Dieppe- the REAL reason?!

Interesting theory, but not sure if I agree with it entirely.
"TORONTO – New research suggests the real intent of the historic raid on Dieppe in 1942 was to steal a machine that would help crack top-secret German codes.
Military historian David O’Keefe spent 15 years searching through the once-classified and ultra-secret war files and says the real purpose behind the Dieppe operation—which cost hundreds of Canadian soldiers their lives — was to capture advanced coding technology from the German headquarters near the French beach.
“For years, so many veterans, men who stormed the beaches and ended up in prisoners of war camps, had no clue what the reason was that they were there,” O’Keefe tells Global National’s Christina Stevens.
“They had their own missions, but they did not understand what the driving force was behind the raid.”
Historians have assigned many purposes to the disastrous raid: to gather intelligence from prisoners and captured materials, to assess Germany’s response to amphibious raids, to boost Allied morale and to assure the Soviets—locked in a titanic struggle with Germany — that the west was committed to fighting in Europe."
Breaking German codes real reason for 1942 Dieppe raid: historian

 

I just skimmed through the article, but its interesting.

IF the allies captured all the ciphers and Enigma paraphernalia at the hotel, wouldn't the Germans just change the ciphers? It would certainly take some effort to do, but could it not be done? And wouldn't that make the entire raid just an interesting footnote on a history textbook? The reason Bletchley was able to use the ciphers from captured U-Boats was that the Germans weren't aware that information was in allied hands, and hence didn't see the need to change them. If they figured it out, Bletchley would be in the dark.

 

Here is a link to an article which might be the "real" reason behind the Dieppe Raid, no matter what was said then by Churchill and others, and the Enigma code-book capture espoused recently. Capturing a single months worth of code cipher settings would be easily changed, capturing the same cipher settings from ships at sea which needed months worth of cipher books was a better bet. That is what the UK did, capture them from the "weather ships" near Greenland, and from U-boat, they needed multiple months worth of settings to function.

Think the new technology of radar, and the German versions called Freya and Wurtzburg.

Goto:

The Battle of Dieppe, 19 August 1942

 

This would also presume that the Germans don't have time to remove or destroy the Enigma machine(s). That would seem to call for a small covert operation, perhaps in advance of the main landing. Otherwise, how likely is it that the landing force could fight their way through the town to the hotel before the Germans could remove a machine which can be carried by one man?

Once the Dieppe operation was being planned, I could see including a 30AU team to try to capture an Enigma or anything else of value, but they'd still be landing with the assault force, after surprise had been lost, and have to fight or sneak their way to the hotel, basically hoping they got lucky. If the snatch was the original basis of the operation, it seems an odd way to go about it.

 

I posted this on AHF recently when this was discussed...

After the raid, the Germans would have turned over every inch of wreckage in that building looking for those four little steel rotors - and if they weren't there...

 

I don't think the Germans would even have to claw through the wreckage to figure out what happened to their encryption machines:

1. the Germans would presumably evacuate the building and would report this to higher authorities after the battle
2. No one would report having destroyed or evacuated the sensitive material
3. A coursory investigation would reveal that the Hotel was one of the main targets inland

It wouldn't take a genius to assume the machines were taken. They would likely begin monitoring British movements and radio traffic for clues that the code was broken. Once they had some type of indication of the latter (coupled with the evidence from Dieppe that the machines are missing) they would go into damage control mode and change the code. And as I said, the entire operation would go down as one of the great intelligence failures.

I think the author's 15 years of research has been for nothing -- recovering the machines may have been one objective of the mission, but it wasn't practical to have it as the main objective.

 

I don't think just "changing the code" I.E. recalling the daybooks and issuing new ones would do it;

1/ A crib and enough intercepts would allow Colossus back into the system eventually;

2/ the Germans wouldn't know this of course...but just changing the daybooks I.E. rotor settings wouldn't be enough of a reaction on THEIR part to a whole four rotor machine going missing That's the reaction to them guessing/discovering that "just" a set of daybooks had fallen into British hands.

Did the German do any work on a total replacement, or a five-rotor system???

 

You raise good point. Just some thoughts (ie: no evidence to back this up):

You said that Bletchley would "eventually" get back in. Changing the rotors would scramble things from the British end for the time being. Knowing that the British had cracked the code, the Germans would actively look into a replacement (possibly a five wheel system that you mentioned). Remember that the OKW never seriously thought that Enigma could be broken, which was one of the central reasons why they never sought a replacement. German code experts knew differently (after the German surrender, many German cryptologists admitted that they knew Enigma was not "invincible" and in fact thought it was already broken). The Dieppe operation would have given the OKW strong evidence that the code was compromised, and (seeing as how many cryptologists already knew its shortcomings) work on a replacement could begin. Taking the Enigma machine off a U-Boat on the seas is a bit more discrete than storming a Hotel and making off with everything in it, so you could hardly state that the system was still secure.

Of course this would have taken lots of time and effort. Assuming the Enigma replacement entered service, Bletchley would have likely found it extremely difficult to crack (they wouldn't have had Polish experts already knowledgable with the machines to help them with this version). The Dieppe raid may have set ULTRA back significantly after the initial intelligence windfall.

Again, just my thoughts -- don't hold me to any of it

 

A raid the size of Dieppe would be a hell of a sized sledgehammer to crack a nut the size of Enigma.

 

I agree totaly. Besides, capturing any secret item (codes, communication machines, ...) is useful when the capturing can be held secret. That's what happened whit the first entire and undamaged Enigma machine that was captured by the British.
I think the wouldbe connection with the Dieppe raid is far from reality.