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Naval History and Heritage Command

Naval History and Heritage Command

Rear Admiral Roger Welles, Director of Naval Intelligence, to Vice Admiral William S. Sims, Commander, United States Naval Forces Operating in European Waters and United States Naval Attaché at London

23  October, 1918.

From:     Director of Naval Intelligence.

To:       Naval Attache, London.

Subject:  Light Filters and Color Screens.

   1.     Owing to the importance that optical aids, such as color filters, light filters, and color screens, play in modern warfare, this Office requests that a report be made on all information pertaining to the use the enemy makes of the above aids.

   2.     If possible, captured goggles, binoculars and gun sights, containing tinted filters of gelatin or glass should be forwarded immediately to the Camouflage Division of the Office of Naval Intelligence in order that an analysis may be made and the scope of their use thereby ascertained.1

Roger Welles       

Source Note: Cy, DNA, RG 45, Entry 520, Box 330. The signature is a stamp. Document identifier in top right-hand corner: “D-5:21071-41/LSI:B-8.”

Footnote 1: Reflector sights or reflex sights, which allow the user to see the illuminated projection of an aiming point or some other image superimposed on a field of view, were first installed on German aircraft in 1918. Harry Woodman, Early Aircraft Armament: The Aeroplane and the Gun up to 1918, 239.

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