Finnegan, Terrence J. 1952-

PERSONAL:

Born 1952.

ADDRESSES:

E-mail—tfinnegan@juno.com.

CAREER:

Writer and defense contractor. United States Air Force (USAF) Reserves, retired officer. Former civil servant for the Defense Intelligence Agency, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), U.S. European Command, U.S. Space Command, U.S. Pacific Command, and the National Security Agency. Current defense contractor to the National Guard Bureau.

WRITINGS:

Shooting the Front: Allied Aerial Reconnaissance and Photographic Interpretation on the Western Front—World War I, Center for Strategic Intelligence Research (Washington, DC), 2006.

SIDELIGHTS:

Terrence J. Finnegan is a retired United States Air Force Reserves officer and senior civil servant. His dual-career included assignments in the intelligence and policy arenas, as well as tours of duty with the Defense Intelligence Agency, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), U.S. European Command, U.S. Space Command, U.S. Pacific Command, and the National Security Agency. Finnegan's work involved a spectrum of issues from theater missile defense to information operations. He currently assists National Guard units throughout the western United States.

Finnegan utilized his varied experience in his 2006 work Shooting the Front: Allied Aerial Reconnaissance and Photographic Interpretation on the Western Front—World War I, "a massive, expertly written and richly illustrated history of British, French and American aerial surveillance on the Western Front," according to Thomas Boghardt, writing on the Central Intelligence Agency Web site. Noting that World War I gave rise to the modern intelligence community, including aerial surveillance, Boghardt went on to explain that Finnegan's book is divided into four parts. In the first part the reader learns how aerial surveillance came of age between 1914 and 1918. The second part details American advancements in this intelligence weapon, in particular the interpretation of images. In part three Finnegan looks at the difficulties of gathering such information, and in the final part of the book he examines the legacy of aerial surveillance in World War I. In fact, the same strategies used during the trench warfare days of 1914 were put to use in the 1991 Gulf War, where Finnegan was detailed to Central Command. Boghardt concluded, "The legacy of World War I aerial reconnaissance is by no means negligible."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Choice, October, 2007, C. Baker, review of Shooting the Front: Allied Aerial Reconnaissance and Photographic Interpretation on the Western Front—World War I.

ONLINE

Central Intelligence Agency Web site,http://www.cia.gov/ (December 12, 2007), Thomas Boghardt, review of Shooting the Front.

Terrence J. Finnegan Home Page,http://terrencefinnegan.com (February 6, 2008).