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Commissioner Government

Nominator(s): Peacemaker67 (talk)

Commissioner Government (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

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The Commissioner Government was a short-lived Serbian puppet regime that was formed by the German authorities in the occupied territory of Serbia following the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia during WWII. Its members were pro-Axis, anti-Semitic and anti-communist. It proved unable to cope with the communist-led insurgency that broke out after the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 and was quickly replaced. This article went through GA late last year, and is as comprehensive as I can make it. All comments gratefully received. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 11:01, 22 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Comments by Indy beetle

Excellent article. I was considering doing the GA myself but feared I lacked the relevant knowledge. Some preliminary comments:

• Perhaps instead of the government agency infobox you could use this one?

• I didn't want to create the impression that it was more than it was.

• "Dr. Harald Turner". Not sure what MOS says about this, but I don't think we normally recognize that someone has received a PhD through a title.

• His was a Doctorate of Law, and he is generally referred to as Dr. in the sources, but I believe you are right per MOS:DOCTOR. Deleted.

• "At the end of August this resulted in the resignation of the Commissioner Government". ---> This resulted in the resignation of the Commissioner Government at the end of August...

• Much better. Done.

• There is some inconstant italicization, namely that most foreign organisations are ital'd but Luftwaffe is not. Per MOS:ITAL proper nouns in foreign language usually are not italicized.

• I'm working off MOS:FOREIGNITALIC, which uses the rule of thumb of only using italics for foreign words is a term is not in the Merriam-Webster dictionary, which Luftwaffe is.

• Nikola Đurić in the reshuffle table links to a professional footballer.

• Whoops. Created new redlink.

• "killing 26 functionaries, wounding 11 and capturing ten". ten ---> 10

• Done.

-Indy beetle (talk) 23:55, 22 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for taking a look! I look forward to further comments. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 05:16, 23 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

More comments:

• In the Background section, a map showing the partition of Yugoslavia would be nice (like this one) or some other visual.

• Done.

• "and he was allocated personnel to form four area commands". Typo?

• Not sure what you are getting at?

Oh I misread that, nm.

• "the Germans still needed to establish a public administrative body that would implement their directives. It was decided to establish a puppet government for that purpose." Establish & establish. Mix it up.

• Fixed.

• "Förster was subsequently transferred". Was this related to his performance as overseer of the Serb state?

• the sources don't say, but he was given command of I. Fliegerkorps for Barbarossa, so I think it was probably because he was more suited to operational air command than occupation duties.

• The capitalization of the ministerial portfolios is inconsistent ("Interior" vs "construction" and "agriculture").

• Fixed the one in the lead, but the rest seem to be proper names such as Minister of the Interior

• "The first fighting occurred at the village of Bela Crkva on 7 July, when gendarmes tried to disperse a public meeting". What was the nature of this meeting, was it political, or were all forms of public assembly restricted?

• Added in a bit early on explaining that unauthorised public meeting were prohibited under German military law.

• Is this photo or others suitable for the Uprising section?

• A lot of the WWII Yugoslav pics on WP and Commons like that one have problematic copyright. Added a pic of Bela Crkva.

• Is there any record of the legacy of this administration or opinions from modern days scholars and politicians? Are they seen as Serb heroes or sellouts? -Indy beetle (talk) 23:33, 23 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

• Added a para at the end sort of summing up the key points about the Commissioner Government. Does that work? Thanks for your review, Indy beetle, here are my edits. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 03:06, 24 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]

• I'd actually remove that, I find it unnecessary. Cohen pp. 61–62 contains an interest opinion from Gavrilo Dožić on the government, which is more what I was getting at. Also note that he calls it the "Commissars' Administration", as do other sources. Cohen also writes on page 53 that the Aćimović government had been "preoccupied" with the creation of "Greater Serbia" and had sent a memorandum to Schroeder expressing the need "to give the Serbian people its centuries-old ethnographic borders". This source mentions that the government made an appeal to civil servants to fill their posts, and addresses more of the details concerning the administration as a polity and its functional subservience to the Germans. All in all, it has many good details that should not be left out. As it has no page numbers, you could cite it using the "loc=" parameter in the shortened footnotes and fill in "Council of Commissars", as that is the relevant section. -Indy beetle (talk) 04:23, 24 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]