Imagery intelligence
[3] In 1939, Sidney Cotton and Flying Officer Maurice Longbottom of the RAF suggested that airborne reconnaissance may be a task better suited to fast, small aircraft which would use their speed and high service ceiling to avoid detection and interception.
Beginning in 1941, RAF Medmenham was the main interpretation centre for photographic reconnaissance operations in the European and Mediterranean theatres.
[8][9] During 1942 and 1943, the CIU gradually expanded and was involved in the planning stages of practically every operation of the war, and in every aspect of intelligence.
A large number of photographic interpreters were recruited from the Hollywood Film Studios including Xavier Atencio.
Two renowned archaeologists also worked there as interpreters: Dorothy Garrod, the first woman to hold an Oxbridge Chair, and Glyn Daniel, who went on to gain popular acclaim as the host of the television game show Animal, Vegetable or Mineral?.
Together with other members of his reconnaissance squadron, he pioneered the technique of high-altitude, high-speed photography that was instrumental in revealing the locations of many crucial military and intelligence targets.
Immediately after World War II, long range aerial reconnaissance was taken up by adapted jet bombers – such as the English Electric Canberra, and its American development, the Martin B-57 – capable of flying higher or faster than the enemy.
Highly specialized and secretive strategic reconnaissance aircraft, or spy planes, such as the Lockheed U-2 and its successor, the SR-71 Blackbird were developed by the United States.
[citation needed] There are claims that the US constructed a hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft, dubbed the Aurora, in the late 1980s to replace the Blackbird.
These satellites remained in orbit for days, weeks, or months before ejecting their film-return vehicles, called "buckets".
Between 1961 and 1994 the USSR launched perhaps 500 Zenit film-return satellites, which returned both the film and the camera to earth in a pressurized capsule.
While the exact resolution and other details of modern spy satellites are classified, some idea of the trade-offs available can be made using simple physics.
Modern U.S. IMINT satellites are believed to have around 10 cm resolution; contrary to references in popular culture, this is sufficient to detect any type of vehicle, but not to read the headlines of a newspaper.
Some other uses of satellite imaging have been to produce detailed 3D maps for use in operations and missile guidance systems, and to monitor normally invisible information such as the growth levels of a country's crops or the heat given off by certain facilities.
As such, the United States Army field manual breaks IMINT analysis into three distinct phases, based upon the amount of time expended in exploiting any given image.
This means that given imagery must be rapidly exploited in order to satisfy an immediate requirement for imagery-sourced intelligence from which a leader may make an educated political and/or military decision.
The exploitation of imagery at this level of analysis is typically conducted with the intention of producing Geospatial Intelligence (GEOINT).
