Courses in espionage offer glimpse of life as a spy

A few UA students will get to find out who the real James Bond is thanks to two espionage courses UA professor Steven Schwab will teach this fall.

The courses, History 300: Special Topics and University Honors 300, will explore myth versus reality in the world of espionage. The course follows a lecture and discussion format, and it will focus on the spy storyteller's craft, with special attention paid to the work of Graham Green and John Le Carr.

Schwab developed the course with the assistance of Frederick Hitz, a professor at Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, who first got the idea for the class as a way to develop critical thinking and analytical skills.

Hitz, the former CIA inspector general, also worked as an assistant to the director of operations for the CIA and as an attorney. Hitz is also recognized internationally for his investigation of the CIA's role in alleged cocaine trafficking in the United States and Central America during the Reagan administration.

Schwab has first-hand qualifications to teach the course - 32 years of experience working for the CIA. Schwab has traveled extensively throughout Central and greater Latin America and has worked in every Latin American country except Cuba, dealing in matters of international terrorism and proliferation as a spy and an analyst.

While reading the spy novels, students will look into three types of true spies: heroes, traitors and double agents. They will debate the moral element.

"At the heart of espionage is persuading people to commit treason," Schwab said. "A spy is doing something illegal, basically - stealing information from the country he is in, and if he is a citizen, then he is a traitor."

Schwab said George Washington was the first great spymaster because his intelligence is credited with being the fundamental reason why the United States won the Revolutionary War.

Aldrich Ames, one of the agents the students will study, was a personal acquaintance of Schwab who is recognized as one of the highest paid spies in American history.

Ames leaked classified information to the Soviet Union's foreign intelligence service in exchange for several million dollars, compromising 100 U.S. intelligence operations and resulting in the execution of at least 10 individual sources.

Students will learn the realities of working for the CIA and discuss how to maintain a strong intelligence organization in a country where freedom of the press stands as the backbone, and most government documents are declassified.

"There is a need to collect information to protect the country you are in," Schwab said. "[But also] to protect the information you have."