DOq ID 400 717J UJaJUUlDUJaJl1 $ BlDrnUU aJ $UJ B um u l m l l W JlD v W J lbWWlIl P L 86-36 EO 1 4 o c J BASIC PATTERNS 6F ICODES AND CIPHERS o ooo b l GLOSSARIES VERSUS DICTIONARIES ooo oo ooo o oooo Jacob Gurin ooo oo o o 5 THE DEVIL'S DICTIONARy oo o o C W B B L Z B oo 6 REPLACEMENT OF THE GUPPY LIBRARy o oo ooo oo o J 7 THE GULF OF TONKIN INCIDENT o o l 8 OPPORTUNITIES o o o o 10 GUIDE TO RUSSIAN TECHNICAL TRANSLATION Review 11 THE ROLE OF THE STATE DEPARTMENT INTERPRETER o 13 GOLDEN OLDIES THE MOLECULE SUPERSERIES 18 CAN YOU MAKE OUT THE NAME Puzzle 18 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 19 CAMINO NEWS 21 L 86-36 1o '1 I I 'fIllS BOEURHMI3N'f EURON'fAINS EUROBI3WORB MA'fI3RIl l I I I ' o o o o o ela i ed b BIRNSl NS l I1lI3 a Hxempt om SBS 139 1 59 Sekiu' I Beelilt l8if I p6B NotilieatioB b P the 9ritiuator Declassified and Approved for Release by NSA on '10-'1 '1- 20'1 2 pursuant to E O '135 26 vl DR Case # 54778 DOCID 4009717 Published MontHly by PI Techniques and Standards for the Personnel of Operations FEBRUARY-MARCH 1975 VOL II Nos 2 and 3 PUBLISHER WILLIAM LUTWINIAK BOARD OF EDITORS Editor in Chief o Doris Miller 56425 Collection o 1 Cryptanalysis 1 f3571SJ P L f8015ij Language o o o o Emery W Tetrault 52365 Machine Support Special Research 1 3215 1 Vera R Filby 71195 For individual subscriptions send name and organizational designator to CRYPTOLOG PI 86-36 DOCID 4009717 TOP SECRET UMBRA EOL4 c P L 86 36 BASIC PATrrERNS OFI ---_ _lcODES AND CIPHERS Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 1 fOP SECRET UMBRA I PI L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 TOP SECRET UMBRA Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 2 'fOP SECRET UMBRA DOCID 4009717 fOP SECRET UMBRA Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 3 'F9P SECRET UMBRA EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 ff8P SE6RE'f H lBAA FIRST LOSSES T who lUt6 both Language EcUtOJLand Oft ha 6 moved on to new d utie o WilUam Jae on the TA EcUtoft t e tbc ed nftom the Agene y -Ut Vee emb eJt OWl thank-6 to bothMJr theJA paJd6 -in Mealing CRYPTOLOG alJdmalUng U we hope a 6Jt-i endly v UOJLto yOWl dell o IS EEURRET lfb'EUREURe J P L 86-36 Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 4 TOP CR T UMBRA ----------- DOCID 4009717 -------- - - - -- ------- - llNCLASSIFIED @ 1 C D @W$UD EXICOGRAPHlf DICTIONARIES WH' C f bvJACOB CURIN PIG ULD I i ack in 1952 when the Language Research Branch was being set up in the Office of Training we debated the ways we could provide materials of real value to linguists in the Production Organization and the School Our objective as we had explained it to General Ralph Canine then Director of NSA was to produce training and reference works which would be needed if the Agency were required to jump quickly into the processing of a relatively unfamiliar language Our experiences with Korean had demonstrated how disastrously unprepared we could be I - There is of course one outstanding exception to this When we approach a language for which lexical aids are either nonexistent or so rudimentary as to be worthless and where little is known about the culture background of the language compilation of a basic dictionary becomes a necessity Experience has shown that in these circumstances the crypto-linguist has no choice but to cull whatever information he can from whatever sources are available to him to put together a general lexical treatment of the language How about taking time out from production duties to compile glossaries This they should We described a variety of possible publications in each language readers handbooks do Perhaps a brief historical look at the decourses and glossaries We agreed from the velopment of dictionaries and glossaries will start that our lexicographical activities would help put the problem and the distinction in be limited to glossaries--dictionaries were out focus I suppose that we made a simple distinction beThe Glossary came first and it had a simtween the two glossaries were limited both in ple origin As the Glossarium it was originally subject-matter coverage and in the extent of treatment of any entry Dictionaries suffered a collection of glosses that is to say it consisted of a list of difficult Latin words with no such restriction either simpler Latin versions or equivalent Presumably these NSA glossaries would be words in the vernacular These words were exdesigned to contain the kinds of words one could tracted from Latin manuscripts together with expect to run into in traffic military terms the explanatory words glossae which had been diplomatic expressions communications etc entered by monkish scholars Yet somehow NSA now finds itself sponsoring the Another prime lexical source was the Vocapublication of suspiciously large and detailed I bulary or Vocabularium In the time-honored lexicographical works which admit frankly to way Latin was taught by providing instruction being dictionaries in grammar and drill in vocabulary Lists of No one should undertake the compilation of 'words vocables were committed to memory and a dictionary without realizing that an enormous these lists with their meaning in the local investment of time and effort--perhaps an imlanguage made up the vocabulary possible amount of each--is involved Joseph W Glossaries and Vocabularies still in manuScaliger a lexicographer of the late 16th century said that the worst criminals should nei- script list form were often combined since ther be executed nor sentenced to forced labor their functions were so similar Eventually it became apparent that their usefulness would be but should be condemned to compile dictionaries because all imaginable tortures are involved in increased if they were arranged alphabetically At first this meant the lumping together of all such work And in more recent times Henry A words beginning with A then a similar mishmash Gleason author of An Introduction to Descriptive Linguistics states Dictionary making is under B etc Later someone improved on this by sorting on the first two letters only It tedious in the extreme It is exacting It is took a long time for the idea of the full sort an incredibly large job to take hold Should NSA linguists be taken off their About the middle of the--15th century the job of producing reports and translations to get involved in the tedious time-consuming job first strictly Latin-English dictionary appeared of producing large full-scale dictionaries I 'called Medulla Grammatices The Marrow of Gramdon't think they should I mar and in the 16th century the Dictionary of Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 5 UNCLASSIFIED DOCID 4009717 F CLASSIFIED Sir Thomas Elyot Knight was the first to use the term dictionary in this way In medieval Latin the word dictionarium literally a collection of dicta sayings gradually took on the same functions as the word vocabularium And it was this word dictionary which took the place of so many others such as Medulla Grammatices Ortus Vocabulorum Garden of Words Promptorium Parvulorum Children's Storehouse Catholicon Anglicum EnglisJi Universal Treatise Manipulus Vocahulorurn Handful of Vocables Alvearie Beehive Abecedarium Bibliotheca Library Thesaurus Treasury World of Words Table Alphabetical English Expositor Ductor in Linguas Guide to the Tongues Glossographia Etymologicum etc Most of those names although colorful are self-explanatory John Baret who chose An Alvearie for the title of his 1573 work referred to his pupils as diligent Bees gathering their wax and Hony into their Hive He explained that his students perceived how much trouble it was to come running to mee for every word they missed I appoynted them every day to write English before ye Latin and likewise to gather a number of fine phrases out of Cicero Terence Caesar Livie etc and to set them under several tytles for the more ready finding them againe at their neede Their experience shows that the need for d eveloping adequate lexical aids based on terms actually encountered with appropriate meanings for those occurrences was as great 400 years ago as it is today The principal stimulus to the development of dictionaries in the modern sense was the need to explain the hard words in one's own language Accordingly Robert Cawdrey in ro04 described his dictionary as A Table Alphabeticall conteyning and teaching the true wri ting and understanding of hard usuall English wordes with the interpretation thereof by plaine Engl ish wordes gath red for the benefit and helpe of Ladies Gentlewomen or any other unskillful person By contrast glossaries are still being published for Latin for Anglo-Saxon for dialects of various languages ancient and modern NSA is in a position to continue the old tradition by concentrating on glossaries since our main concern is to provide clues to the meaning of difficult words in certain special forms of a foreign language whether written or spoken without any pretense of encompasing the entire range of the language with all the literary and historical complexities of such an undertaking UNCLASSIFIED Administrative paperwork the phusical representation of mental constipation Certification an imaginary ine between two states of one's ineptitude separating the imaginary abilities of one from the imaginary abilities of the other Collection system a multimillion-dollar Bustem for transforming electricity in the air to paper at Fort Holabird Cryptanalyst one upon whom NSA sets its hopes during flaps and its dogs at other times File a plaae where dead cryptosystems are laid to rest to CT1J ait the coming of a CiA intern Mathematician an unprincipled rogue who twists relationships in order to distort common sense into uncommon sense for example Clearance Need to Know Aacess becomes Access - Clearance Need to Know 01' Aacess - Need to Know Clearance Multiprocessor a computer which fails to do several jobs at the same time Optimisim the doctrine 01' belief that management knows what it is doing Preventive maintenance that which occupies the portion of the prime shift when the computer is working Regular maintenanae of course occupies the remaining time Push one of the two things mainly conducive to success especially at NSA The other is puZZ Reclama in government to put the dice back into the box for another throw Reorganization the admission of failure with a promise of improvement by the folly of managerial change Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 6 U CLASSIFIED -- -----_ _------ DOCID 4009717 EONI'IDEN'f'IAL Replacement of the GUPPY Librar I Recently the PI Diaqnostlc Working r roup was formed to recommend a replacement system for the GUPPIES on RYE This group Is directed by Dr Donald E McCown other members represent the Offices of A B C E G and P Expectlnq a RYE phase-out In the next few years the major consideratIons of the Diagnostic Worklnq Group are being centered around the diagnostic and exploitation functions of the GUPPIES Discussions are belnq held on the need to reproduce certain routines In another language and on another computer como lex Backup material for such an attempt must come from experienced programmers and cryptanalysts and from the existinq RYE GUppy Library The RYE GUPPY Library occupies a metal fi Ie cabinet In G4 3AI I I This collection of some one hundred proqrams In 494 assembly language has been placed In folders in alphabetical order and covers the date periods from 1965 throuqh the present New 494 proqrams which are CA-related are added to the collection Manv of the older and verv useful proqrams are maintained In this file often the only copy of a proqram may be found here The oriolnal decks of many of the r PPY programs have been misplaced transported to other areas outsIde RYE or have been lost In organizational maneuvers The fl Ie reflects the expertise of Marjorie Mountjoy and Carolyn Palmer who were Instrumental In develorlng algorithms style strip arithmetic and parameter set-up Also reflected In the fi Ie Is the work of other CA programmers who have contributed a great amount of effort to the GUPPIES The Importance of the Library In 3AIII Is obvIous In the event of a RYE phase-out the records in the GUPPY Library wi I I serve as a guide to rewriting those programs which deal with diagnosis and exploitation Perhaps the codlno In assembly language wi I I be difficult to fol low but the existIng flowcharts for the more como lex programs can be read easily The rewriting of the diagnostic and exploitation GUPPIES for a RYE replacement cannot serve cryptanalysts as wei I as RYE unless the new machinery affords simi lar outstation Input output capabi Iitles A portion of the GUPPY Library Includes Special Purpose programs which account for timely decryption and processing of several cryptosystems These routines while performing decryotlon usually wI II call one or more of the TREES programs to reference a Meanings File usually a foreign language Fl Ie update or other FI Ie processinq Whi Ie not as numerous as the real GUPPIES the Special Purpose catenory mav be just as Important to crvptanalytlc effort If not more so The GUPPY Library serves other purposes In addition to housing a collection of source listings To find a fal IIn point in a program a bad load or the limits of a parameter a listing of the assembly language and an octal dump are an absolute necessity To chap or make a correction In a orogram is Impossible without the actual assembly containing Its octal locations and machine language codlnq Clever and concise coding Is often studied by other analysts and programmers as an aid to their own work The maintenance of the GUPPY FIle has to some extent restraIned duplicate programmlno and rediscoverIng the wheel CA-260 covers many areas of the 494 LIbrary The diagnostic and decryotlon effort of NSA has leaned heavily on this Library for years A replacement of the GUPPY Library once the programming language and the machine have been chosen wi II require the same maintenance as the present Library Continuity and control are just as Important here as In any other technical operation To continue programming support for cryptanalytic groups the DiagnostIc and Exploitation Working Group must be Informed at least a year prior to RYE phase-out as to the new computer s and lanquaoe for proqram rewrltlnq No other aoproach for Special Purpose and UPPY olannlng appears practical Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 7 P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 TOP SECRET UMBRA THE GULF OF TONKIN INCIDENT Walter D Abbot Jr Bll In late 1961--early 1962 a series of U S Navy patrols off the east coast of Communist China was proposed The purpose of these patrols was to be three-fold In the first place they would establish and maintain the presence of the U S Seventh Fleet in the international waters off the China coast second they would serve as a minor Cold War irritant to the Chicoms and third they would collect as much intelligence as possible concerning Chicom electronic and naval activity The initial phasing called for one U S destroyer to conduct each mission There would be three installed positions on each mission two radiot lephone and one manual Morse and these positions were to serve a dual role-provide direct SIGINT support to the defense of the ship and serve as intelligence collection facilities for as many different sources and categories of emission as could be obtained These patrols were given the cover name DESOTO From 14 to 20 April 1962 the first DESOTO patrol was conducted with the destroyer USS -DE HAVEN as the participating vessel The area of responsibility encompassed by the mission focused around the Tsingtao area of the Yellow Sea and the ship was instructed not to approach any Chicom-held territory including the offshore islands closer than 10 miles Major intelligence targets for this mission fell into five categories Chicom naval units particularly submarines ELINT of Chicom electrical installations Chicom air activity hydrographic and weather information and merchant shipping particularly Chicom in the area This first DESOTO patrol was singularly effective in evoking Chicom reaction Such things as shadowing of the DE HAVEN by three or more Chicom vessels at one time jamming of the DE HAVEN communications facilities and the use of deceptive pennant numbers on the shadowing vessels all contributed to the success of the intelligence effort on this mission In addition the Chicoms issued three serious warnings to the DE HAVEN for violation of territorial rights during the 7 days the mission was in progress of the patrol vessels was noted and serious warnings were issued to almost all the patrols by the Chinese Government but unique information was virtually nil In December 1962 with DESOTO patrol number IX the USS AGERHOLM conducted the first probe into South China waters and the Gulf of Tonkin around Hainan Island This pattern was repeated in April 1963 when the USS EDWARDS traversed the same path around Hainan Island and then extended its mission down the coast of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam DRV No DRV reflections were recorded at this time and Chicom reaction was again limited to shadowing and issuance of serious warnings Since serious warnings were not reserved for DESOTO missions at that time the U S had received over 350 of these warnings for both air and sea violations no particular significance could be attached to them The first DRV reaction to a DESOTO patrol came in late February--early March 1964 on the third venture into the Gulf of Tonkin this time by the USS CRAIG DRV radar stations performed extensive tracking of the CRAIG on herfirst run up the coast and DRV naval communications referred to the CRAIG by hull number on one occasion Although intelligence collected from this mission was not voluminous it did contribute new insight into the placement and capability of DRV tracking stations and equipment 7 H ' I CHI Lang So V f Z -N M - ' c hanh- J Hoa I Muong Sen ' ' - i 1-1 'e ' ' '9f e j 1in ' ' o- For the remainder of 1962 eight more DESOTO patrols were run and prior to Decel ber of that year these patrols were all conducted in the East and North China areas as well as up gn ' the Korean coast to the Soviet Gulf of Tartary J After the first mission intelligence derived from the patrols was quite sparse Shadowing Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 8 TOP SECRET UMBRA DOng ' Hoi Demaree_ion line N A DOCID 4009717 'fO SECRET UMBRA Prelude to Violence The fourth DESOTO patrol into the international waters of the Gulf of Tonkin was programmed in July 1964 Concerned more with the Vietnamese problem than the Chicom problem of its predecessors this mission was to observe the junk fleet vessels believed to be a constant source of resupply to the guerrillas in the south obtain navigational and hydrographic information and procure any available intelligence on the DRV navy Since the 1954 Geneva agreements specifically prohibited the DRV from establishing a navy the emergence of this force had been until late 1963--early 1964 extremely covert During late 1957 the first DRV naval communications facilities were isolated with an estimated 30 ships involved in the transmissions Then in 1959 the first evidence of the emergence of a modern DRV navy was noted during a probable joint DRV Chicom naval exercise in the Pearl River estuary Some of the vessels involved in this exercise were believed to be the same 10 motor gunboats later noted passing through the Hainan Strait and probably represented the DRV' s initial acquisition of modern naval craft Augmentation of this force was continual after 1959 and as of late 1964 the DRV navy had a total complement of nearly 100 vessels Armed with this background and clear on the purpose of the mission the USS MADDOX reached a point on the 17th parallel about 12 miles off the coast of the DRV on 31 July 1964 at 1300 hours local time From that point the MADDOX turned northward on a tack that was to take her up the coast for three days in what was believed to be another routine running of a DESOTO patrol was going on a course of 52 degrees 9 nautical miles from Hon Me Shortly after placement of the MADDOX near Hon Me Island by DRV tracking authorities a message was passed to an unidentified DRV i fi2hting vessel stating that it had been decided to fight the enemy tonight The MADDOX was apprised accordingly in a warning which preceded the actual attack by more than 12 hours DRV naval tracking stations were observed in continual surveillance from that time on In addition everal messages were intercepted apparently pre-positioning warships in preparation for the attack Between approximately 1130 and 1215 Saigon local time on 2 August the MADDOX reported sighting three PT' s and two probable SWATOWclass PGM's motor gunboats about 10 miles north of Hon Me Island During the same time frame the MADDOX reached the northernmost point of its mission and observed a large junk fleet approximately 75 craft which it intended to avoid on its return route There were no military ships intermingled with the junks and there was still no apparent hostility It is not possible to ascertain exactly which element of the DRV naval command ordered the attack but shortly after the MADDOX reached the apex of its mission a message was passed stating that it was time to close with the enemy and use torpedoes The MADDOX received this information some 50 minutes before the aggressive actions commenced At 1530 some 30 miles from shore the MADDOX altered her course to the southeast heading for the mouth of the Tonkin Gulf and increased her speed to 25 knots attempting to avoid the three DRV torpedo boats reflected on Confrontation radar as closing at about 50 knots within 20 Apparently the MADDOX was not the only miles of the DESOTO ship At that time the vessel active off the North Vietnamese coast on 'MADDOX requested air support and posted all the night of 31 July DRV naval communications hands at their battle stations reflected that on that date the enemy had By 1600 the DRV boats were within 5 miles fired upon the island of Hon Me and had been of the MADDOX still traveling at about 50 pursued by DRV warships to no avail The MADknots and had moved into column formation an DOX reported sighting vessels being pursued by accepted procedure for torpedo assault The DRV patrol craft but had made no attempt to MADDOX fired three warning rounds across the 'investi1tate the action bow of the lead ship but for naught and at Whether or not an association between the 7 minutes past the hour the MADDOX reported above-mentioned attack and the presence of the that she was under attack MADDOX was drawn by the DRV is impossible to The PT boats broke into two formations as say They did protest to the International Control Commission that American imperialists hey closed on theste of the MADDOX with two of them approaching from the right side and had shelled their fortifications but that was one from the left At a range of 2700 yards a constant complaint of the DRV and could not the two PT' s on the right each launched one be directly attributed to the presence of the torpedo The MADDOX then turned to the left MADDOX However as the MADDOX resumed the to void the torpedoes keeping the attacking prescribed patrol route on 1 August a route craft under fire and scored a direct hit on which required her to pass Hon Me Island DRV the PT approaching from the left just as that naval authorities reflected their awareness of the MADDOX when they mentioned that the enemy craft placed a torpedo in the water The torFeb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 9 mp 8EGRET UMBRA DOCID 4009717 'FOP SECRE'F UMBRA pedo did not run Air support from the TICONDEROGA arrived at that point and engaged the attacking vessels and the MADDOX withdrew from the area Total damage one DRV PT boat dead and burning in the water extensive but not totally disabling damage to the other two PT' s and slight damage to one gun on the MADDOX In order to assert the right of the U S to freedom on the seas it was decided that the DESOTO patrol should be resumed as soon as possible The strength of the patrol was doubled with the USS TIJRNER JOY joining the MADDOX for a proposed four-day continuation of the mission a formal warning was issued to the DRV authorities in Hanoi stating that any further such unprovoked actions would result in severe retribution and at 0900 on 3 August the DESOTO mission was resumed For this phase continuous combat air support was provided During the day of the 3rd the MADDOX reported that both she and the TURNER JOY had picked up radar signals and believed they both were being shadowed This same suspect shadow activity occurrred during the daylight hours on 4 August but there were no provocations Then the DRV naval communications facilities were observed alerting two SWATOW-class PGM's to make ready for military operations on the night of the 4th The DESOTO units were advised of the possible attack and headed for the mouth of the Gulf at best speed The MADDOX reported several radar sightings of apparent hostile craft throughout the early evening hours of 4 August Some of these sightings later broke away but some of them continued to close At about 2200 the MADDOX reported firing on an attacking PT boat which had presumably launched a torpedo Three more probable PT' s were tracked closing rapidly on the DESOTO ships and continual torpedo attack was reported through 0035 on 5 August During the attack period the two DESOTO vessels engaged several radar contacts and the TURNER JOY reported that one vessel was probably sunk It was also reported that a DRV PT boat may have sunk one of its own companions in the conflict The weather throughout the attack was overcast and cloudy thus impairing the visibility of the support air fighters and making it impossible for them to sight the assailants The DESOTO patrol initially reported that at least 21 torpedoes were launched during the battle This figure was viewed as highly unlikely since the PT' s carried only two torpedoes each with no known on-sea reload capability and the total DRV PT force was estimated at around 13 three of which had been damaged in the fighting of the 2nd The figure was later amended when it was determined that the sonar operators may have seen their own propeller beats reflecting off the rudders during the zigzagging evasive action followed by the two DESOTO ships In retaliation for this second hostile action JCS ordered CINCPAC to conduct a onetime maximum effort air strike against selected DRV targets to include several ports known to house SWATow-class PGM's and PT' s as well as a priority one hit on the Vinh oil storage area This strike commenced on 5 August at 0700 and resulted in an estimated 90% destruction of the Vinh oil storage area plus total or partial destruction of approximately 29 DRV naval vessels The U S lost two aircraft in the 64 sorties that were flown and suffered severe damage to a third In addition one U S pilot was killed and another was captured The MADDOX and the TURNER JOY resumed the DESOTO mission of 6 August without further incident and the rest is just painful history At the time of the GuZf of Tonkin incident the author then in the Army was on his way home from USM-9 CZarok Ail' Force Base PhiZZipines to NSA Where he became the reporter for the North Vietnamese Branch B261 It was in connection with one of the post mortems on the incident that he gathered together the information presented in this story Tefl SEeRf'f MfIIBRlIt opportunities A RYE program PUNCH converts punched information on cards to Field Data on paper tape The resulting tape can be used as input to other programs For parameters or program descriptions call J D Tankersley on 3l09s Copies of the Guide to Russian Technical Translation reviewed on pp 11 and 12 may be obtained by calling Mr Salemme on ext 5642 or 5236 or by sending a request to him care of P16 The course in codebook recon s truction CA301 to be taught by IL - -' - '-- - - ----- ----J is schedUled to begin 24 March Those interested should contact las soon as possible on ext 3045s since class capacity is limited and in addition it is hoped to tailor the class to the extent possible to meet the needs of the students Programmers welcomel I A cluster of radio stations is sometimes called a complex A psychological fixation is likewise a complex Thus a traffic analyst who insists on calling his targets a complex can be said to have a complex complex But complex also means complicated So if the analyst's problem is complicated by other factors as well he has a complex complex complex Would you like a job on one of the SIGINT terminology panels Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 10 TOP 8ECRE'F UMBRA P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 1' Cl ASSIFIED __________1 reviews ARTHUR SALEMME'S GUIDE TO RUSSIAN TECHNICAL TRANSLATION I t I J Colleagues and friends of Arthur Salemme have been well aware that for several years now he has had squirreled away in his desk drawer two fat sheaves of typescript the draft of a manual for Russian translators Those who had had the opportunity to read even a part of the draft had been impressed and had urged Arthur to publish but as so often happens the more immediate concerns--the short-fuse project the current flap--continually claimed priority and publication had come to seem at best a remote probability Some of us it now appears have been unduly pessimistic The Guide to ussi n Technical Translation is at long last In prInt The idea for such a project grew naturally out of his years of free-lance technical trans- I latlng as well as out of his experience as an gen y 1inguist and a teacher and supervisor of I' Ingulsts The work as published is entirely unclassified but do not for a moment think that it is not relevant to the work we do The published version bears out my impression gained from a reading of the manuscript years ago that the Guide will come to have a place on every Russian translator's desk--whether that desk is here at work or in his den at home--and will be especially effective in helping those new to technical translation to avoid pitfalls and acquire competence far more rapidly It is the special virtue of the Guide that it will be read with interest and studied with prof t by all Russian linguists it is certainly not Just a book for translators It will be valuable to editors and others who must deal with the linguist's product even i f their know-I ledge of Russian is not great Translators and linguists workivg in languages other than Rus- s an will I eel sure find much that is per i tInent and stImulating in the book ' That the Guide has a broader application and appeal than its tit e would suggest is due it seems to me to the felicitous match of form and content that the writer has achieved No ' one who has read Art's recent article Prolegomena to a System of Sandwich Notation will be surprised to find that the Guide is not an overly organized structured work and indeed at first glance it appears to be simply a Russian-English glossary and a rather skimpy one at that with just 241 entries headwords However the body of the Guide 164 pages long is followed by 24 pages of index from which it is immediately apparent that the work actually contains about ten times as many Russian terms as it does entries From the very first page it is also clear that the 241 entries differ widely in content Some 13 APMATYPA 204 cnECAPb are more or less straightforward lexical entries but more fully elaborated than in the typical Russian-English dictionary elucidating meanings and suggesting appropriate translations and treatments Old-timers will find themselves nodding vigorously as frequently abused and mishandled terms are given corrective treatment One of my own favorites is 15 BAnJI the correct treatment of which hardly ever finds its way into our linguists' work without considerable prompting Other entries 127 HAHl13blBAHl1E OAAElKEYI Stringing Together of Cases 169 OOPHAOK CJIOB B OEPEBOAE Word Order in Translation deal with syntactical and structural equivalence and conversions Such entries are in effect concise essays in contrastive grammar presenting general principles and concepts that the reader will find especially helpful in handling many recurring situations in technical translation These principles will of course very often apply to other types of translation as well A third type of entry offers advice and guidance on style Some of these are simply straightforward nuts-and-bolts stuff for example entry l78 0P00I1CHbIE BYKBbl which reminds the translator of the difference between capitalization in Russian and English or entry 17 BI1BJII10rp'A lII1H which deals with the preferred treatment of bibliographies and footnote entries in translation Entry 207 COKPALUEHI1H gives sound guidance on the treatment of abbreviations Entries such as 74 I1METb and 75 I1METb MECTO are pure style-manual material and are a boon to the translator who is trying to write plain English instead of translationese Entry 189 PEAAK l110HHAH PABOTA B OEPEBOi'J E' is quintessential Salemme presenting the author's approach--the result of his many years of translating--to what is certainly one of the trickiest problems the translator must face How much should a translator edit as he translates There is scarcely an entry that does not bear the Salemme stamp--witty humorous asides which though they are asides are nevertheless to the point intriguing word play lengthy parentheses poking good-natured fun at translators' faux pas including the author's own and more Throughout his treatment of every question is practical down-to-earth and Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 11 UNCl ASSIFIED P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 UNCLASSIFIED leavened with wit and gentle never malicious irony Like Fowler's The King's English it can be picked up in an odd moment opened at random and read for any length of time with profit and amusement These qualities should make the guide accessible and acceptable to the greatest number of our working linguists To illustrate a few of these qualities I reporoduce here three of the Guide's briefer entries in toto 19 oJIArO L APH - Russian purists dwell in great detail on the difference between the gerund 6ilal'0 1apll Has in oJIal'o 1apli el'O Thanking him and the preposition 6ilal'0 1apli as in oJIal'o 1apli OTllY 1I II cecTpbl 3HaeM PpaHllY3CKllli HeMellKllli II aHI'JIlllicKllli 1I3bJKII Thanks to my father my sisters and I know French German and English They condemn the frequent occurrence of the genitive case after the preposition 6JIal'0 1apli just as they condemn the occurrence of the genitive case after COI'JIaCHO according to But they particularly condemn the use of 6JIal'0 1apli in such illogical constructio Thanks to the ice I slipped and fractured my leg n e lel ' th an ks for gelling ' Iegs bro ken say t h ' don ' tgive e pUrIsts When such illogical constructions do occur in Russian text it is often best to translate 6JIal'0 1apli as as a result of so as to avoid an argument with English purists 1 on the other hand one an argument with English purists he can always translate 6ilar0 1apli in such sentences as due to 139 OtJ HAKO - Just as the music lover lulled by the opening strains oC the second movement oC Haydn's Surprise Symphony pleasurably anticipates the chord that is supposed to shock him out oC that lulled state the translator of Russian criticism soon acquires a fond affection Cor the O 1HaKO Lulled by the leitmotifs oC nOJIOlKlITeJIbHble tlepTbI and nOile3HbJe 1aHHble he knows that sooner or later a paragraph will begin with the complacency-shattering O 1HaKO to be Collowed by the contrapuntal interweavings oC the He 10CTaTKII and the HeCMOTpli Ha TQ'S still more there is a completely different type of expert who says that gravy should never be put on anything but meat but let's not go into thaI The Guide contains a number of reference features that would in themselves be sufficient reason to keep a copy on one's desk First there is the table of false friends in which the Russian word false friend and its correct translation are paired with the word's deceptive cognate and the cognate's proper Russian equivalent Then there are transliteration tables including tables for converting Chinese and Japanese proper names encountered in Russian texts into the acceptable transcriptions in English Extensive tables summarize many of the correspondences in technical terminology between Russian Engl ish non-technical and English technical derived from Greek and Latin numerica prefixes The differen s stems of enumeratIon of arge numbers a mlll10n nd up are contrasted In another table accompanIed by a disclussion of the problems faced by the trans a tor In the face of the tremendous effort put forth by the author and hisefficientV'aritypist may seem like petty carping o my part t won er what happened to the punch l1ne of the Joke In the second paragraph of entry 184 PA3 Perhaps this is the author's way of finding out who's really reading his work I lit In his introduction the author solicits comments and suggestions from the reader which could be taken into consideration in the event of an expanded re-edition of this work I have already begun my list of items and I hope that others will also take him at his word While it is true that the Agency does not do technical translation in the sense that Joint Publications Research Service for in stance does essentially similar technical Much as he admires the classic Corm however he linguistic work goes on here all the time and should remember that English has its own Corms According while it is also true that the author of the to one oC them the howevers moreovers nevertheGuide has done a great deal of free-lance conlesses and the like should not start the sentence like tract technical translating the fact remains cymbal clashes but should be reduced to the value of grace that he has spent his entire professional life notes and incorporated into the main melody oC the sentence at the Agency Now by judicious writing and Much perhaps as was done with the however that could by I'm sure some painful editing the author has been able to purge his book of anything easily have begun this paragraph classified and thus make it available to the 168 nOPHtJ OK - Russian stylists object to the exgreatest number of readers As applicable as cessi ve use of nopll 1Ka oC the order of a valid maththe Guide is and it is almost totally so our work does present unique features and problems ematical term in contexts where npll6JIII311TeilbHo not treated in this edition As ungracious as approximately or some similar word would do just as it may seem to ask more of one who has already well given so much of his experience I would still English sty lists do not usually object to constructions appeal to Arthur Salemme to relent and start such as a speed oC the order oC 200 miles an hour What work on a classified version or supplement they do object to is changing of the order oC to on the Come on now Art Shu-ucks you'd enjoy it order of They say that on the order oC should be reserved for such constructions as May I have some gravy on UNCLASSIFIED the order oC mashed potatoes To complicate the matter Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 12 UNCLASSIFIED P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 UNCLASSIFIED i FRITNFUL P L I I Be low is the text tr lnsccibedanddondensed by lof a speech presented before CLA on l2 March 1974 by Sophia Porson of the State Department Although live interrpretation tion of anywhere from one sentence to 45 minutes or more and the interpreter stands by takes is seldom required of NSA employees there is notes and once the person has completed his still much of interest here for Agency readers presentation then stands up and says the whole thing over again in the foreign language If I can't tell you how much of a privilege it you've followed the debates at the U N you've often heard them say at the end I waive conis for me as an interpreter who has had to insecutive interpretation TheY'1ave interpreters terpret I-don't-know-how-many speeches in my career to finally get up and deliver one of my who sit in a sort of ring in the middle at the Security Council and who take notes and are very own prepared to do just that when a person finishes When I sat down to draw up a few notes for making a presentation However over the years this talk the first thing that came to my mind this has become a sort of vestigial thing They was that I would not tell a joke to start with don't use it too much any more Though every This is something that every interpreter dreads once in a while somebody forgets at the end of and it is particularly characteristic of American his presentation to say I waive consecutive inspeakers I think we must all learn it in public terpretation and all of a sudden the interpreter speaking class the first thing you have to do gets up and starts interpreting madly and everyis get up and tell a joke Whether it has any body wonders what happened bearing on what follows is immaterial the idea Well the State Department has never waived is that you have to have a grabber as they consecutive interpretation We use it an enorcall it to get everybody's attention and get mous amount in diplomatic negotiations for the everybody in a good mood But as you must appreciate humor does not translate well And simple reason that because it follows the preparticularly when it's in a very serious say sentation in English or the presentation in the a diplomatic conference and the American speaker foreign language it enables the other side to gets up and tells a joke this often falls just check on what you're doing it enables your side to check on what you're doing and it gives And of course the American immediately turns to where the interpreter is in the glass everybody time to think When you're in a negobooth at the back and gives him a filthy look tiating situation you want to gain as much time Laughter So I said to myself No jokes as possible You don't want to rush into anything And all the time the interpreting is goI thought I'd tell you a bit about the type ing on the speaker is able to think what he is of interpreting we do I'm sure you've all seen going to say next So this type of interpretasimultaneous interpreting on television partition is the one that we use very commonly in cularly some of the more important debates at diplomatic negotiations the United Nations so that you have an appreciThe major requirement here is memory We ation of what's involved there we speak at the do use notes but not shorthand We use a very same time that someone else is talking and we schematic form of notes--a form of speedwriting convey that person's thoughts in another language you might call it--a lot of abbreviations and concurrently We lag a few words behind but we some ideographs that e make up ourselves two have to stay fairly close which means quite a bit of mental gymnastics as you can imagine to flags juxtaposed for example to mean peace and flags crossed to mean war --that type of get the syntax sorted out so that it comes out thing The key to our notes is placement on the sounding right in the foreign language This page The something up here will be the intromethod of interpretation is the one that we use duction the thing in the middle will be the in large conferences where speed is of the essence to get a lot of business transacted quick- body of the thought and then the things down here may be the subsidiary ideas Our work basily and where the absolute precise meaning of cally involves analysis of what the person is the word is not the key thing that it would be saying you quickly digest what he said and jot for instance in very delicate negotiations down two or three words or pictures or whatever The other form of interpretation is the and go on to the next thought But these notes consecutive form which actually to my mind is serve only as a crutch we rely essentially on more challenging The speaker makes a presenta- our memories I Feb-Mar CRYPT LOG Page 13 UNCLASSIFIEB 86-36 DOClD 4009717 UNCLASSIFiED The interpreter that you know about primarily is the person who works at the U N but actually there are three different types of interpreters as we define them We have the escort interpreter who travels with foreign visitors who are here in the United States as guests of the State Department or AID These interpreters travel extensively around the U S with the foreign visitor looking at everything from hog breeding to newspaper production I have a diploma on the wall in my office at the State Department and when people come in to see me the first time they think How pretentious can she be But when they look at it up close they see that it's a diploma in swine breeding I spent a month at the Universi ty of orth Carolina with a group of Brazilian meatpackers and hogbreeders going through a training program and at the end of it all when they got their diplomas they decided that I had worked harder than anybody so they gave me my very own diploma So the escort interpreter gets into all' kinds of interesting fields very much off the beaten path Then we have the conference interpreter who works primarily in simultaneous interpretation--not only at the UN or at State Department conferences etc but also at private conferences As the world is getting smaller we have an enormous proliferation of international conferences People meet to discuss everything under the sun from cancer to computer language And these meetings go on everywhere all the time allover the world and most of them are international so they do require interpretation and the conferenae interpreters fly from one to the other The interpreters are not necessarily experts in cancer computer language or whatever but they work terribly hard at studying up and keeping abreast of a variety of fields Before you go into one of these conferences you generally spend at least a couple of days reading all the papers that are going to be delivered at the conference and learning at least the terminology You can do believe it or not a fairly decent job of interpreting at a subject you haven't really studied extensively provided you have had an opportunity o really steep yourself in the subject for a couple of days You learn enough vocabulary and at least you learn the basic principles of what's involved to the extent that YOU can make a cogent job of interpreting Then you forget it immediately and go on to something else It all gets buried back here someplace and then maybe two years later you might have another conference on hydrology or whatever and all that vocabulary that you learned once will come back to you But we do have to be versatile we have to be able to go from one subject to another very readily Now as far as the type of interpreter that I am I'm called a diplomatic interpreter That doesn't imply that I'm necessarily tactful or anything like that--just that I work primarily in the diplomatic field And it means that I have to have some of the skills of the escort interpreter I have to be willing and able to travel with people with large delegations and 'some of those of the conference interpreter the ability to go from one sub j ect to another very 'readily and I have to be able to do the two methods of interpretation that I described--the consecutive and the simultaneous Now what does our work entail Well obviously it means that we are often the only person present during negotiations between say our president and a head of state of a foreign country It means obviously that we have to be extremely fluent not only in our mother tPn e but in at least one other language And I might add that the State Department as in the case of so many agencies worries about funds and as a result the more languages you have the better off you are--the better they like it But basically most of us work in two foreign languages We have a couple of -- I consider real phenomena--who work in three or four This is exceedingly unusual I mean anyone can'read a number of languages but to have the verbal skill required to work say in three or four Romance languages is really exceedingly unusual We have some who do that or who have for example French and Spanish and Russian or Russian and German and bridge two language groups even But this is rather rare Most of us tend to specialize in one language group 'In my case as has been mentioned it's the Romance languases My primary business is with French for the simple reason that there are so many French-speaking statesmen from Africa in particular who have come to the fore in the pas few years that we do an awful lot of business with them as weli as of course with France Belgium and -so forth There are other people in my office who do Spanish as a primary language and they stay busy with that Por'tu ese doesn't keep me too'busy because the Brazilians tend to speak English exceedingly well except at the ver y highest level--at I say the level of the President of Brazil But you have to be bilingual or trilingual and your vocabulary has to be of the widest possible range because as I've indicated you do get into a huge number of fields Diplomacy is not confined as I'm sure you know to just negotiating a treaty on a very specific matter of consular relations Diplomacy these days involves tomatoes it involves brassieres 'I'manufactured in Nicara la that are beinR exportI d to the U S strawberries comin in from I Mexico drugs I've just come back from a twoI week seminar in Brussels on drug enforcement techniques Our interpreters have to be very versatile as far as their vocabulary is concerned and their interest in what's going on I in the world ' I Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 14 UNCLASSIFIED DOCID 4009717 UNCLASSIFIED We also have to be objective This is a lot easier said than done because generally when somebody says something you react to it But as an interpreter you have to learn to subdue your own personality and your own reactions you have to become exceedingly objective and if the speaker says something you go right ahead and say it You don't think How do I feel about it You don't make value judgments This is hard to learn particularly if you have a lively interest in politics and diplomacy and you know what American foreign policy towards the People's Republic of China for instance ought to be France We would render it in English as Audit Office but at the same time we would add This serves the function of the General Accounting Office in the Unites States So we do interpolate to a certain extent this cross-cultural information This is a rather important function as you can imagine because often people get side-tracked if they don't know precisely what the cultural frame of reference is Now what's the status of the diplomatic interpreter It varies A lot of countries don't even have diplomatic interpreters Great Britain for example uses foreign service officers memAnd you have to learn to listen It's amaz- bers of the Foreign Office I think this is all ing how little people actually do concentrate very much in keeping with the British tradition of the gifted amateur or Gentlemen vs Players but once you learn to focus totally on what you Anyway they don't have a cadre of interpreters have heard it becomes a lot easier to remember Sometimes I meet people who have been in a room on their staffs The French have one interpreter who is on the staff of the Quai d'Orsay the with me for days on end in a negotiating situarest of their people are contractors It would tion where I've been the interpreter and they be very amusing to you if you knew tQ what extent have been a subsidiary person not really taking an active part and a year later they'll come other governments just don't care about security up to me and say Oh I remember you And I the way we do Obviously these people are vethave absolutely no idea who they are because ted and they have passed some kind of security I've been so busy concentrating on just the two clearance but the government's attitude is just principals that I was interpreting for that I've not the same and they are perfectly willing to blanked out everything and everybody else in the have a contractor as in the case of the French room interpr t between the President of France and We also have to do the note-taking besides the President of the United States and then go on their way afterwards to work for another the interpreting We often are the only ones client or other governments even who do the written record of what's going on at the negotiations particularly where there's justi West Germany has a very professional attitude towards the interpreting business They the president and another chief of state and have a large number of highly qualified people we're the third person there Our notes serve as the record of what has transpired at the meet- who work in the German Foreign Ministry and the various other departments of government Their ing This places an enormous burden on us as Defense Department etc all have skilled inI'm sure you can imagine We are in a sense terpreters and they have very high ranks Thea Witness to History as Charles Bohlen called senior ones at the German Foreign Ministry have his book and it does present some hazards One of them is if there is ever a leak immediately the rank of Counsellor of Embassy which of course all of us envy terribly It's not so you think My God they're going to say it was much because of the money because we're pretty me We 11 I'm happy to report that never has an interpreter been found guilty of leak The much paid about the same But because they have principals are the ones who generally do the leak- a rank--a protocol rank--they cannot be required to sit behind their principals at dinner parties ing in diplomacy as I'm sure you know by now which we have to do And this is something that Now we also serve to a certain extent as gripes all of us terribl We're always sitting cultural advisors since we do have to bridge on tiny little chairs while everybody else is at two cultures we often help with things like se- the table plowing their way through a ten-course lecting the proper poet to quote for example meal to the Strolling Strings of the Air Force from a country's literature or a statesman to or whatever and there we are plunked down on refer to or something like that Also in the these tiny little chairs And the waiters hate course of our interpreting we try to avoid any us because they can't get in to serve cross-cultural misunderstanding based on a linguistic problem For example let's say that the As I am sure you can imagine the Eastern American speaker refers in talking to a French- Europeans the Chinese and the Russians have mobs man to our Department of the Interior Well of interpreters We've been told though I can't vouch for it since I don't know anything about that has absolutely no similarity to the MiniSlavic languages that the Russian interpreters stry of the Interior in France They are just are very good at the top level and then there is two totally different organizations So what we would say is Ie Departement de l' Interieur a lot of mediocrity at the base But I'm sure you've heard of all these stars Troyanovsky then we would add a little definition saying was a star interpreter of the fifties who later which takes care of national parks waters and became the Soviet Ambassador to Japan Viktor forests Or let's say that a Frenchman would Sukhodrev who travels with Brezhnev and who was say something about the Cour des Comptes in Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 15 UNCLASSIFIEO DOCID 4009717 UNCLASSIFIED here recently holds the rank of U K desk offi- cer in the Foreign Ministry This I think may give them a slightly different approach to their interpreting private meeting of senators and members of the House he kept referring to Senators It's a pleasure to meet with you Senators I know you Senators are very important etc And Sukhodrev who was interpreting was very careful As I've already indicated in the West we keep working in the Representatives at the take the faithful echo approach to interpret- to same time because he knew that they would be ing We have no authority to change what people heartily offended if they thought that Brezhnev say to embroider it improve on it or edit in was just addressing himself to the senators any way Our instructions are If he said it This is a very mild case Actually they have he meant it Just go right ahead don't add or been known to tone down some horrible threats subtract We do try of course to follow the etc Khrushchev particularly used to get emotion and the animation of the speaker not to carried away as you know And they would tone the extent that it looks like we're making fun him down a lot There have been a number of of him obviously and we try to follow the instances of this so obviously they have ausame style If his style is peasanty we try to thority to make their principals look better sound peasanty if its highfalutin' we try to and make sure they don't tread on too many toes sound highfalutin' So this again places strains One of my favorite experiences was when I on our vocabulary and our knowledge of the language We don't correct anything except what is worked at the Paris Peace Talks with the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese for a while the obviously a slip of the tongue You have to be very careful with your voice ones with the table you remember the table and your face because as I've mentioned to you The Viet Cong had an interpreter--a woman I we try to be objective we try not to make value might add interpolating here that women are judgments about what somebody is saying But you very good in this business I say this in total must realize that when you are working alone as immodesty Women are very active in this business both in the Communist countries and in an interpreter for two sides you're going to the United States and in Western Europe I can't hear some pretty outrageous and even some idigive you a percentage but I know that at least otic things said which you have to convey And it's hard for you to keep a straight face or not half of the interpreters are women and maybe more Anyway the Viet Cong's interpreter was let your voice give away what you're thinking a very strident type very vocal and really You know How could he say such a thing gung-ho In fact I called her La Pasionaria when you know it's a pate lie But this happens And you have to be able to keep control I never knew her name We weren't allowed to of yourself throughout and never give away what meet even in the ladies' room If we did meet we turned our backs to each other at the sink you actually feel about what you're saying La Pasionaria was ideologically very sound The other thing is never never to try to She and her principal had a litany where they interpolate or give any clues to the people you had to say certain things about tpe Saigon are interpreting for General Vernon Walters regime that it was bloodthirsty corrupt the No 2 man over at CIA has worked as an in- lackeys of the West etc They had this whole terpreter off and on for many years When he long string of things that they had to say was a young aide to General Mark Clark I guess every time that they referred to the Saigon he was just a second lieutenant or something regime Sometimes her principal would forget ark Clark was trying to extract a concession some of those adjectives and inevitably she from De Gaulle Lt Walters was trying to help would put them all in regardless Because she Clark in this difficult task so he kept saying was ideologically sound So they do have more W'ell General de Gaulle says no but I think he leeway in this way than we do means maybe Or He's just said he won't go The Chinese--you've had Charles Freeman along with you but I think if you press on this issue he'll change his mind At the end whe here and maybe he got into this--but he tells me that the Chinese are very literal Of course de Gaulle came to leave he turned to Lt Walthey have linguistic problems too but they ters and in very good English thanked him for are free to convert at least factual errors that his fine and fascinating interpreting You can imagine how Walters must have felt He told me their principals make that from that day forward he never never ever We in the West are generally nonpolitical added or subtracted anything of that sort You We're career civil servants which means that have to assume that people do know what you're we survive changes of regime fairly well I've saying and that they understand particularly been through three presidents We don't always English and know pretty well what's going on by the way work alone Often the foreign govThe interpreters in the Communist countries ernment will assign an interpreter to come with their principal This is particularly true of however seem to have a lot more leeway in adding the French the Germans the Russians and the and subtracting for the basic purpose of making Chinese A lot of the African countries don't their people look good Recently Brezhnev was and a lot of the Latin American countries don't here in the U S and one of the American interthey just use us as the interpreter But counpreters told me what when Brezhnev addressed a Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 16 UNCLASStFIED DOCID 4009717 UNCLASSIFIED tries with whom we have really serious negoti- Johnson came to office the first thing we did ations and who feel very strongly aboutllailguages was to rush to the Bible to find out how to say and cross-cultural communications do assign Come let us reason together It turned out their own interpreter In which case what I do as is so often true of Bible translations that is interpret what my president says into the what it was in French had absolutely no bearing foreign language and they interpret what their on the English and the aame for Spanish and so president says into English so that neither of forth We also had to learn how to say things us is working into our mother tongues But it like varmint and bluebells and God-willin'works out very well because we monitor each an'-the-crick-don't-rise Interpreting for other and we help each other I remember when Johnson was literally a bruising experience He I was in Iceland with President Nixon and was the kind of person who has to have physical President Pompidou and somehow they got on to contact with the people he was talking to Since the subject of the Queen of Sheba--I don't know he was talking through the interpreter he'd hold why--and the French interpreter had one of thes on to the interpreter In my case he would terrible blanks where he couldn't remember how grab me always by the upper arm and I'd come to say Queen of Sheba in English So I whis- home with these big bruises pered it to him And he in turn bailed me out President Nixon has a marvellous gift which a couple of times is fine for us of using these pointers-- Let me What are the requirements for being an in- say this about that and Let me make this perterpreter Obviously you need the language fectly clear He really does say that and it You'd be interested to know that most of us gives us a clue that he's building up to an imhaven't been to interpreting school I'm one of portant line the few that have About 15 or 16 of us at the We worked with Secretary Rusk for 8 years State Department do the kind of work I do but He liked to work into any conversation There's only three of us actually went to interpreting more than one way to skin a cat Then he'd sit school Most of us either come from foreignlanguage backgrounds or have grown up overseas back with that Buddha smile and see how we got as in my case We work at the languages all the it across in the foreign language We tried time We study we get magazines and newspapers something different every time and it never from overseas Our office pays for them so that workBd Our present Secretary of State LKissinwe can keep up with the living language and with ge understands French exceedingly well and we don't interpret French for him He also underwhat's going on We study the briefing papers stands German of course The only problem with and have access to them before the meeting acinterpreting for people who know the language tually takes place so that we can be prepared so that you are just there as an aide--to hop in Sometimes we run into trouble People don't trust linguists people that speak foreign lan- when the going gets tough--is that when the guages are suspect There'll be a paper labelle going gets tough that's generally when it's something that you don't know either They'll Eyes Only for the Secretary of State and I suddenly turn to you and ask How do you say say I need to see that They'll say Why It's 'moose' And of course you just have this to'Eyes Only' for the Secretary And I say tal blackout I would much rather interpret for What about the Secretary's mouth Sooner or two people who don't know the language any day later I get it than find myself in a situation where I'm bridging a gap between two people who halfway know Then there's another attitude toward each other's languages women interpreters that I ought to mention I think these are people who read a lot of spy novels--they think we really do more than just interpret I vividly remember being somewhere I've tried to give you a very brief aper u in the Middle West with a group of Frenchmen of what it's like to be an interpreter As Dr There was a cocktail party reception for us This American came up to me took me aside and Johnson said Words are but signs of ideas said Girlie I love that I just want you and basically we're communicators of ideas We to know that there are not man women who would try to do it as honestly and as perceptively as we can Of course our interpretation is only do what you're doing for your country as good as the foreign policy we're helping to advance the finest interpretation in the world We do have to be able to adjust ourselves to the idiosyncracies of our customers Presi- doesn't do much good if there's no will to coopdent Kennedy as you'll recall was a demon for erate But where the will to cooperate and to speed He was clocked at 200 words a minute understand does exist then effective interpre A court reporter is required at best to do tation can contribute very much to international 180 words a minute You can see that standard understanding And this makes my work exceedingly gratifying note-taking just do sn't work in this kind of situation That's why we need this schematic UNCLASSIFIED thing and rely on our memory When President Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 17 UNCLASSIFIED DOCID 4009717 TOP SECRET UM8Ri P L D PA T RY oir GOLD OLMBI ESTABLISHMENT OF MOLECULE SUPERSERIES EPSILON CONTROLLED ITEM AMERICAN SECURITY AUTHORITY Fort George G Snead Massachusetts 86-36 an 1 0U maA e outtlte name A real-life puzzle submitted by Pl6 TECHOUTS NO 54-40 or fight 1 Establishment of Superseries The EPSILON superseries MOLECULE is hereby established to protest a most useful product which is based on the exploitation of an obvious source the New York Times Reports made up of reprints of articles on government leaders indicating liberalism untruthfulness or Sabbath-breaking will bear the caveat NEGATIVE MOLECULE 2 Authority to Publish MOLECULE Superseries The Chief of Z Group is authorized to publish all products in the MOLECULE superseries except NEGATIVE MOLECULE BUCKLEY MASORETIC MOLECULE HEBREW SOTTI FIELD MOLECULE R D MOFFETT FIELD MOLECULE AEROSPACE and MICHIGAN FIELD HOUSE MOLECULE ATHLETIC 3 Serialization The product will be serialized by the date section page and noted as to whether it is morning afternoon or Sunday edition 4 Classification of Superseries Designator The designator MOLECULE when used out of context is an ordinary word Sly inferences to the contrary are to be avoided 5 Recommended Hazardous Activities Group The recommended HAG for MOLECULE is P to -M in inverse order of sensitive knowledge with a double inverse calculation of HAG for those also holding NEGATIVE MOLECULE clearances The NEGATIVE HAG resulting from MOLECULE access requires that when a person resigns or is transferred he must leave the United States for the period of the HAG This is to insure his safety from interrogation by the Black Pcl nthers the John Birch Society and Senator Fullb ight Travel expenses will be paid by the U S Treasury from foreign counterpart funds providing the relocation is to a country which by reason of climate or lack of night clubs is not visited by junketing Congressmen The country of resettlement must also be one which has never been visited by Stokeley Carmichael Richard O Douglas William O Douglas Douglas O Haliburton Richard Haliburton or a Greek yacht The nation may not be one in which the reigning queen or princess is a former American citizen or from which a king has at some time abdicated in order to marry an American citizen Also excluded are nations ruled by juntas oligarchies royalists despots fascists communists centrists right or left and intransigent nationalists This leaves Rwanda 'reF SEeRE'f t fto181b Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 18 TtW SEC UMBRA EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 CO FIDEN'fIAL tlei J 10 lite detoi at grade-point averages 3 or above on a scale of 4 CQB scores ALAT language aptitude scores at least STATEN 6 and proficiency test scores in a foreign language On the few occasions when we departed from these criteria we almost always lived to rue the day We did not have any criterion for judging someone I s staying power however that is the degree to which a person was committed to a career in this busi ness In the course of a 35- or 40-minute interview everybody looked dedicated Another point about selectivity you can select only from the output of the recruitment and screening processes In some instances I think we are recruiting the wrong kinds of peop e for the language field but more about that later To the Editor CRYPTOLOG The item in the December CRYPTOLOG entitled Citizens of the World recalled to me how amused my classmates and I were at the Navy language school when our German-born instructor informed us that Germany's most famous railroad trains pre-WWII were the Flying Hamburger and the Flying Frankfurter This news reduced the class to laughter but our instructor was not at all amused Incidentally if you happen to be in Tangier and would like a tangerine the orange you would do well to ask for a mandarin On the other hand if you should ask for a mandarin in China in the old days you might possibly get a Pekingese P L 86-36 I an It is hardly a managerial triumph to graduate interns into surplus career fields and AE is quite right in taking us to task on this issue My only rejoinder here is that she may have identified the wrong set of villains in the melodrama Neither the panel offices nor line operational elements have any real control over sudden shifts in targeting organizational structure or billet distribution Intern programs were begun in good faith but the rules were changed in the middle of the seventh inning To this day we continue to encounter problems in 1 accounting for the skills we have and 2 projecting the skills we're going to need Nowhere is this more true than in the language field where the labor units are not interchangeable If you decide to stop reporting Zendian internal communications you can't simply transfer the Zendian linguists to the Basque navy problem even though the job descriptions sound remarkably alike I've always assumed everybody knew this but lately I'm not so sure I Alexandrine EO 1 4 c F L 86-36 To the Editor CRYPTOLOG It is a reasonably safe bet that your fourpart series on the intern program will win few friends in the Career DeveloPment establishment There will be valid objections to some of the specifics in this series but no one person or group of people can be expected to have a total command of the facts in question It would be a mistake therefore to dismiss everything Anne Exinterne henceforth says for this reason Her perception of the Dverall problem is quite good The following comments on the series are made from an admittedly narrow point of view-my personal experiences and observations in the Language Career Panel office from 1967 to 1972 They represent my own opinions and the policies which were in force during that period not necessarily the views of the present PaneL In discussing the philosophy of the intern program AE notes that many of her friends ha4 the idea that they were FSGs future supergrades I haven't the faintest clue how they ever got that into their heads The only thing we ever told them was that we would do our best to see that they could meet the criteria for certification in Language at the end of three years providing they were not starting from scratch in a new language I used to stress diversity in work assignments as the key element in their internship within the limitations of their major language but I have no recollection of including anything other than technical objectives in their programs 11 ---_ _ Feb-Mar In her discussion of recruitment AE comes close to a favorite theme of mine I don't think that an AB right out of school typically female with a degree in language and literature typically French is necessarily the best choice to send off to learn a language like Amharic 1 I My example is hypothetical but it is a good profile of the kind of intern program most likely to fail expensively I don't agree with AE's suggestibn that we take on high school graduates to train against some of our jobs at least in the language field On the contrary for some of our jobs we ought to be going after graduate-level specialists in fields like Uralic and Altaic stUdies untenured college teachers and ex-SCA personnel who have continued their studies in languages and linguistics CRYPTOLOG Page 19 CONFIDENTIAL IIM S VIA E81lHlT Elbld8lEt 5 ffllU DOClD 4009717 CONFIDENTIAl on some mysterious M7 personality profile It There are several reasons for this On most language problems the language analyst has was kind of a running joke that if a recruit got STATEN 9 on the Russian test we would never to know far more than irregular verb forms and odd usages of the subjunctive Culture histo- see him again Maybe there's nothing to it but I for one would feel a lot better if someone ry politics economics personalities intercould convince me that it isn't so Any takers national relations technology--all of these factors and many more play a role in producing In her treatment of selection and orientaa transcript a translation a report All human knowledge is not derived from SIGINT but tion AE makes one point that I would like to much of it can be applied to the SIGINT process support with few if any reservations I too think that new hires should serve in some geneWhy do we have to start with a tabula rasa ral capacity SIGINT technician for some 12 to We also need people who have already had 18 months use the skills which they bring to some of life's experiences our analysts should NSA CSS skills for which they were recruited have heard of such things as letters of credit to begin with and only after this period be visas four-barrel carburetors rectifiers considered for an internship Both the panels compound interest the Diet etc Many brandand the individual intern candidates could then new college graduates have never before been make better choices in several important ways responsible for I supporting themselves 2 Why not have a year or so of being engaged renting an apartment 3 putting a car on the before taking the plunge In this way a linguist road 4 obtaining a loan etc Hiring 18-yearcould work in a language he knows while he's olds can hardly alleviate this situation I learning the SIGINT business which presumably have to go along with George Allen on the wishe doesn't know I would probably waive this dom of putting rookies on the starting team requirement in the case of someone with both a working knowledge of one of our languages and But most of all we need people who are ready to make some reasonable sort of commitment previous SCA experience to our kind of work people for whom the grass The 12--18 month cooling-off period has will not necessarily seem greener elsewhere a number of intriguing consequences It would Granted we have to look out for the job-hoppers address the problem AE raises of people coming and the unemployed academics who are waiting for here with urgently needed skills and then going the foundation money to start flowing again but off to an internship in a competing but unrelathese risks seem to me far easier to support than the odds we face in trying to assimilate ted field which offers the promise of more glamour fame success and love none of which liberal arts AB's into the work force particucharacterize the language field at least for larly where training often in the form of selfthe first year and a'half The practice might instruction in rare languages is involved even keep us from recruiting individuals who have no immediately usable skills One of the advantages of recruiting the kinds of people described above graduate-level In the section on motivation and morale specialists untenured college teachers ex-SCA AE scores some palpable hits on a relatively personnel is the fact that they have already inviting target but her quarrel is not with gone part of the distance toward the goals we 'the intern program but rather with the larger have in mind when we think of the NSA CSS proproblem of personnel management If interns fessional linguist This kind of recruiting makes more demands on us but if we exploit all see no real relationship between the quality of the contacts we now have in departments of lan- their work and the rewards they receive then guages and linguistics and perhaps anthropology neither do many non-interns If interns have few incentives to aspire to professionalism as we should be able to come up with a few good opposed to professionalization in a technical prospects who will eventually have a greater impact on our mission than fifty of the typical field then what about everyone else The fact remains on this latter point that for whatever college hires we get now reason there is little professionalism in the The graduate student in Uralic and Altaic language field Most of our language analysts studies may be somewhat harder to clear than the profess to have only a limited interest in the new graduates of a small liberal arts school languages they use on the job outside of the and this touches on something else that AE said traffic that goes across their desks or through in one of her articles their earphones Most of the people I counseled in the LCP office particularly after an I suspect that the testing battery and unsuccessful shot at the PQE acknowledged that the other screening devices used by M may be they did nothing or almost nothing to develop producing a population that is too homogeneous and maintain their skills As one man put it Many of us who have worked on the problem Why should I mess around'with that expletive of recruiting and processing would-be linguists at night I see it all day on the job for the Language Career Panel or for A Group have Yet most of our senior linguists insist remarked on the apparent inverse relationship between language proficiency scores and the score that outside contact and work with a foreign Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 20 N I DI NTIAL llMlBhE 'ilA EURe lfN'f elh'dmEL eJNL't r DOCID 4009717 CON Flllr NTIAL language is about the only way to achieve and maintain any real competence and just about all of them practice what they preach A professional has a deep and abiding interest in what he is doing It is never just a job for him By this standard we have only a small number of professionals CAMINO NEWS CAMINO is a good idea that keeps getting better Many linguists will remember the name CAMINOI I in existence since the mid-60's which could be QuerIedJ AE spends a lot of time in this section dealing with the issues of psychic income feedback incentives morale and the general atmosphere on the job I agree with most of what she says but find myself overwhelmed by the high level of generalization Maybe the only solution is to abolish Original Sin One small aside caught my eye a colleague of hers was described as spending a portion of his working These first three files on the RYE system day running down leads for new clients for his many enterprises delivering orders and display- have proved of great value to linguists In the last few years they have been joined by more ing wares Such practices are unfortunately and more new machine language files and abbreviquite common and if you add to them alLthe hobby craft and related activities that go on ation files The newer files have made use of throughout the working day and not orily during the IBM 370 system rather than RYE for two main reasons first RYE wi 11 probably soon be superthe lunch hour you are confiontedwith what must be an enormous amount of employee time de- ceded by newer machines and second RYE memory voted to non-work or at least non-Agency work storage space has been getting harder and harder to come by There are now nearly 20 machine Maybe the Small Business Administration could language files of various sizes all in the same be persuaded to open a regional office within format and processed by the same machine prothe building here I'------------------------- J Where do intern graduates go AE talks about the fact that interns are loved and cared for until they are certified and then cast out into outer darkness and this is true It is no less true for anyone who has r eceivedhis certificationasaJ rgfessional His next logical career ve is out of the field in many instances EO 1 4 c P L 86-36 If AE's article were the whole case for the intern program then the obvious conclusion would be to do away with it entirely Two counter-arguments have to be made 1 The problem is not the intern program per se which cannot transcend the supervisory and managerial climate in which it exists at the present time If we want to improve the intern program we should begin by improving first-line supervision and maybe the new performance appraisal system will be a step in this direction 2 The intern program at least the language part of it has achieved some outstanding successes If challenged I can name them the outstanding young men and women who came out of the program to achieve exactly what we had in mind for them to begin with Maybe they would have9'otten there anyway but like a proud P9rent I can point to them and say These are my jewels Any program that does this can't be all bad I grams and procedures and all forming one system which still bears the name CAMINO in honor of the original good idea I Each file has an executive who is responsible for all linguistic and lexicographic aspects of it In some cases he has others helping him Machine processing standards programs and procedures for all CAMINO files have been developed and are being maintained in P16 Below is a list of the files now forming the CAMINO system with the names of their file executives or other contact points and the sponsoring organizations Emery W Tetrault PIG P L 86-36 EO 1 4 c C8NfI I BENT lAb '1 p rEURSQ For further information call1 13045so EEQNFIQENTIAb 'Ell SEQ Feb-Mar CRYPTOLOG Page 21 P L 86-36 DOCID 4009717 -fl P--5KRI J r 'l'IIIS B9EURt JMEN'f CON'fAINS COB W6ItB l 'IAT ItIAL - - ' '-_ ---' _ - ' --_ -- ------- 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