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Comment by KennyBlanken | Hacker News Reader

In the initial years of Google Earth and similar services, a number of military and intelligence facilities were blurred.

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This is still the case today. See for example this military base in France: https://goo.gl/maps/gRLEBcCQB9CCx8Au6

Why does _france_ need to hide their millitary bases? I mean, France?

This isn’t an answer to your inflammatory question, but there are only a handful of nation states with nuclear weapons, and France is one of them.

These aren’t hand-me-down US warheads on the back of a missile truck: the flagship of the French navy is a 40,000 tonne nuclear armed, nuclear powered aircraft carrier floating above a strategic submarine fleet that can destroy the world.

Are we talking about the same France? France, one of Europes largest military powers which actually use their military in various conflicts around the globe?

Maybe their argument is that France has nothing to fear from anyone, so why the secrecy? Of course it's nonsense no matter how you spin it. All militaries love secrecy (except maybe the ones that are just for show, but I expect even the Swiss Guard in the Vatican has its secrets).

I'm guessing their comment is from the view of the French being "cheese eating, surrender monkeys", a view not supported by France's long military history. This view was supported, for at least a few years, by a Google "I feel lucky" search for "French military victories" taking you to a Google search mockup site which suggested "Maybe you mean: French military surrenders".

Apart from the fact that the view of France as "surrender monkeys" is nonsense, it also makes no sense as an argument that their military wouldn't be interested in secrecy.

Because they're a NATO member with a pretty large and advanced military force, in a very accessible area of Europe?

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