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At the risk of receiving downvotes from both flaggers and mod-supporters, I would say that both you and "declining" moderator made mistakes here.

• Your mistake is of using wrong flag. VLQ description says "answer is unlikely to be salvageable through editing" which makes it a very (very) bad fit for link-only answers.
   
  Thing is, as long as the link isn't broken and is relevant to answer the question, nothing could be easier than salvage the answer by just adding an abstract / summary of the content available at the link. Whenever I do that kind "salvage edits" ^{(1, 2, 3, 4...)} it works like a charm.
   
  ^{In my experience, flagging as Other with an appropriate comment is safer than VLQ (and than Not An Answer for that matter) in cases like that. It just leaves less room for moderator to misunderstand your intent.}
   

• Mistake of the moderator is that they either
   
  were unable to recognize that your flag was submitted in a good faith (link-only answers are discouraged, you are right),
   
  or ignored the official guidance in SE Community Moderator Newsletter to dismiss flags as helpful in case of good faith submission.

At the risk of receiving downvotes from both flaggers and mod-supporters, I would say that both you and "declining" moderator made mistakes here.

• Your mistake is of using wrong flag. VLQ description says "answer is unlikely to be salvageable through editing" which makes it a very (very) bad fit for link-only answers.
   
  Thing is, as long as the link isn't broken and is relevant to answer the question, nothing could be easier than salvage the answer by just adding an abstract / summary of the content available at the link. Whenever I do that kind "salvage edits" ^{(1, 2, 3, 4...)} it works like a charm.
   
  ^{In my experience, flagging as Other with an appropriate comment is safer than VLQ (and than Not An Answer for that matter) in cases like that. It just leaves less room for moderator to misunderstand your intent.}
   

• Mistake of the moderator is that they either
   
  were unable to recognize that your flag was submitted in a good faith (link-only answers are discouraged, you are right),
   
  or ignored the official guidance in SE Community Moderator Newsletter to dismiss flags as helpful in case of good faith submission.

At the risk of receiving downvotes from both flaggers and mod-supporters, I would say that both you and "declining" moderator made mistakes here.

• Your mistake is of using wrong flag. VLQ description says "answer is unlikely to be salvageable through editing" which makes it a very (very) bad fit for link-only answers.
   
  Thing is, as long as the link isn't broken and is relevant to answer the question, nothing could be easier than salvage the answer by just adding an abstract / summary of the content available at the link. Whenever I do that kind "salvage edits" ^{(1, 2, 3, 4...)} it works like a charm.
   
  ^{In my experience, flagging as Other with an appropriate comment is safer than VLQ (and than Not An Answer for that matter) in cases like that. It just leaves less room for moderator to misunderstand your intent.}
   

• Mistake of the moderator is that they either
   
  were unable to recognize that your flag was submitted in a good faith (link-only answers are discouraged, you are right),
   
  or ignored the official guidance in SE Community Moderator Newsletter to dismiss flags as helpful in case of good faith submission.

At the risk of receiving downvotes from both flaggers and mod-supporters, I would say that both you and "declining" moderator made mistakes here.

• Your mistake is of using wrong flag. VLQ description says "answer is unlikely to be salvageable through editing" which makes it a very (very) bad fit for link-only answers.
   
  Thing is, as long as the link isn't broken and is relevant to answer the question, nothing could be easier than salvage the answer by just adding an abstract / summary of the content available at the link. Whenever I do that kind "salvage edits" ^{(1, 2, 3, 4...)} it works like a charm.
   
  ^{In my experience, flagging as Other with an appropriate comment is safer than VLQ (and than Not An Answer for that matter) in cases like that. It just leaves less room for moderator to misunderstand your intent.}
   

• Mistake of the moderator is that they either
   
  were unable to recognize that your flag was submitted in a good faith (link-only answers are discouraged, you are right),
   
  or ignored the official guidance in SE Community Moderator Newsletter to dismiss flags as helpful in case of good faith submission.

At the risk of receiving downvotes from both flaggers and mod-supporters, I would say that both you and "declining" moderator made mistakes here.

• Your mistake is of using wrong flag. VLQ description says "answer is unlikely to be salvageable through editing" which makes it a very (very) bad fit for link-only answers.
   
  Thing is, as long as the link isn't broken and is relevant to answer the question, nothing could be easier than salvage the answer by just adding an abstract / summary of the content available at the link. Whenever I do that kind "salvage edits" ^{(1, 2, 3, 4...)} it works like a charm.
   
  ^{In my experience, flagging as Other with an appropriate comment is safer than VLQ (and than Not An Answer for that matter) in cases like that. It just leaves less room for moderator to misunderstand your intent.}
   

• Mistake of the moderator is that they either
   
  were unable to recognize that your flag was submitted in a good faith (link-only answers are discouraged, you are right),
   
  or ignored the official guidance in SE Community Moderator Newsletter to dismiss flags as helpful in case of good faith submission.

At the risk of receiving downvotes from both flaggers and mod-supporters, I would say that both you and "declining" moderator made mistakes here.

• Your mistake is of using wrong flag. VLQ description says "answer is unlikely to be salvageable through editing" which makes it a very (very) bad fit for link-only answers.
   
  Thing is, as long as the link isn't broken and is relevant to answer the question, nothing could be easier than salvage the answer by just adding an abstract / summary of the content available at the link. Whenever I do that kind "salvage edits" ^{(1, 2, 3, 4...)} it works like a charm.
   
  ^{In my experience, flagging as Other with an appropriate comment is safer than VLQ (and than Not An Answer for that matter) in cases like that. It just leaves less room for moderator to misunderstand your intent.}
   

• Mistake of the moderator is that they either
   
  were unable to recognize that your flag was submitted in a good faith (link-only answers are discouraged, you are right),
   
  or ignored the official guidance in SE Community Moderator Newsletter to dismiss flags as helpful in case of good faith submission.