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The Unbreakable Enigma:
Compact and easily portable, the Enigma machine was used by German army, navy and air force field units to receive and send "unbreakable" coded messages throughout World War II.
Code Making Machine:
Originally manufactured to encipher business communications, the Germans adapted the Enigma cipher machine for use in World War II. The machine linked a keyboard to a series of rotors using electric currents. The rotors transposed each keystroke multiple times. The message was then sent in Morse code.
Enigma generated billions of combinations. The rotor order, starting positions and plug board connections were reset daily. The decipher a message, Enigma's daily settings key -- sometimes encoded in the message itself -- was needed. The Germans believed Enigma provided an unbreakable cipher.
The Allied codebreakers' solving of Enigma messages was a stunning achievement. In another time it would have been awarded a Nobel Prize, but was done with such secrecy that the feat was not recognized until some 30 years later. |