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Welcome to the Monday Morning News Kick Off from got geoint? As always, we hope everyone had a restful weekend and is ready for the last full week before the Thanksgiving break. Even though the holiday season is on the horizon, there is no shortage of actionable news you need to kick start this work week. For this Monday, we have stories about Japan moving to use drones, NATO to offer Russia access to our satellite data and an update on Intel budget reform. So, as we always say, fire up that second cup of coffee and read on.

Intelligence Budget Agreement Hints at More Reform
A preliminary agreement to pull national intelligence spending out of the Defense budget could breathe fresh life into a long-dormant recommendation by the Sept. 11 Commission to simplify oversight of intelligence spending, intelligence experts said. On Nov. 2, Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper told the audience at the annual GEOINT Symposium that he had reached a “conceptual agreement” with Defense Secretary Robert Gates to shift approximately $50 billion in annual intelligence spending out of the Defense budget starting in 2013. The change would leave the approximately $30 billion military intelligence program intact within the Defense budget. Read the full Federal Times article here.

NATO to Offer Russia Access to US Satellite Data: Report
NATO will offer Russia access to some US military satellite data in exchange for its participation in a missile shield project for continental Europe, a Moscow newspaper reported Friday. The offer will come as part of a broader deal to be extended to Russia at the NATO-Russia Council that immediately follows the 28-member alliance’s November 19-20 summit in Lisbon, Nezavisimaya Gazeta quoted a NATO source as saying. NATO officials in Brussels could not immediately confirm the report. Read the full AFP story here.

Japan’s Next Stage of Military Expansion: Drones?
Japan’s naval forces have been gradually expanding their range in recent years, mostly to help protect vital sea lanes through which much of the world’s commerce—and the country’s vital supply of imported oil–flows. The next step under consideration by Tokyo: the introduction of a sci-fi like surveillance tool, dubbed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones. These aren’t the kind of heavily armed stealth drones the U.S. has dispatched to unleash carnage upon unsuspecting terrorist sympathizers. The type of drone Japan has in mind is a weaponless observer plane which would stay perched at elevated levels to perform reconnaissance for extended periods and across long distances. Read the full WSJ blog post here.

ObjectFX Wins US Geospatial Intelligence Foundation’s Industry Achievement Award
ObjectFX Corporation, a leading provider of dynamic geospatial tools and middleware, announced that President Steve Panzer and Chief Technology Officer David Hemphill received the 2010 USGIF Industry Achievement Award. ObjectFX was presented with the award on Nov. 3rd at the annual GEOINT conference in New Orleans, LA for developing and deploying SpatialRULES, a Complex Event Processor (CEP) for geospatial data. Read the full press release here.

China Shows Space Skills with Satellite Rendezvous
Experts say China has pulled off a tricky and uncommon feat in space flight by maneuvering one of its satellites to within about 300 yards of another while they were orbiting the Earth. Analysts say the August encounter could have been a test of China’s ability to inspect its own satellites or to spy on others. It also could have been practice for docking orbiting vehicles, a skill required to build the space station that China is expected to start work on next year. The experts say the rendezvous probably wasn’t meant solely to practice an attack on another country’s satellite by ramming it. Read the full AP story here.

Google Earth Adds Panoramic Images
Take in sprawling views of the Great Wall of China or see the entirety of the iconic Golden Gate Bridge, all without leaving your living room with new panoramic images on Google Earth. “People using Google Earth will find a new “Photos” layer that includes not only the existing 2D photos from the Panoramio community, but also panoramic photos contributed by users of 360cities.net,” said Wei Luo, Google’s senior geo data strategist, in a blog post. “These high-resolution panoramic photos are marked in Google earth as red square icons. When you click on one of these icons, an info bubble containing an image appears, and clicking on the image again will take you into our photo viewing mode.” Read the full PC Magazine article here.

Happy Monday!

Tags: China Satellite Rendezvous, General Clapper, GEOINT 2010, geospatial intelligence, Google Earth and Panoramic Images, got geoint. GEOINT, Intel Budget, Intelligence Budget and Clapper, Japan and Aeral Drones, Japan and Drones, NATO offers Russia Satellite Data, ObjectFX, USGIF