During the Vietnam War, North Vietnamese intelligence units sometimes
succeeded in penetrating Allied communications systems, and they could
monitor Allied message traffic from within. But sometimes they did
more than that.
On several occasions "the communists were able, by communicating on
Allied radio nets, to call in Allied artillery or air strikes on
American units."
That is just one passing observation (at p. 392) in an exhaustive
history of American signals intelligence (SIGINT) in the Vietnam War
that has just been declassified and released by the National Security
Agency.
From the first intercepted cable -- a 1945 message from Ho Chi Minh to
Joseph Stalin -- to the final evacuation of SIGINT personnel from
Saigon, the 500-page NSA volume, called "Spartans in Darkness," retells
the history of the Vietnam War from the perspective of signals
intelligence.
The most sensational part of the history (which was excerpted and
disclosed by the NSA two years ago) is the recounting of the 1964 Gulf
of Tonkin Incident, in which a reported North Vietnamese attack on U.S.
forces triggered a major escalation of the war. The author demonstrates
that not only is it not true, as Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara
told Congress, that the evidence of an attack was "unimpeachable," but
that to the contrary, a review of the classified signals intelligence
proves that "no attack happened that night."
Several other important Vietnam War-era episodes are elucidated by the
contribution of SIGINT, including the Tet Offensive, the attempted
rescue of U.S. prisoners of war from Son Tay prison, and more.
The author, Robert J. Hanyok, writes in a lively, occasionally florid
style that is accessible even to those who are not well-versed in the
history of SIGINT or Vietnam.
The 2002 study was released in response to a Mandatory Declassification
Review request filed by Michael Ravnitzky. About 95% of the document
was declassified. (Unfortunately, several of the pages were poorly
reproduced by NSA and are difficult to read. A cleaner, clearer copy
will need to be obtained.)
See "Spartans in Darkness: American SIGINT and the Indochina War,
1945-1975" by Robert J. Hanyok, Center for Cryptologic History,
National Security Agency, 2002:
http://www.fas.org/irp/nsa/spartans/index.html
Some background on the Tonkin Gulf Incident from the National Security
Archive with links to related documents may be found here:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB132/press20051201.htm
succeeded in penetrating Allied communications systems, and they could
monitor Allied message traffic from within. But sometimes they did
more than that.
On several occasions "the communists were able, by communicating on
Allied radio nets, to call in Allied artillery or air strikes on
American units."
That is just one passing observation (at p. 392) in an exhaustive
history of American signals intelligence (SIGINT) in the Vietnam War
that has just been declassified and released by the National Security
Agency.
From the first intercepted cable -- a 1945 message from Ho Chi Minh to
Joseph Stalin -- to the final evacuation of SIGINT personnel from
Saigon, the 500-page NSA volume, called "Spartans in Darkness," retells
the history of the Vietnam War from the perspective of signals
intelligence.
The most sensational part of the history (which was excerpted and
disclosed by the NSA two years ago) is the recounting of the 1964 Gulf
of Tonkin Incident, in which a reported North Vietnamese attack on U.S.
forces triggered a major escalation of the war. The author demonstrates
that not only is it not true, as Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara
told Congress, that the evidence of an attack was "unimpeachable," but
that to the contrary, a review of the classified signals intelligence
proves that "no attack happened that night."
Several other important Vietnam War-era episodes are elucidated by the
contribution of SIGINT, including the Tet Offensive, the attempted
rescue of U.S. prisoners of war from Son Tay prison, and more.
The author, Robert J. Hanyok, writes in a lively, occasionally florid
style that is accessible even to those who are not well-versed in the
history of SIGINT or Vietnam.
The 2002 study was released in response to a Mandatory Declassification
Review request filed by Michael Ravnitzky. About 95% of the document
was declassified. (Unfortunately, several of the pages were poorly
reproduced by NSA and are difficult to read. A cleaner, clearer copy
will need to be obtained.)
See "Spartans in Darkness: American SIGINT and the Indochina War,
1945-1975" by Robert J. Hanyok, Center for Cryptologic History,
National Security Agency, 2002:
http://www.fas.org/irp/nsa/spartans/index.html
Some background on the Tonkin Gulf Incident from the National Security
Archive with links to related documents may be found here:
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB132/press20051201.htm
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