Station HYPO

Today, the Navy Cyber Warfare Development Group officially changed its name to the Navy Cryptologic Warfare Development Group (NCWDG), marking the latest evolution in the organization’s storied history of supporting Naval Information Warfare.

During World War II, Fort Hunt was the location of a top-secret military intelligence installation (P.O. Box 1142), where high value German captives were interrogated, and means were developed for the escape of captured U.S. servicemen. After the War, some German scientists who chose to come to the U.S. rather than go to the Soviet Union were debriefed at Fort Hunt. Thereafter, almost all the buildings were leveled and the servicemen who worked there sworn to secrecy. As a result, no one knew the importance of what had occurred there until the 1990s, when the information was declassified. Even now, information is only slowly coming to light.

OTD: the first use of transatlantic telegraphic cable generated an upsurge in commercial cryptography. Initially messages on the 1858 cable were sent by an operator in Morse code. However, the 1866 cable could transmit at eight words a minute–80 times faster than the 1858 cable.

The Cold War was a contest not only of military might but of intelligence. While spy planes and satellites often steal the spotlight in histories of espionage, some of the most effective intelligence-gathering platforms were far less conspicuous. Among these unsung platforms was the USS Atakapa (ATF-149) — a fleet ocean tug that, for a brief but critical period, played a key role in Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) collection for the U.S. Navy. Though designed for towing and salvage, Atakapa’s quiet deployment into the world of covert surveillance reveals a hidden dimension of naval operations during the height of U.S.-Soviet tensions.

The AN/USQ-124 Tactical Intelligence (TACINTEL) System was a computerized message processing system that made it possible to transmit and receive special intelligence (SI) message traffic via satellite in a controlled environment while simultaneously screening two predetermined subchannels of the Fleet Broadcast transmissions.