You certainly are talking sense in these last two posts of yours, Jaeger. One of the problems with Ultra was the enormous volume of traffic that existed, and having to filter what was of extreme relevance from the milk and cookies requests (which might be a subject of analysis too). Everything had to be decoded, translated, analysed, sifted, selected. transmitted to the appropriate destinations, and then digested by those in position to act.

Not an easy cycle.

In any case, the Soviets did not have Ultra, and sometimes their British Allies supplied them some snippets from uncertain sources, so they developed their own information sources, from infiltrators at top level to the usual lower level sources like reconnaissance (air and ground), analysis of POW interrogation, radio interception, etc.

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No Rest for the Wicked!

Jaeger,

just started Winterbotham´s Ultra (1974) and any information on Ultra was not allowed to be told until spring 1974...

ANyway, like mentioned by you two here the amount of info was huge ( up to 2,000 messages per day ín the book ) so that´s a problem. Also decoding varied in time. And also how to use it and not get the Germans on their toes about it.

One very interesting thing is what you said Jaeger: "not all military commander is acceptable to change his plans by receiving some papers."

At least according to the author some officers even regarded it a crime to use the info against the enemy. especially Winterbotham does not like the Admiralty, as he points in that direction several times in the book.

Interesting book. I´m now reading about year 1941. Gives great insight to the battles and ideas and how much truly was known...Göring could have sent his orders straight to Churchill in Sept 1940 during the Blitz BTW....

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Thank you for the kind words Za.

Regarding the USSR and Ultra. I don't think that Stalin and his men would readily accept information that was sent to them. The info itself would have to be washed before sending it so it wouldn't compromise the code. Another issue is of course that the USSR would have to confirm the info themselves.

In 2006 it is possible to retreive most information at the drop of a hat. We have search engines to filter out the rubbish that we don't want to know about. In the '40ies you would have to train secretaries to type, learn a new language etc.

The Ultra secret was important, but not as effective as fiction novelists would have us beleive.

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'We march. The enemy is retreating in transport. We follow on foot.' Lt.Neil McCallum 5/7 Gordons 19th November 1942

Kai-Petri

I once read the fiction book by Richard Harris called 'Enigma'. I went on to read some of his selected books for the background. I found them to be very insightful. As for the fiction novel Enigma, it was a fun read.

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'We march. The enemy is retreating in transport. We follow on foot.' Lt.Neil McCallum 5/7 Gordons 19th November 1942