Talk:Kherson Oblast

Hatnote to article on Russian administration

A hatnote on the top of this article previously read:

This article is about the Ukrainian oblast. For the ostensible Russian entity, see Russian occupation of Kherson Oblast.

This element was present in the article from at least late October 2024. It was removed yesterday and when I tried to reinstall it, the editor who had removed it reverted me, invoking WP:HATNOTERULES:

only if there is a reasonable possibility of a reader arriving at the article either by mistake or with another topic in mind

I consider that since there is a Russian administrative entity under the same name of Kherson Oblast, it is entirely possible readers may arrive at this page seeking information regarding the Russian administration, perhaps expecting some sort of hatnote or disambiguation page.

SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 11:22, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Presumably by “Russian administrative entity” you mean the government/military apparatus that is governing the portions of Kherson occupied by Russian troops. I agree that such an apparatus exists; it does not yet have its own article. No-one is going to confuse this article (which is a place) with an article about a military operation (which is an activity). They fall into entirely separate categories of noun, and such a confusion between, on the one hand, a place, and on the other, activities by soldiers, would be bizarre and is not a reasonable possibility. Cambial — foliar❧ 12:52, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

The governing apparatus is considered a constituent province of the Russian Federation and is named an "oblast", so it is not, in fact, unreasonable that it may be interpreted as a "place". In the absence of an article on the apparatus itself, the most appropriate place to redirect readers is indeed to Russian occupation of Kherson Oblast, which is not just about "activities by soldiers", as you put it; the governing apparatus, is in fact, described in detail in the article's History and Government sections. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 15:09, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

A government is not a place. It is not “considered a constituent province of the Russian Federation” by any reliable secondary sources. Not clear where you got that notion - maybe you consider it as such? That’s irrelevant. Cambial — foliar❧ 15:42, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Governments generally assert their authority over places. While Russian sovereignty over this territory is widely unrecognized, it is not in dispute that Russia established an administration in the territories under its control, which it then formally annexed and governs as an oblast. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 15:51, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

Reliable sources dispute that it annexed Kherson Oblast. Whether it established an adminsitration is not the same as that it is “considered a constituent province of the Russian Federation”, which is what you claimed, and what is relevant to the question of whether someone might confuse a place and an ongoing military operation taking place in part of it. Cambial — foliar❧ 16:30, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

I do not think it is in dispute that a chain of events culminating in a 30 September 2022 ceremony at the Kremlin resulted in the annexation of some territories to the Russian Federation. It was a unilateral and widely unrecognized annexation, as most tend to be, but an annexation nonetheless. That the action itself took place is not in dispute, rather it is the legitimacy of the move which is in question. Please see Russian annexation of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia oblasts to become aware of the mainstream points of view regarding this event. SaintPaulOfTarsus (talk) 18:03, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

It's not readily clear why you want to pursue the question of whether Kherson Oblast was annexed in 2022. Were it shown that the most reliable sources now state that it was, that would not mean that readers are likely to confuse a region in Ukraine with a military operation by the Russian state.

That said, in the most reliable sources - scholarship - available to us, there is agreement that the Kherson Oblast was not annexed. They report the Russian government claiming as much, but reality differs from the Kremlin's aggrandising fantasies in September 2022. Although you ought to be mindful that Wikipedia is not a source, this is also exactly what the article to which you link states "Russia, amid an ongoing invasion of Ukraine, unilaterally declared its annexation..." [my emphasis] - please read more closely.

From the LSE:

Russia’s attempted annexation of four Ukrainian regions following hastily organised ‘referendums’ has been heavily criticised by politicians in the West.

From an academic reference work on the territories of Russia (2023):. Heaney, ed. 2023 (Introduction):

Between Putin’s presidential inauguration in May 2012 and the end of 2022 a total of 73 of the 83 heads of federal subjects (as the territories are known) were replaced (in addition to the heads of Crimea and Sevastopol, which were annexed in 2014, and those of four Ukrainian regions annexed de jure, if not de facto, in 2022.)...After Crimea and Sevastopol were annexed from Ukraine in 2014, the federal centre repeatedly emphasized internal and external threats to their stability. Particularly around the time of Putin’s March 2018 re-election as President, both territories were lavished with attention. If Russia were ever to achieve similar control over the four territories purportedly annexed from Ukraine in 2022, such focus on their security, too, would seem likely

Section "The Impact on the Regions of the 2022 Invasion of Ukraine":

Indeed, on 30 September the Kremlin claimed that more regions had come under its control when Putin announced the annexation of four Ukrainian regions: the so-called ‘People’s Republics’ established in the eastern Ukrainian cities of Donetsk and Luhansk (Lugansk) by pro-Russian forces as long ago as 2014, and the southern Ukrainian oblasts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhya (Zaporozhye), despite Russian control of all of these territories being by no means assured.

Section "The Government of the Russian Federation"

In March 2014 Russia annexed two territories internationally recognized as constituting parts of Ukraine—the Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol City— bringing the de facto membership of the Federation to 85 territories. In September 2022, following its invasion of Ukraine, Russia announced the annexation of a further four territories within that country—the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics (established by pro-Russian forces in 2014) and Kherson and Zaporozhye (Zaporizhzhya) Oblasts, amending Article 65 of the Constitution accordingly. However, these annexations were, like those of Crimea and Sevastopol, not internationally recognized, and moreover substantial regions of these territories remained disputed or under Ukrainian state control, as the Russian–Ukrainian conflict continued...between 2005 and 2008 the number of territories was reduced from 89 to 83. Including the two territories in Crimea, the 85 territories comprise 22 republics, nine krais (provinces), 46 oblasts (regions), three cities of federal status (Moscow, St Petersburg and Sevastopol), one autonomous oblast and four autonomous okrugs. Of these, the republics, autonomous okrugs and the autonomous oblast are (sometimes nominally) ethnically defined.

"announced the annexation" "purportedly annexed", "annexed de jure, if not de facto" - not in fact. There is a fundamental difference between one government claiming a thing and that thing actually being the case. Cambial — foliar❧ 20:02, 25 March 2025 (UTC)

References