Thomas Goltz

Author and Academic Adventurer

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Dr. Thomas Goltz is an American author, academic and adventurer best known for his book-length accounts of conflict in the Post-Soviet Caucasus. This body of work is summed up in his unplanned 'Caucasus Triptych' of books on post-Soviet Azerbaijan, Georgia and Chechnya, and others. CF the 'Books' link for more.

Born in Japan in 1954, Goltz was raised in North Dakota and graduated from New York University with an MA in Middle East studies in 1985.

In 2020, he recieved an Honorary Doctorate from ADA University in Baku for his contributions to understanding between Azerbaijan and other countries of the Caucasxus region and the USA.

Goltz is un-expected polyglot. Startng at age 20 or so, he now speaks German, Turkish, Azerbaijani, Russian and (sadly much deteriorated) Arabic as well as fractured Kurdish, Georgian and Farsi.

He now lives in Livingston, Montana.

Books

Goltz is the author at least a half-dozen books, ranging from the aforementioned 'Unplanned Triptych' on the Post-Soviet Caucasus, a curious book on Shakespeare in Africa and a geo-political travelogue about riding Soviet-era sidecar motorcycles down the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline. He is currently completing a 40-year memoir on his intimate association with Turkey, and drafting a new work of essays on the United States. Links to Amazon.com and Kindle are found on the Books page.

Chapters

Additionally, Goltz has contibuted any number of original chapters to anthologies of everything from violations of the Geneva Conventions to tonque-in-cheek travel

Translations

The three books comprising the 'Unplanned Caucasus Triptych' have been translated into and published as a whole into diverse languages, including Azerbaijani, Georgian and Turkish and Hungarian. Individual chapters also translated and published in anthologies in French, German, Persian, Russian and Japanese. This a great honor indeed, because local publishers decided that locals needed to read his work.

We will endeavor to find direct internet links to the foreign publishers because Amazon.com does not usually deal with this sort of stuff, and said books are likely difficult to find.

Articles

Over the years, Goltz has contibuted major articles to leading American and International publications and journals, ranging from The National Interest, Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, The Washington Quarterly, the Journal of Balkan and Middle East Studies, Salon, The Nation and even Soldier of Fortune. Examples are found on the link above in the directory.

Academia

In 2006 Goltz was invited to return to Montana as a Visiting Scholar to beef up a newly-created program on Cerntral Asia and the Caucasus at The University of Montana. He left that position to be closer to home in Livingston, accepting a job at the rival Montana State University.

The result was Goltz accepting an Honorary PhD from ADA University in Baku, Azerbaijan for his commitment to further USA/Azerbaijani and connections to other post-Soviet Caucasus states between 1991 and 2020.

The Model Arab League (MAL)

Inheriting a moribund Middle East class/debate society called the Model Arab League (MAL) in 2008, Goltz transformed the class first into state-wide champions and then into a regional (Rocky Mountain) giant.

Students ranged from techno-nerds to rural Montana farm & ranch boys and girls and quite a few former miltary youth who had never been out of the USA (or even Montana!) before departing in uniform to defend the USA from diverse, nefarious actors (mainly Muslims) in diverse corners of the anti-American world,,,

Upon returning to the Homeland, many wanted to understand Iraq, Afghanistan and other places where they had served under extreme duress, and this class allowed them to open their eyes.

Finally, Goltz led his MSU students to national honors in the annual NCUSAR competetion in Washington, DC, when 'Moo-You' faced off against giants such as West Point, Northeastern, Northwestern and another 20 universities in 2011, 2012 and 2013, when the MSU represented Eritrea, then Bahrain and finally, Palestine, when MSU took runner-up honors to great surprise and acclaim.

Bravo, kids, says the Dictator In The Corner!

Challenge: Find Professor Goltz among students in the picture...

The New Silk Road

The MAL class was so successful that it spawned a clone debate class designed to explore the highly-charged area around the Black Sea Basin, based on the Organization of Black Sea Econonic Cooperation, or BSEC.

That class then morphed into an intense summer school academic adventure called The New Silk Road in 2012.

A taste of this incredible life-transforming student experience across Azerbaijan, Georgia and then Turkey is available under 'Videos/Films' page. It was shown at the official BSEC summit in Baku in 2019.

Films and Documentaries

Over the years, Goltz has also been engaged in assisting in making documentaries for ABC (Nightline) and CBS (60 Minutes) as well as producing independent pieces for the BBC (Our Correspondent) and PBS (Rights & Wrongs.)

Feature documentaries for US and international film festivals include On Aggregate--Champions Without A Hame, about a refugee soccer/football team in Azerbaijan (2015). It became a runner up in Prince Albert of Monaco's annual SporTel contest and was later screened in London at the Chelsea FC stadium at Stamford Bridge! Links to Vimeo and YouTube will be provided to several via this button.

A heart-wrenching moment came when the producers of the docu-drama about the life and death of Goltz's friend and mentor Marie Colvin allowed him to show what was at least the Montana premier of her life at the Shane Arts Center here in Livingston, followed by a discussion about the ins & outs of crisis reporting, joined by Billl campbell and Maryanne Vollers, both veteran hacks (journalists) of Africa war-zones and who had a lot to say.

Despite blizzard-like conditions, the Shane Center was packed, and I could finally explain what I did (or had done) for a living as a 'war correspondent.'

RIP, Marie.

Other/BLOGS

My interests are broad.

Accordingly, I have created this catch-all category to collect my eclectic tastes.

These include everything from Food to International Sport (soccer) to American History to Azerbaijani Music and Opera to Hunting and Human Rights.

My most recent intellectual development is to study Spanish, with a focus on Mexico.

Donations/Subscriptions

I have created a PayPal on-line Donation service to keep me on my feet. I intend to expand this into a Subscribers' Service that guarantees a major article a month as well as a Pay-To-View element for Vimeo/YouTube films such as On-Aggregate.

Contact

Feel free to contact me, and I will endeavor to respond to everything from praise to criticism to cat-calls. But all messages will remain between you and me.

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thomascgoltz@gmail.com