Ultra Machine Research Paper

The Germans utilized the Enigma machine, a transposition device created in Holland in 1919, for communication between all branches of their armed services during World War II . In order to help win the war the allied powers became sufficient in the deciphering of this Enigma code. WWII officially began in 1939 but the first code breaking developments for the allies began quite a few years earlier in Poland . By the start of WWII British logisticians and mathematicians such as Alan Turing and Gordon Welchman led the allies code breaking intelligence from Bletchley Park . The Ultra machine, which broke these complicated codes, was first implemented in June of 1941 . The development of the Ultra Machine, the deciphering of the U-boat enigma,
By early 1941 the German submarine force begin to have a huge impact on the trade routes that Britain depended upon, and the number of British, Allied, and neutral ships sunk climbed ominously upward . British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill declared “The only thing that ever really frightened me during the war was the U-boat peril.” This demonstrates the vast importance that the German U-boats had on the war, and shows how important it was that the allies were able to monitor these boats through their intelligence. The Ultra machine, that cracked the U-boat code, was able to help to control and monitor the German submarines . These developments in intelligence led the allies to be able to make 40 attacks and sink 13 of the German submarines in 60 days. A U-boat whose location had been revealed by the Ultra within the past five days was three times more likely to be sunk than another boat whose location had not been revealed . The U-boats were about 33% less effective in sinking convoys and 84% less merchant ships between 1941 and 1943 (the years that the U-boats were most efficiently monitored.) These statistics demonstrate the vast significance that Ultra-decoding techniques had on the oceanic portion of World War II (the battle of the