DB COOPER DROP IS A CODE BREAKING CLUE
We need eyes on this!!!
After the FBI released the Dec. 11, 1971, letter last November, Sherwood began studying the possible cyphers in it, using his ASA code-breaking training to search for links to Rackstraw. It took him about two weeks to figure out the code, with the initial lightbulb moment coming when he simply added all the numbers up.
Surfacing out of what appears to be a mishmash of unrelated numbers and letters were Rackstraw’s Vietnam military units: the 371st Radio Research Unit and the 11th General Support Company, as well as the Army Security Agency.
It wasn’t a sophisticated code, but Sherwood wasn’t surprised that the FBI couldn’t crack it in the early 1970s, “because it would have made no sense to them. For the FBI to do it, they’d have to know a lot about the individual. I was trying to connect the numbers and letters to him.”
Could Sherwood have accidentally created this solution to the code because he was trying to find a connection to Rackstraw?
“It’s not impossible,” Sherwood says. “But what are the odds that these digits would add up to this? Astronomical. A million to one. Rackstraw didn’t think anyone would be able to break it.”
(Sherwood walked The Oregonian through the code-breaking process he used, with the understanding that the details wouldn’t be included in this article, since they’re a key part of the second D.B. Cooper documentary Colbert is working on.)
https://www.oregonlive.com/history/2018/01/db_cooper_letter_recently_rele.html