Spy plane (Yuri's Revenge)

The spy plane is a Soviet non-combatant scout aircraft and support power in Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge. It is a replacement for the psychic sensor after it was given to Yuri's army.

Background
During the Third World War, the Soviet Union did utilize spy planes, as their Psychic Corps granted them equal intelligence gathering ability, not least through the use of psychic sensors. Following Yuri's defection, however, the Soviet Union needed a way to undertake field reconnaissance without the need for psychic powers. They eventually settled upon bringing back a reasonably fast scout aircraft. As the Soviet Union had ceased the deployment of field airstrips, the spy plane was built and maintained away from the battlefield.

In-game unit
The spy plane emerges from a random edge of the map (implying a take-off from an off-screen location) and flies towards the area selected for reconnaissance. Once it is relatively near the marker, it audibly starts taking photographs to uncover the shroud in its flight path, and stops once it moves far away from the designated area. If any anti-air structure fires on the spy plane, it will be uncovered as well. The plane can be shot down at any time, but a new one will emerge in the next usage of the support power.

While the area revealed by the recon photos was decently sized, the Allied spy satellite uplink was still superior. However, the ability of a spy plane to be serviced fairly quickly allowed it to even the odds in terms of intelligence gathering.

Changelog

 * Yuri's Revenge patch 1.001: hit points increased from 400 to 600.

Cameos
In order: English, French, German, Korean, Chinese.

Trivia
The Spy plane looks like Heinkel He 111 - one of the most produced German medium bomber in World War II, which was also used for reconnaissance purposes. But its more like to be Russian DB-3 or IL-4.