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This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Zanhe (talk | contribs) at 20:49, 2 September 2014 (→Conclusion of Maxwell and Whiting: re). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

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This page doesn't seem to do justice to the journalist, and focusses more on his reportage on India. Too narrow a perspective to judge his work through, it would seem to me. fredericknoronha (talk) 17:05, 22 March 2014 (UTC)

Blatant BLP violation

Recents edits by User:Harshray and User:Mona.SHEPHERD were blatant violations of the WP:BLP policy, which is why they were reverted by myself and User:Huaxia. For example, these edits label Maxwell as "controversial" and having a "pro-China slant", neither of which can be found in the cited sources (both Indian): Rediff and Indian Defence Review, which on the contrary describe Maxwell as an authority on the Sino-Indian War. See also the opinion Who’s afraid of Neville Maxwell? by Shekhar Gupta, chief editor of the major newspaper Indian Express. In these and other edits, the two users (who may be the same person as Harshray has been previously identified as a sockpuppet of the now-blocked user Chellaney, and Mona.SHEPHERD is a newly created single-purpose account) also added pure attacking material, citing several "sources" that have nothing to do with Maxwell. -Zanhe (talk) 17:44, 10 April 2014 (UTC)

The mass deletions and mutilations by User:Zanhe breached every rule of objectivity, in a blatant violation of WP:BLP policy. It is apparent that the User:Zanhe has some connection to the subject, Neville Maxwell. Among the wholesale deletions carried out were references to the works of the renowned Harvard scholar Roderick MacFarquhar and another American scholar John W. Garver. The deletions have been made to present Neville Maxwell in highly favorable light. The mutilations thus speak for themselves. -Mona.SHEPHERD (talk) 14:05, 11 April 2014 (UTC)

You seem to be so blinded by your POV that you're incapable of basic reasoning. John Garver's article calls Maxwell's assessment of the war the "orthodox scholarly view", and says that Allen Whiting reached the same conclusion as Maxwell (p. 3). As for MacFarquhar, he quotes Maxwell extensively in his book The Origins of the Cultural Revolution without giving a single word of criticism. Yet you misrepresent these sources as condemnation of Maxwell.

Your most egregious offence is the misuse of Shekhar Gupta's opinion piece Who’s afraid of Neville Maxwell, in which he praises Maxwell as a "relentless journalist and scholar", and apologizes to him for having been brainwashed by Indian propaganda into "detesting Neville Maxwell as an utterly contemptible India-hater and a pro-Chinese communist toadie", yet you maliciously misquoted him to make it appear as if he still detested Maxwell. In fact, Cullen328, whose view you solicited, commented on his talk page that "the content added by Mona.SHEPHERD it sure looked to me to be an attempt to make Maxwell look as bad as possible. Particularly disturbing is misuse of sources." -Zanhe (talk) 15:52, 11 April 2014 (UTC)

Conclusion of Maxwell and Whiting

Garver says on page 3: "Whiting and Maxwell reached the same conclusion: China's resort to war in 1962 was largely a function of perceived Indian aggression against Chinese territory." The "orthodox scholarly view" mentioned on page 29 is with regard to Chinese perceptions, and not about what actually caused the war. Garver says multiple times that Whiting and Maxwell concluded that there were two factors that made China decide to go to war: "a perceived need to punish and end perceived Indian efforts to undermine Chinese control of Tibet", and "a perceived need to punish and end perceived Indian aggression against Chinese territory" (page 2).

Garver p. 29: "the orthodox scholarly view in this regard, established by Maxwell and Whiting, is that, in deciding for war, China's leaders were responding to an Indian policy of establishing Indian military outposts in territory claimed by both India and China but already under effective Chinese military occupation." -Zanhe (talk) 19:07, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Here, the phrase "in this regard" refers to Chinese views of India's foreign policy, which means that "China's leaders were responding to an Indian policy of establishing Indian military outposts in territory claimed by both India and China but already under effective Chinese military occupation" was China's perception.The Discoverer (talk) 19:48, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes, and the perception was quite accurate, according to Garver, who writes immediately before the quote above: "If Chinese perceptions regarding India's Tibet actions and policies were deeply flawed, the same cannot be said about Chinese views of India's Forward Policy." -Zanhe (talk) 19:59, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Yes, but your rephrasing of the statement makes it seem that China's perception of the Forward policy was the only factor that made them decide for war. This is not true; as I mentioned earlier, there were two factors: "a perceived need to punish and end perceived Indian efforts to undermine Chinese control of Tibet", and "a perceived need to punish and end perceived Indian aggression against Chinese territory". Since we disagree on your interpretation, I request you to stick to direct and complete quotes, and not to include your rephrasing.The Discoverer (talk) 20:11, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Tibet was a major factor, but the Forward Policy was the direct cause of the war. This article is about Maxwell, not an in-depth analysis of the war. Quoting the original Garver statement is fine with me, but we need to be brief and stick with the main point. -Zanhe (talk) 20:32, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

It wasn't the Forward Policy and India's Tibet policy that caused the war, but rather the Chinese perceptions of the Forward policy and India's Tibet policy that caused the war. We must avoid quoting "the orthodox scholarly view in this regard, established by Maxwell and Whiting, is that, in deciding for war, China's leaders were responding to an Indian policy of establishing Indian military outposts in territory claimed by both India and China but already under effective Chinese military occupation.", because the context of "in this regard" is not readily clear. For the same reason, we must not include an interpretation of this sentence.The Discoverer (talk) 20:40, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Please don't play word games. Garver clearly states that the orthodox view established by Maxwell and Whiting is that China's leaders were "responding to" India's Forward Policy when deciding for war. And Garver concludes that the Chinese views of the Forward Policy were accurate. In any case, I've now replaced the paraphrasing with the quote from Garver, so there's no "interpretation". -Zanhe (talk) 20:53, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Your quote leaves out a key phrase "in this regard" which takes out the context of the statement, and so it is unacceptable.The Discoverer (talk) 20:57, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

Are you kidding? The phrase "in this regard" goes almost immediately after the section title "China's Response to India's Forward Policy", which is to decide for war. It's about the immediate cause of the war, and how is that out of context? -Zanhe (talk) 21:05, 1 September 2014 (UTC)

You are mistaken. The phrase "in this regard" goes immediately after the phrase " Chinese views of India's Forward Policy." This means that Garver is talking about the Chinese views. Also, your removal of the text "Maxwell had to rely largely on inferences based on official Chinese statements at the time of the 1962 war." is unacceptable, because Garver has clearly stated that the Chinese perception of India's Tibet policy was wildly inaccurate and was an important part of the decision to go to war.The Discoverer (talk) 12:23, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

It's funny that a person with a history of uncritically adding partisan sources to controversial articles all of a sudden becomes so critical of a neutral, academic paper. As for the the text you added, which implied that Maxwell sourced most of his material from China whereas his book was mainly based on India's classified Henderson Brooks–Bhagat Report, I've clearly stated reason why it's a biased, selective quote in my edit comment. -Zanhe (talk) 20:49, 2 September 2014 (UTC)

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