Re: Dayton Codebreakers

David Hamer <dhhamer@...> writes:

> 
> All...
> 
> A newly released DVD tells the story of the 'Dayton Codebreakers',
> the team led by Joseph Desch that built the 4-wheel American
> Bombe.
> 
> For details see <http://www.daytoncodebreakers.org/> Potential
> purchasers outside of the US should make sure that DVD players
> are compatible.
> 
> David Hamer
> 
> 

Finally found the way through the link to the DVD. A synopsis from the website  
is reproduced below, is someone trying to 'adjust' history again?
Geoff


<Synopsis>
One thousand, one hundred sixty American ships carrying supplies across the 
Atlantic to Britain were sunk in 1942, torpedoed by German submarines-- U-Boats-
-which relied upon secret underwater radio communications. The German Navy used 
a coding machine called Enigma to keep its maneuvers out of the Allies' reach. 
The British had cracked an earlier Enigma device but not this one. The US Navy, 
angry at failures in the British codebreaking operations at Bletchley Park, 
decided to take these affairs into their own hands. Thy came to Joe Desch, a 
self-educated man known for his innovative work on thyratrons--miniature quick-
firing tubes--at the National Cash Register Company in Dayton, Ohio. Desch, a 
civilian of German descent, was under surveillance himself even as he worked.
Desch and his team countered the Enigma with an advanced version of the British 
Bombe, a machine that would shorten the war, thereby saving the lives of 
combatants on all sides. But the pressure on Desch as he worked on this top 
secret mission, equal in secrecy to the Manhattan Project, would take its toll. 
He struggled with the moral consequences of his work--the deaths of thousands 
of young men. 
</Synopsis>