Cryptanalysis of the Enigma immense problem and it gave a great deal of trouble. Work on a high speed machine had been started by Wynn-Williams of the TRE late in 1941 and some nine months later Harold Keen of BTM started work independently. Early in 1942, Bletchley Park were a long way from possessing a high speed machine of any sort. Eventually, after a long period of being unable to decipher U-boat messages, a source of cribs was found. This was the Kurzsignale (short signals), a code which the German navy used to minimize the duration of transmissions, thereby reducing the risk of being
German code breaking in World War II 1941. While the Germans appreciated the gift from their ally, they did not explain that they were already able to read "Black" code messages. In general, however, German performance in code breaking was weak due to the fragmentation of responsibility and specialized personnel. The Navy's "B-Dienst" was an exception to the rule, although its successes largely ended when the Allies began using more sophisticated encryption methods by 1943. German code breaking in World War II German code breaking in World War II achieved some notable successes cracking British Naval ciphers until well into the fourth year of the war, but