During World War I, the British made use of dummy versions of their Mark I tanks, these were lightweight, but visually accurate, reproductions. The tracks were non-functional so they moved on a set of concealed wheels underneath; they were towed from place to place by a pair of horses.
In World War II, both the Allies and the Axis used dummy tanks. The British, who designed them, called them "spoofs." The Americans used them as well. Before the war began, the Wehrmacht utilized mock tanks to practice tactics and train their troops.
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, however, the Royal Engineers improved them further. Jeeps were used to make the "spoofs" more realistic: a steel frame covered with canvas was placed on them, making a self-propelled dummy tank. 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.
Another inflatable dummy, representing the post-WWII M47 Patton
Dummy tanks were used extensively 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, they were used 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 the Pas-de-Calais rather than at Normandy. Similarly, during Operation Shingle at Anzio, Italy, inflatable Sherman tanks were deployed when the real tanks were elsewhere. 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.
The Red Army also employed dummy tanks to increase their apparent numbers, and mask their true movements.
During the Kosovo War, the Yugoslav Army regularly placed dummy tanks in Kosovo which misled NATO forces into thinking that they were destroying far more real tanks than actually occurred.
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, compared to $4.35 million for a real M1. The decoy is also practical: when disassembled, it weighs only fifty pounds, and is roughly the same size as a duffel bag. Its generatorbout the size of a 12inch televisionacilitates inflation, so that two people can erect the decoy in a few minutes. Occasionally, real tanks carry a dummy on board, to deploy when needed.
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"Britannia: The Tank that Ruled the Trenches". The War Illustrated: p.34. 1918-03-02.
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BBC On The Record - Broadcast: 28.10.01
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