Fallschirmjäger II.

This is coolbert:

Titanic and Rupert!

To war with dummies!

As was the case during the airborne landings in Normandy, 6 June 1944, the allied using stuffed manikins resembling paratroopers to deceive and fool the German. This was Titanic!

"Operation Titanic was a series of military deceptions carried out by the Allied Nations during the Second World War. The operation formed part of Operation Bodyguard, the cover plan for the Normandy landings in 1944. Titanic was carried out on 5–6 June 1944 by the Royal Air Force and the Special Air Service. The objective of the operation was to drop 500 dummy parachutists in places other than the real Normandy drop zones, to deceive the German defenders into believing that a large force had landed, drawing their troops away from the beachheads. The episode was depicted in the 1962 film The Longest Day."

Rupert the dummy with medals! English dummy paratrooper of the type as might have been dropped at Normandy. ONLY three feet [one meter] high! The dropping of dummies when COMBINED WITH AN ACTUAL PARACHUTE ASSAULT I MIGHT THINK MOST EFFECTIVE!

DO NOT think however the allied forces were alone in the use of stuffed dummies dropped from airplanes as a deception maneuver. The Germans did it too!!

From that "Some FJ Facts" Internet web site article:

"Allied and German airborne forces alike used dummies to deceive enemy forces. The problem associated with dropping dummies, however realistic the dummies may be, was the fact that the deception does not last very long. It does not take long for the cover to be blown by alert ground troops. Dummies manufactured by the Allies were quite realistic, when they hit the ground they let off firecrackers imitating gunfire. The Germans decided that the best use for dummies was alongside real paratroops to give the deception of numbers involved in the operation and to mask the real objective. The Germans even experimented with the use of smoke pots attached to the dummies to shroud them on landing, therefore elongating the period of deception."

"Some of the JU-52 aircraft that towed the DFS-230 gliders to their objectives in Belgium in May 1940, did not returned straight back to their bases. They carried on 25-30 miles behind the Belgian lines and dropped straw filled dummies to deceive the Belgians that they were being attacked from the rear."

That particular German airborne operation of May 1940 the glider attacks on the Belgian forts of Eban Emael. 

"All war is based on deception." Even a simple deception gimmick and trick as using stuffed dummies dropped from airplanes can cause just that degree of hesitancy on the part of your adversary that is to your advantage. The allies and Germans both during WW2 thought so!

coolbert.