Editing PC Bruno (section)

==History==
In the early 1930s, [[Deuxième Bureau|French military intelligence]] acquired operation manuals and sample messages for the German Enigma cipher machine. French intelligence officer Captain [[Gustave Bertrand]] supplied this material to [[Second Polish Republic|Poland]]'s ''[[Biuro Szyfrów]]'' ("Cipher Bureau"), which used it as part of their successful effort to break Enigma.

In July 1939 the ''Biuro Szyfrów'' gave French and British intelligence all their results. Both countries were expanding their decryption efforts in anticipation of war, and this continued after the war started in September 1939.

When [[Invasion of Poland|Poland was overrun by Germany and the Soviet Union]], the key staff of the ''Biuro Szyfrów'' were evacuated to [[Romania]], and from there eventually reached France. On 20 October 1939 the Poles resumed work, hosted by French intelligence at ''PC Bruno''.<ref>''"PC"'' is an abbreviation for the French term ''Poste de Commandement'' — "Command Post."</ref>

''PC Bruno'' was located in the Château de Vignolles in [[Gretz-Armainvilliers]], some 40 kilometres southeast of [[Paris]]. It was headed by now-Major Bertrand. Its personnel included 15 Poles, 50 Frenchmen, and 7 anti-fascist Spaniards who worked on Spanish and Italian ciphers. The Polish group was led by Lt. Col. [[Gwido Langer]] and included the mathematicians who had been breaking Enigma for nearly seven years since December 1932: [[Marian Rejewski]], [[Jerzy Różycki]], and [[Henryk Zygalski]]. The Spanish team (''Equipo D'' – Team D) was led by [[Faustino A.V. Camazón]], who was aware of the use of the Enigma machine by German forces during the [[Spanish Civil War]]. 

As late as 3–7 December 1939, when Lt. Col. Langer and French Air Force Capt. [[Henri Braquenié]] visited [[London]] and [[Bletchley Park]], the British asked that the Polish cryptologists be made available to them in Britain. Langer, however, took the position that they must remain where the Polish army in exile was forming—on French soil.<ref>Kozaczuk, 1984 ''Enigma'', pp. 84, 99.</ref>

Bletchley Park and ''PC Bruno'' worked together against the German message traffic. In the interest of security, they themselves corresponded using the supposedly "unbreakable" Enigma cipher. In early 1940, the two centres read some old Enigma messages, and in March they broke some German daily keys, and read some messages "in real time" (i.e., sometimes as soon as their intended German recipients). During the next few months, the two centres decrypted several thousand Enigma messages, about half at each centre. Some of the messages gave notice of [[Operation Weserübung|the German invasion of Denmark and Norway]] and of [[Battle of France|the German invasions on Belgium, the Netherlands, and France]]. However, no effective Allied use was made of these warnings.

By June 1940, advancing German forces were approaching ''PC Bruno''. Just after midnight on 10 June, Bertrand evacuated the ''Bruno'' staff from Gretz-Armainvillers. [[Second Armistice at Compiègne|France surrendered on 22 June]]; on 24 June he flew the 15 Poles and seven Spaniards in three planes to [[Algeria]].

In September 1940, Bertrand secretly returned them to France. He established a new decryption center at [[Uzès]] near the [[Mediterranean Sea]] coast, in the unoccupied '[[Zone libre|Free Zone]]' of France. This center, codenamed ''[[Cadix]]'', resumed breaking ciphers. ''Cadix'' operated until [[Case Anton|the German occupation of southern France]] in November 1942.