During this History of Information Technology course, I wrote three essays. The first essay, I wrote on the development of the Chinese written language. The second essay, I wrote on the advancement from sail powered nautical vessels to steamboats and how they advanced transportation and the delivery of messages. My third essay and the essay which I found the most interesting and enjoyable to write, I wrote on the importance of radio communications in World War II, or more accurately, how important it was for the warring nations involved to properly encrypt their transmissions and decrypt their opponents’. In writing these essays, I have come to see that China and the United States as a very good example of how a nations advancements in information technology are directly correlated with its success as a nation and world power.

In my first essay in this course, I analyzed the progression of the Chinese written language and China’s development of new writing methods and materials that went hand in hand with the development of the language. I learned about the stages of the development of a writing system in class lectures and through research that I did on the Chinese language. After some research, I came to the conclusion that China would be a good subject to analyze in order to learn more about the development process. As the written language and writing tools both advanced, so did the ability to spread and preserve information. It went from only religious figures being able to read and write to children being made literate in schools. Printing advances made it possible for information to quickly be spread all across the nation and for research and literary collaborations to be formed across long distances. Because, their writing system improved exponentially, their nation’s productivity and cultural advancement had a brilliant start compared to other rival nations at the time.

In my second essay, I analyzed the transportation advancement from sail powered nautical vessels on rivers to the engine powered steamboats. In our lectures, we learned about the effectiveness of the Pony Express and how quickly such an amazing innovation was made obsolete by the railroad. This made me wonder about the steamboat which I saw as being the nautical equivalent to the railroad. I did some research and decided to write on how they changed transportation. The switch to steam boats made a lot of things possible that previously were not. The new steamboats could now travel upstream against the current. Before, river travel could only be done downstream. This made it so that round trip travel could be done much more quickly than before. Steamboats also did not depend on the weather as much as the wind-dependent sail boats did. Therefore, they could operate on a much tighter schedule and were much more reliable than their predecessors. Also due to the steamboats independence on wind, they were much easier to handle on the waters than the sail boats. This made them much less likely to crash, sink or become stranded on a sand bar than their wind-dependent predecessors. This also made them more reliable to customers who needed goods or information sent along the river. All of these improvements and advantages made the spread of information between river towns and settlements much easier and faster. Not to mention, the success of the steam engine made for further investment by these towns and settlements, and eventually, the national government in steam power. Not only did the steamboat help advance river transportation and communication, but it also encouraged further advancement in nautical transportation.

In my third essay, I analyze the use of the radio in the Second World War. More specifically, I demonstrated the importance of encrypting radio transmissions by using the Navajo Code Talkers as an example and I demonstrated the importance of decrypting your opponent’s transmissions using the British counter to Germany’s Enigma known as Colossus as an example. I chose this topic, because I have been interested in both the Code Talkers and the Enigma ever since I was in middle school. I educated myself on both throughout my middle and high school careers. Because of this, I was able to write this essay quite easily. The Navajo Code talkers were able to provide a double layered encryption to their transmissions using both the Navajo language and a code within the language to communicate with each other. This was used in the war in the Pacific against the Japanese. It was very successful and allowed the United States to freely communicate with each other with no fear of Japanese spying. This gave the Allies a distinct advantage in the Pacific and heavily contributed to the eventual defeat of the Japanese. In Europe, the Germans had also devised an effective means of encrypting their transmissions with a machine known as The Enigma. For a long time, the Enigma baffled the Allied Forces, allowing the Germans to communicate freely, with no chance of repercussions. However, the British eventually got their hands on a German defector who told them how the Enigma worked and used his knowledge to develop Colossus. Colossus was a machine that could take an Enigma transmission and decrypt it. This took away the only communication advantage that the Germans had over the Allies and gave a valuable spying ability to the Allies. This contributed heavily to the Allies’ eventual defeat of the Axis powers in Europe. Both of these scenarios demonstrated that outperforming competitors in wireless communications gives a nation or civilization a very serious advantage.

From all of these essays and all of the lectures and research that went into the creation of each of them, I learned that the development of information technology acts as an accelerator for all other advancements and dominating the field of information technology gives a society a strong advantage over its rivals. It seems that throughout history, the countries with the best ability to record and spread information are the ones that more quickly develop new technologies and policies that allow them to outperform their competitors. Ancient China used their writing system to grow their society and power. They became one of the most influential cultures in history due, in part, to their development of their writing system. The Allied forces in World War II were able to defeat the Axis powers and change the course of history for the better, due to their ability to control the flow of information between both allies and enemies using radio encryption and decryption. Those who dominate information technology stand a better chance of dominating every other field.

References

[1] “From Bones to Press” Nikolos van Leer

[2] “Steamboats and River Transportation” Nikolos van Leer

[3] “Words and War” Nikolos van Leer