Timeline for Why were the Allies so much better cryptanalysts?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
28 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jan 12 at 11:10 | comment | added | ain92 | @Greg Nazi cryptanalysts actually cracked almost all French and Soviet codes they theoretically could (Soviets widely used single-use pads which were unbreakable) and that influenced the war greatly but is now mostly forgotten. For further info see, e. g., chris-intel-corner.blogspot.com/2014/07/… and chris-intel-corner.blogspot.com/2014/07/… | |
| Nov 26, 2020 at 15:05 | comment | added | Spencer | I suspect that the Nazis' decimation of German academic institutions (particularly mathematics departments) along political/racial pretexts once they took power played a part. | |
| Nov 25, 2020 at 13:31 | answer | added | releseabe | timeline score: -1 | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 20:02 | comment | added | R Leonard | one might want to look at ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ETO/Ultra/SRH-024/index.html or ibiblio.org/hyperwar/ETO/Ultra/SRH-025/index.html regarding some of the German communications intelligence activities in the Atlantic Theater. | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 18:51 | comment | added | Denis Nardin | @TylerH I suspect RodrigodeAzevedo's point is that the Germans had access to brilliant people too. If your point is that the Allied used their resources better, fair, but make it explicit, not just an argument ad genium. | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 18:35 | comment | added | TylerH | @RodrigodeAzevedo Turing was famous well before any movies were made about him. I suspect your frame of reference as a mathematician is playing a big bias here. | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 17:13 | comment | added | Kevin | @RodrigodeAzevedo I agree that general layman popularity isn't a good indicator of intellectual importance, but Turing is also very highly regarded among people in the computer science and cryptography fields, which is at least a better indicator | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 17:01 | comment | added | TylerH | @RodrigodeAzevedo Teichmuller is completely unknown outside very small mathematical circles because his contribution is proportionately small. During the war he spent more time on the front lines than he did doing crypto work. Turing was a greater contributor to the effort, by far, and he is proportionately more renowned among the general populace. If you think his existence is somehow enough to disregard Turing's contributions to the Allied efforts, you need to provide evidence to back up those beliefs. | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 14:08 | comment | added | Rodrigo de Azevedo | @drkvogel And the Nazis had Teichmüller. | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 13:56 | comment | added | drkvogel | Perhaps because the Allies had Alan Turing? | |
| Nov 24, 2020 at 7:50 | comment | added | rs.29 | In reality, Allied code-breaking was much hyped myth . For example, they missed all too obvious German concentration of forces for "Wacht am Rhein" | |
| Nov 23, 2020 at 15:00 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/StackHistory/status/1330888927897653249 | ||
| Nov 23, 2020 at 13:38 | history | edited | Rodrigo de Azevedo |
Added tag.
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| Nov 23, 2020 at 1:00 | comment | added | Davidw | @Schwern Like the Rosetta Stone of Cryptography. | |
| Nov 23, 2020 at 0:56 | comment | added | Hot Licks | It should be noted that some of the success at cracking Enigma is credited to Alan Turing Bombe Machine at Bletchley Park during the early stages of World War II. | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 23:57 | comment | added | IMil | @TomasBy sorry, this is completely unfounded. The winners didn't try to downplay German successes in rocketry, aviation, submarine and tank production. | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 23:21 | comment | added | Schwern | @Greg The Allies did not ignore the codes of the other Axis powers. They could be a great resource. Consider if Berlin sends a message to Rome and Rome sends the message to its armies, this gives the Allies multiple opportunities to intercept and decrypt the message. If anything the Allies had a harder job because they had to coordinate their codes between many nations. The general lack of coordination between the Axis powers meant less coordination of their cryptography was necessary... sometimes to detrimental effect of Axis powers using weak encodings. | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 18:41 | comment | added | Greg | There might be an asymmetry here: all the Allies needed / wanted to break the German code, while Germany had to fight several enemies. Allies could ignore the Italian, Romanian, Hungarian etc codes, while Germany had to deal with Britts, Americans, USSR at the same time. | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 17:09 | history | became hot network question | |||
| Nov 22, 2020 at 14:58 | vote | accept | José Carlos Santos | ||
| Nov 22, 2020 at 12:36 | history | edited | Lars Bosteen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
typo
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| Nov 22, 2020 at 12:15 | answer | added | Lars Bosteen | timeline score: 73 | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 12:07 | history | edited | MCW♦ | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
edited title
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| Nov 22, 2020 at 10:29 | answer | added | o.m. | timeline score: 1 | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 10:01 | comment | added | Tomas By | The winners write the history? | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 9:37 | history | edited | José Carlos Santos | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Adding more details
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| Nov 22, 2020 at 9:27 | comment | added | Pieter Geerkens | The Germans had broken the British merchant marine codes in 1937 or '38. This was a key reason for their successes in various "happy times" for their submariners. This was never alluded to in any deciphered Enigma transmissions, so the british never suspected. If no-one else digs up a refernece and adds this as an answer, I'll do it a bit later. Here is a link to start. | |
| Nov 22, 2020 at 9:03 | history | asked | José Carlos Santos | CC BY-SA 4.0 |