Spy Photos
11. North Korea, 2001
This IKONOS commercial satellite image of North Korea's No Dong
missile test pad represented the first use of high-resolution
commercial satellite imagery by a non-governmental organization
(NGO) to independently examine a facility that concerned the U.S.
intelligence community. The Federation of American Scientists
ordered and published this image to influence public opinion. This
and related images revealed that No Dong is rather unimpressive
compared to missile launch sites in other countries; it's smaller,
for instance, and has only a dirt road leading to it. Hardliners in
the U.S. government who had been agitating about the North Korean
missile program withheld releasing the image out of concern that the
public might conclude that the North Korean missile program was not
as advanced as the intelligence community and legislative supporters
of missile defense claimed. In the image, the circle in the center
is the missile launch platform, while the diagonal dark rectangle
below it is the shadow cast by the missile erector.