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In today’s digital battlespace, GIS is a crucial component in the military decision-making process. GIS technology has the ability to successfully incorporate the vast amounts of visual data and geospatial information produced by various sensors and imaging systems currently deployed in defense applications. However, it is not just data assimilation practicality that has put GIS ‘on the map’ for the defense intelligence community, but its potential for rapid data integration, analysis and distribution of complex spatial information.

A curious trait found within most moments of progress is that any technological advancement saves work and yet, at the same time, creates more work. Airborne surveying is no exception. Pessimists reading this should not assume that more work is a bad thing and proof of a failed idea. On the contrary, it illustrates that airborne surveillance work, much like nature, abhors a vacuum. With developments in processing speed and simplicity come reduced costs, new applications, and rising demand for airborne-derived data resources – in short, the opportunity for more work.

The victory of the Americans and French at Yorktown, Virginia, on October 19, 1781, secured the independence of the United States and was a tribute to their ingenuity and perseverance. For General Charles Lord Cornwallis, the British commander, it was an admonition against going into battle without adequate geographical information and intelligence. Information we today call geospatial intelligence or GEOINT.

For implementation of the Common Agricultural Policy, the European Commission needs timely information on the agricultural production expected in the current season. This is the main concern of the MARS (Monitoring Agriculture with Remote Sensing) Stat Sector of the Agriculture and Fisheries Unit, part of the Institute for the Protection and Security of the Citizen of the Joint Research Centre (DG-JRC EC).

Even in an almost corruption-free country like the Netherlands (in the top ten of the TI (Transparency International) Corruption Perceptions Index), a 2005 university survey of 341 representatives of public organizations showed they perceive 3.2% of all civil servants and 5.2% of politicians to be corrupt. In a survey among 1000 citizens, 0.5% reported encountering corruption in civil servants. Although already quite embarrassing, both conclusions were challenged in an investigation by an opinion poll bureau. The findings of this investigation were even worse: its respondents perceived that civil servants are three times and politicians are five times more corrupt than was found in the university survey.

Nowadays general access to positioning systems such as GPS seems a natural thing. The turbulent developments of the last decade appear almost an anti-climax when we consider the history of positioning.

By far the biggest source of the data needed for geospatial intelligence purposes comes from the high resolution imagery acquired from spaceborne and airborne platforms. In the specific context of South and East Asia, where there are numerous concerns about national security and threats from neighbours, the primary source for this type of intelligence is spaceborne imagery. Indeed the defence and security agencies in the larger countries in this part of Asia have all been large consumers of the high-resolution space imagery provided. by commercial suppliers such as

Recently Ricoh unveiled their latest digital camera; the Ricoh Caplio 500SE. Since it is not the custom of this magazine to review photographic products, there must be something ‘geo’ about it. And there is; the camera can connect to a GPS receiver, store position information with the photograph and then export it to Google Earth or GIS package.

Geo-information provides an adequate description of the general lay-out of an area. It cannot, however, capture the truth like a photo or video camera can. On the other hand, manually referencing your photographs is a painstaking process. The Topcon GMS-2 offers a potential solution as it is a GPS receiver / controller with built-in camera, digital compass and GPS receiver.