter and adding more is counter-productive and against consensus. But thanks, I guess, Mjroots. --John (talk) 11:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I've got no strong feelings for or against the flags in that section. My edit was merely to give a consistent appearance for all entries. John, you can always start a RFC here re the issue. Once consensus is established then an edit note or page notice can be made notifying editors of the position. However, I will object to any attempt to remove the flags from the victims table. Mjroots (talk) 14:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia as a tool in the propaganda war

The article is fully protected and all reactions from world leaders towards Russia are kept out. So we do have a section on International reactions, but at the same time that section is heavily edited to keep out what world leaders are actually saying about this incident. It's rather disgraceful and a huge disservice to Wikipedia.

Some actual quotes from world leaders, cited in WP:RS

• Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott "Russian-controlled territory, Russian-backed rebels, quite likely a Russian-supplied weapon. Russia can't wash its hands of this."[5]
• British Prime Minister David Cameron "This is a direct result of Russia destabilising a sovereign state, violating its territorial integrity, backing thuggish militias, and training and arming them."[6]
• Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte described the behavior of the pro-Russian rebels as "revolting".[7]

Is there any reason, apart from a pro-Russian POV, to continue to keep international reactions out of the article?Jeppiz (talk) 08:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Actually the Rutte comments are provided but in the section recovery of casualties. The international response is more geared towards the accident itself while his comments fit better in the investigation/aftermath section. Arnoutf (talk) 08:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

"Ukraine had financial incentive to keep air space open" - Industry insider

Interesting quote from the Sydney Morning Herald, July 20:

"However, an industry source said in this case, the “road” was more like a toll road, as the cash-strapped Ukrainian government was receiving overflight fees for each commercial flight above its territory and therefore had a financial incentive to keep the airspace open as long as possible."

The head of the IATA, Tony Tyler, also says that Ukraine is responsible for the decision to keep the airspace over a war-zone open to commercial traffic.

Link - Ukraine responsible for airspace safety: IATA - Sydney Morning Herald, July 20

I believe that this should be incorporated into the article somehow. --Tocino 08:34, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Seems far too trivial for this article - perhaps in a spinoff. Arnoutf (talk) 08:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

"Terrorist"

I very strongly disagree with the phrasing of the following sentence

"On 19 July 2014 Andriy Lysenko, the spokesman of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine announced to the press that the terrorists removed 38 bodies from the crash site in order to extract from the bodies exploded parts of the rocket used to shoot the plane and destroy the evidence.[100]"

Please remove at least the indirect quote and make it direct. Terrorist is a very strong and subjective term that i think should be used very carefully. — Preceding unsigned comment added by PremiumBananas (talk • contribs)

I'm not sure if you are right or not, but the Ukrainian government refers to the rebels as "terrorists" which might be why other sources do(though not all). 331dot (talk) 09:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Okay.. but.. there isn't even a single, clear, definition of "terrorist" Terrorism

• The source itself leads with this exact word, as does Andriy, and we tend to follow the sources. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:34, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Could we have quotation marks inserted there then? Between "the terrorists" and "the evidence"? Thanks, Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 14:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

No, because that would imply a direct quote and that is not the words he used. Translation makes a direct quote a bit difficult but not impossible. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

What about just quotating "terrorists"? Thanks, Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 15:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That would be against MOS here, we don't qualify words that way as it would imply a POV by us. Many sources are using the term terrorists, so we are consistent by using it here. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm afraid I have to agree with the original poster here. Through the way we are including the word "terrorist" in our paraphrase, we are creating the impression that our sentence presupposes the fact that they indeed are terrorists, which is clearly problematic. It is also quite unnecessary, because in a paraphrase like this it would be quite legitimate to replace one word with another as long as its reference is unambiguously the same. (For example, if there was a country where people routinely refer to the USA as "the Empire of Evil", and the president of that country publicly announced that he was going to meet "with the president of the Empire of Evil" some time, we would still not say that "XYZ announced he was going to meet with the president of the Empire of Evil"; we would still say that "he announced he was going to meet with President Obama"). The use of "terrorist" also has the disadvantage that, in this context, it suggests a sense of "terrorism" different from the intended one. Nobody has seriously claimed that the shooting down was a classical "terrorist act" (in the sense of deliberate murder of innocent civilians, as in 9/11 etc.); the Ukrainian authorities routinely call the fighters "terrorists" not because the shot the plane down, but because of their role in the armed rebellion. So, either quote this literally, or, preferably, reword it using our legitimate editorial discretion in choosing a neutral wording while getting the facts across as intended. Lysenko ... "announced to the press that the rebels removed 38 bodies from the crash site". Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Like Dennis said, the problem here doesn't stem from just how that individual addressed the rebels. It stems from whether or not the medias use the term "terrorists". I doubt that there are serious worldwide medias who would use the term "Empire of Evil" to imply USA. So, this is different. However, the conflict lays between citing the source (and what it said) and keeping neutrality of WP. Right now I'm thinking that maybe inserting a [sic.] next to that word would help? Thanks, Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 16:10, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

No, "sic" is for marking orthographical mistakes in literally quoted text, that's a different thing. And as for what sources use, we always have to keep in mind that sources, even formally reliable ones, have POVs, and the fact that some sources carry a POV is no excuse for us to simply adopt it. This is from a Ukrainian news source, which of course expresses a POV perspective conformant with that of the Ukrainian government. (Just as, in my made-up example, reliable news media of the country in question would also carry the "Empire of Evil" terminology.) rFut.Perf. ☼ 16:19, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I have to disagree with Dennis's assessment that using "terrorist" is in line with the Manual of Style. WP:TERRORIST would beg to differ. As Fut. Perf. says, sources carry a POV. It isn't our job to reflect that POV. We must adhere to WP:NPOV, unlike such journalistic sources. Western sources, especially, have refrained from using the word "terrorist" outside of quotation marks in reference to the insurgents. I cannot see it appropriate to use that word. In fact, I would argue that it is almost never appropriate, as the word "terrorist" does not convey any meaning that cannot be conveyed with more neutral wording. All it does is add pathos, as WP:LABEL states. RGloucester — ☎ 16:27, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• I've changed the wording. But I now see yet another problem with that passage. According to our paraphrase, the Ukrainian official told the press the insurgents removed bodies "in order to extract from the bodies exploded parts of the rocket". It may well be the case that the official said this, but it's an implausible claim to make – since he can't look into the insurgents' minds, he cannot possibly have any way of knowing what their true intentions are in doing what they do. The best he can realistically have been doing is to speculate that this is what the insurgents might intend. How can we re-word this in order to not create the impression of fact here? Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I think the word "claimed" in that sentence says it all. No further adding is required. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 23:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Frustration of AUS/NL PMs about Russian promises vs action

Would it be worthwhile to construct a paragraph for the investigation section where we discuss that both Dutch PM Mark Rutte and Australian PM Tony Abbott show frustration that Russian president Putin promises to do everything he can to support independent investigation, but that there is no indication that he actually has done (other than making promises) any thing at all to support such an investigation. (NB this is not about the blame of the accident, but about the follow up, recovery of bodies and investigation). What do you think. Arnoutf (talk) 09:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Removal of By Country subheader in reactions section

I propose to remove the subheader "By country" in the reaction section because

1. It is unnecessary: It does not add any relevant sub-division as it is placed immediately after the reaction header. The only other subheader (media coverage) makes the distinction between official and media coverage sufficiently clear even without the country subheader.
2. It is factually incorrect: The by country section also lists non country entitities (Novorossiya; EU, UN, ICAO).
3. Labelling these international responses as "by country" is leading to irrelevant and unnecessary discussion of what to do with Novorossiya reactiona see: Talk:Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17#Novorossiya_is_now_a_country.2C_and_Girkin.27s_their_national_spokesman (Arnoutf (talk) 09:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It may be better to just get rid of the reactions section, comments from the main players can be added to the general narrative and a lot of the others are just not that important. MilborneOne (talk) 09:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I can live with that too, but that would requires a lot of in depth revisions of the article. Just deleting this 2 word subheader would be an improvement over what it is now. We can work from there to integrate the reactions later. Arnoutf (talk) 10:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

OK understood. MilborneOne (talk) 10:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Concur. The subheading should be nixed simply because there are IGOs mixed in with the "by country", which is pretty clearly wrong. And really, there aren't all that many reactions at this point... just lump them together for now. My suggestion would be to separate into IGO, national government, and NGO subsections if it gets to the point where there are that many reactions we want to list. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:13, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

•  Done as rather uncontroversial. Broke "media" into its own section, lumped the rest under "reactions" after removing "by country". Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Post-MH370 predictions of second Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 incident (and please don't censor others' comments again)

When MH370 disappeared, those who've been warning of false flag attempts to incriminate Russia (eg Infowars.com) predicted there would soon be a second Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 incident (presumably to allow the wreckage to be swapped for forensics, i.e. hide real accidental shoot-down of Chinese citizens on MH370 by putting time-bomb on MH17, then swap the wreckage). People were expecting this, and for the article to ignore such a striking prediction is kind of elephant-in-the-room stuff. Silent Key (talk) 09:58, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

NO per WP:Fringe. Arnoutf (talk) 10:03, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Agree with Arnoutf, and @Silent Key: your edit request needs to be far more specific to be acted on. Please read what the template says to do:

"This template must be followed by a complete and specific description of the request, so that an editor unfamiliar with the subject matter could complete the requested edit immediately."added--220 of ^Borg 17:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Who are the "People (who) were expecting this"? --220 of ^Borg 17:03, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Add link to Aviation Safety Network

At the registration number of plane, link to this: http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=20140717-0

I cant see why it would be needed, I dont think the registration is a point in dispute. MilborneOne (talk) 10:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done, just to provide a source per WP:V.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

We crossed, so if there is consensus it is not needed I can remove it.--Ymblanter (talk) 10:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

They may be a better source, but it is not that important at the moment it can be left in. MilborneOne (talk) 11:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Intercepted separatist talks confirmed authentic

"Audio data provided to the press by the Ukrainian security service was evaluated by Intelligence Community analysts who confirmed these were authentic conversations..." -- US Embassy in Kyiv United States Assessment of the Downing of Flight MH17 and its Aftermath -- Nazar (talk) 10:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I suggest adding this to the description of the intercepted calls. It's important in light of doubts about their authenticity. -- Nazar (talk) 11:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

How can it be authentic, when the official video cited by everyone, on the official channel on Youtube, has the encoding date of 16 July 2014 in its metadata? I admit that the date set on the computer encoding this was wrong by 1 day, but how plausible is THAT explanation? The security service did not comment this in any way. Also, this is conflicting with the other data. The alleged conversation states that the missile was launched from a location situated 40km from the crash site. Then the US Embassy writes that the launch was from near the crash site because someone shot a video of a transport said to carry missiles (though I failed to identify any missiles).Capilleary (talk) 12:59, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Igor Bezler also confirmed their authenticity. [8] Pawel Krawczyk (talk) 15:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Why the encoding date is one day back -- [9] -- Nazar (talk) 15:34, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

  WP: Original research ? --220 of ^Borg 17:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Stick to the official statements of the US embassy. These are the notable facts... -- Nazar (talk) 18:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

See also bleeding over into references

Please place {{clear right}} at the bottom of the See also section. That will fix the current bleed-over into the references section. —/Mendaliv/^2¢/_Δ's/ 11:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done --Ymblanter (talk) 11:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Infrared Space Systems Directorate and infrared signature of BUK missile

Why has this been totally removed from the article? This is highly notable, and is reported to be the source Obama based his statement of the origin of the missile upon. There are several sources stating this: Ars Technica, NBC News, and New Scientist. This should be readded as soon as possible. Nulla Taciti (talk) 11:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• It is very helpful if you show us a diff of where it was removed. The above statement is so vague that an ininvolved editor could not restore it with so little information, nor could the fellow editors vote the idea up or down. Provide a diff and lets see what the crowd says. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 11:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

No problem. Here is the diff. Another editor later added a few sentences next to Obama's statement further elaborating upon the infrared signature, but I can't seem to find it. I feel this is one of the most, if not the most, compelling pieces of evidence regarding the culpability of this incident, and it distresses me that it has apparently been scrubbed from the article. Nulla Taciti (talk) 11:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

See above (my comment of 05:31, 20 July 2014) for my reasoning for removing it. In short, there wasn't room, and I noted that it should be put back if anyone suggested a spot that would work. Tell me where to put it, and unless your placement will cause similar display/image stacking issues, I'll put it there. Nyttend (talk) 12:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

If you could add it to the bottom of the "Investigation" section, that should work. When the article becomes available to edit, I will add a brief paragraph drawing upon the sources I gave above plus others to the end of this section. Nulla Taciti (talk) 12:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Fully agree it should be re-added. Am not sure stacking or conflict with images is good reason to leave it out. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Image put back. It's entirely possible to have too many images, and as I noted above, all the images together were causing display problems. Part of the situation has been resolved by the deletion at Commons of the Tour de France image (it was a copyvio), so that's provided enough space that we easily have room for the Infrared Space Systems Directorate logo. Nyttend (talk) 13:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

See also No-fly zone Trackteur (talk) 11:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Why? --John (talk) 11:49, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Please reorder the nationalities list by the highest to lowest number. Official sources, like that of the Malaysia Airlines, list the number of passengers and their nationalities from highest to lowest number. More pages also have the table in the intuitive and much more useful numerical order, such as: Japan Airlines Flight 123, Air India Flight 182, Iran Air Flight 655, American Airlines Flight 587, Air New Zealand Flight 901, United Airlines Flight 175, Garuda Indonesia Flight 152, Korean Air Flight 801, EgyptAir Flight 990, China Airlines Flight 676, Birgenair Flight 301, LOT Flight 5055, Kenya Airways Flight 431, PIA Flight 268. A complete alphabetical order may make sense if no nationalities are overrepresented or the official source has them listed so. A rationalization made at this page that the alphabetical order is more neutral does not make any sense to me. Supersaiyen312 (talk) 12:04, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It's a sortable table, so you can get it to sort numerically without difficulty, while the current format makes it easier to find each country. Moreover, I note that the first example you gave, Japan Airlines Flight 123, doesn't have them in numerical order. With that in mind, I'll do it if people agree, but only if. Nyttend (talk) 12:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I would agree with this proposal as most other articles about aviation disasters use that format. Also, the 'dual nationality' column should be removed because it would be almost impossible to make it complete and it unnecessarily clutters and inflates the table. It would be much more useful to instead have 'passenger', 'crew' and 'total' columns as these are also used on most aviation disaster articles and for simplicity and consistency I think it's best to follow the standard format as much as possible. Below is how the table for MH17 would look if it followed the format used on most other aviation disaster articles. OakleighPark 12:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Nationality	Passengers	Crew	Total
Netherlands	193	0	193
Malaysia	28	15	43
Australia	27	0	27
Indonesia	12	0	12
United Kingdom	10	0	10
Belgium	4	0	4
Germany	4	0	4
Philippines	3	0	3
Canada	1	0	1
New Zealand	1	0	1
Total	283	15	298

I agree with this table. With multiple citizenships, passports and permanent residence, it is a slippery slope to report anything other then the nationality that the deceased asserted at boarding. WWGB (talk) 13:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The table we've currently got is frankly baffling. Please can we use this? -- Pingumeister^(talk) 13:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

No, not every page uses the same layout. The current table layout is fine. Kirothereaper (talk) 14:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I've reopened this template as the edit has yet to be made. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 13:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Nyttend, this edit makes sense to me, as second guessing dual citizenship (or even if it is sourced) doesn't really add anything, while using their declared citizenship does. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That means all dual citizenships should stay completely out of it then. Kirothereaper (talk) 14:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I have no opinion elsewhere, but for the purpose of this chart, it makes sense to only focus on their declared citizenship when boarding the plane. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And it does focus on their declared citizenship. Kirothereaper (talk) 14:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• So the US actually didn't have a citizen on board...just to show that real life can't easily be caught in tables. Drmies (talk) 15:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The issue is that, while the boarding passports for all passengers are known, not every dual citizenship is. Thus, listing boarding passports is accurate, whilst also including dual citizenship is inaccurate because it will almost definitely be incomplete. We need to keep the article as accurate as possible so I suggest changing the table format. OakleighPark 04:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I am firmly opposed to doing this, we do not need an entire column dedicated to the crew section that are all from one country. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:58, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

In this situation it could seem somewhat unnecessary, but on the official sources for the people onboard, passengers and crew are separated. As the distinction is seen to be notable by the most official source available (the passenger manifest), I think that it is notable enough to be in the article. OakleighPark 04:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Tour de France missing image <- Edit request

Please remove the missing picture from the article. It's been some time since the uploader didn't fix it. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 13:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

•  Done as an uncontroversial edit. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 13:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

A reference in the Aftermath section is incorrectly formatted and ugly. This is its current wiki code:

<ref>{{cite web|author=<%= item.timeFlag %> |url=http://en.itar-tass.com/world/741304 |title=ITAR-TASS: World - Russian Defense Ministry records Ukrainian missile defense radar on day of Boeing crash |publisher=En.itar-tass.com |date= |accessdate=19 July 2014}}</ref>

I request the reference is changed to this:

<ref name="itar-tass">{{cite news |url=http://en.itar-tass.com/world/741304 |title=Russian Defense Ministry records Ukrainian missile defense radar on day of Boeing crash |agency=[[ITAR-TASS]] |date=18 July 2014 |accessdate=19 July 2014}}</ref>

-- Pingumeister^(talk) 13:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

•  Done as uncontroversial edit. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 13:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Actually, I EC'ed, but Nyttend got it all the same. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 13:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Dennis Brown, but what does EC mean? By the way, Nyttend doesn't appear to have done it. -- Pingumeister^(talk) 14:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

EC= edit conflict, or (edit conflict). He was working in that section, I had assumed he fixed it but he didn't, so I did just now with one change, using "publisher" instead of "agency". I'm trying to not do much direct editing and just do adminy things here on the the talk page. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Oh, okay. Thanks. -- Pingumeister^(talk) 16:26, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Where it says Flight Data Recorder it should say flight recorder. SAJ (T) 14:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

•  Done as uncontroversial edit, as that is the proper term and the term that the source used. Also removed the unnecessary caps in the name. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request: en dash

Under "Aftermath", the words "the Amsterdam-Kuala Lumpur route" should read "the Amsterdam–Kuala Lumpur route" with an unspaced en dash, per MOS:ENDASH. —sroc 💬 14:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

•  Done, uncontroversial and rather minor edit, but done nonetheless. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 14:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014: Dutch commercials

Dutch reaction, something like:
In the first week after the crash, the main Dutch travel agencies did not make commercials for flight holidays. Sander.v.Ginkel (talk) 14:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Not acting in either way here, but will just say this seems rather minor considering the circumstances. (readded, someone clumsily edit conflicted it out). Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• I agree, Dennis. Drmies (talk) 15:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Agree, too minor a response in the larger picture (although it is a rare sign of respect of Dutch travel agencies). Arnoutf (talk) 17:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

'Credible evidence' quote

The article currently states 'U.S. President Barack Obama, citing U.S. intelligence officials, said the plane was shot down by a missile and that there was "credible evidence" it was fired from a location held by pro-Russian rebels'. One given source is the New York Times story U.S. Sees Evidence of Russian Links to Jet’s Downing. The article itself says 'He sent his United Nations ambassador, Samantha Power, to the Security Council to describe what she called “credible evidence” that the separatists were responsible.”' Ms. Power said this, not Barack Obama. Small point maybe, but it's a bad start to an article to misattribute a quotation. - Crosbie 14:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

As of July 19th, the USA has concluded that it was a Russian or separatist shootdown. http://ukraine.usembassy.gov/statements/asmt-07192014.html Hcobb (talk) 15:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Your statement is completely irrelevant. My point here is to note that the article attributes to Barack Obama the words 'credible evidence' that the source attributes to Samantha Power. When we put words in quotation marks and attribute them to a specific individual, that means that specific individual made that statement, not that somebody else made that statement. - Crosbie 15:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request: share price

The "Aftermath" section states:

By 18 July 2014, shares in Malaysia Airlines had dropped by nearly 16%.

It is not clear over what period this drop occurred (e.g., in one day, over several days, this financial year, since MH370, in the past 12 months, etc.). The cited article states: "Malaysia Airlines shares were down nearly 16% in Friday trading..." and later: "Shares are down more than 40% over the last 12 months." I believe this implies that the "nearly 16%" drop occurred in one day. Can this be stated in the article for clarification, or alternatively, if we are not convinced that this is what the source meant, can the figure be deleted from the article as ambiguous, meaningless or potentially misleading. Thank you. —sroc 💬 14:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

•  Done, uncontroversial. Changed "by" to "on", per the sources. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Reactions

I've never seen the need for "reactions": they're words, that's all, and this is an encyclopedia. However, responses in particular by Germany, Ireland, Indonesia, Australia, Romania, and South Africa are particularly meaningless from an encyclopedic point of view, and I suggest removal. Same actually goes for NATO. Unless some responding entity is involved with the investigation or the disaster in some important way, their reaction is not important. And if a country loses one or a few citizens, that doesn't make their reaction important per se; from that rationale, responses by the Dutch, for instance, do have relevance. Drmies (talk) 15:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Is it okay if I say that I disagree? (I may give reasoning in just a short while) Dustin (talk) 15:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Actually, I agree, but everyone seems to freak out when you remove them. For some reason, editors find something of value from the platitudes, which are quite predictable. In this case, there may be some worth while because of the nature of the "accident", but most aren't that informative. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, people saying they're shocked adds nothing, but on what planet would it ever be considered remotely unimportant that NATO said "It is important that a full international investigation should be launched immediately, without any hindrance, to establish the facts and that those who may be responsible are swiftly brought to justice"? Since NATO has absolutely no role to play in aircrash investigations or indeed international justice, but has a large role to play in any potential military conflict in Eastern Europe that might arise from this incident, I think a reaction like this is of eminent importance.

• The issue I see right now with reactions is that they are very fluent and can quickly become outdated. When you have a current event like this, the responses have a tendency to change on a daily basis. There is also the issue of who do we include, when everyone is issuing statements on a daily basis. Having said that, it's obvious that the international community is reacting to this incident, so I believe there should be some sort of limited inclusion of international responses to reflect what is being reported by the sourcing.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 16:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I say remove anything that states "deepest condolences", because, obviously, we're dealing with a tragedy. However, Malaysia, Netherlands, Ukraine and Russia (and Novorossiya) should remain no matter what, and always be kept on top. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 16:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I would suggest remove everything from this section except Ukraine, Russia and "Novorossiya". My very best wishes (talk) 17:03, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I don't know who added "on what planet is it unimportant etc.", but, well, on this planet. What NATO says is not of any kind of substance at all; NATO isn't even involved nor, according to Rutte (on the live blog of de Volkskrant, should they be involved. We should not include a NATO platitude on the off-chance that in the future they may be involved in a future potential military conflict that results from this. Cutting everything but the three suggested by "My very best wishes" seems a bit drastic to me. Obviously the Dutch are playing a main role in the recuperation of the bodies, and Malaysia is involved directly as an affected country. One could argue the same for Australia, with its large body count. So the list drawn up by "Spaceinvaders" seems fair to me. Drmies (talk) 19:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

MOS:FLAG

My understanding of MOS says that at a minimum, we need to remove the flags from the "Reactions" sections. We are already linking the name of the country as the first word of each comment, and the flags are distracting. This isn't a competition table, so the flags add nothing to the reader in the way of enhancing the readability. The inverse is actually true. As I'm admin'ing here, I won't make the edit myself and ask for a consensus to be developed, one way or the other, with a simple, non-verbose poll.

• Support. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 15:33, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• Support – Flags add nothing, and make a mess. The Manual of Style is clear on this matter. RGloucester — ☎ 15:42, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• The MOS is not so clear on the matter, the MOS states "Flag icons may be relevant in some subject areas, where the subject actually represents that country, government, or nationality". Not to go into otherstuff but we have had these discussions before on almost every article that has had a reaction section added to it. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I suppose you've only read MOS:FLAG, and not WP:ICONDECORATION? RGloucester — ☎ 17:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I have read WP:ICONDECORATION, see my comment towards DennisBrown. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 17:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Sorry, but whoever wrote that page is a moron. There's an abundance of research that says the visual cortex processes images, such as flag icons, many times faster than the written word. Therefore, it strikes me that if you're going to format these reactions as a list of countries, and you aren't even going to put that list into alphabetical order!, then flag icons will help readers quickly identify each country in the list. It will also help them quickly identify the entries that aren't countries at all (Novorossiya, UN, IATA). That said, this will probably be redundant if the proposal above, to remove them all, succeeds. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RoryMig (talk • contribs) 15:53, 20 July 2014‎

• Support. Visual clutter does nothing whatsoever to add to the readability of the article as a whole. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:03, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose (But No reason to be impolite.) In my experience, the versions where the flags were removed were much harder to grasp. The flag in this case makes it clearer than the dots where paragraphs end and the next response starts. So in this case I would prefer the flags to stay; unless some other equally visually compelling structuring is provided (or the list is dramatically reduced making visual structuring less important).

PS alphabetical order would be tricky here as in this case this would mean that the countries most involved would be somewhere in the middle of the list because of their names. Arnoutf (talk) 16:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose The flags give the reader a visual on the countries that gave reactions, rather than a wall of text being there. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Support. The manual of style says the flags should not be here. If 'scientific research' says the manual of style is wrong, take it to the manual of style talk page. - Crosbie 16:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Where in the MOS does it say that the flags should not be there? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Knowledgekid87 - apologies. I hate the flags, but the MOS is indeed unclear. I withdraw my vote for being too hasty. - Crosbie 16:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

WP:ICONDECORATION - This isn't an international football match. In this context, they are being used for decoration only, which is against MOS. You aren't conveying information, you are making it purdy. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Did you even bother to read that page? Given that the list is not alphabetical, it's pretty obvious that the icons are being used for "navigational function" and as "visual cues that aid the reader's comprehension".

"serve as visual cues that aid the reader's comprehension, or improve navigation" As I said above they serve as a visual instead of a wall of text. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

How exactly do these flags "improve navigation"? A bullet point would do the same, as ICONDECORATION states. RGloucester — ☎ 17:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Support ONLY if the section is divided into three subsections: "Parties involved" (why was that removed?), "Other countries" and "International organizations". Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 16:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• Oppose – What can you say other than things such as "the flags are distracting". In what way? And "Flags add nothing, and make a mess."? That's just not true. Dustin (talk) 16:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Most people don't even know what flag refers to what country. They just provide visual clutter, and are redundant. Images are not a substitute for prose, and we have no need to decorate this article with little baubles. RGloucester — ☎ 16:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Well, what about those who do know their flags? Why do you care if there is something that might help some people and not really have an effect on everyone else? Dustin (talk) 16:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

"Most people don't even know what flag refers to what country" - prove it. I'd say that learning what flag belongs to what country is pre-school stuff, so what you're basically doing is assuming the average reader of Wikipedia has a level of education below pre-school. Which is quite obviously nonsense. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RoryMig (talk • contribs) 16:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Also, regarding "Images are not a substitute for prose", we are not replacing the prose with images, so I do not believe it really applies. Dustin (talk) 16:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

They don't help anyone, because it is properly written in prose. You won't find flags scattered around the Britannica. They are in violation of the MoS. It does apply, because it is redundancy. The prose describes them, and hence, there is no need for images. RGloucester — ☎ 16:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Who is "Anyone"? This is not Britannica. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Comment If the flags are removed here it really baffles me on how different each article can be, Is there a WP:PRECEDENT? I am really thinking of going to propose there be a mention in the MOS regarding reactions sections as it looks like people are taking the MOS and are trying to take out of it that flags cant be used in reactions sections. If this is true then other articles should follow suit but I feel there should be some kind of consensus put into place for this. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:33, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

MOS:FLAG was arrived at by consensus. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:38, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The problem is that MOS:FLAG does not address reactions sections in articles. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) What are you talking about? If you mean consensus to remove the flags, no, this currently looks more like no consensus. Dustin (talk) 16:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

@RGloucester: I was replying to AndyTheGrump, not Knowledgekid87. That's why I didn't indent farther to the right. Dustin (talk) 17:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

He means that guidelines were agreed upon by consensus, and hence, a local consensus cannot defy the greater consensus of the guidelines per WP:Local consensus]. RGloucester — ☎ 16:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I think we can all agree on that, my proposal is to add to the MOS covering reactions sections as it would apply to all articles. Im tired of seeing the wheel reinvented here. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

If you'd like to do that, do it at the appropriate page. As it stands now, the guidelines do not say that. RGloucester — ☎ 16:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict × 2) @RGloucester: Please see WP:INDENT. You are messing up the formatting. Also, that argument I would consider to be invalid because the MoS is unclear. Dustin (talk) 16:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Support removal; Oppose the use of the cute little icons. Visually distracting. That MOS:FLAG doesn't specifically forbid its use here doesn't mean it should be allowed. Drmies (talk) 16:52, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

How is it "Visually distracting"? That's not a clear reason and ought to be disregarded prior to further explanation. Dustin (talk) 16:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Just saying here but your Oppose should be Support if you are against the flags being here. As for the visual bit I have already provided reasoning above. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 16:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Thanks. "Visually distracting" is a perfectly clear reason: it means that someone (me) thinks that the icons distract from the reading of the text. It's a well-accepted argument as well, at least according to all those editors who put MOS:FLAG together (I am not one of those). So you may have provided reasoning, but there's ample reasoning against your reasoning elsewhere. Drmies (talk) 17:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I guess we just have to decide who has the better argument then. On the one hand, we have 'I get easily distracted by colours' and 'nobody knows their flags anyway', versus the fact that, if scientific research is anything to go by, they are in this context (an unsorted list of countries), quite obviously navigational aids which aid reader comprehension, and therefore are in fact explicitly allowed for by the policy. It's a puzzler, it really is. RoryMig (talk) 18:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Too simplistic. It's not just national flags, and whether it is explicitly allowed is a matter of discussion. Drmies (talk) 19:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I'm going to close this, even though I voiced my own opinion in it (for removal!)--I'm closing it as "no consensus", meaning there is no consensus for the flag icons to be removed. This also takes into account Kelapstick's argument for keeping the flags, which he voiced on my talk page but couldn't get in because of edit conflicts. I suggest that someone post on the talk page for the MOS to see if an explicit allowance for "official reactions" be added to the list of allowable uses--keeping it here is too local, given that it's the MOS that's at stake, and distracts from more important issues. As a side note, of course it can easily be argued that there's "official representation" here--there is no such argument for the victims, who represent nothing (except for tragedy and loss), and "flagging" them is actually a greater violation of MOS:FLAG. But that's by the by. For now, again, there is no consensus to remove the flag icons, and let's leave it at that: this page is busy enough already. Drmies (talk) 19:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I've added an edit notice to the effect that there is no consensus for the removal of the flags. Mjroots (talk) 22:04, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014 (minor interpuntion error)

At Malaysia Airlines Flight 17#Events before the crash:

• 14 July 2014: A Ukrainian military An-26 transport aircraft flying at 21,000 feet (6,400 m) was shot down.[60] (confirmed to be shot using Buk).[61] U.S. officials would later say evidence suggested the aircraft had been fired on from inside Russian territory.[62]

—The dot after "shot down" should be removed. Mayast (talk) 15:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done, uncontroversial--Ymblanter (talk) 16:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request Timeline/Events before crash

Suggest adding:

• 30 June 2014: In a press conference, General Philip Breedlove (NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe) stated that the Russian government had been training pro-Russian separatists inside Russia to have an "anti-aircraft capability" and specifically mentioned “we have seen vehicle-borne capability being trained.”

ref: http://www.defense.gov/Transcripts/Transcript.aspx?TranscriptID=5456 Juan Riley (talk) 16:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Absolutely not - unless we have a source which explicitly links this statement with the flight 17 shoot-down, it is WP:OR (and probably a violation of WP:NPOV) to make the connection. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That may be true in some strict interpretation ...on the other hand then the same could be said about at least several of the items noted in "events before the crash" timeline. Indeed nothing is directly relevant to the crash other than the crash itself. Juan Riley (talk) 16:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It's obviously relevant, especially coming as it did from SACEUR.

Not answered to my satisfaction. Not meaning to say that I insist said addition be made, but WP:acronymic criteria should be consistently applied...or not? Juan Riley (talk) 16:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I'll be more expansive, then: no, it's Original Research coming from a Primary Source. Drmies (talk) 16:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Purely then as a matter of interest, is the problem that the reference I gave is primary? If so the media references to the press conference were deleted yesterday and I would have to go back and find them. If not then (a) save me time and (b) I still do not understand the demarcation. Juan Riley (talk) 16:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

A few secondary sources citing the Breedlove press conference after the fact and hence obviously making a connection:

• ref: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/separatists-said-to-have-had-anti-aircraft-training-in-russia/2014/07/18/0af398f2-0e82-11e4-b8e5-d0de80767fc2_story.html
• ref: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/18/obama-mh17-wake-up-call-europe-ukraine-russia
• ref: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/18/mh17-pro-russian-separatists-blame-downed-malaysia/

Juan Riley (talk) 17:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I apologize for elevating again...just not sure an admin will answer otherwise. Juan Riley (talk) 17:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Apology accepted; no problem. The Guardian says, "[Kirby] stopped short of saying he had indications that the Russian battalions had moved Buk missiles across the border, something the Nato commander, Air Force General Philip Breedlove, told reporters on 30 June that he expected." So at best we could say that someone afterward did not say something that what someone said beforehand. The WP says just a bit more--but why should be re-report such speculation? Drmies (talk) 17:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• You have read one reference as far as you required to refute the quote. Bravo! Or should I call it reverse synthesis? Juan Riley (talk) 18:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• You can call it what you will. The burden is on you to prove that something that was said to have happened and is suggested to be relevant should be included. You can clamor about "autocratic admins" as much as you like--but you should ask yourself whether such yelling is helpful or not. I think someone with your background would know better how to do rhetoric. Drmies (talk) 19:13, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I am not an admin. Twas I think four of you that decided arbitrarily to say no without explanation. And now shall you go on record that you don't want to add to or subtract from a WP article because it is my burden to convince you (after you have made up your mind and I have given primary and secondary references) of something. Frankly Scarlett, I don't give a damn. You are now just trying to say haha I am right. Nice! Juan Riley (talk) 19:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Andy is exactly correct, and I suppose Drmies as well. This is what is known as synthesis of sources and is not allowed. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Synthesis? As in making things up? And what, exactly, is Juan trying to make up here? He has provided a direct quote, from a senior NATO commander, which was reported in reliable sources after the fact. It is obviously relevant to the article. Stop this nonsense and just add it. Whatever the "good reasons" are for preventing people editing this article, they are surely being out-weighed by the fact that eminently worthwhile additions like this are being prevented, for no good reason at all. RoryMig (talk) 17:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Admins are now being arbitrary and uninformative. I am so sorry I asked you to tell me explicit reasons that the suggested addition is any different from other events given in the timeline. At some stage this just becomes inane. By my current understanding the article should read: ""Something happened...people died"". Oh and yes..I am sure an admin will put a warning on my talk page. We should have barnstars for being warned by autocratic admins. Juan Riley (talk) 17:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm not an admin but I don't get what you're trying to add or why. This is an article about a crash on 17 July. Sources from June are unlikely to be relevant by themselves. Nil Einne (talk) 20:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Create a separate section for airspace/aircraft restrictions/activity

Much of the information regarding the warnings given to airlines, what they did (or didn't do) about it, and which other flights/airlines were still operating in the area at the time of the crash, is scattered all over the article. Much of it has been lumped into that horrendous 'Events before the crash' timeline, rendering it pretty unparsable as a topic in of itself. I would like to change this by putting it all in its own topical section (and add some more info I've found that's not in the article), but the current situation, where it appears even though Wikipedia is the encyclopedia "anyone can edit", each individual change has to be listed here in detail and voted on first, makes this impossible. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RoryMig (talk • contribs)

• The article is protected for very good reasons. Also, please sign your name. As for your question, information on other flights, warnings, airspace etc. is simply not directly relevant to this article. Drmies (talk) 16:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
  • Not directly relevant? It's not directly relevant to this crash to discuss what civilian airlines were advised/warned to do about this particular bit of sky? It's not directly relevant to note which other airlines/aircraft were it the airspace on the same day? Are you for real? And how exactly do I sign my name on a computer? "Yours faithfully, Rory?"
    • a. please read WP:INDENT. It helps visually, you know--as supported by scientific research. b. type four tildes: it's all over the project. Like this: ~~~~. I'll do it again: Drmies (talk) 16:39, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
      • Thank you. I can see from the sarcasm that that must have been very difficult thing for you to do. And for the record, I've never seen any scientific research dealing with what formatting style helps people communicate on Wikipedia. I've seen a bucket load about the differences between how the brain processes pictures versus text, but I appear to be the only one here who has. Wikipedia doesn't seem to have any people interested in such things here, even though it has people calling themselves doctors. You must be the medical kind. Gums I'm assuming. RoryMig (talk) 16:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• RoryMig does have a point about the section in general, which is indeed pretty unparsable. Perhaps individual edits can be proposed to clean that up some--maybe in the way Nyttend dealt with that other section. :) Drmies (talk) 16:59, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• • I don't know what Nyttend did, but for me, the idea that such a change could be detailed here beforehand in individual steps is absurd. I'm talking about moving a large number of paragraphs from various different places, and adding some more info, with all the changes in wording and structure that entails. Ridiculous. No, if the "good reasons" for the protection do really exist (still not seeing where they've ever been explained), then they will have to justify people not being able to properly read information like this in topical sections, unless or until its not protected, and people like me can actually improve the article. Assuming of course, people aren't going to stop the work on the idiotic basis that such information isn't "directly relevant". RoryMig (talk) 17:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Coincidence (MH370)

I have posted it in [Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 unofficial disappearance_theories#Events_in_Ukraine], but because it is relevant, would like to post here as well: I wouldn't be completely surprised if there would be reliable sources about connection between these two events. These two events are completely unrelated and that makes it even more incredible of a coincidence. First, Malaysian airplane disappears and then, another one is being shot down. (Karma? Coincidence? Something more deeper?). But in any case, we cannot ignore the fact that two of the most unusual events in aviation history are involving Malaysian Airways and happened in a relatively condensed period of time. If there will be reliable sources about that, I think we can either post them in this (the one mentioned above) article, unless "unofficial theories" article will be created for this one. Dmatteng (talk) 16:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Unless and until we have reliable sources making connections, this article won't. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

What Andy said. This is somewhere between FRINGE and Original Research, and doesn't belong in either article. If there weren't such a thing as "coincidence", then we wouldn't have a word for it. Until something is definitively found and sourced, we assume it is just a coincidence. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I will be stronger, even if we have sources that claim such a relation, it is still a fringe theory and should not be added. Arnoutf (talk) 17:01, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I've seen plenty of reliable sources making the connection, and not just because the basic coincidence (and since when was it not important to note such coincidences?). It is also being discussed in depth, both in terms of the historical rarity of a single airline suffering the loss of two major airliners like the triple 7 in the space of months, as well as the possible financial impact on the airline due to the effect of such a coincidence on their brand in passengers minds. If the article wasn't protected for supposedly "good reasons" (according to Drmies), I could probably add something about that. RoryMig (talk) 17:10, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Please provide the reliable sources that make the connection and nowhere suggest it is a conspiracy theory/fringe theory. Actually your remark "I could probably add something about that" is a very good argument to keep the article protected for the time being. Arnoutf (talk) 17:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Say what? The fact it stops me from adding relevant material to the article is somehow a "very good argument" for keeping it protected? Either you've not been reading a newspaper in the last few days, or you're trying to somehow insinuate I would add garbage to the article. Either way, I'm wondering what it is you're bringing to the table here. For me, if you want sources, I'll just put these here: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/second-disaster-strikes-malaysia-airlines-as-jet-goes-down-over-ukraine/story-e6frg6so-1226992992291?nk=4ee621ae8ebac3ffcf8e8078b38f6add and

http://www.newsday.com/business/what-to-know-how-malaysia-airlines-can-salvage-its-brand-1.8850131 The first calls the coincidence unprecedented, the second goes into great detail about its effect of the brand. I've not looked properly, but I'd say it's a good bet neither of them even mention conspiracy theory. RoryMig (talk) 17:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Multiple accidents are not as rare as you think. In 1950 two Air France DC-4s operating the same route crashed at the same place two days apart with the combinbed loss of 86 people. MilborneOne (talk) 17:23, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yeah; almost 65 years ago. During the intervening decades, virtually the entire history of commercial aviation happened. Semantics? Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I'm not seeing a compelling argument that they were a complete coincidence though (and their combination into a single article rather goes against that idea too). RoryMig (talk) 17:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The two DC-4 accidents were anything but a complete coincidence, as the article makes clear. Meanwhile, per WP policy, this article will make no assertions regarding any link between flights 370 and 17 unless and until reliable sources do. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

They already have, I just gave two links above. Can't you read? RoryMig (talk) 17:59, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The factual information you can get from your sources is already in the article. In the lead: "The crash was the airline's second major incident of the year. Flight 370 (Boeing 777-200ER 9M-MRO) disappeared on 8 March en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur" Arnoutf (talk) 18:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That said, it is generally not a good idea to have information in the lead nowhere in the main article. Can we add the following lines to the end of the airline section: "The crash was the second major incident for Malaysia Airlines in 2014. In March 2014 another of their Boeing 777-200ER 9M-MRO; Flight 370 disappeared en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur and was still missing at the time of MH17 crash." Arnoutf (talk) 18:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Don't talk utter crap. I didn't even have to go past the second sentence in the newsday link before I found a piece of "factual information" not currently in this article. And examining the other source, it seems to me your idea of factual information excludes the opinions of aviation experts/analysts - so good luck with chopping all the other examples of such that are already in the article. RoryMig (talk) 18:19, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The second line of the newsday link is about the past financial performance of the airliner. How is that relevant to this article? Arnoutf (talk) 18:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Seriously? This is like talking to kindergarteners. As I have already said, the coincidence has been dealt with in some sources in the context of the effect on the company's financial health. If the airline was in rude health financially, that would mean the brand would need to be seriously damaged to have an effect. If it was already in trouble, it wouldn't take much. Do you want me to use simpler words or something? Or are you just being deliberately obtuse? RoryMig (talk) 18:52, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The Australian quotes a single aviation expert on the rarity (“Either one of these events has an unbelievably low probability,’’ said John Cox, president and CEO of Safety Operating Systems and a former airline pilot and accident investigator. “To have two in a just a few months of each other is certainly unprecedented.’’). We could add a few words to my suggested my earlier suggestion: "The crash was an unprecedentedly rare in being the second major incident for Malaysia Airlines in 2014. In March 2014 another of their Boeing 777-200ER 9M-MRO; Flight 370 disappeared en route to Beijing from Kuala Lumpur and was still missing at the time of MH17 crash." We could use the Australian as source for that. Arnoutf (talk) 18:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I didn't provide the link as a basis for any particular edit, I merely provided it to prove they exist and they discuss the things I said they were. If or when the protection is removed, I may or may not think about exactly what I want to add, and therefore see which sources are best to use. I'm certainly not going to waste my time drafting it here for your approval, not when it's pretty clear you have serious reading/comprehension problems (and have already basically said I'm only here to add crap). RoryMig (talk) 18:52, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The idea is that we now work together to create text in mutual collaboration which is the core idea of Wikipedia. The talk page is intented to discuss topics and contents geared towards a particular edit. Wikipedia is not what anyone wants to add as that is violation of the core policy prohibiting claiming ownership of parts of or whole articles. My problem with your suggestions is that many of them imply that you would like to add fringe and conspiracy theories. That is also against what Wikipedia stands for as these are almost always unduly supporting irrelevant details. So far about contents, your personal aggressive, uncivil tone of voice and the way you respond to criticism on your suggestions suggests that you do not assume good faith of other editors as a first starting point. This does not help your point to come across, as editors may take offense to the tone and subsequently reject also more relevant elements of whatever you say. Arnoutf (talk) 19:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

User:Dennis Brown, I don't know how you managed to misread what I have written. I have clearly said:

• I wouldn't be surprised... reliable sources. I didn't propose any edit and I mentioned at the same time about reliable sources. So I'm not sure what OR do you mean.
• There is also another aspect I should mention, due to the coincidence or "coincidence" some people probably wouldn't like to fly the Malaysian Airway. And why it is most probably not their fault, it will affect their finances. I think there will be some reliable sources about it too.
• Regarding 'fringe' there is already an article about unofficial theories of MH370. We can as well have the information posted there, create "unofficial theories" for this one, or have the information in the main article. I'm not sure what consensus will be.
• In any case, I'm expecting more reliable sources talking about the "coincidence" over time. I'm in no way suggesting OR. Dmatteng (talk) 20:11, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
  • Here is the deal: We are dealing so many edit requests, we can't keep up. This isn't a a forum to talk about what might be, and opining just takes up resources we don't have. If you have specific text and reliable sources, then fine, but otherwise, we don't have time to chat about it in all the fury that is going on. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 20:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
    • I didn't post it as an edit request, but a discussion towards possible sources. In any case, I see one source that was introduced by an user: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/second-disaster-strikes-malaysia-airlines-as-jet-goes-down-over-ukraine/story-e6frg6so-1226992992291?nk=4ee621ae8ebac3ffcf8e8078b38f6add. It doesn't go into coincidence-karma thing and keeps things pretty mainstream. Do you think this source could be used - to signify the "coincidental nature" of the second Malaysian Airways plane to be down in relation to the first one (in just 4 months)? Certainly, more "esoteric" information could be given consideration later on, once the fury will subside, as you say. Dmatteng (talk) 20:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Map and timeline for final minutes

According to FlightRadar24 [ http://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/mh17/#3d6095b ] the last transponder puts MH17 almost exactly overhead the town of Snizhne at 1321 UTC, hdg: 118, 490kts 33,000 ft. This would indicate that MH17 turned back on itself to reach the crash-site near the village of Hrabove. The maps do not show this. Additionally, one map shows loss of contact at 1315 (ATC  ??) and the other at 1321 (transponder ??) which is a bit confusing. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Montenegroman (talk • contribs)

• PLEASE sign your comments, folks. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• Is flightradar24.com a reliable source? I know they have a stub here on Wikipedia, but I have no idea if they pass RS. This is moot, otherwise. Dennis Brown | 2¢ | WER 16:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
  • Hard to say, Dennis. We have tons and tons of those sites reporting primary data that used to be Well Hidden From Us, The General Public. I suppose this is worthy of a discussion at WP:RSN--but let's not forget that this is all primary information.

    There's quite a bit of discussion about their reliability, with airlines apparently doubting the site, Der Spiegel using its information, and the site itself claiming reliability and raising its visibility. I think, to keep things on the safe side, that we should continue to use secondary sources and, given the misinformation and doubt about things as basic as flight routes, to tread slowly and carefully. Drmies (talk) 17:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

FlightRadar24 are quoted as a source earlier in the article :o) They use a network of volunteers with transponder receivers that feed them the received data in real time (or at least within a few seconds - internet-permitting). In any case, transponder timestamps and positions come from GPS signals - so even if it takes a while to reach FlightRadar24 it will still be a record of where the aircraft was at that time. Montenegroman (talk) 17:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Even if it is reliable under normal circumstances it may not be set up to deal with unusual sitations like this (NB the distance is only about 15 km). Alternative explanations (1) Flightrader may use some kind of extrapolation based on speed and altitude (2) Do not claim precision for cruising altitude at the 15 km (as that does not matter in normal situations) (3) May have made some errors/extrapolations to cover with temporary loss of signal (normal plane movement does not have a transponder disappears permanently). Nothing unusual following any of those; and it would explain the difference in location (which is fairly small). Arnoutf (talk) 17:13, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

OK then, let's look at a minute earlier: At 1320 UTC MH17 transmitted (itself) that it was at 33,000ft (atmittedly this is an approximation as - at those altitides - we are talking in flight levels). Its heading was 118 degrees and had an airsped of 490knots. Its position was slightly south of Rozsypne. All I am trying to get accross here is that MH17 did NOT fly directly to the crash site like the maps show. Montenegroman (talk) 17:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Just to note the signals from aircraft ADSB are ±25 feet. MilborneOne (talk) 17:36, 20 July 2014 (UTC) COI statement I am an FR24 date feeder

Would it make sense to add detailed time of the events directly preceding the crash listed on the timeline on 17 July, like this:

• 14:13 UTC RIA publishes information on "another An-26 shot down by the self-defence", who estimated its crash site to be near "Progress" mine, 10 km south from the actual crash site of MH17.[1] According to LifeNews article published 15 minutes later, the alleged An-26 was shot down at 18:00 UTC.[2]
• 15:23 UTC RIA announces that MH17 has crashed in eastern Ukraine[3]

This information is currently in the article, but spread over several sections, and it makes much more sense when it's presented in a single timeline. Pawel Krawczyk (talk) 17:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

There is no point in analyzing primary source data as we cannot have the WP article include prose based on the analysis or conclusions of such original research. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 17:42, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

So a recording made of a radio-transmission by the aircraft itself, just a minute before it's final contact, giving its Time, Alt, Airspeed, Heading, Lat and Long is just "prose based on the analysis or conclusions of ... original research". Montenegroman (talk) 19:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes and your comments above don't even really belong on the talk page so please stop speculating here. Point to published analysis and don't offer your own. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 23:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

According to the New York Times [ http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/07/17/world/europe/maps-of-the-crash-of-malaysian-airlines-flight-mh17.html ] - on the last map on the page the "Last known location" was "4:21 p.m. local time". The New York Times stated: "Source: Flight path data from flightradar24.com". Montenegroman (talk) 09:07, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Dutch PM press statement - Netherlands will lead identification of victims

Just now we had an update from the Dutch PM. Number of issues that may be useful for the article. Dutch experts will lead the international expert team that will identify the victims. Special memorial session Monday with the PM and King present. Minister of foreign affairs Frans Timmermans flies to New York to talk to UN security council. Should we do something with this or let it lie for now. Arnoutf (talk) 16:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Please add the following under Recovery of casualties: "On 20 July 2014, Ukrainian emergency workers began loading the remains of the passengers of MH17 into railcars for transportation and identification. Workers were observed by armed seperatists. The remains of 100 people are still missing." Source: Wall Street Journal Nathan121212 (talk) 17:04, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

No, there was an official 3rd party (rather than Russian or Ukrainian) statement that "Drunken -- I mean literally, drunken -- separatist soldiers are piling bodies into trucks unceremoniously and disturbing the evidence," and that "airplane parts have been removed," by rebels to hinder the independent investigation [10]. That is what should be included. My very best wishes (talk) 17:23, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Done. Thanks. No, drunken stuff needs better verification than the basics as reported by the WSJ. Drmies (talk) 17:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

John Kerry interview. Meh, almost an opportunity for a great joke. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:45, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

On 18 July The Daily Telegraph reported that the Russian government had allegedly modified or deleted information on Wikipedia pages relating to the MH17 incident, to remove claims that it helped provide the missile system used to shoot down the aircraft. Among the pages edited was the Russian version of an article listing civil aviation incidents, to claim that "the plane [flight MH17] was shot down by Ukrainian soldiers".

The edit itself for reference, also it's not the only occurrence where Russian governmental structures edit Wikipedia articles. In fact they've been streaming such government edits since some time here using the @RuGovEdits handle (also here through dumps.wikimedia.org ). It wasn't the government itself that edited it, but the All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company that is owned by it. --Arseny1992 (talk) 17:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Not really notable nobody would be surprised that the Russian government doesnt edit Russian Wikipedia, even on English wikipedia we have loads of single interest groups editing this article and related articles. MilborneOne (talk) 17:30, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Probably relevant to the Russian Wikipedia article, but not here at this stage in the developing story (perhaps later if it has political consequences in the aftermath). Arnoutf (talk) 17:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• That's very exciting stuff, but it's not for here. As for who edited, what our article says is what the headline says--there's a bit more specificity in the article, but if the Daily Telegraph considers that "government" is proper to use here, then that's what we should go by. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 17:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Whether or not the issue is notable depends on whether or not it is widely covered in reliable sources. Whether the edit was done at English wikipedia or Russian wikipedia is irrelevant. Whether Russian government editing Wikipedia is "surprising" or not is irrelevant. If Russian government edited the Fijian Wikipedia and everyone knew that they always edit Fijian Wikipedia BUT reliable sources for some reason covered their edits extensively then it would STILL be a reason for inclusion.

So yes, this information belongs in this article in the "Aftermath" section. Nothing major - WP:WEIGHT - still applies. But a sentence or so is very appropriate.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:10, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Some sources, after a less-than-one-minute search: [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16], [17], [18], [19], [20], [21], [22], [23]... and I could keep going but I think you get the point.Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

But the issue is: Is this of central relevance to the development of actual crash and the aftermath. In my opinion it is not. It may be of central relevance to other articles that explicitly deal with Russian Wikipedia, state propaganda/censorship etc; but not at this moment to this specific article. Arnoutf (talk) 18:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

No, that's not the issue. If it was of "central" relevance then not only would it need to be in the article, it would also need to be in the lede. Actually, you cut everything that is not of "central" relevance, you're not gonna have much of an article left (and what the hey is 'central' relevance anyway?) The issue is whether it is of relevance and whether or not it has been extensively covered by reliable sources. Yes and yes. Do I really need to put up another dozen sources about this topic? Volunteer Marek (talk) 18:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

We will have to prioritise to avoid making the article too long to be readable. That means some marginally relevant issues should not be mentioned. In my view this is one such issue; but let's wait for others to comment, as it seems the only thing we agree about in this thread is that we disagree. Arnoutf (talk) 20:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Passenger/crew manifest

The airline has released a passenger/crew manifest that appears to be complete, the numbers agree with the current article. It is in a very rough form; one has to deduce from the rest of the entires that KAMSMA/MATTHEUSMR means Mr. Mattheus Kamsma and KAMSMA/QIUMSTR means Mr. Qiu Kamsma. I would be willing to create a table from this data that could be included with a {{Collapse}}. I have laser-like attention to detail, so I'm perfect for the job; however, to avoid wasting a ton of time, I would want to be sure that it would be used; and I don't want to duplicate someone else's effort. Mandruss (talk) 17:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Why? What is the added value for Wikipedia to list a long list of people? Is n't this going rather far into the privacy of the families? As far as I know the lists were made public so that people could see whether someone they know had died, not to create a permanent record. In other words, I my opinion such a list should not be placed anywhere on Wikipedia. Arnoutf (talk) 17:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

This really wouldn't be very useful, as the Wikipedia is not a memorial. The article mentions some of the notable casualties, but we can't have the entire list. Tarc (talk) 17:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Fair enough, consider it not done. I can't say it was something I was looking forward to doing. Thanks! Mandruss (talk) 18:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The only people that should be mentioned by name are those that are notable enough to have, or be able to have, an article on Wikipedia. Take a look at BOAC Flight 712 (a Good Article) and you will see that very few of the passengers are actually named. Mjroots (talk) 18:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Full protection should not be applied by admins without non-admins nominating the page for full protection

So there are edit warriors out there. There always is. The job of admins to keep THOSE edit warriors from editing, by warnings, bans, whatever. The general editing community is also not so helpless that it cannot organically marginalize non-consensus editors to a large degree without unsolicited "help". Where is the Talk page thread where ordinary editors were complaining of being overwhelmed by edit warriors and expressing little hope that ordinary measures can deal with it? The job of admins is not to restrict the pool of editors to themselves. I've been editing Wikipedia for nine years and haven't felt a need for admin tools because I was mostly just interested in building content. In my opinion we're seeing another precedent develop here for a hierarchy whereby admin status provides more editing rights. The content community has dealt with edit wars for years, without admins coming over the top to impose indiscriminate restrictions.--Brian Dell (talk) 17:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I do think violating editors should just be banned from editing this article or blocked. That's why I think article-selective blocks should be made possible for the MediaWiki software. Dustin (talk) 17:52, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

While no fan of full protection, yesterdays edit wars (flags in/out/in/out; conspiracy theories in/out..... pro/anti Russian ranting in/out) makes it for this article a relevant issue in my opinion. At least for now.

Note that controlling such a high traffic article would otherwise place an unfair burden on the admins. (and no I am no admin myself). Arnoutf (talk) 17:58, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

This presumes that we really need "control". If you want a "controlled" article there's always Britannica. What I object to here is the unstated presumption that the wiki concept does not work.--Brian Dell (talk) 18:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It's beyond stupid what protecting this article means for people like me, who can see what flaws it has, and what needs to be added/changed. Just look at the nonsense you have to endure above - requests for sources, after they've been given. Repeated claims that obviously relevant information is not important. It's just total idiocy. Whatever problems the protection supposedly fixed, it's obviously being outweighed by this farce. RoryMig (talk) 18:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

At this stage severe limitation to the number of edits seems in place. Yesterday much of everybody's time was taken up by reorganizing the article dozens of times, every hour. I fully expect that this is a temporary measure and in some time, when the first storm has died down the article will set free for further development. Arnoutf (talk) 18:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Once everyone's stopped reading it. Excellent idea. I came here wanting to know more about which airlines were and weren't flying over the area at the time. I couldn't find it here (because it's both horribly disorganised, and not up to date), and I can't fix it. Rather than wait a few days and come back to it, I think most people will do what I did instead (what some people here seem think everyone should do) and just rely on other information sources. At the end of the day, if you don't want people to come to Wikipedia to read about developing stories (and contribute them by editing them), don't link to them from the front page in the "news" section. Just replace it with another feature on something a little more "encylopedic" (a biography of a painter that's been dead for 200 hundred years, for example). RoryMig (talk) 18:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Also the response of RoryMig shows the relevance of a protected page. Keeping editors like RoryMig from aggressively putting their own ideas in would just take up too much effort. Arnoutf (talk) 18:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

My own ideas? Like the stuff in sources? I hope everyone is getting a good look at people like you, so they get a good idea whether or not it's worth editing Wikipedia at all - do they really want to be associated with people like you? RoryMig (talk) 18:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Rory, the autocratic admins have become the message here. Juan Riley (talk) 19:01, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Mr Rory, I do apologise, be we are not a newspaper. We are an encyclopaedia. If you'd like some news, please do go to WikiNews, or to any other news website. RGloucester — ☎ 18:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
  • Seriously, why do people think that making such obviously idiotic comments add anything? If you meant to say, Wikipedia doesn't do news, then why is the article even here? If you meant to say something else, engage your brain, and try again, because I haven't got a clue what your point is supposed to be. RoryMig (talk) 18:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And when exactly were you planning on removing the full protection? (to sysops) Dustin (talk) 18:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• MrRGloucester: then stop pretending you are anything else. Juan Riley (talk) 18:49, 20 July 2014 (UTC)
• Comment: The full-protection was initiated over a discussion at ANI which involved a dispute between two editors - the airplane guy and john. So in order to prevent those two from editing the article, full-protection was initiated. There was no discussion opened anywhere, as far as I know, that included community input on full-protection. And while this idea that we are not a newspaper is certainly true, once a current event article is created, then we are obligated to support the current event article by inclusion of reliably sourced information. We shouldn't just take the stance of - go somewhere else to find out what's happening.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 18:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I thought full protection was to solve editing disputes which it was between airplaneguy and John, but it seems the reasoning now is to slow editing down because WP:NOTNEWS. I am in favor of the protection being removed as this is an ongoing current event, things in the article can be dated quickly or become non-facual anymore, as an encyclopedia we must also write the truth. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 18:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

If, in fact, we are WP:NOTNEWS, then I don't see why the entire article isn't prohibited until x amount of time after the event. That would prevent a ton of problems now being experienced. The article was created literally within minutes of the story breaking. How is that "not news"? Just one noob's naive viewpoint. Mandruss (talk) 18:59, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Personally, I'd vouch for pending changes protection. This would allow contribution, but would help filter out some of the nonsense. Seems like the perfect solution in this instance. RGloucester — ☎ 19:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I thought of that RGloucester, but the reason why full protection was alleged to be in place is because of an edit dispute between two editors, one an admin and the other a registered editor. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

  No, the reason was massive reverts of information by multiple editors. In particular, you should be lucky that you were not blocked for your five reverts.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Well, the discussion that was opened at ANI was in regards to those two users mentioned, if there was an issue with other massive reverts, then a discussion should have been opened to allow community input on that issue and in regards for full-protection.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 19:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Do you actually suggest that no artice can be protected withot a long and advertized community discussion? It would be great to back up this suggestion with a policy.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The article was fully protected with this edit summary: "Changed protection level of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17: Edit warring / content dispute: See discussion at WP:ANI, section "Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, TheAirplaneGuy and John" as of https://en.wikipedia.org/enwiki/w/index.php?oldid=6" It does not mention WP:NOTNEWS anywhere. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The same person who locks down the page, @Nyttend, is the same person who then proceeded to delete a massive amount of material with the misleading edit summary "removing a section per Talk". Where was the consensus for such a sweeping change? Where was the consensus to remove "Ukrainian authorities said another recording indicated that the weapons system had arrived from Russia with a Russian crew", just to take an example? If you look at the U.S. statement of the evidence on the Ukraine embassy page, a lot of that evidence was in the article UNTIL Nyttend locked down the page and took it out. Nyttend would likely have been reverted and called upon to justify his removals in detail had he not just denied the community the opportunity to revert.--Brian Dell (talk) 19:06, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• PC would not work. For example, yesterdays flags were rolled back and forth 8 times (each direction), with one editor exceeding 3RR and another one, after I warned them that the fourth revert would result in a block, answered that they believe they are reverting vndalis and therefore they do not care about 3RR. PC could not solve this.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:07, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

But blocking those particular editors would. Using full page protection punishes all editors for the actions of a few. —Lowellian (reply) 19:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And now all those busy-bee little admins are still toying with the flag question....sigh. How about you Ymblanter? 19:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Could you please express your ideas in a more clear way? I am not able to understand what you want to know.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I think a more reasonable solution would be semi-protection, with an admin or two watching the article. I also think 1RR is a terrific idea in that it encourages discussion on the talk page for consensus, which is our standard protocol. In the event of content disputes, we would follow the other regular channels for resolution, such as RfC or other remedies that are readily available per our policies and guidelines. I would also suggest that admins use discretionary sanctions to discourage disruptive editors.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 19:15, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

  The page was semi-protected almost from the very beginning. It did not help.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It did not help because the disruptive editors were not being blocked. Full protection punishes all editors for the actions of a few disruptive ones. —Lowellian (reply) 19:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Make it be 1RR then per Isaidnoway's argument. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

That is just a silly idea. Reverting will start right back up. WP:NOTNEWS applies in this situation. In a few weeks when activity calms down, the article can be fixed. I stand behind the admins 100% on this. United States Man (talk) 19:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Saying that you "stand behind the admins 100%" incorrectly implies the admins are all in agreement that full page protection is the way to go. Some admins oppose full page protection. —Lowellian (reply) 19:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

In light of US Mans suggestions, I suggest new lead: Malaysia Airlines Flight 17: Something happened, 298 died.Juan Riley (talk) 19:43, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I have just lowered the protection level from full protection to semi-protection. In my protection log comment, I wrote that it has been "24 hours since full protection". I only realized after lowering the protection level that it has actually been only 20 hours, not 24 hours, a mistake I made due to time zone differences, but I think 20 hours is close enough to 24 to let the lowered protection level stand; furthermore, earlier on this page, it was suggested by other editors that the period of full page protection only be for 12 hours, so 20 hours of protection is already significantly longer than that. I will note that the original decision to implement full protection was made without clear consensus and over significant opposition, as seen in the comments on this talk page and on WP:ANI. —Lowellian (reply) 19:46, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

For whatever reasons, this WP article is no longer listed (as of this moment) by google news on MA17 incident. I just hope it is because of this admin nonsense and not (as I fear) some other site just getting higher ratings. Why is it that WP should care? 20:02, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

audio "unconfirmed"

"Unconfirmed" should be replaced with attribution, namely attribution to Ukrainian authorities. As far as the Ukrainians are concerned, it's confirmed. And also according to the U.S. given the official U.S. statement: "Audio data provided to the press by the Ukrainian security service was evaluated by Intelligence Community analysts who confirmed these were authentic conversations between known separatist leaders, based on comparing the Ukraine-released internet audio to recordings of known separatists." Now there's always going to be some editors who say the U.S. government is an unreliable source. We do not have to indulge that view by declaring "unconfirmed" despite the U.S. statement of confirmation. We also don't have to go to the other extreme and call it "confirmed" just because the U.S. says it is. We rather simply note that the audio came from Ukraine and the U.S. believes it authentic. Those readers who think those two governments cannot be trusted are not being told they are mistaken. At the same time, readers who believe there has been confirmation, as the U.S. believes, are also not being told they are mistaken (if we use attribution instead of "unconfirmed").--Brian Dell (talk) 18:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Could you please formulate a specific edit request suggestion so that we could discuss it?--Ymblanter (talk) 18:48, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I believe what Brian meant was to remove the "unconfirmed" adjective from the frame describing SBU recording. First confirmation is that it was statement of official agency of Ukraine; second is the linked US confirmationofficial U.S. statement; third is confirmation from the separatists themselves[24]. Pawel Krawczyk (talk) 19:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

How about, in the sentence beginning with "An unconfirmed phone call took place between..." replace the first few words with "According to phone calls allegedly captured by Ukrainian authorities, between..."

Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Is this Talk page only supposed to be used for discussing which i's to dot and which t's to cross? You see yourself as just taking dictation like a secretary, Ymblanter? I should think my fellow editors here can operate on a more editorial level as befits the title "editor". It's already specific enough to take action with respect to the page: replace "unconfirmed" with the appropriate attribution (e.g. "Ukraine claimed"), and add the (attributed) view of the U.S. that there has been confirmation. Unlock the page so I can edit if you have no objections in principle to my argument here. If you then don't like the details you'd remain free to change my editing, no? Marek gives an example of what can be done here. Other examples may be equally acceptable.--Brian Dell (talk) 19:57, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

This is a really unhelpful comment from your side. You perfectly know that if I, as admin, would edit a protected page introducing info which was not suggested at the talk page, anybody can take me to ANI and eventually desysop. Anyway, now that the page has been unprotected, and you can edit yourself.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

And you know perfectly well that your hands were not as tied as you pretend they were. You've got three editors here which would have given you a clear mandate to proceed. Nyttend deleted more than 20% of the article after he himself locked it down, and I assure you there were no explicit instructions to do that. Indeed, part of that deletion was reversed after the community complained (most of the rest is in the process of getting reversed) and he's still got the admin bit last time I checked. More importantly you could have done what Lowellian did and unlocked the article so we need not engage in this "spell it out" nonsense. In any case, this is not to re-litigate the past, but to invite you to reconsider the cost to the quality of Talk page discussion before supporting full protection again.--Brian Dell (talk) 23:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Under the responses section, ICAO's response should read (flag) ICAO - ICAO declared that it was ... In order for it to be consistent with other responses. Nathan121212 (talk) 18:20, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done--Ymblanter (talk) 18:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

...terrorists removed 38 bodies from the crash site in order to extract from the bodies exploded parts of the rocket used to shoot the plane and destroy the evidence.

→

...attackers removed 38 bodies from the crash site in order to extract from the bodies exploded parts of the rocket used to shoot the plane and destroy the evidence.

Shooting down a neutral civilian plane is dastardly by any standard, but this use of 'terrorists' is inconsistent with the tone of the article at this time.   — C M B J   18:23, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Are quotes needed? That seems to be the first word of the (Ukranian) headline in the source given to support that statement. Martinevans123 (talk) 18:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The underlying issue is that the statement is being used in the article to describe a specific factual event (recovery of remains), not the source's broader disposition. The article may very well use this terminology in the near future, but for the moment, it's editorially inconsistent.   — C M B J   19:40, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't read Ukrainian, and Google translate seems to fail quite abysmally at that page. But as far as I can see that source uses the word "Терористи". So I think you are absolutely right - the paraphrasing here is a bit too close and a more neutral word should be used. Otherwise, as an alternative, quote marks should be used. I'm also concerned that what is being presented as a fact is supported only by one Ukrainian-language source. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

In case no one has told you, (or me). The text has been changed to: "On 19 July 2014 Andriy Lysenko, the spokesman of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine claimed that the insurgents removed 38 bodies from the crash site in order to extract from the bodies exploded parts of the rocket used to shoot the plane and destroy the evidence.". But still the same single Ukrainian source, which I'm surprised has been allowed. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:29, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done. Text has been changed. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:33, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 20 July 2014

Copyedit: please change the sentence "ICAO declared that it's sending its team of experts to assist Ukrainian National Bureau of Incidents and Accidents Investigation of Civil Aircraft (NBAAII), which according to ICAO is the country in charge of the investigation under Article 26 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation." in the "Reactions" section to "ICAO – ICAO declared that it would send a team of experts to assist the National Bureau of Incidents and Accidents Investigation of Civil Aircraft (NBAAII) of the Ukraine, which according to ICAO is the country in charge of the investigation under Article 26 of the Convention on International Civil Aviation." —Mr. Granger (talk · contribs) 18:53, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• Well, the verb, that's not such a big deal, but I added the wikilink, piped to Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, and the rephrasing. Drmies (talk) 19:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Isnt MH 17 technically the deadliest shootdown on a commercial airliner?

I have included three links below to support this. http://www.financialexpress.com/news/malaysia-airlines-mh17-shot-down-top-5-deadliest-attacks-on-airliners/1271130 http://www.torontosun.com/2014/07/17/top-5-deadliest-attacks-on-commercial-airliners http://world.einnews.com/article__detail/214431219?lcode=4ah0VeoaPs62GaRlQf5LNA%3D%3D

And I was also wondering if this fact could be added to the article; as overall it seems much more significant than the fact that it was "the deadliest air incident in the Ukraine, the deadliest involving a Boeing 777 and the deadliest involving Malaysian airlines." Also, isn't it reasonable to say that it was the third deadliest aviation attack overall, after 9/11 and Air India Flight 182? Could this be added as well? Undescribed (talk) 19:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)x3 :You'd have to be careful about what criterion you use for "deadliest" and "airline attack". 9/11 is only the deadliest if you count all 4 airplanes as one and count in the people who died who were not on the plane but in the WTC and Pentagon. KonveyorBelt 19:31, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

So therefore wouldn't it fit the "overall deadliest" criteria? Undescribed (talk) 22:23, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The September 11 attacks were not shot down, they were flown into buildings. --kelapstick^(bainuu) 20:18, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I would argue against subcategorizing as it will always biggest/deadliest/etc. if you define the category small enough (e.g. it definitely is the deadliest Boeing 777-200ER shot down with BUK missiles over eastern Ukraine but due to the small category also the only one) Arnoutf (talk) 20:22, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Update to lead

In the lead please add the airline name to fourth paragraph. I was reading the lead and saw that the fourth paragraph is the first that discusses the airline and events related to it.

< The crash was the airline's second major incident of the year.

> The crash was Malaysia Airlines' second major incident of the year.

Thank you. --Marc Kupper|talk 19:26, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done, uncontroversial--Ymblanter (talk) 19:33, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

One more

Please remove the following paragraph:

On 18 July a Russian Defence Ministry spokesman reported to journalists that "Russian radar facilities during 17 July detected work of 9S18 "Kupol" (radar station of detection and targeting for 9K37-1 SAM "Buk-M1" squadron), stationed near Ukrainian-controlled village Styla (30 kilometres (19 mi) south of Donetsk)"[87] Ukraine's foreign minister, Pavlo Klimkin stated that Ukraine did not have sophisticated surface-to-air missile systems in the area, and that none had been seized by separatist groups in recent weeks.[88]

It doesn't add anything to the article except muddy the waters, it's just a bunch of (outdated) he-said-she-said. At the very least it does not belong in the "aftermath" section. Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:32, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• That seems fair. Without further detail this is as-yet unrelated bickering. Drmies (talk) 19:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Discretionary Sanctions ?

Now that this article has been taken from full protection to semi-protection, my question (to which I think the answer is yes) is whether discretionary sanctions for edit-warring are applicable under WP:ARBEE? Is Ukraine in Eastern Europe as usually defined? Robert McClenon (talk) 19:45, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes and yes. In particular, while it's unlikely that the admins will start edit warring, it's still possible for someone to get themselves discretion'd for talk page misconduct.Volunteer Marek (talk) 19:49, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I reckon so. I think semi-protection is very unwise, and I will take this opportunity to withdraw and see if a nap is in the cards. Drmies (talk) 19:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The article is now semi-protected rather than fully protected, and editors should be aware that discretionary sanctions can be applied. (The availability of discretionary sanctions makes full protection less important than if Ukraine were in Western Europe.) As Volunteer Marek implies, discretionary sanctions are also available for talk page misconduct, such as personal attacks or improper refactoring. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:56, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

As indicated by the "The Arbitration Committee has permitted Wikipedia administrators to impose discretionary sanctions on any editor editing this page or associated pages" template message at the top of this talk page, discretionary sanctions are fully applicable. Full protection effectively blocks and punishes all editors for the actions of a few disruptive ones. It is better to block just the disruptive editors so that not all editors are blocked from editing, which is one of the purposes for which discretionary sanctions were designed. —Lowellian (reply) 20:03, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I hope Lowellian that you will stay here and participate in blocking the editors violating 1RR.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:08, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Wait, who imposed a 1RR here? Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:10, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I thought it belongs to discretionary sanctions in this case? If not, I apologize.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Nah, it's not automatic. Somebody would have to impose it as an article-level sanction, but I don't see that it's anywhere near that level at the moment. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:14, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Good lord...if the admins don't have any weapons what are they to do? Juan Riley (talk) 20:16, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Good, thanks for clarifying.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

JuanRiley: Oh, they have lots of options. With discretionary sanctions, they can basically take anybody out whose behaviour is less than constructive, in whatever way. All I'm saying is it's not automatically linked to a mechanical bright-line revert count thing (which is good, because an inflexicble revert-count rule is often actually counterproductive in situations of heavy and fast-paced editing.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:21, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Fut. Plu. Perf. I am just noting that after today I care naught about any of the options they have. Juan Riley (talk) 20:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Dear Juan, there are many admins on Wikipedia. In fact everybody showing long term commitment to, and respect for the rules of Wikipedia can become admin.

In general admins do good work, some are nice and helpful, others less so. Sometimes they can be overly bureaucratic. Actually they are normal volunteer editors like you and me. The number of truly disruptive editors among admins is very rare (and they are very harsh on their own so they don't tend to last long)

Admins sometimes limit what can be done like here, but generally for good reasons. If you tried to edit this article yesterday you may have noticed that sometimes the whole article was reorganized in the matter of minutes, while other editors were still putting in information at places now utterly disconnected from the flow of the article. That needed to be calmed down and it was. Far from ideal as the article is not in a good shape, but in my view the lesser of two evils. Arnoutf (talk) 20:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

1RR proposal

I propose that this article be restricted to 1RR given the issues it has had. This can be reported to ANI or be monitored if broken. - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 20:17, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I'd be opposed to that, per what I just wrote in the thread above. There are more useful and more flexible ways of applying discretionary sanctions than to bind them to an arbitrary bright-line revert count rule. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:25, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) That is going to be very hard to enforce if editing picks back up to the level it has been. United States Man (talk) 20:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I've created an edit notice for the page. Admins, feel free to tweak it. 1RR may be added per the instructions at Template:Ds/editnotice. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a way to impose, say, 2RR or add the standard 3RR to the template (I tried this one, it don't work). Mjroots (talk) 20:35, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Oppose implementing a one-revert rule. We just need to be more careful in watching for users who appear to have violated the three-revert rule, and so we don't end up with a lot of users being blocked, try to warn them before they ever break the 3RR in the first place. Dustin (talk) 20:55, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• I support this proposal, if editor's know that a 1RR has been implemented, then it forces discussion onto the talk page for consensus. For those editor's who feel they need to ignore the 1RR and continually revert without discussing, then they can be appropriately sanctioned.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 21:27, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

1RR is better than locking the article down. But 3RR violators should be getting max discipline before we start demanding 1RR.--Brian Dell (talk) 23:51, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

The problem with 1RR on an article such as this which gets edited a lot is that it's very easy to break it on accident or due to edit conflicts. Often times I make a change, save, then go back and look over to make sure everything's alright. Then often make a follow up change. If somebody jumps in an reverts me in the interim - which happens if article is being edited heavily - I revert them and follow through with my correction. That would show up as a 1RR break right there even though it really should be 1 revert via 2 consecutive edits. And then edit conflicts and stuff... I'd rather see it stay full protected.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:23, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

@Volunteer Marek:: You mean, you would rather see it fully protected than semi-protected with a one-revert rule? Dustin (talk) 04:34, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes. I look at it this way. You can either waste your time articulating requests for protected edits on the talk page. Or you can waste your time reverting and cleaning up after brand new WP:BATTLEGROUND accounts, returned sockpuppets of banned users, SPA accounts, generally disruptive trolls, incompetent twelve year olds etc. on the article itself. Either way, time is going to be wasted on an article such as this, but personally I'd rather waste my time in the former way than in the latter. And the article would be better for it.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:06, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose per Future Perfect at Sunrise. My very best wishes (talk) 04:55, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Oppose - IMHO, there are three roles that editors of a big traffic controversial article tend to play:

• Providers of new info - they are often new editors with strong biases
• POV pushers/checkers - people mostly concerned with political bias of the article
• Copy-editors - people making a readable article compliant to wiki standards out of various contributions. It includes removing unreferenced, other inappropriate and duplicating entries, rearrangements of the material, etc.

Without work of the third group a high-traffic article soon becomes an unreadable discussion forum rather than a comprehensible prose. 1RR significantly hinder the work of the third group (as almost every copy-editing effort can be seen as a revert) and that is not that we want to achieve. Alex Bakharev (talk) 05:36, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Black boxes

There is very little in the current version of the article about the fate/finding of the black boxes, which is obviously a very important aspect of this tragedy. I don't have time at the moment to formulate a proper edit request but perhaps someone else could suggest something. Here is one source [25], others should be easy to find.Volunteer Marek (talk) 20:19, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Problem is that very much about the black boxes is speculative so far. So we should probably be a bit careful. BTW the article went to semiprotected so if you put something together you should be able to put it in yourself.

Also it seems from Dutch comments on TV that in this rare case black boxes will probably tell little we do not already know. Most likely they will be something like (all systems fine, all systems fine ...... END) in case it was a direct hit on the hull, if it took out a wing it would probably say (all systems fine, all systems fine, enginefire-multipleenginefailure-lossofavionitronics ...... END).

That said black boxes are important and should be discussed although perhaps not to the extent as in many other crash articles. Arnoutf (talk) 20:28, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Wholly agree. Much more should be added. I suggested an addition, with a source saying "'Second black box recovered' from crash site." yesterday at 14:04, in the "Bodies" thread. I recently saw a headline saying that "Russia does not want them". Martinevans123 (talk) 20:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I added a little about this. Welcome to add more or correct my recent edits.My very best wishes (talk) 21:47, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Add a Wiki link

Please change "Malaysian actress Shuba Jaya" to "Malaysian actress Shuba Jaya". I believe she may meet our criteria for notability as an actress and I've created a page for her. -A1candidate (talk) 22:09, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

 Done. It has already been done. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:12, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

I have moved the article to "Shuba Jay", as that seems to be what both imdb and her own website use. HandsomeFella (talk) 08:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

WP Lead

As of Sunday night, the lead section of this article is highly POV toward the Urkainian/American side of the controversy, without mentioning the Russian side at all. Since no objective on-site investigation and review has yet assigned blame I propose to re-write the LEAD as follows in order to satisfy WP:Lead and WP:NPOV. I am not a troll, or a Kremlin agent, in fact I'm an American citizen. I just want the article to be balanced and not take one side, which is completely in line with the Wikipedia editorial policies cited above. Here is my rewrite of the third paragraph which I plan to post unless heavily objected to:

A Ukrainian Interior Ministry official, Anton Gerashchenko, said a Buk missile hit the aircraft at an altitude of 10,000 m (33,000 ft).[11] All forces in the theater use similar Russian-made equipment, leading to confusion over which faction actually fired the deadly shot. Both Ukraine and Russia have accused the other of responsibility for firing the missile that is believed to have downed the aircraft. The United States has backed Ukraine's accusations by claiming to have "credible evidence" that the missile was fired from a separatist position near Donetsk; while Russia has claimed to have evidence that a Ukrainian BUK AA battery was operating near Donetsk at the time.

Cadwallader (talk) 22:44, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Here is the code for the section that I replaced. I think the details of the accusations and counter-accusations are better included further down in the article.Cadwallader (talk) 22:54, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

A Ukrainian Interior Ministry official, Anton Gerashchenko, said a Buk missile hit the aircraft at an altitude of 10,000 m (33,000 ft).[1] On 19 July, Vitaly Nayda, the chief of the Counter Intelligence Department of the SBU, told a news conference: "We have compelling evidence that this terrorist act was committed with the help of the Russian Federation. We know clearly that the crew of this system were Russian citizens."[2][3][4][5] He cited intercepted conversations in which separatists allegedly express satisfaction to Russian intelligence agents that they brought down an airplane.[6] The separatists denied the recorded talks were related to the crash of MH17.[7] U.S. President Barack Obama, citing U.S. intelligence officials, said the plane was shot down by a missile and that there was "credible evidence" it was fired from a location held by pro-Russian rebels.[8][9][10]

• No, you can not make huge unilateral changes like that without discussion and WP:Consensus. I reverted this per WP:BRD. Please explain why exactly this is POV, and let's wait what other contributors have to tell about this. Thanks, My very best wishes (talk) 23:05, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It was not a "huge unilateral" change. Reasons given above as to why it was NPOV. Nothing in my revised paragraph is controversial - both sides have accused the other, and both sides have claimed to have evidence implicating the other side. Please see WP:Lead for guidance on the level of detail appropriate in the lead section of an article. As I stated above, your detailed citations were preserved to be inserted lower down in the article where they are more appropriate. I will give it until morning. Unless you bring in a pile of other editors who think my edit is somehow evil, I'm doing it come daybreak. Cadwallader (talk)

By the way, shouldn't you be following WP:BPD? My revision of the paragraph was done in good faith. If you had followed BPD you would have discussed it here prior to reverting. Instead you just reverted it, and now claim BPD for yourself. Cadwallader (talk) 23:24, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

• By making this edit you: (a) started WP:Edit war and (b) removed a lot of referenced and relevant materials. The references and info you removed does not belong to any "side" (Russian or Ukrainian). It belongs to reliable sources per policy. But whatever. I also made links to relevant policies on your talk page. My very best wishes (talk) 23:34, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Cad, your proposed rewrite was real bad. Unsourced editorializing, POV-pushing. And BRD is but a gentle suggestion to others that becomes meaningless when policy doesn't allow (much less support) your edits. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 23:41, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

How exactly was my edit "editorializing or POV-pushing"??? It is above. Please point out exactly which sentence or phrase is editorializing. Futhermore, I said in the original edit that the material was not REMOVED, it was PRESERVED to be inserted lower down in the article. Don't accuse me of an edit war. You started it. Cadwallader (talk) 23:50, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Working on getting this to where "consensus" can agree it is a good 3rd paragraph summary of the situation. If you don't like it, then improve it, please:

All forces in the theater use similar Russian-made equipment, leading to confusion over which faction actually fired the deadly shot. Both Ukraine and Russia have accused the other of responsibility for firing the missile that is believed to have downed the aircraft. The United States has backed Ukraine's accusations by claiming to have "credible evidence" that the missile was fired from a separatist position near Donetsk; while Russia has claimed to have evidence that a Ukrainian BUK AA battery was operating near Donetsk at the time. No independent investigation with access to the crash site has yet released a finding of responsibility.

Sorry, what are you proposing, exactly? That text is inappropriate from top to bottom and I'm not touching it. At best, the various implausible claims by the separatists deserve a few summary words in the lead. Centrify (f / k / a FCAYS) (talk) (contribs) 00:04, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• If you wish to achieve consensus, please self-revert and follow WP:BRD. Since your changes are objected, please wait at least 24 hours to allow responses by others.My very best wishes (talk) 00:06, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Support, at least in terms of spirit the changes made to the lead by Cad. I do remember a few days ago the accusations by the Russians / separatists were not mentioned in the lead, that violates NPOV and doesn't tell the whole story either. The Russian / separatist response should be mentioned even if the Ukranian version of events turns out to be true. If you read the BBC's report on 'what we know', you'll see that it provides two POVs as well. starship.paint ~ regal 00:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Using similar equipment is irrelevant if the equipment is not identical and the small differences in the model of missile have implications for who may have fired it. So either "similar equipment" should be removed as irrelevant or a cite given for why the equipment is identical to the point of not being possible to differentiate. Where, exactly, did Russia accuse Ukraine of firing the missile in so many words? They say there was a Ukrainian missile system in the area. So? That's an insinuation, not a claim that Ukraine fired the missile. Where is the assurance that if it were proven the Ukrainians did not fire, the Russians would not say "well we never said they did fire. We just said they were in a position to do so"? It is also not true that the U.S. has backed all of Ukraine's accusations. What the U.S. has backed up is quite specific, and should be enumerated.--Brian Dell (talk) 00:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Good points, Brian. However, we need a paragraph or two that summarize the situation and the positions. You can't bury the reader in details in the Lead. My point was never to remove the information but to put it further down in the detailed part of the article. Cadwallader (talk) 00:17, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Taking your feedback, here is the third try (will add refs after we get the wording agreed upon):

Shortly after the crash, Donbass separatists took credit for downing a Ukrainian military aircraft. However, they recanted and denied involvement after learning that a civilian airliner had been downed, saying they did not have the equipment or training to hit a target at 30,000 feet. Ukraine has accused Russia of providing the BUK missile launcher, crew and training to the separatists , and claims to have intercepted phone calls in which a separatist officer authorized the decision for the Russian crew to fire. Russia denied involvement and suggested that Ukraine’s military might have been responsible. The United States has claimed to have "credible evidence" that the missile was fired from a separatist position near Donetsk; while Russia has claimed to have evidence that a Ukrainian BUK AA battery was operating near Donetsk at the time. All forces in the theater have the same BUK M1 missiles, which may make it difficult to prove which faction fired the deadly shot. No independent investigation with access to the crash site has yet released a finding of responsibility.

For starters, like most of the world outside the US, they use metric measurements, and so would not have said "30,000 feet". HiLo48 (talk) 00:43, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• Please do not forget always sign your comments. Here is the problem with your versions. You place incredible claims by rebels and Russian state-controlled propaganda ("news") organizations on the same footing as claims by majority of WP:RS. According to majority view (and we are talking about majority of sources/publications), the missile was shot by rebels. Intro must reflect this.My very best wishes (talk) 00:48, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

When did Ukraine claim that they had a BUK taken from them? All that I am aware of is boasts from the rebel side that they'd captured them, boasts that could very well be a cover story for missiles actually obtained from Russia. If you are going to lay out the Russian claims, then you should also lay out the U.S. claims, namely,
- Last weekend Russia sent a convoy of military equipment with up to 150 vehicles including tanks, armored personnel carriers, artillery, and multiple rocket launchers to the separatists
- Russia is providing training on air defense systems
- the social media activity
- U.S. satellites detected a launch from a separatist controlled area
- Ukraine never fired a anti-air missile during the conflict
- "Audio data provided to the press by the Ukrainian security service was evaluated by Intelligence Community analysts who confirmed these were authentic conversations between known separatist leaders, based on comparing the Ukraine-released internet audio to recordings of known separatists"
The evidence on both sides here is not equal, and presenting the matter as if it is equal is not consistent with the neutral point of view. "No independent investigation..." should not accordingly not be included because it misleads the reader to believe there is little evidence incriminating anyone to date.-Brian Dell (talk) 00:53, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

No, it does not lead the reader to believe there is little evidence. It just cited evidence from Ukraine and the USA. Next revision follows: Cadwallader (talk) 01:02, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Shortly after the crash, Donbass separatists took credit for downing a Ukrainian military aircraft. However, they recanted and denied involvement after learning that a civilian airliner had been downed, saying they did not have the equipment or training to hit a target at that elevation. Ukraine, however, has accused Russia of providing the BUK missile launcher and crew to the separatists , and claims to have intercepted phone calls in which a separatist officer authorized the decision for the Russian crew to fire . The United States has claimed to have "credible evidence" that the missile was fired from a separatist position near Donetsk. Russia denied involvement and suggested that Ukraine’s military might have been responsible, and claimed to have evidence that a Ukrainian BUK AA battery was operating near Donetsk at the time. All forces in the theater have the same BUK M1 missiles, which may make it difficult to prove which faction fired the deadly shot. No independent investigation with access to the crash site has yet released a finding of responsibility.

Brian, your commentary above confuses weighing the evidence with reporting on what the major parties are saying about each other. Ukraine and the USA have made credible accusations against Russian and the separatists and claim to have evidence to back it up. Russia has responded with counterclaims, that are, admittedly weaker. No independent investigative team has made a ruling. This is a classic public controversy case where you have claim, counterclaim, and wait for ruling from the court. To be NPOV you have to report what both sides are saying about it, even if it is obvious that one side is lying. Cadwallader (talk) 01:12, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

This is basically a murder trial at the international level. In every murder trial, the reporters say prosecutors allege that Bob killed Alice. Bob's attorney says he didn't. The case will be heard by a court on X date. In our reporting, prior to a public finding of responsibility, we should follow the same template. Ukraine + USA says X. Separatists say Y. Russia says Z. Investigators are on the ground collecting evidence now... Cadwallader (talk) 01:16, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

And you are rigging it by declining to have the article reflect the fact that X is vastly larger than Z. Your revision does not include the X points I pointed out above with dashes. Instead you've got "credible evidence" in scare quotes like the reader should consider it a joke. How about replacing that with the last dash point? This is not, in fact, a court case. Wikipedia follows what reliable sources say as opposed to playing judge and jury. Our job is to assess how reliable the various sources are and on that point there are credibility problems on one side in particular that should be pointed out to the reader. By the way, where is the citation indicating that there cannot be any BUK M2 systems in the area?--Brian Dell (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I think this is true to a point, but considering that pretty much every reliable source (including some of the independent Russian media) is treating the Russian claims about this as being particularly fanciful, this should be reflected in our weighting; to do otherwise would be a massively deliberate reinterpretation of mainstream sources. The Drover's Wife (talk) 01:25, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I also object to these proposed changes. In fact the lede was the one part of the article that was actually pretty good before full protection was placed on the article. Hence it's probably the *last* part that needs to be changed, except for updating with new information. What you are calling "pro-Ukrainian/American" side (first, the "Ukrainian side" and the "American side" are not the same thing, despite the nonsense that Kremlin propaganda spouts out) is really just the reflection of what reliable sources have said about this topic. As they say, sometimes reality has a "pro-Ukrainian" bias.Volunteer Marek (talk) 04:38, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

It's quite interesting that none of you are offering a compromise way to summarize the article and fairly represent both sides. It's just no, no, no. I continue to work on a compromise. Brian your five points are good, but too much detail to go into the LEAD summary as per WP:Lead. As I have said all along, that info belongs further down in the article. The line with "credible evidence" was a direct quote from the New York Post article cited, but I've removed the quotes to make you happy. 5th revision:

Shortly after the crash, Donbass separatists took credit for downing a Ukrainian military aircraft. They later recanted and denied involvement after learning that a civilian airliner had been downed, saying they did not have the equipment or training to hit a target at that elevation. Ukraine, however, has provided video evidence they say shows Russia provided the BUK missile launcher and crew to the separatists , and claims to have intercepted phone calls in which a separatist officer authorized the decision for the Russian crew to fire . The United States has claimed to have credible evidence that the missile was fired from a separatist position near Donetsk. In response, Russia denied involvement and suggested that Ukraine’s military might have been responsible, and claimed to have evidence that a Ukrainian BUK AA battery was operating near Donetsk at the time. All forces in the theater have the same BUK M1 missiles, which may make it difficult to prove which faction fired the deadly shot. The UN security council is considering a draft resolution to condemn the "shooting down" of a Malaysian passenger plane in Ukraine, demand access to the crash site and call on states in the region to co-operate with an international investigation. Cadwallader (talk) 09:29, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Separatists vs. Rebels

In line with the goal of using NPOV, I propose the word "separatists" should be used instead of "rebels" or "terrorists" when referring to the Donetsk and Lugansk separatist movements. The reason is that terrorist and rebels both pack the assumption of legitimate versus illegitimate. Unlike the Basque separatists, The Donetsk and Lugansk separatists are not known to have deliberately targeted noncombatants, which is the definition of terrorism. They are rightly defined as separatist movements. Even the Basque separatists are referred to as "separatists" even though they might also fit the definition of terrorist and rebels. Cadwallader (talk) 23:00, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

It's the same debate all over again. Read some of the above from content headers please, there already were at least two similar discussions. As per my POV, since multiple sources use the word "terrorists" (even the ones coming from the country where this is based), it would be specifically hard to sway from the term, and even harder when it gets to direct quotations. My personal opinion isn't ambigious, I too think this word's a little too harsh. But by said NPOV, we can't just invent ways of binding information to appear as we like it to. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 01:26, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Cadwallader: Wikiopedia is a tube to amplify zoo priopaganda line - coardinated lies massed by MSM. Hovewer on verificable sciens it may be useful as first look instance. I to dont like amplifaid here antisemantism but trying again the same way seem insane waste of time. You do not have any chance when banned, time to tree the enermous work deposited here by unsuspecting-naives, from the zoo control op. 99.90.196.227 (talk) 04:41, 21 July 2014 (UTC) ps 'zoo' some prononce as 'zio'

Vkontakte

Is there any reason why the story brought up by the Christian Science Monitor about Girkens alleged Vkontakte post stating that the rebels had downed a Ukrainian military airraft in the area is no longer mentioned in the article. Has this been debunked or is it not considered RS--Bellerophon5685 (talk) 23:26, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

This seems to be the source of all the reports. http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2014/0717/Web-evidence-points-to-pro-Russia-rebels-in-downing-of-MH17-video --Bellerophon5685 (talk) 23:27, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

There was a big discussion about the "Cause" section, first with a lot more info added. But then they decided to dynamite it and start over or rather, hold off on writing the causes section until more definitive information is known from an independent investigation team.

It is quite clear that the separatists thought their guys had shot down an AN-26 and took credit for it in several venues before realizing it was an airliner. What is not clear is whether their taking credit for it was due to any specific knowledge of an AA battery firing from their side. There is a video of even a 4 year old boy seeing the plane falling from the sky and saying "look our soldiers shot down a fascist plane".

So the article you cited is interesting and relevant, but does not belong under the "cause" section, because it isn't does not prove that the separatists fired the missile.Cadwallader (talk) 23:37, 20 July 2014 (UTC)

Why were the social media posts deleted then if they aren't evidence of anything? I'll add that if it "is quite clear that the separatists thought their guys had shot down an AN-26 and took credit for it in several venues" why can't the article say that? You want a finger to continue to point at Ukraine until it is established whether the rebels shot down the airliner by accident or on purpose?--Brian Dell (talk) 00:37, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

That one was a bold claim. There is no 'evidence', only 'speculation' about whether or not the rebels thought that. Maybe they were simply afraid of being chased down internationally after the incident, which may or may not even be their fault. This is all under investigation and still unclear. Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 00:57, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

You'll have to ask @Nyttend why he removed this after locking down the page despite the fact the U.S. government repeatedly refers to the social media posts as evidence.--Brian Dell (talk) 00:30, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Maybe because this article isn't about the US government. HiLo48 (talk) 00:50, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Who said that it is? You don't think that NPOV means calling attention to what the U.S. calls attention to instead of solely calling attention to what the Kremlin calls attention to? Where is the problem in presenting both sides here as both sides want their cases presented? I will add that it isn't just the U.S. government, since many media outlets Wikipedians have deemed reliable sources call attention to many of the same things.--Brian Dell (talk) 01:19, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

What do you mean by "both sides"? Russia is obviously directly and significantly involved. The US involvement should logically be small - only one fatality, etc. If there ARE other, more directly involved bodies making claims in this area, clearly attributed quotes may be appropriate, but they need to be discussed here first. This is NOT about the US. HiLo48 (talk) 02:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

OK, so the US government have used these social media posts as their sources for claiming that the rebels shot down the plane. That the State Dept. is even outright saying that it was the rebels (or separatists) is significant, and that they used Strelkovs posts as their evidence is also significant. I feel this should be included. Note, I am not saying that I know who shot down the plane myself, nor do I know that these social media posts are authentic. But they are being treated as so by the American govt. to justify their claim that the separatists are responsible. --Bellerophon5685 (talk) 02:32, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• No. Brian Dell, above, claims that this here basically says that the US bases its claim on social media--a ridiculous and prima facie false summary of a much more complicated account. Drmies (talk) 02:36, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

So... can someone summarize to me exactly why this isn't being mentioned at all in the article when its being reported/repeated in a lot of mainstream media? As long as its properly attributed to the sources, of which there are now quite a few? A google for "MH17 girkin airspace" (airspace being the trigger for the alleged VK quote/post) gets you a thousand plus hits for news sites alone. Zhanzhao (talk) 06:20, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

re-name article

The name of the article at present in and of itself is A) not sufficient to convey the true substance of the situation and story and issue, and B) is somewhat misleading in a way. This article is NOT really about "Malaysia" per se, nor about a "Malaysian airplane" or "flight" primarily. But about a mistaken shoot-down of a civilian commercial aircraft, in general, over Ukraine, presumably probably by pro-Russia rebels and separatists. The emphasis arguably should be on THAT, in the article name and wording. Nothing in the article name even mentions the word "crash" or "shoot-down" or anything. Just a generic un-informing "airlines flight 17". It should be changed or modified, IMO. Regards. Gabby Merger (talk) 02:55, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Oppose – You propose that we change to use inconsistent formatting, which I consider to be unhelpful. Also, this is the actual name of the plane. The plane was owned by Malaysia Airlines, and the specific plane was "Flight 17". Dustin (talk) 02:58, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Comment. Maybe I didn't make myself totally clear. But I never said that the name of the airplane by Malaysia should not be mentioned at all. But merely that the name of the article LACKS what the actual situation is about. It's not primarily about Malaysia, nor its airplane, per se. That is (to be frank) just happenstance. It's that it was a commercial civilian airplane in general, and that it was a shoot-down, by pro-Russia rebels (presumably). And since that's what the topic is definitely primarily about, why is that not conveyed anywhere in the article name? Gabby Merger (talk) 03:03, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Oppose – This is the standard formatting. Every single aircraft wreck has the same title format of operator and flight number. Even the September 11th flights have individual articles, though the date on the template page links to the overall event. I think you simply don't understand the format or that Malaysia Airlines is a company, not a country. 108.94.106.53 (talk) 03:30, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Comment. What you and the other editor don't seem to be getting is that this wasn't simply a "wreck" in some generic sense, like other plane crashes, going to the point of your "standard formatting" argument. It misses the point that this issue (that you hear constantly in the news) is about the WAR in Ukraine, and because of that war and fighting, this "shoot-down" took place. It's the context of warring that's been going on. And that's the main issue in the news. The "standard formatting" for airplane crashes argument misses that (for some reason) and is not all that relevant to the overall gist of this subject matter. This is not some run-of-the-mill "plane wreck". Regards. Gabby Merger (talk) 03:57, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Oppose – Gabby Merger, information pertinent to the context you are discussing is to be found in the relevant articles which do deal with the conflict. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:38, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request: Change "accident" to "incident"

In the introduction and potentially other areas, accident should be changed to incident. Since the exact cause is unknown, it is impossible to tell whether or not the crash was an accident. Further, the airplane was likely shot down by a missile, and targeted missile strikes are generally not accidents. 108.94.106.53 (talk) 03:21, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• Done Alex Bakharev (talk) 05:14, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request on "deadliest shootdown incident"

I have included three links below to support that this was the deadliest aircraft shoot down in history http://www.financialexpress.com/news/malaysia-airlines-mh17-shot-down-top-5-deadliest-attacks-on-airliners/1271130 http://www.torontosun.com/2014/07/17/top-5-deadliest-attacks-on-commercial-airliners http://world.einnews.com/article__detail/214431219?lcode=4ah0VeoaPs62GaRlQf5LNA%3D%3D

And I was also wondering if this fact could be added to the article; as overall it seems much more significant than the fact that it was "the deadliest air incident in the Ukraine, the deadliest involving a Boeing 777 and the deadliest involving Malaysian airlines." Also, isn't it reasonable to say that it was the third deadliest aviation attack overall, after 9/11 and Air India Flight 182? Could this be added as well?

Why are you making a semi-protected edit request? You have well over ten edits and four days since registration. Dustin (talk) 03:35, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Oops. It was fully protected not long ago. Sorry about that. Undescribed (talk) 03:38, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Reactions image - Russia

I think the LAST image that should be in the article should be the Russian government holding a moment of silence in honor of the victims of this crash. They are the ones who are responsible for it, and having this image in the article itself is disrespectful and disgraceful. Imagine having an image of Osama bin Laden praying for the victims of 9/11 on the main 9/11 article. Disgusting. § DDima 03:33, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

That is a very poor, completely non-neutral post. It does not help to improve the article. Please stop pushing your point of view here. HiLo48 (talk) 04:36, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I've removed the image per WP:POV. Considering that Putin's government are in the picture for having provided separatists with munitions, neither Ukrainian or Russian officials using photo ops for the world stage are appropriate. Naturally, Wikipedia is WP:NOTCENSORED, but in terms of WP:IMAGE RELEVANCE I fail to see how anything outside of countries whose nationals were killed being represented is justifiable.

Personally, I don't see how the Netherlands flag at half-mast enhances the content. Images should only be used where they are informative. Per WP:NOT#JOURNALISM, the use of images for the sake of posturing and emotional impact is not acceptable. No more propaganda from contributors, thank you. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 04:22, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• Sorry Iryna, but I would like to disagree. Assuming you and DDima are right, is not it remarkable and important that they observed the minute of silence? This is the reason the image should stay in the article. This is possibly the most remarkable image on the page. This is not propaganda, but merely statement of fact. You and DDima object on moral grounds; such criteria have nothing to do with creating encyclopedic content. My very best wishes (talk) 04:51, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

The image was already removed. I don't think it was useful indeed. However the half-mast Dutch flag moment is, as it illustrates what a great tragedy it is to the Dutch people. Commentaries such as the one many by OP are more than inappropriate, they should deserve disciplinary measures (starting with PM of Australia - jk) Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass (talk) 04:54, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

@Spaceinvadersaresmokinggrass: It was removed because I removed it. It just so happened that I was working on several articles concurrently and didn't post my rationale until I'd finished presenting information at a DRN... so that was just a case of time lag. As is evident, I did leave the Dutch flag in place as it is relevant and unbiased: I was merely expressing my own take on the use of images when they start crowding the text. And, yes, Abbott is a moron. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:11, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

@My very best wishes: While I understand your thought process on the use of the image, this is Wikipedia and it is not our place to work in subtleties (unless you want to add a caption stating "Hypocrisy on display in Putin's administration"). Whether the image is being used for being 'remarkable' (as you would have it) or as propaganda, the objective is WP:NPOV. Using it in either context violates the most fundamental policies of Wikipedia. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 05:18, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Collapsed version of 2013–2014 unrest in Ukraine

I'm sure I saw {{2013–2014 unrest in Ukraine}} on this page in a collapsed state at some stage, but I can't find it in the history, and with a little bit of checking I haven't found how it would have been implemented. I know it would be against WP:COLLAPSE, but I'd prefer it to be in the article and collapsed than not in the article to "fix the appearance of this template".

And while I tried to confirm how to do this User:Illegitimate Barrister has put the campaign box back in its place, exactly what I was trying to avoid :-( Mark Hurd (talk) 04:40, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

The template {{2013–2014 unrest in Ukraine}} was removed by me because it was pushing the passenger/crew by nationality box too far to the left. Dustin (talk) 05:19, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, I know why you removed it. I tried putting the table of "People on board" on the LHS but that looked no good in the preview.

I just didn't want the template to be removed completely. For the next ten hours, at least there's a reminder of it here. Mark Hurd (talk) 06:03, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

@Markhurd: I am not sure, but if you want the bot to wait longer before archiving, I think you might be able to use a fake timestamp with a later time. I believe that if you sign without a timestamp (you use three tildes instead of four), the bot won't ever archive it, but I don't think we want this discussion to be permanent. In any case, I do think that there should an option to collapse the table or something. There doesn't appear to be any other suitable location in the article to put {{2013–2014 unrest in Ukraine}} in its current state. Dustin (talk) 06:13, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Countries included in the Reactions - Countries section

As start - apologies i'm not good at linking to things. I'm still a bit new and don't have all the shortcuts figured out.

In the : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17#Countries section, I reverted the following edit: 02:58, 21 July 2014‎ Drmies (talk | contribs)‎ . . (88,707 bytes) (-2,689)‎ . . (→‎Countries: trim predictable responses from uninvolved countries) don't see it being helpful to curb the countries included in the 'response' section. If people have problems with the substance of what's included in the 'response' write-up for a specific country, then i think that's fine.

But I don't think it's reasonable, in the context of this site, to draw a black line on what countries should be included in that section....and if there is a 'blackline' re the inclusion/exclusion of certain countries - that should be clarified in the heading. Otherwise - it's the content of the information that should be reviewed - not the inclusion of any specific country.

Again - sorry if my inclusion on this page isn't totally clean (feel free to leave me a msg giving me tips on how to write better). I hope I expressed my opinion enough that people get what I mean.

• There has already been discussion on this, earlier on this page ("Reactions"). We don't need to clarify in any heading: we need to make a judicious judgment as editors. What you're suggesting is that basically every response by every single entity should be allowed; in my edit summaries I have indicated why certain responses could be deemed relevant. As for content: all those responses say "it's a tragedy and we should do everything to help solve the situation". So I'm going to revert this edit, since clearly South Africa, India, and Switzerland have nothing to do in any material or political sense with the aftermath of the tragedy. Thank you, Drmies (talk) 05:28, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

That's nice. Then the heading should be changed. I don't understand your reference to 'every single entity' - the topic line specifies 'countries'. If the subject doesn't include responses to all countries (subject to appropriate edits) then the subject line should be changed. Given the topic heading, it's not appropriate for you to exclude things as you have. If you don't think the content of the 'countries' qualifies, that's one thing - but it's not appropriate for you to unilaterally delete response from countries.

On this basis, I've reverted your edit.

This discussion should be elevated. My position is as follows

1. The topic/subtopic is "Reactions - 'countries'" 2. There is no clarification re what 'countries' qualify as being included in the heading 3. There are concerns about 'reactions' being posted for various 'countries' that editors don't perceive as being germane to the topic 4. The response to this is by deleting the 'country' response as though it was never added 5. ^^ is not appropriate.

You need to sign your posts. You can do that by typing four tildes ~ ~ ~ ~ (no spaces) or in the alternative you can simply click on the signature icon in the editing area and it will be automatically generated for you. Thanks and welcome to Wikipedia.-- Isaidnoway (talk) 06:23, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Most of this section is really boring and not saying anything really, I would list only responses that are either saying something different than "how sad we are that this has happened" or from countries deeply involved ie The Netherlands, Ukraine, Malaysia, Australia.Andrewgprout (talk) 05:59, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I don't like these "Reactions" sections as a rule, as they're not very encyclopedic. But if we're gonna have such a section then it makes sense to stick just to the countries directly involved.Volunteer Marek (talk) 05:57, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I 100% agree with the problems with these sections and all else being said. But I still don't agree with the i idea that the section is being presented as 'countries' if people think that there are countries who should be curbed out (subject to the content of 'country' comment being inconsistent with what's appropriate on wikipedia).

For those of you who feel that the section should represent the countries directly involved - then why not change the heading from 'countries' to 'countries direction involved'?

Going back to my original problem - it's not that i'm so insistent that every country get must have a flag with a voice - my problem is if there are 'curbs' on the countries involved (such as 'they must be directly involved' then why would anyone shy away from that clarification?)

we should go one way or the other. if people's opinions are that the only countries that should be included are those who are directly involved, i'm willing to get behind that - so long as the subject heading makes clear those are the countries being included. if your own opinion is that only the countries directly involved warrant inclusion - why would you have a problem with that being specified in the subject heading?

if you want to leave the subject heading as 'countries' - then i think people have to be more open minded re country involvement (subject to the content being in line with wiki standards).

...my point remains - either clarify the heading to make clear inclusion or leave as is and accept the widened net.

I have to agree with VM. Public commiserations are going to be pouring in, the majority keeping a careful political distance from stating that those who are responsible are really naughty and ought to be punished. Does this mean it is in any way constructive to end up with 100+ 'official' expressions of sadness at how awful this was? Keep it down to countries directly involved, or where the country is taking a definitive position with real world political ramifications. If readers are interested to know what countries are taking some form of action or absolute position, they shouldn't need to scroll through a couple of megabytes of flag icons and unremarkable responses. Ergo, this should be interpreted as supporting the idea of redacting the content there and providing an apt subsection title accommodating exclusion of non-significant reactions. --Iryna Harpy (talk) 06:29, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

If 'countries' responding carries with it a minimizing factor, why not clarify that up front?

I, personally, don't have a theoretical problem with 'minimizing'/'editing' whatsoever - and in fact agree it might be necessary - just as long as the subheading doesn't cause any confusion.

That's my big issue - it's not the editing, it's the subtitle. i just don't like the subtitle with the editing going on. i can deal with the editing as long as it's a better subtitle

• I also agree that some of the memorial quotes need to go. At this point, I think the only ones that should remain are those directly involved and like IH suggested the ones who are "taking a definitive position with real world ramifications". I don't care about the subsection title one way or the other, it looks fine to me. Isaidnoway (talk) 07:10, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Alphabetised again.... Really?

This whole section turns out to be a nightmare. Everybody wants their country in. Some people want some kind of logical order (e.g. the countries that matter/were stricken hardest somewhere near the top of the list) while others think the alphabet is the best way to organize this (resulting in readers to have to dredge through response of Ireland - 1 dual nationality victim before finding Ukrainian, Malaysian or Dutch response). An alphabetizer has changed the order overnight without any more justification than saying it is now alphabetized (but no explanation why).

In my opinion we have more or less three options now. Either (1) we decide to throw the whole section out, or (2) limit the list to only a few (many fewer than 10) countries - and rigorously stick to that(!); or (3) we go the other way and construct a table with each and every country in the world with their response. We can even make that sortable on alphabet and number of casualties. The current in between compromise has been a POV fork from the start of the whole incident and we need to do something about that.

In case we go for deletion I have been starting to integrate some of the more relevant information into other sections (e.g. half mast in Netherlands and Malaysia to aftermath). This will help to clean up the section later on in any case. Arnoutf (talk) 08:47, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

I agree. I trimmed out Ireland and slimmed down some of the worst quoting. --John (talk) 08:56, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. Ireland was of course an example, the same would go for Romania, South Africa (each 1 dual nationality), Canada (1 casualty) and to a lesser extend Germany (4 casualties). The loss of these individuals is of course as appalling as all other losses; but I doubt whether readability is served with all those responses. Arnoutf (talk) 09:17, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Not to be confused with MH370?

Do we need the hatnote "Not to be confused with Malaysia Airlines Flight 370"? I don't think someone is going to confuse the number 17 with 370. Lcmortensen (mailbox) 06:17, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

• I agree with you personally - because I know about these things, as do you (and many others). With that said, keep in mind that there are people not so knowledgeable. Bad (but true) example - after this flight when down I was outside and heard my neighbours talking - and one of them asked whether the flight that went down was the same one that disappeared a few months ago - as if MH370 had been flying around the planet the last 5 months and was suddenly shot down. The point being i totally agree with your 'starting point' mentally - but would say just leave well enough alone on the tag - b/c there are people out there who suffer from confusion (and there is no harm for leaving well enough alone imo)

Causes

Am I the only one who thinks that 3 sentences for such a high-interest section is not enough? I agree that the gigantic section with all the aggressive suggestions/declarations was a bit much, but I do thin that readers coming here are curious at least of a summary of what do the Ukrainians or the Russians accuse each other of, or how do the explain the events. Nergaal (talk) 06:29, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

In my view no section can be larger than the facts. So far there are hardly any facts, so expanding the section would be speculation in my view. It will be filled in once more definitive facts come to the table, but since the cause of this specific aircrash is fairly simple it may remain somewhat short; unless of course we want to integrate the whole Ukrainian insurgance as direct cause for this crash. It is not always that larger is better in such cases. Arnoutf (talk) 08:23, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Yes, we don't want to turn this into a section where the claims of every player in the conflict are aired. That would add nothing to the article apart from POV bullshit. HiLo48 (talk) 09:06, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Should this be here?

"However, in a recent article by Paul Craig Roberts, and in contrast to most main-stream media reports, Roberts is of the opinion that - mistake or otherwise - it was the Ukrainian military who are most likely responsible for the downing of MH17.[162]"-- Source barely notable, referenced article full of unreferenced assertions and assumptions some of which would be laughable if there was anything about this to laugh about, and seems to have been shoved randomly onto the end of the article.

No. I've removed it. Please do not restore without a proper source. --John (talk) 08:54, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Protected edit request for air-to-air missile theory

I can't figure out why this edit was deleted in the Cause section. It cites published media sources. May I put it back, and can it be protected from being taken down again? Thank you, JP Leonard

/* Cause */ Russian sources, air to air missile possibility

The Russian news agency TASS reported that Ukraine moved a BUK system to the Donetsk area on July 16.

The air-to-air missile possibility has received less attention, although the day before the disaster, Kiev claimed a Russian MiG 29 shot down one of its fighters. The Russian journal Politikus.ru concluded the MH17 was downed by an air-to-air fragmented rod warhead . Russia Today/RT posted an eyewitness report of a "Ukrainian air force plane that followed the Malaysian Boeing 777," and gave rise to speculation that the actual target could have been President Putin's jet, which was in the general area at the time, on its return trip from Brazil.

JPLeonard (talk) 08:51, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Moving trucks is not the cause of the crash - so no the first line does not fit.

The same goes to the MIG story by the BBC - the shooting down of a Ukrainian fighter is not the cause of this planes crash.

I do not know who in Politikus.ru concluded this, but to my knowledge no-one of any authority anywhere came up with a definitive conclusion although the SAM theory is supported by the vast majority of sources (including Ukrainian and Russian sources). Simply put, the evidence as is now is about 100:1 for SAM over AAM, so our reporting should reflect that. So no that cannot go in. (btw the howstuffworks references does not give anything specific on this case so that is an irrelevant reference).

Finally the old Putin's plane conspiracy theory is back. Well, it was never closer than about a 1000 km to the shootdown site, so that would be some confusion indeed. If we go there we can as well suggest Air Force 1 was the original target (also in the general area - ie Northern Hemisphere at the time).

So no do NOT put this mess in. Your request for immediate protection is also way out of line as that sounds like claiming ownership of part of the article , and some kind of sanctioned pushing of a specific point of view. Arnoutf (talk) 09:09, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

Comparison with September 11 attacks

The article says "With 298 deaths, the crash of MH17 is the deadliest aviation incident since the September 11 attacks". Those only involved a total of 246 people on four planes. This is one plane with 298 deaths. I know there were many others killed in the September 11 attacks, but it seems a weird comparison to me. I'm not sure what it demonstrates. HiLo48 (talk) 08:51, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

True, it does not say much; although implicitly it raises terrorism associations (not very neutral is it?). It is the largest single airplane incident since 1985, but that was way back in a different generation of airplanes and attributed to incorrect repairs so that comparison is also not that relevant. I ma ok with removal. Arnoutf (talk) 09:24, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

The Obama pic

I boldly removed the image of Obama on the phone, on the basis that it demonstrates very little about the plane crash, and this isn't really a major event for the US anyway. And there's no evidence that he's talking to anyone, let alone who the caption says he's talking to. Someone restored the image without even an Edit summary, so I don't know their reasoning. There's mine above. What purpose does that image serve? HiLo48 (talk) 09:01, 21 July 2014 (UTC)

We are very sorry! What a terrible shame!

"Russian citizens brought flowers to the Dutch embassy in Moscow. Among the flowers was a note in English that read: "We are very sorry! What a terrible shame!" - Is this worth to be mentioned on Wikipedia? Looks like an anonymous person that happened to be in Moscow (that's all we know) wanted to turn all the blame for the plane crash to Russia and its people and luckily got quoted on Wikipedia. This cannot be referred as a general stance of ordinary Russians on the issue. There is even no proof that the note was written by a Russian. Wikipedia has become a propaganda machine. That's sad.