No Subject

> 
>The Navajo/Na Dene codetalkers (WW II) developed a real arcane jargon,
>so I was told.  Maybe it was because the conditions of war were
>completely different than their language's environment so they
>were forced to invent words, or maybe they thought it was a good
>idea, or whatever.  But I believe transcripts of their transmissions
>are often mostly unintelligible to native Navajo speakers who weren't in
>the know.
>
>
>
It is my understanding that the codetalkers invented very few new words,
they simply combined the words they already had to create descriptions of
things that the language was never meant for. One of the reasons they were
so successful was that more than one phrase could mean the same thing. For
example, both 

"A flock of eagles with fire in their bellies is coming from the rising sun"

and

"Many birds are flying from the east to rain fire on you"

Could reliably be translated to "There are bombers coming from the east"

Add some new words for specifics that you needed (like altitudes and compass
directions) and the codetalkers presented the bad guys with a language that
was completely unrelated to anything they had heard before.

Also (I copied this from RSA) "The Navaho language is so difficult to learn
and its linguistics are so complex that it is virtually impossible for a
non-native speaker to counterfeit its sounds. Furthermore, Navaho seems to
have no linguistic connections to any other Asian or European language.
Consequently, at any given time, there are only a few thousand people
capable of speaking the tongue. For these reasons, the U.S. military made
extensive use of hundreds of Native American codetalkers . During World War
II, Navaho codetalkers relayed operational orders in the Pacific theater
with a level of security that was unattainable by current encryption
algorithms. The Japanese signal corps task was further complicated by the
codetalkers liberal mix-in of Navaho and military slang resulting in a
communications network so secure that it was, in fact, never compromised by
Axis powers." 

In my stone age level of Crypto understanding I would liken this to having a
public key that was the Navajo culture and an algorithm to process it that
only runs on the human brain. Makes me wonder when somebody will set two AI
computers down and tell them to invent a code we can't break.

dwl@hnc.com		
David Loysen		
619-546-8877 x245

Is there any indication that the GRU or Chinese or Iranian intelligence 
(I think these are our only foes nowadays who have blue-water {to mix a 
metaphor} spook services) could do better than the Japanese did in 
sigint'ing against human speakers of Navajoe?

Is the Navajo language still extent among draft-age men?  Life in the 
Southwest has changed considerably since 1943.

Alan:

On Sat, 30 Mar 1996, Alan Horowitz wrote:

> Is there any indication that the GRU or Chinese or Iranian intelligence 
> (I think these are our only foes nowadays who have blue-water {to mix a

	What about the Allies, and alleged allies of the US.
	Canada, Britian, Israel?   << Why assume that only
	non-allies will want to conduct any sort of sigint
	against human speakers of Navajo.
 
> metaphor} spook services) could do better than the Japanese did in 
> sigint'ing against human speakers of Navajoe?

	Have the Chinese turned their thought towards cryptography,
	or cryptanalysis yet?   If so, I suspect the answer is 
	yes,  If not, then the answer is a definate No.

	The Chinese Intelligence Service traditionally has 
	not looked outward, preferring to ply its trade domestically.
	That said, the earliest extant text on espionage is Chinese. 


> Is the Navjo language still extent among draft-age men?  Life in the 
> Southwest has changed considerably since 1943.

	I suspect more anglos can speak Navajo now, than during WW2 -- both
	numerically, and as a percentage of the population. 
	<< Some americans do think a second languages is useful, unlike
	some people on this list.   Admittedly, the US still has
	a far way to catchup to the European idea of what a 
	literate person is.  >> 


        xan

        jonathon
        grafolog@netcom.com

On Sat, 30 Mar 1996, Jonathon Blake wrote:

> 	Alan:
> 
> On Sat, 30 Mar 1996, Alan Horowitz wrote:
> 
> > metaphor} spook services) could do better than the Japanese did in 
> > sigint'ing against human speakers of Navajoe?
> 
> 	Have the Chinese turned their thought towards cryptography,
> 	or cryptanalysis yet?   If so, I suspect the answer is 
> 	yes,  If not, then the answer is a definate No.
> 
> 	The Chinese Intelligence Service traditionally has 
> 	not looked outward, preferring to ply its trade domestically.
> 	That said, the earliest extant text on espionage is Chinese. 

This is not strictly true.

The Chinese are widely reputed to have penetrated both Japanese and 
Russian services quite completely.  Their industrial espionage has been far 
reaching (United States, U.K., Germany) and their political disruptive and 
fund raising activites have included fully funding arms dealers in 
California and all over the western United States.

In the mid 80s several "former" Chinese intelligence officers appeared 
in California and opened gun shops.  Their prices on Chinese made weapons 
were so low that compeditors couldn't figure out how it was done.  
Finally someone did some poking around and found that the Chinese 
government was literally giving the weapons to the agents, allowing them 
to keep something like 80% of the profits.  Really quite a clever (and 
typically communist) scheme.

"The capitalist pigs will destroy themselves with our guns and pay us 
for the favor.  Muahahah!"

20/20 and Frontline both did pieces on the operation.

Bottom line:  The Chinese have often extended their intelligence 
operations beyond their borders, even boldly.

>         xan
> 
>         jonathon
>         grafolog@netcom.com

---
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"In fact, had Bancroft not existed,       potestas scientiae in usu est
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00B9289C28DC0E55  E16D5378B81E1C96 - Finger for Current Key Information

Black Unicorn wrote:
[..]
> Bottom line:  The Chinese have often extended their intelligence
> operations beyond their borders, even boldly.

I remember after Tiannamen Sq. many protests/meetings help by Chinese 
were semi-secret or they did their best to keep cameras out, or in many 
of the public ones people disquised themselves (from wigs and makeup to 
outright bandanas or bags over their faces) because of fear that the 
Chinese authorities would see them and persecute relatives who were still 
there.

ObCPunk: Anonimity is important not just in the cybernetic aether.