The American Venona-project - The unmasking of Soviet foreign espionage inthe 40s

In 1943, American intelligence began to work on Soviet cryptograms and even tually managed to decipher coded telegrams. This attempt evolved into a mas sive long-term project code-named "Venona" which ended in the 1980's and wa s made public only in 1995. U.S. signals intelligence efforts successfully contributed to the arrest of spies like Klaus Fuchs and Julius Rosenberg bu t, until recently, the demands of secrecy prevented the full publication of the contents. By unmasking structures, personnel and goals of Soviet intel ligence in the US, the intercepted cables shed new light on events during t he Second World War and the postwar period. Together with first scholarly s tudies, they allow a detailed look at Soviet intelligence networks at the t ime of their greatest success in America. Since the Venona telegrams became accessible in London and Washington archives, and in part on the web, they have been studied carefully by historians. Already, some comparative resea rch has shown that the findings are corroborated by Moscow documents. Altho ugh large sections of the telegrams remain undeciphered, the Venona project opens up new fields of study and debate. The release of the documents has added to the discussion on the influence of cryptogrammic material on histo rical events. The article gives an overview of the Venona project and exami nes recent scholarly literature and memoirs.