In 1965, the United States invaded the Dominican Republic to prevent the creation of a “second Cuba.” The invasion and subsequent occupation of the Caribbean nation maintained peace in Santo Domingo beneath the banner of a multi-national peacekeeping force representing the Organization of American States (O.A.S.) as a provisional Dominican government prepared for a democratic presidential election. Although operation Power Pack, the U.S. military name for the intervention, is one of the largest uses of armed force in U.S. – Latin American history and both military and foreign policy leaders deemed the operation a success, few members of the U.S. military seem to remember Power Pack today.The one exception to this is the U.S. Army’s 82d Airborne Division. Unlike other U.S. military branches, or other parts of the U.S. Army, which fail to remember the intervention, the 82d Airborne remembers the intervention and has gone to great lengths to celebrate and memorialize its role in Power Pack. The division’s production of a commemorative book, the construction of political and intellectual discourse buoyed by the operation’s success, and the construction and maintenance of memorials and monuments to Power Pack make it clear that the organization has made a deliberate effort to maintain a collective memory of the conflict. A fuller understanding of why the 82d has maintained these memories is key to understanding why other U.S. military organizations chose to disregard their memory of Power Pack and allows scholars to begin to assess the cost of the military’s forgetfulness. / History

In response to the emerging Cold War conflict, American policymakers adopted cultural diplomacy as a permanent component of US foreign policy for the first time. In an attempt to win the hearts and minds of the worlds’ people, American leaders utilized international cultural outreach, through methods such as exchanges of students, teachers, and scientists, traveling exhibitions, radio and television broadcasts, publications, and tourism, among others. In recent decades, many historians have begun to explore the significance of these efforts. However, none of these works have examined the experience of those individuals who actually participated in the exchanges. This work begins to fill that void by focusing on American academics who travelled to the Soviet Union on educational exchange during the Cold War. By exploring their personal reports and recollections of their time behind the Iron Curtain, this study illuminates how they perceived their own nation, its values, and their own sense of national identity and purpose. Ultimately, I argue that these Americans used the image of the inferior Soviet “other” to cement a more unified national identity and affirm their feelings of American exceptionalism. Still, though their belief in American superiority remained constant throughout, their commitment to actively serve as America’s cultural representatives abroad waxed and waned at different points in the Cold War. Namely, although at the start of the program in 1958 exchangees enthusiastically assisted in spreading American values abroad, when American public opinion shifted against the Vietnam War their efforts immediately ceased. This shows specific examples of how conceptions of American ideology changed in this period. For a time, these Americans, and probably many others, abandoned a tenet that had long been central to American identity- the belief that the United States had the duty to assert its ideology globally. It was not until the last years of the Cold War, when American and Soviet leaders made significant improvements in superpower relations, that these individuals felt confident enough to serve again as cultural ambassadors. These fluctuations provide a case study of the direct and personal effects of major political and foreign policy shifts on ordinary Americans.

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On 4 October 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the world's first artificial satellite, and the Space Age had arrived. While not an American achievement, Sputnik stands as a significant juncture in United States history. This thesis explores the resulting American political crisis, its development in the final three months of 1957, and the impact Sputnik had on American life. The thesis also examines the social and political context of the Sputnik crisis and will challenge some long-standing analysis of how America's reaction to the Soviet satellite developed. To accomplish this task, it was necessary to consult both primary and secondary sources. Important primary sources include government documents from both the Legislative and Executive Branches of the United States Government, attained from both printed volumes and online archives. The memoirs of key individuals also shed light on the mindset of prominent politicians and policymakers of the period. Newspapers and magazines from the era were examined to explore the media and public reaction to the Sputnik Crisis and related events. Secondary sources are used as both avenues of information and theory regarding the events, and also for the purposes of examining the consensus of others who have explored this topic. The topics covered in the thesis include the flow of events before, during, and after the Sputnik Crisis of 1957; analysis of contextual issues such as missile and satellite development and American culture of the period; and analysis of how the Sputnik Crisis unfolded and how this impacted American culture and national policy.

The purpose of this research is to address how geopolitical factors influence the foreign policies of states in the South Caucasus. Due to the recent Russia-Georgia War, this region is central to contemporary foreign policy, fueling discussions of a New Cold War between the US and Russia. With the explicit goal to provide policy relevant research on this critical region, the South Caucasus states (Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia) are examined in three separate case studies. Utilizing qualitative analysis of historical event data, each case examines the role of five different variables: energy resources, routes, demography, proximity, and state leadership. That research reveals several corollary relationships. First, demographic (ethnic/religious) cleavages are found to define the borders of separatist conflicts and to be positively correlated with state perceptions of threat that follow from the proximity of foreign powers to separatist regions. Energy resources and routes define economic conflict and are positively correlated with perceptions of threat resulting from the proximity of foreign powers to these strategic points. Finally, state leadership is correlated with the value placed on demographic groups, resources, and routes in the foreign policies of the South Caucasus states and the subsequent balance of threat behavior exhibited in each state's foreign policy orientation. These findings are consequential for the discipline of International Relations, demonstrating the contemporary relevance of geopolitical variables. Specifically, the synthesis of these variables provides significant explanations of where, with whom, and why conflicts have emerged in the South Caucasus. Answering those questions is a vital step toward furthering the relevance of academic research for policy makers.

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This dissertation examines the U.S. government’s covert use of religion during the Cold War. The research investigates, “How and why did the U.S. government instrumentalize and operationalize religion in the Cold War as a part of its covert intelligence operations?” The inquiry utilizes an historical methodology interweaving the academic disciplines of history, religious studies, and international relations. Archival research from sixteen government, national security, university, religious and private archives, as well as personal interviews, provides the foundation for the narrative. Prior to this dissertation, no published work has attempted to present a comprehensive examination of covert operations and religion during the Cold War. Snippets and stories appear in the literature of the Cold War, as well as the memoirs of intelligence operatives. Studies on religion and missionary activity during the Cold War era reveal the involvement of religious leaders in clandestine activities. However, no previous work has attempted to consolidate the historical fragments into a comprehensive story. This dissertation begins with an overview of religion and spying leading up to World War II and the creation of the US Office of Strategic Services (OSS), where the US government first employed religion as a covert tool. At war’s end, former OSS agents entered the newly formed Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), bringing with them the expertise and networks necessary to operationalize religion in clandestine activities. CIA officials like Allen Dulles, Kermit Roosevelt, Miles Copeland, William Eddy and James Jesus Angleton did not hesitate to use religion as a transactional tool. In addition, American clergymen, missionaries, and evangelist Billy Graham covertly collaborated with the CIA. U.S. presidents, the National Security Council, the CIA and other intelligence agencies were actively involved in formulating policies that weaponized religion. The term “blowback” refers to the “unintended consequences” of covert operations. The term was first used by the CIA in its official history of Operation TPAJAX – the 1953 Iran coup d’état overthrowing Mossadegh – where religion was used by the CIA. During the Cold War, religion in covert operations produced for the US government and religious institutions both intended and unexpected consequences. / 2026-09-30T00:00:00Z

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