Operation Cascade was the codename for an Allied

military deception Military deception (MILDEC) is an attempt by a military unit to gain an advantage during warfare by misleading adversary decision makers into taking action or inaction that creates favorable conditions for the deceiving force. This is usually ...

operation during the

Western Desert Campaign The Western Desert campaign (Desert War) took place in the Sahara Desert, deserts of Egypt and Libya and was the main Theater (warfare), theatre in the North African campaign of the Second World War. Military operations began in June 1940 with ...

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

for North Africa. Operation Cascade was one of the first successful Allied deception operations in World War II, and provided valuable experience for later operations. In 1942, the British forces in the Mediterranean and Middle East were very weak. To deter the

Axis An axis (: axes) may refer to: Mathematics *A specific line (often a directed line) that plays an important role in some contexts. In particular: ** Coordinate axis of a coordinate system *** ''x''-axis, ''y''-axis, ''z''-axis, common names ...

from attacking, a deception operation was planned. This operation was started by 'A' force under command of

Colonel Colonel ( ; abbreviated as Col., Col, or COL) is a senior military Officer (armed forces), officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, a colon ...

Dudley Clarke Brigadier Dudley Wrangel Clarke, ( – ) was an officer in the British Army, known as a pioneer of military deception operations during the Second World War. His ideas for combining fictional orders of battle, visual deception and doubl ...

Howard, pg 33 in 1941, and in 1942 eventually evolved into ''Operation Cascade''.Howard, pg 43 The goal of the operation was to create a false

order of battle Order of battle of an armed force participating in a military operation or campaign shows the hierarchical organization, command structure, strength, disposition of personnel, and equipment of units and formations of the armed force. Various abbr ...

in order to keep the Axis guessing as to the strength of the Allies in the region, by use of bogus troop formations, radio traffic and

double agents In the field of counterintelligence, a double agent is an employee of a secret intelligence service for one country, whose primary purpose is to spy on a target organization of another country, but who is now spying on their own country's organ ...

Implementation

In 1941,

Advanced Headquarters 'A' Force Advanced Headquarters 'A' Force, generally referred to as 'A' Force, was the name of a deception department during the Second World War. It was set up in March 1941 and based in Cairo under Brigadier Dudley Clarke. General Archibald Wavell, the co ...

, the British organization responsible for army deception operations in the Middle East, had already created three bogus formations to deceive the enemy in the Mediterranean Theatre: the

1st SAS Brigade The 1st Special Air Service Brigade (1st SAS) was a fictional brigade during the Second World War. It was first formed in Cairo in 1941, as part of a deception by Brigadier Dudley Clarke, to play on Italian fears of airborne attacks. Clarke used d ...

,Howard, pg 34 the

10th Armoured Division 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the first and smallest positive integer of the infinite sequence of natural numbers. This fundamental property has led to its unique uses in other fields, ranging from science to sp ...

in the Western Desert, and the 7th Division to guard Cyprus. This fictional build-up was expanded into a systematic plan to inflate British strength throughout the Middle East. In March 1942, the real strength stood at 5 Armoured and 10 Infantry divisions. ''Cascade'' intended to increase this strength, for the benefit of enemy intelligence, to 8 Armoured and 21 infantry divisions.Crowdy, pg 168 Bogus units had to be created, and actually shipped from their bases in the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, India and South Africa. An

had to be drawn up for these units, crests and signs had to be created, and some form of physical presence was needed to convince enemy agents that the units existed. False radio traffic for enemy

signals intelligence Signals intelligence (SIGINT) is the act and field of intelligence-gathering by interception of ''signals'', whether communications between people (communications intelligence—abbreviated to COMINT) or from electronic signals not directly u ...

, and information gathered by civilian informers in Egypt, increased the Axis impression that these units were real and present in the theatre. Most of the civilian agents, however, were

double agent In the field of counterintelligence, a double agent is an employee of a secret intelligence service for one country, whose primary purpose is to spy on a target organization of another country, but who is now spying on their own country's organi ...

s controlled by 'A' force through a network called Cheese.Latimer, Pg. 155 Enemy documents, captured during and after the battle of El Alamein, showed that ''Cascade'' was a success. An analysis by 'A' force, published on 19 November 1942, showed that enemy intelligence overestimated the armoured strength of the British forces by 40%, and infantry strength by 45%.Howard, pg. 44

Influence

Operation Cascade gave the

Allies An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not an explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are calle ...

valuable experience in planning deception operations, which was later used to good effect in the deception operations covering the invasion of Europe ( D-Day landings in Normandy, and the invasion of Southern France). The British forces built up during Operation Cascade were later used in Operation Zeppelin to tie down

Axis forces The Axis powers, originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis and also Rome–Berlin–Tokyo Axis, was the military coalition which initiated World War II and fought against the Allies of World War II, Allies. Its principal members were Nazi Ge ...

in the

Balkans The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...

and

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

, and deter the Axis from using these forces against the

Allied invasion of Sicily The Allied invasion of Sicily, also known as the Battle of Sicily and Operation Husky, was a major campaign of World War II in which the Allies of World War II, Allied forces invaded the island of Sicily in July 1943 and took it from the Axis p ...

, (

Operation Husky Operation or Operations may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * ''Operation'' (game), a battery-operated board game that challenges dexterity * Operation (music), a term used in musical set theory * ''Operations'' (magazine), Multi-Man ...

).Crowdy, pg 281 In 1944, the actual Allied strength in the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...

totalled about 52 divisions; Axis intelligence accepted a strength of about 70 divisions in the theatre.Howard, pg 137

Implementation

Influence

See also

Notes

Further reading