Henri Koot
Henri Koot (born December 29, 1883 in Singaradja , Bali , † January 18, 1959 in The Hague ) was a Dutch general and cryptanalyst .
Life
Born as the son of a Dutch colonial official and a Chinese mother in Bali, then part of the Dutch East Indies , his military career began at the age of 17 as a cadet of the Koninklijke Militaire Academie ( KMA , German " Royal Military Academy " ) in Breda (picture) . Three years later, on July 22, 1904, he completed his training there with the officer's examination and was promoted to lieutenant .
With the outbreak of World War I (1914), he was in the General Staff drafted and was given the task there encrypted enemy radio messages to analyze , one at this time for the Dutch army new field. After the war, in April 1920, now with the rank of captain , he became head of the new cross-armed forces cryptographic bureau ( Dutch Cryptographic Bureau ). He remained in this position until January 1933.
During this time he received a German Enigma-D rotor cipher machine (picture) from Chiffriermaschinen AG for viewing and testing. After two months of analysis, he came to the following conclusion:
“I dare say that it satisfies all requirements, be they ever so high even the possession of an equal machine with the same electrical connections both in the ciphering cylinders and in the other parts of the machine will not enable an unauthorized person to find out its solution. "
“I dare say that it meets all requirements, no matter how high. Even having an equivalent machine with the same electrical connections both in the encryption cylinders and in the other parts of the machine will not enable an unauthorized person to find a solution . "
During the Second World War , now Colonel , he was on 5 September 1944 commander of the newly established Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten ( German about " Dutch domestic - Armed Forces " ) appointed. It was an officially formed association of the three most important Dutch resistance groups that fought together against the German occupation in the final phase of the war (1944–1945) . First in Amsterdam , in November 1944, his headquarters moved to the Ulvenhout estate south of the now liberated Breda . In April 1945 he was promoted to major general.
A authored shortly after the war, his time as a Top Secret classified report in 2015 by the NSA was released, described him as a Dutch counterpart to the American Herbert Yardley , calling him "the 'godfather' of Dutch military cryptology" ( German "the, Godfathers of the Dutch military cryptology ” ).
General Henri Koot died at the age of 75.
literature
- EA van Heugten, HEM Mettes, R. van Velden: Inventories van de collectie generaal-majoor Koot, 1942–1955 (1958). Nationaal Archief , The Hague 2006 (Dutch), accessed March 14, 2019.
Web links
- Portrait photo
- Inventoryis van de collectie generaal-majoor Koot Koot collection in the Dutch National Archives (Dutch)
- Koot, Henri (1883–1959) CV (Dutch)
Individual evidence
- ^ EA van Heugten, HEM Mettes, R. van Velden: Inventoryis van de collectie generaal-majoor Koot, 1942-1955 (1958). Nationaal Archief, The Hague 2006 (Dutch), accessed March 14, 2019.
- ^ NSA Daily - History Today - August 24, 2011 . PDF; 220 kB (English), accessed on March 18, 2019.
- ↑ Louis Kruh, Cipher Deavours: The commercial Enigma - Beginnings of machine cryptography . Cryptologia, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Taylor & Francis, Philadelphia PA 26.2002,1 (January), p. 10. ISSN 0161-1194 , accessed on March 14, 2019. apprendre-en-ligne.net (PDF; 0, 8 MB)
- ↑ Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten in the Resistance Museum Amsterdam (Dutch), accessed on March 15, 2019.
- ^ NSA Daily - History Today - August 24, 2011 . PDF; 220 kB (English), accessed on March 18, 2019.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Koot, Henri |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Dutch general and cryptologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 29, 1883 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Singaradja |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 18, 1959 |
| Place of death | The hague |