Seizing the Enigma

The Race to Break the German U-Boats Codes, 1939–1943

By: David Kahn

Narrated by: Bernard Mayes

Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins

Publisher's summary

For almost four desperate years, between 1939 and 1943, British and American navies fought a savage, losing battle against German submarine wolf packs. The Allies might never have turned the tide of that historic battle without an intelligence coup. The race to break the German U-boat codes is one of the last great untold stories of World War II.

David Kahn, the world’s leading historian of cryptology, brings to life this tense, behind-the-scenes drama for the first time. Seizing the Enigma provides the definitive account of how British and American code breakers fought a war of wits against Nazi naval communications and helped lead the Allies to victory in the crucial Battle of the Atlantic.

©1991 David Khan (P)1994 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“The best historian of cryptography explains the cracking of the Naval Enigma cipher.... David Kahn writes with authority and enthusiasm.” (Simon Singh, author of The Code Book and Fermat's Last Theorem)

“[Kahn] underscores the strategic importance of submarine warfare in the Atlantic, giving a balanced account of the ultimate importance of code breaking in that arena. High drama at sea seizing German codebooks and equipment and analytical genius ashore were essential. Kahn describes both of these matching efforts expertly. Informed laypersons and specialists will find this book valuable and intriguing.” ( Library Journal)

“Kahn provides detailed, action-packed accounts (drawn from interviews with surviving eyewitnesses on both sides) of the bold seizures that yielded vital documents…A first-rate briefing on the use of brawn as well as brains to alleviate the U-boat threat.” ( Kirkus Reviews)

This time free is good !

Excellent history of history’s most important information war. This was well read and very interesting !

Techno Thriller but it is a True Story

The story of how the enigma machine was conceived and developed after WW1 then perfected by the German Navy in WW2. Then how the Poles almost cracked it before moving to Britain where a massive secret program at Blechley Park and throughout the Navy ultimately destroyed the German submarine packs and won the war.
The best thing about this book is the way it describes how the machines were constructed and how the messages were decrypted. Ten times better than the movies I've see on the subject. I want to read more from David Kahn but only after I have built an enigma machine myself.

Fascinating Book

This is a very interesting book with the entire background of the British efforts to break the code to the Enigma machines.

The one problem with the book is that there are many pages explaining how to set up and operate the enigma machine - this is interesting only to a very limited audience.

Other than that I recommend it highly.

A somewhat slow narrative

The Enigma story is like something out of a thriller- the author recounts several daring exploits in the quest for Enigma, but they fall a little flat. I think part of the problem is the narrator; I have several other books narrated by him which I quite enjoyed but his lack on inflection in this recording is disappointing. I still enjoyed the book, but I wasn't able to just listen all the way through as is my habit.

Loved it, incredible detail.

Way more information than I ever knew about the Enigma. An excellent book for the history buff.

Great Story

Very well done. Exciting plot, wonderful narrative. This is a great value for those interested in history.

A tough coice for audio

Any additional comments?

This is a somewhat less-than-great presentation of a great story. It documents what is likely the most amazing feat of sustained intelligence analysis ever performed against a target that should, by all rights, have been unbreakable. The intellectual level achieved by people like Alan Turing, as well as the selfless efforts of hundreds of others at BP are nothing short of amazing in retrospect.

The presentation is factual, detailed (some might say dry), and often hard to follow due to the lack of photos, numerical tables, and other information that is not conveyed by the audio alone. For example, if you can visually picture an Enigma machine after having listened to the written descriptions only, I congratulate you. I cannot. But I will now go seek out the photos, and I will know what I am looking at.

If you are looking for an action-packed war adventure, this book is not for you. If you are looking for thoughtful account of a crucial aspect of the war in the North Atlantic, you will like this one. I certainly did.

Dry as Toast

Probably a good read in person with pictures and tables but as a listen I had to stop half way through. I tried listening at 1 1/2 speed to make it less painful but had to give up after a while. The story is there but doesn't really come alive with narration. Its bogs down an a bunch of places and was a difficult listen.

The Secret Weapon of the Battle of the Atlantic

In the dark days of 1941 Hitler was was winning the "Battle of the Atlantic." His U-Boat submarines were sinking the cargo ships that were bringing needed supplies to Britain, sinking them faster than new ships could be built. Britain was in real risk of being starved into surrender.

An unlikely army of academics, chess champions, crossword puzzle enthusiasts, and mathematicians was assembled to attack the secret codes and ciphers of the German Navy, especially those produced by the "Enigma" coding machine that was considered by the Germans to be unbreakable. The codebreakers were assisted by targeted captures of German ships (with codebooks intact).

By 1943 Britain and the US had reversed the dire situation; ship sinkings were drastically reduced, US shipbuilders made more new ships than ever thought possible, and U-Boats were being sunk faster than they could be built.

"Seizing the Enigma" tells this story, and how it was never a sure-run thing. There were months on end that the cryptanlysts (code/cipher breakers) made no progress; the tides of war shifted back and back. The book introduces the people that played so vital a role in the story, from the Polish cryptanalysts worried about the German threat in the 30's to the French spy chief to the German Hans-Thilo Schmidt who gave early secrets to the French to the brilliant British cryptanalysts of Bletchley Park, including Alan Turing,

David Kahn is the best person to tell this story. His prior work includes "The Codebreakers: The Comprehensive History of Secret Communication from Ancient Times to the Internet" which is acclaimed as "...the best and most complete account of cryptography yet published." (Time)Sebag Montefiore's narration brings the story to life.

#WWII #Cryptanalysis #Enigma #BattleoftheAtlantic #BletchleyPark #Tagsgiving #Sweepstakes

Fascinating story requiring patient audience

This is a VERY detailed history of a very convoluted military technology that evolved and matured over several decades, not just the period of 1939 through 1943. As such, the author chose to include at times bewilderingly complex, long-winded, and dry technical content that is nonetheless vital to his audience’s understanding of the momentous contribution of the decryption of the Enigma cyphers to the Allied victory in the Battle of the Atlantic. While the narrative contains several moments of wartime drama, this is a work intended for an audience of serious serious students of military history, as well as academics looking for source materials. Bernard Mayes’ reading style is clear and of an appropriate pace for such an information-dense subject, making this book an ideal candidate for an audiobook. This reviewer probably would not have attempted to read this on his own!