Check out these commercial satellite photos of the buildup of the US air base in Qatar.

I believe that, under the 1992 Remote Sensing Act, the US government does have de jure shutter control over this type of imagery. I’m wondering if and when they’re going to exercise it, or at least purchase the rights to the photos themselves from Ikonos and Quickbird (as they did during the Gulf War, and more recently, in Afghanistan last fall). The fact that they’re not makes me think that they don’t mind folks (and particularly folks in the region, e.g., Riyadh) seeing them…