The Ghost Army

During World War II, the United States Army created a group of soldiers called the 23rd Headquarters Special Troops. 1,100 soldiers, (artists, designers, or actors) had a mission to confuse the enemy with fakes. These men were unofficially called the "Ghost Army". In 1994, when soldiers were moving through Europe, the Ghost Army sent fake radio messages for the Germans to overhear. They sewed different shoulder patches onto their uniforms to look like a lot of different units of soldiers. Speakers were set up to broadcast recordings of marching soldiers and trucks driving so that it sounded like a lot of American soldiers were coming. They made inflatable rubber tanks (like the picture above) truck, and weapons for spy planes to see from the air. Nobody knew about the Ghost Army until 1996 because the mission was top secret. I think that the whole Ghost Army idea was brilliant and clever. I also wonder who thought of the idea to trick all the enemy soldiers by using fakes. (After some research, I learned that it was Ralph Ingersoll who came up with this idea.) I think that it is possible that other countries have made a Ghost Army and that two countries can fool each other. I think a flaw to the Ghost Army is that the enemy might take the risk of attacking the Ghost Army. Most likely, they will soon realize that these people are no soldiers and they will know that they are fakes. But the Ghost Army was lucky and the enemy didn't take the risk of attacking. I wonder if America or another country will use a Ghost Army in the future.


Source(s): http://www.ghostarmy.org/ and the magazine called "Muse"