Ever read "The Puzzle Palace" about NSA?

[masraum]

I'm reading The Puzzle Palace (Amazon, wikipedia) now. My dad was a CT (cryptologic technician) in the Navy. He never told me anything about what he did other than that it had to do with code, and that he listened to the other guys. I was always proud of the fact that he was so tight lipped about what he did, but I would have loved to know more. A guy at work was in the Marines and apparently, did the same or a very closely related job. He's the one that told me about the Puzzle Palace. My dad passed away years ago, but my mom says that when the puzzle palace came out, they weren't allowed to be seen with the book.

It's fascinating stuff, and was apparently, pretty much all information that was not classified when the author did his research until the NSA found out how much was out there and then reclassified a ton of it.

We were in Misawa japan for 2 tours when I was younger. Misawa was part of the echelon project per wikipedia.


Rota, Spain was another tour.


3 of the places that we lived had similar antennas. They've all since been dismantled because they are outdated.

He spent a tour in the DC area. I have no idea where he actually worked when he was there.

It's nice to get a little glimpse of what he was involved in.

It's an interesting book, that covers info about the US intelligence community going way, way back and up through to around 1980 or so. I guess I'll have to search out the stuff that Snowdon released to learn anything more recent.

[motion]

Nice post and interesting stuff about your pops.

I was involved with Air Force intelligence technology circa 1981-1983 (AFCC). I'll have to grab a copy of the book.