BRITISH PHANTOM FLEET

Evening Post, Volume CXL, Issue 31, 6 August 1945, Page 5

BRITISH PHANTOM FLEET

USED TO HOAX THE ENEMY Rec. 11.15 a.m. LONDON, August 5. For nearly two years the British Navy used a phantom fleet of wooden warships with dummy guns to hoax enemy reconnaissance aircraft and bombers. They were merchantmen fitted with elaborate superstructures of plywood and canvas painted to transform them into replicas of battleships and air-craft-carriers, and they were used as bait for U-boats and as decoys to draw away bomber attacks from ships in Scapa Flow. A dummy fleet was also used in the Firth of Forth when the Fleet was away1 or to dilute the scale of attacks against the Fleet when in port. They- kept the enemy guessin gon the strategic disposition of capital ships. The steamship Pakeha became the battleship Revenge, the Waimana became the Resolution, and the Mamari was the aircraft-carrier Hermes. Mr. Churchill, as First Lord of the Admiralty, ordered the new dummy ships, which were known as tenders, at the outbreak of war. The Pakeha and the Waimana have now been turned over to; their owners again and are running as merchantmen.