Seizing the Enigma (29 page)

The rotors are inserted into the machine.

The jacks on each end of several short cables are plugged into the sockets specified by the key list of a plugboard on the front of the machine.

The rotors are turned until the letters specified by the key list appear in the windows of the Enigma’s lid.

When the machine has been set up, encipherment begins. Each plaintext letter of the German message is pressed on the keyboard, and the letters that light up on the illuminable panel are written down. This is the ciphertext. After the entire message has been put into cipher, the cryptogram is radioed from headquarters to a U-boat or from a U-boat to headquarters.

Russian sailors look at the wreck of the
Magdeburg
, partly blown up near the island of Odensholm in August 1914.

Arthur Scherbius, the inventor of the Enigma.

Hans-Thilo Schmidt, the spy who revealed some secrets of the Enigma.

A. Dillwyn Knox, who made some progress in the attempt to solve the Enigma.

Marian Rejewski, the Polish mathematician who solved the Enigma.

The U-33 and some of her crew members.

The Führer greets von Dresky, skipper of the U-33.

Fish-oil tanks burn during the British commando raid on the Lofotens, March 1941.

The
Krebs
just before the British boarded her during the Lofotens raid and seized Enigma keys and rotors.