U.S. National Security Challenges in the Middle East
Course Description (*Awaiting notification from MES for the class to be cross listed with LBJ.)
The course is designed for graduate students from the LBJ School and the Middle East Studies Program to engage in readings, discussions, and projects to understand the complexity of U.S. national security policy in the Middle East. U.S. relations with Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Israel, and Iran will be examined to underscore the centrifugal and centripetal forces at play with any decision the U.S. makes in the region that impacts any of these countries. The goal of this course is to have students use their cultural and linguistic understanding to navigate the abstruseness of U.S. policy accomplished by students constructing a team white paper on a transnational policy issue linked to U.S. security concerns that impacts all four Middle Eastern countries to highlight the persistent trade-offs required for each policy decision. The transnational subjects that will be addressed are as follows: cybersecurity, counterproliferation, counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and traditional military/geopolitical concerns for regional stability (such as population migration) and energy security.
Students will complete a policy white paper team project, an individual research paper, and two book reviews as the graded assignments for the course. In addition, students will receive grades for participation, to include commenting on weekly readings via the course Canvas site.
Course Modality
The course will be taught as a hybrid class for the spring semester. In practice for this class, this hybrid modality allows students to choose whether to use Zoom or attend class in person for lectures and team assignment time. Students who opt to use Zoom will not/not be disadvantaged regarding the team times and interactions with the Professor as UT’s technical capability allows for real-time interactions that promote dialogue as part of the classroom experience of lectures, class discussions, and team interactions.