Talk:Joseph Rochefort

Untitled

This article is now displaying in both a sans serif font and, interspersed with it, a typewriter face font. The difference doesn't seem to consistently be related to recent edits, and is generally odd. Does anyone have any suggestions as to what's going on? The browser doing this is IE 5.00.3502.1000 and until this article it had been displaying WP content satisfactorily. Ideas? ww 18:20, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I think it was the ">" and "<"'s looking like a <code> tag; I think Snoyes' edit fixed this. — Matt 18:30, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Thomas Dyer

This article links to the wrong Thomas Dyer (quite evident if you follow the link). I don't know how to fix this...perhaps someone else can?

I've gone and disambiguated it, although I don't think we yet have an article on the cryptanalyst. — Matt Crypto 23:56, 12 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Atribution

Parts of this page are verbatim from the NSA's web site, http://www.nsa.gov/honor/honor00025.cfm. Shouldn't this be noted on the page? --Tms 19:34, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, probably. We're allowed to use their text freely (it's public domain, being a work of the US government), and the origin is in the page history, but I've added a note at the bottom. — Matt Crypto 22:57, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Which is correct?

The article credits two different men with identifying Midway as the target.

• Fifth paragraph -- "It was one of the Station HYPO staff, Jasper Holmes, who had the idea of faking a water supply failure on Midway Island with a cleartext emergency warning, provoking Japanese JN-25 traffic on the subject, thus testing whether Midway was a target or not. The Japanese took the bait and broadcast instructions for additional water desalinization equipment to be loaded for the code group for the major attack point, thus confirming a Midway attack."

• Two paragraphs on -- "An ingenious suggestion by Rochefort, gave Admiral Nimitz confirmation of AF's identity."

Which is accurate? Moriori 03:23, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Good catch. Jasper's book, Double-Edged Secrets, implies the idea was his, & I've heard him credited with it. It would've gone to Joe, & from him to Layton (Fleet intel officer), & from Layton to Nimitz. If somebody can confirm Jasper originated the idea (I haven't read Layton's book), this might help clear it up.

Also, how solid is the use of compromised cypher? Jasper implies it was en clair (which I simply can't believe).

On another note, can somebody name the "Midway base commander"? I'd say he deserves a credit... Trekphiler 06:19, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Layton, p. 421, attributes the idea to Holmes, who was familiar with the island's facilities, and also says the fake message was sent in the clear. Tms (talk) 07:31, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

Not much of a source, but the film Midway indicates it was sent in the clear.--Daysleeper47 (talk) 13:39, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

re: comment

It's an unsourced comment, and not a terribly convincing one. There are similarities in the design of a nation's cryptographic systems, and without knowledge on the relation of Purple and Red to IJN ciphers, how much access to the knowledge contained in Red or Purple would've helped Rochefort is not known, but quite plausible. Also, there are similarities in the formatting of plaintext that would also have been helpful. Given the military bent of the Japanese government, it's not unlikely that there would've been crossover. Indeed, one of the great breaks of WW2 was the use of Purple decrypts of Japanese diplomatic code to get good evaluations of German military defenses in Normandy. Very strange things can happen in the world of intelligence, and it's not our place to interject uninformed commentary into the article. Informed commentary should, of course, be properly cited and sourced - in this regard, if somebody could track down the David Kahn remark in the comment, and see if there's anything to it, that would be helpful. Ray^Talk 20:41, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

You're missing the point. It's not about the crypto system, it's about the content: PURPLE wouldn't have contained anything about the attack, because it was a diplomatic cypher, not a military one. I've seen the same apparent misconstrual elsewhere, & it's unhelpful to understanding the matter. As for "unsourced", it's only because I can't find it again... TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 21:00, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

If Turner could deduce that the order on PURPLE to burn documents and papers meant war, then surely Layton and Rochefort could have deduced the same and formulated a thesis to prove. Little clues on PURPLE may have given them a path to follow. As for the comment: "That this would have helped is in question.", and the placement of said: You are making the reader make up his own mind that it would have helped. The choice of words and the placement of statements can move the reader in one direction or another (think jury trial; advertising, political statements, etc.). You (whether intended or not) force the reader to germinate a thought in their mind that had they had access to PURPLE that it would have helped them. Spock knows this all to well. > Best O Fortuna (talk) 21:53, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

War, yes. Attack on Pearl Harbor, no. And it's the attack that's being discussed, not the war. The clues in PURPLE were about the war. There were clues to be found about Pearl, too, but they weren't in PURPLE, they were in the J-19 traffic, which ONI wasn't paying attention to, because it was too low priority & they didn't have the manpower. And I'm not suggesting PURPLE would help; the previous sentence, saying they were denied it, is doing that, & it's a false proposition (tho a common error). I mean to refute. TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 22:01, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to insist on a seriously authoritative source for this, and even then, I'm very skeptical. It's an elementary maxim of cryptanalysis that access to an adversary's plaintext supplies a lot of helpful information that can aid in breaking other systems. It might be the cryptosystems that are similar. It might be some clue in the formatting, or just plaintexts enciphered in different systems (cribs). It might be keying material inadvertently reused. All of these have happened. You can't just go out there and declare, counterfactually, that you're sure PURPLE would've been of no use whatever to Rochefort and his team. Ray^Talk 03:17, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

"You can't just go out there and declare, counterfactually, that you're sure PURPLE would've been of no use whatever to Rochefort and his team." I'm not. You are. I'm repeating what David Kahn is quoted as saying (only I can't recall where he said it...but he calls it a "purple herring"), & I suggest he'd know better than both of us. He says, & I've repeated, it's in doubt how much use it would have been. And it's not about the crypto system, it's about the content of the messages. I presume Kahn understands the distinction. I also presume whatever PURPLE traffic there was would be available to Rochefort & his team, & whatever lessons may've been learnable would be taken by them. If you want to add a mention of that, with source, feel free. As for the value of PURPLE, have a look at this: "of no use". (Yes, it's a paysite...) TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 05:48, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

Is it in here:

• Kahn, David (1996), The Codebreakers: The Story of Secret Writing (2 ed.), Simon & Schuster, ISBN 978-0684831305

> Best O Fortuna (talk) 08:20, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

It's more recent than that (unless I'm mistaken, that's just a reprint of the '67 ed). I have a hunch it's quoted in the intro to Smith's The Emperor's Codes, but I don't have a copy handy. TREKphiler ^{any time you're ready, Uhura} 19:30, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

The 1967 version was updated and revised. > Best O Fortuna (talk) 02:03, 10 February 2012 (UTC)

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WW1 service

He enlisted in early 1918 so he is also considered a WW1 veteran. As anyone who enlisted before November 11,1918 is considered a WW 1 veteran. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.104.95.120 (talk) 18:06, 24 March 2020 (UTC)

Double listing?

“Battle of Midway Edit After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Navy cryptographers, with assistance from both British cryptographers at the Far East Combined Bureau (in Singapore; later Colombo, Kenya, Colombo), and Dutch cryptographers (in the Dutch East Indies), combined to break enough“

Colombo is listed twice. I’m unsure if that’s an accident or on purpose. I’m also unsure what it stands for? Just thought someone should see it. ADHDBear (talk) 02:40, 9 March 2021 (UTC)