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Nazi Enigma machines helped General Franco in Spanish Civil War

Sixteen crates locked in a dark store room in Madrid for more than 70 years hold the secret to how General Franco might have won the Spanish Civil War.

Inside the crates are Enigma code-making machines that Franco had bought from Nazi Germany and used to co-ordinate his troops who fought on fronts hundreds of miles apart.

The 26 machines were discovered this week by the Spanish daily newspaper El País, hidden in army headquarters since the Civil War ended in 1939, most still in perfect condition.

The Enigma machines gave Franco's Nationalists a crucial advantage because their code was never cracked by their Republican foes. Hitler used the machine to devastating effect to command his forces during the Second World War, until the code was finally deciphered by cryptologists at Bletchley Park, Oxfordshire.
Read entire article at Times (UK)