Enigma Machines

  The Enigma machine was created by Arthur Scherbius, a German engineer. It transcribed coded information as a way of creating secure communication. The machine works where the operator types in a message and the Enigma will scramble the message using notched wheels which displayed different letters of the alphabet. For the receiver to accurately understand the message, they would need to know the exact settings of the rotor, or wheels, to reconstruct the coded text. At first, in 1931, Britain and her allies understood that the Enigma machine posed a problem, but where unable to break the cypher. Eventually, they handed the detail to the Polish Cipher Bureau, who was able to reconstruct the Engima machine with the internal wiring and read the German forces' messages due to their connection with the German engineering industry.
     As there was the threat of a German invasion in 1939, the Poles shared the secret of the machine with the British, who created Britain's Government Code and Cipher School, which became the center for Allied efforts in the Enigma output. At this school, top mathematicians and general problem-solvers were recruited. However, the Germans were convinced of the security of their machine, and so used it for an extensive amount of communications. Through this, the British were able to gain a lot of intelligence, which they called "Ultra" and was top secret. Perhaps the most surprising yet devastating fact about the machine, however, is the fact that the British had to use the information they gleaned from the German's Enigma sparingly so that they would not tip the Germans off. This sometimes meant letting innocent lives die.