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REPORT OF COMMISSION VII 55
specific conditions for navy operations, cannot be carried out otherwise than
as ground photo reconnaissance—from terrain or sea.
The possibilities of photo-interpretation are, however, essentially dependent
on the quality and scale of the pictures, and therefore chiefly on the technical
resources and execution of the photo reconnaissance. In considering these facts
it is always advisable to discuss both these branches of activity of intelligence,
photo reconnaissance and photo-interpretation, in close connection one with the
other, and with special stress on the reconnaissance.
AIR PHOTO RECONNAISSANCE
METHODS AND MATERIAL
The methods of air photo reconnaissance change chiefly with the progressive
developments of the enemy’s air defense and radar equipment. A method, which
one year was considered well adapted to its purpose, may in the following year
greatly endanger both personnel and material, and must be regarded as al-
together condemnable. These unavoidable changes in the decision of methods
force the construction of new cameras and improved optics, etc. to meet the new
demands.
For example, we should remember how, during World War II, the enemy's
air force and anti-aircraft artillery gradually forced the strategic photo-recon-
naissance aircraft to greater and greater altitudes. After a relatively modest be-
ginning for the German Air Force with a maximum altitude of approximately
21,000 ft. (6,500 meters) in the autumn of 1939, the photo-reconnaissance planes
were soon forced up to a normal height of approximately 26,000 ft. (8,000 m.)
during the offensive against France in June 1940, and to approximately 33,000
ft. (about 10,000 m.) during the attacks on Leningrad and Kronstadt in the
autumn of 1941. During reconnaissance raids over certain well defended German
bases towards the end of the war, the Allied Air Force raised this latter figure.
I well remember the comments of a Finnish general to my praises of the achieve-
ments and courage of the Finnish airmen when, one day in August 1941, they
carried out aerial photography over the Russian positions at Hangè at an alti-
tude of 21,000 ft. that the Germans later executed at 33,000 ft. ‘Had the Fin-
nish planes been able to go up as high as the Germans, our boys would certainly
have availed themselves of the greater altitude.” The Russian anti-aircraft
fire was widely known as both intense and effective.
After World War II this extremely great altitude for photo reconnaissance
was increased still more, and as early as 21st August 1949, extraordinarily good
small-scale verticals for topographic intelligence purposes were taken in flight
by an American Navy jet fighter from an altitude of 51,089 ft. or 15,571 meters
(according to an article by Glenn E. Matthews, F.P.S.A., in a special number
of the Photographic Journal, April 1950).
With the increase in altitude for reconnaissance, aerial cameras with ever
longer focal lengths have been constructed, so as to get a satisfactory photo
scale for photo-interpretation under all circumstances. As an example it may
be mentioned, that the chief of the photographic research activities of the Amer-
ican Air Force, Colonel George W. Goddard, in an article about new and pro-
posed developments in aerial reconnaissance photography in PHOTOGRAM-
METRIC ENGINEERING, Vol. XV, No. 1 (March 1949) discussed cameras with
focal lengths up to 240”, or about 6 meters. A photo scale of not under 1:10,000
is usually necessary in order to interpret details in the enemy lines. One can get
this scale at an altitude of 33,000 ft. (about 10,000 m.) with a camera with a focal
