An Enigma

originally posted by: 727Sky
a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

The whiz wheels were a pain in the butt to use especially when trying to fly, listen to the "set" and the following numbers on one radio while two other radios had chatter on them.... Once away from any head shed REMF's we just made up our own codes especially for call signs. We all flew together almost every day so someone could burp we would get the meaning...hahahah

One of the places in S.E. Asia could listen to the taxi cab drivers in N.Y. if they wanted to and that was all in the early 70s.... No telling what the capabilities are today. We could triangulate a bad guy transmitters location down to 250 meters (or better) and ARK-LIGHT (B-52 bomb drop) the the hell out of them if they were on some REMFs hit list.

Those were the days... Push a button and make them disappear ! Nothing has really changed as there is always someplace the REMFs want to push a button on !

Did you have a way to identify retransmission stations from primary source transmissions when you were dfing? A weak vhf to a strong hf retrans seems like a logical way to screw with direction finding techniques.

a reply to: Dalamax

They were not that sophisticated as most of the units we were interested in were battalion size units in contact with their companies in the field. Logistics and marching orders were what was being transmitted for the most part and it was done by direct communication with a unit in the field.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk
The biggest pitfall with enigma was the morning weather report. It always was sent out first thing every morning and always ended with “Heil Hitler” If you make an enigma machine that can run backwards and begin at the end, when you get to the first letter you have the rotor selection and rotor settings for the day.

Once this was worked out, the British were reading the enigma messages faster then the Germans.

Cool. I worked everything from battalion down to section level using 77 sets and raven equipment.
I know better then to ask for too many details about deployments and theatres.
Very interesting, i know both sets could be remoted using don10 quite easily, I’ll have to wrack my brain and shake a mates boot to remember the ranges we could remote with the older gear and the boosters.

Stupid signals training I always thought I was never that interested in it till I start remembering what I learned.
a reply to: 727Sky

originally posted by: beyondknowledge
a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Once this was worked out, the British were reading the enigma messages faster then the Germans.

Ha! That’s awesome. How familiarity breeds contempt eh?

Numbers are stupid.
There's too many.
I send secret messages by smell.

Nice like a hound I agree. Numbers, their just one thing after another!
a reply to: Homefree

a reply to: Dalamax
The biggest problem with knowing the other sides secrets is not letting them know that you know. The British could only react to a very small amount of this information or the Germans would figure it out and change the code system.