[Amps] U.S. Military chooses Harris

[gdaught6@stanford.edu]

On 27 Apr 2005 at 16:29, Joe Isabella wrote:

> Depends how "embedded" the crypto is.  Unless it's an easily removed
> module, it will never be surplussed out.

That may be, but as James Bond says, "Never say never."  When I was 
in the Air Force, our planes had a secret radar transponder called an 
APX-6, if I recall correctly.  (Now, all commercial airliners carry a 
modern version and it's a good thing!  Air Traffic Control uses them 
routinely to identify your plane's individual "blip" on their radar 
scopes.)  The APX-6 had a shotgun-shell sort of a self-destruct 
thingie we were to use to make sure the intact set didn't fall into 
the wrong hands.  [AF OF's, am I remembering this approximately 
correctly?]   A number of years ago, I noticed that the manuals for 
the sets were still classified, but you could buy the transponder 
sets on the surplus market!

73,

George T. Daughters, K6GT