This is my first post in History. I hope this is a good stack for my question, as I see a lot of posts related to military hardware. If not, well, let me know.
Are there any documented cases of lens flares exposing sniper positions? It's a movie trope that snipers are spotted because someone catches a glimpse of a reflection of the scope. It seems to me that this is a serious design flaw. How do I research whether this ever was a historical concern in the (evolution of) design of scopes?
My thought is this: Why is the frontmost (nearest the target) lens/glass so close to the end of the pipe (as in ╞═════╪╡)? Why isn't that piece of glass hidden way inside the pipe (as in ╞═════╪════╡)? That the extra bit of pipe could then block out any light/reflections apart from what is in the view of the shooter. It would also make the scope longer, but that can't be that much of a downside, can it?
If there are such "long scopes", how common are they? Or, put the other way around, given that reflections are undesired, how is this actually dealt with outside of the movies?
