Gerald Cranwell is a 20+ year veteran of the Information Warfare Age, starting as a Navy Cryptolinguist in the '90s and working around the world, including many conflict zones; through this, he came to understand the vital role intelligence can play in warfare, where success or failure turns on foreknowledge of enemy intentions and capabilities.

While teaching analysis and foreign languages to military and college students, he incorporated examples from history into lesson plans and lectures; short essays on the use of intelligence in Civil War battles led to a larger study on the subject, and eventually a historical 'what-if' incorporating this research.

When not engaged in re-fighting the Civil War with advanced analysis and intelligence-gathering techniques, he makes his home in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and son.