Alexander Kartozia Editor

Dr. Givi Gabliani (1915–2001) was a general surgeon who practiced medicine for over 35 years in Quincy, Illinois. Born in the highland village of Mulachi, Republic of Georgia, Gabliani was of "Svan" ethnicity and an avid mountaineer. He was a medical student in Tbilisi before World War II broke out. Gabliani came to the United States in 1950 via Germany with his wife Rusudan (Alshibaja) after his harrowing years in World War II as a conscripted medical officer for the Red Army and as a German POW. In 1942–1943, he volunteered for the Bergmann military unit along with other prisoners of war from the Caucasus in the hope of liberating their homelands. Commanded by a group of anti-Hitlerite Germans, the Georgian Legion served in Ukraine and Crimea before being disbanded. Because his father Ignata Gabliani was a politician and resistance fighter killed in Stalin's purges in the 1930s, Givi lived his life in exile. He wrote his memoir in 1991 as the Soviet Union was collapsing, and it looks forward to a future world without a Russian oppressor in the Caucasus.

Alexander Kartozia is an author, professor and translator. He is former Minister of Education of Georgia and was a director of the National Parliamentary Library. His research includes German-Georgian cultural exchange and Georgian culture, literature, and language. He is based in Berlin and Tbilisi.

Hans-Heinrich Herwarth von Bittenfeld, also known as Johann von Herwarth, was a German diplomat in Moscow who provided the Allies with information prior to and during the Second World War. He revealed the secret pre-war pact made between Hitler and Stalin on how to divide Central Europe and continued to advise Western powers not to give in to Hitler's territorial demands. In 1955, Herwarth became the first post-war ambassador from Germany to London.