List of TICOM M reports

Again thanks to Dermot Turing, who copied the TICOM report M-15, it was possible to identify the titles of the TICOM M reports 1-15.

M-1 Vierling's Laboratory at Ebermannastadt

M-2 Major Barlow's Report on Dr. Vierling's Laboratory

M-3 'DELTA' Machine

M-4 Full Preliminary Report of Investigation of Dr. Vierling's Laboratory "Feuerstein"- by Major Heller

M-5 Demonstration of Kesselring ‘’Fish Train’’

M-6 Interim Report on Laboratorium Feuerstein - by Lieuts. Howard and Tompkins, U.S.N.R.

M-7 Report on Multichannel Intercept Teletype (HMFS)

M-8 Diary kept by Captain T. Carter, I.C., of Tests on Baudot Equipment conducted in the U.K. 29/6-8/7/45

M-9 Report on German Multi-Plex Intercept Equipment by Lt. Holmes, A.U.S.

M-10 Note on German Antenna Multicouplers

M-11 Five Drawings of the Lueckenfuellerwalze

M-12 CIOS Target Evaluation Report on Laboratorium FEUERSTEIN, Ebermannstadt

M-13 Manufacture of Enigma Machines by HEIMSOETH & RINKE, Berlin

M-14 Note to TICOM/M-5 (Kesselring ‘’Fish Train’’)

M-15 List of TICOM/M-reports 1-14

List of TICOM I reports

Here is a list of the TICOM I reports 1-213. Thanks to Dermot Turing, who copied the lists from NARA, it was possible to find the titles for almost all of the reports.

I-1 Final Report on TICOM Team 3 on Final Exploitation on Burgscheidungen

I-2. Interrogation of Dr. Huettenhain and Dr. Fricke at Flenshurg,21 May 1945

I-3 Ubersicht der Russischen Chi verfahren

I-4 Record of conversation with Lt. Morgenroth

I-5 Report of Interrogation of Oberst Kettler on 21 May 1945

I-6 Interrogation of Lt. D. R. Muentz

I-6A Supplementary interrogation of Lt. D. R. Muentz

I-7 Statement of major McIntosh on Uffz. Graul

I-8 Conversation between TICOM team 6 and OKM 4/SKL III personnel

I-9 Notes on Kurier communications system

I-10 TICOM personnel lists (Brown list)

I-11 Allgemeine Aufgaben der Abteilung Funk.Opt.Signal und Erkennungsignale der 4/SKL II

I-12 Translation of the Preliminary Interrogation of O.R.R. Tranow of 4/SKL III/OKM, carried out at Flensburg on 24-25 May 1945 by T'ICOM Team 6

I-13 Composite Report on two Interrogations of Oberstlt. Friedrich, Chief of the G.A.F. Sigint Service, 18/5/45 and 9/6/45

I-14 TICOM personnel list (Brown list, revised)

I-15 Interrogation report of Oblt Schubert

I-16 Notes on interrogation of Amtsrat Schwabe and  Obfkmstr Warsecha on Russian naval ciphers

I-17 Extracts of SHAEF interrogations of Maj. Gen. Boner, Colonel Grube, Lt. Col. Mettig, and Major Rottler.

I-18 Interrogations of Oberst Muegge, O.C. of NA 4 and NA 7 of German Army Sigint Service

I-19 A-G Report on Interrogation of KONA 1 at Revin, France, June 1945

I-20 Interrogation of Sondertuehrer Dr. Fricke of OKW/Chi

I-21 "Preliminary Interrogation of Oberst  Kettler, R.R. Dr.Huettenhain , Sdf Dr. Fricke and ObIt. Schubert (OKH/Chi),15 June 1945

I-22 "Interrogation of German Cryptographers of Pers Z S Department of the Auswaertiges Amt

I-23 Interrogation of Major Ernst Hertzer, German Army Signals Intelligence Service (KONA 1).

I-24 Interrogation of members of OKM/ 4 SKL II on (a) soluble printing inks and (b) German-Japanese communications

I-25 Interrogation of five members of the RLM/Forschungsamt at Schloss Gluecksburg on 15, 21 June 1945

I-26 Interrogation of Oblt. Schubert (OKH/Chef HNW/Gen.d.NA) on Russian Military and Agents’ systems

I-27 Preliminary Interrogation of Fraeulein Hagen Head of English Section of Pers Z S, Auswaertiges Amt

I-28 Interrogation of Amtsrat Dr Stiehler of OKM 4/SKL II on German meteorological cyphers

I-29 Third Interrogation of Oberstltn. Friedrich, Chief of the GAF Signals Intelligence Service

I-30 Report on Interrogation of Uffz. Karrenberg at Steeple Claydon on 7th July 1945 at 11.00 am

I-31 ‘Detailed interrogations of Dr. Hüttenhain, formerly head of research section of OKW/Chi, 18-21 June 1945’

I-32 (no report issued, number cancelled)

I-33 Report on Traffic Analysis of Baudot traffic by capt. Jack Magilavy, AUS and D.R. Uzielli, SIXTA

I-34 TICOM personnel list (Brown list)

I-35 Paper written by Lt. Muentz of OKM/4 SKL III on the solution of the M-209 Hagelin machine

I-35A Appendices to the Paper written by Lt. Muentz of OKM/4 SKL III on the solution of the M-209 Hagelin machine

I-36 Translation of paper written by Reg Rat Dr Huettenhain and Sonderfuehrer Dr Dricke on the development of OKW/Chi, Sections A.III and B V

I-37 Translation of paper written by Reg.Rat.Dr Huettenhain of OKW/Chi on special apparatus used as aids to cryptanalysis

I-38 Report on interrogation of Lt. Frowein of OKM/4 SKL/III, on his work on the security of the German naval four-wheel Enigma

I-39 ‘Organization of OKW/Chi’

I-40 Report of work on Russian naval and naval-air systems for the period 1939 to 1945

I-41 Report on First Interrogation of Major Oeljeschlaeger, Addendum: Interrogation of Major Beulmann

I-42 Report on Fourth Interrogation of Oberstltn Friedrich (Head of OKL/Gen. Nafue. 3. Abt)

I-43 Report written by Vierling

I-44 Memorandum on speech encipherment by ORR Huettenhain and Sdf Dr Fricke

I-45 OKW/Chi Cryptanalytic research on Enigma, Hagelin and Cipher Teleprinter machines

I-46 Preliminary Report on Interrogation of Dr. Otto Buggisch (of OKH/Gen.d.NA) and Dr. Werner Liebknecht (employed by OKH and OKW as tester of cryptographic equipment) 23  June 1945.

I-47 P/W Situation report

I-48 Report on Special Interrogation of Drs. Huettenhain and Fricke, Oberst Mettig, and Lt. Morgenroth carried out on 29th July 1945

I-49 Notes on OKW/Chi and on intercept organization under K.O. Spain

I-50 Paper written by Lt. Muentz of OKM/4SKL III on statistical solution of the M-209 Hagelin machine

I-51 Interrogation Report on Ufrz. Herzfeld, Heintz Worfgang, and Translation of a Paper He Wrote on the British War Office Code

I-52 Papers written by Uffz. Herzfeld on Mihailovic and Tito ciphers

I-53 Construction of Schluesselgeraet 39

I-54 Second interrogation of five members of the RLM/Forschungsamt

I-55 Interrogation of Seven Members of NAA 11

I-56 On German diplomatic ciphers – Notes from an interrogation of Wilhelm Thoem

I-57 Enciphering devices worked on by Dr Liebknecht at Wa Pruef 7

I-58 Interrogation of Dr. Otto Buggisch of OKW/Chi

I-59 Interrogation of Uffz Arno Graul at Revin

I-60 Further Interrogation of Oblt. Schubert of OKH/Chef HNW/Gen.d.NA

I-61 Interrogation report on Friedhelm Baechle W/T operator with KO Spain

I-62 Field interrogation of Paul Ratz of the German Army Signals Intelligence (1933-1945)

I-63 Interrogation Report on ORR Herrmann Scherschmidt of, Pers Z S, Auswaertiges Amt

I-64 "Answers by Wm. Buggisch of OKH/Chi to Questions sent by TICOM

I-65 Interrogation Report on Four Members of the GAF Sigint Service

I-66 Paper by Dr. Otto Buggisch or OKH/ln 7/VI and OKW/Chi on Typex

I-67 Paper by Dr. Otto Buggisch of OKH/ In 7/VI and OKW/Chi on Cryptanalytic Machines

I-68 Consolidated Report Based on Two Interrogations of Oberst Randewig, of Hoeh. Wehrmachts Nafue z.b.V. 700, carried out at CSDIC on approx. 1 Aug. and 10 Aug. 1945

I-69 Summary of cipher information on Jugoslav traffic provided by Uffz. Herzfeld

I-70 Paper on the German Sigint Service by Oberstltn Friedrich'

I-71 Major Wm.P Bundy’s preliminary report on targets inspected in the Berlin area, during the period 8-11 August 1945

I-72 First part of the report by Wm. Buggisch on S.G.41

I-73 Translated version of homework done by Wm. Buggisch

I-74 Interrogation Report on Obgefr. Keller, formerly Auswertestelle 4 and Nachrichten Aufklaerungskompanie 611

I-75 Interrogation Reports on German Field Sigint Personnel carried out at BUFFER - Ltn. August Schroeder, Ltn. Starke, Obefr. Heudorf, and Hptm. Holetzke

I-76 Interrogation Reports on Lehwald, Haupts, Klett and Lauerbach

I-77 Translation of joint report made by Drs. Huettenhain and Fricke on the ‘Saehlwerk’ Enigma

I-78 Interrogation of Oberstlt. Mettig on the History and Achievements of OKH/AHA/ln 7/VI

I-79 Supplementary papers by Drs. Huettenhain and Fricke on the solution of the Hagelin machine

I-80 POW Interrogqation report - Obgefr. Clement Schuck Inps. VII/6 (OKH)

I-81 -Short POW Interrogation Report Received from AC of S, G-2, USFET

I-82 POW Interrogation report - Dr Werner Liebknecht of Wa Pruef 7 of the Heereswaffenamt

I-83 Additional interrogation of Lt. Morgenroth of 4 SKL/III

I-84 Further interrogation of R.R. Dr. Hüttenhain and Sdf. Dr. Fricke of OKW/Chi on questions set by Mr. Friedman

I-85 P. O. W. Interrogation Report on Reg. Rat Flicke, Techn Insp. Pokojewski, Stabsintendant Hatz of OKW/Chi

I-86 Interrogation of Oberstlt. Mettig of OKH and OKW/Chi on the higher direction of German cryptanalytic work

I-87 - Report on the Apprehension of Regierungsrat Voegele of LN.ABT.350'

I-88 Report on interrogation of Mr. K. Vetterlein of the Reichspost Laboratorium on German interception of transatlantic speech circuits

I-89 Report by Prof Dr. H Rohrbach of Pers Z S on American strip cipher

I-90 Interrogation of Herr Reinhard Wagner (OKW/Chi) on Japanese systems

I-91 POW Interrogation Report - General Major Robert K.H. SCHLAKE, Chief of Communications in the Main Office of the Ordnungspolizei, Ministry of the Interior

I-92 Final Interrogation of Wachtmeister Otto Buggisch (OKH/In 7/VI and OKW/Chi)

I-93 Detailed interrogation of members of OKM 4/SKL III at Flensburg

I-94 TICOM personnel list (Brown list)

I-95 Interrogation of Lt. Morgenroth on organization of 4 OKM/SKL III

I-96 Interrogation of Oberstlt. Mettig on the organization and activities of OKW/Chi

I-97 Report of Mr H.C Kenworthy on the Feuerstein Laboratory at Ebermannstadt

I-98 Interrogation of Oberst Randewig on German Deception plans

I-99 Interrogation Report of Hptm. Herbert Roeder (Head of Gruppe VI, Gen.d.NA, OKH, 1944-45)

I-100 Report by Uffz. Herzfeld of NAAST 5 (Gen. d. NA) on the Work of the Italian Referat of In 7/VI.

I-101 List of TICOM I reports 1-100

I-102 Interrogation report on Dr. Sebastian of the German Met. Service on Allied Met. Systems

I-103 Second interrogation of Reg. Rat. Hermann Scherschmidt of Pers Z Auswärtiges Amt. on Turkish and Bulgarian systems.

I-104 Report on Berlin targets by Major Heller of G.S.I. (S) 21 A.G., B.A.O.R.

I-105 Interrogation report on Frau von Nida wife of Major Wolfgang von Nida, one-time deputy head of OKH/Chi.

I-106 Final Interrogation report on the Norway party (NAA 11)

I-107 Preliminary interrogation of Obltn. Chlubek and Lt. Rasel both of III / LN Regt 353.

I-108 Interrogation of Goering on the RLM/Forchungsamt. (Goering – vol. 7)

I-109 Translation of a Report by Lt. Ludwig of Chi-Stelle Ob. d. L. (Ref B) based on questions set for him at A.D.I. - (K).

I-110 Information on Radio Communication Circuits operated in conjunction with Feuerstein

Laboratories.

I-111 Further interrogation of Oberstlt. Mettig of OKH/Chi on 14 September 1945

I-112 Preliminary interrogation of Reg. Rat. Dr. Ferdinand Voegele (Chi Stelle, Ob.d.L) and Major Ferdinand Feichtner (O.C. of LN Regt. 352, etc.).

I-113 Interrogation of Major Dr. Rudolph Hentze, head of Gruppe IV (cryptanalysis), General der Nachrichtenaufklärung.

I-114 Further interrogation of Lt. Morgenroth of 4 Skl III

I-115 Further interrogation of Oberstlt. Mettig of OKH/Chi on the German wireless security service (Funküberwachung).

I-116 Report of interrogation of Lt. Alex Dettmann and Oberwachtmeister Sergius Samsonov of OKH (Gen. d. NA) at Oberursel, Germany, during August 1945.

I-117 GLOSSARY OF GERMAN CRYPTANALYTIC TERMS

I-118 Joint reports by Reg. Rat. Dr. Hüttenhain and Sdf. Dr. Fricke, written at CSDIC on or about 28 August 1945

I-119 Further interrogation of Reg. Rat. Voegele and Major Feichtner of GAF Sigint.

I-120 Translation of Homework by Obltn. W. Werther, Company Commander of 7/LN Rgt. 353,

written on 12th August 1945 at A.D. I. (K).

I-121 Translation of Homework by Obltn. W. Werther, Company Commander of' 7/LN Rgt 353,

written on 12th August 1945 at A.D.I.(K).

I-122 Interrogation report on Obergefreiter Hansa (OKH/Gen d NA)

I-123 Interrogation report on Rudolf Trappe (civilian) of OKH/Chi.

I-124 Interrogation report on Dr. Werner Weber of OKH/Chi.

I-125 Interrogation Report on Anton Stock of OKH/Gen. d. NA.

I-126 Homework by Major Feichtner, C.O. of LN Regt. 352.

I-127 Interrogation of Oberstlt. Mettig of OKW/Chi (September 1945)

I-128 Deciphering achievements of In 7/VI and OKW/Chi.

I-129 'Interrogation of SS Rottenfuehrer GRASSHOF'

I-130 Homework of Hauptmann Herold, O.C. of LN Regt. III/353.

I-131 Obstlt. Mettig of OKW/Chi on Wa Pruef 7 and RLM/Forschungsamt.

I-132 Notes by Hüttenhain and Fricke on OKW/Chi and the German I.S.

I-133 Homework by Lt. Rasch of III / LN Regt. 353.

I-134 Homework by 1st. Lt. Chlubek of III / LN Regt. 353.

I-135 Homework by Lt. Ludwig of Chi-Stelle Ob.d.L. (Ref .B).

I-136 Homework by Regierungsrat Dr. Hüttenhain and Sdf (Z) Dr. Fricke on Hagelin B-211

I-137 Final report written by Wachtmeister Otto Buggisch of OKH/Chi and OKW/Chi

I-138 not known

I-139 Account by Obergefreiter Holtermann of his work with OKM/4/SKL III

I-140 Preliminary interrogation of Funkhauptgefreiter Lothar Biege of 3 Kp, MPA, The Bight

I-141 Interrogation of Amtsrat Schulze of 4 SKL III.

I-142 P/W Barthel's Account of German Work on British, American, Swedish, and French Machine Ciphers (October 1945)

I-143 Report on the interrogation of five leading Germans at Nuremberg on 27 September 1945. (Jodl, Keitel, Doenitz, Goering, and von Ribbentrop)

I-144 Further interrogation of Lt Muentz of 4 SKL III

I-145 Report on the US Strip System by Reg. Rat Dr. Hüttenhain 

I-146 Detailed interrogation of members of OKM/4 SKL/III at Flensburg

I-147 Detailed interrogation of members of OKM/4 SKL/III at Flensburg.

I-148 German D/F and Intercepting System Against Illicit Transmitters

I-149 Report by Uffz. Karrenberg and colleagues on Allied Cipher machines.

I-150 Report by Uffz. Heinz W. Beyreuther on the organisation of OKH/Chi.

I-151 List of TICOM I reports 101-150

I-152 Second homework and report on further interrogation of R.R. Voegele.

I-153 Second Interrogation of Uffz. Karrenberg of OKH on the Baudot-Scrambler Machine (‘Bandwurm')

I-154 Interrogation of Uffz. Rudolph Schneider of In 7/VI

I-155 Report by Ostuf Schueddekopf on the Forschungsstelle Der Deutschen Reichspost at Langenveld near Eindhoven

I-156 Report of preliminary interrogation of Wilhelm Gerlich, AIC 1900, carried out by 3rd US Army, 28th September 1945

I-157 Chart of Communications Within a Russian Army Drawn up by Uffz. Karrenberg.

I-158 Report on Hollerith work at OKM by Dipl. Ing. Karl Schmaltz and Referat Dickof

I-159 Report on GAF intelligence based on interrogation of Hauptman Zetzche

I-160 Homework by Sonderführer Kuehn of Gen. d. NA. on General Organization and Work of French Referat

I-161 Further statements on Typex by Hüttenhain, Fricke and Mettig.

I-162 Report on Interrogation of' Kurt Sauerbier of RLM/Forschungsamt held on 31 August 1945.

I-163 Report on Interrogation of Hptm. Scheidl, Ltn. Sann and Ltn. Smolin, all of I/LN Rgt. 353 (East) on German Sigint Activity Against Russian Air Forces

I-164 Report by Kurt Sauerbier of RLM/Forschungsamt on Russian Agents' Traffic.

I-165 Interrogation of Kapitan Zur See Otto von Baumbach

I-166 Report by Uffz. Karrenberg on Russian cryptographic Course

I-167 Report by the Karrenberg Party on the NKVD

I-168 Report by the Karrenberg party on Miscellaneous Russian W/T

I-169 Report by Uffz. Karrenberg on the Bandwurm

I-170 Report on French and Greek Systems by Oberwachtmeister Dr. Otto Karl Winkler of OKH/FNAST 4

I-171 Report on Work on Russian Systems by Wachtmeister Berger of FNAST 6.

I-172 Interrogations of Hagen and Paschke of Pers Z S

I-173 Report by the Karrenberg party on Russian W/T.

I-174 Preliminary Interrogation of O R R Mueller of OKW/Chi

I-175 Report by Alfred Pokorn of OKH/Chi on M.209.

I-176 Homework by Wachtmeister Dr Otto Buggisch of OKH/Chi and OKW/Chi

I-177 Interrogation of Kirfel on Far Eastern Systems.

I-178 Homework by Hptm. Boedigheimer of IV/Nachr. Regiment 506

I-179 Homework by Obwn Riel of Störbefehls-stelle Balkans

I-180 Homework by Uffz. Keller of In 7/VI and WNV/Chi

I-181 Homework by Dr Werner Weber of OKW/Chi.

I-182 Homework on Russian Air Force by Hptm. Scheidl, Ltn. Sann and Ltn. Smolin of I/LN Rgt. 353

I-183 A.D.I. (K). Reports on GAF Signals Intelligence during the war

I-184 Interrogation of two members of the staff of Siemens & Halske (Rossberg and Jipp).

I-185 Letter from Fritz Wichert on interception and reading of Allied service W/T traffic

I-186 Interrogation of Oberpostrat Kurt VETTERLEIN on Attempted Tapping of Transatlantic Cables

I-187 Report on Production of ENIGMA Cipher Machines by the Ertel Factory, Hohenaschau

I-188 Interrogation of Liselotte Gebert of OKW/Chi.

I-189 Preliminary interrogation of Friedrich Stohlket

I-190 Extracts from report on interrogation of Dr. Hans Wilhelm Thost

I-191 Homework of Dr. Wilhelm Gerlich on Russian Systems

I-192 Interrogation of Gustav Schade of OKM 4 SKL III and of the Reichspost and Reichsrundfunk

I-193 Interrogation of SS Obersturmbahnführer Urban, Liaison Officer of RSHA/VI with the Crypto Bureau of Hungarian General Staff

I-194 Report by Dr. Regula on German metereological cypher systems and the German Meteorological Intelligence Service

I-195 List of TICOM I reports 151-194

I-196 Interrogation of Ilse Rantzau of the German naval sigint service

I-197 Further Interrogation of Amtsrat Schulze of OKM/4 SKL III.

I-198 ‘Short Brown List’, July 1946.

I-199 Report on Interrogation of Oberregierungsrat Nikolai Rohen, head of Anglo-American section of OKW/Chi

I-200 Interrogation of Min. Rat. Wilhelm Fenner of OKW/Chi.

I-201 Interrogation of Franz Weisser, Dr Mil Studienassessor of Anglo-American Section of OKW/Chi.

I-202 Interrogation of Min. Rat. Viktor Wendland of OKW/Chi (September 1946).

I-203 Interrogation of Herbert Marinick and Herbert Korn, former members of the Reichspost and OKW/Chi

I-204 Preliminary interrogation report of former Regierungsbaurat Johannes Marquart of OKH/Gen d NA.

I-205 Detailed Interrogation Report of former Regierungsbaurat Johannes Anton Marquart of OKH/GEN d. NA

I-206 Extracts from written homework by Min Rat Wilhelm Fenner of OKW/Chi

I-207 Report on interrogation of Major Dietrich G. von Truetzschler of the RLM/FA

I-208 Interrogation report on Kurt Selchow, former head of the Pers ZS department of the German ministry of Foreign affairs

I-209 not known

I-210 not known

I-211 Preliminary interrogation of Dr Hans Peter Luzius of OKH/In 7

I-212 Interrogation of George Ruckheim

I-213 Report on interrogation of Alfred Muche

Still waiting for the FOIA reports

I requested TICOM report I-40 from the NSA back in 2015. It’s August 2019 and it has not been reviewed yet….

I requested the Henriksson report from the State Department in June 2018 and as of August 2019 this case has not been processed (apart from assigning a case number)…

Let’s hope I don’t have to wait years for these files to be released.

New finding aid for the TICOM collection in the Political Archive of the German Foreign Ministry

Some time ago I posted the finding aid for the TICOM collection in the Political Archive of the German Foreign Ministry (excel file).

Now a new finding aid is available with a short description of each file (in pdf format). I have uploaded it to my Google Drive account.

Google drive link. 

TICOM report DF-217

I’ve uploaded TICOM report DF-217 ‘Russian cipher device K-37’, written by dr Grimmsen. 

Also added a summary and pics in The Soviet K-37 ‘Crystal’ cipher machine.

TICOM DF-196

The NSA FOIA/MDR office has declassified the TICOM report DF-196 ‘Report on Russian decryption in the former German Army’.

Google drive link

Cipher systems of the German Foreign Ministry

The TICOM report IF-266 ‘DEPARTMENT OF STATE REPORTS ON THE GERMAN FOREIGN OFFICE’ has some information on the codebooks and cipher procedures used by the German Foreign Ministry during WWII:

Pages from the diplomatic codebook No4:

Use of cipher systems by embassy and consulate:

Book review – ‘TICOM: The Hunt for Hitler’s Codebreakers’

Signals intelligence and codebreaking played an important role in WWII. British and American codebreakers solved many important Axis crypto systems, such as the German Enigma machine and the Japanese Navy’s code JN25. These operations remained hidden from the public till the 1970’s, when several books finally acknowledged the Allied codebreaking successes.

Since then countless books have been written about the Allied codebreakers, their successes and their contribution to the overall war effort.

Information about the similar successes of the Axis codebreakers is much harder to find since the relevant material only started to be declassified in the 2000’s.

The material that has been declassified reveals that at the end of the war in Europe the US and UK authorities were interested in finding out as much as possible about the operations and successes of the German codebreaking organizations. For this reason the TICOM (Target Intelligence Committee) project was created. The goal was to send small teams into Germany in order to capture the German codebreakers and their archives.

A new book has been published that covers the operations and findings of the TICOM teams sent to Germany at the end of WWII. ‘TICOM: the Hunt for Hitler’s Codebreakers’ by Randy Rezabek is available in both paperback and e-book format.

The book starts in 1944, when the Anglo-Americans expecting the war to end soon had started planning for the capture of enemy sigint personnel and archives.  The joint US-UK effort was codenamed TICOM and six teams were formed to go into Germany and search for the German signal intelligence personnel and archives.

The operations of the individual TICOM teams are covered in the following chapters. Travelling through a war ravaged Germany they had to improvise and take risks in order to locate their targets. The teams managed to retrieve important enemy personnel and files, including the entire codebreaking unit of the German Foreign Ministry. Other great successes were the capture of a ‘Kurier’ burst-radio communications device in Northern Germany, multichannel radio-teletype demodulators found buried in a camp in Rosenheim and the retrieval of the OKW/Chi archive, found in metal boxes at the bottom of lake Schliersee in Bavaria.

The author not only describes the operations of the TICOM teams but also explains the organization, personalities and achievements of the German codebreakers.

The book contains maps and several rare photographs of personnel and material from that era. There is also an appendix with an overview of the different codes and ciphers used in WWII.

Q&A with Randy Rezabek

The author was kind enough to answer some of my questions.

1). How did you become interested in WWII cryptologic history and why did you decide to write a book about the TICOM operation?

Many years ago (35+) I was saving in the Navy and was stationed at a Naval Security Group intercept site running the local photo lab. I had a clearance and learned a bit through osmosis, but it wasn’t until I read Bamford’s book The Puzzle Palace that things became clear about what we were up to. I maintained an interest in things Sigint even though life moved on in different directions.

About 2010 I was diagnosed with MS and that created physical limitations on many of my activities, so I focused on TICOM as a pastime that could focus on.

I first learned about TICOM through another Bamford book Body of Secrets, also the account in The Ultra Americans by Parrish. I found the whole topic fascinating but little researched in the literature. Since then I have acquired a personal library of 150 or so volumes on Signit, intelligence and military communications.

Since nobody else had written a book on TICOM I thought that was a worthwhile goal.

2). How hard was it to find information about the TICOM teams and the information they gathered?

About the time I got serious about this I started doing follow ups with NSA and NARA. It was around this time that TICOM documentation started being released. It was a very slow process, especially with the NSA FOIA requests, they often took years, and by the time they replied the requested documentation had been released to NARA anyway. The release of “European Axis Signal Intelligence…” was a great boon to researchers. In addition to the overview, I compiled a list of 150 or so TICOM reports that were cited in the footnotes, this gave me a guide on what to look for. I also hooked up with some other researchers in the field, such as Ralph Erskine, Frode Weierud and you. I made the acquaintance with David Kahn, who was a great inspiration, and met and corresponded with Stephen Budiansky, all have helped me find sources and sharpened my knowledge.

Otherwise it was a matter of patience watching the slow drip, drip of releases over the years. NARA was a great help, when I started out there was no use of the Term TICOM in the descriptors. But by 2012 they had reorganize lot of the catalog and put the newer TICOM stuff into their own entries.

3). You said in the book that the reasons why TICOM remained classified into the 21st century is perhaps its greatest secret. Do you think it was simple bureaucratic inertia or something else?

At this point I think it was inertia. After the end of the cold war there was no real need to keep it secret from a security viewpoint. Human sources were long retired or dead, technologies and techniques were long superseded, and the use of captured German intelligence information against the Soviets would be obvious to even the most clueless observer.. But the law says a secret is a secret until properly declassified, even if everyone knows about it. And declassification is a laborious process with little priority: as I say in the book “nobody in the NSA ever got fired for not revealing a secret.”

4). Are you going to write more books on the subject?

At this point I think I have pretty well exhausted the topic. I tried to include as many details as possible in it to provide a guide to future researchers. If something comes out in future released that alter the story then I may do a follow up article or two. However, publishers don’t see enough profit in the story to bother, that why I had to publish it myself.

More TICOM reports

The NSA FOIA office has released the following TICOM reports:

I-31 ‘Detailed interrogations of Dr. Hüttenhain, formerly head of research section of OKW/Chi, at Flensburg on 18-21 June 1945’

I-84 ‘Further interrogation of R.R. Dr. Hüttenhain and Sdf. Dr. Fricke of OKW/Chi on questions set by Mr. Friedman’

I-118 ‘Joint reports by Reg. Rat. Dr. Hüttenhain and Sdf. Dr. Fricke, written at CSDIC on or about 28 August 1945’

I-120 ‘Translation of Homework by Obltn. W. Werther, Company Commander of 7/LN Rgt. 353, written on 12th August 1945 at A.D. I. (K).’

I-137 ‘Final report written by Wachtmeister Otto Buggisch of OKH/Chi and OKW/Chi’

I-160 ‘Homework by Sonderführer Kuehn of Gen.d.NA. on General Organization and Work of French Referat’

I-176 ‘Homework by Wachtmeister Dr Otto Buggisch of OKH/Chi and OKW/Chi’

I-181 ‘Homework by Dr Werner Weber of OKW/Chi’

Enjoy!

Finding aid for the TICOM collection in the German Foreign Ministry’s Political Archive

Recently released TICOM material can be found in the TICOM collection of the German Foreign Ministry’s Political Archive.

I have uploaded the excel finding aid here. 

What happened to my FOIA requests? Progress report

When I started researching WWII cryptologic history I not only copied stuff from the archives but I also requested a lot of material from the NSA’s FOIA office.

Although I have received some interesting reports from them (I-172, I-89, DF-111, DF-105, DF-176, DF-169) they are still reviewing a lot of the TICOM files that I’ve requested. Why do they need to ‘review’ material from the 1940’s? I don’t know.,,

So what’s the progress of these cases?

Let’s see, so far in 2016 i have received information on the following cases:

State Department M-138-A instructions

The M-138-A strip cipher system was used by the State Department during WWII for enciphering messages classified SECRET. The 1944 instructions can be found at NARA but the previous editions from 1939 and 1942 are not there (or at least I haven’t been able to find them).

The NSA FOIA office stated that ‘a thorough search of our archival files was conducted but no records responsive to your requests were located’.

However the 1939 instructions can be found in TICOM report DF-15 so that’s not a complete loss.

Note that the 1939 instructions describe the straight board system (30 letters taken from one cipher column) while the 1944 instructions state that channel elimination is to be used for each message.

Dr Wilhelm Vauck, head of Referat 12 (Agents section)

In 1942 the German Army’s codebreaking agency OKH/Inspectorate 7/VI created a new department tasked with the solution of enemy agents codes. This was Referat 12 (Department 12), headed by the mathematician dr Wilhelm Vauck. According to the short bio of dr Vauck found at the website of Dresden University he survived the war and was a POW for the years 1945-48.

I thought that in that period he would have been interrogated by the Allies about his wartime activities so I requested information from the NSA. The recent response was ‘a thorough search of our historical files was conducted but no records responsive to your request were located’.

Still it is possible that other agencies might have some information on Vauck. We’ll see…

Dr Herbert Lotze, head of Wa Pruef 7/IV/E

Dr Lotze was head of research on speech privacy systems at the German Army’s Ordnance, Development and Testing Group, Signal Branch Group IVe. His team solved the US Bell Labs A-3 speech scrambler and similar Soviet devices.

The response of the NSA to my request for any postwar interrogations of dr Lotze was ‘a thorough search of our historical files was conducted but no records responsive to your request were located’.

However there seems to be material on Lotze at NARA so this isn’t the end of this case.

Other cases

During the year I was able to copy from NARA some of the reports that I had requested from the FOIA office years ago. This is material that was given to NARA in 2015.

Apart from these cases there are about a dozen TICOM reports that are being reviewed by the FOIA office. Let’s hope that they are released soon.

July 2011 to July 2016 - 5 years of Christos military and intelligence corner

This July marks 5 years since I created the Christos military and intelligence corner blogsite. During this time I’ve written many essays on WWII military, economic and intelligence history, I have attracted a small but dedicated audience and I think that I’ve made valuable contributions to WWII cryptologic history.

Did I start with that goal in mind? No.

Prior to 2011 I was simply a person who had read a lot of books on WWII and occasionally took part in conversations at various internet forums. Back then social networking sites hadn’t taken off so lots of interesting and knowledgeable people frequented internet forums. Some were WWII buffs (like me), others hobbyists, wargamers or aspiring historians. Although internet forums weren’t perfect it was possible to have great debates about battles, weapon systems, strategies, personalities etc.

Some of these individuals had researched these cases thoroughly and they had documents from the archives that contradicted the arguments made in ‘popular’ history books. Through these forums I learned that many of the things I thought to be true because I read them in ‘best selling’ books were in fact completely wrong.

In order for someone to take part in these debates and not look like a fool it was necessary not only to have read a few books on the subject but also to have specialized information from academic journals and from government archives. That’s why my next step was to download several articles from academic journals. I also ordered files from the British national archives through their website.

I not only read this material but I also wrote down the main points and created excel tables with interesting statistics (strength and loss reports for men, tanks, planes etc). Thus I was able to debate some of the ‘old timers’ on an equal footing.

At that time I had read a lot on WWII but there was an aspect of the conflict that I had neglected. That was the role of intelligence (not only spies but also signals intelligence and codebreaking). In 2010 the NSA published on their website the ‘European Axis Signal Intelligence in World War II’ volumes and I happened to find them through a google search.  I was impressed with this material and especially the fact that after all these years the operations of the German codebreakers were unknown to the public. I knew of the German Navy’s B-Dienst due to the role that it played in the Battle of the Atlantic but I had never heard of Inspectorate 7/VI or the Luftwaffe’s Chi Stelle.

After reading these reports I knew that it would be interesting to research some of these cases further, so I emailed several people (academics and authors) that were known in the field and asked for their assistance plus i told them about my own findings regarding the Russian radioteletype equipment mentioned in the books  ‘Body of secrets: anatomy of the ultra-secret National Security Agency’ and ‘The ultra Americans:the U.S. role in breaking the Nazi codes’ (see Bamford, the Russian ‘FISH’ and Unteroffizier Karrenberg - part 1, part 2, part 3).

Unfortunately I learned that most of them either do not respond to emails or if they do they will just say that they cannot help (or worse).

People in this ‘field’ are weird!

I decided to persevere on my own, so had a quick look online on how to start a blog, how to set it up, how to upload pics etc and I decided to create Christos military and intelligence corner. In the beginning I posted the information i had on WWII statistics and of course my research on the German exploitation of Soviet multichannel radio-teletype networks 1936-1945.

In order to find more material on the work of the Axis codebreakers I contacted a researcher at the British national archives and one at the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. Thus I was able to copy a lot of the original TICOM reports, i started posting them online at my Google Docs account and I also created a Scribd account in 2012.

One thing that this experience taught me is that proper research requires a lot of time and money. That’s why most history books are shit. Authors simply do not have the resources to check the archives thoroughly.

Especially in the field of intelligence things are further complicated by the fact that government agencies hold important files classified for too long and when they release them they do so in a haphazard manner.

Even so I pushed on and I think that I’ve been able to cover almost all the cases that interested me. In order to achieve this I had to spend my own money, I copied material from government archives in the US, UK, Germany and Finland and I’ve also been lucky enough to receive help from like minded individuals.

A lot of people have helped me by giving me information and/or files and I’ve tried to repay them by giving them some of my own material.

I hope that I’ve helped you as much as you’ve helped me!

Toughest cases

You can find my best essays here.

Some of them required a lot of work either in locating the files or in reading and comprehending them. Here are some memorable cases:

1). The Russian FISH case

In the book ‘Body of secrets: anatomy of the ultra-secret National Security Agency’, p15-16 it said:

Within a few days the team struck gold. They came upon an entire convoy of four German signal trucks, complete with four Fish machines, a signals technician, German drivers, and a lieutenant in charge. Arthur Levenson and Major Ralph Tester, a British expert on the Fish, escorted the whole lot, including the Germans, back to England. Once at Bletchley Park the machines were reverse-engineered to determine exactly how they were built and how they operated. (Levenson would later return to Washington and go on to become chief of the Russian codebreaking section at NSA.)

With enough Fish and other equipment to keep the engineers busy for a long time at Bletchley, the team began a manhunt for key German codebreakers. On May 21, 1945, Lieutenant Commander Howard Campaigne and several other TICOM officers interviewed a small group of Sigint personnel being held in Rosenheim. They had all worked for a unit of the Signals Intelligence Agency of the German Abwehr High Command, a major target of TICOM. What the prisoners told Campaigne would lead to one of the most important, and most secret, discoveries in the history of Cold War codebreaking. Their command, they said, had built a machine that broke the highest-level Russian cipher system. The machine, now buried beneath the cobblestones in front of a building nearby, had been designed to attack the advanced Russian teleprinter cipher-the Soviet equivalent of the Fish.

If this was true, it was breathtaking. For over six years US. and British codebreakers had placed Japan and Germany under a microscope, to the near exclusion of Russia and almost all other areas. Now with the war over and with Communist Russia as their new major adversary, the codebreakers would have to start all over from scratch. But if a working machine capable of breaking high-level Russian ciphers was indeed buried nearby, years of mind-numbing effort would be saved.

The Germans, eager to be released from prison, quickly agreed to lead TICOM to the machine. Campaigne wasted no time and the next day the twenty-eight prisoners, dressed in their German Army uniforms, began pulling up the cobblestones and opening the ground with picks and shovels. Slowly the heavy wooden boxes began to appear. One after another they were pulled from the earth, until the crates nearly filled the grounds. In all there were a dozen huge chests weighing more than 600 pounds each; 53 chests weighing nearly 100 pounds each; and about 53 more weighing 50 pounds each. It was a massive haul of some 7-1/2 tons.

Over the next several days the dark gray equipment was carefully lifted from its crates and set up in the basement of the building. Then, like magic, high-level encrypted Russian communications, pulled from the ether, began spewing forth in readable plaintext. Whitaker, who pulled into the camp a short time later, was amazed. "They were working like beavers before we ever arrived," he scribbled in his notebook. "They had one of the machines all set up and receiving traffic when we got there."

The Russian system involved dividing the transmissions into nine separate parts and then transmitting them on nine different channels. The German machines were able to take the intercepted signals and stitch them back together again in the proper order. For Campaigne and the rest of the TICOM team, it was a once-in-a-lifetime discovery. Back in Washington, Campaigne would eventually go on to become chief of research at NSA. Once the demonstration was over, Campaigne had the German soldiers repack the equipment and the next day it was loaded on a convoy, completely filling four heavy trucks. Two TICOM members, including I First Lieutenant Sehner Norland, who would also go on to a long career at NSA, accompanied the equipment and soldiers back to England. There it was set up near Bletchley Park and quickly put into operation. It, or a working model, was later shipped back to Washington. The discovery of the Russian codebreaking machine was a principal reason why both the US. and British governments still have an absolute ban on all details surrounding the TICOM operations.

Initially I wrote about this case in ‘Bamford, the Russian ‘FISH’ and Unteroffizier Karrenberg’ - part 1, part 2, part 3.

I continued to research this case and after locating the reports SI-32 - Special Intelligence and CSDIC SIR 1717 i presented all the available information in German exploitation of Soviet multichannel radio-teletype networks 1936-1945. (note that Randy Rezabek has covered aspects of this case in Case Studies‎: Russian FISH)

2). Compromise of the State Department’s strip cipher

In the period 1940-1945 the US State Department used the M-138-A strip cipher for encrypting messages classified SECRET. Each embassy had 50 alphabet sets for decrypting circular messages and 50 alphabet sets for direct communications with Washington. The codebreakers of Germany, Finland and Japan were very interested in these messages and during the period 1940-1944 they were able to exploit this traffic.

The German success was made possible thanks to alphabet strips and key lists they received from the Japanese in 1941 and these were passed on by the Germans to their Finnish allies in 1942. The Finnish codebreakers solved several diplomatic links in that year and in 1943 started sharing their findings with the Japanese. German and Finnish codebreakers cooperated in the solution of the strips during the war, with visits of personnel to each country. The Axis codebreakers took advantage of mistakes in the use of the strip cipher by the State Department’s cipher unit.

This has been the hardest case I’ve had to research because the information is scattered in various files, in various collections and in the archives of several countries!

For example I’ve had to copy relevant reports from the US National Archives and Records Administration (OSS, NSA and State Department collections), from the British national archives, from the German foreign ministry’s political archive, from the Finnish national archives, from the Bavarian State Library, from the US National Cryptologic Museum, from books written by Erkki Pale and Aladár Paasonen, from the Japan Center for Asian Historical Records and I’m still not done researching this case!

So far I’ve covered important aspects of this case:

The compromise of the State Department’s strip cipher – Things that don’t add up…

Compromise of the State Department’s M-138-A strip cipher and the traffic of other US agencies

New developments in the strip cipher case

Einzeldarstellungen aus dem Gebiet der Kryptologie - Hüttenhain’s statements on the State Department’s strip cipher

Japanese codebreakers of WWII

3). Engineering analysis of the Russian T-34/85 tank

The US report Engineering analysis of the Russian T-34/85 tank has a detailed examination of a Soviet T-34/85 tank captured in Korea. I’ve added information from that report in my essay WWII Myths - T-34 Best Tank of the war but locating the report proved to be really, really hard!

The report is mentioned in Osprey books but the author didn’t have a specific reference. I emailed his publisher and they forwarded my request but I never got a response from the author. Instead I tried to find the file at NARA but I was not successful. After emailing the US Army Center of Military History I was told to check with the National Armor and Cavalry Archives and they did have the file but it was in an unpacked box and since they were in the process of unpacking their files they could not copy it for me right away.

By pure luck I saw in a google search that the CIA’s FOIA office listed this file and my researcher went to NARA and copied a few pages from the CIA collection. Thus I was able to confirm that this was the file I was looking for and I requested it from the CIA’s FOIA office.

Then I waited. And waited. And waited…

Then, more than a month later, I got a phone call from the post office asking if i had ordered stuff from the US. The CIA’s FOIA office had gotten my address wrong so the post office people were trying to find where to send the report. After clearing things up I finally got the report, scanned and uploaded it. I also had to pay the CIA’s FOIA office for the copying cost.

4). Inspectorate 7/VI war diary

While looking at the finding aid to the NSA collection RG 457 – entry P11 I saw several files titled Journal/Activity Report, Wehrmacht/Army High Command. For some reason I thought this was the OKW/Chi (Signal Intelligence Agency of the Supreme Command, Armed Forces) war diary and I told my researcher to copy some of the months.

When I got the reports I saw that they were the war diary of the German Army’s signal intelligence service Inspectorate 7/VI and I was not happy. First of all I didn’t think these reports would be very interesting and they were written in German! (Scheiße)

It turns out that they are interesting, very much so, and even though I can’t read German google translate does an adequate job (plus I convinced Frode Weierud to translate some of it).

A friend from the Balkans copied several more of the monthly reports and we exchanged material plus I also located other Inspectorate 7/VI reports (in entry 9032) listed in the sources of the book Delusions of Intelligence: Enigma, Ultra, and the End of Secure Ciphers.

Unfortunately NARA does not have copies of all the monthly reports and many of the ones it does have are of such poor quality that they are practically unreadable. The solution to this problem was clear. I would have to copy the remaining reports from the TICOM collection of the German Foreign Ministry’s Political Archive (Auswärtiges Amt Politisches Archiv).

Together with some friends we formed a team and we copied the material. This was undoubtedly a great success.

5). Books written by former Finnish codebreakers

The Finnish codebreakers solved several foreign cryptosystems during WWII. Their greatest successes were the solution of Soviet military codes and of the State Department’s strip cipher. I was interested in what they had to say about the strip cipher so I tried to find copies of 'Marsalkan tiedustelupäällikkönä' by Aladár Paasonen and ‘Suomen radiotiedustelu 1927-1944’ by Erkki Pale.

It turns out that getting copies of these books is not easy but in the end I got the pages that dealt with the Finnish work on the strip cipher.

My friend Frode Weierud had 'Marsalkan tiedustelupäällikkönä' so I got that part from him. Two friends in Finland had a copy of ‘Suomen radiotiedustelu 1927-1944’ and they sent me chapter ‘DIPLOMAAT TISANOMIAKIN AVATTIIN’. Then it was easy for me to OCR and translate the text.

6). Did the German codebreakers solve the Japanese Purple cipher machine? – Conversation with Otto Leiberich

In the late 1930’s the Japanese Foreign Ministry distributed the Purple cipher machine to its most important embassies and it was used to encipher high level messages to and from Tokyo. Unfortunately for the Japanese the introduction of this new cipher machine wasn’t able to secure their diplomatic communications.

The codebreakers of the US Signal Intelligence Service were able to solve this device in 1940 and according to Russian historians the codebreakers of the Soviet Union, led by Sergei Tolstoy, also solved it. The British codebreakers were not able to solve this system on their own but they received information and a copy of the device from their American allies in 1941.

US reports based on the interrogation of German cryptanalysts claim that the Germans made an effort to solve the Purple cipher machine but were not successful.

There is information pointing to the compromise of this device by the Germans and I’ve presented a summary in German success with Purple?

In 2013 I tried to contact mr Otto Leiberich, chief cryptologist of the German cipher department in the period 1972-1990, because he had written about the Purple machine in his article Vom diplomatischen Code zur Falltürfunktion. Hundert Jahre Kryptographie in Deutschland:

‘Zwei Erfolge verdienen eine besondere Würdigung: die Entzifferung des Purple-Verfahrens der Japaner und die Entzifferung der amerikanischen Chiffriermaschine M 209.

Während des Krieges hatten die Japaner eine Chiffriermaschine entwickelt und zum Einsatz gebracht, die der amerikanischen Aufklärung größte Probleme bereitete. Da gelang es einer amerikanischen Gruppe um den Kryptologen William Friedman, diese Maschine, die als purple machine bezeichnet wurde, zu rekonstruieren und zu entziffern.

Dies gilt seither in Amerika als der größte Erfolg in der Kryptologie-Geschichte. Angeregt durch eine kürzlich ausgestrahlte Fernsehsendung fragte ich bei einem ehemaligen Kollegen nach, der während des Krieges auf diesem Gebiet tätig gewesen war, und erhielt bestätigt, woran ich bis dahin nur eine ungefähre Erinnerung hatte: Auch die Deutschen hatten die Sendungen der verbündeten Japaner bearbeitet, insbesondere die Meldungen, die der japanische Botschafter Oshima aus Berlin nach Tokio sandte. Einer Gruppe von Kryptologen und Technikern der Chiffrierabteilung des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht (OKW) unter der Leitung des Mathematikers Erich Hüttenhain war die Entzifferung ebenso gelungen wie den Amerikanern. Hin und wieder war ein Bericht schon entziffert und weitergeleitet, wenn Tokio wegen Übermittlungsfehlern um nochmalige Übersendung bitten mußte. Wenn also die Entzifferung der purple machine der größte Entzifferungserfolg während des Zweiten Weltkrieges gewesen wäre (er war es nicht!), so hätten ihn Hüttenhain und sein Team ebenfalls errungen. Leider existieren in Deutschland hierzu keine Unterlagen mehr.’

Initially I contacted the editorial board members of a journal that dealt with intelligence. Leiberich was also a member of this board but there were no contact details for him. The people I spoke with told me that they could not give me his contact details (which probably makes sense considering his previous government position…).

However his name was listed in the German yellow pages and I decided that I might as well call him and see if I can find out more on the Purple case.

I called twice and he picked up the phone the second time. For some reason I did not really believe that he would be Leiberich the cryptologist and I hadn’t prepared my questions in advance. It had also been a while since I had spoken in English and to make things worse he couldn’t hear me very well!

After asking him if he was Otto Leiberich, the mathematician, and explaining who I was he said that he had written that article a long time ago and he could not remember all the details. The information in the article came from conversations with his coworkers during their lunch break, especially since some of them had worked in this field during WWII.

I apologized several times for calling him at home and he was interested in the fact that I was calling from Greece (Griechenland).

Moral of the story, it’s probably not a good idea to call government officials at their residence, although in this case I’m glad I did!

7). Carlson-Goldsberry report

As I said previously the Finnish codebreakers solved several foreign cryptosystems during WWII and one of their greatest successes was the solution of the State Department’s strip cipher.

In September 1944 Finland signed an armistice with the Soviet Union. The people in charge of the Finnish signal intelligence service anticipated this move and fearing a Soviet takeover of the country had taken measures to relocate the radio service to Sweden. This operation was called Stella Polaris (Polar Star).

According to the NSA study History of Venona (Ft. George G. Meade: Center for Cryptologic History, 1995) by Robert Louis Benson and Cecil J. Phillips, it was at that time that the Finns revealed to the US authorities that they had solved their diplomatic codes. On 29 September 1944 colonel Hallamaa met with L.Randolph Higgs of the US embassy in Stockholm and told him about their success.

In response two cryptanalysts were sent from the US to evaluate the compromise of US codes in more detail. They were Paavo Carlson of the Army’s Signal Security Agency-SSA and Paul E. Goldsberry of the State Department’s cipher unit. Their report dated 23 November 1944 had details on the solution of US systems.

Unfortunately I haven’t been able to locate this report at NARA. The NSA’s foia office however has located the file and it has been placed in the review queue. The problem is that it takes a long time for reports to be reviewed and declassified. 

We’ll see….

8). Compromise of Polish military intelligence codes and Major Szczesny Choynacki, Polish deputy consul in Bern, Switzerland.

One day, while thinking about the compromise of Polish communications in WWII, I remembered that several sources mentioned a person named Choynacki.

According to Wilhelm Flicke’s ‘War Secrets in the Ether’ a captain Choynacki who collaborated with the office of the Polish military attaché in Bern had agents whose information showed that they were in ‘Hitler’s  immediate vicinity’.

Keith Jeffery also mentioned Choynacki in ‘MI6: The History of the Secret Intelligence Service 1909-1949’.

So it was easy for me to put two and two together and I wrote about this case in Polish Stencil codes and secret agent ‘’Knopf’’.

Still important information was missing and I had to wait till Craig McKay covered this case in Major Choynacki’s Ace: the Solution to an Old Puzzle of Wartime Intelligence in order to get the whole story.

9). Referat 12 reports

In 1942 the German Army’s signal intelligence agency Inspectorate 7/VI created a new department to deal exclusively with the solution of enemy agents codes. This was Referat 12 and it was headed by 1st Lieutenant Dr Wilhelm Vauck, a talented mathematician.

I was very interested in locating the reports of Referat 12 and in fact I thought that it would be unlikely that they survived the war.

My first move in tracking them down was to file a FOIA request with the British national archives. Unfortunately that was rejected, so I thought that I would never find them.

Previously I said that I was lucky to find the war diary of Inspectorate 7/VI. Since Referat 12 was a part of Inspectorate 7/VI its reports were included in the war diary, thus I killed two birds with one stone!

That wasn’t the end of this story. Since the reports were in German I used OCR software and google translate plus some parts had to be typed by hand. After translating and studying this material I wrote the essay Allied agents codes and Referat 12.

10). Czechoslovak report ‘Dopady lúštenia šifrovacieho systému čs. londýnskeho MNO z rokov 1940-1945 na domáci odboj’

After writing the essay Svetova Revoluce and the codes of the Czech resistance i’ve tried to find out more on the compromise of Czechoslovak ciphers in WWII. Recently i saw online a reference to the report ‘Dopady lúštenia šifrovacieho systému čs. londýnskeho MNO z rokov 1940-1945 na domáci odboj’ and I tried to locate it.

I emailed a well known Czech academic who is an expert on the Czechoslovak resistance but he did not respond.

I requested this report from the Czech Defense Ministry’s history department but they could not locate it.

I even called the editor of their military history magazine in case he knew how to proceed but he wasn’t interested in this case.

How did I solve this problem? I simply asked Jozef Krajcovic. It turns out that the report is held at the archive of the Museum of the Slovak National Uprising in Banská Bystrica.

11). TICOM report DF-112 ‘Survey of Russian military systems’

The report DF-112 ‘Survey of Russian military systems’ was written in 1947 by Alexis Dettmann (an important member of the German Army’s signal intelligence agency) and it contains lots of information on the solution of Soviet military, NKVD and partisan codes.

I saw this report mentioned in the Cryptologia article ‘Cryptology in the early Bundesrepublik’ and after failing to locate it at NARA I tried to contact the author of the article mr Michael van der Muelen. This proved to be harder than expected but in the end a friend of a friend was able to give me his email.

Mr Muelen sent me a copy of the report and I scanned and uploaded it. Thus I was able to learn a lot about German work on Soviet ciphers.

12). Rommel’s supply convoys

One of the most important questions regarding the war in North Africa, during WWII, is what effect did the sinking of Axis convoys have on the overall campaign. Can Rommel’s defeat be attributed to his lost supplies? Or were the losses tolerable?

In order to answer this question I wanted to find the detailed statistics on what was transported from Europe to N.Africa by the Axis powers.

This wasn’t as easy as you’d think. Books on the subject do not have the actual tables. Instead authors give figures or percentages for some of the months. I wanted all of the data.

I first emailed the owner of a website on the Italian Navy but his response was that ‘I’m limiting my assistance only to academic research’.

I guess the rest of us are the unwashed masses and we don’t need these files…

Anyway, I tried to find another source and I asked Andreas Biermann for this information. He scanned the relevant pages for 1941-42 and I typed the data into an excel file.

Then I was able to write ULTRA intelligence and Rommel’s convoys.

These are just a few of the cases that proved hard to crack. In fact even easy cases had parts that required a lot of work to get right.

Remaining cases

At this time I’m only actively researching the case of the strip cipher. I’m also waiting for several of my cases to be processed by the NSA’s FOIA office.

Hopefully these will be released soon and they will add to our knowledge of WWII history.

Be patient and let’s keep our fingers crossed!

For now enjoy these interesting files:

US diplomatic messages decrypted by the Finnish codebreakers in 1943

Inspectorate 7/VI War Diary - Report of September 1942

Inspectorate 7/VI War Diary - Report of March 1943