tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-78589502024-03-07T09:11:02.703+03:00Otto's Random ThoughtsMann auf dem WegJ. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.comBlogger2784125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-10121034054685339172019-03-24T11:50:00.002+03:002019-03-24T11:50:56.729+03:00Looking for a new jobDespite publishing three peer reviewed journal articles in the last three years, which is more than the vast majority of my colleagues here, my contract was not renewed. I am still not sure why I was chosen along with at least six other people for non-renewal. When I inquired with the administration they refused to tell me and instead said they needed to contact their lawyer, which indicates to me they are involved in criminal activity. At any rate I will need a new job doing something come August. I am willing to move out of academia into something more stable, but I really don't know where to start looking. My CV and a fair number of my publications are at my <a href="https://auis.academia.edu/OttoPohl">academia.edu site </a>. If anybody has any suggestions please let me know in the comments or email me.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-78998776855714605752019-02-27T15:45:00.001+03:002019-02-27T15:45:58.626+03:00HappeningsYesterday, I got my reimbursement for my plane ticket and conference registration for the Sacramento conference. I also got the official guidelines for submitting my paper for publication and the new deadline announcement of 12 April 2009. I had just finished editing the paper and submitting. I now need to redo the format some. But, other than that and some cuts to bring it down to 8,000 words I don't think I need to do much more on it.<br />
<br />
Today, I deposited the check I got for my Sacramento expenses and ate lunch with a friend at the Nepali cafe. Then we wandered around the bazaar. After getting home I took a cab to work to briefly check up on things.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-87610925720351218292019-02-25T09:17:00.001+03:002019-02-25T09:17:22.363+03:00A Short History of Forced Labor by Ethnic Germans from South Eastern Europe in the USSR<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
“Reparations through Labor”: The Mass Deportation of Ethnic
Germans from Romania, Hungary and Yugoslavia to Forced Labor in the USSR<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
By<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
J. Otto Pohl, PhD<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Near the end of World War II the Soviet Union began the
deportation of ethnic Germans from the Balkans to the USSR as forced laborers.
In particular the Soviet Union targeted the ethnic German population of Romania
and to a lesser extent Hungary and Yugoslavia for these "reparations
through labor." In total GUPVI (Main Administration for the Affairs of POWs
and Internees) mobilized and interned a total of 112,480 ethnic German
civilians in the Balkans and Central Europe for labor in the USSR between 24
November 1944 and 2 February 1945. This institution of labor camps for foreign
citizens represented a second archipelago of forced labor projects parallel to
the GULag (Main Administration of Camps) which housed Soviet citizens. The
largest number of these men and women came from Romania at 69,332 followed by
Hungary at 31,923, and then Yugoslavia at 10,935. Only a couple hundred came
from Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria combined. They were divided between 61,375 men
and 51,105 women (Polian, 249-260). The Soviet government used these workers in
coal and iron mines located primarily in eastern and southern Ukraine. Over a
fifth of them perished due to poor material conditions during the next four
years. The last of the surviving men and women were not repatriated until after
1956 although the vast majority had been either sent back to their home country
or East Germany by 1950 (Polian, 285-297). <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This round up and transfer of ethnic Germans
from the Balkans to the USSR for forced labor at the end of World War II
involved the permanent removal both through deaths and repatriation to East
Germany of tens of thousands of ethnic Germans from the Balkans. In particular
it reduced the ethnic German communities of Romania.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Soviet Union suffered a severe shortage of labor by the
end of the Second World War. One way to compensate for this deficit was to
forcibly conscript civilian workers in the countries it occupied after the
defeat of Nazi Germany (Polian, 244). In particular ethnic Germans were
considered by the Soviet regime to be a source of potential laborers to rebuild
the USSR. Both Germans from Germany and those from the Balkans would be subject
to being rounded up and shipped to the Soviet Union for forced labor (Polian,
244-248). This provided the USSR with a substantial labor pool. It also
provided a means of implementing a punitive revenge against the German people
for the crimes of the Nazi regime.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The German population in the Balkans was concentrated in
Romania and Yugoslavia. Bulgaria had a very small ethnic German population and
Greece and Albania almost none. Adjacent to the Balkans, Hungary also had a
substantial ethnic German population. It is from Romania, Hungary, and
Yugoslavia that almost all ethnic Germans from the Balkans and Central Europe
sent to the USSR for forced labor came from. Other ethnic Germans mobilized for
forced labor in the USSR during this time came from East Prussia and Silesia in
Germany proper and from the ethnic Germans with Soviet citizenship. This
article, however, will not be addressing either of these groups and will
instead concentrate on the ethnic Germans sent to work in the USSR from
Romania, Yugoslavia, and Hungary.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These
men and women share the common traits of being ethnic German minorities living
outside of Germany and having citizenship in a state other than Germany. The
Soviet targeting of these populations for forced labor thus had an ethnic
rather than a state basis.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The German population of Romania was the largest and oldest
one in the region. In 1930 it totaled 745,421 people or 4.1% of the population.
Most of this population lived in territories acquired by the Romanian state
after World War One. The largest settlements were in Banat with 275,369 Germans
followed by Transylvania with 237,415. Other large settlements in territories
acquired after 1913 lived in Bessarabia, Bukovina, Sathmar, and Dobrudzha. The
territories forming Romania before the Second Balkan War only had 32,366
Germans (Wien, 59-60). The German settlements in Transylvania (Siebenburgen)
dated back to the 13th Century when they had come at the invitation of
Hungarian kings (Castellen, 52). The Swabians in the Banat had been settled in
the region by the Habsburg emperors from western Germany after 1718 as farmers
and miners (Castellen, 53). Most of the Germans in pre-1919 Romania had
immigrated there from the Habsburg Empire in the 19th Century (Castellen, 55). This
minority remained fairly quiet during the 1920s and early 1930s. It is only
after 1935 that its leadership strongly asserted demands for German autonomy
under the leadership of adherents to National Socialism (Castellen, 56). By
1940 the Germans living in Romania had come completely under Nazi control
(Wien, 61-62). This led to a separation of the administration of the ethnic
Germans in Romania from the Romanian state during the war.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
From 1940 to 23 August 1944 the ethnic Germans came under the
direct control of Berlin rather than Bucharest. During the Second World War the
ethnic Germans in Romania served in German military formations including both
the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Wehrmacht</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Waffen SS</i>. Close to 75,000 ethnic
Germans from Romania served in these two organizations during the war. This
represented about 10% of the total German population of Romania in 1940. The
position of the ethnic Germans in Romania in relation to Berlin made their
position precarious after Bucharest switched sides and turned against the
remaining Axis powers (Wien, 64). Things deteriorated further for the ethnic
Germans in Romania after the Soviet Red Army occupied the country the following
month. At this time the German authorities began a massive evacuation of ethnic
Germans from Romania. About 100,000 Germans left Romania at this time (Wien,
64-65). The remaining German population became subject to a number of
discriminatory policies based solely on ethnicity. The most significant of
these policies was the shipment of nearly 70,000 ethnic Germans to labor camps
in the USSR.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The German population of Yugoslavia was the second largest
in the Balkans after Romania. The 1921 census counted around 500,000 Germans or
about 4.2% of the population. This made them the largest national minority
(ethnicity with a titular nation state) in Yugoslavia ahead of the Hungarians
and Albanians (Prauser and Sretenovic, 47). Like in Romanian the ethnic Germans
in Yugoslavia became politically associated with Nazi Germany during World War
II. A very large number of them served in German military units dedicated to
anti-partisan warfare. Their association with the Nazi regime in the minds of
the new communist Yugoslav government under Tito contributed greatly to the
decision to systematically deprive them of their property and rights including
the deportation of thousands to the USSR for forced labor. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Although technically not part of the Balkans this article
also covers the 30,000 plus ethnic German civilians sent to the USSR for forced
labor from Hungary, making them the second largest contingent from what the
Soviet mobilization orders refer to as South Eastern Europe after Romania. The
Soviet occupation forces sent them along with some 600,000 Hungarian POWs and
civilian internees to GUPVI camps. After World War I there were around 450,000
ethnic Germans in the new contracted borders of the Hungarian state (Apor, 36).
At the end of World War II there remained a little over 200,000 ethnic Germans
in Hungary of which nearly 180,000 were expelled into what eventually became
West and East Germany (Apor, 43). Hungary also differed from Romania in that
even though Romania had earlier been an Axis Power civilian ethnic Romanians
were spared forced labor in the USSR while a large number of Hungarians were
not.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The number of ethnic Germans transferred from Yugoslavia to
the USSR to work was limited by the demand for their labor by the new communist
Yugoslav government under Josip Broz Tito. Already in October 1944 the
Partisans began rounding up ethnic Germans and putting them into concentration
camps. Another 5,800 were shot at this time (Prauser and Sretenovic, 55). Most
of the German population in Yugoslavia ended up interned in Yugoslav
concentration camps where nearly 50,000 perished by March 1948. Together with
some 7,000 executions a total of almost 17% of the ethnic German population of
Yugoslavia perished at the hands of the new communist regime in four years (Prauser
and Sretenovic, 56-57). As a result of the repression in Yugoslavia itself
against this minority only about 11,000 ended up as forced laborers in the
USSR. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first step in organizing the mobilization, internment,
and transfer to the USSR of ethnic Germans in the Balkans was to count them. On
24 November 1944, the head of the NKVD, Beria sent a formal report to Stalin on
organizing a count of Germans on territory captured by the Red Army. This
report noted that three operative groups representing the second, third, and
fourth Ukrainian fronts would count the number of Germans in the territory they
had occupied over a period of ten days. Heading the operation would be Deputy
Chief of the NKVD Apollonov and Chief of the Administration of NKVD Internal
Troops for Guarding the Rear Gorbatiuk (Pobol and Polian, doc. 3.213, 586). On
5 December 1944, Apollonov and Gorbatiuk sent an official report to Beria
regarding the count of ethnic Germans in foreign territory taken by the Red
Army on the second, third, and fourth Ukrainian Fronts. They counted a total of
187,042 Germans in this territory. The largest number were found in Romania at
83,815 people followed by Yugoslavia with 52,697, then Hungary with 43,312,
Czechoslovakia with 2,375, and Bulgaria with only 953. In Romania and
especially Yugoslavia the internment of ethnic Germans in camps had already begun.
Bucharest had one camp with 258 German internees and Yugoslavia had 22 camps
15,981 interned Germans. A good portion of the ethnic Germans counted by the
NKVD were either too young or too old to be mobilized. Only 115,086 of them
divided between 48,061 men and 67,025 women were between the ages 16 and 50
(Pobol and Polian, doc. 3.124, 586-587). Most of these ethnic Germans would
subsequently be rounded up and transported to the USSR for labor.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
This initial count was only partial. By 12 December 1944 the
number of Germans counted in the region under Soviet occupation had reached
551,049 of which 240,436 were men and 310,613 women. The vast majority of these
Germans, 421,846 lived in Romania. However, only 70,476 were men aged 17 to 45
capable of physical labor. Another 73,572 were found in Yugoslavia, 50,292 in
Hungary, 4,250 in Czechoslovakia, and 1,089 in Bulgaria (Pobol and Polian,
583). About a fifth of this population was mobilized and sent to the USSR for
labor in coal and iron mines. The remainder consisted of the elderly, children,
and those to infirm to work.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
During the first two weeks of December 1944 the NKVD helped set
up a network of internment camps for ethnic Germans in Romania like existed in Yugoslavia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A 12 December 1944 report from Apolonov to
Beria noted that 15 internment camps for ethnic Germans holding 7,890 people
had been established in Romania. In Yugoslavia there were 22 such camps with
16,084 internees. Most of these internees were men. The camps in Romania only
held 1,418 women and those in Yugoslavia 6,907 women. Likewise most of the
internees were between 16 and 50. Only 1,676 internees in Romania were either
younger than 16 or older than 50 while none were in Yugoslavia (Pobol and
Polian, doc. 3.125, 587-588). This breakdown by sex and age clearly shows the
intention of using these internees for labor. Most of the internees were young
men presumably more capable of hard labor than women or men over 50.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The actual order to mobilize ethnic Germans in the Balkans
for forced labor came from the pen of Joseph Stalin himself. On 16 December
1944, Stalin in his capacity as head of the GKO (State Committee of Defense)
issued GOKO Resolution No. 7151ss "On Mobilizing and Interning the German
Population in the Countries of South-Eastern Europe. This decree ordered the
mobilization of all German men capable of labor ages 17 to 45 and all German
women capable of physical labor ages 18 to 30 found in territory occupied by
the Red Army in Romania, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria. It
applied to German citizens as well as ethnic Germans with Hungarian, Romanian,
Czechoslovak, Yugoslav, or Bulgarian citizenship. The mobilization was to be
conducted by the NKVD under Beria. The NKVD was to mobilize collection points
for the ethnic Germans and then load them onto guarded train echelons and send
them to the USSR. Transported Germans could bring up to 200 kg of warm clothing,
linen, bedding, china, and provisions with them. All of the Germans from
South-Eastern Europe were to be sent to the coal mines of the Donbas and the
Iron mines of Southern Ukraine. The mobilization and transportation of the
Germans to their new work places in the USSR was to be completed by 15 February
1945 (Pobol and Polian, doc. 3.126, 588-589). This decree provided the legal
basis for the Soviet deportation of Germans from the Balkans to the USSR for
forced labor.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The forced round up of the ethnic Germans in the Balkans and
Central Europe for forced labor in the USSR took place around Christmas time
1944. The first such operation took place in Yugoslavia from 28 December 1944 to
5 January 1945. After the transfer of ethnic Germans from Yugoslavia to the
USSR for forced labor the NKVD next rounded up many of the ethnic Germans in
Hungary. This operation lasted from 1-10 January 1945 (Polian, 253). In
addition to Soviet NKVD operatives and soldiers the Hungarian operation also
involved a Romanian regiment (Pobol and Polian, 584). These two operations
together were much smaller than the subsequent mobilization and transfer of
ethnic Germans from Romania to the USSR. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The largest operation in terms of numbers of internees
transported to the USSR took place in Romania. It involved more than three
quarters of the Soviet NKVD personnel assigned to the mobilization and transfer
of ethnic Germans in the Balkans and Hungary to GUPVI camps in the Soviet Union.
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It started on 11 January and ended on 2
February 1945. The operation first targeted the urban German population in
Romania, followed by the rural population in the villages, and finally the
around 2,000 ethnic German men remaining in the Romanian army (Pobol and
Polian, 584). The operation in Romania involved both Soviet NKVD personnel and
Romanian police forces. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the only
substantial qualitative difference between the operation in Romania and those
in Yugoslavia and Hungary. The Romanian authorities in cooperation with the
Romanian communists collaborated with the Soviet NKVD in rounding up ethnic
German citizens in Romania for forced labor in the USSR as part of the price
they paid to switch sides from the Axis to the Allies near the end of the war
(Polian, 249). First, Soviet and Romanian forces surrounded the German villages
to prevent any escapes during the conduct of the mobilization. Then the local
Romanian authorities including the police and communist party put together the
list of names of ethnic Germans to be mobilized in each village. The local
Romanian gendarme then announced the mobilization and called those inducted for
forced labor to report to the local authorities to receive instructions
regarding their imminent transfer to the USSR. After returning home to pack the
Romanian police and security organs then transported the Germans to collection
points under NKVD supervision. At the collection points an NKVD inspection of
the conscripts usually weeded out the disabled, sick, and otherwise infirm as
well as non-Germans, pregnant women, women with children under one and half
years of age, and clergymen. The Soviet representatives exempted these categories
of people from forced labor and sent them home if detected (Polian, 254). The
NKVD and Romanian police and security forces then loaded these men and women
onto trains bound for destinations in the USSR. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The entire campaign removed a sizeable population of ethnic
Germans from South East and Central Europe and transported them by rail deep
into the USSR. The NKVD and their Romanian assistants brought a total of
124,542 ethnic Germans to collection points for deportation to the Soviet Union
as forced laborers in GUPVI camps. This number included 66,616 men and 57,926
women. The NKVD, however, did not send all these men and women to the USSR.
They released 12,190 at the collection points (Pobol and Polian, 585). The
number of Germans actually transported totaled 112,480 divided between 69,332
from Romania, 31,923 from Hungary, 10,935 from Yugoslavia, 215 from
Czechoslovakia, and 75 from Bulgaria (Polian, 260). The more than 112,000
ethnic Germans transported from these countries provided the Soviet Union with
a rather significant pool of forced laborers to rehabilitate the coal and iron
industries in Ukraine and the Urals.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The round up and transportation of the ethnic Germans from
the Balkans and Central Europe to the USSR involved a considerable commitment
of man power on the part of Moscow. Each train echelon had between 25-30 NKVD
internal troops guarding it on its journey to the labor camps in the interior
of the USSR (Pobel and Polian, 584-585). <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It involved 664 operative workers of the
NKVD-NKGB and 10,443 soldiers and officers of the NKVD internal troops, border
guards, and forces for guarding the rear of the Red Army. Thus over 11,000 men
in the NKVD-NKGB, particularly its paramilitary subdivisions participated in
the mobilization of ethnic Germans in Romania, Hungary, Yugoslavia,
Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria for forced labor. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It also involved a considerable commitment of rail resources
to forcibly transfer tens of thousands of ethnic Germans from South Eastern
Europe to GUPVI camps in the interior of the USSR. The entire series of
operations took 103 train echelons composed of 5,677 wagons. Each echelon
consisted of between 60-70 train wagons (Pobol and Polian, 585). This rail
stock represented resources devoted from the war effort. The war continued on for
another five months after the start of the mobilization of ethnic Germans in
Yugoslavia for forced labor in the USSR.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The transported Germans made the journey to the GUPVI labor
camps in the USSR under horrendous material conditions. The NKVD stuffed the
Germans tightly into the train wagons of the departing echelons. On average
each wagon carried between 40-45 people each (Pobol and Polian, 585).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The journey to the camps in the USSR followed
the earlier Soviet patterns of deportations to special settlements. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The allocation of ethnic Germans from the Balkans and
Central Europe to various coal, iron, and non-ferrous metal mines in the USSR
took place at the end of December 1944 when Stalin issued GOKO Resolution No.
7252ss on 29 December 1944. This decree assigned 80,000 people to work for the
People's Commissariat of Coal, 40,000 for the People's Commissariat of Ferrous
Metals, and 20,000 for the People's Commissariat of Non-Ferrous Metals (Pobol
and Polian, doc. 3.217, 590-591). The largest numbers of mobilized Germans from
the states between the USSR and Germany were to be sent to Stalin,
Voroshilovgrad, and Dnepropetrovsk oblasts in Ukraine. Stalin Oblast was to
receive 56,000 Germans of which 42,000 were to work in the coal industry,
12,000 in iron, and 2,000 in non-ferrous metals. Vorshilovgrad was to take
28,000 German workers divided between 26,000 in coal and 2,000 in iron.
Finally, Dnepropetrovsk was to employ 22,500 as iron miners (Pobol and Polian,
doc. 3.128, 592). The forced labor of these Germans clearly was intended to
rehabilitate the Soviet steel industry from the damage it suffered during the
war.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Personal accounts by ethnic German survivors of the GUPVI
camps detail horrendous suffering.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
lived and worked behind barbed wire under armed guard. The men and women were
segregated into separate barracks. These barracks tended to be overcrowded and
prone to frequent lice infestations leading to typhus outbreaks. At one of the
camps devoted to mining coal in Stalino (Donetsk), Ukraine there were no
toilets. The internees slept on wooden planks. The rations consisted of bread,
porridge, and some sort of vegetable soup. Rarely the porridge had pieces of
horse meat. Most of their daily caloric intake came from the bread (Polian,
282). These poor material conditions naturally led to significantly increased
mortality.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As can be seen from above the material conditions suffered
by the ethnic Germans from Romania, Yugoslavia, and Hungary to GUPVI camps in
the USSR were extremely harsh and resulted in high levels of sickness and
death. Indeed ethnic Germans from the Balkans like other interned and deported
groups suffered the loss of about a fifth of their population. The German
civilians from Germany itself interned in GUPVI camps, however, had much higher
death rates at nearly double the percentage of those from the Balkans. By the
end of 1949 a total of 40,737 mobilized Germans out of 205,520 from the Balkans
in GUPVI camps had perished. This comes to 19.2%. In contrast GUPVI recorded
25,719 deaths of civilian internees from Germany out of 66,152 people or 38.9%.
The total number of ethnic German internees in the USSR to die in GUPVI camps
thus reached 66,500 people. Non-German civilian internees such as the Poles (a
mortality rate of 6.8%) and Japanese (a mortality rate of 2.1%) suffered much
smaller proportional losses in the GUPVI camps (Polian, table 17, p. 293). The
especially high mortality rates of internees from Germany compared to the
Japanese appears to be largely a function of the Soviet regime taking revenge
upon German civilians for the crimes of the Hitler regime against the people of
the USSR. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The bulk of releases and repatriations of ethnic Germans in
GUPVI camps took place from 1945 to 1949. Early on in 1945 the Soviet released
and repatriated over 40% of the internees from Germany. The largest release and
repatriation of ethnic Germans from Hungary took place in 1947 with the return
of 41.5% of the internees from that country.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Finally in 1949 the Soviet government released the last 34% of German
internees from Romania and 28.9% from Yugoslavia (Polian, table 18, p. 294). By
25 January 1950 only 3,692 civilian internees remained in Soviet captivity
versus 202,720 repatriated and 66,468 deaths (Polian, p. 295).The use of ethnic
German labor as reparations for damage caused by the war had largely ended by
1950.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The deportation and mobilization the USSR of ethnic Germans
from Romania, Yugoslavia, and Hungary represented a significant expansion of
the Soviet system of forced labor beyond its borders to foreign citizens. Prior
to this time almost all forced laborers in the USSR had either been Soviet
citizens (according to the Soviet regime) or POWs. The mobilization of German,
Romanian, Yugoslav, and Hungarian citizens for forced labor in GUPVI camps thus
represented something new in the history of Soviet labor history. The Stalin
regime not only claimed the right to use its own citizens for forced labor, but
now also claimed a right to use ethnic Germans outside the USSR as forced
laborers as part of a system of reparations through labor. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Works Cited<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Apor, Balazs, “The Expulsion of the German Speaking
Population from Hungary” in Steffen Prauser and Arfon Rees, (eds.), <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Expulsion of the ‘German’ Communities
from Eastern Europe at the End of the Second World War </i>(Florence, Italy:
European University Institute, 2004). <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Castellan, Georges, “The Germans of Rumania<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">.” Journal of Contemporary History</i>, Vol.
6, no. 1, 1971.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Pobol, N.L. and P.M. Polian, (eds), <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Staliniskie deportatsii 1928-1953: Dokumenty</i> (Moscow: MFD, Materik,
2005).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Polian, Pavel, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Against
their Will </i>(Budapest: Central European University Press, 2004).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Prauser, Steffen and Stainslav Srentenovic, “The ‘Expulsion’
of the Germans Speaking Minority from Yugoslavia” in Steffen Prauser and Arfon
Rees, (eds.), <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Expulsion of the
‘German’ Communities from Eastern Europe at the End of the Second World War </i>(Florence,
Italy: European University Institute, 2004). <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Wien, Markus, “The Germans in Romania – the Ambiguous Fate
of a Minority” in Steffen Prauser and Arfon Rees, (eds.), <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Expulsion of the ‘German’ Communities from Eastern Europe at the
End of the Second World War </i>(Florence, Italy: European University
Institute, 2004). <o:p></o:p></div>
<br />J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-45580457451821987162019-02-19T15:02:00.002+03:002019-02-19T15:02:59.864+03:00StuffOkay I have again started posting to this blog. But, other than hits to the critique of Cofnas it appears to still have no readers. The piece on Cofnas got a couple hundred hits. Which is a lot for this blog. Still it is almost nothing by any other standards. But, that is okay. I only need one reader, myself, to justify writing here.<br />
<br />
I am currently working on editing the paper I gave on ethnic Germans in the USSR to the Genocide Conference in Sacramento in November last year. It is mostly done and just needs editing, a few more footnotes, and some more material on the concept of genocide in general at the beginning. So far I have gone through and edited half of it. I hope to completely finish revising it by the end of Thursday.<br />
<br />J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-50168576976475873232019-02-18T09:25:00.000+03:002019-02-18T09:25:26.638+03:00Middleman Minority Diasporas and Over Representation in Communist MovementsIt appears that ethnic Chinese were disproportionately over represented in the ranks of the communist parties of Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Burma during their hay day in the 1950s and 1960s. I haven't been able to find solid statistical breakdowns of the exact ethnic composition of these parties, however. So if anybody has any suggestions of where to look for this information please let me know.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-47984606159559874572019-02-15T13:33:00.001+03:002019-02-15T13:41:59.129+03:00Blogging AgainI have decided to revive my blog after almost a year hiatus. It was a good break. But, somethings like my short critique of Cofnas can only be expressed in writing and not orally. So I am going to be doing occasional posts here again along with my <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGDA_3w0-mqywO9MS-eq1Gg">youtube channel. </a> Since I last posted here I had one academic journal article published which is available on my <a href="https://auis.academia.edu/OttoPohl">academia.edu page</a>. The article is "Cultural, Spatial, and Legal Displacement of the Korean Diaspora in the USSR 1937-1949," <i>The Review of Korean Studies</i>, vol. 21, no. 1. It can be found <a href="https://www.academia.edu/37238345/Cultural_Spatial_and_Legal_Displacement_of_the_Korean_Diaspora_in_the_USSR_1937-1945">here</a>. The article is a revised version of the conference paper I gave at Korea University in Seoul in summer of 2017.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-42390858203141792462019-02-13T11:36:00.000+03:002019-02-13T11:36:02.347+03:00A Preliminary Critique of the Cofnas Critique<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
A Preliminary
Critique of the Cofnas Critique<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
J. Otto Pohl, PhD<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Nathan Cofnas seeks to explain Jewish disproportionate
overrepresentation in various 20<sup>th</sup> century leftwing movements as
being solely the result of higher average IQ and geographical concentration in
urban areas. He completely ignores the role of affinity networks, in group
ethnic preference, and the creation of economic niches by certain ethnic groups
most notably middle man minorities as well documented in the scholarship of
Thomas Sowell, Amy Chua, John Armstrong, Daniel Chirot, Anthony Reid, and Yuri
Slezkine to name just a few, none of whom are mentioned at all by Cofnas.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
Instead he merely cherry picks examples from McDonald and seeks to show that
Jews were equally involved in non-leftwing movements and that this somehow
proves that the disproportionate role of Jews in leftwing movements such as
communism is explicable entirely by IQ and geography and has absolutely nothing
to do with any other possible factors. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Before tackling the main issue of Cofnas falsely claiming
that IQ differences between ethno-racial groups is the “default hypothesis” in
academia I would like to note that this is largely a false question and one
that creates a self-serving narrative. Instead of asking why Jews were
disproportionately involved in the terror apparatus of the Soviet regime from
1918 to 1938 should not the conclusion be that such involvement was morally
wrong and that proper apologies and restitution should be made? Why a
disproportionately large number of Jews including very prominent ones like Bela
Kun, Genrikh Yagoda, Lazar Kaganovich, Genrikh Liushkov, Izrael Leplevski,
Matvei Berman, Boris Berman, and many other Jews were involved in large scale
crimes against humanity in the USSR is not the most interesting question to me.
Rather the fact that while Germans, Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Latvians,
Estonians, Hungarians, and others have been held collectively responsible for
crimes against Jews that Jewish crimes against Germans, Ukrainians,
Lithuanians, Koreans, and others have been completely de-ethnicized. This is
true even when the Jewish state of Israel has openly harbored Stalinist murderers
from justice like Solomon Morel and Nachman Dusanski.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn2" name="_ftnref2" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn2;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[2]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
This blatant double standard rather than the reasons that the Jews in the USSR,
Poland, Hungary, Romania, and Czechoslovakia were disproportionately involved
in communist crimes against humanity should be the real focus of scholarship. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The vast literature on middle man minorities which include
not only Jews, but Chinese in South East Asia, Lebanese and Syrians in West
Africa, Asian Indians in East Africa, Armenians and Greeks in the Ottoman
Empire, and Baltic Germans in the Russian Empire largely explains their overrepresentation
in certain occupations and political movements. None of this literature which
is quite mainstream and includes very accessible authors like Sowell, Chua, and
Slezkine makes reference to IQ as an explanatory factor. Instead the historical
cultural practices of these groups and their differences from the peasant
majorities of their host societies is emphasized. The role and
overrepresentation of Greeks and Armenians in the Ottoman Empire was in the
exact same fields as Jews in Europe and North America. Yet the average IQ of
Greece is only 92, Armenia is 94, versus 110 for Ashkenazi Jews. The
surrounding Turkish population that lived around the Greeks and Armenians is 90
not significantly lower. Likewise Asian Indians have dominated in many of these
same positions in Africa and the Caribbean. This despite that the average IQ of
India is only 82. Lebanese fill a similar economic role in West Africa with an
average national IQ also of 82.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn3" name="_ftnref3" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn3;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[3]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
Cofnas makes no reference to other comparable middle man minorities and thus
does not deal with this huge problem in his Judeocentric approach. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Instead of dealing with the middle man literature regarding
economic overrepresentation of Jews, Chinese, Greeks, Lebanese, Indians, and
other diaspora groups Cofnas seeks to focus on individual Jews in intellectual
movements. But, the most important political movement to have a
disproportionate Jewish influence is communism. Cofnas has a short section
devoted to Poland in 1949 after most of the Jews surviving the Holocaust from
Poland had already left to Palestine to engage in a war of ethnic cleansing
against the Arabs.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn4" name="_ftnref4" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn4;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[4]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> He
does not, however, deal with the much more important and larger case of the
USSR especially in the years 1918 to 1938 when their overrepresentation in the
highest echelons of the organs of terror were at extraordinary levels. This is
a huge oversight.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The highest echelons of the NKVD between 1934 and late 1938
ranged from a high of 39% Jewish in October 1936 to a low of 21% Jewish in
September 1938 shortly before most of them were purged despite the fact that less
than 2% of the total Soviet population was Jewish. After their purge they were
overrepresented by a factor of about double their percentage in the population
the same level of overrepresentation Germans had in 1934.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn5" name="_ftnref5" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn5;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[5]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
This is a far higher percentage than be accounted for by the differences in IQ and
urbanization between Ashkenazi Jews and Russians and Ukrainians. It is easiest
accounted for by affinity networks, in group preference in recruiting, and
given the importance of the political police in Stalin’s USSR,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the success of Soviet Jews as the dominant
middle man minority in the state. Especially since the very highest official of
the NKVD during 1934 to 1936, Genrikh Yagoda was himself Jewish. It is also a
time period when the NKVD engaged in the massive arrest and execution of
innocent civilians including hundreds of thousands of Poles, Germans, Latvians,
and Finns targeted on the basis of their ethno-racial identity.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn6" name="_ftnref6" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn6;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[6]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
In addition to the national operations this period of time also saw the massive
ethnic cleansing of over 172,000 ethnic Koreans from the Soviet Far East into
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn7" name="_ftnref7" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn7;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[7]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
The main overseers of these crimes were ethnic Jews. In the case of the Polish
and German operations Izrael Leplevski and Boris Berman the heads of the
Ukrainian and Belorussian NKVD branches. In the case of the forced resettlement
of Koreans and creation of a whites only Soviet Far East, Genrikh Liushkov,
head of the NKVD in the region. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></div>
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The national operations specifically targeted Poles,
Germans, Latvians, Finns, and other diaspora groups, but not Jews.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn8" name="_ftnref8" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn8;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[8]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
As a result the proportion of Jews arrested during the great terror was just
slightly above their representation in the Soviet population as a whole versus
the extremely high levels of racially targeted groups like Poles, Germans,
Latvians, and Finns. The Great Terror which saw the vast majority of executions
by the Soviet state occurred in 1937-1938. Between 1921 and 1953 the Cheka and
its successors the GPU, OGPU, NKVD, and MVD sentenced a recorded 799,455 people
to death of which 681,692 took place in the two years of 1937 and 1938.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn9" name="_ftnref9" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn9;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[9]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
The national operations such as the “Polish Operation”, the “German Operation”,
and the “Latvian Operation” targeting alleged operatives of these foreign
states and falling largely upon their diaspora populations in the USSR
accounted for 247,157 of these death sentences despite the fact that
collectively these groups only made up 1.7% of the Soviet population.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn10" name="_ftnref10" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn10;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[10]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
Thus already before World War II Soviet persecution had taken on a distinctly
ethno-racial basis against diaspora groups, but Jews were not one of the groups
targeted for disproportionate arrest and execution. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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Out of a total of 1,420,711 arrests in the USSR from 1
January 1936 to 1 July 1938 Russians and Ukrainians were underrepresented and
Germans, Poles, Latvians, and Finns overrepresented. Russians constituted
657,799 arrests or 43.6% while they made up 58.4% of the Soviet population.
Ukrainians with 189,410 arrests came in at 13.3% versus 16.5% of the total
population. Germans with only 0.8% of the population racked up 75,331 or 5.3% of
arrests or 6.625 times their proportion of the population. Poles with 105,485
arrests 7.4% of the total were only 0.4% of the population and overrepresented
by a factor of 18.5. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Latvians
constituted 21,392 arrests or 1.5% compared to their 0.1% of the population an
overrepresentation by a factor of 15. Finally, Finns with 10,678 arrests or
0.7% compared to 0.1% of the population were overrepresented by a factor of 7.
Jews in contrast with 30,545 arrests or 2.1% of the total were just slightly
overrepresented since they made up 1.8% of the Soviet population.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn11" name="_ftnref11" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn11;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[11]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
Contrary to the myth that Jews were especially targeted for persecution in the
USSR the number arrested during the Great Terror does not greatly exceed their
proportion in the population as a whole whereas Germans, Poles, Finns, and
Latvians were all overrepresented by factors ranging from 6.6 to 18.5 times. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The percentages of diasporas in the leadership of the NKVD
does not mean that much when it comes to Poles, Latvians, and Germans since the
total numbers involved are so small. Compared to the Jews the total number of
these other diaspora groups in the NKVD was much lower although Latvians and
Poles were significantly overrepresented. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Latvians were the highest reaching 9% of the
NKVD highest ranks in October 1936 or a factor of 90 although the total number
of Latvians in these positions only reached 9. In contrast Poles peaked at 5.5%
or overrepresented by a factor of 13.75. Although again the total number of
Poles involved peaked at 5 in 1936. In July 1934 the German representation
peaked at 2.08%, a total of 2 people, and an overrepresentation of 2.6 times. Whereas
Jews made up 39% of the highest ranks of the NKVD or 43 people at this time,
more than Russians at 30% or 33. Compared to their population as a whole Jews
were overrepresented in the NKVD leadership by a factor of 21.9.<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftn12" name="_ftnref12" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn12;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[12]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
Thus Latvians, Germans, and Poles were all also overrepresented in the highest
ranks of the NKVD. But, their total combined numbers only came to 15, or only
about a third of the Jewish membership numbers. Finns were not overrepresented
in the highest echelons of the NKVD leadership. But, out of all the major
Western diaspora nationalities only Jews are not greatly overrepresented as
victims of the Soviet state during the Great Terror of 1937-1938. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The overrepresentation of certain ethnic groups in various
professions is well established despite its complete neglect by Cofnas. None of
this literature mentions yet alone stresses as the main explanatory factor, IQ.
This is because some of these groups like Greeks, Armenians, Indians, and Lebanese
do not as a whole score very high on IQ tests especially compared to Ashkenazi
Jews. It should also be stressed that some of the niches disproportionately
dominated by Ashkenazi Jews as dominant middleman minorities in various
countries are not ones that require very high IQ scores. This is the case of
the Soviet political police where a great many of its members even at high
levels had very poor Russian language and mathematical abilities (just read
through the NKVD reports in the archives). Given that less than a third of them
were ethnic Russians in the mid-1930s the first deficiency is not surprising.
But, they are both indicative of a lack of particular skills associated with
intelligence among the ranks and even officers of the organs of state terror.
Thus factors other than high IQ or even urbanization would appear to account
for much of the Jewish overrepresentation in certain fields, professions, and
movements just as it does in the case of the overrepresentation of other middle
man minorities such as Greeks, Armenians, Lebanese, Chinese, Indians, and other
similar ethno-classes. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<div style="mso-element: footnote-list;">
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<div id="ftn1" style="mso-element: footnote;">
<div class="MsoFootnoteText">
<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Andalus",serif;"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Andalus",serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Andalus",serif;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Andalus;">Thomas Sowell, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Markets and
Minorities</i> (Basic Books, 1981), Amy Chua, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred
and Global Instability</i> (Doubleday, 2003), Yuri Slezkine, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Jewish Century </i>(Princeton University
Press, 2004), John Armstrong, “Mobilized and Proletarian Diasporas,” <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The American Political Science </i>Review,
vol. 70, no. 2 (June 1976), Daniel Chirot and Anthony Reid, eds., <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Essential Outsiders: Chinese and Jews in the
Modern Transformation of Southeast Asia and Central Europe </i>(London:
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref2" name="_ftn2" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn2;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[2]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> Adam
LeBor, “Israel Protects Concentration Camp Boss,” <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Independent</i>, 29 December 1998. <span class="MsoHyperlink"><a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/israel-protects-concentration-camp-boss-1194791.html">https://www.independent.co.uk/news/israel-protects-concentration-camp-boss-1194791.html</a></span>
And <span class="MsoHyperlink"><a href="https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=136382">https://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=136382</a></span>
Accessed on 10 February 2019. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref3" name="_ftn3" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn3;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[3]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> <span class="MsoHyperlink"><a href="https://brainstats.com/average-iq-by-country.html">https://brainstats.com/average-iq-by-country.html</a></span>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref4" name="_ftn4" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn4;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[4]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> Mark
Jan Chodakiewicz, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">After the Holocaust:
Polish-Jewish Conflict in the Wake of World War II</i> (Boulder, CO: East
European Monographs, 2003), pp. 35-36.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref5" name="_ftn5" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn5;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[5]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> <span class="MsoHyperlink"><a href="http://old.memo.ru/history/NKVD/kto/stattab4.htm">http://old.memo.ru/history/NKVD/kto/stattab4.htm</a></span>
Accessed on 10 February 2019.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref6" name="_ftn6" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn6;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[6]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> Terry
Martin, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">An Affirmative Action Empire:
Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union </i>(London: Cornell University
Press, 2001), pp. 338-339.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref7" name="_ftn7" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn7;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[7]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> J.
Otto Pohl, “Cultural, Spatial, and Legal Displacement of the Korean Diaspora in
the USSR: 1937-1945,” <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Review of
Korean Studies</i>, vol. 21, no.1 (June 2018), p. 176.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref8" name="_ftn8" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn8;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[8]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> S.U.
Alieva, ed. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Tak eto bylo: Natsinal’nye
repressi v SSSR, 1919-1953 gody</i> (Moscow: Insan, 1993), vol. 1, p. 253.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
<div id="ftn9" style="mso-element: footnote;">
<div class="MsoFootnoteText">
<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref9" name="_ftn9" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn9;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[9]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> J.
Otto Pohl, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Stalinist Penal System</i>,
(Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1997), pp. 7-9.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref10" name="_ftn10" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn10;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[10]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> Martin,
pp. 338-339.<o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref11" name="_ftn11" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn11;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[11]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> Viktor
Krieger, Hans Kampen, and Nina Paulson, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Deutsche
aus Russland gestern und heute: Volk auf dem Weg </i>(Bundesministerium des
Innern und Landsmannschaft der Deutschen aus Russland, Stuttgart, 2006), p. 16.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="file:///C:/Users/jonathan.otto.AUIS/Documents/Cofnas%20Critique.docx#_ftnref12" name="_ftn12" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn12;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Calibri",sans-serif; font-size: 10.0pt; line-height: 107%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">[12]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a> <span class="MsoHyperlink"><a href="http://old.memo.ru/history/NKVD/kto/stattab4.htm">http://old.memo.ru/history/NKVD/kto/stattab4.htm</a></span>
Accessed on 11 February 2019. <o:p></o:p></div>
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J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-61220403057037725292018-04-10T16:33:00.000+03:002018-04-10T16:33:38.745+03:00You Tube Channel I have started a Youtube Channel. The first video can be found <a href="https://youtu.be/YQdQ8mAcd-o">here</a>. The second one is <a href="https://youtu.be/-sFKKdfDjno">here.</a> I will doing more of these and probably be blogging less as I move into the 21st Century.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-43323437073782060542018-04-04T08:54:00.001+03:002018-04-04T08:54:28.162+03:00US ConferenceThis morning I wrote up a proposal and abstract for a conference paper in the US in November. If it is accepted it will be the first time I will be back in the US since 2011. Seven years is a long time and during those years I have spent significant time in Ghana, Kyrgyzstan, and Iraqi Kurdistan. Looking on the Internet it looks like the US collectively went insane in the last seven years since I have been gone.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-89158601196649334832018-03-26T23:12:00.002+03:002018-03-26T23:12:36.106+03:00The Dying of BlogsAt this point blogs seem to be almost obsolete. All the interesting discussion of ideas seems to have migrated to Youtube in the last five years or so. I read very few other blogs now and they seem to have less and less interesting content. I am pretty sure that my audience has been stuck at less than a half dozen people for the last six or seven years. Of course this blog's main function has been merely as an electronic diary for myself for quite some time now.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-32688712712124167732018-03-24T12:22:00.001+03:002018-03-24T12:22:55.507+03:00New Year's BreakMy New Year's break is almost over. Tomorrow I go back to work. Besides going up into the mountains I didn't do anything special. I went to the gym to work out a lot. I ate at B to B a lot. At one of my lunches at B to B I witnessed a gun battle on the street below. But, I still have no idea what it was about. Yesterday, I was taking a cab to the park by the bazaar to eat Nepali food when I saw my friend in the car in front of me and he told me to get in with him. Then his car broke down before we reached the bazaar and we ended up taking the bus to the park. Other than that I didn't do much.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-33885467240112957972018-03-21T19:48:00.001+03:002018-03-21T19:48:29.633+03:00New Article on Germans in Labor Army AvailableMy article, <a href="https://www.academia.edu/36177233/Forced_Labor_in_a_Socialist_State_Ethnic_Germans_from_Kazakhstan_and_Central_Asia_in_the_Labor_Army_-_1941-1957">"Forced Labor in a Socialist State: Ethnic Germans from Kazakhstan and Central Asia in the Labor Army - 1941-1957" </a>is now available on my Academia.edu site. Just click the link on the title of the article.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-30630327484887103592018-03-21T12:44:00.002+03:002018-03-21T12:44:39.942+03:00Happy New YearYesterday I went up to the mountains with some Kurdish friends to celebrate the New Year. The green mountains were beautiful. The grilled fish was delicious. The weather was fantastic. Finally, I had a great time.<br />
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J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-90269497958043561652018-03-13T13:40:00.001+03:002018-03-15T21:18:42.194+03:00GymYesterday, I joined a gym in order to intensify and better organize the exercise my cardiologists have demanded. The coach there wrote me out a weekly exercise plan. I am hoping that this will at least delay for a significant period having to have anymore stents inserted in my arteries.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-69530125532955812962018-03-12T13:52:00.002+03:002018-03-12T13:52:51.329+03:00I Now Have Iraqi Residency (good for ten months)I finally got my residency and work permit sorted out and got my passport back with another Iraqi visa. It is good until the middle of next January.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-91668580747962528292018-03-11T16:22:00.001+03:002018-03-11T16:22:28.022+03:00Next SemesterI got my schedule for fall 2018. Like this semester I am only teaching three large classes on Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday mornings from eight to eleven thirty. This is a reward for getting two articles accepted for publication before July 2018. It doesn't appear that any amount publishing will ever get me promotion here. But, at least it does get me "flexible schedule." Next semester's "flexible schedule" has two CIV 102 sections and one geography class.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-59867865527495087212018-03-05T12:33:00.000+03:002018-03-05T12:33:16.015+03:00HolidaysIt turns out that today is Raparin Day which is the day the uprising against Saddam Hussein began in Ranya. Which meant that my attempt to do business at the bank today failed since the bank was closed. For some reason our university is the only educational institution in all of southern Kurdistan that does not have the day off. So I was given no indication that today was anything other than a normal work day before I attempted to go to the bank.<br />
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Today is also the 65th anniversary of the death of Joseph Stalin. Unfortunately, the despot is more popular than <a href="http://jpohl.blogspot.com/2015/03/62-years-since-stalin-died-and-his.html">ever</a>. From everything I can see on the Internet it appears that the younger generation in the US is completely unaware of his <a href="http://jpohl.blogspot.com/2014/11/the-anniversary-of-bolshevik-revolution.html">crimes</a>. But, American university students became a lost cause more hopeless than the Confederacy years ago.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-69406780213934055832018-03-05T08:49:00.003+03:002018-03-05T08:49:49.016+03:00The Weekly GrindYesterday, I graded over 80 quizzes. This morning I have been making progress on another eighty plus. But, I haven't finished the pile yet. I have fifteen minutes left of office hours and so far only one student has come in. Having my office hours from 7:30 to 9:00 in the morning has really cut down on the amount of stress in my life just as my cardiologists ordered.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-53352721140089824542018-03-03T09:38:00.000+03:002018-03-03T09:38:01.079+03:00FridayYesterday, I had a brief video chat with my wife and daughter. Then I took a taxi to the bazaar and walked to the park to buy some Nepali noodles. There was one particularly annoying beggar woman who kept following me around and refused to leave me alone even though I kept telling her I had no money. After she finally left and I was able to finish my noodles, I took a walk through the bazaar and drank some tea.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-5883102271370925882018-02-26T11:04:00.001+03:002018-02-26T11:04:46.495+03:00WeatherIt has now been raining almost nonstop for nearly two weeks here now. This is after after having absolutely no snow at all down here in the city this winter. The rain isn't that hard which is good because my umbrella committed suicide and I haven't been motivated enough to purchase a new one.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-80443527578595418172018-02-22T16:12:00.002+03:002018-02-22T16:12:50.059+03:00Another WeekThe work week is finally over. In addition to lectures and endless marking of quizzes I have been discussing a conference proposal with a colleague in the US. It looks like I'll finally get back the US later this year. The last time I was there was January 2011.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-49530699156167428952018-02-16T16:08:00.005+03:002018-02-16T16:10:24.980+03:00Kurds in the USSRMy article <i>Kurds in the USSR, 1917-1956</i> is now up on my academia.edu page. You can access it<a href="https://www.academia.edu/35901602/Kurds_in_the_USSR_1917-1956"> here. </a>J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-30778350914142619852018-02-08T07:29:00.003+03:002018-02-08T07:32:07.233+03:00Thank God it is Finally ThursdayI am very glad that the work week will finally becoming to an end today. I have classes from 8:00 am to 11:30 am and then Kurdish class at 4:30-5:30. But, I do not have to go to Baghdad this weekend so I at least have a short break to rest.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-6106031392340384692018-02-07T08:51:00.002+03:002018-02-07T08:51:47.092+03:00This MorningIt is now 8:30 am and I have been at work for one hour and twenty minutes. During that time I have accomplished three things. Two of them are routine matters relating to teaching. The third thing was revising a syllabus for a proposed course on the history of the USSR. This is proving to take a lot longer and a lot more revision than I initially anticipated. Fortunately, I haven't had to take anything out yet. I have just had to add stuff. Everybody else so far seems to want me to put more emphasis on international relations and geopolitics. I suspect this is because history itself as a discipline is extremely devalued in the region compared to IR.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7858950.post-75973347705125488802018-02-06T13:38:00.000+03:002018-02-06T13:38:12.714+03:00New Publication on Germans from Kazakhstan and Central AsiaMy article, "Forced Labor in a Socialist State: Ethnic Germans from Kazakhstan and Central Asia in the Labor Army, 1941-1957" will be appearing in <i>The Journal of International Crimes and History </i>next month.J. Otto Pohlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07457089758142264049noreply@blogger.com1