"Ghost Troops" in World War II

On June 6, 1944, Allied forces landed in Normandy, France, opening the second world war. A few days later, two Frenchmen riding bicycles through the cordon of Special Unit 23 of the United States Army Command were shocked to see four American soldiers lifting a Sherman tank weighing about 40 tons. "The French were kind of dumbfounded, obviously waiting for our side of the story," said Arthur Hillston, one of the American soldiers. "I told him, 'The American army is strong.'"

The soldiers of this special unit have no superhuman military strength beyond their patriotic zeal -- their tanks are inflatable. Known as the "Ghost Army," the soldiers are artists, including singers, illustrators, radio announcers, and sound engineers. In January 1944, the men were drafted from art schools in New York and Philadelphia with the task of fooling the German army. Their methods included inflatable tanks, the use of 500-pound loudspeakers to broadcast troop rallies, and fake radio messages. Jack Massie was only 18 when he was recruited to the Ghost Army. When he was told they would use inflatable equipment to disguise themselves as a team to fool the Germans, he thought, "I joined a rubber army."

Between the time they joined the fight in early 1944 and the end of World War II, they performed a total of 20 "conceals," saving the lives of an estimated 15,000 to 30,000 American soldiers. They never showed their true colors, not even to the other soldiers involved.

After 40 years of secrecy, the story of the "ghost army" first appeared in the press in 1985, when Hillston, a painter, opened up about his military service. In 2013, Hillston and 18 other Special Forces 23 soldiers were featured in the PBS documentary "Ghost Army" about their strange experiences during the war.

Rick Bell, director of the documentary, was also surprised when he first heard the story. "People think they've got it wrong, or maybe it just happened once," he said. That's how many people feel. Once, when Rick Bell was telling a story about the "Ghost Army" for the elderly, an audience member raised a question. The old man was a veteran who had fought in General Patton's Third Army. As Rick Bell prepared his speech, he pointed out that Bell's story was nonsense because he had never heard of a "ghost army." But after Bell patiently showed the pictures to the audience, the old man finally came up to him and said, "That's the most amazing story I've ever heard!"

"This story shows that even though it's been nearly 70 years since the end of World War II, there are still amazing and even fantastic stories to discover," Bell said.

Cunning and subterfuge have long been a part of human warfare, and the Trojan Horse is perhaps the most famous example. The ghost Army takes this spirit of disguise to the extreme. They use a variety of techniques to "roving" sound and light, "act" on the battlefield, design sounds, and create sets. What's more, after the first day's show, they pack up all the props and go to another place the next day to put on the same show. To make up for weak points in Allied lines, the unit could use inflatable tanks and large speakers with a 15-mile range to create the illusion of a large force massed, plus some false radio intelligence to make these battlefield "scams" work.

From the Normandy landings to the Battle of the Bulge, the ghost troops put on several realistic "military performances." Their most successful performance came shortly before the end of the Second World War. The Germans were already back at home, fighting on the Rhine. The American 9th Army is preparing to cross the Rhine into Germany. The mission of the twenty-third unit was to draw attention to the German army and distract its defense. With only 1,100 soldiers, the 23rd Army had to be disguised as the 30th and 79th Divisions, which together had a strength of about 30,000 men.

The 23rd Army mixed real tanks with inflatable tanks to confuse the enemy by creating the illusion of a large army. They even fooled their people by making fake spy planes: some American pilots tried to park their planes next to them. Their realistic performance helped the Allied advance troops cross the Rhine with little German resistance. The Germans gave up their bridgehead on the Rhine, and the "ghost army" was rewarded for it.

Because the army had to operate in secret, they often disguised themselves as other troops. When on leave in the city, their tanks were painted with false numbers or sewn with false insignia to hide them from spies.

The secrecy of the mission, which separated them from the rest of the military, provided an unusual insight into the war. When they discovered a bombed church in Treviers, a small town in northern France, some of the artists stopped and tried to paint the structure. In Paris and Luxembourg, these art soldiers recorded everything they saw with their paint brushes: glamorous women cycling past, skylines made of rooftops and picturesque streetscapes. Bell collected more than 500 of these drawings over eight years of working on the documentary, which will accompany the broadcast at the Edward Hope Center for the Arts in New York.

"When you think of war," Bell said, "you probably think of the bloody men at the front and the generals at the headquarters. The experience of ordinary people brought about by war seems never to be appreciated."

"Whether it's painting a bombed church, spending a depressing Christmas after the Battle of the Bulge, or comforting Polish orphans in a refugee camp in Verdun, it's all part of that war. I want to tell these stories of war with human interest."

In July 1945, the ghost troops returned to China. After Japan's surrender, the unit ended its mission and was disbanded on 15 September 1945.

Many members of this special unit went on to work in the arts, including painter and sculptor Ellsworth Kelly and fashion designer Bill Blass. They were not allowed to tell their wives, family, and friends about their experiences in World War II until classified documents were declassified, and there is no account of the unit in the official history of the war. Bell says there's a lot more hidden here waiting to be discovered.

Bear wants to through the documentary to correct some American's views: for the history of world war ii, Americans have relished the British forces in playing with rival "elegant", it seems that American troops be foolhardy, will only artillery gun rushed up: "ghost forces of history tells us that American forces disguise also very creative, full of imagination."

The documentary was echoed by retired NATO commander General Wesley Clark, who said: "At the heart of success in war is a plan to defeat the enemy." And have the imagination and creativity of the ghost army is this master.