horse's mouth, but if you can't use it, what good is it? Except perhaps 

for historical purposes In other words it is one :tldlXK thing to have COMINT 

and another thing to use it properly, that is, so as not to dry up the source 

of COMINT and to continue to receive it 

~his afternoon we are going to observe a case which illustrates some of 

these points. During the first pa.rt of last Friday's talk, you saw and 

heard Walter Cronkhite's film, 11You Are There 11 , an account of the Zinnnermann 

Telegram Episode It depicted in a rather sensational but historically 

accurate manner, except for one thing, the profound impression that the 

publication of the text of that telegram created in Congress. When the film 

,,. .... -. ~ ended, I said I would leave for today's session a discussion of the cryptologic 

background of this astounding important episode of World War I, for it 

• certainly aba.rged the atmosphere with great tension and had a most serious 

influence upon the course of World War I and in that way upon the course of 

history 

The Cronkhite film hardly needs comment to indicate the importance which 

the publication of the Zimmermann Telegram. exercised upon history for it 

inevitably must be considered in any ~tudy of the causes which led to the 

--···... , "" entry of the United States of America into World War I Incidentally, because 

the United States is the leading power.in_the Western Hemisphere, I hope, the ' . 

publication of the text of the Zimmermann Telegram helped bring Argentina, 

Boliv.B., Brazil, Cuba. and Panama into the arms of the allies So important 

an incident in cryptologic history therefore warrants careful study by 

@'pp roved for Release by NSA on 10-09-2013 pursuantto E .0. 1352a 
REF ID:A38470 

.... - 2 =-

- . . .. .... - historians as well as by cryptologists It i9,~ story complete with lessons 

on the disastrous consequences of weakness in C-power and with lessons on the 

great opportunities which attend much strength in C-power--C-power as defined 

in the first book And in passing I may add, that the story as it now appears 

in history books and popular accounts has many errors and some of them will 

be pointed out today 

I think it is correct to say that history attributes the U S. entry on 

6 April 1917 in World War I as a belligerent on the side of the Allies to 

the disclosure of the contents of the Zimmermann Telegram Note that the 

statement is qualified by a date, namely, 6 April 1917 Perhaps that woul.d 

have come about without the Zimmermann Telegram sooner or later for one 

reason or another but most probably as a result of German ruthlessness in the 

conduct of submarine warfare But later might have been too late because 

after l February 1917, when unrestricted submarine warfare started, there 

wasn't much time left to help England was being starved for food and for 

munitions and if America had waited until England had been starved into 

submission and capitul.ation, it is possible that America woul.d never have 

entered into the war .. or if it had would have been forced to enter as a 

resul.t of German arrogance and might have been left to fight the powerful. and 

Jubilant Germany all alone, who knows The fact is, however, that the c 

Zimmermann Telegram was published~ O:n March 1, 1917 and within a little over 

one month, on April 6, we declared war on German'y There seems to be little 

doubt therefore that America entered the war when she did because of the 

-2-
REF ID:A38470 

Zimmermann Telegram, or shall we say rather as a consequence on the one 

hand of obtuseness in the affairs diplomatic and naivete in the affairs 

cryptologic and on the other hand the proof of British astuteness in affairs 

diploma.tic and brilliance in the affairs cryptologic It was only to be 

should 

expected that question and doubt ~ be raised as to the authenticity of 

the Zimnermann 'ti.egram The newspapers were full of lilDDutx~ 

denunciations and discussions of what many people regarded a complete hoax 

In the Congressional Record the debate on March l takes up 22 whole pages--

all devoted to the question of the authenticity of the Zimmermann Telegram 

which bad so far nothing to back 1t except the word of the Washington 

correspondent of the Associated Press The publication had not been ma.de 

.. 

on the authority of the State Depa:rtment at all It had strangely appeared 

merely as a dispatch from the Associa~ed Press sent broadcast apparently upon 

its own responsibility You will recall that stirring scene in the Cronkhite 

film showing the way in which lha1R Senator reacted and some of the -----

other senators and the picture wound up with a rather interesting accounting 

for the delay of some weeks--six weeks about--between the time the British had 

the Zimmermann Telegram and the communication of its contents to the U S 

Now let's lift the secrecy veil a bit and it will be of interest to start 

in with a brief story about how the British cryptologic organization got 

started Rlfl!i For this, I am going to read from a lecture given at 

Edinburgh at the Plhilosophical Institution on December 13, 1927 by Sir 

Alfred Ewing, who was the first head of the organization known as Room 40-0B 

-3-
REF ID:A38470 

designation 

It was a cover/for the organization and became known by that designation 

from the very start and it seemed useful to keep it until the very end of the 

wa.r Here is the first detailed statement of what Room 4~ did and there is 

something here about the Zimmermann Telegram, how it was intercepted and so on. 

However there were hints even before that Ewing's son in 1939, published 

a book, a copy of which I have here, 11The Man of Room 4gJ 11 and I am going to 

read just a little from here and there of this account 

Sir Alfred had been Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Cambridge, I 

think it was, when he was tapped on the shouJ.der by the Admiralty and selected 

to become Director of Naval Education This was a year or two before the 

wa.r broke out 

On the fate:f'ul 4 August 1914, Ewing's routine work as Director of Naval 

Education was in consequence brought to a sudden standstill but fortunately 

bis friedd, Admiral Oliver, then Director of Intelligence Division of the 

Admiralty War Staff, now Admiral of the Fleet, Sir Henry Oliver, showed him 

the same day a number of enemy cipher telegrams, intercepted wireless messages 

which had been taken in :zkR by our naval listening stations Such messages 

were called intercepts but they were intercepted only in the sense of being 

over heard They bad no doubt reached their destination to which they were 

addressed in their callsigns Each ship or other wireless station bad its 

callsign, an arbitrary group of letters which serves as a signature when both 

sending and receiving Now Ewing bad had an amateur's experience with 

.. cryptography and in fact he devised one or two ciphering mechanisms as he 

called them The Admiral, that is Admiral Oli~er; referred to a talk that 

-4-
REF ID:A38470 - ,. 

he had had with Ewing as an indication that Ewing had once taken some 

interest in the subject, asked him to tackle the messages and see what he 

could do Bwing replied that he would willingly try but at the time he 

thought the chance of success was small Accordingly, be took the bundle 

of messages away and Admiral Oliver ordered all the listening stations to 

send the material direct to Ewing's office In consequence a stream of 

telegraph intercepts began to pour in A stream which swelled and swelled 

as additional listening stations were opened up and the business of intercepting became more systematized until the number of telegrams, all addressed 

to Ewing, Admiralty, often exceeded 2,~~0 a day 

There goes on a point there wanting to make sure the reader understood 

quite clearly that this was a new activity that Britain had not engaged in 

eavesdropping before this It is right to make this clear for long af'ter 

the war was over and thh enemy ha..d become aware that their ciphers had been ... 

read, it was claimed in the Foreign Press that Britain's pre-war perfidy was 

demonstrated by the preparation that she had made for cryptography before 

hostilities commenced I I told you the other day that this activity bad ... - ... , - .. _- ii" 

been closed down in the year 1844 and was -not resumed until the outbreak of 

World War I There was a little bit of studying, it is true, before that, 

& " !. "" 

a couple of years before that, but no actual work on messages 

Now we go next to a book which was published in 1955, comparatively 

recently, "The Eyes of the Navy" by Admiral Sir William James, which is a 

biographical study of Sir Reginald William Hall who was Director of Naval 

-5-
REF ID:A38470 

Intelligence during World War I and who was largely responsible for the 

astute manner in whlhch the Zimmermann Telegram wa.s handled Though the work 

of Ewing's small band had been kept so secret, all of the great powers, 

except for the exception of ourselves, maintained a department for the 

decipherment of foreign codes in their pea<Etime organizations -- The Russian 

and French departments being especially efficient He should have excepted 

the United States Government because we didn't have anything I know the 

Russians and the French did have Then he goes on to say With the 

exception of Ewing, who had at one time been interested in ciphers, not one 

of the pioneers or for that matter, not one of the men and women who Joined 

them later had any previous knowledge of codes, ciphers or wireless procedure 

The Admiralty Staff first worked on messages from :Zkexkxgk a high-powered 

German station to stations in the German colonies and though with the help 

of Mr Bradfield of the Marconi Company, code signals were identified and 

code books of German commercial firms were collected and studied, no real 

.. progress was made for several weeks This ~as quite understandable What 

Ewing did at the beginning was to go o~er to the British museum and pore among 

- - .. ~ 

. the old commercial codes XBX that were on file there, thousands of them I 

suppose, and see if he could find out how a code was constructed They ha.d, 

of course, this one intercept station to begin with but they began to expand 

The first station was eventually expanded into 14 stations in the British 

Isles, all with direct landlines to the Admiralty and all manned by Government 

Post Office operators Hipsley was also responsible for brirgng into service 

later in the war three stations overseas 

-6-

1 

----------, Malta and Cohna The 
REF ID:A38470 

stream of messages on the lower naval wave length was now arriving in 

Ewing's room and the research workers hhd their first stroke of fortune 

when a German mercantile signal book arrived Xll from Australia It bad 

been taken from a German merchant vessel at the outbreak of the war and 

bad been sent by the quickest route to the Admiralty It was the book 

used by German outpost vessels and warships In the ftb.ddle of October, 

they bad another stroke of fortune On August 2~, the German light cruiser 

.. ... 

Magdebord, bad been destroyed by~Russian ships in the Gulf of Finl.and A 

few days later the body of a German signalman was washed mdmmt ashore and 

clasped in his arms was a copy of the German Naval signal book The 

Russians, realizing the yalu~ of this book to the British Naval authorities, 

sent it to England where it arrived on October the 13th In those early 

days they also began direction finding It was very important to the 

success of which was attributed for a good many years the British success 

in naval warfare and in submarine warfare In April, this is April 1915, 

something of even greater importance happened There came into Hall's 

the 

hands a copy of/axGerman diplomatic codebook, treasure trove from Persia 

How this book reached Hall is one of the strangest stories of the war A 

naval officer in from the Persian Gulf came to Hall one day and 

told him about a raid on the Abadan pipeline that had been planned by a 

German Vice Consul, named News of the impending raid was received 

in time to attack the raiding party in their camp and the German Vice Consul 

got away in his paJama.s on horseback, leaving his baggage behind Hall 

-7-
REF ID:A38470 

was quick to see that the baggage might contain useful information and as a 

result of his inquiries, it was found in the cellars of the office 

He sent over Mr Cousins Hardy, who was tbe.n working with him, to examine the 

baggage and he returned with the codebook The codebook was the one used for 

messages between Berlin and Madrid, and Berlin and Constantinope and it was 

via Madrid that the German Foreign Office sent their messages to diplomatic 

representatives in North and South and Central America and ever since the 

special stations have been intercepting wireless traffic, a continual flow 

of txaffxg messages which from their construction are obviously not naval 

messages had been arriving in Room 4~, and have been stowed away in cupboards 

The time had come to retrieve these piles of messages, sort them and begin 

work on them You'd be surprised how many messages get stowed away in 

I 

cupboards nowadays too Now the first hint at to the cryptograp~ic or 

cryptanalytic work done in Room 4~ was b1 Churc~ill, in a talk which was 

recorded in the "Scotsman", an Edinburgh paper, on July 14, 1923 and also 

he mentioned it more specifically in his book, "The World Crisis" published 

the same year But even as early as 1921, the "Scotsman" in an issue + 

19 July had a remark by a Sir Maurice Hankey, "that among those who had 

worked in obscurity as opposed to those who were all the time in the limelight, there was no name which deserved greater honor than that of Ewing and 

no man who had done greater service to his country " 

Now Ewing remained head of Room 4~ until July 1917, when Admiral Hall 

was ma.de the Director of Naval Intelligence and also the Head of Room 40 

-8-
REF ID:A38470 

Several months later came the episode involving the infamous Zimmermann 

Telegram and the first lifting of the secrecy veil that had been thrown 

about this episode came in ~X 1925, when the November issue of "World's 

Work" magazine brought the final installment of Hendrick's Life and Letters 

of Walter H Page Page was the United States Ambassador to the Court of 

St James during World War I I will read from 11World's Work" and from 

time to time, I will make comments In order to preserve this precious 

thing, I will read from the photostat 

We shall not concern ourselves now with the steps taken by President 

Wilson and Secretary Lansing, culUll.nating in the publication ~ by the 

Associated Press of the text of the Zimmermann Telegram Our attention 

will be concentrated upon the minute details of the aa.nner in which the 

message was intercepted and solved One day, in the la'tler part of February .. 

1917, Mr Page was requested to call on Mr Balfour at the Foreign Office 

The first sentence contains a mis-statement of fact He was not requested, 

it was all arranged He was there because the arrangements were ma.de tha.t 

he be there for purposes which will become clear in a moment or two Mr 

Balfour, quietly handed the Ambassador a sheet of paper, a document that in 

its influence upon American policy proved to be the most sensational that 

the European war had so far brought forth This paper contained a message 

that will be immortal as the Zimmermann Telegram It disclosed the preparation 

Germany was ma.king for war with the United States It was a message from 

the German Foreign Office in Berlin to the German minister in the 

-9-
REF ID:A38470 

city of Mexico As Germany had no satisfactory method of communicating - with Mexico, this telegram had been sent to Count Bernstoff in Washington 

with instructions to forward it by cable to the German Minister in the 

Mexican Republic This latter diplomat was directed to enter at once into 

Carranza th negotiations with~, President of Mexico and to make an alliance wi 

Mexico for a Joint German and Mexican invasion of the United States In 

case this invasion succeeded, Mexico was to obtain Texas, New Mexico and 

Arizona, territory which she had lost to the United States as a result of 

the war of 1846 and which was now to be treated as a kind of Mexican 

Alsace-Lorraine and to be "redeemed" Remember I mentioned that to the 

people in the Middlewest, Southwest and the Far West, the European war was 

3,000 miles away and it might JUSt as well have been on a different planet 

but when the Zimmermann Telegram began talking about returning New Mexico, 

Texas and Arizona, this was a horse of a different color The German plan 

also contemplated an attempt to detach Japan from her European Allies and 

persuade her to Join the German-Mexican alliance 

Carranza Yf ho 

President X:ailat&-,/as 

subsequent events disclosed, looked not unfavorably upon this ambitious 

Carranza 

proposal was the same :lflialamK- who President Wilson bad supported for the 

Mexican presidency among the multitude of revolutionary candidates 

Carranza 

Rli?F+1€ 

was President of Mexico, iniiiaej: as a result of the succession of events 

i 

.. ... t ....... 

that amounted almost to American interv~ntion Now_~Page at once transmitted 

this information to the State Department, London, February 24, 1917 and the 

message was received in the State Department at 9 00 a m addressed to the 

Secretary of State In about three hours I shall send a telegram of great 

-l:ftJ-
REF ID:A38470 

importance to the President and Secretary of State Signed Page 

London, 8 3~ p m , same date Secretary of State Conf'ident1al for 

, 

-... the President and Secretary of State This confidential is rather amusing 

these days Confidential was the hl.ghes"t classification there was in those 

.:: M Ir .ar. .. 

• • _. - .. I ! -l.:;r.._ 

days Balf'our has handed me the text of a German tel~gI'am from Zimmermann, 

German Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, to the German Minister to 

Mexico which was sent via Washington anti relayed by Bernstorff on January 19th 

You can probably, that's a good one--I mean the word probably--you will 

see why, you can probably obtain a copy of the text relayed by Bernstorff 

from the cable office in Washington The first group is the number of the 

telegram, 13~ and the second is 13~42, indicating the number of the code 

used, the last group of two is 97556 which is Zimmerma.nn's signature I 

shall send you by mail a copy of the cipher text and the decode into German 

and meanwhile I will give you the English translation as follows {and I 

think it worth reading) We intend to begin on the 1st of February unrestricted 

submarine warfare This means sink without notification without a chance 

for any survivors to escape drowning We shall endeavor in spite of this 

to keep the United States of America neutral In the event of this not 

succeeding, we make Mexico a proposal of alliance onthe following basis 

Make war together, make peace together, generous financial support and an 

understanding on our pa.rt that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in 

Texas, New Mexico and Arizona The settlement and detail is left to you. 

You will inform the President, tba.t is President Carranza., of the above most 

-ll-
REF ID:A38470 

most secretly as soon as the outbreak of war with the United States of 

America is certain and add the suggestion that he should on his own initiative 

invite Japan to immediate adherence and at the same time mediate between 

Japan and ourselves. Please call the President's attention to the fact that 

the ruthJ.ess employment of our submarines now offers the prospect of compelling 

England in a few months to make peace. That last sentence was the sentence 

that ZJ.IJ1111ermann had in mind when he said, in extenuation of the fact that 

. be used the American State Departmeni1sown channels to send this message, he .. 

- said "that message had to do with peace" because before that the arrangement 

... • I. 

had been that the German Government cOUld use the American facilities to 

further proposals concerning peace. The page goes on. The receipt of this 

information had so greatly exercised the British government that they bad 

lost no time in communicating it to me to transmit to you, (I don•t know 

what no time means) in order that our government may be able without deJ.ay 

to make such disposition as may be necessary in view of the threatened invasion 

of our territory. The following paragraph is strictly confidential. EarJ.y 

in the war, the British Governmen1obtained possession of a copy of the German 

cipher code used in the above message, (That •s not true.) and have made it 

their business to obtain copies of Bernstorff 's cipher teJ.egrams to Mexico, 

amongst others which are sent back to London and deciphered here. This accounts 

for their being able to decipher this telegram. from the German representative 

to the representative in Mexico and also for the delay from January 19th 

until now in their receiving the information. You see the idea is that the 

-12-
REF ID:A38470 

message had to be obtained in Mexico and sent across the ocean by packet boat 

I suppose and this would take some time. This system has hitherto been a 

Jealously guarded secret and is only divulged now to you by the British 

Government in view of the extraordinary circumstances and their friendly 

feeling toward the United States (This I think is rather dis-ingenuine.) 

They earnestly request that you will keep the source of your information a.nd 

the British Government's method of obtaining it profoundly secret but they 

put no prohibition on the publication o:f' the Zimmermann Telegram itself. Now 

this was a marvelous sentence--they had worked it out so that you could 

publish the text and still. not give away the real secret 

The copies o:f' this and other telegrams were not obtained in Washington 

but were bought in Mexico. This sentence is important. It wouJ.dn•t have been 

have to 

nice to/say "we stole the copies out of your telegraph office of Western Union 

in Washington". I have thanked Balfour for the service his Government has 

rendered us and suggest that a private official message of thanks from our 

Government to hJ.mwouJ.d be beneficial I am informed that this information hEJ,s 

not yet been given to the Japanese Government but I think it not unlikely that 

• 

when it reaches them, they may make a public statement on it in order to clear .. 

up their position regarding the United States, ~ and prove their good 

faith to their allies. Now when that telegram was sent the British already 

had the copy of the message from Wa.Bhington to Mexico in their hands so they 

knew that the text of the message must be in the WashinSton office. That's 

,, -· y,,,eA"' 

why I was a little bit amused by Page sayingl\probably find that message in 

" the Washington office. The manner in which the British had acquired this 

-13-
REF ID:A38470 

mesa.age is disclosed in Page's telegram. It was "bought in Mexico", that is, 

the British secret service had obtained it ~vidently !rom some approachable 

person in the Mexican capitol, a practice which it appears from Page's 

communication had been gang on for some time. An interesting additional fact 

is that this is not the only way in which the British obtained this priceless 

treasure. The German Government was so determined to make this Mexican alliance . . .. 

that it did not depend upon a single route :f'or transmitting the Zimmermann 

message to von Eckhart. It dispatched it in several other wayst and then it 

goes on to talk about the different ways 

For one it used the wireless route from Nauen, Germany to Sayville, Long 

Island. In the British Adm:Lralty this Nauen-Saville thoroughfare was known as 

the amx mainline. It was the most direct and consequently the one most used for 

sending German dispatches to the United States. Hendrick cites no authority 

whatever for the statement that the Zimmermann Telegram was transmitted by 

radio from Nauen to Savill.e. There is very good reason to doubt that it was 

as we shall soon see. A few hours after the outbreak of the war, the British, 

who al.ways recognized the impo:isance of controlling communications cbhnnels, sea 

as well as air, took immediate steps to isolate Germany from the rest of the 

world that lay beyond the oceans by cutting and diverting to her own service 

the two German cables across the Atlantic, leaving only indirect channels of 

communication with her Ambassador at Washington. These were four in number. 

First was that radio channel, Nauen to Saville, Long Island, Nauen to 

Tuckerton, New Jersey. Both of these were supervised by the United States 

-14-
REF ID:A38470 

Government and they were well supervised. Hendrick says "it was scandalous 

how the Germans sent messages by this Nauen-Saville route" but it is not true. 

I went through aJ.l. the records and every time there was a message sent there 

was a censorship. The Germans deposited two copies of the code that was used 

for transmission of' messages via that route. These copies are now in our 

Archives. I wish I had brought one 

Then there was the cable from Germany, via Berlin, Stockholm to Buenos 

Aires and Washington but this route was secret from the U.S. although there 

is positive evidence that it was known to the British from the first days of' 

its use for the cable from Stockholm to Buenos Aires passed through EngJ.a.nd. 

I think the British would have been crazy to have failed to copy everything that 

went over that cable. 

The third route via Berlin, Copenhagen, Washington and this cable also 

touched English soil. This was a very unusual channel. f'or the Germans because 

r .. • 

it could only be used with the knowledge and~ coopera.ti~p. of the United States. 

. ~ 

The fourth involved insertion of secret text in ordinary ~ news 

.e 

dispatches and was disclosed only after the war by Bernstorf'f' himself'. I know 

that the United States Government didn't know this route and I don•t know 

whether the British knew it. I have never seen a:ny references to it except in 

Bernstorff 's own book. 

-15-
REF ID:A38470 

Now as to the first method, the use of the radio, I told you it was prohibited except under the supervision of the government authorities and this was 

exercised through Navy officers and it was very detailed. Hendrick is absolutely 

wrong when he says "how little this prohibition interferred with the Germans .... 

is shown by the use they made of the Loni Island station for this the most 

fateful message sent to America during the war " I have very carefully searched 

every available record and have found not the slightest shred of evidence that 

this channel was actually used. The German accounts have been examined as well 

as American. I think the Germans would have been more silly than they actually 

were to ha.Ve tried to send it that way because they would have had to use this 

code that was known :fm 9972 and it would be no point to it. No, the 

Zimmermann Telegram wasn't sent that route although Hendrick's account makes 

it plausible by saying: "On the 16 January l.917, the ever watcbfu:l. ea.rs of 

the British wireless operators detected the characteristics fl.uttering which 

informed them that another German message was speeding through the air. When 

decoded the British found that they possessed this somewhat disJointed but 

still extremely valuable document. Zimmermann to Bernstorff for Eckhart, 

16 January 1917. Most secret. For your Excellency's personal information and 

to be banded on to the Imperial. Minister in ? Mexico with telegram#! 

by safe route (There are blanks all. through here ) The message is onl.y 

partially decoded and there is not one word in it about giving back to Mexico 

Texas, New Mexico and Arizona--not one word. 

Hendrick really calls attention to the fact that there isn't any mention 

-16-
REF ID:A38470 

of New Mexico, Texas a.nd Arizona. and he seems to imply that he want~ you to 

believe tba.t Bernstorft' added this little touch to the message himself'. This 

would be pr:"eposterous Hendrick's explana.~ion is quite flat a.nd disingenuous. 

We shaJ.l soon learn the real explanation of the gaps and the doubtful points 

and the text of this first intercept. 

We come now to the second communication channel used by the Germa.nr Government. I wish somebody would put this story together once and for all so that 

you wouldn't have to Jump back and forth. This comes from a brochure which, 

in collaboration with a late comrade of mine, wrote in 1935 I think it was, 1937, 

on the Zimmermann Telegram. We come now to the second communication channel 

that was used by the German Government to communicate with Bernstorft', the 

route via Berlin, Stockholm, Buenos Aires, Washington. This channel was ma.de 

available by the good offices of the Swedish Foreign O:t'fi~e and its representa- - . as to • 

tives abroad. Hints :rd the use of tbis channel may be found in Bernstorf'f.., 4. 

for example, on page 65, 11we had to fall back exclusively o~he wireless 

stations when, as frequently happens, we were unable to make use of' the 

circuitous routes via neutral countries 11 Again on page 149, "telegraphic 

communication between the German Government and the Embassy at Washington was 

carried out by circuitous route which made it extremely slow This was a 

very bad thing to do to use a neutral country. Sweden knew better but was 

too sympathetic to the German IDQU[R cause. There is plenty of evidence that 

the British knew of this circuitous route from the very beginning. It happens 

to be that decodes of messages that passed over this route and later appeared 

-17-
REF ID:A38470 

among the hundreds in the affidavits by Ad:nu.ra.l Sir William Hall in the case 

of the Lake.wanna rail.road age.inst the Berman Government in the Black Tom a.nd 

Kingsman disasters Many messages passed over the Berlin, Stockholm, Buenos 

Aires, Washington route and these WEre a.11 in the Hall affida.vi t What the 

Germans did was to hand their coded telegrams Di over to their Swedish friends 

in Washington and in Berlin. The Swedish .Ambassador or Minister embodied 

the German code groups in a message apparently all their own using the disguise 

that consisted of a simple shifting about of the German code groups by a 

process which still left plenty of tell-ta.le marks and the Germans hoped that 

the difference between the Swedish and German code groups wot4-d not be noted 

even it occurred to either to the Swedes or to the Germans that the cables 

touched England and of course it didn't dawn on the Germans that their codes 

\ could be unravelled and read by anybody not possessing a copy of the codebook, 

certainly not by the stupid Englishmen Their codes were invulnerable. 

The Hendrick account would make it appear as if the Zimmermann telegram. 

was the only one that received special treatment of this kind but it is clear 

from the German records alone that the transmission of important messages by 

more than one route was a routine procedure with Bernstorff but Hendrick's says. 

"The facts seem to be that the Swedish court was openly pro-German, that 

popular opinion in Sweden similarly inclined to the German side and by 

January 1917, the Swedish Foreign Office had almost become an integral part 

of the German organization In many ca_pitals, German messages were frequently 

' 

put in Swedish ciphers and sent to Swedish Ministers in other countries and 

-18-
REF ID:A38470 

by them delivered to their German colleagues Herr Zimmermann, in his desire 

to make certain that his Mexican telegram should reach Washington, again fell 

back upon the assistance of his Swedish confers He banded his message to the 

Swedish Minister to Berlin This functionary sent it to Stockholm, Sweden 

From this point it was cabled to Buenos Aires, Argentina and from that city 

in turn cabled to Washington The Journey was a round-about one covering 

seemed about lS,SSS miles, yet nothing was sent through the air or under the sea RRRJDXRg 

to escape to watchful attention of British Naval Intelligence and the Swedish 

message was captured almost at the same moment as the one tbat was going and 

went by the mainline, tbat is, by that radio Now I've talked for 

fifty minutes and I think we will have a break and we will resume and God 

help Jl8 if I don't finish this this afternoon 

-19-
REF ID:A38470 

With regard to the German use of the American State Department 

facilities, Burton Hendrick tries to make it appear that obtaining permission 

to use those facilities was a rather simple matter It is not so Careful 

study of available records shows that while this !DUI cba.nnel was used on 

more than one occasion, it was not used nearly so frequently as Hendrick 

implies and its empl.oyment was confined to periods of strained relations. The 

first was on June 2 1 1915, shortly after the sinking of the Luisita.na. which 

occurred on May 71 1915 Of this period, Bernstorff says, "it is certain 

that if I bad not at this stage of the Lusitana crisis had my interview with 

the President, relations would have been broken off and war between United 

States and Germany must have inevitably have followed. During our conversations, t11a1ever, the President offered for the first time to permit me to 

j, -

dispatch a cipher telegram through ... the State Department to be sent on to the - .. 

American Embassy in Berlin." The reason why Bernstorff asked that was quite 

.. -

clear The British had all facilities for communicating with whomever they 

wanted They controlled the cables everywhere in the world but the Germans 

couldn't do anything except by direct communications via the State Department 

or by radio which they were not permitted to use without the American 

Government knowing everything that went in that cipher tbat was used on that 

Na.en Saville route, so Jiey•1111xst; Bernstorff said, "pl.ease give me a chance to 

talk privately with my government" And, President Wilson says, "that's 

reasonable, you shall have that chance. 11 

The initial instance apparently paved the way for several more during the 

same crisis as is evidenced by Bernstorff "From this time onwards, that is, 

-2~-
REF ID:A38470 

about 21 JuJ.y 1915, Mr. Lansing agreed with me that as a r_!!gular thing I should 

be permitted whenever negotiations were going on to ~end cipher dispatches to 

my government through the channels of the State Department and the American 

privilege 

Embassy in :Berlin. It wi11 be remembered that similar 1r11'Mlf'1tws7 had been 

granted me at the time of the Lusitania incident 11 But 1est one Jwnp to the 

conclusion that the State Department was careless in pla.cing the facilities at 

the possibiJ.ity of 

the disposal of the Germans and regarded the matter as being without7serious 

repercussions, let it be noted that Mr Lansing not only rea1ized the i'ul.l 

implications of the unusual procedure but also refused to transmit a message 

on at 1east one occasion on the ground that there appeared to be no particular 

urgency for the transmission of the message on account of either of the subjects 

mentioned Those are his words 

It must al.so be noted that the State Department transmitted messages not 

only for the German Government but al.so for the Austrian Government as is 

proved by a telegram. dated February 14 from Lansing to Ambassador Penfield at 

Vienna The State Department wa.s indeed careful. in placing its communications 

facilities at the disposal of the Germans 

Now we come to a study of the code used for the Zimmermann Telegram and 

" 

first in its passage from Berlin to Washington. There can be no question that 

the message was the one which had been appenied to the Berlin-Washington message 

No 157, which had been sent via State Department channels Indeed the 

Zimmermann Telegram in its first form bore~the number 158 As I B&Xli have 

already said, the British Government bliLs officially never published any 

"' 

account of the interception and solution of the Zimmermann Telegram by its 

-21-
REF ID:A38470 

cryptologic agency, commonly referred to as Room 4~ OB Not one word officially 

f'rom that day to this and 42 years have gone by but when we study very 

intently the telegrams that passed between the British and American Governments 

dealing with the Zimmermann Telegram, as related in the Hendrick account, and 

now 

more especially/the account contained in the book which I just referred, the 

James' book, we get some information from which we can make certain deductions. 

Admiral James, in his foreword says: "When, through the publication of 

a letter in the press, it became known that I was collecting material for a 

biography of Sir Admiral bir Reginald Hall, I received letters from his old 

friends and colleagues expressing their pleasure that his great services were 

to be placed on record and their willingness to help with personal recollections 

II •• 

of a J!RX•l!HK man's leadership they had so much admired and whose friendship 

Ill .. ; 

.. !. 

they had so greatly valued Nearly a!l Qf _my correspondence asked the same 

biographer? And was 

two questions. Had the Admiral left any papers useful to a 1axaagxqk7txamiXJQUl 

it now even after 40 years possible to give a full account of his achievements 

without having access to official papers still under lock and key'l Ball did 

not, as is generally believed, destroy all the records of his sewa.rdship as 

Director of Naval Intelligence 11 As a matter of fact, I don't lmow how he got 

away with it, but he took all the messages with him when he left the Directorship. In 1932 he began work on his autobiography but abandoned the proJect 

after 5 of the 35 chapters bad been completed and I think what happened was 

that he found out that if' he published it he woUld be running afoul of the 

official secrets act and this he didn't want to do I found some useful 

-22-
REF ID:A38470 

material. in those first five chapters and it is evident from the chapter 

headings of the thirty unwritten chapters that his autobiography would have 

been a book of historical importance. It is unlikel.y that there are now any 

papers in the official archives wbich would throw any light on bis activities 

I told you about that, didn't I'l His was not the type of work that could be 

recorded in reports and letters of proceedings He had a very large correspondence with senior officers a.f'loat, attaches and agents but this correspondence 

never eeached the of'f icial files On the other hand, all official histories 

and nearly all biographies and autobiographes embracing the 1914-18 war throw 

light on his remarkable contributions to the war effort of the powers ranged 

against Germany and he goes on to tell bow the books of the World War period, 

World War I period, are now gathering dust on the library shelves and everybody is studying World War II But he says, "As I had no access to unreleased 

official paper~ in the framework of this book is a distillation of a mass of 

materials gathered through standard works which were best sellers twenty 

years ago, it was not necessary for me to obtain official approval or support 

for publication 11 I don't believe that is quite an accurate statement because 

when I bought the book, immediately after it was published, I wrote a letter 

to our Liaison Officer at GCHQ and asked a few questions about the book and 

this I will read now from a memorandum to me from the Deputy Senior Liaison 

Of:f'icer "Joilh Cooper, speaking informally, says that the book was submitted 

to the Admiralty for review and then passed to GCHQ Cooper received it and 

made suggestions that certain material be deleted and names o:f' living persons 

associated with Room 4S not be included He also offered, as his opinion, 

-23-
REF ID:A38470 

that the book contained no previously unpublished material but it would have 

been better if it had not been pubJ.ished He is not sure that aJ.1 the 

recommended deletions were ma.de but he is confident that most were. In 

addition to a. weak substantive case, it would have been very bard to recommend 

against publishing in view of Admiral James' status as former Chief' of Naval 

Intelligence and in view of his nationaJ. prominence. It appears that the U.K 

like the U.S. has a mechanism for reviewing ma.nuscriJpts but is faced with 

similar frustration--nothing can be done to prevent publication except a threat 

of prosecution and prosecution is undertaken onJ.y when the material is such 

that after warning not to publish and it_is published and the contents is 

considered substantiaJ. enough to support this prosecution and then the 

prosecution is underway. Cooper believes that certainly no one would hold 

that the contents of this book is of such a nature Apparently Cooper knew 

that 

Admiral James in the Navy and m:Dx mentions/two members of Room 4flJ are 

employed here--they are Mr Burch in Historical Section and Miss Wendy White 

who since your retirement has the transatlantic title for continuous regular 

service {Your retiJl!ment gave me kind of a np laugh) • Mr Burch, I regret 

to say, died about a year after :tilR this memorandum was written. I take it 

Miss White is still alive. Anyhow this book was no matter what 

Admiral James says 

He goes on to say: "I was indeed in a better position to judge what 

could and what should not be published tha.n anyone to whom the first World 

War is anly a boyhood's memory, if a memory a.tall, because I knew how much 

of Hall's work was known to our enetnJ.es during the war and how much has been 

-24-
REF ID:A38470 

publ.ished to the world since then." He was a member of Room 4~ as a matter 

of fact--he was one of Admiral. Hall's assistants. "I also had the advantage 

JD~ 

of having taken some pa.rt, when at the Admiral.ty, in passing f'or publ.ication 

books and articles covering various aspects of the l.914-18 war and informing 

authors what for security reasons cOul.d not be published and more important 

., the advantage of personal knowledge of the men and events I will be describing 

which would enable me to distinguish fact from fiction and to Judge when 

references to the shortcomings of individuals shoul.d be omitted. In recalling 

the work of Ball's Naval Section, I was also on well worn ground, the text 

of intercepted a.ndeeciphered signals is given in American, British and German 

official histories " 

Now, let 's begin by quoting from Admiral James ' account~ of the Zimmermann 

Telegram "Early in the new year came the Zimmermann Telegram and although 

the first knowledge of this surprising communication was derived from European 

sources, (I wonder if he knew what information I derived from JUSt tba.t 

phrase) Ball's friends in Mexico City were soon playing an important pa.rt in 

the complicated business d that fo1lowed. On Wednesday morning, January 17, 

Hall. was at work at the usual dockets and papers and at about ba.lf past ten, 

a member of the political section came in and told hJJD. that he and one of his 

colleagues had partly deciphered a message from the German Foreign Office 

to Bernorstoff which, if made known to the American Government, would probably 

bring America into the war. The two men, who by solving this cipher altered 

the course of history, died several years ago and tbeir names have already 

-25-
REF ID:A38470 

been published so in their case, it is justifiable to ignore the canon that the 

names of those engaged on secret work should not be disclosed They were 

Nigel N DeGray, a publisher and after the war a Director of the Medici 

Society and the Rev W. Montgomery of Westminster Presbyterian College, 

Cambridge I remember Mr DeGray He was a picture out of Dickens, really, 

a very strange looking man and a very nice man and very sharp, very shrewd and 

ma.de a name for himself' in the organization 

There is reason to beli~ve that the version that we have just seen came 

from the British copy of the State Department message containing Berlin No 157 

and 158 to Washington but I don't think it would have been very polite at the 

time or even now to say or even to intimate that the British were also intercepting and studying messages of' the United States Government. Hall at once 

realized that Zimmermann•s message to Mexico was by far the most important 

message that had so far come into his hands He also realized that it would 

require the most careful handling. He gave orders that a.l.l copies except the 

original message and one enciphered copy were to be destroyed, locked them 

away in his desk and sat down by himself to evolve a plan of campaign. What 

was the position'l Within a fortnight's time, the fact that Germany was pro-

~ posing to declare immediate unrestricted warfare would be communicated 

by Bernstorff to the United States Government Would this be sufficient to 

convince President Wilson that the Germans would stop at nothing. His recent 

note had shown something in the way which his mind was working. It seemed 

that he drew little ix•xt~ distinction between the behavior of the Allies and f 

-26-
REF ID:A38470 

between 

that of the Germans or indeed/the justice of our cause and of theirs. If this 

new declaration was sufficient, well and good, we need not run risks and the 

Zimmermann TeJ.egra.m need never be used at all On the other band, the new 

submarine warfare might not in itself be sufficient to convince the President 

and in that case this information of the Mexican plot must be made use of if 

we would safeguard ourselves Publication of the telegram in the United States 

was almost certain to arouse the whole of the United States and mght force the 

President to declare war but it would be at the cost of hazarding the most vital 

part of our intelligence service--a hazard that he would not take Beyond the 

fact that the message gave the date on which unrestricted submarine warfare would 

begin, it was of no immediate naval interest and the proper procedure wouJ.d have 

been for Hall to pass the message to the Foreign Office He deliberately withheld all information from those best entitled to receive it and assumed a 

responsibility which ought never to have been his because he would not run the 

smallest risk of the message becOIDJ.ng known to somebody who not being familiar 

with every branch of bis activity might all unwittingly compromise some pa.rt or 

all of the work in Room 4flJ Yet some plan bad to be evolved and while mentally 

following the route that the Zimmermann Telegram would take, Hall saw that the 

Bernstorff-Eckhardt messages which H had secured (I'll tell you a.bout R) might 

solve his problem because the Zimmermann Telegram when forwarded on as it must 

service 

be from Washingtcnto Mexico would be only another message in that JrBaxsBx If he 

coillld secure a copy, it could be ma.de to appear that the message when passing 

from Washington to Mexico had been copied and deciphered by the American 

Intelligence Service and that we had nothing to do with it He was certain that 

-27-
REF ID:A38470 

1, 

even if somebody whom President Wilson implici'lt/ trusted, like Mr Balfour gave 

bis personal assurrance that the telegram deciphered by Mr. DeGray was genuine 

the President would demand a most definite proof that the message bore the 

meaning ascribed to it and it would not be easy to convince the President and 

the Americans that the Zimmermann Telegram was not a hoax. There was no need 

for an immediate decision as be could not take any active steps until af'ter the 

declaration on February 1 of the unrestricted German warfare Meanwhile it 

was essential to keep the closest possible watch on Bernstorff and the American 

situation in order to be ready at any given moment with alternative plans 

Bernstorff tried desperately to have Berlin change the decision about unrestricted 

warfare to no avail. On the lst of February Bernstorff presented the declaration 

with regard to unrestricted submarine warfare which began that day President 

Wilson immediately broke off relations. To Hall's dismay but not altogether to 

Washington and 

his surprise, matters went no further. Cables from/New York &Jlli: warned him that 

there would be delays and that perhaps no more positive action than a proclamation 

of armed neutrality by the President The time had come to take action and on 

February 5th, Hall saw Lord Barding, the perma.ment Secretary of the Foreign 

Office and showed him an amplified decipher of the Zimmermann Telegram which 

deGrey had now been able to produce. The reason for the gaps in the f'irst message 

that I showed you and talked about and the reason for this amplified IDCql decipher 

that he talks about here is this The message f'rom Berlin to Washington via that 

circuitous route was in a new code, 75~~ It had been put into eff'ect on1y 

several months before Bernstorff got a copy of' it on the second trip of the 

Deutcbland, remember that submarine that ma.de the trip across the ocean twice 

-28-
REF ID:A38470 

coming to :Ba.J.timore--now on the second trip it brought this new code There 

had not been very much traffic in that code therefore when this message 158 

in that code was intercepted and tackled by Room 4111, they co\ill only make 

bits and pieces out of it--it wasn't enough of it It was a two-part code, 

l!il,'11'11'11 groups Well, Ball, in talking with Harding, pu! forth several suggestions. 

" 

J 

In the first place, it would be necessary to obtain a copy of the message from .. ~ - .. .. Mexico City H was no longer there but his place had been taken by T who was l ~ 

:f'ully aware of what was afoot in the telegraph office and HaJ.l did not anticipate 

much trouble there. I think it is an amusing incident to talk about in 

connection with this H and T H was a secret agent of the British Government 

in Mexico City One day and Englishman who was a printer in Mexico City 

got into difficul.ties You see there were many changes in the Presidency and 

many revolutions in Mexico at the ti.me and when the new President came in he 

declared all money, all. previous money, to be null and void, and he printed 

new money and pretty soon it became the practice to print fake money, counterfeit. 

This money consisted of little things that looked like the railway tickets which 

you get in Europe in this country and they were called ca.rtonis and 

President Ca.raza put in an edict that anyone caught ma.king ca.rtonis would be 

tried by court martial and sentenced to death. Well, this Englishman was a. 

printer and he operated this printing plant and on a Saturday afternoon he 

came back suddenly and when his workmen were out and on the desk or table in the 

room was a bunch of cartonis and the plates from which they bad been printed. 

Well, he took fright, he grabbed the plates and the cartonis and he put them 

in the saf'e and he went to consult a. friend of his, what to do? what to do? 

29 
REF ID:A38470 

The Mexican workmen who did the Job returned when the Engl.ishman was out and 

realizing his predictament decided that he would get the Jump on his empl.oyer 

and he reported his employer to the authorities whereupon the authorities came 

and took the Englishman, put him into Jail, he was tried that afternoon and 

sentenced to be shot the next morning Well, the friend whom he had consulted 

knew H and told H what had happened. H interceded and pointed out that 

obviously an Englishman wouldn't go into any such picaunious business If he 

were going in for any counterfeiting, he would do it in a big way. It mustn't 

have been this fellow so he got him off and the Englishman was released and H 

then had two very good friends It happened that the friend who interceded for 

the Englishman worked in the Mexican Tel.egraph Off ice and that is how Admiral 

Hall got copies of the messages that he wanted. Ball then took steps to obtain 

the additional evidence that would be required in the circumstances and telegraphed 

to his secret agent in Mexico to get all copies of Bernstorff's to Eckhardt since 

18 January These were sent to Wa~hington by mail and forwarded by cable to 

London without delay James goes on. "So much progress on the reconstruction 

of the code had been made that by February 19th, Hall had in his hand an almost 

perfect transcript" and then he goes on and gives the text of the Zimmermann 

Telegram as I read it to you--the complete text. But James is throwing a 

little dust in our eyes, the version of the Z:unmerma.nn Telegram as was finally 

JDOitxx publ.ished was not the version that was in the telegram from Zimmermann 

to Bernstorff' which was in Code 75fi1fi1 but the equivalent version which was in 

the telegram from Bernstorff to Eckhardt and that was in a much older and much 

simpler code, 13!/J4fil 

-316-
REF ID:A38470 

Now, Ball was still in a quandary, what to do, how to manipulate this 

thing. For the past week or so, Ball bad been visiting the Foreign Office every 

day to discuss methods of handling the telegram but no satisfactory solution had 

- been found. Lord Barding was adverse from any step that couJ.d possibly h convey 

the impression in Washington that there_~s a black chamber in the Foreign Office 

pr that the British Govermnent was endeavoring to influence a neutral.state in 

its favor Now, by this time, Hall. had inf'orma.tion that the German-Americans 

in the U.S were extremely active in their endeavors to stay the President's 

band He felt that the time bad come for immediate action and formally pressed 

:for a decision. On 2f6 February he received Mr Balfour's authority to handle 

the whole matter as he saw fit This was a very very l.lllportant decision, a 

great responsibility which Admiral Hall undertook without any shilly sballying 

Now prolonged discussion with Br Page and Mr Bell followed Be called them 

in. Be called in Bell and he showed him the telegram and he said, don't use 

this --you can tell the Ambassador but don't say anything until I tell you to 

The Ambassador was in no doubt about the best method to adopt with regard to the 

•a•ittwg handing over of the telegram itself--he was sure that the effect of the 

telegram on the President's llUnd would be infinitely greater if the documents 

were to be given him of':f'icially by the Foreign Secretary and this Mr. Balfour 

agreed to do That's why, in opening my talk, I said he wasn't requested to 

appear, it was laid on that way. This was to give a solemn undertaking, this 

was a solemn package of information from-one goverzfment to another. The next 

otJt2.. 

question was an absolute cover for Room 4~ , the necessity forj<.p.oing nothing on 
REF ID:A38470 

on American soil for which the Americanf people could obJect. The possible 

refusal to accept the genuineness of the message and the steps which would have 

to be taken in the event of Zimmermann himself' denouncing the telegram a 

forgery were not so easily resolved 

The advantages that were to flow from having obtained a copy of the 

telegram in Mexico and not in the United States were now evidenced. There was 

nothing to prevent the American authorities from obtaining their own copy from 

the Washington Cable Off ice and the fact that the British Government had official.ly 

provided a decoded transcript would satisfy them of its genuineness but there 

was still a possibility that the American Government would demand absolute proof 

and that would mean handing over to them deGrey's reconstructed code which Ball 

would never do. Then all of a sudden, a possible solution suggested itself 

which was so simple that Hall, the .Ambassador and Mr Bell wondered why it had 

not occurred to any of them before. If President Wilson, when he exposed the 

telegram, was in a position to state that it had been obtained and deciphered 

by Americans on American soil, all would be well and this could be achieved if 

Mr. Bell deciphered the message sent from Washington to Mexico under deGrey's 

tuition :xiii in the American Embassy which technically speaking was American 

ground. As for Zimmerma.nn's possible denial, it seemed better to wait until 

after the exposure before making any decision. After that things happened 

speedily enough On Saturday, February 24, while the newspapers in Washington 

were certain that in official circles there was still hopes of averting trouble, 

Dr Page cal.led at the Foreign Office and was official.ly handed the message. 

Be lost no time and within a few hours the cable was on its way to the State 

-32-
REF ID:A38470 

Department and I read you that (Balfour handed me a translation of a message ) 

Now, you remember that in the message that Page sent, he was told that 

early in the war the British Government obt~in~d possession of a copy of a German 

cipher code used in the above message and bad ma.de it their business to obtain 

copies of Bernstorff's cipher messages to Mexico amongst others which were sent 

back to London and deciphered here. This accounts i'or their being abl.e to 

decipher this message from the German Government to the representative in Mexico 

and also for the delay from January 19th until now in their receiizng the 

information and James goes on and says: "It was not the case that the British 

Government bad obtained a copy of the German cipher code but it was the 

expla.na.tion Bal.l. decided to give the American Government. Risk of the loss of 

codebooks was being taken throughout the war by ~ everyone of the belligerents 

and it would be much better for the President to suppose that a copy of the 

codebook had come into our hands than that without such assistance we had been 

able to read the message. Hall afterwards described the next few days as the 

most anxious time of the whole war for him personally He had assumed a great 

responsibility. Would it be Justified? Had he done all that was possible to 

safeguard Room 4S'l Was there a chance that the Zimmermann Telegram would msfire? 

Now, no one can blame Hall for trying to put everyone including Page, 

the President and the Secretary of State off on the wrong trail and to cover 

the tracks of Room 4S OB. At the time this was !ll"itten, we didn't know all the 

facts, we were ma.king inferences and deduct~ons. We said as to this claim of ~ • ~ .,"'_L ,t 

having been done by means of a codebook that had been captured, it seems 

-33-
REF ID:A38470 

unlikely that a German consu:{engaged in an expedition to cut a pipeline should 

carry a diploma.tic codebook in his baggage Moreover, the copy of the British 

13040 is fragmentary and has every evidence of having been gradually reconstructed 

in the cryptographic bureau doing the decipherment of messages. In the preceding 

part of this brochure, we tell how after we got into the war the British 

Government was very generous and gave us everything that they had that was needed 

to work on the German codes and ciphers including copies of 7500, 13040 a.nd that 

is why we could state categorically that that was not a captured code It 

showed many gaps in the code where there hadn't been usage sUfficient to establish 

- will 

the meaning of groups You who have.worked on code reconstruction lDEB easily see 

that that was a point of great importance A glance at the copy given by the 

British to the United States after American entrance into the war will demonst#ate 

this fact. This copy contains about half of the vocabulary and is not a 

transcript of pa.rt of the codebook since it comprises some words and phrases 

from all of the pages Some of the identifications too are marked doubtful. 

An actual copy of the codebook would certainly not exhibit missing and doubtful 

sections 

On the other hand, there is now fairly good evidence that some code was 

captured and it was a version of 13040 By this I mean the German basic code 

13040 was ma.de by taking sections of a bsic code and shuffling the pages and 

sometimes only pa.rt of the pages so that they remain, whole series af words 

and phrases in alphabetical order and they had several versions of this--this 

kind of rearrangement and each one bare a different number related to 13040 

-34-
REF ID:A38470 

For example, this message to Mexico was .13042 and there were others 13~44 

and 6 and etc 

Question: 

Yea, that's right. He did the unforgiveable cryptologic error. .f 

He had 

the message in 7500, he :practically word for word put it out in 13040 That's 

why the British had to wait until they got the copy from Mexico City Cable Office 

in order to give a complete version--it wouldn't have done for Balfour to have 

handed Page a message partially decoded with gaps and so on, you see. Very 

important to get that Mexican cow 

Now there is some element of truth to what Hall told Page about the code 

because here Ewing says: "During the summer months codebooks which had been 

If. 

captured in the German consulate at Bushear, which I now through the courtesy 

of Dr Swift have ascertained definitely is on the Persian border of' Persia, were 

ma.de use of' That was this Mosbmos fellow. Soon it was found that much of the 

enemy's diploma.tic correspondence coul.d be read, thus :providing a starting point 

from which to penetrate one after another the German Foreign Office ciphers. 

You see this is what happens when you are working on the communications of a 

government, you don't work on just one code and it's JUSt silly for people to 

talk about the Japanese code, the German code, there are hundreds of them in 

simultaneous use 

On the other hand, James gives us much more specific and va.1.uable information 

on this point and I think it is accurate Here is what he says· "In April. 

something of even greater importance happened There came into Hal.1.'s hands a 

copy of the German diploma.tic codebook, a. treasure-trove from Persia " Nothing 

-35-
REF ID:A38470 

could be a more categorical statement than that. How this book reached Hal.l. 

is one of the strangest hist»ries of the war A Navy officer invalided from 

the Persian Gulf came to Hall one day and told him about a raid on the Abadaan 

pipeline,, etc I read you that This is how they began their work. Now, if 

I bad had more time to pre::pare for tbhse talks I would have brought with me 

that 1304!6 code, 750f/J,, and the --they are interesting things 

Unfortunately they are stored away in a vault which is not at NSA and it would 

have taken too much time to get 

But now to get back to the Zimmermann Telegram itself', you will recall tbat 

I said it was published in all the important newspapers of the world on March 1, 

1917 A:f'~er acromonious debate,, a resolution was passed by the Congress tbat 

the President be asked to state the source of the information. He replied the 

same evening through his Secretary of State as follows: "The Government is in 

possession of evidence which established the fact that the note referred to is 

authentic and that it is in the possession of the United States and that the 

evidence was procured by this government during the past week but that it is in 

my opinion incompatible with publ.ic interest to send :i* to the SeDa.te at the 

present time any further information in possession of the Government of the United 

States relative to the note mentioned in the resol.ution of the Senate" 

Now Zimmermann, in a statement lmx before the Reichstag, made a long 

involved and foolish apology for his inept conduct. What he did was,, when the 

newspaper fellows came to him on March l in Berl.in and said,, "how about this", 

he said, "Yes, I sent it 11 Why didn't he say 11no, I didn't send such a foolish 

thing"? He would have forced the Britisi4 to~ disclosmx exactly how they 

-36-
REF ID:A38470 

got the information Here is what Zimmermann tried to tell the Rethstag--it's 

a l.ong thing, I will only read you part of this. "Anticipating these possibiJ.ities - ... 

it was not only the right but the d~ty of our government to take precautions 

in time in the event of a wa.rJ.ike conflict with the United States in order to 

balance if possible the adhesions of our enemy to a new enemy The German Minister 

in Mexico is therefore in the middle of January instructed, shoul.d the United 

States declare war, to otter the Mexican Government an alliance and arrange 

further details 'fl These instructions, by the way, expressly enjoined the Minister 

to make no advances to the Mex.can Government unless he knew for a certainty that 

America was going to declare war How the American Government received information 

of' instructions sent by a secret way to Mexico is not known but it appears that 

~~ treachery and this can only be the case had been committed on American 

territory. 11 How naive 

Now we are going to wind up by reading a little bit more from James 

I:f' Zimmermann had been really smart he would have denounced the telegram as 

fprgery, a fraud, a product of British duplicity, t!hicanery, even if only to 

smoke the British out and make them prove the authenticity of' the telegram by 

disclosing exactly how the message and the information contained was obtained. 

Tbat is JOdlX what Hall greatly feared would happen but his fears turned out to 

be groundless. Zimmermann was too dumb, too sl.ow, too inept and he soon lost his 

JOb 

Now, when during the subse<J_uent debate in the Senate on the Armed Neutrality 

Bill, only 13 opponents could be found, Hall felt fairly confident This little 

' 

willful group of men, as the President called them, were able to talk out the 

-37-
REF ID:A38470 

measure but the feelings of the American Nation had been shown in no uncertain 

manner War was inevitable but Hall was still aa afraid that :D. his anxiety to 

would prove 

:sri•pnit enlist all. his efforts to safeguard Room 41/J ;pmi to be inadequate. 

He knew the Germans would make strenuous efforts to discover the truth. It was 

important to prevent publication of the German text of the message in its 

entirety and this Hall was able to do Dr. Pgge wrote to Lansing. 11The authorities 

directly concerned would prefer that the German text should not be published as 

its publication in entirety would indicate that our Government or some other 

parties are able to decipher the German code used in its transmission from 

Washington to Mexico and the Germans would then cease using it elsewhere This 

inf'orma.tion, which Judging by Zimmerman's reported statements, they may suspect 

would be of great value to them. At present the Germans cannot know exactly 

t. ... 

where or how the leak occurred For all they know a copy of' the message may 

have been lost or removed from the German Embassy in Washington or the leak 

Were 

mght have occurred between Berlin and Washington ~ serious doubts 

being cast in America on the genuineness of the instructions to the German 

Minister in Mexico, the authorities here might reconsider their position but as 

Zimmermann bas aa.m¥itted their genuineness in the Reichstag, this can hardly be 

the case 11 Now the curious part of' it is --well a large crop of' tall stories 

followed the publication of the telegram., secret codes it was hinted bad been 

stolen in the unlikeliest places and bought by the .Americans for colassal sums; 

heroic backwoods men from Arizona, searching for excitement, in France had 

broken through the enemy lines disguised as church Army padres, obtained Jobs 

-38-
REF ID:A384'l0 

in Brussels, discovered the German cipher books in the Governor General's own 

J 

~ - ' 

... - ' 

-39-

.. 

...