subject: Interesting Warfare Role In Military For Dummies [print this page] The term dummy has various connotations in military language that can relate to a variety of assorted technologies. It can mean dissembling practices employing equipment and techniques made to delude a foe before during and after the cessation of battle as well as guns and equipment that are used for education purposes. also, another use of the word indicates a mechanism that does not have a chemical explosive. In other words, a dummy slug, projectile or grenade will not detonate and is usually involved in some type of preparation regimen given to green personnel. The expression also indicates that the round is entirely deficient in propellant and has no explosive potential whatsoever.
This expression is ofttimes confused with the concept of a blank; whilst a blank does have some form of powder it does not have a bullet projectile to impact a target. Additionally, the word has come to denote many forms of deceiving practices used before and during combat operations. Duplicate airfields and towns were scattered across the English countryside during the Second World War in order to bedevil the Luftwaffe, the German Air Force. As a result, armed forces installations and civilian cities were spared the ravages of perpetual bombardment runs. There were many other misleading tactics utilised during the hostilities in order to reduce damages and subdue a resolute foe.
The tactical utilization of dummy airfields and dummy towns led to the systemization of the dummies concept in an extensive operational plan. One of the most famous of the strategies implemented during the Second World War was known as Operation Fortitude that itself was merely a component of Operation Jael later known as Plan Bodyguard. Divided into a twofold branched attacking tactic the dummy landing sites included the Pas de Calais and Norway. The 'Allies' deceived the 'Axis' powers that a northerly and a southerly front would open up at the indicated sites. This dummy information tended to condense the forces of the Axis powers at locations that would receive the main disastrous blows that would be the commencement of the conclusion of the warfare.
The comprehensive Bodyguard campaign included a assortment of subterfuges regarding the timing, positioning and forces deployed to attack the mainland. The Bodyguard operation had three main components: Fortitude's northern and southern dummy operation as indicated above and Operation Zeppelin that was a ruse implying a invasion in the East. The entire struggle hoped to achieve at least a triad of primary goals that would be utilized in conducting the hostilities. The first, as was previously mentioned, included the initial timing of the invasion. Secondly, to holdup the enemy powers for two or more weeks.
But the most foremost of all objectives was of course to make the German High command assume the attack would come around the Pas de Calais region or East of this area so as to secure a relatively undefended front at Normandy. Each of these objectives met with outstanding success and as a result victory over the Axis powers would soon be attained despite heavy losses in the initial landings. The outcome of the deceit and dummies used in combat continue to reverberate across history but their counterparts in peacetime are more effective and less well known as part of a scheme of deceiving the subject populations.
