I originally reported this incident to the S-2 Security Officer of my unit when it happened, while I was still on active duty as a soldier. They never classified it then, or told me not to talk about it, so now this little anecdote is yours to mull over…

    During the Gulf War my Armour battalion was continuously deployed on the front lines, and successfully engaged the enemy: at one point I was only a mile or two away when I monitored (over the radio) the calls of our soldiers as they engaged an Iraqi group that attacked one of our vehicles. Our men vaporized the Iraqis, but not before they killed one of our soldiers and wounded others, adding to the miraculously low figure of 246 Armed Forces personnel who eventually lost their lives in the war.

    At the time I deployed with my black Minox LX to the Gulf war, I had had this little jewel for over 11 years, and it had performed flawlessly every time I used it. Taking the LX to war wasn't a casual decision, but it was a fairly easy one: I had a wonderful 35mm SLR and a compact 35mm camera to select from, as well as my LX. A soldier's home consists of whatever he or she can jam in their pockets or carry on their back…period. Professionals don't have the time or the inclination to waste precious space and energy carrying things of dubious value, or that don't work. The tiny size, light weight, almost noiseless operation, rock solid reliability and extra close focusing abilities of the LX made it an obvious choice for me. So I carefully packed it, the 8 x 11 Electronic Flash unit with adapter foot, a spare PX-27 battery and 4 additional rolls of film in a plastic sandwich baggie in my shirt pocket and went off to war…

    During the 6 months of all three campaigns that I was deployed through, I shot numerous photographs with the LX, carefully returning it after every shot to the plastic sandwich baggie I kept it in, in my shirt pocket, to keep the insidious sand and grit out of it. My subjects were enemy tanks, APCS, weaponry and other minutiae of war that cover the battlefield…the performance of which was of intense interest to both Russia and America, being the supplier of this equipment. Someone once callously remarked that the Middle East is the only truly effective proving ground for defense contractors, as it allows them to see the performance of their equipment and how well it holds ups under the only conditions that really count: actual warfare. I smiled several times as I squeezed into the turrets of some pretty tightly packed armoured vehicles, realizing I could never have made many of the shots I was successfully taking without the LX: tight closes up of electronic and optical equipment, data identification and instruction plates, control knobs and guages, hastily abandoned bunkers and CP's, etc.. I assumed that after the war our intelligence people might appreciate copies of these photos; at the very least, my unit's S-3 Operations/Training section could probably work up some fairly effective training material with them…and if nothing else, I was certain our Commander would probably make some sort of "war book" of photos documenting our unit's presence in the Gulf action.

    On redeployment back to Germany, I turned in the two rolls that had the bulk of these types of photographs on it to the German photo shop I had been using for the past year or so (not having a darkroom available to me). Normally, I got my film back, perfectly processed, within a week's time; this time, it was over 4 weeks before I received them back, and only after my wife had made four different inquiries about them.

    Strangely enough, every frame of the film returned to me was blank! Every roll shot through the LX prior to these two, and every roll shot immediately afterward was properly exposed and turned out well (excepting, of course, those pictures I screwed up through my own incompetence, but generally speaking, it was easy to tell which ones those were, and where I had made my mistakes)…only these two rolls were completely blank.

    Even stranger, the film stock returned to me was not the same film stock that I had turned in…they had been switched somewhere along the line (the film that was returned to me was unevenly cut, and actually had traces of film ID markings on them, i.e., a section of the name "Kodak" showing on the bottom edge, something you would never see on a "real" Minox roll).

    I don't know if it's the Russians or the Americans who are analyzing my film…or if perhaps a local national merely coveted some war souvenirs; but someone has proof of a Minox on the battlefield…