Lieutenant General Joseph Francis Carroll (March 19, 1910[1] – January 20, 1991) was the founding director of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the first commander of the U.S. Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI or OSI).

After working with Swift and Company, a meat-packing concern, in Chicago, where he rose to a position as assistant sales manager, and soon after completion of law school, he left to join the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

He was instrumental in catching noted gangster Roger "Tough" Touhy, which brought him to the personal attention of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.

[2] From the time of his entry on active duty on May 6, 1948, General Carroll served as the first director of AFOSI, creating and organizing this centrally-directed investigative service, establishing district offices to service the air commands in the United States, and furnishing trained specialists to Air Force activities worldwide for the conduct of special investigations.

In this assignment he was responsible for the security and physical protection of Air Force installations and activities against sabotage, espionage, and other hostile threats.

[2] While there, he was stationed with his close friend from seminary, Monsignor, and later major general and Air Force Chief of Chaplains, Edwin R. Chess.

[2] With his last residence being in Fairfax County, Virginia, on January 20, 1991, Retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Joseph Francis Carroll died due to complications related to Alzheimer's disease, from which he suffered for a decade.

[4] Nevertheless, General Carroll donned his uniform to represent Dennis, after he returned from India, before the Selective Service board and succeeded in getting his son recognized as a conscientious objector.

Several of his novels, including Prince of Peace (1984) and Memorial Bridge (1991), bear traces of the general's fraught relations with his sons, albeit in fictionalized form.