Hans-Thilo Schmidt (13 May 1888 – 19 September 1943) codenamed Asché or Source D, was a German

spy Espionage, spying, or intelligence gathering, as a subfield of the intelligence field, is the act of obtaining secret or confidential information (intelligence). A person who commits espionage on a mission-specific contract is called an ''e ...

who sold secrets about the

Enigma machine The Enigma machine is a cipher device developed and used in the early- to mid-20th century to protect commercial, diplomatic, and military communication. It was employed extensively by Nazi Germany during World War II, in all branches of the W ...

to the French during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. The materials he provided facilitated Polish mathematician

Marian Rejewski Marian Adam Rejewski (; 16 August 1905 – 13 February 1980) was a Polish people, Polish mathematician and Cryptography, cryptologist who in late 1932 reconstructed the sight-unseen German military Enigma machine, Enigma cipher machine, aided ...

's reconstruction of the

wiring Electrical wiring is an electrical installation of cabling and associated devices such as switches, distribution boards, sockets, and light fittings in a structure. Wiring is subject to safety standards for design and installation. Allow ...

in the Enigma's rotors and

reflector Reflector may refer to: Science * Reflector, a device that causes reflection (for example, a mirror or a retroreflector) * Reflector (photography), used to control lighting contrast * Reflecting telescope * Reflector (antenna), the part of an ant ...

; thereafter the Poles were able to read a large proportion of Enigma-enciphered traffic. He was the younger brother of

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the German Army (1935–1945), ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmac ...

general

Rudolf Schmidt Rudolf Schmidt (12 May 1886 – 7 April 1957) was a general in the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany during World War II who commanded the 2nd Panzer Army on the Eastern Front. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leav ...

Selling Enigma secrets

A former officer, Schmidt had been forced to leave the army having suffered from gas during the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

.May, Ernest ''Strange Victory'', New York: Hill & Wang, 2000 page 135. His brother,

, secured him a civilian post at the German Armed Forces'

cryptographic Cryptography, or cryptology (from "hidden, secret"; and ''graphein'', "to write", or '' -logia'', "study", respectively), is the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of adversarial behavior. More gen ...

headquarters, the Cipher Office. Shortly after the military version of the

was introduced, he contacted

French French may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France ** French people, a nation and ethnic group ** French cuisine, cooking traditions and practices Arts and media * The French (band), ...

intelligence Intelligence has been defined in many ways: the capacity for abstraction, logic, understanding, self-awareness, learning, emotional knowledge, reasoning, planning, creativity, critical thinking, and problem-solving. It can be described as t ...

and offered to supply information about the new machine. His offer was accepted by Captain

Gustave Bertrand Gustave Bertrand (1896–1976) was a French military intelligence officer who made a vital contribution to the decryption, by Poland's Cipher Bureau, of German Enigma ciphers, beginning in December 1932. This achievement would in turn lead t ...

of French Intelligence, and he received from the French the

codename A code name, codename, call sign, or cryptonym is a code word or name used, sometimes clandestinely, to refer to another name, word, project, or person. Code names are often used for military purposes, or in espionage. They may also be used in ...

''Asché'', and was assigned a contact, the French agent codenamed ''Rex''. For the next several years, until he left his position in Germany, he met with French agents at various European cities and supplied them copies of the Enigma machine's instruction manual, operating procedures, and lists of key settings. Even with this information, however, French Intelligence was unable to break messages

encrypt In cryptography, encryption (more specifically, encoding) is the process of transforming information in a way that, ideally, only authorized parties can decode. This process converts the original representation of the information, known as plai ...

ed on the Enigma. Nor were the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

cryptologist This is a list of cryptographers. Cryptography is the practice and study of techniques for secure communication in the presence of third parties called adversaries. Pre twentieth century * Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-Farahidi: wrote a (now lost) book ...

s whom Bertrand contacted able to make any headway. In December 1932, Bertrand shared intelligence obtained from Asché with the Polish

General Staff A military staff or general staff (also referred to as army staff, navy staff, or air staff within the individual services) is a group of officers, Enlisted rank, enlisted, and civilian staff who serve the commanding officer, commander of a ...

's Cipher Bureau (

Biuro Szyfrów The Cipher Bureau ( Polish: ''Biuro Szyfrów'', ) was the interwar Polish General Staff's Second Department's unit charged with SIGINT and both cryptography (the ''use'' of ciphers and codes) and cryptanalysis (the ''study'' of ciphers and cod ...

). Mathematician-cryptologist

had already set up a system of

equation In mathematics, an equation is a mathematical formula that expresses the equality of two expressions, by connecting them with the equals sign . The word ''equation'' and its cognates in other languages may have subtly different meanings; for ...

s describing the operation of the then new German Army Enigma rotor-wirings. The key-settings lists provided by Schmidt helped fill in enough of the unknowns in Rejewski's

formula In science, a formula is a concise way of expressing information symbolically, as in a mathematical formula or a ''chemical formula''. The informal use of the term ''formula'' in science refers to the general construct of a relationship betwe ...

e, allowing him to speedily solve the equations and recover the wirings. That accomplished, the Poles were henceforth able to read Enigma traffic for nearly seven years to the outbreak of

as well as for a time into the War, while operating in conjunction with French intelligence in France. In a two-week January 1938 trial, they solved and read about three-quarters of all

(German Armed Forces) Enigma intercepts: a remarkable result, considering that parts of the raw intercepts were garbled or incomplete due to interference ozaczuk, ''Enigma'' 1984, p. 45 After the

Battle of France The Battle of France (; 10 May – 25 June 1940), also known as the Western Campaign (), the French Campaign (, ) and the Fall of France, during the Second World War was the Nazi Germany, German invasion of the Low Countries (Belgium, Luxembour ...

, the French agent who had been Schmidt's case officer, a German citizen named Stallmann who went by the name " Rodolphe Lemoine" ( fr) and used the codename "Rex," was arrested by the

Gestapo The (, ), Syllabic abbreviation, abbreviated Gestapo (), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of F ...

and betrayed Schmidt as a French spy. Schmidt was arrested on 1 April 1943, and in September 1943 his daughter Giselle was called on to identify his body; her account (as recounted in

Hugh Sebag-Montefiore Nicholas Hugh Sebag-Montefiore (born 5 March 1955) is a British writer. He trained as a barrister before becoming a journalist and then a non-fiction writer. Biography He has published two books on the history of the Second World War, of whic ...

's book) suggests that Schmidt had committed suicide.

References

, ''Enigma ou la plus grande enigme de la guerre 1939-1945'' (Enigma: the Greatest Enigma of the War of 1939-1945), Paris, Librairie Plon, 1973. * Paul Paillole, ''The Spy in Hitler's Inner Circle'' (English translation of ''Notre Espion chez Hitler''), Oxford, Casemate UK, 2016. * Paul Paillole, ''Notre espion chez Hitler'', Paris, Editions Robert Laffont, 1985. *

Władysław Kozaczuk Władysław Kozaczuk (23 December 1923 – 26 September 2003) was a Polish Army colonel and a military and intelligence historian. Life Born in the village of Babiki near Sokółka, Kozaczuk joined the army in 1944, during World War II, at B ...

, ''Enigma: How the German Machine Cipher Was Broken, and How It Was Read by the Allies in World War Two'', edited and translated by

Christopher Kasparek Christopher Kasparek (born 1945) is a Scottish-born writer of Polish descent who has translated works by numerous Polish authors, including Ignacy Krasicki, Bolesław Prus, Florian Znaniecki, Władysław Tatarkiewicz, Marian Rejewski, and Wł ...

, Frederick, MD, University Publications of America, 1984. *

, ''Enigma: the Battle for the Code'', London, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2000. (Provides information on Schmidt obtained from his daughter.) * Fred B. Wrixon, ''Codes, Ciphers & Other Clandestine Communication: Making and Breaking Secret Messages from Hieroglyphics to the Internet'', 1998, Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, Inc., , p. 84.

Selling Enigma secrets

See also

References

Further reading