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World War II tactics could help in war against rhino poaching

14th March 2014

By: Terry Mackenzie-hoy

  

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Iam sure you will not know what ‘Anna Numbers’ are. If you enter Google to search for them, you will find that there are many hits but none related specifically to Anna Numbers.

Anna Numbers were, in fact, the numbers that the Germans gave to the various radio crystals used in German radio transmitters during World War II. When notifying the army or air force that transmission frequencies were changing, it would be a bit stupid to transmit the actual frequency (66 MHz, for example) and so the radio crystal which related to the frequency was given a number, known by the British as an Anna Number.

A young man, Professor RV Jones, worked out the correlation and used it to assist with jamming German transmissions. Hold this thought. Then, in 1942, the German Luftwaffe launched attacks on London by V1 flying bombs – an early version of a cruise missile. Over 1 000 were launched in the following year. It became very important for the British to know if the bombs were accurately aimed or just placed on a launch pad and pointed in the direction of London.

RD Clarke, of the Prudential Assurance Company, carried out a mathematical analysis of the map of bomb locations and showed that the pattern fitted a Poisson (random) distribution extraordinarily well and thus the bombs were not aimed.

What to do? Professor Jones realised that it was possible to alter the time and location of the bomb landings and publish this in the newspapers – thus, if a bomb landed at 14:00 in West London and another at 08:00 in East London, all one had to do was to publish that the West London bomb landed at 08:00 and the East London bomb at 14:00.

Sooner or later, this information would get back to the Germans, who would conclude that the bomb they fired at about 08:00 landed in West London (and, thus, overshot) and the 14:00 bomb landed in East London, thus undershoot- ing. Consequently, for future bombs, they would add or reduce fuel, which would, in fact, cause the West London bombs to overshoot more and the East London bombs to undershoot more. Further, the British were able to redirect V1s by sending false impact reports through the German espionage network in Britain, which was actually controlled by the British.

Finally, from what distance can you hear a gunshot? Well, it depends on the gun – whether it has a silencer. However, in general, a 0.303 unsilenced rifle can be heard at a distance of about 4 km in the bush, depending on wind conditions.

This brings us to the poaching of rhinos. In the Kruger National Park, the rhino death rate has risen from 0.41 a day in 2010 to 1.69 a day in 2013 and to 1.61 in 2014 to date. The rate, which was steadily increasing, is now decreasing, perhaps due to the deployment of General Johan Jooste (ret), who is SANParks commanding officer for special projects and is upping the response to rhino poaching.

I have tried to speak to or email him but it has been difficult. What I would say to him, if I could, would be the following: The problem of killer invasions is not new. It has happened before and what should be done is to take away or at least rationalise on a more procedural level the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research and other authorities – a different kind of input is required. Secondly, SANParks must employ some bright statistical people who can look at rhino death locations, times and other data until one can tell that either the rhino attacks are the efforts of uncoordinated teams or have some central direction by one or more rhino poaching organisations. Thirdly, confuse the location of rhino deaths and times. This may well lead to rhino poaching managers losing faith in their people on the ground. Finally, SANParks must install cloud-based wireless gunshot detection systems. Yes, I know KwaZulu-Natal Parks has a border with Mozambique of about 360 km, which would imply about 90 detectors, but they would not all have to work – just tell people that they do and they will be a deterrent.

Will this work? Will Jooste even read this? Well it is worth a try.

Edited by Martin Zhuwakinyu
Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

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