Entry-Level Certificate in Counterterrorism

This entry-level certificate is designed to give the student a more comprehensive knowledge of key definitional and conceptual issues to describe terrorists (including the sociological and psychological characteristics of both leaders and members) and identify their methods, including organizational structures, target selection criteria, operational tradecraft, weaponry, etc.  This program examines the strategies, tactics, and techniques used to combat terrorism and will teach students to distinguish conceptually between defensive “anti-terrorism” approaches and offensive “counterterrorism” approaches.  Students will learn to recognize and describe the securing of financing and weaponry, the criteria used for target selection (symbolic or representative nature, functional importance, and vulnerability), the preliminary surveillance of targets, the role played by the group’s active and passive supporters (front groups, etc.), the exploitation of the media and post-facto claiming of responsibility, the avoidance of security force dragnets, and how terrorists  react to and  prosper from the action’s fallout.  And most importantly, students are given ample hands-on opportunity to learn, develop, and hone practical report-writing skills used throughout the intelligence community.

Outcomes

Upon completion of this certificate, students will be able to do the following:

• Employ information literacy skills to types of terrorist motivations and goals from other forms of violence.
• Apply what is known of historical foundations of terrorism to modern threats using conceptional reasoning skills.
• Distinguish between the various methods and philosophies of international counterterrorism.
• Adopt the mindset of a terrorist and engage in an extended revolutionary campaign.
• Demonstrate and hone practical report-writing skills used throughout the intelligence community.

Course availability is subject to minimum class size requirements.