Deadly Magic: A Personal Account of Communications Intelligence in World War II in the Pacific

Van der Rhoer, Edward, Deadly Magic: One of the most closely guarded secrets of World War II was the success of American code breakers in reading the messages of the Japanese armed forces and diplomatic service. From the Battle of Midway to the final surrender of Japan, Communications Intelligence(comint) provided the American high command with virtually continuous knowledge of Japanese plans and operations.

The author of this historically revealing book worked at the center of the U.S. Navy's communications intelligence operation throughout the entire war. Upon graduating from high school, several years before Pearl Harbor, he had begun the study of Japanese, taking lessons from a Buddhist priest in Manhattan. Soon after the United States entered the war he was recruited into the Navy and ordered to Washington for duty in OP-20-GZ, the secret unit responsible for reading and translating intercepted messages.

Here he was part of one of the most productive intelligence teams ever assembled. In effect "listening in" on enemy communications, he frequently came upon information that was of electrifying urgency.

The reader of Deadly Magic is brought into the middle of this round-the-clock intelligence-gathering effort. He is shown an insider's picture of the dedicated men and women working at a feverish pace to decode and interpret the flow of messages, and he shares the exhausting difficulties of the problems they had to solve.

By a stroke of good fortune the author also happens to be a man of unusual literary skill. As a result of his vivid description of this hitherto virtually unknown branch of the U.S. Navy, his book will take its place as one of the most thrilling narratives of World War II.