I don't understand what the surprise about this "news" article is.
Its been long established that Aeroflot was simply a civilian uniformed extension of the Soviet armed forces, with crew and aircraft subject to military tasking and discipline. The aircraft were all dual-purpose, cabable of rapid conversion to either transport or recce roles, in which case the glass nose made sense both for photography and to aid visual navigation. Remember the Soviets were years behind in electronics at the time - no ground mapping radar worth considering, minimal nav systems.