'Ghost Army' soldiers awarded Congressional Gold Medal for little-known heroism in WWII

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The group tricked the Third Reich with deceptive battlefield tactics.

Ghost Army members John Christman, of Leesburg, N.J., second from left standing, Seymour Nussenbaum, of Monroe Township, N.J, in wheelchair at left, and Bernard Bluestein, of Hoffman Estates, Ill., in wheelchair at right, join military and congressional officials as members of their secretive WWII-era unit are presented with the Congressional Gold Medal during a ceremony on Capitol Hill, March 21, 2024.

"The soldiers included technicians and artists from around the country and they used their talents to deceive and divert the Nazis," Speaker Mike Johnson said during the event Thursday. "Some of them paid the ultimate price, but because of the courageous work of this group, it is estimated that 15,000 to 30,000 lives were saved."

"No soldier who served in this unit considers himself a hero. I have talked to many veterans of the Ghost Army and each told me that the real heroes were the infantrymen and the tankers who bore the brunt of the frightening," Beyer said. "But it has always struck me that the Ghost Army's deception mission demanded a special kind of courage: to protect strength when you have none, to purposely draw any fire to keep it from falling on others.

"Even though technology has changed quite a bit since 1944, our modern techniques build on a lot of what the Ghost Army did and we are still learning from your legacy," she said. "Our experience observing the war in Ukraine has shown us that even with an increasingly transparent battlefield, military deception can still have a significant impact on military operations."

 

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