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The interception of Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto's planes was indeed at the
result of code-breaking.  The interception was carried out by 16 Lockheed
P-38 Lightnings (a twin-engine fighter with very long range.) of the USAAL
347th based at Henderson Field in the Salomon islands.   On 18 April, 1943,
four days after the message was intercepted by Magic, they intercepted the
2 Japanese Mitsubishi G4M "Betty" bombers carrying Yamamoto and his
entourage in a tour of the installations around Bougainville.   This was
the longest interception ever carried out at that time (1,000 miles).  The
feat was kept secret until after the war was over as one of the pilots had
a brother who was a captive of the Japanese at the time.  In 1943, the
longest range fighter was the P-38 Lighting, a design by Clarence "Kelly"
Johnson who also designed the P-80, the F-104, the U-2 and the SR-71.

In terms of sheer distance covered by such a small (relatively) plane,
timing and impact of the mission, this ranks right up there with the
exploits of the Avro Vulcan of Black Buck fame during the Falklands war
(16Hrs 8,000 miles) and the B-52 mission from Barksdale, Louisiana to Iraq
and back which started Operation Desert Storm (35 hrs, 14,000miles).

As a final note, Yamamoto was against the war with America. He figured that
if Japan did not achieve its objectives within 6 months, they would
ultimately lose the war.  He decided to lead the attack on Pearl Harbor
because Japan was going to do it anyways, and he believed himself to be the
best person to plan it and carry it out.  Once the attack was over,
Yamamoto was recorded as saying "We have awakened a sleeping giant and have
instilled in it a terrible resolve."  He was right!

I recommend "Enigma" by Robert Harris.  An excellent novel with a plot
interwoven with lots of technical details about the goings on at Bletchley
Park and the process of deciphering Enigma.  Incidentally, you may wish to
visit http://www.cranfield.ac.uk/ccc/bpark/morebpark.htm

Now some of you may think, what does all this have to do with computers?
 Well, arguably the first computer ever designed and used was the Colossus,
the first electronic valve computer.  Visit
http://www.cranfield.ac.uk/ccc/bpark/colossus.htm

Kind regards,

Denys. . .

Denys Beauchemin
HICOMP America, Inc.
(800) 323-8863  (281) 288-7438         Fax: (281) 355-6879
denys at hicomp.com                             www.hicomp.com


-----Original Message-----
From:   Jerry Fochtman [SMTP:[log in to unmask]]
Sent:   Monday, 22 June, 1998 10:05 AM
To:     [log in to unmask]
Subject:        Re: Re[2]: New version of QCTerm available

At 03:44 PM 6/12/98 -0700, toback2 wrote:
>Both the German Enigma and the Japanese Purple were
>solved analytically, using a known-plaintext attack. In fact, Enigma was
>reconstructed by analysis well before the first one was ever captured.
>Both attacks relied on weaknesses in the system, not weaknesses in the
>algorithm, and the system is only partially under your control. (When the
>systems were improved, as in the German naval cryptosystems, analysis
>sometimes used a chosen-plaintext attack.) British codes were almost
>trivial to solve by analysis, and the Germans were doing so regularly
>until about 1943.

I seem to recall a number of other interesting aspect of encrpytion during
WWII.  I believe we succeeded in breaking the Japanese code and shortly
thereafter intercepted a message of a trip that Admiral Yamamoto (sp?) was
to
take flying to a Japanese held island in the South Pacific.  The U.S. then
sent out a squadron which intercepted and shot down the plane carrying
the man who planned and carried-out the attack on Pearl Harbor.

In turn, the top-security encryption used by the U.S. during WWII was never
compromised.  The message was first translated into the Navajo language
then
encrypted.  So even if the message was decrypted they couldn't be sure
because
the language itself wasn't widely known or understood.  I seem to remember
that the Navajo language itself had never been documented either and was
only known to these native Americans.  I believe the U.S. had a number of
Navajo in the service solely for this level of classified communications.

I can't recall all the specifics, don't have all by cryptography material
here....

/jf
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                          Monday, June 22nd

           Today in 1944 - The "G.I Bill of Rights" granting educational
                           and vocational benefits was passed.

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