followed hamilton and the secretary of treasury office. other people. there are a lot of really interesting founders that would be -- we would like to include some of their letters. that's it. hey, thank you very much. been a real pleasure to be with you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] on august 20 4, 1814, british soldiers routed americans. the victories left america's forces wide open. more about the burning of washington during the war of 1812 this thursday from historian anthony pitch at an event hosted by the smithsonian. our coverage starts at 6:45 eastern. more about the burning of washington next saturday, august 23, as we take you live to bladensburg waterfront heart for a panel discussion on the events of 200 years ago. live at 1:00 p.m. eastern here

on american history tv on c-span 3. week, american artifacts into archives and historic sites around the country. next, we visit the national cryptologic museum located just north of washington, d.c., on the campus of the national security agency. to learn about the making and breaking of secret codes and u.s. history. this is the first of a two-part program. >> hello. i'm patrick weadon. the curator of the national cryptologic museum. i would like to welcome you. this is a museum that some people think is all about the national security agency. that is certainly about nsa. but the purpose of this museum is to help people understand the critical role that cryptology has laid really from the beginning -- has played from

the beginning of time. when we use the word cryptology we mean the making and breaking of codes. if you go back to history, you can find one example after another where the ability to get information from an adversary has been critical not only to the survival of nationstates but two armies and a host of other organizations. some people say that cryptology is the world's third or fourth oldest profession. it does go back to the beginning of time. we have artifacts in this facility that date back to the 1500's. in addition, we also have artifacts from the 1990's. so it really is a museum that has artifacts for many different eras. there are any number of interesting stories from world war ii, which in many respects is the golden age. again, we do try to cover a great deal of ground in helping people understand the importance of this great disappoint. -- discipline.

thatology is an asian art goes back to the very beginnings of human history. we do not quite go back that far, but we do has an interesting artifacts that help people to understand just how long people have been taking and breaking codes. we have what is perhaps the oldest book on the subject. it was written by a monk. 1518. dates from it is an extremely rare text. throughout time of the individuals, not only the ones who ran the national security agency, but the agencies that came before nsa, the individuals involved in training often look for anything they could get their hands on that spoke to the art and science of the discipline. toagain, this is a testament the fact that cryptology has been with us for a very, very long time. when we talk about the united

states, it's important to note that the making and breaking of codes has been a part of america even before we gained independence. one of our most precious artifacts is referred to as the jefferson cipher device. truth in advertising. it is very important to note that we don't have any conclusive evidence that this particular device belonged to thomas jefferson. but there are some inducing facts about it. one, this device was found in an antique store very close to monticello. it appears to have the ability to cipher french and english, and we know that jefferson was an ambassador to france. and probably the most compelling point is there is a drawing of a device similar to this in jefferson's private papers. even so, we cannot say for sure that jefferson owned it.

what we can say is that this is an excellent example of how people used cryptology in the 19th century. so the way device work is, there scs. a series of letter di you would put a bar across the top. and you would line up the plain text on one side and write the ciphertext on the other. you would put that in a message and send that off, either with a courier or maybe even a ship. the good news is if it was picked up by pirates or bandits or fell into the hands of somebody who should not have it, if they do not have a device with the discs arranged in the proper sequence, they would not be able to understand what the message said. again, because we are working with a wonderful c-span network today, this is a model of the device. you can see the bar. we have the message " welcome c-span2 the museum."

the way this would work is the plain text. you could choose any one of these lines and write the ciphertext. if the individual at the other and knew which line you were going to use, you could protect the message if it fell into the hands of somebody who should not have it. they do not have one of these and they do not know the prearrangement of the desks. -- the discs. today when we conduct operations, we use state-of-the-art technology and most of the operations are done with lightning speed. doingndamentally, we are exactly the same thing. you have a sender, a receiver. there is a set sequence or a key. they both know it. intoe information falls the wrong hands, it is not going to be able to be used against you because the individuals will not know what it means. in addition to the jefferson cipher disk, we do like to talk about times in history where cryptology has made a difference.

and in the beginning when our nation was fighting for its independence, the making and breaking of codes laid a critical role. -- played a critical role. in the example i like to talk about is that the fact that washington's decision to move his army south at a rapid clip to trap cornwallis was basically due to a series of intercepted messages. of course, the dispatchers at cornwallis -- that cornwallis sent were encrypted. luckily, washington had individuals on his staff that were able to decrypt those messages. and from the information, they were able to discern that cornwallis was in a very difficult position. if he could not be resupplied by the british fleet, there was a good chance they could trap him. that is exactly what happened. so had they not know what cornwallis was planning to do, it is likely that washington may have a continued his attack on new york and may have never made the tactical move. but because he knew what

cornwallis was intending to do, he was able to team up with the french. in invention, the -- in addition, the french navy kept the british navy away. and the american army was able to prevail at yorktown. from the beginnings of our republic, making a breaking of codes has played a a critical role. of, the making and breaking codes is equivocal part of our nation at the very beginning. but it has played a role in all of the major wars that our country has fought in, not the least of which was the war between the states, the civil war. any time armies go to the field they have to have the ability to get critical information from the enemy and protect their own. the civil war was no exception. the civil war came at a time where there were any number of new inventions. probably the most important one from a cryptologic perspective was the telegraph. send messages over long distances and for the very first time, the commanders could communicate with their

er senior and oth military leaders in the field. but the problem is, a telegraph wire is affixed, physical entity. guess what? you can intercept messages. so in order to secure the messages, you had to have the ability to encrypt them. this was a rare union codebook. it contains a cipher system that was used by general hooker at the battle of chancellorsville. as you can see, it is rather detailed. it help you to understand how important it was to be able to again, ifges that, they did fall into the hands of the enemy they would be basically meaningless. again, in wartime, making and breaking codes is critical, not just on a strategic level, like the telegraph, but also on the tactical level. this is an authentic confederate cipher reel which works

similarly to the jefferson cipher device. so both the union and the confederacy were using cryptologic methods to achieve their goals. however, while the telegraph and other technologies were being developed, many times in battle you have to go to what you would call analog methods. one of the most effective ways was the -- >> system which was developed by wig-wag system that was developed by dr. albert meier. flight.a battle honors we believe there is only one other in existence. when a person distinguish themselves in the wig-wag system. this is an example. it's moving the flag back-and-forth in certain movements to denote letters of the alphabet. it could be used line of site over great distances. unfortunately for the soldiers involved in this activity, oftentimes they had to do this

from areas that were quite clear to the enemy. so they would come under fire. so they not only had to be very intelligent, but they also had to be brave. if an individual involved in this operation the state with themselves, they would take the rectangle off their flag, that you can see clearly here. and in order to indicate they were the best of the best, they would put on a star. in addition, they would stitch in the name of the battle you distinguish yourself in. so what you can say about the hat both sides are trying again to get critical information from their adversaries and protect their own. we have seen some of the many methods they used to do just that. in history into world war ii. now, this is our most popular exhibit. we have people who come from all over the world to see it.

german an authentic enigma machine. we have 40 nr collection. we have about five you can actually operate. many people come from not only the united states but from around the world because they want to not only look at and enigma machine but you can actually operate this device. and we are going to do that in just a second. devicemans adopted this as their main battlefield tactical communications device largely because it had an amazing capability. despite the fact that it's electromechanical, it can produce permutations of three times 10 to the 114th power. that is more than all the stars in the universe. and it makes it virtually impossible, at least on paper theoretically, to do what we e operation. forc it is way too much information to go through. and because of that, the germans believed that you could never get to the point where you could find the key. you cannot find the key, you

will not break any messages. now, the power, the thetologic power comes from three rotors. there are 26 wired points on each rotor. wave hit a key on the keyboard, the current will flow into this plugboard up to the rotors where it will go through each one, hit a reflector, come back through the plug board and again light up here. this is a very versatile machine. it is portable. so really you can take us anywhere. you can have it in defensive fighting position or at headquarters. one of the critical parts of this process was the key -- which you can see in this exhibit case. had three months worth of rotor settings and it was disseminated every four months by german couriers. if you do not have the key list, you are not going to be able to get the rotor settings correct, and if you do not have the ability to get the rotor

settings, you could not communicate with everyone else in the network. now, i am going to do a quick demonstration here just to show you. and we're going to use our vivid imaginations. we are going to pretend it is march 24, 1942. the world is at war. we look at our key list, and the rotor setting we are going to have is 1-1-1. and the message we are going to send from berlin where we are now is u.s.a. it will gethis out there. but it will also fall into the hands of any number of people who are monitoring our frequency. so we are going to encrypt this message before we send it off to stuttgart. i'm going to hit the "u." i'll hit the "s." the "y." there's the "c."

this is what we would send. using our imaginations again, we are no longer in berlin. we are in a different place a little bit later in the day. however, our rotor setting has not changed. in stu card, i am bringing the message back. 1-0-1-4.ne is set to 0 now i'm going to decrypt the message. the "c."the "u," there is the "a." it works nicely. a lot of people are not impressed by this. they say things like, my grandfather gave me a little orphan annie decoder ring, so what is the big deal. it was doing it at a rate of three times 10 to the 114th p ower. that is why the germans had every reason to believe it was a perfect insertion device. thankfully for the world, the allies were able to break it. the first country to make progress was poland.

poland's worried about a german invasion. they were able to ahdn se -- to select a series of gifted mathematicians. they begin an effort to break the enigma code. it is one thing to have bright, intelligent people, but when you're going up three times 10 to the 114th power 11 tough row to hoe. they did not give up. they got some help. it was a gem in the german cipher bureau. he had once been a wealthy man. he lost all of his businesses because of the great depression. now he found himself destitute. luckily, his older brother was able to get him a job as a humble government clerk at the cipher bureau. and hans decided to do something to enhance his financial situation. he contacted an agent of the french secret service. he said, i have got some secrets about and admit i would like to sell -- about enigma.

how does $20,000 sounds? idt was more than open to that. the exchange was made. and bertrand forwarded the information to them. it was a slow process, but the poles eventually over time are able to discern how the process works and to begin to break an enigma messages. once you do that, though, you have got to turn it into a 24-hour operations so that you can develop real-time intelligence. they really did not get the chance to do that because their country was invaded in 1939. what it is worth noting it was the poles that had a breakthrough. now after two years, they were able to make it to a place called bletchley park. bletchley park was the code breaking headquarters for the british empire. it was set up personally by winston churchill. there were any number of brilliant people there. not the least of which was alan turing. he comes up with a very innovative approach that he

referred to as assumed text. they were able to find radio stations and the third reich and occupied europe that send out messages every day at the same time, and in the messages. and because of the nature of the mission of the radio station, they were able to get the first sentence of the transmission. station 26 one -- the coast of france comes on the air every day at 7:00 a.m. in the first sentence off the tower is the weather today off the coast of france will be. why? it was concerned with putting out weather reports to the german ships and submarines. with that you get a head start. you can begin, the process. and touring is able to design a marvelous device referred to as the bombe. this is a guessing machine that helps sort out the other patterns and sequences. i do not want to make this sound easy. it was not. between eight to 12

hours and the core of cryptanalysts, linguists and many more support personnel. here's the bottom line. by the end of the day, with some exceptions, they were able to determine the rotor settings. they had been intercepting messages all day. now they are able, in some sense, to be able to discern the future tactical intentions of the german military. it is a critical, critical breakthrough, because people forget that great britain was standing alone against the not onslaught. the battle of britain was a very yalgh challenge for the ro air force. and the ability to discern future tactical operations of the german military was a huge advantage. one of the methods that the germans used with great effect was to conduct their bombing raids at night. if you read anything at all

about the blitz, it was an incredibly difficult time. britaintions of great are being destroyed. lives are being lost. did bomb atmans night, it was more effective. they lost your pilots. they lost fewer planes. one of the systems they used was, they would send a radio beam from the airfield, either in germany or france or somewhere and occupied europe, to the target in the u.k. they would lock onto the beam. they would be able to deposit their bombs and lock back on the beam and fly back through their airbase. this proved to be very effective. but when the enigma code was broken, the british, knowing what they were, because they were intercepting luftwaffe messages, they were able to bend were able to move the beams so that the bombers their are dropped

immense on "pastors rather than on military and population centers. pastrues. cow that shows you what you can do when you know what your adversary is going to do before they do it. bravery of thee british people and the effectiveness of their armed forces that played a huge role in helping great written to survive, you can also make the case that the ability to read enigma messages also was key. now, i would like to tell you that the story ends here., but it is always a cat and mouse game that is always one side adjusting to the other. an admiral in the german navy noticed a change and began an effort to try to make sure that enigma was secure. he asked the german high command to be sure there was a problem that enigma was secure. they told him to stop worrying.

he wanted to take out insurance. so he took all of the enigmas out of the ships and submarines he controlled and just so he could sleep better at night, he had his technicians install a fourth rotor. the entire process at leslie park was based on three rotor traffic, not four, which means that the allies lose track of the german subs. for a portion of 1942, german submarine commanders referred to time.months as the happy they sunk over 200 ships off the coast of the u.s. alone. the u.s. navy is growing frantic because the cowboys are being destroyed. they signed a contract with register inh dayton, to develop a device similar to the ones that brits had developed. now we're going to do is take a look at america's contributions. now, what you see here is one of our most precious artifacts.

this is the last existing u.s. navy cryptologic device. there were over 100 of these built in dayton, ohio. they were put on trains. they were moved to a facility just off nebraska avenue. that facility today is owned by the department of homeland security. but in pastors at the launch to the navy. now, like the british device, it was important to get clues i then morning and once you are able to obtain those, you could begin the process. this is basically like the british device a giant calculated machine, i guessing machine that helps you with a had star to winnow down and finally get the four rotor setting. it took eight to 12 hours. it took a lot of very good cryptologic work, a lot of linguists, a lot of support personnel. but by the end of the day, with

some exceptions, they were able four rotor settings. and with that, they could do one of two things. they could either send out tactical units to destroy the wolfpack because they knew the location. sometimes the cowboys were at sea. seays.convo were at many historians believe this project helped to shorten the war by a year. basically because it helps to read secure the north atlantic. other historians disagree with that. but there is consensus on one point. and that is that it ultimately save thousands and thousands of allied lives. in 1974 after almost three decades or over three decades, the british told the world and the germans guess what? we broke the enigma code as early as 1940. one that was announced, there were any number of individuals living in germany who had been

involved with and responsible for the name of program. -- the enigma. they were stunned. they believed it was a perfect machine. so it was a very well kept secret. there is a lesson you can take from this it is one, that anyone in a position of responsibility should know. always be careful of the word impossible. when something tells you something is impossible and there is a lot riding on it, you really need to check it out. you have to be careful of your assumptions. if you assume too much, and you do not investigate what you believe to be the truth, you can meet with devastating consequences. rmans believed the machine was perfect. it could never be broken. that was not the case. thankfully for the rest of the world, they paid a very high price. so it always pays to check out your assumptions. we are going to look at another very interesting and impressive story from world war ii. this is a device.

the gentleman behind the design like to refer to them as the babe ruth of cryptology and the 20th century because he was not only good offense, breaking codes, but also good at making devices that could protect critical information. this is probably one of the most impressive. it really in many ways is the antithesis of the enigma machine. the enigma was electromechanical, rotor driven and fought by the germans to be perfect because it could produce untold permutations, three times power.he 114th this lies at the opposite end of the spectrum because it is rotor driven. it is a lecture mechanical, but there is not one recorded instance of a not one, of this machine ever being compromised. and we're going to talk a little bit about why. wlett took a look at the enigma.

made the point that the enigma was an amazing device but because of the regularity of the motion of the machine, it had some vulnerabilities. avoidigned the sigaba to them as much as possible. so there are three rotors, sometimes four. rowlett included 15 rotors in the sigaba. they fit into this basket. that basket recesses into the device. when he hit a key and the keyboard, some of the rotors turned forward. some of them reverse. some of them do not move at all. and it is the sum total of the movement of those rotors that amazinge machine its power. what you are trying to do when you designed a cryptologic device is to get as close to perfect randomness as you can. and this machine does a pretty good job of that. we know from looking at german intelligence documents that they

tried for about two months to crack this machine, and then they basically gave up and said, we will never be able to do it. we have to get the information in other ways. ien i became curator in 2006, was of the opinion that if humans could design a cryptologic system, he was could break it. i still believe that, but i have to tell you this is the argument to the contrary. because this machine was perfect from the time it was put online, and it was perfect from the time it was taken off-line. in fact, the only reason it was removed from service was other machines were getting a little bit faster. the computer age was dawning. owlett was asked, what are you most proud of? he reply, i do not have to think about that much, fellows. i am most proud of the fact that i created a perfect encryption machine. so when we look at this exhibit, we can ask the question. why did the united states win world war ii? well as not they won because

brave soldiersed were able to go off and stand in harm's way and carry the fight to the enemy. they had the requisite number of guns and planes and tanks to apply force were needed. but there is another reason. with some exceptions, we were able to tap into the strategic communications of our adversaries and ga knowledge of their intentionsi,n and because of devices like sigaba when i try to do the same to us, they failed. and this was a major reason why the allies were able to be victorious during the conflict. this was the first of a two-part program from our visit to the national cryptologic ecm. you can watch this and other american artifex programs at any time by visiting our website. cspan.org/history. of the live coverage

u.s. house on c-span and the on c-span3-span 2, we complement that covers by showing you the most relevant congressional hearings and public affairs events. on weekends, c-span 3 is the home to american history tv with programs that tell our nation stories, including the civil war 150th anniversary, visiting battlefields and key events. american artifacts. touring museums and historic sites to discover what they reveal about america's past. history bookshelf with the best-known writers. the presidency, looking at the policies and legacies of our nation's commander in chief. lectures in history. what to america.ew series reel nationalcreated by the cable tv history. watch us in h