Talk:Vidkun Quisling

Plans for the article

Hey all. I just thought I'd make a note that this article is one of my WP:Wikicup targets for this year. I have, in my possession, the Dahl biography (English translation), which I am first going to go through meticulously to expand the article to a decent length. The next stage will be to layer another other books I can get hold of. After that, I will finish off with what I can glean from Google-Books sources, before putting it through a GA.

That much is certain. In later rounds, when I have more time, it would also be nice to get the article to featured status. But that's a little way off. In the meantime and beyond, any help with the article - if only copyediting and flagging up dubious/misleading sentences - would be much appreciated. Regards, - Jarry1250 ^{[Who? Discuss.]} 17:20, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Good stuff. Quisling is on my long-term to-do list. I have the Hewin biography so can help there. --Roisterer (talk) 23:32, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

Excellent, I'm sure there will be differences in interpretation and material. I've made a start and, after a week hiatus from tomorrow onwards, I expect to finish off by mid-to-late March. - Jarry1250 ^{[Who? Discuss.]} 17:13, 17 February 2011 (UTC)

Nice expansion, Jarry! I have a few Norwegian-language biographies of Quisling and other Norwegian Nazis at home, so I could help out with a bit of expansion. Best, Eisfbnore ^talk 07:53, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Excellent, that should help with the slight over-reliance on the (nonetheless good) Dahl biography. :) Regards, - Jarry1250 ^{[Who? Discuss.]} 22:15, 12 April 2011 (UTC)

Category:Defectors

To where did he defect? When? is it mentioned in the article (I searched for the word defect)? Geschichte (talk) 12:25, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Didn't notice that category. AFAIK he cannot be said to have defected in any way, so I'm going to go ahead and remove the category. Good spot, thanks. - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 20:28, 30 May 2011 (UTC)

Showdown

The article says: "trying to avoid Norwegian deaths in the showdown that was about to occur between German and Allied forces in Norway". This makes it sound like a major showdown did occur, which it didn't. There were fatalities spread out over the last couple of months, but not in the form of a showdown. The transition of power was not particularly violent; Allied forces did not intervene in a large scale to proliferate a war situation. (An exception, of course, to all this is the liberation of Northern Norway). So, can the sentence be renamed, i suggest something like "showdown that some/many/most believed was about to occur" Geschichte (talk) 19:06, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I would prefer "trying to avoid Norwegian deaths in any showdown that might occur between German and Allied forces in Norway" or alternatively "he believed was about to occur". I haven't checked, but I think that both those could be reasonably sourced. What do you think? - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 21:11, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

I think the latter is better. I don't think Quisling was preoccupied with avoiding Norwegian deaths in any thinkable case, for an example of a mini-showdown turned fatal see Leif Tronstad#Operation Sunshine. Geschichte (talk) 12:46, 2 June 2011 (UTC)

Prosecutor

The article says: "The prosecutor called for the death penalty". Can you confirm that the prosecutor was Annæus Schjødt, and if it is, can we insert the name: "The prosecutor [[Annæus Schjødt]] called for the death penalty". Geschichte (talk) 10:38, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Indeed it is (Dahl, 1998). I shall leave you to update the article -- I always fear editing FAs :) - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 11:13, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Dahl 1999, right? Geschichte (talk) 20:58, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Why does Ukraine appear everywhere?

Paris, Ukraine and Norway - that's the title of a sub-chapter, which does not however mention Ukraine. Ukraine, a state that did not exist at the referenced time, appears in a number of other locations at oddest junctures. What is this about? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.196.81.181 (talk) 08:11, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

I agree. Very odd header indeed. Changed to "Eastern Europe". Regards.--GoP_T^C_N 10:30, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

I should also point out that the Ukrainian SSR being part of the USSR did not stop it being a state (or at least a place you could visit). That said, I agree in the final form of the article is not in the section of which it was part of the title, therefore the change is a good one. - Jarry1250 ^{[Deliberation needed]} 11:12, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Kolstad's Cabinet and Hundseid's Cabinet "Agrarian government"

The election result of Bondepartiet "(Farmers' Party)" in the parliamentary election of 1930 and 1933, was 15.9% and 13.9%. Therefore we probably should use the names of two cabinets, as listed in List of Norwegian governments—Kolstad's Cabinet and Hundseid's Cabinet—instead of the term "Agrarian governments". --Vistamesa (talk) 13:36, 19 June 2012 (UTC)

quote box vs rquote

• diff of Vidkun Quisling

The above dispute change is inappropriate. {{rquote}} and a form of {{cquote}} intended for use with pull quotes, which these are not. The {{cquote/doc}} has long reflected this by rquote's seem to be missing that and will be updated. This was discussed at: Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2011 September 18#Template:Cquote which didn't delete these poor templates but did highlight that they are often inappropriately used.

Point being that these should not be used much in article space as they are for *repeating* quotations that appear in the main prose. The usages in this article are not repeats. See especially the definition of what pull quotes are. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 19:15, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

I've tweaked {{rquote/doc}} per the MOS. Note that it has already been calling out that it is "rarely appropriate in articles". Despite this, there are currently almost 1500 usages^count in articles. Wilful wiki ;) Br'er Rabbit (talk) 19:35, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

At the end of the day, you're making a point about the visual appearance of a handful of quoteboxes, so yeah, knock yourself out I guess. - Jarry1250 ^{[Deliberation needed]} 19:31, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Yes, it's about appropriate appearance. I also made other fixes such as the use of proper list structures in the infobox using {{plainlist}}, which actually generate list markup. This has gained wide acceptance in the last year or so.

My attempt to fix this was reverted which is why I've brought this here. Br'er Rabbit (talk) 19:40, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Homosexuality

One of the authors of the 1995 book The Pink Swastika, Scott Lively, in a lecture states that Vidkun Quisling was a homosexual. Since I haven't heard that claim put forward before, I figured it would be appropriate to mention this here pending corroborating or elaborating information. Although it isn't clear what Lively's source for the claim is, it might be the book Germany's National Vice, written by Samuel Igra, and published in London in 1945. __meco (talk) 13:17, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

That claim is nonsense, a lie and non-credible. That book and its authors are not a realiable source, and the book is condemned as homophobic, as were both the Nazis (who killed 100.000 gays in the concentration camps and the only gay member was Ernst Rohm) and Quisling (read the book Quisling by Hans Fredrik Dahl). Faunas (talk) 20:50, 25 October 2012 (UTC)

There were certainly gay Nazis besides Rohm. It was a well-known phenomenon in the SA, something Himmler got all butthurt about. Otherwise you're correct. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.209.13.119 (talk) 18:47, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Religious and philosophical views

A noticeable omission in this section of the article. "During the first week of October he wrote...Universistic Aphorisms". In which year?Cloptonson (talk) 20:42, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

Intended deletion of duplicated quotation

I notice a lengthy quotation concluding he would be seen "as another Saint Olav" repeated more than once. I have decided, to help space, to leave only the copy which is adjacent the section of this article that is chronologically closest to the date of the quotation.Cloptonson (talk) 20:46, 7 January 2013 (UTC) The undeleted quotation remains in the section "Arrest, trial, legacy".Clopson (talk) 20:56, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

Confused

"Quisling acceded to a German request to halt the resistance of the Bolærne fortress". What does this mean? Quisling was working with the Germans, if it was up to him there would have been no resistance. He neither authorized Bolærne to resist, nor had the power or authority to stop it. Then the "conclusion" that "As a result of actions such as these, it was claimed at the time that Quisling's seizure of power in a puppet government had been part of the German plan all along" does not follow. Of course Quisling supported Germany, and wanted to stop Norwegian resistance. That does not mean that his coup had been planned all along.Royalcourtier (talk) 20:53, 15 March 2014 (UTC)

Is this truly a Featured Article?

This is clearly a well-written, & well-sourced article, yet I have a serious problem with it, in that it omits an important detail. What Vidkun Quisling is best known for is being a fascist collaborator & the most infamous traitor of World War II -- if not all time. Any general history of World War II would make those statements about him. However, this article oddly skips around his reputation. Although the article admits to his participation in the German military occupation, & to his involvement in some of the less savory activities of the German occupation, they are presented in a manner that mitigates his notoriety. Items such as the "ice front", & the extent of his involvement in deportation of Norwegian Jews ("There is evidence to suggest that Quisling honestly believed the official line throughout 1943 and 1944, that they were awaiting repatriation to a new Jewish homeland") are buried in details about other parts of his life, such as his intellectual pursuits. This lack of focus would lead someone who is not familiar with Quisling's reputation to think that he might not be a villain. If it weren't for my experience with writing Wikipedia articles -- I know that in writing an article it's easy to lose sight of the forest for the trees -- I'd suspect this was a white-washing of Quisling.

The problem is not that this article needs to assert without qualification that he was a collaborator & a traitor, but that it doesn't even touch the fact that a large number of people believe Quisling were those things, & the reasoning for that belief. Although the article states that he is frequently written about, there is little sign of disagreement about assertions or facts about Quisling. There are no details about the charges made against him at his trial, for example. According to The People's Almanac, his mansion "Villa Grande" was lavishly furnished, including paintings taken from the national museum, & he was so paranoid that he was escorted everywhere by 150 bodyguards & every scrap of food he ate sampled first by someone else -- details which clash with the person this article describes. So is The People's Almanac repeating deceptive propaganda created about Quisling in the 1940s, or do they reflect the real man?

I feel that I have rambled a bit here but to repeat my point, Quisling has a nasty reputation -- almost as bad as Hitler's -- & this article says as little about that reputation as possible. (I suspect finding material that meets Wikipedia's standards about his reputation can be challenging.) And a lot more could be written about that reputation, whether it was deserved, or manufactured in part or whole by Allied sources. And needs to be written for this to be truly considered a Feature Article. -- llywrch (talk) 06:17, 28 May 2014 (UTC)

Well, in the lead you do have "...found guilty of charges including embezzlement, murder and high treason ... The word quisling has since become a synonym for traitor" and references to participating the final solution; while I accept that a reputation section might be useful (and I think there was one for a long time) the difficulty with trying to discuss reputation is that you really want a metareview. In any case I have added an extra clause to the lead. Not sure what else (in concrete terms) might help the article? Apart from rewriting it based on a more critical account of his life? - Jarry1250 ^{[Vacation needed]} 21:01, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Answering myself, perhaps a historiography section? - Jarry1250 ^{[Vacation needed]} 21:02, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

"Quasi-Christian" tenets

The intro mentions that he formulated a philosophy involving, among others, "quasi-Christian" tenets, but no citation is given and the article only mentions that he rejected basic Christianity. A citation should be added if one exists, and then a fact like this mentioned in the intro should be expanded upon in the article proper.Snarfblaat (talk) 02:28, 9 April 2015 (UTC)

Use of the title Prime Minister

There is a disconnect between the Norwegian version of this article and the English one in that this one uses the term Prime Minister and in the Norwegian one uses Minster President (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minister-president#Norway) , while there may be semantics in regards to that they both describe the same function, there is an important historical and moral issue, in so much that he never used the Norwegian term for Prime Minister "Statsminister" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statsminister) and instead was titled Minister President, which means he is not recognized as a "Statsminister" in Norway, both since he was convicted for treason and also in that his regime is not given official sanction by the King. What I am driving at is that in the English version of this article one can be given the impression he was legally a Prime Minister of Norway, something he never was, that he was it de facto does not mean he should be given a that distinction, after all this is an encyclopedia based on facts and sometimes the facts are in the details, and in my mind it is an important distinction. Also since the government in exile lead by Prime Minister Johan Nygaardsvold, was still working and also empowered by Parliament "Stortinget" to act in its stead, one can make the argument that the info box on Qusiling is misleading in so much that Nygaardsvold was never succeeded by Quisling nor did Nygaardsvold succeed Quisling after the war, as Norwegian Prime minister. If I may bring your attention to the English version article on Nygaardsvold (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johan_Nygaardsvold), it does not list Quisling as a Prime minister and only shows Nygaardsvold as sole Prime Minister throughout the war period. If nothing else, we should endeavor to make Wikipedia internally consistent and not have articles contradict each other. I would like to ask the editors of this article to consider correcting this oversight and ammend the article as needed. 0331marine (talk) 06:36, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

As of 04/28/2024, Quisling is still listed in the info box as if he had legitimately served as prime minister of Norway in between two terms when Johan Nygaardsvold held that office. 0331marine makes what seems like a valid point that the legitimate Norwegian government remained intact under King Haakon in exile and that Nygaardsvold's term as legitimate PM of Norway was continuous.

Can we fix this? Whatever Quisling was, he was not a legitimate prime minister of Norway. Pascalulu88 (talk) 23:27, 28 April 2024 (UTC)