Graduate Certificate in Strategic Leadership

The purpose of this course is to provide students with the analytical tools and knowledge skill sets to assess American foreign policy and America’s role in a changing world. Specifically, this course attempts to make sense of the change dynamics by exploring the policy process and the core values that have defined America’s role in the world.

This course of study examines the history of political, tactical and strategic developments and concepts regarding geopolitical concerns regarding political and military planning and execution from the mid-20th Century through the modern era. The comparative analysis of these concepts from the applicable secondary literature will provide a stepping stone to understanding the nature of modern combined arms and joint forces warfare.

This course examines the defense policies of a number of nations in Europe and Asia that had to deal with enormous changes following the East bloc's collapse. It concentrates on the effect of post-Cold War induced changes on these nations.

This course is an in-depth analysis of the characteristics of leadership common to great military leaders. It focuses on those personalities and decision making skills that are inbred and/or learned by the great leaders. Students compare and contrast the characteristics of great military leaders and choose a specific leader to assess the persona of that individual. Special emphasis is on investigating the biographical literature and what sources reveal about personality and leadership style.

This course addresses the application of strategy and process of the making of strategy, both of which deal with the preparation and use of military power to serve the ends of politics. The treatment is chronological, as determined by the various case studies, and two themes run throughout: the relationship of strategy and the strategic level of war to other levels of war, especially policy and the political level of war; and the difficulty inherent in the process of the making of strategy. Note: Not available for students who have previously taken MILS520.

This course considers the nature of future military conflict, the history of future war doctrine, and the impact of current conflict on the conceptualization of the "next war." Students examine current, past, and future low-intensity as well as high-intensity conflicts, and the appropriate use of military force in the power projection role to influence a diplomatic resolution to a conflict. Rogue nations, and related cultural clashes, and religious factors are related to planning for future war.