[GreenKeys] WWII-Era "Computers"

[Craig Sawyers]

> COLOSSUS and many of
> the others that were tried with poor results.

I'm sorry, but that is total nonsense.  Bletchely was using 10 Colossus
computers by the end of the war to decrypt messages between Hitler's field
commanders and the Berlin bunker.  These used a combination of 2000 valves
(tubes) and a tape loop that passed the encrypted text past a bank of
photocells at 60 miles an hour and 5000 characters per second.  It took up
to 6 hours to calculate the wheel settings of the 12 rotor Lorenz SZ42
cipher machine.

One Colossus Mk II has been rebuilt at Bletchley by Tony Sale over the last
13 years, and works every day for 8 hours, and breaks test encrypted
messages in 6 hours - the same length of time it takes a Pentium PC to break
the same message.

Craig