Rating: 
Summary: One of the best books about this topic
Review: A great book. If you are passionate with hisotry, mind challenges and encryption you must read it. I've read the italian edition (very well transalted, BTW) and now I'm gonna buy the english one.
The finding of facts is accurate and well exposed (except for the encryption related technicalities,that are a bit confusing for their shortness, but this is really a minor and non relavant "bug").I just have to remark that - while the author go deeply in the first WWII's years, explaining the "US-UK breaking Enigma's howto", he don't spend enough pages on Colossus-Mark1 (the Turing's "computer" used for brute force attacks and about the involvement of IBM machines both in the US and German battlefield.
Rating:
Summary: Good book, but weak on Japanese codes
Review: I agree with the reivewer from Washington, D.C., who enjoyed the book: I thought it was marvelously well-written -- I have enjoyed Mr. Budiansky's stuff in the Atlantic Montly magazine in the past -- and it showed me new things about a subject I thought I knew pretty well. At the same time, I have to agree with John Berry that the greater part of the book was spent discussing British/U.S. cooperation, and the focus was clearly on cracking the German Enigma (and the use of Ultra intelligence). I am glad I read the book, as it was informative and fun (I laughed out loud at a few things, surprising myself and the others on the train) but I really would have really enjoyed deeper coverage of the Pacific theater.
Rating: 
Summary: Really complete story!!
Review: I was interested in the history of codebreaking in World War II but my very incomplete knowledge about the subject stemmed from fiction work, both movies (such as "Enigma') and books (such as Neal Stephenson' 'Cryptonomicon'). After reading this book I have now a very clear picture of what really happened. The author does a great of explaining in great details the history and background of this cryptograhical war. The emphasize of this book is really on efforts by both British and Americans to break German codes although activities to break codes of other Nazi allies also described. The author does a very good job of explaining how various algorithms worked in a language that should be understandabe to anybody (for somebody who is interested in more technical details there are a number of appendixes). It provides a very good and 'live' portraits of people that were involved in these activities. It made me realize how much bureaucracy and stupidity these people had to overcome. Highly recommended for anybody who is interested in the subject but feels he still didn't get a complete picture.
Rating:
Summary: Overview of WWII Codebreaking
Review: If you are going to read only one book on Allied cryptoanalysis during World War II, this is clearly the book to get. Stephen Budiansky does an outstanding job of covering the story. The work has more detail than many readers (including this one) can absorb on specific codebreaking techniques. Perhaps some of this nmaterial could have been moved into appendices. Nevertheless, "Battle Of Wits" is definitely worthwhile even if the reader should decide to skim its more technical sections.
Rating: 
Summary: Version of 1950
Review: If you liked the 1950 versions of Pearl Harbor and United States code breaking, you'll love this book. Give it a two for excellent copy-cat-ism.
Rating: 
Summary: Biased.Too Anglo-American centric
Review: It seems there is no dearth in books on intelligence[codebreaking ] in World War II.Ever since British Govt lifted Official Secrets Act in 1974 there have been explosion of books on this sensitive subject. Author dwelts upon complex intricate nature of German, Japanese ciphers;difficulties involved in breaking it which make up most of this book .Author's narration at times looks convoluted,abstruse.Especially dificult to follow mechanism of American IBM computer used to break Axis ciphers.Americans being more mechanically minded came up with devices like Comparator,RAM [Rapid Analytical Machinery ]for breaking codes.Appendix section of the book contain detailed explanation of German naval Enigma and Japanese purple ciphers plus techniques used for decoding it. What I like in this book is the section dealing with U boat warwhat author calls shadow warfare.This was a dicey situation with warring powers reading each other codes with themselves not aware of it.On the negative side ,To assert FDR had no fore warning about Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor when we have abundant evidence to the contrary partially detracts the value of this book . Budiansky has virtually ignored Eastern Front despite the fact former Soviet Union bore brunt of war against Nazi Germany.I feel this to be a manifestation of author's cold war mentality unfortunately prevalent among few academics in the West. What we do not know even today wheather Russians too read German ciphers.Soviet dictator Stalin definitely knew about Ultra thanks to Kim Philby and Cambridge spyring.Soviets had a spy network operating in the Nazi-occupied Europe [Red Orchestra].Information it provided influenced some crucial battles fought on the Eastern Front.For details refer Red Orchestra by Tarrant V.E. To sum up,Budiansky's work is highly Anglo-American centric.To call this book-as given in the title'Complete story of codebreaking in World War II'- is actually misnomer.
Rating: 
Summary: Waste of Time
Review: Most people probably don't know that until late 1999 Budiansky was writing this book only about codebreaking of European codes. His understanding of codes and codebreaking is practically nonexistent. He has no judgment about what is important or not. This book is a complete waste of time, even casual readers should avoid it.
Rating:
Summary: A valuable update on Ultra
Review: Stephen Budiansky, who knows both math and military history, has provided us with a well written new telling of the story of how the USA and UK cracked German and Japanese codes, and used this knowledge in winning World War II. This is the best treatment for a wide audience since David Kahn's The Codebreakers, and contains much new material from documents declassified in the last decade. Budiansky is particularly good at explaining how the cryptanalysts actually worked, with excellent diagrams. He also explains how the early data-processing machines they used functioned--at the dawn of the computer era. As for the war itself, he sticks to the high points, such as Midway and the Battle of the Atlantic, but the military history is accurate. This is a must-read book for any Ultra-Magic buff.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating Account of Codebreaking and Its Effects
Review: This book deserves more than five stars, and the massive British and American government information releases that made it possible also deserve credit for making the book possible. This book pays the reader the compliment of assuming both intelligence and sincere interest in the subject. Although much of the book is a repeat of what has been written before, the book also contains much new information (especially about breaking the Japanese codes) and important insights. As the most complete examination of the code side of World War II, the book is essential reading for anyone who is interested in that conflict. Although this book is about World War II, it contains much interesting material about earlier code-breaking, especially during World War I and the disarmament conference in the 1920s. Basically, codes and codebreaking were in a transition period during the 1930s and 1940s between the primitive historical codes and the modern encryption techniques. The weakness of this transition period was that computer-like devices could use brute force calculations to spot patterns that the code designers were unaware of. Clues came from many places. For example, "eins" showed up very frequently in German communications, so by looking for four word groups of great frequency, you could guess that they meant "eins" and work from there. This could unmask the daily code key much faster. Luftwaffe code operators were sloppy about the codes they used, and those bad habits provided clues as well. The British were brilliant in targeting German naval and weather vessels, and sinking them in ways so that codes and code machine parts could be saved. In some cases, Japanese embassies were broken into and codes directly stolen. The most fascinating parts of the book come from the descriptions of how raw brain power solved problems. Many new code-solving techniques were developed. The Poles (especially Marian Rejewski) deduced the structure of the German Enigma machine just through examining the encoded message structures, and built one. Later, Turing took the idea of linking Enigma machines together to test patterns and developed a process for finding which settings were being used each day. Almost unbelievably, ideas and machines came along later that greatly improved the efficiency of this process even further. If you like puzzles, you will love the discussions of the codebreaking technques because they employ detailed descriptions of the codes, code machines, and the exact methods used. Many wonderful diagrams of wiring and logical connections make this transparent for those who are interested in fully understanding. If you are not so interested, you can skip ahead to the material that interests you instead. Emotionally, you will find yourself riveted by the races between the code breakers and the pace of unfolding battles. In several instances, such as at Midway, in the North Atlantic convoy runs, in North Africa, and during the Battle of the Bulge, the codebreakers played a decisive role. You will be intrigued by how many military leaders were reluctant users of this intelligence. Does Monty come to mind? You will never think about the events in World War II in the same way, after fully understanding what was known and not known by government and military leaders. New light was shed on major controversies for me in this book. A famous one surrounds whether FDR knew of the attack on Pearl Harbor, and used inaction to manipulate entry into World War II. From a codebreaking perspective, it is clear that the U.S. knew that the Japanese were going to break off diplomatic relations, but little else. There were indications that an attack was coming, but no knowledge that it was aimed at Pearl Harbor. On the other hand, decoded radio transmissions from German police units clearly indicated that massive numbers of Jews were being killed during the invasion of Russia. This material was probably read by Churchill. It is not clear who else read it. Those who are interested in what government should have been doing about the Holocaust will find much troubling evidence of government's knowing inaction in this book. The many bureaucratic battles detailed here to take over codebreaking and to get the credit for it are worth the price of the book by themselves. For example, there is a fascinating story of how the key person in the codebreaking for the battle of Midway, Commander Joseph Rochefort, ended up running a dry dock on the west coast soon thereafter, far away from codebreaking for the rest of the war. 007 fans will enjoy the many references to the war-time activities of Ian Fleming in dreaming up schemes to help the codebreakers. After you finish reading and thinking about this fascinating book, I suggest that you consider how you can overcome the vulnerability that you have to someone breaking into your communications. How can and should you be using encryptian today? This book won't answer those questions, but you should be asking them and looking for answers.
Rating:
Summary: Overview of WWII Codebreaking
Review: This book is well-written in a clear, flowing and lucid style. Lots of details and human interest liven up a subject that is always on the edge of putting some readers to sleep. This book surveys code-breaking in both the European and Pacific theaters of war and even-handedly deals with the contributions of both the Brits and the Yanks (all too few books on this topic do so). The author wisely puts the most arcane bits of math in appendices.
Very well done and hightly recommended to both those who have never read a book on this subject and those who have read several.
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