Mathematical Conundrums - Turing
Alan Turing was a British Mathematician who was the head of Hut 8 at Bletchley Park during World War 2, the section in charge of decrypting Naval traffic. Turing was responsible for the development of the Bombe which built upon and greatly extended the amazing work of the Polish cryptographers who first broke Enigma. The Bombe was used to break Enigma traffic throughout most of the war. The German navy had the most sophisticated systems, which were the hardest to break, but even these eventually largely fell.
Turing was also at the forefront of modern computing and artificial intelligence, and has the Turing test named after him. Unfortunately the government of the time didn't treat Turing with the respect he deserved, and he committed suicide. The British government still hasn't formally apologised to his family, even to this day.
It is not well known by the general public, that the success of the code breaking efforts at Bletchley Park was due in no small part to the bravery of British, Canadian and US sailors risking their lives to enter captured U-Boats to collect code books. Without these code books the ciphers would no doubt still have been broken, thanks to the likes of Turing, but they most definitely sped up the process giving the broken messages that much more strategic importance.
Numberphiles YouTube video on Enigma - Part 1
Numberphiles YouTube video on Enigma - Part 2
I have devised a puzzle, based around the history of Ultra, and utilising methods that the Kreigsmarine and Wehrmacht as well as the spooks of the day would have used, updated for the modern day of course. (This puzzle was inspired by my favourite puzzle cache to date, La Capanna).
May 1941 - The Battle of Crete
A U-Boat patrolling the Mediterranean around Crete sends a distress message to the Kriegsmarine command and then disappears, presumed lost. Bletchley Park recieves the message, but as they had not yet managed to crack the Dolphin network, they could not decrypt it.
Shortly there after they receive a message from the Admiralty that the U-Boat was in fact captured, with its Enigma cipher machine and code books intact! Bletchley Park analysts get hold of the intelligence from the captured U-Boat. With the code books they can read the message, as well as the messages for at least the next month! This may be the critical piece of the puzzle that will crack Dolphin wide open!
As well as the Enigma and the code books there was a photo left at the radio operators desk.
Through SIS , SOE and the contents of the message, along with the Grundstellung for the day (AMT), it becomes clear that the crews of 2 U-Boats were collaborating to steal a shipment of gold between Crete and Cyprus. They would use the battle as cover and would rendezvous afterwards. It was one of these U-Boats that was captured just before the heist! The remaining U-Boat apparently succeeded, as the merchant marine ship was lost at sea, crew unaccounted for.
It is left in the hands of SOE to mount an operation to grab the gold! You have been attached to an SOE team, uncover the rendezvous coordinates and make the find!
The message and the code books are in the gallery, while the photo can be found here, or for those that prefer lossless compression, here.
Check your coordinates here.