Germany discovers Ultra and Enigma hack

[MatthewB]

It is amazing to me how poor Germany’s spy network was in Britain before and during WW2. Compare it to the USSR during the Cold War, where its spies infiltrated the upper echelons of the military-intelligence establishment and bureaucracy.

So.... let’s give Germany an effective spy network that scuppers the Ultra program. Perhaps it’s as simple as Germany discovering that the Poles had found a weakness in the Enigma system, or as complicated as a spy within the group that would create Bletchley Park.

So, end 1940, Hitler is informed that their codes are being read. Hitler demands changes. What would those changes be? Can Enigma be fixed, or must a whole new encryption device be divulged? And if Britain can’t break Enigma messages, what’s the impact?

Next, we need the Germans to warn the Japanese to check their own code system.

 

[Ian_W]

It is amazing to me how poor Germany’s spy network was in Britain before and during WW2. Compare it to the USSR during the Cold War, where its spies infiltrated the upper echelons of the military-intelligence establishment and bureaucracy.

So.... let’s give Germany an effective spy network that scuppers the Ultra program. Perhaps it’s as simple as Germany discovering that the Poles had found a weakness in the Enigma system, or as complicated as a spy within the group that would create Bletchley Park.

So, end 1940, Hitler is informed that their codes are being read. Hitler demands changes. What would those changes be? Can Enigma be fixed, or must a whole new encryption device be divulged? And if Britain can’t break Enigma messages, what’s the impact?

Next, we need the Germans to warn the Japanese to check their own code system.

The thing is, correctly used, Enigma is functionally uncrackable - it was operator mistakes and captures of examples that allowed most of the cracks.

The problem is that any new system will still have these operator mistakes ... and they might get worse as a new system is rushed in (note the worst Japanese cracks were done when the same message was sent under the old and the new system).

Not cracking Enigma will hurt the allies, but in the submarine war a detected transmission through High Frequency Direction Finding doesnt need to be cracked to be useful - something must have made a transmission on X bearing, so there's a submarine that way.

At the end of the day, it was air cover that closed the Atlantic rather than information from Enigma (and the Germans were cracking the codes used to route convoys anyway, so it wasn't one way traffic).

 

[MatthewB]

Not cracking Enigma will hurt the allies, but in the submarine war a detected transmission through High Frequency Direction Finding doesnt need to be cracked to be useful - something must have made a transmission on X bearing, so there's a submarine that way.

If this method of detection is discovered, then perhaps the Germans change their submarine ops, with orders distributed upon sailing and strict radio silence. This will limit the coordinated wolf pack and the use of Condor reconnaissance flights.

 

[Ian_W]

If this method of detection is discovered, then perhaps the Germans change their submarine ops, with orders distributed upon sailing and strict radio silence. This will limit the coordinated wolf pack and the use of Condor reconnaissance flights.

Which itself would be a massive win for the British, as anything other than coordinated wolf packs works very badly against escorted convoys.

 

[hammo1j]

Wrt to Japanese codes, these were especially critical to the Battle of Midway.
So if the Japs clean up their act , there's butterflies there...

 

[Some Bloke]

Considering Nazi Germany's racism and hubris relating to the same, this doesn't seem likely. IIRC, there had been hints that the Poland had partly cracked enigma, which most people dismissed out of hand because every German patriot knew that the Poles couldn't possibly be that smart. Then again, considering how their head of military intelligence was anti-Nazi, he (Admiral Canaris) might have exploited these prejudices to scupper the Nazi war effort. Maybe a if you bump off Canaris and replace him with someone more politically reliable who won't try to hoist the Nazis by the petard of their own racially charged complacency.

 

[Deleted member 94680]

It is amazing to me how poor Germany’s spy network was in Britain before and during WW2. Compare it to the USSR during the Cold War, where its spies infiltrated the upper echelons of the military-intelligence establishment and bureaucracy.

So.... let’s give Germany an effective spy network that scuppers the Ultra program. Perhaps it’s as simple as Germany discovering that the Poles had found a weakness in the Enigma system, or as complicated as a spy within the group that would create Bletchley Park.

So, end 1940, Hitler is informed that their codes are being read. Hitler demands changes. What would those changes be? Can Enigma be fixed, or must a whole new encryption device be divulged? And if Britain can’t break Enigma messages, what’s the impact?

Next, we need the Germans to warn the Japanese to check their own code system.

After the war, Allied TICOM project teams found and detained a considerable number of German cryptographic personnel. Among the things learned was that German cryptographers, at least, understood very well that Enigma messages might be read; they knew Enigma was not unbreakable. They just found it impossible to imagine anyone going to the immense effort required. When Abwehr personnel who had worked on Fish cryptography and Russian traffic were interned at Rosenheim around May 1945, they were not at all surprised that Enigma had been broken, only that someone had mustered all the resources in time to actually do it. Admiral Dönitz had been advised that a cryptanalytic attack was the least likely of all security problems.

I mean... the mind boggles. They knew it was possible, but thought no-one would try it because it took a lot of effort. That’s a level of idiotic naivety that I struggle to assign to anything other than deliberate sabotage of the War Effort by anti-Nazi Abwehr members.

 

[fastmongrel]

What would replace Enigma there were tens of thousands of machines issued and replacing them all with another machine would take years and cost a fortune. As said up thread you still have the same problems with operator errors allowing Bletchley Park into the new codes. Only way of replacing the machines quickly is with one time code books as used by spies.

 

[MatthewB]

Which itself would be a massive win for the British, as anything other than coordinated wolf packs works very badly against escorted convoys.

The U-boats can still use radio messaging from aerial reconnaissance to coordinate, they just can’t reply back.

 

[Shimbo]

After the war, Allied TICOM project teams found and detained a considerable number of German cryptographic personnel. Among the things learned was that German cryptographers, at least, understood very well that Enigma messages might be read; they knew Enigma was not unbreakable. They just found it impossible to imagine anyone going to the immense effort required. When Abwehr personnel who had worked on Fish cryptography and Russian traffic were interned at Rosenheim around May 1945, they were not at all surprised that Enigma had been broken, only that someone had mustered all the resources in time to actually do it. Admiral Dönitz had been advised that a cryptanalytic attack was the least likely of all security problems.

I mean... the mind boggles. They knew it was possible, but thought no-one would try it because it took a lot of effort. That’s a level of idiotic naivety that I struggle to assign to anything other than deliberate sabotage of the War Effort by anti-Nazi Abwehr members.

All cyphers other than those using one-time pads are theoretically crackable. There's nothing idiotic or naive about the B-Dienst knowing that. They proposed attacking the British code machine, Typex, (which was literally an improved version of Enigma) but were not given the resources, so it's not even all that ridiculous that they assumed their counterparts in the UK were similarly constrained.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-Dienst gives a long list of the cyphers they did manage to crack.

 

[thaddeus]

The thing is, correctly used, Enigma is functionally uncrackable - it was operator mistakes and captures of examples that allowed most of the cracks.

The problem is that any new system will still have these operator mistakes ... and they might get worse as a new system is rushed in (note the worst Japanese cracks were done when the same message was sent under the old and the new system).

Not cracking Enigma will hurt the allies, but in the submarine war a detected transmission through High Frequency Direction Finding doesnt need to be cracked to be useful - something must have made a transmission on X bearing, so there's a submarine that way.

At the end of the day, it was air cover that closed the Atlantic rather than information from Enigma (and the Germans were cracking the codes used to route convoys anyway, so it wasn't one way traffic).

they were working on Kurier https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurier_system don't know how well that could have worked had it not been a latter days project?

have seen a suggestion here for messaging buoys for the return transmissions, the u-boat being well away from the area, assume those could send a legit encoded message followed by garbage and misdirection?

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

The Germans did take active measures. They added a fourth rotor to the naval models. The Stecker board was added. They tightened training for the Navy communications techs. All that helped them, but did not solve the core problem of IBM& NCR building high speed 'key finders' to Brit specs. The multi bank NCR machines could test thousands of key settings a second.

 

[MatthewB]

but did not solve the core problem of IBM& NCR building high speed 'key finders' to Brit specs. The multi bank NCR machines could test thousands of key settings a second.

That’s the project and tech I want our German spies to discover.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

After the war, Allied TICOM project teams found and detained a considerable number of German cryptographic personnel. Among the things learned was that German cryptographers, at least, understood very well that Enigma messages might be read; they knew Enigma was not unbreakable. They just found it impossible to imagine anyone going to the immense effort required. When Abwehr personnel who had worked on Fish cryptography and Russian traffic were interned at Rosenheim around May 1945, they were not at all surprised that Enigma had been broken, only that someone had mustered all the resources in time to actually do it. Admiral Dönitz had been advised that a cryptanalytic attack was the least likely of all security problems.

I mean... the mind boggles. They knew it was possible, but thought no-one would try it because it took a lot of effort. That’s a level of idiotic naivety that I struggle to assign to anything other than deliberate sabotage of the War Effort by anti-Nazi Abwehr members.

They're talking about the Abwehr codebreakers, which were a pretty minor group all things considered in the wider German codebreaking effort. They, perhaps not unreasonably, did not expect the British and US to have unified cryptography given the general infighting that comes with intelligence services and probably assumed they had a fractured one somewhat similar to Germany and her allies. They also probably did not comprehend the enormous resources the Allies had either that went far beyond weapons in the field.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

In some respects it might benefit the Allies. Twice Eisenhowers staff were blinded by a over reliance on IULTRA sourced intel. The first was the 'Morning Ar' offensive March 1943 in Tunisia. Kesselrings command settled all the planning and coordination by face to face meetings & telephone. The Brits picked up nothing via radio/Enigma. The result was Rommels attack crushing the US 1st Armored Div with a four division attack and driving on to the Kasserine Pass.

The second was the Ardennes offensive. again none of the planning or preparation message traffic went by radio. Without Enigma the Allied intelligence is forced to make better use of other sources. In both these cases there were strong clues collected by patrols, prisoner interrogation, air reconissance, ect... but the intel officers and staff were over focused on the ULTRA originated intel.

The Luftwaffe was the worst at Enigma security, poor operator discipline, & overuse by command staff made it the best source for operational intel in land battles. Unlike the Navy the air and ground forces did not make a wholesale conversion to four rotor machines, sticking with the three rotor. Internally in Germany some of the military administrative agencies kept the antique two and single rotor machines in use. Those messages were useful in evaluating German industrial production, and the effects of bombing.

Probablly the best use of the UTRA system was the highest level traffic. Analysing that, the Deception Committiee was able to track the effects of the deception operations and fine tune them in real time to fit Hitlers current thinking. losing Engima would reduce the effectiveness of the many deception operations underway.

 

[Deleted member 94680]

All cyphers other than those using one-time pads are theoretically crackable. There's nothing idiotic or naive about the B-Dienst knowing that. They proposed attacking the British code machine, Typex, (which was literally an improved version of Enigma) but were not given the resources, so it's not even all that ridiculous that they assumed their counterparts in the UK were similarly constrained.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-Dienst gives a long list of the cyphers they did manage to crack.

By changing their methodology of using Enigma they could have taken measures to delay the WAllied breaking of their codes. They were so smugly assured of the unbreakability of their codes they used them for everything. What’s the implication of the WAllies breaking said code in that scenario? They know or can read everything. I mean, excuses could be made if they believed it was unbreakable in practical terms but they knew it was practically possible. We’re not talking one lone voice trying to convince the High Command “if they...” “it’s possible with this unknown advance, they could...” the specialists in the field knew it was possible. So what did they do? They assumed the WAllies wouldn’t bother trying. Wouldn’t bother trying whilst they were using Enigma to starve the British to death.

They simply did nothing. That is idiotic.

Always plan for the worst case and end up pleasantly surprised, rather than blithely assuming everything is alright and end up devastated.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

One of the German obstacles was they captured some US SIGABA & Brit TYPEX encryption machines. They were unable to find a effective hack into them, & decided theirs was equally difficult. The Japanese had the same problem, 'We cant crack theirs, so ours must be even tougher'.

 

[lukedalton]

Regia marina get a needed shot in the arm, italy code were never broken but germany pressed for the esclusive use of enigma as though more securr than anything italioan

 

[Ian_W]

By changing their methodology of using Enigma they could have taken measures to delay the WAllied breaking of their codes.

Changing the Enigma machine is simple.

Changing user behavior is hard.

You're going to need to convince every mid-grade Heer, Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine officer to put one of his better officers onto cipher duty, and rotate them out once they start getting too cocky.

You'll need to make sure said officer doesn't train his replacement by sending a bunch of dummy messages.

You'll need to deal with the blowback of said mid-grade officer's bosses saying 'This crap is only happening because B-dienst don't believe in their own equipment.'

And if you're really unlucky, seeing as how you just admitted Enigma was worthless, Hitler will get the idea in his head that poem codes should be used.

 

[RodentRevolution]

Regia marina get a needed shot in the arm, italy code were never broken but germany pressed for the esclusive use of enigma as though more securr than anything italioan

That is interesting, I must admit I never knew that. Can you provide any more details on the encryption system the Italians used?