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Battle of Kherson was nominated as a Warfare good article, but it did not meet the good article criteria at the time (April 11, 2024, reviewed version). There are suggestions on the review page for improving the article. If you can improve it, please do; it may then be renominated.

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This article contains a translation of Бої за Херсон from uk.wikipedia.

A fact from this article was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the On this day section on March 2, 2024.

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for speedy deletion:

• ZSU capture abandoned Russian ammo storage in Blahodatne.webm

You can see the reason for deletion at the file description page linked above. —Community Tech bot (talk) 18:51, 13 November 2022 (UTC)

Controversy section

Hey Curbon7. Since you added the controversy template to the article, do you have any immediate issues/see non-neutral issues with the section? I'm asking because after my copy/edit request out right now for the article, I was hoping to GAN it. Any thoughts would be useful. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 03:12, 29 November 2023 (UTC)

Generally, such controversy sections should be intertwined with the article rather than separated out. Good luck on the GAN. Curbon7 (talk) 18:24, 30 November 2023 (UTC)

Natural and logical sectioning and organization

This way the timeline is subdivided, with each day as its own sub-subsection, isn't great. It doesn't make for a logical experience when looking at the table of contents. It might be possible to organize it by "phases" of the battle instead, like how battle of Avdiivka (2022–present) does it. HappyWith (talk) 21:40, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Do you have any suggestions? Maybe 24-28 Feb is around Kherson and then 1-2 March is in Kherson? But then again, 24 Feb had the airport strike plus 24-26 Feb involved the battles at the bridge, which is also in Kherson. I know what you mean that it isn't ideal, but I'm honestly not sure how else to organize it besides the timeline, since fighting took place around Kherson and in Kherson just about every day. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 21:48, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I see your point. I might try to do some research to find retrospectives on the battle that might help us with analyzing and organizing the article in a logical structure. HappyWith (talk) 21:55, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Hey HappyWithWhatYouHaveToBeHappyWith, I'm on a self-imposed 0RR restriction, but I think at least one reference (the NYT reference named under "falls" (<ref name="falls"/>) should probably be added next to the Russian victory in the infobox. Some of the battles, even when it is clear who the victor is also have a reference next to the "X victory" in the infobox, i.e. Battle of Kyiv (2022). Also, since there is a common mistake that Ukraine won the "Battle of Kherson" (due to some sources stating the "Battle of Kherson" was the event in November), the source should probably remain in the infobox at least for the time being. Thoughts? The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 22:29, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I don't think that's necessary - there's a hatnote at the top of the article saying this isn't the same thing as the November event, and there's sourced text that say it was a Russian victory easily findable in the lead and article body. Per MOS:INFOBOXREF, "References are acceptable in some cases, but generally not needed in infoboxes if the content is repeated (and cited) elsewhere or if the information is obvious". HappyWith (talk) 22:32, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

I've reorganized it along the lines of the way this article does. Let me know if you have suggestions or criticism, I can adjust it. HappyWith (talk) 23:00, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

Unit flags

I think a nice touch to the article would be to add some unit flags in the infobox like it was done in the 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive page. Alexis Coutinho (talk) 22:03, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

MOS:INFOBOXFLAG recommends against this. HappyWith (talk) 22:06, 5 December 2023 (UTC)

😢 Alexis Coutinho (talk) 04:52, 6 December 2023 (UTC)

@HappyWithWhatYouHaveToBeHappyWith, the link you've provided appears to refer to infoboxes for military conflicts as exceptions to MOS:INFOBOXFLAG. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 02:11, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Read it in full. It is not a blanket exception. Cinderella157 (talk) 05:27, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Edit request: "Teroboronov"

Please change "Kherson Teroboronov" to "Kherson Territorial Defense Forces," which is the English equivalent of the term that appears in the Ukrainian article. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 17:24, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

 Done The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 17:41, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

WP:SYNTH: "Beginning the battle of Mykolaiv"

In the "Aftermath" section, the following sentence appears to violate WP:SYNTHESIS:

Later in March, Russia advanced westward, beginning the battle of Mykolaiv.

I'm making this claim because it seems that this sentence reaches a conclusion not explicitly stated by the source - the NYT article makes no mention of the Russian westward troop movement marking the beginning of a battle. Indeed, the bulk of RS report on combat in and around Mykolaiv well before the fall of Kherson, including during the last few days of February. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 17:36, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

 Done — Removed. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 17:38, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Inconsistency in spelling of the surname of Kherson's mayor

The spellings "Kolykhaev," "Kolykhaiev," and "Kolykhayev" are variably used. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 17:42, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Good catch. It's a bit like the Zelenskyy/Zelensky/Zelenskiy situation, where there is no established transliteration of his surname so RS use various different ones - but in this article, we should stick to one, preferably the one used in the name of his article. I'll try to get to this when I have time. HappyWith (talk) 18:27, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

I just went through and changed them all to Ihor Kolykhaiev to match the title of his Wiki article. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 19:31, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Bullet points

Hey Cinderella157, I got a question. I looked over MOS:MIL and I am unable to locate where it says bullet points are not allowed. Could you point me to that and/or quote where it says that? The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 23:20, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

See section on infoboxes. It gives voice to the template documentation and explicitly states what is allowed. Dot points are not included in what is allowed. c (talk) 23:26, 8 December 2023 (UTC)

Hi WeatherWriter, I took a look at the bullet points you had added and had a question about their content. Note that this is not related to the question on whether or not MOS:MIL allows for the use of bullet points, I just wasn't sure where else to put this - feel free to remove my reply and discuss elsewhere if you prefer.

• Russia captures Kherson and most of Kherson Oblast

To avoid possible synth I wanted to ask you to justify the implication that the occupation of most of the oblast was the result of a battle that took place only "in and around Kherson" according to the infobox and the content of the body. To geographically illustrate what I mean, out of the five raions of the Kherson Oblast, it is not clear how control over substantial parts of Beryslav Raion, Henichesk Raion, Skadovsk Raion, and Kakhovka Raion would have been affected by this battle.

SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 00:44, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

It wouldn't have been a synth violation. Some sources do state that fact. SCEEUS states, "Russian troops attacking from the illegally annexed Crimean Peninsula quickly captured most of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia Oblast" and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty stated, "Russian forces hold most of the part of the Kherson region that is on the east bank of the Dnieper." Exact raion controll wouldn't matter too much since sources state Russia had control of most of the oblast. Even a visual of the Russian occupation of Kherson Oblast infobox map elludes to that. Either way, the discussion I started at MOS:MIL will help solve if they are allowed or not. Some of the most searched battles have them and others don't, so the debate topic should get solved one way or another in that discussion. Thanks for the help and idea to avoid a synth issue! Cheers! The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 01:08, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

User:WeatherWriter, thank you for providing these souces. To be clear, I am not disputing that the majority of the Kherson oblast came under Russian control early on in the war. That's essentially indisputable.

What I do find questionable is the assertion you attempted to include in the results section of the infobox: the assertion that the majority of the oblast fell as a result of the battle covered in this article. The combat we're defining as the Battle of Kherson here seems to only have taken place within the city limits, in satellite villages such as Chornobaivka, and the nearby Antonivka Bridge; hence my mention of places like Skadovsk and the Beryslav Raion, relatively far from the action. Do RS claim that the oblast fell because the city fell? I wasn't able to locate that claim in the provided references.

SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 01:59, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

No, RS don't say that specifically. That said, the battle for Kherson Oblast was this battle, as given by the numerous other towns and cities mentioned during the battle, which Russia all gained control of prior to or on March 2. The occupation/military administration began once Kherson fell, i.e. Russia had almost all of Kherson Oblast when Kherson fell. It's sort of like how Vichy France began right after the ending of the Battle of France ended. So, while RS don't state it, it is an understood thing. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 06:18, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Dear @WeatherWriter:

Many thanks for your reply.

I'm glad you brought up the numerous other towns and cities mentioned during the battle. I was going to add another Talk page section to address this but decided that five in a single day was probably more than enough. By numerous other towns and cities, I assume you are primarily referring this sentence on the page: At the end of the day, Russian troops had captured several towns in the region including Henichesk, Skadovsk, Kakhovka, Nova Kakhovka, Tavriisk, as well as the Kakhovka Dam and the North Crimean Canal.

There's a major problem with this sentence: it's completely unsourced, and has been since you added it to the article on November 17th. From your edit summary, I became aware that you were adding content from uk:Бої за Херсон, and were calling on editors to check there for the attribution. Unfortunately, I checked the analogue sentence there and it also lacks a source. As things stand now, I believe the sentence constitutes an WP:EXCEPTIONAL claim that must be struck from the article until WP:RS can be found to support it, which will be relatively difficult to achieve considering the bulk of RS state that Russians didn't enter Skadovsk until March 9, 2022, like this one quoting the mayor of the city.

So, ignoring that one sentence for now, let's explore the numerous other towns and cities mentioned here. I see the following places: Kherson, Nova Kakhovka, Antonivka, Sadove, Oleshky, Chornobaivka, Zymivnyk, and Komyshany. With the exception of Nova Kakhovka, all of the numerous other towns and cities mentioned fall within an approximate 20km radius of the city center of Kherson, roughly following the curve of the Kherson Ring Road. Please understand that when we are talking about the Kherson Oblast here, we are talking about a place with a square area of nearly thirty thousand square kilometers. You can not realistically justify that the battle for Kherson Oblast was this battle when all the significant combat operations of this battle took place in a twenty kilometer radius.

In my opinion, once we start getting into comments like So, while RS don't state it, it is an understood thing to justify our arguments, we are entering extremely murky and frankly dangerous territory as editors, especially as it relates to a conflict still going on its second birthday with minimal formal military-historical analysis to draw on. I need to remind you, per WP:PST, that analyses and interpretive or synthetic claims about primary sources must be referenced to a secondary or tertiary source and must not be an original analysis of the primary-source material by Misplaced Pages editors.

My very best wishes and thank you for your assistance in implementing my desired changes so far.

SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 07:12, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

• Cinderella157, do you have any other reason as to why bullet points should not be in this article? When asked about this on the MOS:MIL talk page, two different experienced editors basically said it wasn't a MOS:MIL problem. Basically, saying it isn't allowed under MOS:MIL isn't valid, just because it isn't there. You can see their replies here: Misplaced Pages talk:Manual of Style/Military history#Dot (Bullet) Points - Proposal to allow. One of them even said, It doesn't seem pertinent to this page, since it's a content dispute, and it belongs at Talk:Battle of Kherson. So, if I may, would you mind self-reverting or at least saying a different reason to not have bullet points? Also, if you decide to self-revert, feel free to help us not have a SYNTH issue with those bullet points. Cheers! The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 06:35, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

WP:ONUS applies. I don't think you can declare a consensus either here or at WT:MILMOS based on 2 responses there (that are arguably not incontrovertible) after 6.5 hours. Cinderella157 (talk) 11:26, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

Edit requests: "194th Belozersky Battalion"

Hello again all, I'd like to address this page's mention of the "194th Belozersky Battalion."

The origin of this terminology appears to be the article titled "Подвиг у Бузковому парку," which tells the story of a military unit called the "194-ий білозерський батальйон" in Ukrainian.

(Presumably) machine translation turned "білозерський" into "Belozersky," likely influenced by the existence of several notable Russian people and Russian places named Belozersky.

But it must be noted that this translation process has taken a Ukrainian word and returned an English word that uses Russian romanization. Given that language is a particularly sensitive issue on articles relating to the Russo-Ukrainian crisis, I don't anticipate any opposition to my request that this article follow the Ukrainian romanization, Bilozersky, in order to properly represent the name of the military unit in question.

In addition to using Ukrainian romanization, I have another suggestion for the way that we translate the name of this military unit. The word "Bilozersky" here is just the adjectival form of Bilozerka, the village west of Kherson where the battalion was headquarted. The article mentions that nearly everyone in the battalion was a resident of a village in the Bilozerka Raion - specifically, it mentions people from Posad-Pokrovske, Chornobaivka, Stanislav, Naddniprianske, and Kyselivka. So maybe it's better for the readers' understanding if the name is translated as the 194th Bilozerka Battalion. Grammatically, it makes no real difference, and there's also the opportunity include a link to the location, so that the name appears as 194th Bilozerka Battalion. I'll leave this suggestion to the discretion of the editors with the ability to edit this page.

I also want to point out that for the Ukrainska Pravda article which contains all this information, the date of publication appears to have been mis-transcribed. It was published on November 8, 2022, not March 8, 2022.

Another small catch: In the infobox, you might also consider "pushing forward" the name of this battalion by one space, in order to represent its subservience to the 124th Kherson Territorial Defense Brigade, which is already well-established.

SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 00:18, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

I will take a look at these in the morning and correct them. They all need fixed, but it will take some formatting/control + f searches to get them all. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 06:39, 9 December 2023 (UTC)

February 2024 checks

Hey SaintPaulOfTarsus, whenever you are done with all the changes for the article, shoot me a ping here. I was not anticipating really any changes to the article, so the article already went through a copy/edit and was a GA nomination.

Part of the GA nomination criteria is that the article doesn't change much day to day. So a ping would be much appreciated once the changes are done, since the copy/edit process probably needs to take place again and the GA nomination may need to be withdrawn pending it. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 06:01, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

I'll try to expedite my edits so that the process isn't interrupted too much. But there's a lot more information that can be added, especially from non-English sources. In my opinion, as it stands now the article barely scratches the surface. I'll make this my main priority and let you know when I'm done. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 06:35, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

GA Review

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.

This review is transcluded from Talk:Battle of Kherson/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Nominator: WeatherWriter (talk · contribs)

Reviewer: Amitchell125 (talk · contribs) 17:23, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

Happy to review this article. I notice you are (as of the end of March) on a Wikibreak—please let me know when you are ready to start working with me on the review. AM

@Amitchell125: Hey Amitchell125! I am available to assist with any questions from the review anytime. My userpage says partial Wikibreak only because I am going to be active for roughly an hour a day. That said, I am available to respond to questions that arise from the GA review. Cheers and thank you for being willing to review the article! (Courtesy pinging @SaintPaulOfTarsus as they also contributed a ton to the article after the GAN was started.) The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 22:20, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

WeatherWriter: Thank you. Your ping here reminded me of the discussion we had above in February, where I said I would let you know once I was done adding content to the article. Unfortunately offline life took priority and I never ended up making some of my intended edits, and probably will not do so for a while – I foresee another wikibreak in my near future. But I wanted to return the courtesy and make you aware that there is some information I plan on adding sometime in the future (nothing groundbreaking, just supplementary), as long as it can be done in a manner that doesn't jeopardize this nomination process. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 23:54, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

@WeatherWriter and SaintPaulOfTarsus: It would be helpful to allow me to complete my review comments once the article is stable. Is more time needed to update the article before I start? Amitchell125 (talk) 08:07, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

Review comments

Leads section / infobox

• The lead needs to be expanded to double its current size, in order to be a better summary of the article (see MOS:LEAD).
• Kherson, Kherson Oblast, Ukraine in the infobox need only read ‘Kherson, Ukraine’.
• Link 192 and 194 in the infobox 124th Territorial Defense Brigade (Ukraine).
• Link personnel carrier; rocket launcher.
• I would consider enlarging the map to fit the infobox.
• The battle of Kherson – battle needs a capital (in both cases).
• by Russian forces - imo should be within the middle of the sentence, not at the end.
• Kherson was the first major city - ‘Kherson is the first major city’ sounds better imo, as the war is still ongoing.

1.1 Russian invasion

I have gone ahead and added a map to help understand the events of the battle. Please feel free to delete it if you wish. Amitchell125 (talk) 20:20, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

• Link Dmytro IshchenkoІщенко (Дмитро Миколайович (uk)), using Template:Interlanguage link.
• Link column (Column (formation)).
• Dup link - Nova Kakhovka.
• a large Russian force – large is a redundant word here, and so can be removed.
• by Ukrainian military expert Serhii Hrabskyi – is unnecessary, and i would remove it.
• the town of Chaplynka – Chaplynka is much smaller than a town.
• for the city's defense - should be ‘for the defense of Kherson’ (as it has not yet been introduced).
• The Kherson International Airport - simply ‘Kherson International Airport’?
• Thereafter – ‘Afterwards’ sounds slightly less formal.
• nearby makes no sense in this context.
• Antonivka links to a set index page, to the actual village, so the link needs to be replaced.
• of the Territorial Defense Forces. – not GA, but it is normal practice to have references in numerical order (this happens here and in other places in the article).

1.2 Battle for the Antonivka Road Bridge

• Dup link - Antonivka.
• 8 kilometers – all distances need to be in both km and miles (if not already done), use Template:Convert.
• the city of Mykolaiv - this needs to be moved to where Mykolaiv is first introduced in the section.

1.3 Ukrainian counterattack

• Dup link – Oleshky.
• Link Tweet (Tweet (social media)); the Kyiv Independent; checkpoint (Security checkpoint).
• I would call Radensk a village (or amend near the towns of Radensk and Oleshky to ‘near Radensk and Oleshky’).
• in the town of Chornobaivka – perhaps ‘in Chornobaivka’, as it is a village.
• There is a tag that needs to be sorted.

1.4 Encirclement and Russian victory

• Dup links - Kherson International Airport; 124th Territorial Defense Brigade.
• Link Lilac Park (Бузковий парк (uk)).
• Link Kherson Refinery (and amend Kherson Oil Refinery to 'Kherson Refinery').
• Link Svobody Square (Площа Свободи (Херсон) (uk), amended to 'Freedom Square').
• "finishing off" – should be replaced with something less euphemistic (see MOS:EUPH).

2 Aftermath

• Dup link - CNN.
• Link Ukrainian government (Government of Ukraine).
• Consider amending who were armed to ‘who they found armed’ to improve the prose slightly.

4.1 Treachery and collaboration

• Unlink United States (MOS:OL).
• Consider linking Journal of Advanced Military Studies (School of Advanced Military Studies).
• Chatham House think tank – MOS:SOB, consider amending to something like ...’Chatham House, the British-based think tank’.
• Introduce and link Zelenskyy (using his full name).
• Link aide (Aide-de-camp); airstrike.
• I would simplify ...Russia had its agents infiltrated into the Ukrainian security forces.… to ‘Russia had its agents infiltrated into the Ukrainian security forces’.
• SBU should be unabbreviated.

4.2 Significance

• Some of the information in this section sounds obscure. El País – why is it notable that this newspaper described the defeat in this way? Is there a more general consensus that this is the case? Why is the information about the ‘measured spike in bots’ important enough to include here?
• by analysts - seems unnecessary.

5 See also

• 2022 Chornobaivka attacks should not be included here, as the link is already in the text.
• I would query including Pavel Filatyev here. He is not particularly related to the article (see MOS:ALSO).

6 References

• Ref 60 (Smart) has an error message.
• What makes you think Ref 20 (Twitter) is a reliable source? (see WP:USERG).
• Ref 23 (Daily Sabah) has a tag.

• Strictly speaking the following is outside the scope of a GA review (as long as the references can be accessed and are relevant), but for GA the format used should be consistent (MOS:REFERENCES). Some points to consider:

• Ref 3 (Pavel Fitalyev) does not have the surname put before the first name.
• Avoid using Ukrainian text (e.g. Ref 5 (Рєуцький, Костянтин)), but include it where the words are also in English (e.g. "Вони встали за Херсон. Історії оборонців вільного міста" should read something like "Вони встали за Херсон. Історії оборонців вільного міста" ("They stood up for Kherson. Stories of the defenders of the free city").
• Where articles are not in English, the language has not always been given (e.g. Ref 13 (Ukrainska Pravda)).
• Ref 14 (The Kyiv Independent) – link the newspaper.
• The numerous quotes take up quite a lot of space and are not applied in a consistent way. Are they really needed?
• (not GA) Ref 38 (Landry) has (News article), which is not needed.

7 External links

• Could this source not be incorporated into the article?

I have yet to do spot checks on the references, these will follow shortly. Amitchell125 (talk) 06:40, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Spot checks

(The version of the article use is this one.)

• Ref 2 - OK
• Refs 6/9 - both OK but here is no need to cite this statement (it is cited in the text of the article and is non-controversial).
• Ref 19 - OK but mayor Ihor Kolykhaiev announced that Kherson remained under Ukrainian control – it was the website that reported it.
• Ref 36 - The text is not cited by this reference.
• Ref 41 - OK
• Ref 50 - The text is not cited by this reference.
• Ref 58 - OK
• Ref 59 - described by analysts as "a gateway to Crimea" – this phrase was said by only one person.

On hold

I'm putting the article on hold for a week until 11 April to allow time for the issues raised to be addressed. Regards, Amitchell125 (talk) 15:54, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Failing

Failing the nomination due to a lack of activity, but hopefully this will soon be re-nominated. Amitchell125 (talk) 07:15, 11 April 2024 (UTC)

Overwhelming majority of use of term "Battle of Kherson" refers to different events

Kherson, we have a problem. My analysis below shows that an estimated 93% of instances of reliable sources using the term "Battle of Kherson" use it to refer to events not covered by this article whatsoever.

I performed a Google search for the exact string "Battle of Kherson" (not case-sensitive) on 13 April 2024. Of approximately 157 search results, I managed to access 47 unique pages from seemingly reliable sources (methodology is below) that used the term "Battle of Kherson" a total of 65 times. All direct quotes are included here with context. Notable authors (those with their own Misplaced Pages pages) have been denoted in parentheses.

I welcome discussion on whether Battle of Kherson remains an appropriate article title in light of this evidence. Questions for consideration: Should a parenthetical disambiguator be added? Should "battle" be replaced with word|s used to describe these events more frequently, e.g. "Russian capture of Kherson"? SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 08:39, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

The trouble is the events are so recent and so complex that its hard to know how future historians are going to qualify these; for example, from a historiographic perspective, the entire 2022 Kherson counteroffensive can reasonably be considered to be a singular large battle for Kherson, similar to the Battle of Berlin. A parenthesis disambiguator may be a band-aid fix for now, but this is definitely something that needs coming back to. Curbon7 (talk) 09:34, 14 April 2024 (UTC)

Update on GA review comments above

I have implemented some of the more minor recommendations made in the GA review above; I plan on leaving the remaining points to other editors, as I am less familiar with certain sections of this article. For the sake of convenience, I am leaving a record here of which changes I have applied.

SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 23:55, 15 April 2024 (UTC)

Discussion on use of Valentyna Romanova in casualties section

Romanova's article, on the topic of decentralization in Ukraine, makes a passing mention of Kherson, saying, without a citation footnote, that the territorial defence unit – up to 300 military personnel – continued to defend the city when the Russian army entered Kherson in tanks. The entire Kherson territorial defence unit was shot in battle by the invaders, which is interpreted by editors on this page as Ukraine sustained 300 military losses during the battle, with the entire Ukrainian defense force at Kherson having been killed during the fighting. This constitutes an WP:exceptional claim and is easily disproven by sources that are far more appropriate to be used in this article like Ukrainska Pravda 1 2 3 which managed to conduct interviews with no less than fourteen living former and current members of the 124th Brigade (the Kherson TrO) who resisted the Russian capture of Kherson: Ihor Likhnov, Mykhailo Baliuk, Ihor Kuraian, Mykola Zozulia, Ihor Hryhorenko, Stanislav Vazanov, Dmytro Ishchenko, Serhii Serheiev, Oleksandr Fediunin, Oleksii Vorontsov, Oleksandr Berezovskii, Oleksandr Kozak, Yevhen call sign "Snake", Oleh call sign "Bear" and photographed probably a dozen more. It is also mentioned in these articles that various additional surviving members of the territorial defense unit took part in guerrilla activities after the Russian capture of the city on 1 March, others joined a reconstituted 192th Battalion/124th Brigade after escaping to Ukrainian-controlled territory at Mykolaiv, and still others joined the 59th Motorized Brigade at Mykolaiv instead. About a dozen members of 194th Battalion/124th Brigade are also reported to have successfully fled the engagement in Buzkovyi (Lilac) Park; several others were taken prisoner by the Russians. Romanova fails WP:ECREE hard. @WeatherWriter SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 05:29, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Let me add few more sources with which that chapter could be written: Key Ukrainian city's rapid fall leaves unanswered questions | AP News and Херсон. Репортаж Елены Костюченко, который «Новая газета» удалила по требованию Роскомнадзора (zona.media) and Битва за Антоновский мост и победа ВСУ под Николаевом. Как и почему Украина пропустила армию РФ из Крыма в феврале 2022 года - BBC News Русская служба . ManyAreasExpert (talk) 08:36, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

Compliments on locating these excellent sources. I will incorporate them into the article soon if no one else already has. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 15:01, 22 June 2024 (UTC)

• I just learned of this section. On the topic of the exceptional claim, all it sounds like is that the phrase in the article should be "Ukraine sustained 300 military casualties during the battle, with the entire Ukrainian defense force at Kherson having been injured or killed during the fighting." Doing that removes the "exceptional" claim aspect and allows the source to be used. I do not support the removal of it entirely nor the source as no discussion has formally stated the author or the authors organization is not a reliable source. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 21:22, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

  300 military casualties
  I think this number should be more detailed. As I remember from memory, the battle consisted from battles for and around the Antonivsky bridge, and the Lilac park Kherson battle, and perhaps others? I was reading only about Lilac park casualties, which were around 35-45 defenders killed. ManyAreasExpert (talk) 21:28, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

Recent major changes

Ok, SaintPaulOfTarsus, we need to talk because you just did a whole lot of changes without any talk page discussion. So, can you give some reasoning for the following (just wanting to make sure we have a discussion trail, since this was originally GANed, failed, and following the GAN fail, it seems so much is being altered.

1. Date ending on March 1?
2. Why you are saying that this article from The Daily Telegraph does not say the phrase "Battle of Kherson", when I just checked and it does. Since you added a "failed verification" tag to it now twice (twice I have checked and verified it), I plan to open a discussion at WP:RSN or request a third opinion (WP:3O) following this since this is a dispute on verification between myself and you it appears. {Discussion started at Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Verification of a phrase The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 16:39, 6 July 2024 (UTC)}
3. Removing AP and ISW from the lead citations. This tacks on to the date changing it appears, but I am mentioning it separately, since plenty of sources say 2 March, including those, and you happen to change the date while removing the verification sources.
4. Valentyna Romanova's citation. This also feels like something that should be discussed probably at RSN, since this is more of a dispute on reliability/usage rather than a true content dispute. If you agree that is probably the case, I would be willing to start that RSN discussion, so the larger community (basically not just me and you) can look at it and discuss it, specifically on reliability/usage.

The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 16:23, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

Valentyna Romanova's citation
See sources above Talk:Battle of Kherson#c-Manyareasexpert-20240622083600-SaintPaulOfTarsus-20240622052900 , with which this piece can be detailed. ManyAreasExpert (talk) 20:49, 6 July 2024 (UTC)

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