Continuing his Cold War Series, Mark revisits his conversation with Dr. Kate Tietzen about the turmoil in the Middle East during the difficult years following WWII to the final days of the USSR. Cold War studies often focus on events in Europe. However, the Cold War quietly and sometimes loudly raged in the Middle East. Numerous political, religious and ethnic factions struggled for power while the U.S. and the Soviet Union maneuvered to exert influence and control in the region—whether behind the scenes or overtly.

Mark first interviewed Dr. Tietzen for his podcast, “Iraq: Ancient Country, Modern Conflicts,” when they discussed the conflicts, sometime resolutions and the evolution of the country. Her in-country research delves into the many facets of the Iraqi people, the religious factions and the nation’s friends, foes and allies.

Photo: Saddam Hussein and Hafez al-Assad of Syria at an Arab Summit in Baghdad in November 1978

About Kate Tietzen, Ph.D.

Kate Tietzen is a Military Historian at the U.S. Army. Dr. Tietzen has a Ph.D. in Iraqi military and diplomatic history. Her dissertation explored the Iraqi-Soviet relationship in the Cold War, analyzing this dynamic through the Iraqi point of view by using Ba’athist regime documents housed in the United States. In it, she sought to demonstrate the complexity of the Cold War in the Middle East, and to draw out the legacies of this relationship in the post-Cold War era. She was a research fellow with the U.S. Army’s Operation IRAQI FREEDOM study group and the recipient of the Mark A. Chapman Military History scholarship.