It was originally requested from the National Archives in October of 2022, and released about a week and a half later under FOIA case 23-02451.

Document Archive

History of Special Project Branch, SIS ETOUSA, aka the “BEECHNUT Report” or “Rowlett Report,” written by Col. Frank B. Rowlett [9 Pages, 1.5MB]

Loading...

Taking too long?

Reload document

| Open in new tab

Download [1.81 MB]

The post History of Special Project Branch, SIS ETOUSA, aka the “BEECHNUT Report” or “Rowlett Report,” written by Col. Frank B. Rowlett first appeared on The Black Vault.

Cryptolog was created in 1974 and was, according to the editor, “a new vehicle for the interchange of ideas on technical subjects.” Another editor called it “a mix of technical, expository, philosophical, futuristic, argumentative and historical articles – with a light touch here and there – there’s always an article or two to engage the reader.” Issues of Cryptolog were published initially on a monthly basis, but in the final years of its publication, were released on a quarterly basis. There were no issues published in 1993 and the final issue was released in July of 1997.

The Black Vault began not only archiving the released versions first put out in 2012, but later filing Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR) requests to get them further reviewed.

Below you will find the October 1981 edition, and the huge MDR request success that got much of it further declassified.

Document Archive

Cryptolog (NSA Newsletter), October 1981 Edition, Released September 2020 [18 Pages, 7.5MB]

Loading...

Taking too long?

Reload document

| Open in new tab

Download [7.30 MB]

Cryptolog (NSA Newsletter), October 1981 Edition, Released September 2020 – HIGHLIGHTED EDITION – [18 Pages, 7.5MB] – This version contains highlighted text, which discerns the newly released information after the MDR.

Loading...

Taking too long?

Reload document

| Open in new tab

Download [7.47 MB]

Archived Versions

Cryptolog (NSA Newsletter), October 1981 Edition, Released October 2012 – This is the original release of the 1981 edition in 2012. It is archived here to represent how redacted the record originally was.

The post Cryptolog (NSA Newsletter), October 1981 Edition first appeared on The Black Vault.

Richard Bissell Jr. was a Central Intelligence Agency officer responsible for major projects such as the U-2 spy plane and the Bay of Pigs Invasion. In 1965, he created a report that looked into the NSA’s effort to crack high grade cipher systems. This was his report.

In February of 2019, The Black Vault requested a mandatory declassification review (MDR) of the document, which was previously released but heavily redacted. Although redactions still remain, many were lifted, and the report offers a more in-depth review of the NSA’s efforts.

Document Archive

 The Bissell Report of 18 February 1965 [86 Pages, 28MB]

The post The Bissell Report of 18 February 1965 – Review of Selected NSA Cryptanalytic Efforts first appeared on The Black Vault.

The Space Surveillance Sigint Program came into existence in the early 1960s when both the United States and the Soviet Union were racing to get satellites launched and were preparing for unmanned and manned exploration of outer space.

This history was prepared in draft in 1968, and a limited number of copies were circulated throughout the Agency. We are indebted to [ REDACTED ] who served as project officer of the SSS program, for reviewing this history and locating the photographs used, and to [ REDACTED ] of the History and Publications Staff for performing the copy editing and seeing the manuscript through the printing process.

Document Archive

United States Cryptologic History, Space Surveillance SIGINT Program, Originally Drafted in 1968 (highlighted version) [59 Pages, 33.5MB] – This version of the document was released after a Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR) request I filed in May of 2018. The record was released in April of 2019. Newly released information is highlighted.

United States Cryptologic History, Space Surveillance SIGINT Program, Originally Drafted in 1968 (clean version) [59 Pages, 33.5MB] – This version of the document was released after a Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR) request I filed in May of 2018. The record was released in April of 2019.

United States Cryptologic History, Space Surveillance SIGINT Program, Originally Drafted in 1968 (clean version) [59 Pages, 32.5MB]

The post United States Cryptologic History, Space Surveillance SIGINT Program, Originally Drafted in 1968 first appeared on The Black Vault.

Kryptos is an encrypted sculpture by American artist Jim Sanborn located on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Langley, Virginia. Since its dedication on November 3, 1990, there has been much speculation about the meaning of the encrypted messages it bears. Of the four messages, three have been solved, with the fourth remaining one of the most famous unsolved codes in the world. The sculpture continues to provide a diversion for cryptanalysts, both amateur and professional, who are attempting to decrypt the final section.

The below represents multiple FOIA requests to get documents on the sculpture declassified.

Document Archive

The National Security Agency (NSA) Documents

In the early 1990s, the NSA proposed a challenged that was taken up by a small group of cryptanalysts who wanted to decode the message on the Kryptos statue.  The documents below were the results of their research, including clues to deciphering the still unencrypted ‘fourth message.’

 The CIA Kryptos Sculpture [ 98 Pages, 2.36MB ] – This document was declassified and released to The Black Vault in September of 2014.  It took nearly 3 years to process.

 NSA Documents on Kryptos [ 60 Pages, 8.56MB ] – This was the first batch of documents released to The Black Vault by the NSA, in relation to my 2011 FOIA request.

 CIA Released Document, 9 July 2014 [ 2 Pages, 8.56MB ] – This single document was referred by the NSA to the CIA for review and release.

The Kryptos Sculpture Intellipedia Entry [ 10 Pages, 2.2MB | Released 07/2017 ]

The post The CIA’s Kryptos Statue first appeared on The Black Vault.

According to Wikipedia:

The Voynich manuscript is an illustrated codex hand-written in an unknown writing system. The vellum on which it is written has been carbon-dated to the early 15th century (1404–1438), and it may have been composed in Northern Italy during the Italian Renaissance. The manuscript is named after Wilfrid Voynich, a Polish book dealer who purchased it in 1912.

Some of the pages are missing, with around 240 remaining. The text is written from left to right, and most of the pages have illustrations or diagrams. Some pages are foldable sheets.

The Voynich manuscript has been studied by many professional and amateur cryptographers, including American and British codebreakers from both World War I and World War II. No one has yet succeeded in deciphering the text, and it has become a famous case in the history of cryptography. The mystery of the meaning and origin of the manuscript has excited the popular imagination, making the manuscript the subject of novels and speculation. None of the many hypotheses proposed over the last hundred years has yet been independently verified.

In 1969 the Voynich manuscript was donated by Hans P. Kraus to Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, where it is cataloged under call number MS 408.

 In June of 2017, I requested from the National Security Agency (NSA) all records they had to The Voynich Manuscript. Below, you will find the search results.  They did inform me they have put some of the material on their website, however, it does not appear that it is complete.

Below, according to the NSA, is a complete set of records.

Document Archive

 The Voynich Manuscript NSA Documents [348 Pages, 57MB]

The post The Voynich Manuscript – National Security Agency (NSA) Documents first appeared on The Black Vault.

The Martin and Mitchell Defection occurred in September 1960 when two U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) cryptologists, William Hamilton Martin and Bernon F. Mitchell, defected to the Soviet Union. A secret 1963 NSA study said that “Beyond any doubt, no other event has had, or is likely to have in the future, a greater impact on the Agency’s security program.”

Martin and Mitchell met while serving in the U.S. Navy in Japan in the early 1950s and both joined the NSA on the same day in 1957. They defected together to the Soviet Union in 1960, and at a Moscow press conference they revealed and denounced various U.S. policies, especially provocative incursions into the air space of other nations and spying on America’s own allies. Underscoring their apprehension of nuclear war, they said “we would attempt to crawl to the moon if we thought it would lessen the threat of an atomic war.”

Within days, citing a trusted source, Congressman Francis E. Walter, chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), said Martin and Mitchell were “sex deviates”, prompting sensational press coverage. U.S. officials at the National Security Council privately shared their assumption that the two were part of a traitorous homosexual network. Classified NSA investigations, on the other hand, determined the pair had “greatly inflated opinions concerning their intellectual attainments and talents” and had defected to satisfy social aspirations. The House Un-American Activities Committee publicly intimated its interpretation of the relationship between Martin and Mitchell as homosexual and that reading guided the Pentagon’s discussion of the defection for decades.

Below, you will find my research into this defection, and the declassified documents that have been released.

National Security Agency Documents

 NSA Declassified Documents, Released March 2015 [ 103 Pages, 49.5MB ] – The NSA is charging nearly $2,000 to complete their search for records relating to this incident. They used the 2 hours allotted to me for free, and sent me the first 100 pages that they found. This is that release. Any additional searching or releases, I will be required to pay the thousands of dollars.

The post Martin and Mitchell Defection to Soviet Union, September 1960 first appeared on The Black Vault.

(Scroll Down for Declassified Documents)

The following is a great write up by Wikipedia of what “The Beale Ciphers” or “The Beale Papers” really are. I was surprised to learn of an extensive collection of documents regarding these papers.

The Beale ciphers, also referred to as the Beale Papers, are a set of three ciphertexts, one of which allegedly states the location of a buried treasure of gold, silver and jewels estimated to be worth over $63 million USD as of September 2011. Comprising three ciphertexts, the first (as yet unsolved) text describes the location, the second (solved) ciphertext the content of the treasure, and the third (unsolved) lists the names of the treasure’s owners and their next of kin.

The story of the three ciphertexts originates from an 1885 pamphlet detailing treasure being buried by a man named Thomas J. Beale in a secret location in Bedford County, Virginia, in the 1820s. Beale entrusted a box containing the encrypted messages to a local innkeeper named Robert Morriss and then disappeared, never to be seen again. According to the story, the innkeeper opened the box 23 years later, and then decades after that gave the three encrypted ciphertexts to a friend before he died. The friend then spent the next twenty years of his life trying to decode the messages, and was able to solve only one of them which gave details of the treasure buried and the general location of the treasure. The unnamed friend then published all three ciphertexts in a pamphlet which was advertised for sale in the 1880s.

Since the publication of the pamphlet, a number of attempts have been made to decode the two remaining ciphertexts and to locate the treasure, but all efforts have resulted in failure.

There are many arguments that the entire story is a hoax, including a 1980 article “A Dissenting Opinion” by cryptographer Jim Gillogly, and a 1982 scholarly analysis of the Papers and their related story by Joe Nickell, using historical records that cast doubt on the existence of Thomas J. Beale. Nickell also presents linguistic evidence demonstrating that the documents could not have been written at the time alleged (words such as “stampeding”, for instance, are of later vintage). His analysis of the writing style showed that Beale was almost certainly James B. Ward, whose 1885 pamphlet brought the Beale Papers to light. Nickell argues that the tale is thus a work of fiction; specifically, a “secret vault” allegory of the Freemasons. James B. Ward was, in fact, a Mason himself.

The National Security Agency Declassified Records

The following records were released to me, in connection with my FOIA Request 75804 with the National Security Agency (NSA). There are more records being reviewed for declassification, and will be added here once I receive them (or they are posted online by the NSA):

[205 Pages]

1. A Cipher’s the Key to the Treasure in Them Thar Hills
2. A Treasure Buried Deep in Bedford County
3. Beale, The Beale Papers
4. Beale Treasure – Fact or Fiction
5. Has the Beale Treasure Code Been Solved?
6. Historical and Analytical Studies in Relation to the Beale Cypers, dated 7 March 1970
7. Historical and Analytical Studies in Relation to the Beale Cypers, dated 15 April 1972
8. Membership Application
9. More Information on Unsolved Cipher
10. Other Miscellany
11. Research Library
12. Secret Code to Virginia’s $2 Million Blue Ridge Bonanza
13. Signature Simulation and Certain Cryptographic Codes
14. Solve the Cipher, Find a Treasure
15. The Beale Ciphers
16. The Beale Papers
17. Treasure Beyond Your Wildest Dreams

The post The Beale Ciphers first appeared on The Black Vault.

  NSA Newsletter – September 1999 [16 Pages. 1.45 MB]

  NSA Newsletter – October 1999 [16 Pages. 2.03 MB]

  NSA Newsletter – November 1999 [16 Pages. 1.92 MB]

The post NSA Newsletters first appeared on The Black Vault.

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 35 [4 Pages, 367kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 36 [4 Pages, 353kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 37 [4 Pages, 227kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 38 [4 Pages, 275kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 39 [4 Pages, 364kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 40 [4 Pages, 342kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 41 [4 Pages, 346kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 42 [4 Pages, 360kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 43 [4 Pages, 383kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 44 [4 Pages, 304kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 45 [4 Pages, 393kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 46 [4 Pages, 343kb]

Communicator – Vol. III, No. 47 [4 Pages, 338kb]

The post Communicator – NSA’s Employee Publication first appeared on The Black Vault.

The National Security Agency released all 136 issues of one of its longest-lived technical publications, Cryptolog. This released collection encompasses well over a thousand articles covering a cross-section of the disciplines and focus areas of the Agency, and is over 4,100 pages.

Cryptolog was created in 1974 and was, according to the editor, “a new vehicle for the interchange of ideas on technical subjects.” Another editor called it “a mix of technical, expository, philosophical, futuristic, argumentative and historical articles – with a light touch here and there – there’s always an article or two to engage the reader.” Issues of Cryptolog were published initially on a monthly basis, but in the final years of its publication, were released on a quarterly basis. There were no issues published in 1993 and the final issue was released in July of 1997.

For more information on Cryptolog, check out the FAQ below.

The Black Vault began not only archiving the released versions first put out in 2012, but later filing Mandatory Declassification Review (MDR) requests to get them further reviewed. Where available, the issues with an MDR have been added, and when you click on the issue below, it will either go to the page to download both copies, or if a new version is not available, it will directly link to the PDF that is. All listing below without a generally indicates an MDR was filed, completed and is available.

Document Archive

FAQs for Crytologs

Entire Collection of Cryptologs in 1 files [4,174 Pages, 233 MB]

Vol. I, No. 1 – August 1974

Vol. I, No. 2 – September 1974

Vol. I, No. 3 – October 1974

Vol. I, No. 4 – November 1974

Vol. I, No. 5 – December 1974

Vol. II, No. 1 – January 1975

Vol. II, Nos. 2 – 3 – February – March 1975

Vol. II, No. 4 – April 1975

Vol. II, No. 5 – May 1975

Vol. II, No. 6 – June 1975

Vol. II, No. 7 – July 1975

Vol. II, Nos. 8 – 9 – August – September 1975

Vol. II, No. 10 – October 1975

Vol. II, No. 11 – November 1975

Vol. II, No. 12 – December 1975

Vol. III, No. 1 – January 1976

Vol. III, No. 2 – February 1976

Vol. III, No. 3 – March 1976

Vol. III, No. 4 – April 1976

Vol. III, No. 5 – May 1976

Vol. III, Nos. 6 – 7 – June – July 1976

Vol. III, No. 8 – August 1976

Vol. III, No. 9 – September 1976

Vol. III, No. 10 – October 1976

Vol. III, No. 11 – November 1976

Vol. III, No. 12 – December 1976

Vol. IV, Nos. 1 – 2 – January – February 1977

Vol. IV, No. 3 – March 1977

Vol. IV, No. 4 – April 1977

Vol. IV, No. 5 – May 1977

Vol. IV, No. 6 – June 1977

Vol. IV, No. 7 – July 1977

Vol. IV, No. 8 – August 1977

Vol. IV, No. 9 – September 1977

Vol. IV, No. 10 – October 1977

Vol. IV, No. 11 – November 1977

Vol. IV, No. 12 – December 1977

Vol. V, No. 1 – January 1978

Vol. V, No. 2 – February 1978

Vol. V, No. 3 – March 1978

Vol. V, No. 4 – April 1978

Vol. V, No. 5 – May 1978

Vol. V, No. 6 – June 1978

Vol. V, Nos. 7 – 8 – July – August 1978

Vol. V, No. 9 – September 1978

Vol. V, No. 10 – October 1978

Vol. V, No. 11 – November 1978

Vol. V, No. 12 – December 1978

Vol. VI, No. 1 – January 1979

Vol. VI, No. 2 – February 1979

Vol. VI, No. 3 – March 1979

Vol. VI, No. 4 – April 1979

Vol. VI, No. 5 – May 1979

Vol. VI, No. 6 – June 1979

Vol. VI, No. 7 – July 1979

Vol. VI, Nos. 8 – 9 – August – September 1979

Vol. VI, No. 10 – October 1979

Vol. VII, Nos. 1 – 3 – January – March 1980

Vol. VII, Nos. 4 – 6 – April – June 1980

Vol. VIII, Nos. 1 – 3 – January – March 1981

Vol. VIII, Nos. 4 – 6 – April – June 1981

Vol. VIII, No. 10 – October 1981

Vol. VIII, No. 11 – November 1981

Vol. VIII, No. 12 – December 1981

Vol. IX, No. 1 – January 1982

Vol. IX, No. 2 – February 1982

Vol. IX, No. 3 – March 1982

Vol. IX, No. 4 – April 1982

Vol. IX, No. 5 – May 1982

Vol. IX, Nos. 6 – 7 – June – July 1982

Vol. IX, No. 8 – August 1982

Vol. IX, No. 9 – September 1982

Vol. IX, No. 10 – October 1982

Vol. IX, No. 11 – November 1982

Vol. IX, No. 12 – December 1982

Vol. X, Nos. 1 – 2 – January – February 1983

Vol. X, No. 3 – March 1983

Vol. X, No. 4 – April 1983

Vol. X, No. 5 – May 1983

Vol. X, Nos. 6 – 7 – June – July 1983

Vol. X, No. 8 – August 1983

Vol. X, No. 9 – September 1983

Vol. X, No. 10 – October 1983

Vol. X, No. 11 – November 1983

Vol. X, No. 12 – December 1983

Vol. XI, No. 1 – January 1984

Vol. XI, Nos. 2 – 3 – February – March 1984

Vol. XI, No. 4 – April 1984

Vol. XI, No. 5 – May 1984

Vol. XI, Nos. 6 – 7 – June – July 1984

Vol. XI, Nos. 8 – 9 – August – September 1984

Vol. XI, No. 10 – October 1984

Vol. XI, Nos. 11 – 12 – November – December 1984

Vol. XII, Nos. 1 – 3 – January – March 1985

Vol. XII, No. 4 – April 1985

Vol. XII, No. 5 – May 1985

Vol. XII, Nos. 6 – 8 – June – August 1985

Vol. XII, Nos. 9 – 10 – September – October 1985

Vol. XII, Nos. 11 – 12 – November – December 1985

Vol. XIII, Nos. 1 – 2 – January – February 1986

Vol. XIII, Nos. 3 – 4 – March – April 1986

Vol. XIII, Nos. 5 – 7 – May – July 1986

Vol. XIII, Nos. 8 – 9 – August – September 1986

Vol. XIII, Nos. 10 – 11 – October – November 1986

Vol. XIII, No. 12 – December 1986

Vol. XIV, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1987

Vol. XIV, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1987

Vol. XIV, No. 3 – 3rd Issue 1987

Vol. XIV, No. 4 – 4th Issue 1987

Vol. XV, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1988

Vol. XV, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1988

Vol. XV, No. 3 – 3rd Issue 1988

Vol. XV, No. 4 – 4th Issue 1988

Vol. XVI, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1989

Vol. XVI, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1989

Vol. XVI, No. 3 – 3rd Issue 1989

Vol. XVII, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1990

Vol. XVII, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1990

Vol. XVII, No. 3 – 3rd Issue 1990

Vol. XVIII, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1991

Vol. XVIII, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1991

Vol. XVIII, No. 3 – 3rd Issue 1991

Vol. XIX, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1992

Vol. XIX, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1992

Vol. XIX, No. 3 – 3rd Issue 1992

Vol. XX, No. 1 – 1st Issue 1994

Vol. XX, No. 2 – 2nd Issue 1994

Vol. XXI, No. 1 – Issue 1 1995

Vol. XXI, No. 2 – Summer 1995

Vol. XXI, No. 3 – Fall 1995

Vol. XXI, No. 4 – Winter 1995

Vol. XXII, No. 1 – Spring 1996

Vol. XXII, No. 2 – Summer 1996

Vol. XXII, No. 4 – Winter 1996

Vol. XXIII, No. 1 – Spring 1997

Vol. XXIII, No. 2 – Summer 1997

The post Cryptolog Issues – National Security Agency (NSA) Publication first appeared on The Black Vault.

In issuing the directive that gave birth to the agency, then-President Harry Truman understood the need to continue U.S. efforts that had led to breaking German and Japanese codes in World War II, success against the German U-Boat threat in the North Atlantic, and victory in the Battle of Midway in the Pacific. America had become a dominant power on a global stage, facing global responsibilities and threats. As war raged in Korea, the creation of NSA allowed the Defense Department to consolidate cryptologic support to military operations, and to meet challenges that the nation would face in the Cold War.

NSA 60th Anniversary Book [62 Pages, 18.7MB]

https://documents.theblackvault.com/documents/nsa/NSA_60th_Anniversary.pdf

The post NSA 60th Anniversary Book first appeared on The Black Vault.

Military Cryptanalysis Part I

Military Cryptanalysis Part II

Military Cryptanalysis Part III

Military Cryptanalysis Part IV

The post Cryptanalysis first appeared on The Black Vault.

Disclaimer

John H. Tiltman: A Reminiscence – Summer/Fall 1982-Vol. 1, Nos. 2-3

Computer Virus Infections: Is NSA Vulnerable? – Fall 1985-Vol. 4, No. 3

The Origination and Evolution of Radio Traffic Analysis: The World War I Era – Spring 1987-Vol. 6, No. 1

What Every Cryptologist Should Know About Pearl Harbor – Summer 1987 – Vol. 6, No. 2

Influence of US Cryptologic Organizations on the Digital Computer Industry – Fall/Winter 1987-1988 Vol. 8, Nos. 3-4

Third Party Nations: Partners and Targets – Winter 1989 – Vol. 7, No. 4

Meteor Burst Communications: An Ignored Phenomenon? – Fall 1990 – Vol. 9, No. 3

Geographic Information Systems – Fall/Winter 1991 – Vol 10, Nos. 3-4

DOS/UNIX Interoperability and Email in the Agency – Spring 1992 – Vol. 11, No.1

Solving xa=b(mod c) for x and Undecimating Recursions – Winter 1992 – Vol. 11, No. 4

The First US Government Manual on Cryptography – Winter 1992 – Vol. 11, No. 4

Telephone Codes and Safe Combinations: A Deadly Duo – Spring 1993 – Vol 12, No.1

Sub-HF Search and Acquisition – – Summer 1994 – Vol.13, No2

A World War II German Army Field Cipher and How We Broke It – Winter 1995 – Vol. 14, No. 4

Guerillas in the Mist: COMINT and the Formation of Evolution of the Viet Minh, 1941-45 – Spring 1996 – Vol. 15, No. 1

Book Review: A Century of Spies: Intelligence in teh Twentieth Century – Fall 1996 – Vol. 153, No. 3

Dealing with the Future: The Limits of Forecasting – Fall 1996 – Vol. 153, No. 3

The BS Attitudes: How Things Work in Bureaucracies – Winter 1996 – Vol. 15, No. 4

The post Cryptologic Quarterly Articles first appeared on The Black Vault.

Entire collection of Venona documents from the NSA

Please note: The above collection was copied from the official NSA index. It is currently under construction for a better index, and format, and will be converted soon.

The post Venona Project first appeared on The Black Vault.

1996

Rosman Tracks on to the End
August 1996

1998

Baron Oshima’s Contributions
September 1998

2002

AFSAM-7
January – February 2002

Rear Admiral Earl Everett Stone: A Convert to Cryptologic Centralization
January – February 2002

The Central Security Service
January – February 2002

The Creation of NSA – Part 1: JOP
January – February 2002

The Creation of NSA – Part 1: AFSA
January – February 2002

The Creation of NSA – Part 1: The Brownell Committee
January – February 2002

The Effort to Create a Smokefree NSA
January – February 2002

The Korean War: The First Phase
January – February 2002

VENONA: An Overview
January – February 2002

William F. Friedman
January – February 2002

The Breaking of Geheimschreier
January-March 2003

The Necessary Invention: The Cryptologic Effort by the Philippine Guerrilla Army, 1944-1945
January-March 2003

Vint Hill Farms Station: 1942-1945 (USM-1)
January-March 2003

Days of BOURBON
January – February 2002

The World at the End of the War
January – February 2002

Three African-American Cryptologic Pioneers
January – February 2002

William Coffee
January – February 2002

Wilma Z. Davis
January – February 2002

A mission of great importance?: Recruiting Scientists and Mathematicians at NSA, circa 1960
March – April 2002

Betrayers of the Trust: Joseph Sidney Petersen
March – April 2002

Did Anyone Tell the President? Establishing the CRITICOMM System
March – April 2002

Dorothy Toplitzky Blum: A Pioneer Computer Scientist
March – April 2002

Dr. William D. Wray
March – April 2002

From Librarians to Leadership: Women at NSA
March – April 2002

Hungary, 1956: The Crisis That NSA Did Not Predict
March – April 2002

Joseph N. Wenger
March – April 2002

Madame X: Agnes in Twilight, The Last Years of the Career of Agnes Driscoll, 1941-1957
March – April 2002

Madame X: Agnes Meyer Driscoll and U.S. Naval Cryptology, 1919-1940
March – April 2002

Oscar Collins: A Successful Senior Executive
March – April 2002

SIGINT and the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley, November 1965
March – April 2002

The Last Days of the Enigma
March – April 2002

The Move to Fort Meade
March – April 2002

A Child of the Century: Washington Wong
May – June 2002

Betrayers of the Trust
May – June 2002

Francis A. Raven
May – June 2002

Hall of Honor Inductees for 2002
May – June 2002

Juanita Moody
May – June 2002

Louis W. Tordella
May – June 2002

Before Super-Computers: NSA and Computer Development
May – June 2002

Quis Custodiet Ipsos Custodes?
May – June 2002

Ralph J. Canine
May – June 2002

The TRS Program Part I: The Beginning
May – June 2002

The TRS Program Part II: The Capture of the Pueblo
May – June 2002

Update to Martin and Mitchell Article
May – June 2002

Vietnam: A SIGINT Paradox (Part I)
May – June 2002

Vietnam: A SIGINT Paradox (Part II)
May – June 2002

Collection and Processing at NSA
July – August 2002

From Spring, into a Long Winter’s Night: The Czechoslovakian Crisis of 1968 Part One
July – August 2002

From Spring, into a Long Winter’s Night: The Czechoslovakian Crisis of 1968 Part Two
July – August 2002

Lambros D. Callimahos, Part 1
July – August 2002

Lambros D. Callimahos, Part 2
July – August 2002

Quiz
July – August 2002

KAL-007: The SIGINT Perspective
September – October 2002

A Peek Behind the Scenes: The History of History at NSA (Part 1 of 3)
September-October 2002

A Peek Behind the Scenes: Special Functions In the CCH (Part 2 of 3)
September-October 2002

A Peek Behind the Scenes: Founding of the National Cryptologic Museum (Part 3 of 3)
September-October 2002

Richard A. Day: A Telecommunications Pioneer
September – October 2002

The Soviet Union’s Invasion of Afghanistan,
25 December 1979 – October 2002

Six Decades of Second Party Relations
January – February 2002

NSA’s Field Sites
March – April 2002

A Reconsideration of the Role of SIGINT during the Cuban Missile Crisis, October 1962
March – April 2002, Part 1

A Reconsideration of the Role of SIGINT during the Cuban Missile Crisis, October 1962
March – April 2002, Part 2

A Reconsideration of the Role of SIGINT during the Cuban Missile Crisis, October 1962
March – April 2002, Part 4

Essential for Morale of the Workforce
July – August 2002

The Formation of NSOC
July – August 2002

Nothing Left to Give Up: SIGINT and the Fall of Saigon, April 1975
July – August 2002, Part 1

Nothing Left to Give Up: SIGINT and the Fall of Saigon, April 1975
July – August 2002, Part 2

Operation Billy Budd: NSA and the U.S. Army’s Secret
July – August 2002

The Yom Kippur War of 1973 (Part One)
July – August 2002

The Yom Kippur War of 1973 (Part Two)
July – August 2002

Dining at NSA
September – October 2002

The Time of Investigations
September – October 2002, Part 1

The Time of Investigations
September – October 2002, Part 2

A Brief Look at ELINT at NSA
November – December 2002

Night of the Living Coup: The 18/19 August 1991 Coup in Moscow
November – December 2002

No Such Agency
November – December 2002

NSA’s First Inspector General
November – December 2002

The First Round: NSA’s Effort against International Terrorism in the 1970s
November – December 2002

Velva Klaessy
November – December 2002

2003

Luna 9, the First Soft Landing on the Moon
January – March 2003

The Pre-Pre-Modern Era
January – March 2003

J. Rives Childs
April – June 2003

Save the Bismarck! German Communications Intelligence Support to Operations Rheinubung May 1941
April – June 2003

SIGINT Support to the White House
April – June 2003

The Longest Search: The Story of the Twenty-one-Year Pursuit of the Soviet Deep Space Data Link
April – June 2003

The post Cryptologic Almanac 50th Anniversary Series first appeared on The Black Vault.

Declassified Documents

A History of U.S. Communications Security Volume I [94 Pages, 3.18mb]

A History of U.S. Communications Security Volume II [61 Pages, 2.37mb]

American Cryptology During the Cold War 1945-1989, Book I-IV

The Cryptology of the German Intelligence Services [38 Pages, 2.01mb]

German Clandestine Activities in South America in World War II [78 Pages, 4.80mb]

In the Shadow of War

The Origins of the National Security Agency 1940-1952 [155 Pages, 9.83mb]

Purple Dragon

Spartans in Darkness

Working Against the Tide

The post Cryptology and the United States Intelligence Community first appeared on The Black Vault.

Nash is the subject of the Hollywood movie A Beautiful Mind. The film, loosely based on the biography of the same name, focuses on Nash’s mathematical genius and struggle with paranoid schizophrenia.

All Letters from John Nash to and from the National Security Agency [18 Pages, 6.1 MB]

Loading...

Taking too long?

Reload document

| Open in new tab

Download [6.02 MB]

The post John Forbes Nash, Jr. Letters, National Security Agency first appeared on The Black Vault.

Excerpt

INTRODUCTION: I am one of those “outsiders” I talk about so much in the later chapters of this book. I was fortunate to be brought into the National Security Agency as one of the Center for Cryptologic History’s first Scholars in Residence. I was borrowed from my university because I had spent a decade working on the history of computers at NSA’s predecessors. I even had the courage to write a book about the subject. 

That monograph was on the machines, policies, and relationships that led to the U.S. Navy’s cryptanalytic machine (computer) program in World War II. The book was also about the first major attempts to automate the American library. It had to be about both because the same people built bibliographic and cryptanalytic machines.

My study covered events in the history of the machines through the 1940s, but its focus was on the period between 1930 and 1945. An important conclusion was that the relationship between the efforts of America’s codebreakers and the emergence of the modern digital electronic computer was more complex than had been thought. The navy’s cryptanalysts were in a push-me, pull-me situation. Their work made mechanization a necessity, but the pressures of war and the refusal of the government bureaucracy to sponsor long term research and development programs prevented the navy from becoming the inventor of the modern computer.

During World War II American cryptanalysts built some of the most sophisticated electronic machines in the world, but the need to address cryptanalytic crises blocked them from creating the general-purpose digital electronic computer.

Just as my book was published, I was asked to come to the National Security Agency. One purpose of my year in residence was to see if it was possible to write a complete history of computers at the Agency. The goal was a monograph that covered the entire life of NSA and its predecessors. The thought of finally being able to see the many highly classified documents that had been withheld from me more than balanced the pledge I had to give: I had to promise to refrain from publishing without the approval of NSA’s censors.

Download the Document

Wasn’t All Magic: The Early Struggle to Automate Cryptanalysis [ 362 Pages, 49MB ]

The post Wasn’t All Magic: The Early Struggle to Automate Cryptanalysis first appeared on The Black Vault.