DO ID1 WillUV0Will 1 LrUJUlV $ l JlBVUij illlB $W ij l5fiJrn l5 OOl5aJl Jl5 f OO iJrn l1wWl J SPECIAL ISSUE - VIETNAM For table of contents see page 1 inside Declassified and Approved for Release by NSA and CIA on '10-'1 '1- 20'1 2 ursuant to E O '135 26 MDR case # 54778 THIS OOCtfM NT CONTi INS e6DEW6ltD Mi TEItIAL ill_ilell It BIRN8A SIIS88 NBAjSBBI I 1 9-2 Elempt Om 68 1 6 118ft eatelOl' geelllllllir ' 1lIooiAMBoo It the Srili-atot DOCIO 4019723 OP SECRE Published Monthly by PI Techniques and Standards for the Personnel of Operations VOL II No 10 OCTOBER 1975 WILLIAM LUTWINIAK PUBLISHER BOARD OF EDITORS Editor in Chief Cryptanalysis Arthur J Salemme 5642s 1 kS025S Language Emery W Tetrault 5236s Machine Support David J Williams III 332ls Special Research Vera R Filby 7119s Traffic Analysis Frederic O Mason Jr 41425 For individual subscriptions send name and organizational designator to CRYPTOLOG PI qJOP SECRET P L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 8EEURRE'f VIETNAM Except for short features this entire issue is devoted to the Vietnam War and its significance to NSA -- achievements failures lessons learned problems unresolved The intent is to record the personal impressions of NSAers while those impressions are still fresh even if painful so that they can serve as a guide for future NSAers Because the emphasis is on the personal and subjective there are slight overlaps in the treatment of the same topic by different authors and slight differences of opinion While the articles in this issue cover a wide range of topics they obviously do not exhaust the subject Therefore the Publisher and Editorial Board of CRYPTOLOG continue to invite contributions documenting the role of NSA in the Vietnam War Any such contributions that are accepted for publication will appear in future issues of CRYPTOLOG EO 1 4 c F L 86-36 l L 86-36 TABLE OF CONTENTS I Page 3 6 I NSA in Vietnam Proud and Bitter Memories Vietnam Articles in DRAGON SEEDS I I Edward Wi ley I I I 1 1972-1973 A Vietnam Odyssey FRANCOPHONEGLOS Announcement Language 7 10 I ii Lessons Learned A Personal Memoir 1 1 13 P L 86-36 EO 1 4 c 18 A J S NSA-Crostic No 1 22 IRONHORSE A Tactical SIGINT System 24 o The Danang Processing Center 27 _ Tactical Language Exploitation A Lesson I Learned o 31 Tim Murphy Automation of a TA Proces o 33 _______1 o Computers Comms and Low- Grade Ciphers 1 - - - - - William Gerhard I 38 1 Linguists -- You Have an Expert to Cal1 One Chance in Three -- But It Worked Letters to the Editor ' ' ---- ' 40 41 44 October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 1 SI3EURRI3'f' 1I1UIQJ S VIA ESIIWr EIWltlEhS StlJ Y FOft OFFICIAL E aNLi DOCID 4019723 Extra copies of this special issue of CRYPTOLOG are available for subscribers who would like to receive additional copies to circulate in their work areas or for persons who would like to begin their subscription with this issue To receive copies contact CRYPTOLOG Editor P16 Room 3C099-l xS642s Uctober 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 2 FeR eFFICIAh HSH Q Y I DOCID 4019723 'f'OP SECRE'f' UMBRA NSA IN VIETNAM Proud and Bitter Memories L ---_---- P L One day toward the end of the Saigon nightmare -- I don't recall which day but it must have been 25 April or ah ds -- I decided to stop by to see Major hilelmademy rounds There were only our NSA people left in Saigon three communicators and myself and so daily I went to pick up the intercept ARDF results and tech messages from the Vietnamese SIGINTers and deliver tech support mat rialto them and also to bolster their flagging spirits I didn't really have tim Josee I o but I liked and respected him more than any other Vietnamese officer I knew and I wanted to see how he was holding up Alone in his office we talked quietly He told me that USAID where his wife worked had offered to evacuate her along with her falllily He said he could not bring himself to bandon his men and he had urged her to take their two sons and go She would not leav without him He knew he said that his ch nces of escape at the end were slim But he knew he could not live under communism If Saigon fell lr1d he could not escape he would shoot his wife and children and turn the gun on himself On the morTling of 29 April 1 tried in vain to warnc Jto pull out while he could but I could not reach him That afternoon he telephoned another American told him that he was still operating the Center with his forces intact inquired what had happened to his commanders they had disappeared and asked if there were any chance that his family and he could escape He did not escape eare several reasons for repeating story First to convey the genuine trage y of the end of Vietnam second ito illustrate the nobility and calm courage the Vietnamese were capable of and finally to underline quite deliberatelf the irony of much that was Vietnam by making lend the point of departure for relating the splendid things NSA did in Vietnam I For all of us have every right to be extremely proud of the NSA role in Vietnam Of all the stunni Jgsucce s scryptologY 1 cJc e f t i v r ' ' fr m t 16 I y_ I o o thing like so long a period of t e ' 'e-f sOllfor that success was the people NSA put on the problem They were a gamy imaginative lot addic ted to thE'l problem merciless to themselves in their drive fO r resukts and given to puckish zaniness The finest that I knew were those who were in Saigon uP to the end and my admiration for them is boundless All of these people have had to face the haunting moral question of involvement in Vietnam The question is not escapable and it is wrong to avoid it I cannot honestly grapple effectively with the moral rectitude of U S military involvement in Vietnam for my own involv was not so much with war as it was withl----Jand people like him my work and my conviction that it is better to know the truth than not to know it I believe that the job of intelligence is to discern and to tell the truth Had we failed to tell the truth about Vietnam we would be morally indictable But we did tell the truth and often did it brilliantly If much that happened was ugly and i f the ending was sad then perhaps our trust in the wisdom and humanity of our decision-makers was misplaced perhaps not My personel bitterness over Vietnam does not extend to condemning them As will be eminently clear by now what I am saying here is personal and subjective I make no claim for the objective precision of my words and still less for historical accuracy I am less concerned with a recital of verifiable data than I am with sharing some of the feelings' and memories that went with SIGINT in Vietnam NSA's presence in Vietnam goes back in my memory to 1958 During that time and up until 1962 the problem was readable The Viet Cong operating clandestinely communicated among October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 3 TOP SECKEl' UMBRA 86-36 DOCID EO 1 4- c P L 86-36 4019723 TOP 8ECREqJ UMBRA themselves in South Vietnam usin ' larly painful exercise called pattern analysis whereby uiers plotted unidentified ARDF inhopes of discovering the ultimate truth -- something akin to the square root of the si ze of the enemy L-__ I Hence we were able to watch while Hanoi force djvided by cumulative weight of all his laid out her plans for the establishment of the heavy rtillery or something equally arcane National Liberation Front named its officers And t en there was the lieutenant who told me and dictated what its flag would be We were that e had analyzed the RAD system used by the able to report on the use of the Ho Chi Minh enem ' and discovered a consistent relationship Trail for the infiltration of men and materiel to the communications structure and first-heard and to describe in some detail the maritime indates filtration effort All this in addition to deThe Vietnamese with our help had already tailed information on Communist Party activities gotten into the SIGINT business in the e throull hout the country I 1960's In 1963 one Lieutenant Colonell----J 1 Iwas put in charge of the effort Among his e rlY Icadre were bright y oun g lieutenants -who always reminded me of a caricatu r of anese general ftom a World ---- I I Until 1964 War I I movie L- J boyish and bright married we lived in a SIGINT desert except for the burto one of the most beautiful women I have ever geoning ARDF effort which began to give us good who had wanted to be a priest and locations on Party terminals In 1963 if I told his boss the truth whether he recall correctly SIGINT did its first spe tacu- wanted to hear it or not lar prediction in Vietnam when it forewarned of But in those days the Americans had little the Communist buildup at Ap Bac time interest in thestumbling Vietnamese In 1964 military communications were intro- C0MINTor effort They Were too concerned with duced into South Vietnam in profusion Our TA their own SIGINT and its uses As the sixties effort and ARDF took on new importance as a tool wore on they found a way to intercept infiltrato follow the North Vietnamese buildup in t he tion communications GDRS and keep track rousouth The forerunners of the 5th and9th Di-' tinely of the movement of men into South Vietnam visions B3 Front and Military Region Trifrom the north 1 Thien-Hue all appeared in late 1964 and early 1965 In late 1964 forces of roughly regimental size gathered in Phuoc Tuy Province and again SIGINT foretold the attack before it hap- I There was never much question in their pened The pattern of successful prediction minds from the communications point of view that was established North Vietnam was in command of the show in the south and that the distinction between VC and Through 1972 NSA succeeded in foretelling every major offensive that the Communists NVA invented by the U S military did not launched in South Vietnam It was no that the exist i the Vietnamese Communist mind And target was so malleable rather the resources despite the recalcitrant resistance of the tarcommitted against it were monument al and the get our analysts were able to see through the analysts on the target had come to know it so communications and report the truth as it was happening well that they could almost sm eLl an offensive coming And they were faced with perennial In looking back it seems to me that someproblems customer's failure t o believe the where in the early 1970's the American people foretelling and customer' s belief that the and their government made a tacit decision to Vietnamese Communists were using communications let Vietnam fall if need be for the sake of deception and misleading theSIGINT community ending U S involvement That decision led to More than once lives were lost in converting a thing called Vietnamization 'r and in the users to believers in the SIGINT indicator sys- SIGINT world that meant getting the Vietnamese tem SIGINTers known variously as tile DGTS J7 JGS Meanwhile we made some mistakes we came to and SSTB to a professional level instantly a regret seriously We a llowed some customers in job as urgent as it was impossible By 1973 the Vietnam access to sem itechnical communications United States was intent on proclaiming the war 'at an end and Vietnam a thing of the past The information -- mes sage volumes contact logs unidentified ARDF fixes G2 and J2 briefings NSA effort on the problemiwasdrastically reduced and the job of NSA personnel in Saigon all over South Vie tnam blossomed with graphs became primarily one of helping the Vietnamese charts plotting $ 'stems and mathematicians COMINT effort to get on its feet quickly As trying to findi heinagic relationship between things progressed intQ 1974 -- when I arrived message flow aAd the number of ARDF locations which like the secret of the pyramids could for the last time -- the irony of the situation was becoming palpable somehow shed divine light on the thinking of the Communi ts I will never forget a particuEO 1 4 c October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 4 EO 1 4 c I EO 1 4 d P L 86-36 P L TOP 8 CK T lJM BKA 86-36 O-OC I D d 40 19 12 J P L I 86-36 'fOP SECRE'f UMBRA Congress was cutting back expenditures in Vietnam Meanwhile the North Vietnamese continued to build their forces in the south The effort on Vietnam at NSA was reduced again In July 1974 the Communists launched the Due DucThuong Due campaign -- the first of magnitude in 10 years that had not been foretold by SIGINT fice that day for protection FTIk c tiy- s rocketed Into early April amid reports of panic and chaos in the military we got the last of our families out and strained to get the work force out Panic fluttered over Saigqn We closed down our houses and moved to a hotel for quick The ironies multiplied as the situation worsevacuation should the end come with little ened A senior TOYer asked me what it was warning Tall muscular young American men in like to drive out in the country in Vietnam now that the war was over We learned inadvertently civilian clothes and crew cuts appeared in the hallways of our building muttering vulgarisms that the Vietnamese COMINT organization in Danang was passing message volume figures and and Marine slang Marine Colonel a long-time SIGINTer and Vietnam veteran many contact logs to the Commanding General I Corps times over flew in quietly from the 7th Fleet who was keeping graphs and charts on them In December the Communists started the Phuoc Long anchored just out of sight to confer on the Campaign -- again unforeseen in SIGINT The evacuation plan and the SIGINT support to it province fell in January Infiltration spiraled Through all of this the NSA employees still We began to detect indicators that the reserve in Saigon astonished me They knew perfectly divisions in North Vietnam were preparing to well that they were in very real danger from move to South Vietnam The Commanding General the Communists on the one side and from incipiII Corps expressed the opinion that the Commuent panic in the city on the other Yet they nists were deceiving the SIGINT organization never faltered They banded together to supI started a folk group in the local Catholic port one another worked harder than ever bechurch fore and dug intelligence out of the VietnamBy March 1975 it was clear that Congress ese COMINT organization They kept communicawas not going to provide funds to support the tions open scheduled departures destroyed classified material and shipped out whatever South Vietnamese military organization which was accused of being corrupt and was utterly valuable machinery they could Their endurance drive and raw courage were a testimony to me dependent for survival on the U S aid The of what people are capable of in a disaster Vietnamese military began to waver in its selfassurance Battles began to erupt aroundPleiku When we were finally down to 16 people in the highlands I flew there on 7 March with none wanted to leave More than once I had to I Ito review Pleiku deliver a direct and blunt order to get an NSA Center's status Banmethuot fell several days employee on a plane out of the country Each later The President of the Republic ordered a volunteered to stay in the place of another strategic withdrawal from Pleiku which ultiunwilling to desert the Vietnamese or to leave mately turned into a grisly horror show with the job unfinished Weary to the point of gidthousands fleeing in insane terror to the coast diness they pushed themselves on knowing that I ordered our NSA representative to return to what they did could give the forewarning necesSaigon at once He barely escaped By midsary to save American lives and prepare the March the highlands were in the hands of the Vietnamese for the ending Through small-arms Communists The highlands campaign had not attacks on the outskirts of the city and rocketbeen foretold ing at random spots they kept their gritty humor and their morale By late March we began to feel like players in a classic tragedy Events developed with a We were down to four whenc Jintercepts relentless logic too pat to be real Things from COMBAT APPLE made it clear that the attac that never happen in real life were happening on Saigon was days away The attack was to and Saigon took on the look of a sardonic start at Tan Son Nhut -- where we were working nightmare In a fit of hysteria Hue and -- and it would be a mixture of artillery fire Danang fell our man escaping by air at the and rockets The timing was uncertain because last possible moment The Vietnamese military the Communists were not sure how soon they began to crack seriously Stories reached us could be in position of the monstrous bestiality that rose out of the Then it struck me that SIGINT was not being panic in the north We booked our wives and believed The Embassy it turned out was of children on the earliest flights available out the opinion that the Communists were using com of the country caring little where they went munications deception to intimidate the Vietso long as they left Vietnam At Easter Mass namese It was the final irony 30 March my folk group sang about peace brotherhood and joy in the newness of life By that time we were down to three people while NSA wives wept in the congregation and Then the attack came as predicted It began my daughter on the altar beside me forced with a bombing from the air -- the first the back her tears The following Friday one of Vietnamese Communists had ever attempted -- on the singers in the folk group died in the C5-A the afternoon of 28 April Small-arms fire began The heavy artillery started after crash The palace was bombed by a renegade dark Shells fell close to us and shook VNAF pilot We took NSA families into our of- I October 75 CRYPTOLOG PaQe 5 TOP SECRET UMRR EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 723 OP SEeRE cations gear so much that I feared ht go out of commission Y' The exchanges we had with NSA during those last days and especially on 28 and 29 April were edged with cynical humor The Vietnam task force at NSA desperately wanted to help but there was literally nothing they could do except to give us information We were somewhat less than kindly to them and to others who talked to us then partly because of our tiredness partly because of our bitterness over the Embassy's communications-deception reaction but principally because we were mavericks and were hard to live with even in the smoothest of circumstances The three of us got out by helicopter on the 29th and then spent days on ships going nowhere VIEtNAM UMBRA or so it seemed The sudden enforced inactivi ty after so much concentrated work was perhaps the greatest hardship A handful of the Vietnamese we knew and had worked with for years escaped Most liker J did not That is the hardest thing we have to live with Now that we are all back in the world of staff coordination triplicate forms and being asked to comment on someone else's comments anout what he thinks of commenting it is clear that there was much about the ending that left bi terness in our mouths But when I look back I'm glad I was there for the ending And as long as I live I will be ever grateful and immoderately proud cf the NSA people who were there doing the best they could because it was worth doing ARTIC LES IN 1 l A Go ' SM1 li l The fo owing artia es on Vietnam appeared in various issues of DRAGON SEEDS the B techniaa periodiaa whiah was pub ished from Deaember 1971 through June 1974 founder and managing editor MPs Minnie Kenny aurrent y Chief P16 A comp ete set of DRAGON SEEDS is maintained in the P16 Crypto ogia Library Room 3W076 where copies may be read or bprrowed For information aa 4017s 1 --- Recovery of a Vietnamese Communist Call sign System Allen L Gilbert The Impact of ARDF on Traffic Analysis Letter from Pleiku Vietnamese Communist Tactical COMINT Operations Tim Murphy Things That Go Clank in the Night SEADEV -- Mechanization for TIA Development Uncertain Origins The Development of a COMINT Translation Course for Vietnamese Linguists The Jack Butcher Case One Chance in Three -- But It Worked William Gerha rd The 'C' Parallelogram or A Vietnam Cover Story Bee Kenna'td 1_------'1 I J -- ' r l _ ti 'e8 I No 5 Jun Sep Sep Dec 72 72 II No 3 Sep 73 Vol II No 4 Reprinted in this issue of CRYPTOLOG Dec 73 II No 1 aPe not individua y 'a88ified but every issue of DRAGON SEEDS eified TOP SECRET CODEWORD Classification of this listing is SECRET SPOKE October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 6 P L 72 72 II No 2 II No 2 History of a Dragon Vol Vol Vol Vol Vol Dec 71 Dec 71 Mar 72 Dec Mar Jun Jun 1 '---_ I 1972-1973 A Vietnam Odyssey -' ' E ' 'dw-a r d A 'o o - O ' Connor Vol I No I Vol I No I Vol I No 2 Vol I No 3 Vol I No 4 Vol I No 4 Vol I No 5 86-36 TOP SECRET UMRRJ 72 73 73 73 CfOP SECRET UMBRIa 1972-73 A VIETNAM ODYSSEY ______ JI nd EdwardA O'Connor F46 Approximately 125 kilometers SSW of Saigon 4 hours by bus and 6 hours by cycZe two tanks of gas by Honda and 40 minutes by Air America Cooney Bird in Phong Dinh Province Central Mekong Delta lies the beautiful tropical splendor of Can Tho City and sanctuary hideaway for IV Corps' ruthless intrepid u s Advisory Team Reprinted from DRAGONSEEDS Vol II No 4 December 1973 the training program The new program was successful enough so that the supervision was eventually returned to the ARVNs When new personnel arrived they assumed their duties with a minimum amount of on-the-job training OJT However after several months the operators as well as other personnel began to lose their incentive To eliminate this negative attitude the ARVN CO was convinced that a Soldier of It was the Lunar Year of the Rat when the the Month award should be initiated This Odyssey began The mission was to advise South award consisted of 5 000 Piaster provided by the advisors and a Letter of Recognition By Vietnamese Army ARVN personnel while they assumed the U S SIGINT mission in the delta from U S standards the award was minimal but the USM-607 Since there was no established preced- plot worked The competitive spirit between sections increased and following the first ence to follow each problem encountered had to be dealt with in a unique manner Realizing presentat10n all personnel were striving to that extensive changes were essential to make achieve the award the transfer of responsibility efficient the The first award was presented to the Airborne first priority of the advisors was to circumvent the inherent language barrier and to estab- Radio Direction Finding Ground-to-Air radio lish a workable rapport with their ARVN counter- operator Significantly the ARDF tipoff function had undergone an extensive transformaparts This was achieved to some extent through patient guidance and constant interface tion and emerged from a state of chaos to the point of receiving- special recognition In fact i e sign language graphic illustrations etc With such techniques at their disposal advisors standard operating procedures were produced by this section and disseminated for employment began to examine the innumerable problem areas throughout South Vietnam Initial corrective efforts were directed at Following the cease-fire and associated withsecurity procedures which were almost nonexistdrawal of American military personnel the U6A ent The following aberrations were rectified immediately first there was no ARVN officer on ARDF aircraft assigned to the U S 146th Aviaduty during weekends or holidays second an ex- tion Company were transferred to Saigon Al though four missions were tasked from Saigon daily cess of defunct classified material was stored numerous problems occurred and approximately in file cabinets and boxes third and most imone mission per day was flown Believing ARDF portant ARVN personnel were not familiar with effectiveness could be increased with additional the use of the numerous incendiary devices for missions advisors clamored for the assignment emergency destruction of crypto gear and clasof ARDF ircraft at Can Tho Center CTC and_ sified documents In addition advisors established a picture badge identification system and the accompanying requirement for preparation of access list for all authorized personnel This tech data lists TDLs for each mission When list excluded one unidentified indigenous indi- four U6As were finally returned to Can Tho the vidual who purportedly was employed by the 335th ARVNs did not possess the sophisticated secure Radio Research RR company to guard the antenna air-to-ground voice communications as American field Can Tho Center's antenna field is located predecessors and relied solely on the much slower process of one-time pads Nevertheless in a nonsecure area approximately 500 yards NE with Can Tho assuming control of the aircraft of the operatiops bunker lthough the 335th and providing mission tech data ARDF results RR Co departed L Jremained vigilant began to improve and personnel were instructed as ever at the expense of an unknown source in methods of altering mission frag points to Concurrent with improving security practices maintain greater cognizance on priority targets As a reSUlt more information was provided trafa program to xtend manual morse intercept capability was mplemented Vietnamese operators fic analysts enhancing development efforts had and were continuously receiving training in In the early stages of the Vietnamization intercept teChniques but their proficiency was Improvement and Modernization VIM Program far below that of their U S predecessors there were only five analysts assigned to the Specifically their copying speed was approxiTA section two of them were radio operators mately 8 words per minute they could not back- for ARDF ground-to-air tipoff The remaining link activity and they were unaware of the ef- three were required to devote all their time fectivenessof morse operator characteristics to preparing and transmitting daily TECSUMs analysis After discussing these problems with To increase productivity five additional anathe ARVN commanding officer CO advisors relysts were transferred to CTC but they had only ceived pe ission to reorganize and supervise recently completed school and were unfamiliar EO 1 4 c EO 1 4 d P L 86-36 October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 7 CfOP SECRECf UMBRA P L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 Tor CIt T with operations Complicating this situation the new people spent almost 3 months painting filling sandbags and satisfying other administrative trivialities When they were finally released to operations their training was accelerated In March 1973 the procedure for filing tech data was altered a new system to handle unidentified entities was established and the TECSUM format was revised to facilitate changes Once analysts overcame their fear of error development was successful and new entities were notatp rl and forwarded as isolated Al though posit i ve resul ts were being attained a recurring difficul ty plagued the TA sections --' the perplexing importance of serialization NRs and chatter extracts and the necessity for accurate logging of all entries to satisfy a computer an alien wonder they had never seen but were told existed In addition to the lack of experience and comprehension only one traffic analyst spoke English and he was hospitalized with pneumonia for 3 months during this critical period Instruction pointing and drawing illustrations was provided through non-analytic interpreters and with the limited operational Vietnamese of the advisors After many hours of frustrating and occasionally humorous guidance on the part of both advisors and ARVN personnel periodic checks of the TECSUM and raw traffic indicated a continued improvement and a decreasing error rate ---------------------- 1 Ul 'lftltA ods were the only alternatives to satisfy demands for timeliness Although timeliness is an innate characteristic of the SIGINT mission natural and manmade phenomena often alter the course of events An excellent example was the selection of a location and construction of CTC's AN TRD-23 medium-range direction-finding MRDF site Between July and September each year the tropical monsoons visit Can Tho Again field expediency dictates Nothing shall be wasted to include monsoons therefore concurrent with the arrival of the monsoon was Can Tho's Annual Aqua Festival Although these festivals improved morale and helped solidify relations with the local inhabitants the Year of the Rat proved to be the last of the Aquacade Follies In May 1972 land surveyors from Engineer Region IV ER-4 inspected the only possible location for Can Tho's roposed MRDF site which unfortunately was one and the same as Mini-Lake where the festivals were held The surveyors estimated that approximately 7 000 cubic meters of fill dirt would be required to displace and remove all the water from MiniLake so that a base for the site could begin All of these calculations led to numerous questions not to mention where next year's Aqua Follies would be held Where would this amount of dirt be found Once found how would it be transported to the proposed site and finally Who would finance the venture E'o 1 4 c Because this MRDF site would bel1 nintegrall L 86- 3 6 part of the ARVN MRDF net seryingall of South Vietnam and would be manTled by ARVN personnel it was automatically assumed that the ARVNs would make all financial and building arrangements After 2 months of ARVN procrastination paper shuffling and overall apparent apathy the advisors decided to initiate some action There were 2 weeks of rambling over the countryside in a jeep over roads previously traveled only by reconnaissance teams Then the advisors found a large farm-like residence with an expanse of adjoining land After several hours of verbal ping-pong threats shouts obscenities and finally handshakes the advisors had bargained with the owner for the required amount of fill dirt The nominal fee Although results were favorable there is agreed upon was eight 55-gallon drums of gasono implication intended that the cryptanalytic line hopefully provided by Uncle S m and six effort was without its peCUliar headaches cases of American beer provided reluctantly by Numerous problems were experienced in courierthe advisors from their very limited personal ing intercept from LLVI teams and from ASTDs cache when circuit outages occurred Since the situThe fill dirt dilemma was solved transportation vacillated in direct relationship to the ing it from the farm to Mini-Lake was still tactical environment advisors were stymied in another predicament After several sociable endeavors to alleviate this dilemma Despite the requirement air transportation helicopter evenings with members of the ER-4 team the advisors were able to borrow several 5-ton was seldom available and courier by road was trucks and one front-end loader to fill them extremely hazardous Yet LLVI teams attempted There were no operators available to run any courier every 2 to 3 weeks and when necessary even traveled by bus in civilian clothes With- of the machinery so the ruthless intrepid advisors began a trial-and-error fill dirt out any secure means available to transmit intercept for preparation of EMRs these meth- operation that would have put Contee out of October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 8 OP SECRET UMBIV DOCID 4019723 'fOP SI3CRI3'f UMBRA business in a week Anyway 2 weeks and 184 truckloads later overlooking hours of exasperation at the controls of the front-end loader or back and vocal strain when trucks were unprofessionally backed too far into MiniLake and had to be push-pulled out the base level was nearly workable However continuous rains along with the rising water table postponed any substantial achievements until early December 1972 when the earth finally dried up and initial work began on the installation of the TRD-23 While operations were running as smoothly as could be expected at Mini-Lake 500 meters to the northwest was another facet of the MRDF project This was the location of the obsolete AN TRD-4 site where some of the equipment for Mini-Lake had been stored The removal of this equipment left only the hut connecting cables and antennas By order of the Commander of Can Tho Airfield a different section of perimeter grass was burned each month As fate would have it the date for burning grass in the area of the TRD-4 site coincided with the operation at Mini-Lake and no advisors were available to monitor the burning GIs from the airfield command trudged out early one morning to begin their detail With gasoline cans and blow torches they began what was supposed to be a small controlled well-supervised grass fire All went well for the first hour or so Personnel were strategically placed armed with shovels and rakes just in case something should happen An undetected slight change of wind in velocity and direction began to move the fire toward the AN TRD-4 hut and its many antenna cables Before anyone realized what was happening the highly inflammable cables began to burn and spread toward the remaining antennas This prob bly could have been stopped with a minimum of effort if there had not been a war in progress ARVN helicopters returning from a sweep and destroy mission flying low over the airfield fanned the flames in every direction at once creating pandemonium and mass chaos Before the fire could be brought under control approximately $1 500 worth of cable connectors and antennas had been destroyed Meanwhile back at Mini-Lake to insure that future rains would not destroy the equipment installed for the TRD-23 everything was elevated one foot This was accomplished by pouring concrete antenna pedestals 12 high for each of the 26 antennas and two 12 thick 12 x 18' slabs to support the generators and the TRD hut All this was completed in 3 weeks with most of the time being consumed scrounging cement and lumber for forms Before any antennas could be placed on their respective pedestals four perimeter poles each 40' high had to be erected in each of the four corners of the antenna array with aircraft warning lights fixed to the top of each one This was necessary because Mini-Lake TRD-23 site was only 200 feet from the end of the Can Tho Airfield run- way As soon as the poles were in place tne lights had to be operational thus another project was temporarily halted until a power source could be found The only generator in the area was owned by the Pacific Architects and Engineers PA E also known as Promises Alibis and Excuses so advisors approached them and obtained permission to use their generator Yet another delay of 3 weeks was incurred because PA E had another requirement to supply power for the Joint Military Commission JMC and the International Commission for Control and Supervision ICSS peace-keeping forces while they were at Can Tho Airfield The delay came as a blessing Checking their cable supply the advisors discovered a shortage and the generator in question was approximately a quartermile away After securing additional cable the day finally came when the power was available When the poles went up the electrical cable was laid a quarter mile to the generator the aircraft warning lights were working and now the final installation of antennas could begin Not 2 hours later a Vietnamese garbage truck making its daily run through the airfield veered off the road cut the electric cable just laid and felled two of the 40-foot poles supporting the aircraft warning lights Had the advisors not been pillars of virtue and possessed of great fortitude this would have discouraged them But being ruthless intrepid types they had the cable spliced and the poles back in place in a matter of hours Finally on St Valentine's Day 1973 the metamorphosis of Mini-Lake was a reality and Can Tho's AN TRD-23 MRDF site became operational ARVN personnel however were not familiar with even the most basic maintenance procedures to support the site Any outages that occurred were normally extended until TDY personnel from Saigon could diagnose the malfunction and acquire the necessary parts Inadequate maintenance capabilities not only plagued the MRDF site but all facets of operations -- vehicles generators air conditioners commo signal-equipment etc Since CTC was only permitted to perform first-echelon maintenance repairmen assigned received only limited training as opposed to the extensive schooling afforded their U S predecessors As a result of limitations any equipment malfunctions usually had an extended adverse effect on the entire operation As at any other field station Can Tho's nucleus was the communications center CC Without this equipment running smoothly the station was cut off from the rest of the intelligence community Prior to January 1973 the CC at W33 intercept designator for CTC experienced many maintenance problems Because of cramped working conditions maintenance personnel could not perform daily preventive maintenance PM and this resulted in many operational hours lost October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 9 TOP SBCRBT UMBRA DOCID 4019723 'fOP SBCRB'f UMBRA Recognizing the cracker box problem advisors suggested to higher headquarters Unit 15 -Saigon Center that the CC at Can Tho be relocated to the area vacated by the U S CC This move would facilitate the following first daily PM could be performed thereby eliminating approximately 50% of equipment down-time second the addition of three new circuits two with Saigon and one with the proposed 44th Support Platoon could be accommodated third a significant amount of circuitry and equipment was left by the U S communications people which would simplify the transition fourth the proposed area provided ample space to house all CC equipment and would also allow for further expansion should the need arise and finally the 'new area had the muchneeded direct air conditioning ducts to aid in keeping the equipment cool and operating With Saigon's concurrence the move was made and the CC began to run smoothly For any operations to run smoothly constant supervision and guidance are necessary therefore every month the senior advisor accompanied the CO CTC on his inspection tour to the three subordinate ASTDs These trips provided an on-the-spot review of equipment personnel problems at hand and any foreseeable problems could be discussed Transportation was always the fastest best mechanically tuned jeep available at CTC while the ARVN driver was a conglomerate of Andy Granatelli Richard Petty Bobby Unser and Steve Mcqueen This combination of driver and jeep was needed most on trips to the 7th ASTD located in Dinh Tyang Province To reach the 7th from My Tho City a spine-tingling drive along Ambush Alley a stretch of road approximately 1000 meters long flanked by thick jungle on both sides was necessary This was where jeep driver and all occupants hoped for a new speed record on each and every trip These monthly sojourns into the VC NVA occupied suburbs of the Mekong Delta also allowed for sampling of the local culinaryl gastronomical delights offered at the many roadside stands These stands are known by many pseudonyms Ba muoi ba stands named after the Vietnamese beer 33 Hepatitis stands named after post-dinner complications and more commonly known to all as the local Howard Johnsons Inevitably upon their return to Can Tho the ruthless intrepid advisors proceeded post haste usually with a gait reminiscent of that of the Green Apple Quickstep to the dispensary for a small white envelope humorously marked Stopgap or Cement pills for internal use only The successful transition from U S to ARVN COMINT operations has been evaluated and found satisfactory The only unanimous regret reflected by both ARVN and U S personnel involved is that the VIM Program didn't begin earlier Naturally there is always room for improvement but keeping in mind the newness of the Vietnamese in the COMINT business much credit must be given for their many accomplishments in such a short period of time The advisors at Can Tho Center feel that the desire of the Vietnamese to constantly better the quality of their COMINT product will continue and enhance the overall Vietnamese Intelligence effort Autr ors' note The preceding article only highlighted some of the achievements and humor associated with the Vietnamization Improvement and Modernization Program in IV COI' s To discuss the numerous anomalies and corrective actions that occurred on a daily basis would be cumbersome and would detract from the continuity of events In reality these daily occurrences often had the characteristics of the aimless wanderings of an odyssey and the futility of attacking windmills FRANCOPHONEGLOS ANNOUNCEMENT Printout VI of FRANCOPHONEGLOS PROD's computerized dictionary of the French language which is sponsored by G52 is now available for all eligible users Although exactly the same size as th previous printout this one has been made more compact by revision of the definitions and the withdrawal of Source 55SUPP which has been l re laced b the new two-vo lume Harr ' s I t has been ht u to date r--z nc l -ud ' Ti n-g--- t e-n-ew- - l't e rm s -z ' n ' r e T Il'I'lI l r' r o - s - s - a r y a r--- f' O 1 4 c ' 5- 50- 0 r-e-c-o-r d -s 'ld er--z ' v-e '-f 'r-o m analysis of the French and English texts of the Official P L 86-36 Jou ronal of the European Communities Anyone having the necessary clearance and showing a need to knowmaYmr quest P L 86-36 a copy of the printout from Barbara Dudley 48l4s orl 1470' '8 S-r mple instructions for on-line-querying of the FRANCOPHONEGLOS are also ava-z lable CONFIBEN'fIAL October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 10 TOP 8 CRlST UM8Rl I OOClO 4019723 SBCRE'f SPOKE THE DO XA PADS Edward 5 Wiley 1441 Representatives from the Military Assistanc Command the Central Intelligence Agency he monsoon season in Vietnam Quang Ngai Province National Security Agency and the Army SeAurity beyond the coastal enclaves was a contested area Agency were on the scene at JGS headquart rs of the Viet Cong moved freely at night and avoided 14 May to examine the materials It was pbvioHS government forces during the day unless they that quick action to copy the pads and i tore perceived a tactical advantage from ambush As the packaging for reburial at Do Xa wot l Jje- the end of the dry season approached the comquire American technology and experien EfJ nd mander of II Corps General Nguyen Khanh orthe South Vietnamese could allow the AnleTi'cans dered a sweep of western Quang Ngai Province only 4 days to do the job General Kh rih including the region known as the Do Xa base insisted that he could not hold his pQs tion area The Do Xa Operation was launched on the at Do Xa beyond Saturday 18 May rhe'A nerican# agreed They would go all out to C opy the pads morning of 6 May 1963 when ARVN elements of General Khanh's II Corps moved unchallenged int and return them to Khanh by 18 May rh task western Quang Ngai Province By 12 May ARVN was staggering some 36 000 pages of ey to be troops were less than 10 kilometers from the re- photographed and all packaging restored to its ported location of the Viet Cong's Intersector original state The undertaking far exceeded V command post Airborne Radio Direction Find- any capability existing in SaigOn j The nearest oo ing ARDF aircraft had pinpointed the InterU S installation wit h an tLh - sector V radio station less than 2 kilometers ecessar facilities from the position held by the ARVN on 12 May 1 - ' 'O O' ieh e r-a-c-e-w a s-- - _--- The Do Xa pad story began in the spring of 1963 in the last month before the onset of the tba ru t I c e g t o o The first step was to gE1t t he loaned cache slipped away some 8 or 10 kilometers to the east of pads1 Ifor a technical On 13 May a company of South Vietnamese estimate of tfie feaslblh tY of the t ask at hand n government forces holding a small sector in the NSA insisted that first priority be given to Do Xa base area unearthed a watertight tin con- copying the pads before their return to General tainer weighing approximately 14 kilograms In- Khanh CIA and NSA a ta if the 'ob were side were more than a dozen packages of unused beyond the capability one-time key pads all carefully wrapped in a the pads would immediate y e rubberized sealant An entire shipment of Viet An officer from the NSA st ff Cong pads buried in the soil of Do Xa awaiting panied th pads on a midnight fllght from Salgon retrieval' and distribution had fallen into ARVN to Clark Au Force Base in the Philippines and at hands Clark a special the courier _ - and Word of the cache spread rapidly up the South r-----_ J Vietnamese chain of command and the tin can and it s pri zed contents were fl own to General Khanh' s headquarters in Pleiku The opportunity for deception was obvious -- if If the pads could be photographed and reburied without detection The initial reaction of thA 1 by the enemy and if the ARVN could hold their far from e couraging Onlv tactical position long enough to permit the pads 'an was at t he station even to be duplicated o For i f the ARVN held copies of t e clock for 3 days he could the Do Xa pads and if the Viet Cong eventually reseal all the ackages Time was retrieved and used them then the enemy's tactical b th t hor t 'd' d' h communications would be readable throughout the y en hO St to conSl er sen lng t e materlal w f h h 1 ' o n to as lng Whatever was to be done would f 1 leo t e cryptograp lC materla s h ave t 0 b e done ANSA' I t s con t'lnue d General Khanh seized the moment Within hours urging photocopyIng the pads was to be accomthe shipment of pads was flown from II Corps plished first Deception became a secondary headquarters in Pleiku to the Joint GeneralStaf concern The seals on the packages were entered compound on the outskirts of Saigon There the and the photographing began find was inventoried ten packages of SO pads each and four packages of six pads each -- a total of 720 000 groups of key 0t' Time was now the critical factor American intelligence authorities in Saigon were alerted October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 11 ECIU T DOClr - Time was Ii It ------------------------'1 ' 'P L 86-36 TEO 1 4 Ie SPOKE f ' OGA SaigOn te n Plane is being held to depart for 1200 and 1400 h urs 17 May Mate t'ials O ibe ready to attempt deception By retu 1r m $Sag the NSA office in Saigon advised tl l t es t infd r- mation as of 1000 hours lbcal time'j l'ie hginal plan is being carried out Mate r'Yil' wi be in Saigon on schedule Troops are h6 uirlg terra n for one more day to complete qi' g ilaY j lan f rea j rhe 69%a Success was within pad$ had been copied and the otf$i al pip aging r - constitu ed The entir ici e w s A lown to f Saig9n arriving at 21J5 ho JTs h he e veniryg of 17 May CII and A tepieseIlta rl vesmspected the refurbishing jQ f jincl the t W container was soldered shut Shor t lyA'efor e dawn on 18 May the Do Xa pads w redetiverrd Pleiku A few hours later asARiiNlroops s1 ood guard a CIA officer from Saigon buried tlle metal cannister in the soft ea dh aM covered the spot to disguise the intr usi ii1 Under 'the mid-morning sun the ARVNfor 6esbegan b whhdraw from the Do Xa base iarea The long w di had begun to Becati e ra fo viet Cong stations often re tirn d to previous ly held locations after Jtidving to 4void AIWN SWeep operations ARDF airl--- -- --- - _---1 I traff cloSely monito d events around DQ Xa Everything now hinged on time Ther aff IS May An aitb rne fix of 12 June showed technicians were pressingr _ _ _ _ _ 1 th t thi Interse ctorN radio station had moved back for an extension of the 18 May deadline Some i within 2 kiiomefers of its location prior room for optimism was reflected in an NSA message to i r itiatiorv of ihe Do Xa Operation i Ex SA Perhaps the byried pads from Saigon In regards to deadline of 18 May peq ations r ose this is still the date we must have pads bacJ we t-e about to be'iretrieved and used The watch There exists a possibility that we might 9 1in d er event at Pb Xa continued a few days extension if Gen Khanh will h O J ' 9 p r e - i lii 0 t sent position in field This optimi s irt as MeanWhi1e th fil Va lads w s reinforced by a JSPC meSSage he iA9ffl ' flown ort to w lsh ington Prints in Saigon a few hours later I reached NSA headquarte s l l y omputer had extensive correspondence Wlt and programs toi ma tch the recovered key with ciph r 7 they think they have an extension 11 22 May text wereiwritten and the material was speedlly Then the bubble burst From the N'SA represenco1 tated' i o fted and assembled According to tative in Vietnam came the follow ng message NS ' s analysis the Do Xa pads had probably been General Harkins has approved sending complete prepared for distribution some time bef re their package of crypto material v acour er from JSPC discovery i-_ they had been wrapped ln VIet Cong to NSA Stop any further r toductlon of mate- newspapers dated May 1961 Further examination ial tactical troops wi tjlct'rawing evidently sugges ted that the Nam Bo Regional Committee had resul t of someone trying t ci change our deadline beeI responsible for forwarding these cryptofrom 18 May to 22 May wry jch cannot be approve graphic materials to their destination By 5 July due to tactical plans A later message added NSA was able to report the identity of some in coordination was nQ t completed throughout tended recipients of the Do Xa pads Some pads ARVN on the date of 22 May Wi thin a few hours ind s ries of pads designed for use between Hanoi troops had started t o partially withdraw from atldSaigon Cnolon Special Sector No known link terrain presentlj field Since this was t re between them situation our p lart' to rebury material wer rt down the drain i All intercepted Vietnamese Communist radio 1t echnicians at tfaffic was checked for evidence that the Do Xa to Jork on he Do Xa pads By the m6 lng o pads had been retrieved and used Results were 17 May wi t the ori inal deadlin 7 only J I negative wa JSP C cabled Salgon and Washu lgton 1 I did not stop work on __ _ ' 1 I Somewhere out in the western reaches of has been in touch wit puicr Quang Ngai Province in Vietnam a cannister of their word is that chance of r J Lerials unused one-time pads lies buried in the moist to cache is still possible Present plans are earth undisturbed by the events of more than a to have all materials photographed and original decade and unknown save to a few who recall 1 s t a t e those hectic days of May 1963 ads returned to very near 1 y orlglna 72 r I l ontin ed bd October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 12 SECRE'f SPOKE DOCID 40197 23 SECRE SPOIH P L 86-36 LANGUAGE LESSONS LEARNED A Personal Memoir I 95 It was a typically hot and humid day in Saigon when our jeep pulled up at the building that housed Headquarters Military Assistance Command Vietnam MACV But it was not the humidity that made me uncomfortable The purpose of my visit to the nerve center of the U S military establishment in Vietnam was judged by the standards of the day deceptively simple Convinced that obstacles were awaiting me but fortified by the thought The older I get the less I have to lose I entered the building At the time I was working with the linguists at USM-626 on the analysis translation and reporting of Vietnamese Communist eVC military operational trafficl I do not know the fate of that unpretentious publication with the eyecatching title but I have never forgotten it Since the SIGINT industry like any other field of human endeavor progresses on a building block basis -- one generation profiting from the successes and failures the trials and errors of the preceding one -- I have often wondered how an NSA publication entitled LESSONS LEARNED would be received Suffice it to say that if there were one I doubt whether any of us could resist the temptation to take a peek inside In any event after 20-plus years of involvement in SIGINT Vietnamese language problems I am convinced that there are more than a few lessons to be learned from our experiences My conclusions obviously are based on my personal vantage point and as the saying goes do not necessarily reflect the views of the management CouLd We Have Done Better The obvious source of such information was MACV At that time NSA had a small liaison element at MACV After a brief stop there a couple of phone calls and a guided tour through a labyrinthine complex of corridors I found myself inside a human beehive known as the Combat Operations Center Documents galore wall-to-wall sliding maps briefing charts blackboards and strategically placed desk officers who were responsible for specific areas of the country 1 explained our requirements to the desk officer in our area of interest and in a short while I had in my possession copies of the U S ARVN Disposition of Forces and other relevant documents It was then that the desk officer showed me a MACV publication entitled LESSONS LEARNED It turned out that after every tactical operation the platoon leader company or battalion commander or other person in command would prepare a detailed report -- a kind of postmortem -- of the operation outlining the problems encountered the results achieved and of course the lessons learned October 75 EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 The expression the languagepr6blem inevitably creates in the mind of the listene-r or reader a negative image - lnsufficient numbers of linguists in ufficient skill levels of linguists inagequate training insufficient effectiveness in job performance etc But in the langl lage field as in any human endeavor there is also a positive side to the coin whi chwe often tend to forget or at least do not stress So before we ask Could we have done better in the SIGINT Vietnamese language effort let's stress the positive That's easy to do Vietnamese linguists civilian and military made an enormous contribution to the National SIGINT effort That contribution is not yet chronicled but it is nonetheless well documented The repositories can yield mountains of evidence I -Jrthat the linguist played a central role in the SIGINT production process Untold numbers of unsung and unheralded linguists met the challenges of the time with high dedication and exceptional talent Therefore we mean them no disrespect when we ask ourselves Could we have done better or when I answer that question with a resounding Yes The language function to use an expression of a local sports commentator is really a very simple game I might add at this point that my focus is on the translation-transcription world and not the cryptolinguistic arena where CRYPTOLOG Page 13 SECRET SPOKE 8B6RE'f SPOKt DOCID 4019723 It is part of our national psychology to think big -- assembly line production massive retaliation cheaper by the dozen etc So faced with a problem of immense proportions the logical move was to respond in kind If we can produce rifle parts on an assembly line then we can produce Vietnamese linguists on the same scale and at the same pace right Wrong There were jap too many linguists with fap too The development of linguists to accomplish a little language ability The most worrisome was a far more formidable task than to produce effect of this phenomenon was not the squanderthose skilled in b and c It was precisely ing of resources -- as bad as that was -- but there that most of our language headaches orithe increased hazard of providing customers with ginated inaccurate SIGINT which of course is worse One of the foremost linguists in the Agency than no SIGINT at all This problem of linguist during a conversation in which I was agonizing training and development plagued us to the very over the problems we were having in developing end of the war Why The answer in large a cadre of skilled linguists said The lanpart was the lack of effective quality control guage problem is 98% managerial and 2% technifrom the engineering design to the manufaccal I was astounded at that remark and was tured product inclined to pass it off as a humorous hyperLinguist Selection bole With the passage of time however the Consider for example the selection process truth and the wisdom of that observation became I am aware of the existence of various screening all too clear to me Virtually all the lanmechanisms including language aptitude tests guages we have to deal with are fairly well which are designed to permit only those who are documented There are of course exceptions qualified for language training to enter the such as parts of sub-Saharan Africa and Asia pipeline On the basis of my experience I The Vietnamese language however is not one of the except'ions and in essence the techni- have to believe that the system broke down No training in the world no matter how well cal difficulty is in ourselves and not in the staffed with expert instructors or how well set structured the course may be can succeed if Linguistic Quality Contpol the students are either not qualified by dint of aptitude or academic background or not If I were asked to name the most serious flaw motivated If the selection criteria are vaj id in the Vietnamese language effort I would unhesitatingly point to the training and develop- then they presumably were waived at times If they were scrupulously followed at all times ment of linguists If I were asked to state what main ingredient was missing in the recipe then they are invalid Language Tpaining I would unhesitatingly say quality contpol Consider also the training segment Again What does quality control connote in this there are undoubtedly tests and various concontext Well for openers let's take a look at Webster's definition the aggregate of trols or safety valves designed to permit only the qualified to emerge Here too the sysfunctions designed to insure adequate quality tem had glaring weaknesses The tendency in manufactured products by initial critical study of engineering design materials proces- throughout the war was to evaluate a training program primarily on the basis of the caliber ses equipment and workmanship followed by periodic inspection and analysis of the results of the graduates This in itself may have been inherently unfair to the school and the of inspection to determine causes for defects instructors in that as stated before the stuand by removal of such causes dents may not have had the prerequisites and As we gradually moved from the role of inno type of training could have succeeded We terested observer watching the French chase were generally satisfied with the training prothe Viet Minh allover the countryside with con- vided by the National Cryptologic School NCS summate lack of success to that of active par-- we had firsthand knowledge of the skill of ticipant when we took over the chase with equal our instructors he content of the course frustration by this time it was the Viet Cong the qualifications of the students and the -- which means Vietnamese Communist and which capabilities of the graduates The physical the RVN applied to all communists north or proximity of the NCS and the fact that training south the pressures on the SIGINT community and operations were all in the family permitunderstandabl y became more intense I ted continuous and close contact with the school authorities and instructors and facilitated monitoring of the program and a reasonable degree of quality control With the DefensE Language Institute ULI L - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - I however it was a different matter Distance the word simple may raise some eyebrows All the linguist has to do is determine a the content of the message or the voice transmission b its intelligence value if any and c the appropriate vehicle for reporting the information October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 14 SECRE'f SPOKE EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 SECRET SPO KR both physical and organizational posed a formidable barrier for all practical purposes for the kind of liaison that we were able to maintain with the NCS The DLI training for the most part remained unevaluated At times there was considerable unhappiness with the skill level of DLI graduates At other times the graduates' on-job performance reflected well on the training they had received We tended to treat the symptoms rather than the cause of the ailment Where were the weak points student selection the expression of our r quirements instructors course content the tIme gap between training and operational assignment on-job training the nature of the operational assignment There probably were elements of all these factors but to my knowledge there was little or no concerted systematic effort to identify them precisely weigh their importance and take corrective action I had occasion to visit an SCA training facility where I and other members of a TDY team were briefed on the training programs their objectives and contents Aware of some seemingly chronic difficulties we had been having with field product I asked one of the program managers if there was any attempt to obtain feedback from the field stations such as by a form to be filled out by the operations officer which would appraise the performance of the students who had completed the course Yes we do have such a form he responded What do these forms tell you I asked These forms tell us he said with an impish smile on 'his face that people don't like to fill out forms So much for quality control -- at least in that program There were undoubtedly other attempts to ascertain the quality of the trainees and perhaps there were some remedial measures taken -- but the impac of any such measures was not readily discernible Development of voiae Linguists One of the most frustrating quests in the area of linguist development was the effort to produce voice linguists The personnel who could transcribe a free-flow unformatted and unpredictable Vietnamese conversation accurately and with reasonable speed were few and far between Try as we might the system simply did not or could not produce this type of linguist Maybe we were faced with an impossible dream The use of indigenous Vietnamese -- the DANCER program -- for the transcription of VC voice communications as well as for direct support in combat operations as was the case primarily with the Marine units was generally successful I doubt that the nature and the difficulty of the tasks we expected the trainees to perform or the dimensions of the process to produce such linguists were ever adequately spelled out If they were then again the quality control was weak or completely lacking Targetists vs Funetionists The deployment afid use of Vietnamese linguists were generally and rightfUlly considered to be organizational prerogatives Down through the years at NSA the organizational structure has been the obj ect of a tug-of-war between the targetists those who advocate plugging all the necessary cryptologic skills into one target-oriented unit and the functionists who would organize primarily along functional lines and assign specific skills to specific problems on a temporary or ad hoc basis Should cryptanalysts or programmers for example be concent ated in one organization or should they be dIspersed among various organizations In either case at what echelon -- section branch or the new work centers division As the Vietnamese language problem grew inquantum jumps the targetists emerged as the dominant influence The linguist workforce was fragmented and linguists were assigned to various elements within the VC problem In terms of effective and efficient use of scarce resources it was one of the worst things we could have done There was much to be said for this organizational approach and there are those who are convinced that it was the only method I however remain unconvinced I believe we paid too heavy a price for the dismemberment of the Vietnamese language effort The effect was to dilute control over the most skilled of the Vietnamese linguists whose talents could have been applied over a much broader area in the management and conduct of SIGINT language functions As it turned out they became highly localized or specialized if you will So in the critical areas of linguist development product review and control field support standards flexibility in linguist assignments construction and maintenance of language working aids especially the most vital of them all -- a comprehensive dictionary -- our posture was weakened Organizations that corner the market on talented personnel understandably tend to place such people under a form of protective custody regardless of the size or complexity of the workload The Vietnamese problem was no exception We will never know what might have been if the functionists had won the tug-of-war I will never cease to wonder however Language Lessons Learned If we have really learned our lessons from the Vietnam experience we should be taking action in any or all of the following areas o Establishment of a system of quality aontrol for linguist training and development The terminal objectives must be defined in specific i U '9uivooal ton October 7S CRYPTOLOG Page 15 SECRE'f SPOI E EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID SECRET SPOKE 4019723 The system should include such Examination OQE which would do two things a license the linguist to practice and b provide a barometer on the effectiveness of the training program I L-it-e-m-s--a-s--a-n o-p-e-r ational Qualification A thorouqh review of the selection criteria Are the criteria valid Are they being maintained It may be a normal reaction to relax them in times of crisis but that is precisely when we must not relax them We cannot compensate by quantity for what we lack in qU lit -at least in the world of language and lInguIsts o Evaluation oj' the training programs Are they meeting our requirements Do they need revision or updating Can we really develop linguists who for example can cope with a I lor are we reaching for the unattaInable What mIX of trainee qualifications and training programs is needed to produce such a linguist o An active dictionary system Only in recent years have we awakened to the importance o having authoritative current and comprehensIve dictionaries In the languages for which we are responsible It was only in the late 1960's that the Vietnamese language effort produced such a dictionary known as RICE BOWL for Vietnamese and a system for managing and maintaining it The dictionary was also computerized and could even be interrogated on-line A USSID was issued establishing it as the authority to be followed by NSA and SCA linguists in translation and standardization as well as the procedures for its maintenance J EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 the quality of that friendship The fragmentation of the Vietnamese language problem was undoubtedly a factor in lour neglect of this vital working tool Today a language-processing organization that does not have ani active dictionary system in which new terms and abbreviations are-duly recorded and processed for inclusion in a machine-listed data base is simply not fulfilling its responsibility This is clearly not a technical problem It is a management problem We have reared a generation of linguists who assume that once a message is scanned or translated or a tape is scanned or transcribed their task has been completed Since they do not document the new terms and abbreviations for the benefit of others the wheel keeps getting rediscovered One of the senior NSA linguists once suggested that a linguist'siperformance appraisal should automatically include a rating on the linguist's fulfillment of the responsibility to extract dictionary data from the traffic he processes This suggestion has much merit and should certainly be a factor in performance appraisal o Consolidation of linguists and language problems We should take a long hard look at the current deployment of our linguist workforce to determine if consolidation would be advisable Are we deriving the maximum benefit from the most skilled'ofourlinguists DQlinguists have the opportunity to work ona v riety of targets or perform a variety of functions Are we confining them to a specific target or area in order to satisfy an artificial organizational bias In our Vietnam experience there were some elements that were linguist-rich and others that were linguistpoor The negative impact of such situations on linguist development and product quality control are obvious Career Incentives and Motivation The problem of career incentives and motivation could easily be the subject of a separate article The difficulties encountered in the Vietnam experience were symptomatic of long ---- -- - Istanding attitudes toward language work and linJ Someone in that distant past guists I happen to believe for example that h-a-d-h ad b r-l 'l l l 'ant foresight but unfortunately the SCAs will never really develop a truly prothe infant glossary was never given the necesfessional cadre of career linguists until such sary nourishment and it as well as the idea time as senior translators and transcribers are died Our failure to build on that glossary given officer ranks It takes about 15 months to was a crucial mistake and it cost us dearly train a fighter pilot to the point of combat in the ensuing years in terms of linguist capa- readiness and a much longer time to develop a bility and product quality Very useful infor- professional linguist to a point of combat mation on the meanings of new terms and the readiness I have yet to see a fighter pilot expansion of new abbreviations appearing in who is not of officer rank or an SCA full-time traffic went down the drain Who needed to professional linguist who is In the NSA condocument and disseminate that data it was text it is absolutely essential that selected felt After all John Doe and Mary Smith our individuals whose strength lies primarily in senior linguists were immortal and would altheir mastery of a foreign language and the ways be around to answer questions Actually ability to apply this knOWledge in the SIGINT however the dictionary is the linguist's best world be at the GG-15 and GG-16 levels and be friend Accuracy and speed in SIGINT lanhighly visible to the linguist population Opguage production are very often dependent on portunities for advanced language training and October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 16 gCRET SPOKE Dt70 C I'I 1 'iD-- - ---- l4nO 'l 1 ' 'l9 3'5 - - ---'------------------- _ _c - I JI tl SECREqJ SPOKE with that greatest advantage of them all -hindsight Had there been a publication called LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE KOREAN WAR with a detailed account of the problems and pitfalls in the effort to develop an effective SIGINT Korean language capability in a wartime context we might have been better equipped to respond to the requirements for SIGINT support in the Vietnam War Perhaps we would have done things just a little bit differently with much better resultsl There are undoubtedly many lessons that were learned from the Vietnam experience These The SIGINT record in the Vietnamese conflict few that stand out in my mind are by no means is one of considerable achievement The Vietexhaustive but I believe they do offer us guidenamese linguist contributed immeasurably to that lines for the future Since they are presented record It is the hope here that as we continue 1 4 d from a personal point of view they are subject to examine our language posture and to strive L 86- 3 6to debate They are couched in general terms for ways to strengthen and develop it to a point of both peacetime effectiveness and combat because the individuals and organizations were but players in the drama -- as the Bard of Avon readiness at least one or more of the lessons said The play's the thing They are stated learned from Vietnam will be of some value the chance to grow in the profession are equally important The crush of the pressures of a wartime situation did not afford us much time for a proper exploration of the subject of linguist incentive and motivation Identifying the root causes of the dissatisfaction or disinterest of Vietnamese linguists may have shed light on situations that were unsatisfactory and which management actions may have been able to remedy or at least improve WANTED A GOOD HOME for 32 copies of an old faithful working aid Degarbling Code Text National Security Agency 1954 SECRET Working aid is o longer being used at National Cryptologlc School and will be destroyed if no one wants copies Take one copy take two take as many as you want Contastl Ip16 Room 3C099-1 56428 October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 17 P L 86-36 SEEURRET 8POK EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 EO 1 4 _c - _ _ DOCID P L 4019723 86-36 'fOP SI3EURRI3'f UMBRA I October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 18 TOP CR T UMBRA P L 86 36 j EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 I TOP SECRET U tBRA I October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 19 'fOP SI3CRI3'f UM8Rl EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 'fOP SECRET UMBRA October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 20 TOP SECRE'f UMBRA j EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 401972 3 I P L 86-36 'fOP SRCRR'f UMBRA Editor's note The author of this artiale has chosen to use a nom de plume beaause he feels that if his real name were to appear he might seem to be taking credit for the work performed so long so diligently and 80 suaaessfuZZy onc Jby a hundred people THE WINNAH-KlD APOSTROPHE It was a tough fight Maw but I lost I knew that Kid Apostrophe would be a tough contender One of our editor's Vera Filby wrote a short item The Apostrophe Some Thought's CRYPTOLOG November 1974 in which she dealt with plural ending's with and without apostrophe's So when I became CRYPTOLOG editor I knew I'd have a tough bout with the Kid Well here I am after putting the fourth issue together and I'm throwing in the towel For four months Maw I tried to make sense out of how to pluralize abbreviations SOl's TECHSUMs But now after hearing all the arguments about familiar vs unusual abbreviations abbreviations that sound like words vs those that you read like individual letters those that end with an 5 in the singular anyway etc I know when I'm licked So in this issue and in subsequent issues any and all abbreviations will be pluralized u thout the apostrophe SOls ASTDs TECHSUMs etc In case this offends any purists here Sprinkle them in at will oo t r r r ' 11' r' rr r I' r UNCLASSIFIED October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 21 fOP SFJCRBf UMBRA DOCID 4019723 UNCLASSIFIED P L 86-36 NSA-croatic No 1 In the early 1950's I constructed a series of about 60 Russian-language DoubleCrostics as language-teaching aids does anyone still remember those purple Ditto sheets Recently I have received a numerable request to construct a new series But I'll do better than that I'll construct a series of English-language ones using quotations from published works of our own NSA-ers 'lhe following NSA-Crostic is the first in the new series Solution will appear next month CRYPTOLOG Editor October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 22 UNCLASSIFIED DOCID 4019723 L UNCLASSIFIED October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 23 UNCLASSIFIED P L 86-36 86-36 DOCID 4019723 SECRBl' SPOKE IRONHORSE A Tactical SIGINT Srs_t_em During the Vietnam conflict tactical commanders in Southeast Asia SEA had a continuing requirement for more and better tracking data on aircraft activity over North Vietnam DRV Increased low-altitude activity and scrambles of MIG aircraft could not be seen by U S radar As command's ability to exercise direct control over U S aircraft improved so did their need for this type of tracking data U S SIGINT provided these commanders with trackin dat at low altitudes and during deep penetratIons Into enemy air space In answer to their need a USAF Security Service unit the 6924th Security Squadron USA-32 stationed at Da Nang RVN began providing a limited amount of needed data through Project HAMMOCK in November 1965 HAMMOCK was a manual plotting system of SIGINT derived from USA-32 copy and from information relayed from airborne intercept platforms ACRPs operating over the Gulf of Tonkin and Laos HAMMOCK however had severe limitations Intercept from USA-32 was relayed to the Tactical Air Command Center Northern Sector TACC NS Fig 1 at Monkey Mountain by secure tele- ---- The need for a rapid and therefore automated transfer of data was realized Systems attempting this had been achieved The success of Project FURNACE the automated plotting of SEA strike activity begun in June 1964 and operational by mid-September led to a project to rectify this time problem Approved in November 1964 the project was given code name IRONHORSE The office of R8 assumed responsibility for the technical development and provisioning of equipment for a visual display of SIGJNT derj ved tracking of aircraft reflected inL ___ DRV Air Defense Communications P L 86-36 EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 The problem as seen by RB was that of a classic command and control operation The mission of TACC NS was the control and warning of USAF strike aircraft over DRV Data from a maximum number of inputs had to be reduced and fused into a common data base and presented to the battle commanders Their solution was a data processing display forwarding system to automate the processing of manual data through the use of cathode ray tube CRT displays and the rapid forwarding of selected track data to the consumer via a data link Fig 2 In INlfAfACf Of TActICAL NIl CON AIIIO REPORTING SYStEMS IN SOUTHeAST ASIA _ ' iVSAS AdUfNAfl tACft Al AUl CONllfOt Cl NH A IIOQ'fM SIc fMt ' ATACC -N UbOAN ll1Al1 AHtl USAf tM'-r 'AL o Atll cmlTao L - RUle rr _ 51 ' ' T occ C a -- l j 'l _S'ISlf_ _ -' fACt CAl S f CUlf ot CUtf Of' _te'N C Hll lI' P N Hf-ll- 621 _SWT' '''' ' l f-V W01JN1AIJ j NtAFl bAN 4NC eweD Il tMnNHORU fA $ nM '-'i-' -' - -- ' Fig I phone The data was plotted and then relayed via secure teletype to Seventh Air Force where it was manually plotted for display to Command officers TACC NSalso provided this informa- ' tion to the Commander Task Force 77 CTF-77 of the Seventh Fleet operating in the Gulf of Tonkin and to the Marine Tactical Data System MTDS in the form of radar plots This manual system was limited to a maximum of ten tracks and its quality and timeliness were affected by the number of steps involved Time from intercept to the consumer was usually 8 to 10 minutes during which time an aircraft could have traveled 150 miles from the area of interest October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 24 SESRE'f SPOKE ---------------------III I IIIIfI N ' ''' EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 T SECRET SPOKE After the original concept was approved 1n November 1965 it took 2 years to assemble the necessary equipment and to write and debug software The equipment was illstalled in vans and delivered to Da Nang in November 1967 After 4 months of testing and interfacing with TACC NS the system was declared operational by USAF on 27 March 1968 Later in that year a new operations building was buH t and all IRONHORSE equipment the S W center and operator positions were put under one roof Shortly after the March operational date it was decided to build a second system IRONHORSE II to be placed at USA-29 Udorn Thailand as a backup for the Da Nang system A fire in the Marine bomb dump in April 1969 caused virtual destruction of the operations building The force of the explosions and the accompanying shock waves caused the base perimeter to be moved and the Operations site was isolated from the rest of the base Emergency destruct procedures were initiated Most of the computer programs and documentation were destroyed Fortunately none of the IRONHORSE hardware was damaged The equipment was removed to an environmentally controlled quonset hut For the next 3 months two pro- grammers and a data analyst reconstructed programs manuals and operating procedures A new operations building was built and IRONHORSE resumed operations in July 1970 The IRONHORSE mission was continued at Da Nang until April 1971 During November 1970 the decision was made to move IRONHORSE II to Udorn to take over the USA-32 mission concurrent with the U S withdrawal of forces The system remained operational until December 1972 when the SEA tactical data interface was terminated manual morse and radio telephone and from tour Model-35 teletypes operated by data analysts Fig 4 CRrs were added to meet the requirement that it be a visual display Fig The The hardware for the IRONHORSE system consisted of a special version of two AN GYK-9 FLEXSCOP computers CP8l8s Inputs were provided by 22 AN GGC-15 AG-22 configured intercept positions Fig 3 which copied both Fig 5 CRT presented a map showing significant land masses coastlines major rivers islands and political boundaries and was overlaid by a grid system Fig 6 Fig 3 The operator positions would copy aircraft position reports and amplification data such as altitudes numbers and aircraft types The TTY would electronically feed intercept track data to the computer which would convert the position reports to Geographical Reference Grid GEOREF decode the amplification data convert the call sign and frequency to a station location for azimuth-range position reports recognize ELFAIR-relevant traffic flag it and place all traffic on magnetic tape The second computer could then edit and decrypt the information presenting it to the analyst operating the CRT display The analyst would first see the data as a blinking trace and upon command October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 25 SECRET SPOKE DOCID SECRET 4019723 o ir t c it C1 ' h' Fig CJ could retrieve and display any amplification data The computer was programmed to detect and reject irrelevant chatter and if tracking data was in an unrecognizable form it would be printed out on an edit console where the edit analyst would correct the information and reenter it The CRT analyst was required to recognize in formative ttracking data and initiate forwarding to the consumers Since all copy was displayed the CRT analyst would decide which command level of the air defense net to forward Information that was redundant or superfluous would be left in a suppressed mode o purged from the system Upon command from the analyst the computer would automatically forward designated data to the Seventh Air Force TACC Seventh Air Force Command Post Seventh Fleet Commander CTF-77 and the Marine Tactical Data gPOK EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 Center simultaneou$ly with transmission to TACC NS CRTsatthese 1ocations would present I hacking data in the sanitized fO rm of GEOREF plots with limited background ampllfication The commander could then combine this information with other tracking data received via the SEEK DAWN l interface to make his decisions The net result of IRONHORSE was to reduce the intercept-to-consumer time from 10 minutes to a matter of seconds The IRONHORSE system was able to complete its mission effectively It gave battle commanders the near real time reflection of aircraft positions they required It had the ability by nature of its source to reflect aircraft at low altitudes In the case of dogfights and shootdowns the position of downed U S aircraft could be relayed to Search and Recovery SAR missions 2 Regardless of the cost if the system was able to aid in the recovery of one pilot it was worth the investment ISEEK DAWN was the exchange of digital air tracking information between TACC NS at Monkey Mountain and Marine Tactical Data System Navy Tactical Data System and the Air Tactical Data System units in Vietnam and the Tonkin Gulf area 21 was at USA-32 from August 1969 to August 1970 during the bombing halt and had no direct reflection of the use of SAR However as an amusing anecdote during one of the probe missions sending a photographic drone in over Haiphong and Hanoi at treetop level two MIG-17s were scrambled The MIGs intercepted and the trailing MIG locked on and fired a heatseeking missile Unfortunately the other MIG was between the missile and the drone Only one MIG returned to base and the drone was later recovered in the Gulf ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS IN ' BDUL HIS 40 TANKS CRYPTOLOG August-September 1975 SEER 'f' 6811Hl'f October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 26 SECRET gPOKI EO 1 4 c IbldlShE VIA OW v EURIW1 18I DOCID 40197 23 I SECRET SPOKE P L 86-36 THE DANANG PROCESSING CE I IA852 The ARVN SIGINT organization was known as the Directorate General for Technical Services DGTS and had its headquarters in Saigon The Danang Processing Center was the northernmost field Hq of the DGTS and had a personnel strength of 329 men Danang Center operated 50 Morse intercept ositions on Danang Airbasemandua Icollection ef ort on top of nearby Mon ey Mountain The South Vietnamese Danang Center and lowerechelon SIGINT units in ARVN Military Region I MR-I were Intended to provide intelligence to the MR-I J2 and to the ARVN combat divisions within that region This intelligence took the form of daily intelligence summaries and spot repor s issued by the Center and its subordinate units Danang Center and the other SIGINT units in MR-I had their successes and occasionally produced valuable tactical intelligence Unfortunately they did not produce enough it was not produced fast enough and the SIGINT users at Corps level did not have a proper appreciation of the validity and usefulness of SIGINT I Following the signing of the Paris Peace Agreement the tactical environment in Vietnam took on a fixed-piece posture where enemy units made few tactical movements The result was a loss of many national intelligence sources such as document exploitation and prisoner interrogation With the loss of these collateral sources SI should have come to the forefront of available sources supplying the national J2 However the production of this SIGINT at least in MR-I was not satisfactory It is the purpose of this article to explain some of the reasons why I think the overall ARVN SIGINT effort was a failure and fell short of its mission and to touch briefly upon life in Danang An assignment in Vietnam following the withdrawal of U S military forces in February 1973 was unlike any other NSA overseas assignment The Paris Peace Agreement limited the number of U S Department of Defense personnel i allowed in-co try I One U S representative was assigned to each of the three ARVN SIGINT field centers at Can Tho in the Delta Pleiku in the central highl nn and Danang in the northern reqi o ns Jeach field representative was provided with housing a vehicle and gas purchase privileges in their bar restaurant and commissary and inclusion in most of their social activities I o _ Each of the six ARVN combat divisions in MR-I had an organic SIGINT unit known as an ARVN Special Technical Detachment ASTO These ASTOs controlled 35 highly mobile low-level voice intercept LLVI teams which werecARable of short-notice deployments to keep up with enemy movements LLVI teams were also intended I to accompany the combat units into action to provide real-time direct support Top-level officer administration in theMR-I SIGINT organization was generally excellent middle-level management was weak and low-level was poor to nonexistent The top-level managers were well educated trained and motivated but a lack of these qualities among the lower-level officers prevented full productivity of the Center from ever being attained LLVI team operation could have been farmore productive if the lieutenants and senior NCOs had been more professional Most of these teams were located in forward areas and I was unable to visit many of them Those I did visit invariably needed basic improvement Antennas were often oriented in wrong directions or were found to be grounded radios and generators were rarely properly grounded bunkers were not secured with perimeter wire and the men had not been counseled in document and equipment destruction in case of overwhelming enemy attack As another example in December of 1974 Danang Center was tasked with collection of North Vietnamese air surveillance tracking data The particular radar sites and sector filter centers we copied were located in the southern panhandle of North Vietnam and we hoped that North Vietnamese MIGs deploying to staging bases just above the DMZ or actually penetrating South Vietnamese air space would be reflected on these cases It was suggested that the Center be able to tip off via phone such MIG movements to the MR-I Commander the MR-I Air division Commander and the South Vietnamese radar facility located atop Monkey Mountain October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 27EO 1 4 c P L SECKEl' SPOKE 86-36 EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 But weeks after starting collection of these communications the analysts plotting the tracking data were found to be working 2 days behind a delay hardly acceptable when the computed flying time between the DMZ and Danang Airbase was approximately 6 minutes into the hangar and climbed into his hammock It was small wonder the pilots scraped off so many wing tips while making unassisted parks The South Vietnamese were never able to make the airborne direction finding ARDF program function as the money-maker it was while under U S control Several management problems crippled the effort Even in the final days of South Vietnam's existence when locating data on the many NVA Divisions ringing Saigon was critical to an organized defense it was impossible to force the responsible officers to straighten out the ARDF program Payoffs corruption and nepotism were a way of life in the Vietnamese government and the ARVN SIGINT organization was no exception I soon learned that it was far easier and quicker to buy a service or cooperation than to go through normal channels Two six-packs of beer would get a half-day loan of a forklift a few cigarettes would gain entrance to a restricted area and a fifth of cognac would guarantee a staff officer's cooperation in obtaining real estate for a field site expansion Some jobs simply could not be done without a bit of preliminary palm-greasing Six EC-47 ARDF aircraft and their crews were assigned to Danang but were rotated every 2 weeks from the Squadron Hqs in Saigon The men were directly subordinate to Saigon This meant that the MR-I Hqs could not control the flights even though they were the primary user of the DF fixes Support for the aircraft was also in Saigon If an aircraft needed parts or maintenance that could not be provided by the few men assigned to the EC-47 hangar it would have to wait until the aircraft was ferried to Saigon Corruption within the officer administration of Danang Center was accepted as long as it did not get out of hand and the officers continued to produce One officer a Center Commander eventually devoted so much time and effort to lining his own pockets and was so incompetent in his job that he had to be replaced It was impossible to stop the thievery completely The best we could do was to keep it at a minimum and accept some losses as long as the job got done For a good part of the year the morning weather in MR-I is generally cloudy but it usually clears up by afternoon Cloud cover has an adverse effect on the Doppler navigation system used in the EC-47's so many morning flights were aborted However by afternoon when the flying weather was perfect the crews had disappeared for the day The extensive nepotism could be turned to advantage It was always more productive to conduct business arrangements with an officer of a support organization who had a relative on our staff Likewise an almost equally strong allegiance as blood relationship existed between old college classmates and this was used to advantage whenever possible Gas stealing by the crews was also a major problem Most of the officers had oversized briefcases lined with plastic bags which they filled with gas from the aircraft wing tanks and carried through the airbase gates to sellon the black market Ground crewmen also took their share and it was not unusual for a completely topped-off plane to be drained overnight While I was there at least two of Danang's aircrew barracks were destroyed by fire caused from plastic bags of aviation gas The Vietnamese had their own ways of doing things and these methods were not without In late JUly 1974 I received a messa e The flight crews were also rough on wing tips In December 1974 I noticed that there had been several recent mission cancellations due to wing tip repairs Not understanding this I drove to the flight line and watched as an EC-47 returned from a mission and taxied into the parking revetments The normal procedure at any airfield would be for a few ground crewmen to meet the aircraft and guide it into the parking area making sure there was sufficient clearance between the wing tips and the revetment walls While I watched though the only assistance the pilot got was the br ef appearance of a ground crewman from the hangar who ran out in his BVDs pointed a finger at the nearest empty revetment and then ran back that would soon pay us a V1Slt I informed the DanangCenter Commander of this and suggested to hiIDotl1a t4 he c have the grass in the antenna field tp-lll ll eds 6 6 it was quite high and posed a fire hazard The General would be sure to spot it The next morning I arrived at work to find that a fire of unknown origin had quite mysteriously swept the field and consumed the grass Unfortunately this fire also destroyed several lead-in cables which connected the Center's antennas with the multicouplers effectively wiping out over half of our antenna system In my mind I suspected that Captainl the Center Commander had ordered one of his lieutenants to have the grass remov d and the 1ieutenant without devoting a greatdeal of thought to what he was doing touched off the grass with a match I never did have the courage to pursue the cause of the fire but accepted Captainl Idictate tijat unknown circumstances caused the fire Weeks later when new grass was starting to grow in the field the Captain and I spent part of a day trying I October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 28 SECRET S OKE EO 1 4 c EO 1 4 d P L 86-36 i i DOCID 4019723 8ECRET 8POKE to buy a calf to tether in the field and eat grass We were not able to get an acceptable price on a calf although sheep and goats were going cheap Unfortunately both sheep and goats consider RG-ll lead-in cable to be a gourmet's delight and so had to be ruled out The rainy season in Danang occurs during the winter months of November through March and is opposite the rainy season in Saigon which occurs during the summer months Also Saigon's rains are characterized by being torrential and occurring a few times daily but lasting only minutes Danang's rains generally lasted for days but rarely did it rain very hard In Danang the continuous humidity caused mildew to grew on almost everything and even saturated paper so deeply that graphite would run Many of the Center's roofs leaked and the communications center roof was of major concern because of the electronic equipment s re a ir materials were unavailable Captain had an ingenious system of catch basins an troughs installed The most unusual remedy to a leak was over an HW-IO HW-19 crypto device had the men punch a hole in the nearest wall several feet below the ceiling and run a rag from theleak in the ceiling to the hole in wall Thus the water ran down the rag to the outside by capillary action instead of dripping on the equipment g Going to and from scnQol the dependent children of Danang CeJlterwalked past my quonset hut which was just inside the perimeter cyclone fencing Vietnamese children are adorable and I got in a habit of giving them through the fence small hard candies whic h I bought at the U S commissary This was qui tEl at reat for them and they would wait for hours on the road for me to corne out of my hut Eventually this got a bit out of hand and on occasion as many as 50 or so children would gather I didn't have enough candy for groups this large and sQ I wouldn't go outside when I heard them calling from the road for me One day one of them got the idea to throw a rock onto my roof to get my attention -- which it did -- and bring me outside-which it did At this time Danang Airbase was regularly taking VC 122-rnm rocket attacks and these rocks crashing onto the metal quonset hut roof just feet over my head were enough to send me diving under my desk The DGTS had difficulty in organizing and maintaining communications between their own units The lowest echelon of the DGTS was the LLVI team It comprised two to five men one or two radios one or two rudimentary 292 sloping-V or doublet antennas and sometimes a typewriter By directed or random search these teams would find and copy VC low-level voice communications Messages on these links were usually encrypted in easily read hand encryption systems The underlying text had immediate tactical value since much of it dealt with VC troop movements and preparations for forthcoming attacks Decryption of these messages was performed at the next echelon by the ASTD These ASTDs were organic to ARVN combat divisions and were responsible for the immediate processing and reporting of decrypted messages to the Division G2 All too often however the ASTDs received the encrypted messages days after the actual intercept As a result much of the decrypted information obtained was after' the fact Most of the ASTDs in MR- I attempted to visit their teams a few times a week and courier the raw intercept back Gasoline rationing often curtailed these visits In at least one case an ASTD resorted to civilian taxi motorbikes to get the intercept In November 1974 in an effort to speed up the forwarding process our Saigon COMSEC office allocated secure voice KY-8 systems to three of the MR-I ASTDs and their subordinate LLVI teams With this equipment it was hoped that the te ms would be able to radio their raw intercept directly to the ASTD just after copy But several problems kept this project from ever being fully successful The KY-8s and their associated VRC-46 radios frequently could not be supplied with stable electric power at the LLVI team Crypto management problems occurred The men operating the gear and the officers responsible for them often did not have sufficient training in crypto set-up and use and minor maintenance problems with the VRC-46 radios could not be corrected locally As a result of these problems little time was saved in getting the intercept to the processing and reporting echelon The ASTDs supported their parent divisions with intelligence product but forwarded their technical material and raw intercept to Danang Center The 1st ASTD at Phu Bai had two 60-wpm teletype circuits to Danang Center which employed HW-IO HW-19 crypto security Two circuits were necessaryas this ASTD processed intercept gathered by its own LLVI teams and those teams subordinate to the Marine Ranger and Airborne ASTDs The traffic volume on these circuits was high somuth so that prepared message tapes often had to wait days for transmission In addition the Marine Ranger and Airborne ASTDs generally batch-forwarded their material to Phu Bai once weekly and this caused poking backlogs in the Phu Bai communications center On several extreme occasions when hundreds of prepared message tapes were backlogged at Phu Bai I or a Danang Center courier was allowed a seat on an Air America helicopter to get the tapes from Phu Bai to Danang This procedure was not encouraged since we were tryi rigto get the Vietnamese to depend on their own support organizations rather than U S The 3rd ASTD at Hoa Khanh alsdhad a single circuit to Danang Center The operation of this October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 29 EO 1 4 c EO 1 4 d P L SHCREf SPOKE 86-36 ------- DOCID 4019723 SECR 'f SPOKB circuit was continually plagued by technical problems in the cable Flooding and sporadic rocket attacks were blamed for cable outages and it was rare when the Vietnamese Air Force responsible for that portion of the cable on Danang Airbase and the Vietnamese Army responsible for the cable portions from the airbase to the Hoa Khanh Hqs could agree on where the break occurred As a result the majority of the intercept provided by this ASTO was usually couriered to Danang Center via jeep and even though the ASTD was only a few miles away over perfectly secure roads it took constant prodding to get them to make the trip more often than once weekly P L 86-36 -- we were given 12 ribbons a month This meant that each typewriter received a new ribbon approximately every 6 months The local MR- I Maintenance Company which was responsible for maintaining DanangCenter's common equipment such as R-390 radio receivers recorders typewriters etc was not regularly given updated copies of our Table of Organization and Equipment and so was never able to stock enough of the parts needed for our equipment Many equipments and supplies basic to operation of an intercept site were not stocked at Danang Center the MR-I Logistics Command or at Saigon Such items were antenna The supply and maintenance methods used by wire and insulators TMC boxes lead-in cable Danang Center can be summed up as almost totally RF connectors and ground strap So desperate inadequate In retrospect I now think that a were we for some materials that on oneocrasion working logistics system is the most critical when our Saigon resident engineer requirement of any field operation Danang Center and I were fabricating new antennas for the had many personnel management and technical ASTD at Phu Bai Charlie entered a minefield problems but even if these had been solved trying to liberate a pair of unused TMC boxes mission effectiveness could hardly have improved and failed only because VC 8S-mm field gun without sufficient working materials and rounds started dropping around him equipment maintenance Soon after the U S military withdrew from Several examples of our poor support come to Vietnam and the DGTS had assumed complete remind For supplies such as pencils erasers sponsibility for the collection analysis and and tape the Center received no allocation but reporting of 5IGINT it became apparent their was given approximately $40 a year to buy the state-of-the-art would not advance as rapidly as we wanted The DGTS simply would not be supplies on the open market It was barely a fraction of what was needed considering our pushed faster than they wanted to go I feel their management and logistical problems and consumption of these materials their lack of a true desire to learn the proWe received our typewriter ribbons fro Saigon duction and use of SIGINT contributed to the Logistics To supply the 75 or so typewrIters overall failure of the independent ARVN SIGINT we had -- which were used almost continuously effort f I 111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111II111111111111111111111111111nllllll111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 Answers to I IPAPER ON CRY PTO- LOGrolling puzzles CHARACTER STREAM SCANNING BY MACHINE See CRYPTOLOG August-September 1975 P T 0 L E MA I C U P TOW N E R S TIP TOE I N G CRY P T 0 LOG NOT U P T 0 I T THE TIP TOP G I VEL I P T 0 CRY P T 0 LOG A CRY L ATE S ENe R Y PTE D o E 5 CRY I N G X E N 0 CRY S T NOR DIe RYE I N F U L L CRY LOG 0 MAC H Y S LOG A N I Z E P H LOG 0 5 I S U N C LOG G E D P E DOL 0 G I C BUM POL 0 G Y CRY P T 0 LOG I IRSI has recommended that broader publicity be given o a recently published Pl6 paper He wt'ites Some of the readers of CRYPTOLOG may have missed seeing let alone reading a recent document on the perennial task of program writing debugging maintaining updating etc for operational tasks involving compter processing of data in which alphanumerics playa significant role The paper dated March 1975 is by Mary I 1 16 is entitled A Systematic Approach to Chavacter Stream Scanning by Machine is classified SECRET and bears the official document number 5-211 893 Copies rnay be obtained from I IR oom 3W076 4998s UNCLASSIFIED October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 30 SECR 'f SPOKE P L 86-36 DOCID SI3CRl3tF 4019723 P L 86-36 Vietnamese is an exotic strange-sounding ing us that information the VC did not want language particularly to a Westerner's ears their own units to learn inadvertent Iv how their None of the vowels or consonants sound like any- comrades had fared in battle I thing in English or any of the Romance languages And of course it has those tones As a result training in Vietnamese involves a complete readjustment of the student's learning process starting at base zero This is at best a lengthy procedure As the Vietnam War heated up and more and' more large-sized Vietnamese Communist VC units were committed to combat the air became saturated with low-powered voice transmissions often between individuals at the platoon or squao echelons of the combat force CollectIng this mass of transmissions was a monumental task which could never be totally accommodated Beyond that since most of the voice data was extremely perishable rapid exploitation of the collected signals was critical o Often lives hung in the balance depending upon whether the attack orders could be understood instantly or required extensive processing before being reported To attempt to grapple with this language need the Service Cryptologic Agencies sent thousands of young men through various language schools to teach them Vietnamese And they learned the language -- they learned how to read newspapers order meals in a restaurant count to 100 work with a dictionary on complex written subjects etc There's nothing wrong with that kind of training -- 1 ' m- not maligning it Within the short period of a year training speakers of English to function at all in Vietnamese is a fine accomplishment and these people did function But within the space of their training they could not achieve __ and could not be expected to achieve __ the auditory proficiency needed for on-line --J But this still did not accommodate the pla intext voice problem and it was apparent to all parties that this problem simply could not be successfully accommodated using U S linguistic personnel 1 should note that 1 am spea ing in broad generalities Certain facets of the plain language problem -- notably tactical air -- were within the capabilities of the U S personnel primarily because of the stereotyped nature and limited vocabulary of such transmissions But let me continue with the generali- _ ties Native linguists were the only real solution and were acquired in small numbers with many restrictions on both their physical and cryptologic security This program originally known as the DANCER program and later as the BEES helped fill the breach especially on those signals that could wait for transcription until they reached an area occupied by the DANCERS BEES Such lengthy conversations signals as those passed I Iwere ideal for this program Suffice it to say tha U S lin uists proved able to cony simnle transmissions r il rr-an-d provided combat support on a near real-time ba sis from these sources Native linguists were able to perform the more complex transcription tasks exploitation of low-level tactical conversations thus contributing immeasurably to the overall in a combat situation This special skill - ' k un d ers t an d'Ing an d measurIng o f th e enemy O S d beIng able to thInk In a language h'-- ta es years W 11 In t en t and capa bOl't' 1 1 le5 e never ac h leve an to develop Many people never ac leve It ata 'on-line capability for plaintext tactical voice no matter how long or how hard they t r y ' Tactical Voice Capabil'ity in Future Wars Fortunately for us the VC had a methodical We must assume that in any future wars against approach to warfare and among other things were quite conscious of communications security other nations there will be the same real need Thus except for actual in-combat transmissions for on-line exploitation of tactical voice transmissions One possible means of addressthey were quite precise about what could be ing this need is to take native linguists and passed and how various types of information use them on position If they can relate in could be handled For example although many types of information were routinely on the air English what they have heard so much the betmore sensitive things such as after-action re- ter But at minimum they can write down the essence of the intercept lin their native script ports which included casualties were almost and pass this immediatelyito a U S translator never observed in any traffic that we could exploit presumably because in addition to deny- for necessary processing and delivery to the tactical commander 0 0 October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 31 I EJV M Rlmr GllAmlHe 8NJ Y P L --------_ _ o 86-36 SBCRET DOCID 4019723 o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o I I UPCOMING LECTURES sponsored by the CRYPTO-LINGUISTIC ASSOCIATION MONDAY 17 NOVEMBER 1000 Brigadier Til tman will speak on jh nq ferJtpt FRIDAY 19 DECE MBER 0900 P W Fil by Both leatures will be given in the William F Friedman Memo'l'ial Auditorium THE GWE EKS HAD A GWOUP FOR IT Reminisaenaes of Bletahley Park in the 1940s By the by speaking of Brigadier Tiltman and Bletahley Park next month's issue of w Winterbotham's The Ultra Secret CRYPTO OG will inalude the Brigadier's aritiaal review of F October 75 ' CRYPTOLOG ' Page 32 EO 1 4 c SBC ' 86-36 IJlIr 'BbE 'VIA eellH 'f SHAW EbS eUbY DOCID 4019723 SECRE'f SPOKE AUTOMATION OF A TA PROCESS Tim Murphy 8341 effort to mechanize our analytic findings and create a single processing system In addition to transmitting our analytic findings to fi ld sites we also used this data to create identification dictionaries that became the heart of our match-ident process I What few people realize is that the workload associated with the Southeast Asian SEA problems did not decrease as U S forces withdrew from Vietnam and B3 previously B6 underwent successive personnel reductions In fact the amount of SEA communications intercepted and processed at NSA was still peaking in 1975 when the South Vietnamese Qovernment fell Of equal importance to these contributions was the fact that the methods that the experts used and the approaches that they took to the TA task rubbed off on many of the junior analysts working the SEA problem This group of analysts with outstanding support first from C5 and later from B42 continued this trend toward automation always strivingto I elieve analysts of most of the repetitive mOtaJsu c and to permit more time for actual all a Iys i8 6- 3 6 AlIllmgtheir major contributions were o the creation of a single analytic data base -- the Southeast Asian Case File SEACF Traffic analysts have borne a proportionate share of the decrements incurred by B3 yet there has been virtually no drop in target communications Analysts have been assigned larger case loads and have assumed responsibiIi ty for collection management yet in my view the quality of analysis has improved and the analysts in general are not overworked There is little doubt that technical support to field stations has improved significantly The automation of a large serment of the SEA traffic-analytic processes has been the key not only to high-quality analysis but also to our ability to do the job better over the yeal'S with fewer people Fortunately during the early stages of U S involvement in Vietnam managers with the Traffic Analytic Support Division for the Vietnamese problem took an enlightened view toward mechanization With help from some of the Agency's leading traffic analysts and a cadre of hi hly-qualified datasystems personnel the first steps toward an automated traffic-analytic process were taken _ - - ' __ '----_ I At the same time we began a major In addition the availability of on-line access to our data base in recent years through the COPE terminal has led to many analyst-initiated special programs that have greatly expanded the analysts' capacity for research I should also point out that field stations tasked against SEA targets have also taken many initiatives toward automation SEA Maahiru JData Ba8es P1'oae8se8 and Re80UI'CeS SEACF Perhaps the most significant single step toward reducing the workload of SEA traffic analysts was the creation of the Southeast Asian Case File The SEACF ot only resulted in highly efficient data-base management but also permitted many follow-on processes that greatly reduced the workload of SEA traffic analysts Many of the processes that were introduced during the early stages of the Vietnam War to mechanize the TA process required the establishrnent of data bases to support them As October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 33 SI3URE'f SPOKE DOCID SECRET SPOKJi those processes expanded the number of data bases expanded to the point where analytic time saved was being spenton data-base maintenance A review of thosE' l datapases revealed that there were a lar ge numbeT of common fields of information but eomparativefy few unique Eelds In effect we weremul tiplying pur file-maintenance workload and making ours elves vulnerable to contradictions between identical data items in different data bases The major data bases that had to be maintained prior to theimplementation of SEACF we re The SEACF consolidated all 1 hese data elements into a single data base thus eliminating the requirement to maintain thOSe multiple data bases Since its establish 1lent the SEACF has been expanded to include data elements that support both cryptanalytic and cOllection-management functions As now constituted the SEACF consists oJ eight basic data records which analys ts use to provide permanent maintenance of the communication charactp ristcs and crypt characteristics of a given target identification and location data on that tarQet and also collectionmanaQement data I October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 34 SECRE'F SPOKE DOCID 4019723 SECRE'f SPOKE It was inefficient and time-consuming for analysts to collate all these varied input yet very necessary from an analytic standpoint Hence they were eventually collated by machIne as part of our daily process and our activity data base is now a composite of all primarysource technical inputs This program I'educed by countless hours the task of the SEA development analyst To a large degree the analyst has been able to rely on the machine to isolate ne continuities and then concentrate his or her efforts on identifying that continuity to region or function The number of analysts tasked against the development problem Wps reduced from 45 to 10 between 1972 and the spring of 1975 with no adverse effect on the mission Much of the credit goes to the SEADEV process that has just been described L -_ _ J Another major step in automating both the traffic-analytic and the traffic-forwarding processes was the implementation of IATS The user routine developed for SEA communications co ied on IATS or AG-22 intercept positions -- October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 35 SJ3CRE'f EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 SPOK DOCID 4019723 SEC E't' SPOKE October 7S CRYPTOLOG Page 36 SECRET SPOKE L 1 c 86-3E DOCID 4019723 St3CRE3'f SPO Kt3 EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DORIS MILLER HONORED oris A Miller editor of CRYPTOLOG from itsi inception until her retirement in June 1975 returned to the Agency on 4 August to receive the NSA Cryptologic Literature Award Lt Gen Lew Allen Jr Director NSA Chief CSS presented the award at a ceremony in his office in the presence of a small group of Doris's friends The award is in recognition of the many valuable contributions that Doris made to the cryptologic literature during her distinguished career at NSA UNCLASSIFIED - ifk E oo g NEW PROGRAMMING INSTRUCTIONS I Impact of Automation 'In summary it can be said that the impact of automation on the SEA problem has significantly reduced the number of analysts required to do the job The caliber of analysts required has increased however since his or her primary remaining function is pure analysis or to use another term thinking Many of the crutches that have kept analysts busy over the years e g logging sorting traffic are gone To function effectively SEA analysts must have an understanding of their data bases and of how machines can be used to manipulate the data that they contain Imagination is currently a key asset since much of what can be imagined in terms of analytic approaches is now feasible There is an increased demand for the traffic analyst programmer Knowledge of the SPECOL retrieval language is becoming a highly desirable attribute of the SEA traffic analyst In short the impact of TA mechanization has made B3 like the Marine Corps B3 now needs a few good analysts - oo ZE BACK ISSUES AVAILABLE Copies of most of the back issues of CRYPTOLOG can be obtained from the Editor Room 3C099-l x5642s If you have recently become aware of CRYPTOLOG newly assigned to NSA recently returned from overseas PCS just never noticed CRYPTOLOG before you might like to re d some of the back issues They contaln a lot of good articles UNCLASSIFIED The following item is reprinted from the April May 1975 issue of C-LINERS C Group Machine Processing Info ation Bulletin The STARTING GATE Advanced Programming Language Study Group has been holding regular planning sessions aimed at the development of advanced programming techniques for the forthcoming new System 1776 computer network Some of the proposed new instructions have been noted in the minutes of the sessions written on soggy beer mats and are presented for comments TheStudy Group would welcome any additional instructions which should be sent to the Editor C-LINERS BH lIB TDB DO SRZ PI SSJ FSRA RASC SRSD BST RIRG UER EMF SPSW EIOC EROS PBC CM MLR CRN DMPK DC EPI LCC HCF Branch and Hang Ignore Inquiry and Branch Transfer and Drop Bits Divide and Overflow Subtract and Reset to Zero Punch Invalid Select Stacker and Jam Forms Skip and Run Away Read And Shred Card Seek Record and Scar Disk Backspace and Stretch Tape Read Inter-Record Gap Update and Erase Record Emulate 407 Scramble Program Status Word Execute Invalid Op Code Erase Read-Only Storage Print and Break Chain Circulate Memory Move and Lose Record Convert to Roman Numerals Destroy Memory Protect Key Divide and Conquer Execute Programmer Immediately Load and Clear Core Halt and Catch Fire UNCLASSIFIED October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 37 SECRET 8POK DOCID 4019723 P L SBCRB'f SPOKB EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 86-36 COMPUTERS COMMS and LOW-GRADE CIPHERS l I IB34 October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page SBCRB'f SPOI B 38 - DOCID 4019723 SECREtt SPOKB EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 39 SECKEtt SPOKE DOCID 4019723 BBCBEtt' P L 86-36 in the research techniques necessary to make effective use o fthese sources If the desired information i s not available here at NSA we have well- eS tablished ii ontacts with a wide variety of organizations that can provide assistance The expert in this case is not an expert in widgets or in beekeeping but an expert in finding information There are quite a few of them in the Agency and they're located in Central Information C5 The publication ofl-------Iarticle on the need for an experts yellow pages in the August-September issue of CRYPTOLOG was a disappointment to those of us in Central Inf rma- tion who spend a considerable amount of time providing the type of servicel Ifinds so sadly lacking A survey of recent requests for information yields numerous examples of terminology assistance given to linguists and nonlinguists Are some Agency personnel unaware of our existence and our services It seems unlikely as we had a publicity campaign called INFO '75 just this spring and the April 1975 issue of CRYPTOLOG included a directory of our various components However just in case Central Information C5 maintains an extensive collection of specialized dictionaries reference books journals and documents on a wide variety of topics We have people trained C5 d o e s deal in the svecifics of all the many subjects thatl Jcites On Monday we could have told her as we told another NSA analyst that the SALT GROUP is a group of European allies of the United States who meet informally to discuss how provisions of the SALT Agreements will a ffect them as Europeans We could have told her on Tuesday that Merluaius capensis is the common hake on Wednesday that gold-secured loans come under the Zeist Agreement on Thursday that filament yarns will be reviewed during the second year of the Japan-U S textile agreement and on Friday that the term used in the Law of the Sea negotiations is resources research Anytime we can tell her or any other NSA analyst the same thing that we told a Persian linguist -- that when you have a choice of the words compression concentration condensation or solidification when referring to uranium processing the correct term is concentration it means the extraction of uranium from ore or what we told a Spanish linguist -- that the word blanca when referring to cellulose is translated as bleached rather than white or what we told a foreign-trade analyst -- that the MZ 250 motorcycle is manufactured by the VEB Motorradwerk Zschopau East Germany and the 250 refers to-the engine displacement in cubic centimeters So next time instead of 15 phone calls make just one - - to the Central Reference Service x3258s or consult the Central Information Directory If you haven't saved your back issues of CRYPTOLOG copies of the Directory are avail able at the Circulation Desk Main Library Room 2C051 eMI SECREr lYCCS CRYPTO-MATHEMATICS INST IJUTE --------------------------------------------------- 6 NOVEMBER 0930 Wm F Friedman Auditorium NOVEMBER LECTURE I 1 I I I I DECEMBER LECTURE c _ - c _ - - ' a' c _ - DR WALTER JACOBS Proving Theorems and Answering Questions by Computer -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1 I 4 DECEMBER 0930 Wm F Friedman Auditorium I I I I I G49 wilT speak on a result P L 86-36 from SCAMP 1975 '--_ I I October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 40 SBCRIJ'f UNCLASSIFIED IlMlBhE VI1t EURSIIHI'f EIWUlEh6 StihY DOCID 4019723 TOP SECRET UMBRA ONE CHANCE IN THREE BUT I'TWORKEDI WILLIAM GERHARD Reprinted from DRAGON SEEDS Vol II No 2 June 1973 P L 86-36 ARDF needs no trumpeters in B Group in ASA or inAFSS But important as the ARDF program was to he come experts in 1961 and early 1962 doubted that the first experiment involving direction fI nding and an L-20 aircraft would prove success fJ ll As it turned out there was one chance in three that the experiment which led to the ARDF p ogram in Vietnam would in fact work at all The foUowin excerpts from an interview of D Ch of Staff for R D Hg U A Y Mr ASA s e on the first ARDF birds to fly for the U S in Vietnam on the early improvising by ASA innovators and despite odds against them on their success there and copy what he is saying butwhe-ll I tr y to take a bearing I am trying toEtJa e t c bearing almost straight up and there P l t 'il1 f5 36 no way you are going to do that I Ilof WHY ARDF WAS REQUIRED IN THE FIRST PLACE Q ior to ASA's becoming involved in ARDF development was there any ongoing development of the capability within the Army A The answer is really no There had been of course a lot of development of ADF airborne direction finding systems for navigation purposes which don't operate in the HF range and also the FM homers and other VHF navigation systems Q The question I always had o Why it so difficult for us to do that A There is actually a technical explan ation for why this difficulty occurs the Vietnamese and the VC were using low power radios Now how do I get in HF a low powered radio say a one-watt power to transmit a hundred miles Well the way to do that is to use a horizontal antenna radiate the energy up to the ionosphere then the ionosphere causes it to reflect down on the point you want That means almost no energy is going out directly so you sit over here on the ground with your direction finder even a half mile away and there is no ground wave energy to hear Now an interceptor can listen because the sky wave is coming down from the ionosphere I can sit was It was October November of 1961 when the ur'gent requirement came out of Vietnam because they 3rd RRU members had gone in-country and were trying to use AN PRD-ls and they couldn't The AN PRD-l is a ground loop type DF set and needs a good ground wave signal to work against A cable came back asking us what we suggested or what we could do THE EXPERIMENT Q Was this the Jrd RRU A Our 3rd RRU anduspecifically uuf f--o - - _ I lwasthe proj ect officer for direction finding systems in these days I I and I -- I had the action here through command channels and he had the action there -- had this exchange of messages there were prouably 10 or October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 41 q 'OP SECREq ' UMBRA L 86-36 DOCID 4019723 OP SECRET tTMIUtA 12 messages in that sequence We worried about how to improve the AN TRD-4s which is the larger OF set and what we were going to do with his AN PRO-Is Then we got on to what we could do to solve it That was where the idea of trying the aircraft emerged We thought an aircraft would be useful and he agreed that probably the aircraft would be great In November about Thanksgiving I went over to Vietnam along with an engineer namedl from ECOM U S Army Electronics Command So we went over and spent a month in Vietnam and wandered land the rest of the around withl people involved We went around on PRD-l operations ourselves took receivers and listened making measurem nts of what the propagation conditions were Q When and under what circumstances did ASA first become involved with researah and development of ARDF Was it a result of the 3rd RRV's reaommendation CV's Department of the Army's A You can summarize it by saying that the way we got involved was reacting to the problem -- that we couldn't use AN PRD-ls to do the job and the proposition was could we use airplanes And the answer was Yes we think we can I Q You got together with ECOM on this and went out wit I A Exactly Q When d id you britlfJ Department of the Army into this A we dian't really this whole thing 'was done on a $hoestring There were no external contracts made during this time frame all was done in-house at ECOM There were very few approvals btained because we weren't talking dollar levels that required any approvals Secondly there wasn't a great deal of attention that was attracted in this time frame in the eyes of the Department of the Army The 3rd RRU was calling for a solution but it was to ASA So it was later n that major involvement on the part of DA tOok place Q were the pilots organia to the unit 31'41 RRV A Yes I don't know how they came to be butl I CO 3rd RRU Saigon had acquir d two pilots one a CPTLI-- __ Llw h o later came and worked here and CPT1L J c J They were both Transportation Corps officers and didn't know anything about A5 A until they came in I believe a lot of credit belongs to them for having operated the thing Q Did they 4Qme e r pZiaitly for this pr'ojeat A Yes that was something the 3rd RRU had rranged We weht out the first time feeling We could produce the gadget and I I 1 andledtlw arrangementsfof getting aircraft whichheborrowedt'rom a Signal Unit I believe andthe tw pilots Later we came back with the equipment and put it on P L 86-36 Q The first planes flew in Marah of 1962 A Right Q How muah testing were you doing there A We were running a pretty extensive program In the first place it was a fairly simple system although it performed an elegant solution We had done work earlier with VHF ground direction finder a thing called AN TRD16 which ECOM developed which is composed of a pair of antennas differentially connected That was a very effective ground direction finder in the VHF That was the technology which we applied to the HF but increased the spacing between antennas In terms of hardware you weren't talking a great deal -- a receiver some cables the antennas on the aircraft and a little bit of circuitry to connect them That was the size of it in the first version It was a kind of thing which did not require weeks and weeks of fabrication It did require an awful lot of testing A whole series of antennas were tried tQ get out of the coupling problem with the airframe -- that was going on at Fort Monmouth -- the actual testing When we felt we had something we were able just to use the shops at Monmouth to fabricate antennas cables and other things and rush over and install them ourselves Q Was there any training involved by the pilots and operators A There was a lot of training by the pilot This was very demanding of the pilot because he had no navigation sytem which would tell him where the airplane was at the time he was taking the bearing He had to learn to fly over a point on the ground that he could then identify on his map as he took a bearing The operator who was flying with him with a map had the duty of operating the receiver The operator's task was not too different from the one he had operating the PRD-l or an intercept position He had to find the signal frequency and copy it making sure he was on the right one So that was pretty much what he was used to on the ground except he now was in 'a plane and had all the risks of getting airsick etc But really the pilot was the one who had to do thIS by pointing the aircraft at the target and slueing the tail back and forth reading on his gyrocompass while he was still over ground he could recognize A skilled pilot can do that very well but this is something the average Army aviator isn't trained to do When we installed the thing we worked a couple of days with the pilots there refining it We flew a lot of hours ourselves They caught on very quickly To prove what we had done we had a hidden transmitter hunt The 3rd RRU hid some transmitters around Saigon and they went out and found them If the pilot was careful in finding a bearing even this first system could be incredibly accurate For instance during this hidden trans- October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 42 'fOP 8ESRE'f UM8Rl DOCID 4019723 'fOP SECftE'f UI JIBftA mitter test the system showed which side of a road at a Junctl0n the transmitters were were talking even then about accuracies of hundreds of meters ribly unsymmetrical RF current distribution and we had no way to adjust for that at the time At that time we found ourselves literally Q Why were the -20 aircraft selected for faced with the problem of selecting airplanes We wound up then leaving those two which worked ARDF Where in the United States and when did the initial ARDF testing take place quite poorly and one which worked very well o Aircraft tail #5682 was the good one and #33731 A We found out that this aircraft was and 37963 were the poor ones We came home and fairly available over there It was adequate chose airplanes ECOM sent people -- Walt Day for our purposes because you needed something I believe -- from airfield to airfield finding with good visibility it could carry two or planes which had not been through this major three people and some equipment The L-20 rehab eqiupped two tested them here loaded just happened to be a very nice airplane for them on board an aircraft and flew them out to the purpose The big thing was it was availVietnam to give the 3rd RRU the three it was able over here and could be maintained because the MACV Flight Detachment was who their people after The planes they had which didn't work well went back to where they came from The worked with in the beginning -- the old MAAG 3rd RRU wound up then with three working L-20s Military Assistance Advisory Group Flight Detachment actually The Detachment had L-20s after that ordeal Actually the ECOM lab A C #55151 and #82012 were the ones that were Q Was it the Signal Corps from whom we had sent out We borrowed the early planes A Yes it was the Signal Corps we got the Now I said there was divine intervention It turned out historically that one out of the aircraft from three aircraft worked successfully with this We had the one aircraft at Monmouth from the system on it So the odds were very much in favor that we would have gotten a bad plane in Flight Detachment that we had put the antennas on and it eventually worked out very well That the beginning at Monmouth or that we should have became the basis of the system we took over We gotten a bad plane in the beginning in Vietnam went over with equipment to do three airnlanes Given the suspicion or skepticism about ARDF As I say this went as luggage I went l -- e could have very well stopped had that I ItheECQMproject engineer went a happene4 -- and here very competent people hadsaid itco lldn I t be done anyway There may technician from ECOMbytheIlalTIeofl went and an airplane technician by the name of not havebeensuchathi g as ARDF today It I Ijobuuwas'toIllollnt uthe 7 tousthi g andsQmethingwespecuantennas on the aircraft Walter Day was the electronic technician who was to hel mnd Q Doyouhaveany an CdotesEe7X1 tedto t he----de-ve-'lDpment---- if--ARDF ------ ------ -- P L 8 6- 3 6 me get the system together c Jandl did most of the flying A I think this business of taking it out So we had this airplane which worked well as luggage And the pilots would have been far at Monmouth We went to Vietnam and they had more worried than they were if they had known arranged three airplanes to work with The just who mounted some of these systems because first plane we put it on it worked very well all of us wound up riveting things on airplanes This is the one we did the hidden transmitter I did We almost lost it all in Hawaii when hunt from As soon as that day was over they they misrouted all our luggage We had to go at took it away from us We wanted to test a litthe last minute and dig that out of another Pan tle more but they figured it worked well American aircraft I think the selection of enough so that it went into operation We did aircraft is also significant fly some operational missions with them for a One of the things we took some technical while to make sure things were working We worked on the other two L-20's but neither one satisfaction in was a little event out there of those aircraft worked We installed the sys- when we were flying the first one What we would do was to fly to Bien Hoa where we had a tems and sweated blood for several weeks and finally just had to plain give up We couldn't DF site and the flash transmitter which controlled make the systems work on these two planes The our DF nets in Saigon So we would fly over our DF site at Bien Hoa and shoot that flash transreason for it had to do with the way the aircraft themselves are constructed We apparently mitter taking a bearing on it because that was had some type of unsymmetrical airframe current one of the check bearings they used that was supposedly quite accurate We worked a couple distribution As long as that is symmetrical and you can maintain a decoupling from it your of days because there were a couple of degrees error and finally in disgust went back and resystem will work But some of the L-20s had been through extensive rehab The inboard ends computed the check bearing and found out it had of the wings had been painted more coats on the been calculated wrong and that the aircraft had one than the other and things like this When been correct all this time they had been put back together you had a ter- I iiliiB o ---------- October 75 CRYPTOLOG Page 43 'fOP SECREI' UMBRA This document is from the holdings of The National Security Archive Suite 701 Gelman Library The George Washington University 2130 H Street NW Washington D C 20037 Phone 202 994-7000 Fax 202 994-7005 nsarchiv@gwu edu