Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-09T05:41:47.615Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The International Telegraph Conference of Brussels and the Problem of Code Language

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2017

Irvin Stewart
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The first telegraph had been in operation only a short time when a code was made available to the users of the new instrument. From that time to the present, codes for use in electrical communications have appeared in ever-increasing number. Two principal objects have been sought and achieved by their use: secrecy and economy. To the business man, the second of these objects is paramount; and code-makers have constantly endeavored to express an increasing amount of information in a given number of letters.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , April 1929 , pp. 292 - 306
Copyright
Copyright ©American Society of International Law 1929

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Report on the History of the Use of Codes and Code Language, the International Telegraph Regulations pertaining thereto, and the Bearing of This History on the Cortina Report, by Major William F. Friedman, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1928. Document No. 1 of the Brussels Conference, presented by the Belgian delegation, contains a brief summary of the action with reference to code language taken by the various telegraph conferences.

2 International Telegraph Regulations, Article 8 (Article 9 of the Paris revision); Article 19 (21), § 4.

3 Ibid., Art. 8, § 2.

4 Ibid., Art. 9 (10).

5 International Telegraph Regulations, Article 8 (Article 9 of the Paris revision); Article 19 (21), § 7.

6 Ibid., Art. 19 (21), § 3.

7 Friedman, op. cit., pp. 51, 52.

8 Friedman, op. cit., pp. 40–43.

9 “Neither is the clerk in a position to determine whether the pronounceability rule is observed or not, because he does not know the languages from which the words for code language may have been drawn. On the other hand, senders manage with facial contortions to pronounce words which contain up to four or five consecutive consonants, whence arise discussions between senders and telegraph clerks with a noticeable loss of time.” Statement of the Chairman, August 3,1926, Documents of the Committee for the Study of Code Language, Part IV, p. 15, English translation, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1928. Citations hereafter are to the English translation and will be given as Cortina Documents.

10 Taken from a long list of similar combinations which had been presented at the Amsterdam office in December, 1925, Cortina Documents, Part II, pp. 67–69. A similar list compiled by Belgian authorities appears ibid., pp. 53–58. For a criticism of the pronounceability rule from the standpoint of its difficulty of application, see Friedman, pp. 43–50.

11 Op cit., p. 54. He also mentions XYSNIGNIIMN, ALLLLAAALA, and AWKMNEPNE15 as other examples from the English language (p. 45).

12 Cortina Documents, Part I, p. 1.

13 Ibid.

14 Cortina Documents, Part I, p. 15.

15 “The European system includes all the countries of Europe, with Algeria and those territories outside Europe which are declared by the respective Administrations to belong to the European system. The extra-European system includes all countries other than those indicated in the previous paragraph.” Telegraph Regulations, Article 23, §§ 2 and 3.

16 Cortina Documents, Part I, p. 10.

17 Ibid., p. 13.

18 Data accumulated by the Berne Bureau prior to the reassembling of the Committee of Study is published as Part II of the Cortina Documents. Proposals submitted in the course of the committee’s sessions at Cortina constitute Part III of the Documents. At the second plenary session at Cortina, August 3, 1926, the chairman summarized the information obtained by the questionnaire. Cortina Documents, Part IV, pp. 15–27.

19 The conclusions of the committee on the subjects covered by the questionnaire are printed in its report, published as one of the Cortina Documents.

20 Cortina Documents, Part IV, p. 138.

21 Ibid., Report, p. 12.

22 At the Brussels Conference the results of this inquiry were presented. They showed that the coefficient x for the European régime should be 88.5%; for the extra-European régime, 66%. The coefficient y for the European régime should be 64.9%; for the extra-European régime, 60%. Through an oversight, these figures were never incorporated in the procès verbaux; they are to be found in the report of the American delegation.

The information obtained by the United States pursuant to a similar inquiry was published under the title Delegation of the United States of America to the International Telegraph Conference of Brussels, Tabulations of Data Furnished by American Users of the International Communication Facilities in Response to a Questionnaire Based on the Cortina Majority Report, Washington, Government Printing Office, 1928. The tabulations showed that for the firms consulted, a coefficient of 57% applied to Cortina plan No. 1 (coefficient x) would result in an average decrease in cost of 1.69%, while a coefficient of 58% would result in an average increase in cost of .04%. It was pointed out that for individual customers the results would vary widely; thus a coefficient of 60% would result in a decrease in cost of 14.15% to one firm and an increase of 15.48% to another. About 500 firms replied to the questionnaire, and their answers show the importance which they attached to the subject.

23 For a justification of the majority position see the Report, Annex III, pp. 27–34.

24 For a statement of the British objections to the majority position and a defense of the British proposal, see the Report, Annex II, pp. 22–26.

25 Cortina Documents, Part I, p. 2.

26 Ibid., Part II, p. 21, and Part IV, p. 15.

27 For a brief account of the fate of the Cortina Report at the Washington Conference see an article in this Journal, Vol. 22, p. 28, at p. 38, entitled The International Radiotelegraph Conference of Washington.

28 Conférence télégraphique internationale de Bruxelles, 1928, Document No. 4. Subsequent citations will be to Brussels Documents followed by the number of the document.

29 Brussels Document No. 5. A similar proposal had been made by Sweden prior to the Cortina sessions; see Cortina Documents, Part II, pp. 22–25.

30 Brussels Document No. 10, Sept. 12.

31 See supra, p. 297. Clause (d) related to the authority which should ascertain whether the pronounceability rule had been met.

32 Brussels Document No. 21, Sept. 14.

33 New York Times, Sept. 15, 1928.

34 For the position of the United States, Canada and Nicaragua, see Brussels Document No. 21.

35 Brussels Document No. 31, Sept. 17.

36 Ibid., No. 34, Sept. 17.

37 Ibid., No. 23, Sept. 15.

38 Ibid., No. 26, Sept. 15.

39 Ibid., No. 16, Sept. 14.

40 Ibid., No. 21, Sept. 14.

41 Ibid., No. 36, Sept. 18.

42 Ibid., No. 40, Sept. 18.

43 Ibid., No. 52, Sept. 20.

44 Ibid., No. 40, Sept. 18.

45 See p. 296, supra.

46 Brussels Document No. 11, Sept. 12; No. 34, Sept. 17.

47 Brussels Document No. 10, Sept. 12; No. 34, Sept. 17.

48 Ibid., No. 20, Sept. 14.

49 Ibid., No. 21, Sept. 14.

50 Ibid., No. 33, Sept. 17.

51 Ibid., No. 19, Sept. 14. Compare these figures with those recommended by the Cortina Committee, footnote 22, supra.

52 Ibid., No. 12, Sept. 12. This figure was based on a study of 1,750,000 words; ibid., No. 40.

53 Ibid., No. 27, Sept. 15; No. 34, Sept. 17.

54 Ibid., No. 34, Sept. 17. The proposal would give customers the option of using a ten-letter word at full rate.

55 Ibid., No. 24, Sept. 15.

56 Ibid., No. 37, Sept. 18.

57 Ibid., No. 40, Sept. 18.

58 Ibid., No. 38.

59 Brussels Document No. 42.

60 Ibid., No. 45.

61 Ibid., No. 31, Sept. 17.

62 Ibid., No. 41, Sept. 18.

63 Ibid., No. 44, Sept. 19.

64 Ibid., No. 46, Sept. 19.

65 E.g.,Japan, China, and Czechoslovakia at the sixth plenary session, Sept. 20; ibid., No. 52.

66 See the debates in the sixth plenary session; ibid., No. 52.

67 Ibid.,No. 60, Sept. 24. The cöefficient established by the committee was approved by a separate vote of 40 affirmative to 9 negative with 6 abstentions. The report of the American delegation to the Conference, together with an English translation of the protocol adopted, was released by the Department of State on October 18, 1928.

68 Ibid., No. 43, Sept. 19.

69 Ibid., No. 49 and No. 51, Sept. 20.

70 The companies stated their positions at the sixth plenary session, Sept. 20; ibid., No. 52.

71 The report of the American delegation contains on page 6 the following statement: “Telegraphic inquiries were instituted to determine by reference to actual code telegrams how seriously the requirement that ten-letter code words must contain at least three vowels would affect modern five-letter codes. The results of such inquiries by the British delegation, the Belgian delegation, and others showed that a relatively insignificant percentage of code words contained less than three vowels.”

72 It has been stated that the new regulations governing the construction of five-letter groups will permit the compilers to put into five letters the meaning at present conveyed by two five-letter words in combination. This has been denied by a leading code expert who anticipates that codes will become more extensive but believes that the increase in “condensing power” will probably be not more than 33% to 50%.

73 To become effective, the protocol will have to be ratified by all of the parties to the Telegraph Convention. At the present time it appears possible that the necessary unanimity may not be obtained.