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Comment by guard-of-terra | Hacker News Reader

1980s CIA album has map of central Moscow. On it, subway stations and embassies are marked (that's the expected), gas stations (okay) and also churches (what's weird).

Nothing more, just embassies and churches. Would like to hear a story here.

Baghdad's 2003 map has basically the same set of POI.

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IIRC They're suppose to be protected under the Geneva Convention.

Churches are useful landmarks. Probably quite useful for navigation and even locating photography.

Is that typical of all cities? How about Paris? Rio? Tokyo?

Have a link? I'd like to take a look.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/ciagov/30849056096/in/album-72...

If it's a tourist map then probably so, but I assume CIA would like to see something more substantial on their map. They're not in for the sights are they?

Churches are major landmarks.

Some are - they are absolutely everywhere in all cities I've lived in or visited, and yet I couldn't tell you the names of more than a couple. Do people really know the names of a significant portion of them?

Probably the people who live in those neighborhoods do, which can be a useful reference if you're in those areas.

Asking people about churches in 198x USSR was probably not the wisest way to go around for a CIA spy. Better stick with libraries.

I was thinking more along the lines of "I'm looking for a shop near X."

Никогда ещё Штирлиц[1] не был так близок к провалу.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stierlitz

Or a useful reference point to call back to the artillery.

Recording information that is tactically useful for a ground battle would almost certainly have been a goal of the mapping program.

They are also long-lived ( on the scale of decades and centuries ) and have reasonably static names.

Yes, although in Soviet Union, they still often had other names and functions (as a movie theatre, or a grain warehouse, or whatever).

Most of CIA's work is at the ground level. Stuff relevant for tourists is highly relevant in the field. (Meet this source next to the statue of St. Something, next to the kiosk across from the children's zoo entrance #3.)

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