Currently an adjunct professor at the Institute of World Politics, Washington DC, and the School of Defense and Strategic Studies, Missouri State University, John Gentry writes mainly on intelligence subjects. He has extensive experience in the intelligence world as a CIA analyst, military intelligence officer, and scholar. For twelve years, he was an intelligence analyst at the Central Intelligence Agency and was for four years on the faculty of National Intelligence University. As a CIA analyst, Dr. Gentry worked mainly on economic issues concerning the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. He was senior analyst on the staff of the National Intelligence Officer for Warning in 1987-1989. He also is a retired U.S. Army Reserve officer. He is co-author of Strategic Warning Intelligence: History, Challenges, and Prospects (Georgetown University Press, 2019), author of Diversity Dysfunction: The DEI Threat to National Security Intelligence (Academica, 2025), and author of about forty major articles and book chapters on intelligence topics. He received a Ph.D. in political science from The George Washington University.

In 1986 he experienced politicization from the political Right—efforts by CIA managers to make the Soviet Union and its allies look even worse than they clearly were, which heightened his sensitivity to the politicization of intelligence. The politicization of intelligence rose dramatically in new ways in recent years as the Obama and Biden administrations altered the organizational cultures of intelligence agencies, especially the CIA, in ideologically purposeful ways, mainly by using “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) policies. In his second term, President Trump has made modest reform efforts whose effects remain to be seen.

Neutering the CIA offers important context for understanding a continuing, major bureaucratic battle in Washington.For open-access articles on aspects of the politicization of intelligence, see Gentry’s:

Culture: A new venue for the politicization of intelligence

Critique of the U.S. Intelligence Community’s Diversity Claims · Econ Journal Watch : Diversity, DEI, intelligence, forecasting, CIA, Obama, Trump, Biden

Full article: Demographic Diversity in U.S. Intelligence Personnel: Is It Functionally Useful