Dummy tanks superficially resemble real tanks and are often deployed as a means of military deception in the absence of real tanks. Early designs included wooden shells and inflatable props that could fool enemy intelligence; they were fragile and only believable from a distance. Modern designs are more advanced and can imitate heat signatures, making them more effective illusions.
During World War I, Allied forces made use of dummy versions of the British heavy tanks. These were constructed from a wooden framework and covered with painted Hessian cloth. [1] The tracks were non-functional so some were fitted with concealed wheels underneath and were towed from place to place by a pair of horses. [2] Dummy tanks, representing Allied models, were also found to have been constructed by the Germans, [3] even though they deployed only a small number of real tanks. It is possible they were used in training, rather than for military deception.
Dummy tanks saw significantly more use during World War II by both the Allies and the Axis. German forces utilized mock tanks prior to the start of the war for practice and training exercises. [4] [5] Their use in military deception was pioneered by British forces, who termed them "spoofs." [6]
One of the first uses of dummy tanks during the Second World War was in the North African Campaign. The Royal Engineers stationed there constructed two per day; between April and June 1941, they were able to build three dummy Royal Tank Regiments, and another in November that same year. These were foldable, and thus portable; and the Royal Engineers improved them further. Jeeps were used to make the "spoofs" more mobile: a steel frame covered with canvas was placed on them, making a self-propelled dummy tank. The Jeep did not realistically simulate the noise or movement of a tank, but allowed the dummy to be deployed quickly. [7] Meanwhile, the reverse was also done, to make tanks look like trucks. A further device was put into use that both created simulated tank tracks and erased real ones. [8]
Inflatable dummies consisted of a fabric covering supported by a network of pressurized rubber tubes that formed a kind of "pneumatic skeleton". These were generally preferred in the field, despite their tendency to rapidly deflate if punctured by accident or shellfire. In one operation in September 1944, the British deployed 148 inflatable tanks close to the front line and around half were "destroyed" by fragments from German mortar and artillery fire, and by Allied bombs falling short. [9]
Dummy tanks were used in Operation Fortitude prior to the landings at the Normandy Beaches. During this operation, they were used to confuse German intelligence in two ways: first, by making it seem that the Allies had more tanks than they did; and second, to hide and downplay the importance of the location of their real tanks in order to make it seem that the invasion would occur at Pas-de-Calais rather than at Normandy. [10] However, dummy vehicles played only a small part of the overall deception plan as, at that stage of the war, the Germans were unable to fly reconnaissance planes over England and such effort would have been wasted. Dummy landing craft were stationed at ports in eastern and southeastern England where they might be observed by the Germans [11] [12] but the Fortitude deception was largely carried out using double agents and false radio traffic.
During Operation Shingle at Anzio, Italy, inflatable Sherman tanks were deployed when the real tanks were elsewhere. [13] In the Pacific Theater of Operations, the Japanese also utilized decoys; one recorded instance was during the Battle of Iwo Jima. A "tank" was surrounded by American infantry, which had been under artillery bombardment: they found it was not real, but merely a sculpture carved out of volcanic ash. [6]
The Red Army employed dummy tanks to increase their apparent numbers and mask their true movements. [14]
During the Kosovo War, the Serbian army regularly placed dummy tanks in Kosovo, which misled NATO forces into thinking that they were destroying far more tanks than they really were. [15]
The United States Army has developed a modern dummy tank. It imitates the M1 Abrams tank not only in appearance, but also in its heat signature, in order to appear real to infrared detectors. One of these decoys can take fire from the enemy and still appear to be operational, thus delaying the enemy by as much as an hour, as they are forced to destroy the decoy. These M1 decoys cost only $3,300, [16] compared to $4.35 million for a real M1. [17] The decoy is also practical: when disassembled, it weighs only 50 pounds (23 kg), and is roughly the same size as a duffel bag. Its generator—about the size of a 12 inches (30 cm) television—facilitates inflation, so that two people can erect the decoy in a few minutes. [16] Occasionally, real tanks carry a dummy on board, to deploy when needed. [18]
During the Battle of Mosul (2016–17), the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant constructed and deployed wooden mockups of various vehicles in order to distract Coalition airstrikes. [19]
Dummy tanks, manufactured by the Czech company Inflatech, are also being employed by the Armed Forces of Ukraine during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, in order to waste Russian resources by attracting missile and drone attacks. [20]
Operation Fortitude was a military deception operation by the Allied nations as part of Operation Bodyguard, an overall deception strategy during the buildup to the 1944 Normandy landings. Fortitude was divided into two subplans, North and South, and had the aim of misleading the German High Command as to the location of the invasion.
Operation Bodyguard was the code name for a World War II deception strategy employed by the Allied states before the 1944 invasion of northwest Europe. Bodyguard set out an overall stratagem for misleading the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht as to the time and place of the invasion. Planning for Bodyguard was started in 1943 by the London Controlling Section, a department of the war cabinet. They produced a draft strategy, referred to as Plan Jael, which was presented to leaders at the Tehran Conference in late November and, despite scepticism due to the failure of earlier deception strategy, approved on 6 December 1943.
During World War II, Operation Chettyford was the code name for a tactical deception mounted in January 1944 in support of the 1944 Allied invasion at Anzio. The plan was meant to convince the Germans that Allied forces led by George Patton would launch a pincer attack against Pisa on the west coast of Italy and Rimini on the east coast, and aimed to contain German reserves to northern Italy.
Operation Bertram was a Second World War deception operation practised by the Allied forces in Egypt led by Bernard Montgomery, in the months before the Second Battle of El Alamein in 1942. Bertram was devised by Dudley Clarke to deceive Erwin Rommel about the timing and location of the Allied attack. The operation consisted of physical deceptions using dummies and camouflage, designed and made by the British Middle East Command Camouflage Directorate led by Geoffrey Barkas. These were accompanied by electromagnetic deceptions codenamed Operation Canwell, using false radio traffic. All of these were planned to make the Axis believe that the attack would take place to the south, far from the coast road and railway, about two days later than the real attack.
A Quaker gun is a deception tactic that was commonly used in warfare during the 18th and 19th centuries. Although resembling an actual cannon, the Quaker gun was simply a wooden log, usually painted black, used to deceive an enemy. Misleading the enemy as to the strength of an emplacement was an effective delaying tactic. The name derives from the Religious Society of Friends or "Quakers", who have traditionally held a religious opposition to war and violence in the Peace Testimony.
Military deception (MILDEC) is an attempt by a military unit to gain an advantage during warfare by misleading adversary decision makers into taking action or inaction that creates favorable conditions for the deceiving force. This is usually achieved by creating or amplifying an artificial fog of war via psychological operations, information warfare, visual deception, or other methods. As a form of disinformation, it overlaps with psychological warfare. Military deception is also closely connected to operations security (OPSEC) in that OPSEC attempts to conceal from the adversary critical information about an organization's capabilities, activities, limitations, and intentions, or provide a plausible alternate explanation for the details the adversary can observe, while deception reveals false information in an effort to mislead the adversary.
Operation Zeppelin was a major military deception operation run by the British during the Second World War. It formed part of Operation Bodyguard, the cover plan for the invasion of Normandy in 1944, and was intended to mislead German intelligence as to the Allied invasion plans in the Mediterranean theatre that year. The operation was planned by 'A' Force and implemented by means of visual deception and misinformation.
A paradummy is a military deception device first used in World War II, intended to imitate a drop of paratroop attackers. This can cause the enemy to shift forces or fires unnecessarily, or lure enemy troops into staged ambushes.
Dummies and decoys are fake military equipment that are intended to deceive the enemy. Dummies and decoys are only one aspect of military deception.
Operation Titanic was a series of military deceptions carried out by the Allied Nations during the Second World War. They formed part of tactical element of Operation Bodyguard, the cover plan for the Normandy landings. Titanic was carried out on 5–6 June 1944 by the Royal Air Force and the Special Air Service. Its objective was to drop hundreds of dummy parachutists, noisemakers and small numbers of special forces troops in locations away from the real Normandy drop zones. It hoped to deceive the German defenders into believing that a large force had landed, drawing troops away from the beachheads and other strategic sites.
The Ghost Army was a United States Army tactical deception unit during World War II officially known as the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops. The 1,100-man unit was given a unique mission: to deceive Hitler's forces and mislead them as to the size and location of Allied forces, while giving the actual units elsewhere time to maneuver. Activated on January 20, 1944, the Ghost Army arrived in Europe in May shortly before D-Day and returned to the US at the end of the war in July 1945. During their tenure, the Ghost Army carried out more than 20 deception campaigns, putting on a "traveling road show" using inflatable tanks, sound trucks, fake radio transmissions, scripts and pretense.
Operations Taxable, Glimmer and Big Drum were tactical military deceptions conducted on 6 June 1944 in support of the Allied landings in Normandy. The operations formed the naval component of Operation Bodyguard, a wider series of tactical and strategic deceptions surrounding the invasion.
Operation Cockade was a series of deception operations designed to alleviate German pressure on Allied operations in Sicily and on the Soviets on the Eastern Front by feinting various attacks into Western Europe during World War II. The Allies hoped to use Cockade to force the Luftwaffe into a massive air battle with the Royal Air Force and U.S. Eighth Air Force to give the Allies air superiority over Western Europe. Cockade involved three deception operations: Operation Starkey, Operation Wadham, and Operation Tindall. Operation Starkey was set to occur in early September, Operation Tindall in mid-September, and Operation Wadham in late September 1943.
Operation Forfar was the name given to a series of British Commando raids on the French coast during World War II. The raids were part of Operation Starkey, a military deception intended to draw out the Luftwaffe. The purpose of these raids was to identify German coastal units and to gain technical intelligence on German equipment, creating the impression of pre-invasion reconnaissance.
R Force was a British deception force during World War II that consisted of armoured vehicles, field engineers and a wireless unit. During Operation Fortitude it attempted to exaggerate the strength of Allied forces in Britain, and deceive German intelligence about Allied intentions. Later it performed a similar role during the fighting in Western Europe in 1944–45. It was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel David Strangeways.
Lieutenant Colonel Victor Harry Jones OBE was a British intelligence officer and "visual deception" expert during the Second World War. First serving with the 14th/20th King's Hussars in the First World War, he made a name for himself during the North African campaign of the Second World War by using dummy tanks to mislead the enemy. In 1941 he was transferred to A Force in Cairo, under Dudley Clarke, to continue deception operations on a larger scale.
The 1st Special Air Service Brigade was a fictional brigade during the Second World War. It was first formed in Cairo in 1941, as part of a deception by Brigadier Dudley Clarke, to play on Italian fears of airborne attacks. Clarke used documents, photographs, news reports and even fake Special Air Service (SAS) soldiers to plant information about the brigade – he even named the Cairo-based deception department, 'A' Force, to bolster evidence of their existence.
The British Middle East Command Camouflage Directorate organised major deception operations for Middle East Command in the Western Desert Campaign of the Second World War. It provided camouflage during the siege of Tobruk; a dummy railhead at Misheifa, and the largest of all, Operation Bertram, the army-scale deception for the decisive battle of El Alamein in October 1942. The successful deception was praised publicly by Winston Churchill.
Sonic deception refers to a deception tactic on the battlefield that involves the projection of sounds to produce noises intended to mislead hearers. The recorded noises target the enemy's sound-ranging equipment, as well as the human ear. It is employed in various activities, which include vehicular movements and the construction of infrastructure and military facilities.
