Craig Collie

A fly-on-the-wall book, opening up what happened in Australia during WWII, especially concentrating on the code breaking of Japanese messages during the war in the Pacific.
While on a trip to the UK, I finished Alan Turing's biography and I visited Bletchley Park. It was fascinating to walk through history and view the exhibits. It really brought it alive.
I had no idea that a similar code breaking effort had happened right here in Australia. 'Code Breakers' has been in my 'to read' pile since it came out. Then a friend at U3A (University of the 3rd Age) commented there was a WWII museum in Brisbane. A visit to the 'MacArthur Museum', started me on another adventure into history. Now I have completed 'Code Breakers', I have a more complete picture of WWII happenings in Melbourne, Brisbane and the Pacific.
It is an easy book to read book describing warts and all. It was illuminating hearing the infighting, the competition within and between groups. It takes astute leaders to decide what action to take with incomplete and conflicting information.
We even have an Australian hero, Eric Nave, he had a background in the navy, knowledge of Japanese and skill on code breaking. In Collie's words "Newcomers to the Bureau marvelled at Nave's instinct for codes and his knack for inferring message content from partial decrypts."
An excellent, illuminating book, thank you Craig Collie.… (mer)