US ‘ghost army’ that fooled Hitler with inflatable tanks honoured
‘I guess we were successful because the Germans fired on us’
WHENEVER family members asked 100-year-old Seymour Nussenbaum what part he played in the Second World War, he told them: “I blew up tanks!”
Little did they know what he really meant. In fact, Mr Nussenbaum, from New Jersey, was part of a secret 1,100-strong ghost army whose job was to dupe the Nazis about the size and location of Allied forces with life-size inflatable decoys on the front line.
Inspiration for the unit came from the British who had honed the deception technique for the battle of El Alamein in 1942, as Operation Bertram.
Armed with sound effects, costumes, scripts and props worthy of a Hollywood production, the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops and its sister unit, the 3133rd Signal Service Company Special, masqueraded as a combat force more than 30 times its actual size.
“The mission was to try to be able to take 1,000 men and put them in so that 15,000 men could move somewhere else and not be detected,” said Pte Ed Biow. They fooled the Nazis by deploying fleets of blow-up rubber tanks, trucks and planes, and tricked their ears by broadcasting fake radio chatter and playing pre-recorded soundtracks of troop exercises from powerful loudspeakers.
Classified until 1996, the unsung heroes of the unit – who often ended up in the Nazi firing line to spare the real Allied forces from bombardment – received belated recognition yesterday by being awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.
Of the unit’s seven known surviving members, Mr Nussenbaum, fellow centenarian Bernard Bluestein, of Illinois, and 99-year-old John Christman, also from New Jersey, attended the ceremony at the US Capitol.
Joe Biden, the US president, signed legislation honouring the service members into law in 2022, noting in a statement “their unique and highly distinguished service in conducting deception operations in Europe during World War Two”.
At the awards ceremony, Senator Mitch Mcconnell called the Ghost Army’s legacy a “story of commitment and resolve, bravery and devotion – and remarkable talent and ingenuity”.
“A grateful nation knows how you answered the call in its time of need,” he added.
From a few weeks after D-day, when they landed in France, until the end of the war, the Ghost Army is credited with saving the lives of up to 30,000 servicemen by luring away the enemy during more than 20 full-scale deception campaigns.
In the UK, they were based near Stratford-upon-avon, and troops participated in the Allied deception convincing the Germans that D-day would take place in Calais rather than the Normandy beaches. Fearful they would be found out on various missions, Lt Fred
Fox constantly demanded more theatrics. “There is too much MILITARY and not enough SHOWMANSHIP,” he wrote in a memo to the unit’s leaders.
“We must remember that we are playing to a very critical and attentive radio, ground and aerial audience. They must all be convinced.”
The Ghost Army’s greatest and final trick was to mimic two Ninth Army divisions – a 40,000-man force – set to make the difficult crossing of the Rhine in March 1945.
They inflated 200 decoy trucks and tanks 10 miles down the road from the attack point, blasting sounds of rumbling vehicles, hammering and even soldiers swearing.
Fake radio orders were given and disinformation spread to German spies in local bars and cafés.
“We were turned loose in town [and told], ‘Go to the pub, order some beers and talk loose’,” said one.
“I guess we were successful because the Germans fired upon us,” Mr Bluestein, who specialised in fake signs and vehicle stencils, told The Washington Post. “We convinced them that we were the real thing.”
The Ninth Army encountered token resistance as it forded the Rhine with minimal casualties.
However, the Ghost Army often received a battering.
Lt Gil Seltzer, who was in the camouflage unit, said the men asked their superiors: “You mean we’re asking the enemy to fire on us?”
He said: “The answer was ‘yes’. From that moment onwards, we came to the conclusion that this was a suicide outfit.”
“If you’re in the wrong place, you can be dead, if you are in the right place, you can live to be as old as I am,” said Sgt Victor Dowd.
When the war came to an end, the military showmen, who included artist Ellsworth Kelly and fashion designer Bill Blass, returned home to resume their creative lives.
For decades, though, they were sworn to secrecy in case their art of illusion needed to wheeled out again during the Cold War.
“Some of these guys went to their graves without telling anybody in their families what this unit was involved in,” said Rick Beyer, co-author of The Ghost Army of World War II and producer and director of a 2013 documentary on the force.
“I didn’t even tell my wife until the 1990s, when the secrecy came off,” said Mr Nussenbaum.