The German Spy and the Codebreakers: Hans Thilo Schmidt and the Allied Efforts to Break the Enigma Codes

The German Spy and the Codebreakers is a book that describes the remarkable efforts by French Intelligence officers to recruit the spy who provided the Allies with the German Enigma codes and his remarkable revelations about Germany’s stunning military growth that was downplayed or ignored by European and British leaders before World War II.This book fills in empty spaces in our understanding about exactly what information Hans Thilo Schmidt passed to the French, the dates of the meetings, who was in attendance, and the impact it had on the Polish efforts to break the Enigma codes. It also puts into perspective the enormous volume of German military intelligence that the French had received from Schmidt and their reactions to that intelligence. Lastly, the individual sacrifices made by Bertrand, the spymaster Lemoine, Schmidt and the Polish codebreakers that have been described in written accounts published decades apart in different languages are now brought together in one book.