page_title: Signal Intelligence Regiment (KONA)
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Signal Intelligence Regiment (KONA) / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Table describing the cryptanalysis successes of KONA 1, which was a Signal Intelligence Regiment of the German Army unit, the General der Nachrichtenaufklärung. The table indicates the number of messages from the Russian Army broken by the German unit KONA 1. TICOM I-19ab, Report on Interrogation of KONA 1 at Revin, France, June 1945. Report No 25, Page 44 Other information Report is printed on Orange blotting paper. All TICOM documents are in the public domain, and this has already been decided by Dianna
context_page_description: The Signal Intelligence Regiment (KONA) was the basic element of the field organisation of the German Army signal intelligence organization during World War II. The KONA regiment were mobile communication reconnaissance units which were assigned to an Army group and operated close to the front lines within the operational Theatre to intercept and build intelligence, via evaluation services and disseminate the intelligence to senior staff locally and in the OKH/GDNA headquarters in the rear. To quote World War II cryptographic historian, Christos Triantafyllopoulos:
  The KONA units did not have the ability to solve complicated Allied cryptosystems. Instead they focused on exploiting low/mid level ciphers and even in this capacity they were assisted by material sent to them by the central cryptanalytic department. This was the German Army High Command's Inspectorate 7/VI
context_section_description: KONA 1 operated in the southern sector of the Russian Front from June 1941 until May 1945, intercepting and evaluating Russian Army, Russian Army Air and the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD) traffic. Certain personnel within Kona 1 appeared to have succeeded in reconstructing the detailed Order of Battle of the Russian military, and in predicting the timing and location of Russian offensive before they occurred The results were achieved by close integration of all sources of information as opposed to cryptanalysis of Russian ciphers, although low and medium grade Russian ciphers were read. The ratio of general evaluation against pure cryptanalysis was about three to one which was due to the following:
  * Russian High Grade ciphers were generally unreadable, due to the use of one-time pads.
  * A large amount of information could be obtained from Russian military practices, movements of strategic reserves, chain of command, intentions to attack as well as including use of Indicators on ciphers, call-signs and a low standard of Russian wireless discipline.
  From an examination of the cryptographical processes of Russian security, Kona 1 appeared to have determined that one time pads were used for high grade ciphers, and a number of code books and recyphering tables were used for medium and low grade ciphers. Medium and low grade ciphers appear in most cases were within the capability of KONA 1 to be available for reading.
  Captain Roman Roessler, Chief Evaluator of KONA 1, and commanding officer of the Intelligence Evaluation Centre (German: Nachrichten Aufklaerung Auswertungsstelle) (abbr. NASS) of the KONA regiment, stated that even if identification of individual formations wasn't possible, KONA was still successful in formulating a picture of groupings and number of formations. As regards the Russian Rifle Corps and Divisions, KONA had to rely on other means to gather signal intelligence KONA 1 successes may be considered overenthusiastic.
caption: Survey of Successes in Cryptanalysis at KONA 1 for 1944.
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