2nd July 2025

A big thanks from Australian Spy Museum to a former team leader of the Stasi OTS who has donated his final development for The Firm – the WSA-6 burst transmitter set, in factory mint condition.

He developed it for agents of the Hauptverwalting Aufklärung (HVA or foreign intelligence service), and released in 1988 – just before the Berlin Wall came down – a factor in its rarity. There were a couple of types of WSA-6 – a small integrated unit, or this type of modular design optimised for concealments.

The WSA is microprocessor based and has no user interface – its controlled via an external digital device, usually the Sharp Pocket PC-1350/1600. Software on the pocket PC was used to test antenna setup, select frequencies, and then compose and send burst messages.

Paired with the Sharp, up to 200x 5-digit groups can be sent in burst at a speed of 900 baud or 1.2Kbps. Its the 1980’s so that’s kiloBITS per second!!! where 1000 characters are transferred in about 6-7 seconds.

Anyone who’s been to our ASM talks knows we love a German compound word and the WSA is Weitverkehrssendeanlage – Long Range Transmitter System. Output power is 20 watts for a longer range of 300-2000km in any of 14,000 frequencies between 4 – 18 Mhz with a spacing of 1 Khz.

== UPDATE ==

On unpacking it we thought we’d photograph it next to the previous WSA-6 fragments we had acquired – and immediately realised those are from an even rarer version. It turns our existing modules are from a more compact version of the WSA-6 designed for burying in watertight containers, then being retrieved later by agents for covert action.

You can see our compact version modules next to our Stasi Numbers Station appliance pictured above.

We’re super happy to be able to bring them to Australia to reunite them, and build out our picture of opponent capability.