Excerpt from Manual for the Solution of Military Ciphers The history of war teems with occasions where the interception of dispatches and orders written in plain language has resulted in defeat and disaster for the force whose intentions thus became known at once to the enemy. For this reason, prudent generals have used cipher and code messages from time immemorial. The necessity for exact expression of ideas practically excludes the use of codes for military work although it is possible that a special tactical code might be useful for preparation of tactical orders. It is necessary therefore to fall back on ciphers for general military work if secrecy of communication is to be fairly well assured. It may as well be stated here that no practicable military cipher is mathematically indecipherable if intercepted; the most that can be expected is to delay for a longer or shorter time the deciphering of the message by the interceptor. The capture of messengers is no longer the only means available to the enemy for gaining information as to the plans of a commander. All radio messages sent out can be copied at hostile stations within radio range. If the enemy can get a fine wire within one hundred feet of a buzzer line or within thirty feet of a telegraph line, the message can be copied by induction. Messages passing over commercial telegraph lines, and even over military lines, can be copied by spies in the offices. On telegraph lines of a permanent nature it is possible to install high speed automatic sending and receiving machines and thus prevent surreptitious copying of messages, but nothing but a secure cipher will serve with other means of communication. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

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"Success in dealing with unknown ciphers is measured by these four things in the order named: perseverance, careful methods of analysis, intuition, luck." So begins the first chapter of Colonel Parker Hitt's 1916 Manual for the Solution of Military Ciphers, a foundational text in the history of cryptology. An irrepressible innovator, Hitt possessed those qualities in abundance. His manual, cipher devices, and proactive mentorship of Army cryptology during World War I laid the groundwork for the modern American cryptologic system. Though he considered himself an infantryman, Hitt is best known as the "father of American military cryptology." In Parker Hitt: The Father of American Military Cryptology, Betsy Rohaly Smoot brings Hitt's legacy to life, chronicling his upbringing, multiple careers, ingenious mind, and independent spirit. In the 1910s, after a decade as an infantry officer, Hitt set his sights on aviation. Instead, he was drawn to the applied sciences, designing signal and machine-gun equipment while applying math to combat problems. Atypical for the time, Hitt championed women in the workplace. During World War I he suggested the Army employ American female telephone operators, while his wife, Genevieve Young Hitt, became the first woman to break ciphers for the United States government. His daughter, Mary Lue Hitt, carried on the family legacy as a "code girl" during World War II. Readers of Elizabeth Cobbs' The Hello Girls, Liza Mundy's Code Girls, and David Kahn's The Codebreakers will find in Parker Hitt's story an insightful profile of an American cryptologic hero and the early twentieth-century military. Drawing from a never-before-seen cache of Hitt's letters, photographs, and diaries, Smoot introduces readers to Hitt's life on the front lines, in classrooms and workshops, and at home.

In May 1917, William and Elizebeth Friedman were asked by the U.S. Army to begin training officers in cryptanalysis and to decrypt intercepted German diplomatic and military communications. In June 1917, Herbert Yardley convinced the new head of the Army’s Military Intelligence Division to create a code and cipher section for the Army with himself as its head. These two seminal events were the beginning of modern American cryptology, the growth of which culminated 35 years later with the creation of the National Security Agency. Each running their own cryptologic agencies in the 1920s, the Friedman-Yardley relationship was shattered after Yardley published a tell-all book about his time in military intelligence. Yet in the end, the work they all started in 1917 led directly to the modern American intelligence community. As they got older, they became increasingly irrelevant in the burgeoning American cryptologic fraternity. Topics and features: * Examines the lives of three remarkable and pioneering cryptologists * Offers fascinating insights into spies, codes and ciphers, rumrunners, poker, and military history * Sheds new light on interesting parts of the cryptologists’ careers—especially Elizebeth Friedman, whose work during World War II has just begun to be explored * Recounts several good stories, i.e., What if the Friedmans had gone to work for Herbert Yardley in his new Cipher Bureau in 1919? What if Yardley had moved back to Washington to work for William Friedman a decade later? This enjoyable book has wide appeal for: general readers interested in the evolution of American cryptology, American historians (particularly of World War I, the inter-war period, and World War II signals intelligence), and historians of—and general readers interested in—American military intelligence. It also can be used as an auxiliary text or recommended reading in introductory or survey courses in history or on the related topics.