Otto's Random Thoughts

Recently two pieces of my writing were published. The first to appear in print was "Soviet Ethnic Cleansing of the Crimean Tatars...

Yesterday I saw the movie Big Men. Now I too want to be a Big Man. But, to be a Big Man you need Big Money and in West Africa the biggest ...

It turns out that most of the foods we eat here in Ghana originally came here from the Western hemisphere, particularly from Brazil via th...

Today I saw a great performance of poems, songs, and dances done in Arabic, Chinese, French, Kiswahili, Russian, and Spanish put on by maj...

It has been a long time since I updated this blog. Part of the reason is that I have been busy doing more important things. But, probably ...

One of the things I have written about has been the deportation of the Crimean Tatars. For a long time it was a topic, like most of what I...

This picture actually has nothing to do with anything. I just like it. Unfortunately, there is no place on campus where you can get real c...

Today is the 71st anniversary of the deportation of the Balkars from their homeland in the Caucasus to Kazkhstan and Kyrgyzstan. The Stali...

I have reached the point where I take it as a victory if a big name academic journal sends my manuscript out to peer reviewers rather than t...

It has been 62 years since Stalin died. Despite knowing now more than ever about the crimes of his regime, Stalin is more popular than at ...

Hppy Independence Day to Ghana.

Reports from Moscow are noting that opposition politician Boris Nemtsov has reportedly been shot and killed by four bullets to the chest whi...

Most people will remember the late Leonard Nimoy for his iconic role as Spock in the first Star Trek franchise. Indeed, reruns of that show ...

This is my ethnic heritage on my father's side.

Today is the 71st anniversary of the deportation of the Chechens and Ingush . To celebrate Red Army Day in 1944, the NKVD systematically d...

In the fall of 1941 the Stalin regime removed almost all ethnic Germans from the Red Army and sent them to the labor army . The vast ma...

I have placed another piece of mine that was published in 2008 on my academia.edu page . The print version appeared as J. Otto Pohl, “Loss...