The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1919-03-03
SHAMTANKS USED
 TO PUZZLE HUNS
Used for Purpose of Draw ing Artillery Fire of Enc my, Canvas Camoudage Tanks Played Important Part in War.

London March s-Reference in Sir Douglas Haig's victory despatch to dodges of camouhage by which the very gullible German was tricked give only a pale suggestion of the nu- merous artifices actually used.
 Tanks offered perhaps the best opening. because the Germans were so terrified by them. One stalwart
 colonel of tanks spent months in Flanders entraining and detraining the same little squad of tanks for the sole ediffcation of enemy airmen and
 possible spies. The writer has since seen a German intelligence report
 complaining that the airmen always reported tanks, even when there was none. and refusing utterly to credit their news of real tanks assembling behind Arras because information had been so wrong in Flanders and elsewhere.
 We used tanks made of Iath and canvas as early as September 1916, 1 leaving them on the skyline at dawn and drawing a furious barage. A fine little fotiIla of these dummies was used in front Of the Hindenburg line in October last, but the effect was, or should have been, rather spoiled by the effect of a strong wind which got under the canvas and totally cap- sized one
 It was betrayed very muc1' like the wood guns in the dummy Ag--ne1nnon, which gayIy foated off on the surface of the Mediterranc~l when the ship was struck. Happily in both cases the Germans duly reported the de- struction of the target.
 O7,y- nj T-a | always attempting to deceive, were themselves adept at deception. False i aerodromes with false tents and even
 false machines filtered the country and some were riddIed with bombs. i As soon as enemy night bombers were 1 reported an electric light or two would be switched on in the dummy ! while the netghboring reality reposed ! in safe ObsCurity.
 | In the second battle of Nessines a 1 whole corps. the Eighth. was given a purely dummy part A sham camp l was riEged up at night and Quanfi- 1 ties of dummy figures, at least as plausible as any of the false heads used by German snipery, were shown 1 in support trenches.
 The lure worked to perfection. and very soon after dawn German batter
 les poured shells among the empty
 tents and the infantry made all pre- parations to resist an attack in force
 afterward duly chronicled in the Ger. man CommUnique as if q real assaul had been stopped.
 The writer has seen German artf7 | lary drawn" in all sorts of ways. II
 one of the ThiepvaI attacks clouds O smoke were released on one flank
 and the fear of what might be turk ing within t drew down an intenst
 barrage just at the moment when tn,
 real ass 8lt was delivered on the righ
 wing.
 With equal success buoys 7ver, placed in the night along the Belgian
 coast when we advertised a shan
 threat, and it was great sport the nex !, day to watch the German shoe bat
 teries and huge single guns register
 ing for all they were worth on thes
 suspicious anchOrages.
 Both sides had many sham batter
 ies, made of iron pipes, or even trees and the enemy went so far as to shoo sham flashes from sham guns. Bu the immense superiority of our air ? men in observation and photograpl
 made us much less guilible than tn Germans, even when their effort were more elaborate.