Inflatable mock tanks and trucks were set up near the Rhine in Germany. Attention to detail was crucial. Bulldozers were used to create tank tracks that led to the 42 kg inflatable mock tanks. Real artillery shells were thrown around the fake guns.
What use is an inflatable tank dummy in a very real war? A great deal, if the enemy believes it’s a real one. During both World Wars, the Allied forces used dummies of British heavy tanks. These consisted of a wooden frame covered with painted hessian.
Since the tracks were not functional, some of them were equipped with hidden wheels on the bottom and were pulled from place to place by a team of horses.
It turns out that the Germans had also constructed dummy tanks modeled after Allied models, although they only fielded a small number of real tanks. It’s possible they were used for training purposes rather than for military deception.
Dummy tanks were used much more frequently in World War II. Military deception maneuvers are as old as war itself, but the Allied planners’ idea represented something new: a mobile, self-contained deception unit that could stage multimedia illusions on demand.
The unit’s 1,100 men were capable of simulating two complete divisions—up to 30,000 men—with all the tanks and artillery pieces one would expect from real units.
The illusion could deter the enemy from exploiting a weak point by making it appear as if the location was heavily defended. Or it could lure enemy troops away from a location where real American units were planning an attack.
Founded in January 1944 and deployed after D-Day, the Ghost Army went to war using three deception methods to deceive the enemy: optical, acoustic, and radio. The 603rd Camouflage Engineering Battalion was responsible for the optical deception.
Originally founded to carry out large-scale camouflage work, the organization was now full of young artists, architects, and designers who were now translating their visual talent into a different kind of art.
A Ghost Army soldier paints an inflatable rubber tank modeled after an M-4 Sherman. The 23rd Special Forces Headquarters, an elite unit specializing in tactical deception, was classified as military secrecy until its declassification in 1996.
For this purpose, they were equipped with hundreds of inflatable tanks, cannons, trucks, and even airplanes, which could be used to recreate tank formations, motor pools, and artillery batteries that looked like real ones from the air.
These decoys weren’t simply giant balloons, but consisted of a skeleton of inflatable tubes covered with rubberized canvas. This ingenious design ensured that a single grenade splinter wouldn’t be enough to instantly deflate the entire decoy.
During Operation Fortitude, dummy tanks were deployed on the beaches of Normandy prior to the landings. During this operation, they were used to confuse German intelligence in two ways: first, by making it appear that the Allies had more tanks than they actually had; and second, to conceal and downplay the significance of the locations of their real tanks, making it appear that the invasion would take place in the Pas-de-Calais rather than Normandy.
However, the dummy vehicles played only a minor role in this deception, as the Germans were unable to fly reconnaissance aircraft over England at this point in the war and such efforts would have been in vain.
During Operation Shingle in Anzio, Italy, inflatable Sherman tanks were used while the real ones were elsewhere. In the Pacific War, the Japanese used mock tanks made from wood and available materials, even molding one from the volcanic sand of Iwo Jima.
To complete the experience, the Ghost Army also employed auditory illusion with the help of engineers at Bell Labs. The team recorded the sounds of various units on a series of sound effects records, each up to 30 minutes long. The sounds were recorded using state-of-the-art equipment and then played back using powerful amplifiers and speakers, audible from 24 kilometers away.
The 1,100-strong Ghost Army typically mimicked a specific, much larger division, such as the 6th Panzer Division, which comprised 15,000–20,000 soldiers. This photo shows a model of an artillery piece, typically used to support large divisions.
An inflated rubber L-5 reconnaissance aircraft used by the Ghost Army in one of their last operations on Germany’s western border. In their final action, Operation Viersen, they succeeded in convincing German forces to assemble to defend a point on the Rhine, miles from the intended point of attack.
Soldiers lift an inflatable rubber tank mockup in England. 1939.
A German tank mock-up made of reeds. 1918.
German soldiers push a pair of dummy tanks. 1925.
German cardboard tank mock-ups during maneuvers. 1928.
German tank dummies. 1926.
A German soldier pushes a mock-up tank. 1931.
German soldiers carry the shell of a mock tank to attach to a car. 1931.
German tank dummies. 1931.
The Germans conduct military exercises with dummy tanks. 1932.
German troops transport a mock-up tank across the Oder River during military exercises. 1932.
A German tank mockup in front of the Reichstag. 1932.
British troops inflate a rubber tank. 1940.
American soldiers inspect a wooden German tank mockup built over a four-ton truck in France, 1944.
An American soldier inspects a German tank mockup in Metz, France, 1944.
A US Marine tears a wooden plank off a Japanese mock tank on Okinawa, 1945.
An American soldier looks inside a German tank mock-up on the outskirts of Cologne. 1945.
British soldiers hoist an inflatable dummy tank during exercises on Salisbury Plain (after the end of the war).
