HIST 2453 Counterintelligence: An American Social History

Fulfills US History requirement for History Majors. Counterintelligence is the detecting and apprehension of spies, depriving foreign governments of information, and frustrating hostile foreign intelligence services from collecting information. The course will study the most impactful U.S. counterintelligence operations from the American Revolution to the present. However, this course aims to move beyond the strict political history to engage issues of psychology, gender, ethnicity, ideology, religion, and nationalism. George Washingtons use of female spies during the American Revolution, African-American agents in the Civil War, the birth of professional counterintelligence during World War I, U.S. Army surveillance of African-Americans and Jews, plus the Cold War cases such as Alger Hiss and the Rosenbergs will be studied. Modern cases such as the Edward Snowden case and the Steele Dossier will also be assessed.