Would D Day Have Been Possible Without This Chap?

[ToraToraTora]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-27701207
As we commemorate DD landings, it's now 60 years since this chap was hounded to death by draconian stupidity of the day. His contribution saved many thousands of lives and is estimated to have brought the end of the war closer by 2 years. The bravery of the forces with their equipment is complimented by the sheer genius of Turing with his.

[Sqad]

Homosexuality was illegal in those days and that is the bottom line.
It isn't now.
There would always have been an Alan Turing, nobody is irreplaceable.
Yes, D-Day would have gone ahead without him.

[jim360]

As wonderful as Turing's achievement was, I do sometimes wonder if it's the manner of his death that makes his story so popular. Perhaps too much so, to the detriment of the many hundreds of people who worked on the project to crack the Enigma code. The Polish mathematicians who started it all off, such as Marian Rejewski, barely get a mention.

In terms of the question -- it's almost unarguable that the work done on breaking German (and, separately, Japanese) codes shortened the War considerably and saved many thousands of lives. Perhaps even it shortened the war by a timescale measurable in years. Hugely vital work. No question about that. Turing's role in it was immense, to be sure.

[jomifl]

The value of his work was much enhanced by the invention of the programmable computer which was invented by Tommy Flowers.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colossus_computer

[Baldric]

He broke the Law as it was then, although it would appear all is forgiven!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25495315

[Gromit]

They may have hounded him to his death, but then they named a road after him.

http://www.fcet.staffs.ac.uk/jdw1/sucfm/turing11alanturingway.jpg

Alls well that ends well.

[andy-hughes]

TTT - as advised, it is the tragic death of Turing that means he is remembered above any others - some of whom may have made a larger and more vital contribution to the war effort.

But this is not the day to be disingenuous - anyone and everyone who played a part however big or small to give us the freedoms we enjoy today, is to be remembered with respect and gratitude by all of us.

[VHG]

Tommy Flowers did not INVENT it he built it.

Turing invented it, Flowers built what Turing had invented.

However they were both important because without Flowers it would probably not have been built (he even used some of his own money to build it).

Turing is rightly consider the "father" of the programmable computer.

Rather stupidly we destroyed all the computers at the end of the war, and also destroyed all the plans, to stop them getting into enemy hands (ie the Russians).

If we had kept them we could have taken the lead in computing for the period after the war.

Sadly that role was taken by the Americans.

[jomifl]

VHG, I wasn't aware that Turing was an electronics engineer, give Flowers some credit, it was a joint effort.

[mikey4444]

Turing was treated no worse than others like him at the time. Homesexuality was a serious crime, and the activity was widely despised by most of the British population at the time, and continued to be up until very recently. It still is by a small number of bigots today.

I have read quite a lot about Turing and have visited the Bletchley Park site
where it all happened. He was certainly a genius, amongst many clever and dedicated people at Station X. Churchill stated that the work of Bletchley Park shortened the war, and I have no reason to doubt that the cracking of the enemy codes was a very important part of the process of defeating Hitler.

Its a pity that it has taken so long to recognise Turing's input but I'm glad that we finally have.