The 23rd Special Headquarters Troops carried out 21 psychological deceptions operations during WWII with each operation specifically written to encompass the location, field conditions and its main battlefield objective. From the mimicking of an observation, aerodrome that was so realistic in scope and depth that on a few occasion allied airplanes would find themselves landing at this mockery airfield. There were two main deception operations that the Ghost Army of the 23rd Special Headquarters carried out which were pivotal to the judicious defeat of the Germans. From the beginning of the formation of this group the actuality of an elite group devoted strictly to psychological deception must be kept top secret to keep Germany and others …show more content…
This would be the final and largest operation of the 23rd Special Headquarters. Operation Viersen’s plan was a two-folded denial and deception scheme. The first was the denial of the true buildup location of the 9th Army to the German, and the second main point to the plan was to make the Germans believe that the 9th Army was traversing the Rhine River at a location other than the real location. The 23rd would attempt again to hide the real. In order for this operation to work a mammoth troop buildup of both the fake and of the real was needed. The 23rd provided the expertise while units 117th, 119th and the 120th provided support and volume that further helped in the rues. (Gawne, 2002) Each of the supporting units was supplied with a laundry list of rubber decoys from tanks, planes, trucks, jeeps and other various artillery pieces; along with camouflage netting that was used to simulate hiding what was not really the real. Over 900 pieces of fake military equipment was deployed to simulate this Rhine River crossing area. Once again a parade of the real took place during the daylight hours while a staging of the fake was created during the night hours. The 23rd Psyops used their sonic deception to accurately simulate the construction of bridges and the movement of tanks and troops during these and daylight …show more content…
Vast areas of Asia and Europe were reduced to rubble. The economy had crumbled in Europe and the majority of their manufacturing infrastructure fell to ruin. The Soviets economy was also devastated in the war, approximately a quarter of the country’s resources were obliterated. The Soviets population also decreased significantly not just to combat but to starvation and many other issues. The war also left the United Kingdom in debt; they exhausted most of their capital on the war. The Russians, Japanese’s, and other countries also suffered immensely. American had also suffered but the war ended the great depression and created an environment for productive postwar alliances with the government and private businesses. The United States came out of the war as a superpower and it was time to rebuild. Patton’s 23rd infantry worked hard to save lives and end the war. Despite the fact that many lives were lost and tremendous amounts of suffering occurred, if the deception operation were not successful the war would have been prolonged. The porlonging would have cost many more lives this historical scheme helped to end a terrible war and gained favor for our Military and Intelligence community to use denial and deception techniques along with other intelligence gathering