Evening star., 1943-04-08
German Night Fighters
Use Lights 10 Make
Them Look Like Stars
False Fires Also Tried
To Confuse Pilots of
Raj Bombers
BY THOMAS r. HENRY,

Star Staff Correspondent
CANADIAN BOMBER STATION
IN ENGLAND (By MaiD German
night fighters disguise themselves
as stars.
That is the object, bomber pilots
here believe, of the brilliant search
lights carried on the Nazi planes
noses which, in cloudless sky
hardly can be distinguished from the
conglomeration of stars, much more
brilliant than they appear from the
surface of the earth, which can be
seen in all directions.
Only when the headlight falls on
and illuminates patch of cloud can
bomber observers be sure that it is
attached to rapidly moving object.
1t is the technique of hiding by be-
ing as conspicuous as possible.
Can Close in on Bomber.
BY masquerading as star Ger
man night fighters sometimes can
get as close as 100 yards before sud-
denly opening fire and then diving
Or rolling out of the way of return
FIRE. They also try to silhouette the
bomber against the background of
the sky, thus making it more con-
splcuous target At other times the
object may be deliberately to attract
attention while another fighter, COM
pletely dark, steals in from the side.
Actually. the bomber crews say,
the masquerading technique is very
good Three or four miles in the
air one seems to be in sea of stars
They appear to be above. on all sides,
and even between the plane and the
earth.
A favorite German trick, the
bomber crews explain, is to light
dummy fires 20 to 80 miles away
from target. The object is to trick
the night bomber pilot into thinking
that these are fires in the actual
target itself, lighted by the bombs
of some of his comrades who have
been there few minutes before.
Few Pilots Are Fooled.
But long experience, they say. has
reduced the utility of this particular
strategem. 1t is likely to work only
with amateurs on their first few
raids, anxious to get their bombs
dropped and be home again. The
fires are of various sorts-sometime
burning hayStackS, sometimes oil
blazeS, sometimes electric lights. But
the experienced man always can tell
the difference between them and the
fire from actual burning buildings.
There is, they say, warm glow
about the latter which the Germans
have been unable to duplicate and
which always can be sensed by
pilot who has been on a few raids
Real fires started by bombs are al
most unmistakable.
In addition there is the highly
developed technique of "pin-point-
Ing by which bomber pilot sights
some previously designated object
On the ground-such as an island,
village, a bay-Whose directional
relation to the proposed target is
known. Relying solely on dead reck-
oning or on astral navigation he
might well be 20 or 30 miles out,
but the pin pointing enables him to
hit it exactly.
Dummy fires have been reported
around most of the principal tar
CClS AL dIlSC dllu Uub ~
is long time since anybody ac-
tually has been fooled by them.
Dummy Towns Built.
Another strategem recently re-
ported is the building of dummy
towns few miles away from the
actual target which is pretty we'll
Camouflaged. These are sometimes
quite extensive. They may be card
board replicas Of houses and fac
tories or they may merely be paint
ed on the ground by a highly de-
veloped arr of reverse camoufage
Some Of these dummy towns look
quite realistic. bomber crews return
ing here report. Seen only by dim
moonlight or starlight. or by the
smoky light of dummy fires started
around them, they would be quite
likely to deceive anyone who had
not been forewarned of their ex-
istence, or who was not constantly
on the alert for trickery.
But for months the strategems
probably have not saved the actual
targets from a single bomb intend
ed for them