Challenges in Intelligence Analysis

In Challenges in Intelligence Analysis, Timothy Walton offers concrete, reality-based ways to improve intelligence analysis. After a brief introduction to the main concepts of analysis, he provides more than forty historical and contemporary examples that demonstrate what has, and what has not, been effective when grappling with difficult problems. The examples cover a wide span of time, going back 3,000 years. They are also global in scope and deal with a variety of political, military, economic, and social issues. Walton emphasizes the importance of critical and creative thinking and how such thinking can be enhanced. His 2010 book provides a detailed and balanced idea of intelligence work and will be of particular interest to students who are contemplating a career in intelligence analysis.

“Serious students of intelligence learn far more from examining the successes and failures of actual cases than they do from abstract theorizing. They want to hear it from someone who has been there and who can speak from firsthand experience. In my opinion, it would be hard to find anyone with better credentials to write a book on intelligence analysis from a practitioner’s standpoint than Tim Walton.” – James M. Olson, The Bush School of Government and Public Service, Texas A&M University, and former Chief of CIA Counterintelligence, “Timothy Walton has written the best beginner’s guide to the complex world of intelligence analysis with a historical perspective that also deserves to be pondered by experienced analysts.” – Christopher Andrew, Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge, author of The Defence of the Realm: The Authorized History of MI5 and The Mitrokhin Archive: The KGB in Europe and the West, “Timothy Walton offers in these pages a readable and reliable survey of secret intelligence operations, from Biblical times through the contemporary efforts of the Western nations to thwart global terrorist activities perpetrated by Al Qaeda and its allies. The work is a rich mosaic of espionage down through the years, filled with images of shadowy figures and dazzling spy machines.” – Loch K. Johnson, University of Georgia

Timothy Walton is an adjunct professor of intelligence studies at Mercyhurst College and on the roster of subject matter experts at Omnis Inc., an intelligence training consulting firm. The author of The Spanish Treasure Fleets, he served in the U.S. Navy and spent twenty-four years as an analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency.