Vince Houghton PhD, Director, National Cryptologic Museum, Describes the Exhibits in Reopened Museum

Interview of Friday, 20 January 2023 of Vince Houghton PhD, Director/Curator, National Cryptologic Museum, NSA, former Historian/Curator International Spy Museum. Interviewer - Host: James Hughes, AFIO President, a former CIA Operations Officer.

TOPIC: Vince Houghton and Jim Hughes discuss all the changes made while the National Cryptologic Museum was closed during the pandemic. So many changes that it is fair to call it the "All New" National Cryptologic Museum. New one-of-a-kind items pulled out or declassified from NSA archives and now on display include: The DEC Alpha which made THE nuclear codes; the MP37 which made the “Biscuit” or the “Cookie” for subs, bombers, and ICBMs; the ill-fated Challenger mission encryption system pulled from the wreckage; The Bombe -- the only remaining 4-rotor bomb for breaking German submarine comms; The Hitler Enigma -- the only remaining B-variant Enigma; The Purple Analog built to break Japanese Purple system; the original manuscript of Herbert Yardley’s American Black Chamber; the original Jefferson Cipher device.
The interview runs 20 minutes and includes several Q&As.
More about the National Cryptologic Museum can be found here: https://www.nsa.gov/museum/

BIOS:
VINCE HOUGHTON PhD is the Director, National Cryptologic Museum. He is the former Historian and Curator of the International Spy Museum. He has a PhD in Diplomatic and Military History from the University of Maryland, where his research centered on US scientific and technological intelligence (nuclear intelligence) in the Second World War and early Cold War. His Masters, also from the University of Maryland, focused on the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union. He has taught extensively at the middle school, high school, and university level, most recently at the University of Maryland, where he taught courses on the history of US Intelligence, US Diplomatic History, the Cold War, and the History of Science. Vince is a veteran of the United States Army, and served in the Balkans, where he worked closely with both civilian and military intelligence agencies in several capacities.
Dr. Houghton has made numerous media appearances, on a variety of media platforms. These include CNN, NBC News, Fox News, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, The Travel Channel, The History Channel, The American Heroes Channel, Vanity Fair, Maxim, ESPN.com, and many more.
Dr. Houghton has spoken publicly on hundreds of occasions. Audiences ranged from middle school and high school students, to the general public, to practitioners and experts in the field. Audience size ranged from dozens to hundreds.
Author of two books: Nuking the Moon (Penguin, 2019), and the Nuclear Spies (Cornell UP, 2019)

JAMES R. HUGHES currently serves as the 17th President of AFIO. His service began January 2015. He had a career of US Government service spanning 37 years in numerous foreign countries with a particular focus in the Middle East. He started in U.S. Military Intelligence in the late 1960s and then joined the CIA’s Clandestine Service. He served overseas as a Chief of Station several times, and at CIA Headquarters in a number of senior management positions, including as Chief of the Near East and South Asia Division, in the Directorate of Operations [today’s National Clandestine Service]. He was also named the Associate Deputy Director of Operations (ADDO) at the National Security Agency, 1998-99. Following his retirement from the government in 2005, he joined EDS in Herndon, Virginia, as the Client Industry Executive for the U.S. Intelligence Community. After the HP acquisition of EDS, he continued to serve in a similar capacity until his retirement in 2012. His parents were missionaries in Turkey in the 1950s, where Jim spent his formative years. He is fluent in Arabic.

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