Colonel Arthur L. Conger of the American Expeditionary Force shut himself inside his hotel room. Carefully placing a fresh carbon between two sheets of paper, the colonel began typing a description of a planned major U.S. offensive through the Belfort Gap and toward the Black Forest in Germany. Finishing the document, Conger examined the carbon. Held to the light, it would be legible. He then lightly crumpled the telltale sheet and put it in the wastebasket. Folding the original and the copy, he placed both inside his tunic and then went outside for a stroll around the hotel grounds. After returning sometime later, Conger was satisfied to note that the carbon had been removed from the wastebasket. It was August 30, 1918, in Belfort, France, a small town near the German border.

The Belfort region had been a quiet zone since the initial bloody battles of 1914-15 and was one of the few places where the French had driven the Germans back on their own soil. That happened in the first few weeks of the war, and the Germans had not responded in any significant way. The attention of the German high command was fixed on more decisive terrain farther to the north and west: Verdun, the Somme, and Flanders. In the spring of 1918, General Erich Ludendorff launched a massive effort to break the Allies. His attacking units were hurled at French and British lines in five separate offensives. The Allies were knocked back, but with the increasing support of fresh American units, they successfully stemmed the tide. Now, late in the summer, it was the Allies’ turn. The British, French, Belgians, and Americans were to begin their own offensives. They would make two major thrusts: one led by British Expeditionary Force (BEF) commander Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig in the north; the other led by American Expeditionary Force (AEF) commander General John J. Pershing in the south. Neither would be anywhere near Belfort. Conger, however, was hoping Ludendorff could be led to believe that Belfort was the launch point for Pershing’s offensive. He was attempting to divert the German commander’s attention from Pershing’s actual plan, an attack against the St. Mihiel salient.

Colonel Conger was arguably well suited to work in the esoteric realm of deception. He had been educated in classical languages, Eastern religions, and music and graduated from Harvard in ‘94. Commissioned after service in the Spanish-American War, Conger stayed on in the Philippines as a scout platoon leader. The young officer was then assigned as an instructor at Fort Leavenworth and later sent abroad to study under the noted historian Hans Delbruck in Berlin. Conger had translated a number of German military works and was selected as an intelligence officer for Pershing’s headquarters when the U.S. Army established itself in France. At the time of his visit to Belfort, he was an order-of-battle officer whose prime duty was to keep track of German units. Whatever his possible qualifications for the deception assignment, Conger may not have relished the job or even favored this particular scheme, and it was not his idea.

The event, later referred to as the ‘Belfort Ruse, stemmed from a suggestion of General Henri Philippe Pétain, commander of the French armies. Pétain’s staff officers had become alarmed at the lack of security associated with the forthcoming American offensive against St. Mihiel, the first large operation under U.S. command. The Frenchmen had informed an American liaison officer at Pétain’s headquarters on August 17 that Pershing’s plans were common knowledge in Paris. The U.S. offensive was scheduled for September 9, and French troops were involved. Something had to be done.

When Pétain became aware of the breach of security, he penned a personal letter to Pershing suggesting that action be taken to mislead the Germans as to the actual American target and offering French assistance. The AEF commander took Pétain’s suggestion seriously and replied on August 23 that he regretted any indiscretions and agreed that measures should be taken to throw the Germans off the scent. He went on to accept Pétain’s offer of assistance, indicate a deception plan would be in the offing, and state that the scheme would be coordinated with the French.

The fact that John J. Pershing was intimating a request for French assistance should have come as no surprise to the hero of Verdun, General Pétain. True, the United States had extended the hand of support to the Allies in 1917, but to the hard-pressed French and British, the palm of the American hand always seemed to be up. The AEF had little artillery, practically no aircraft, few machine guns, and a severe shortage of means of transport. Pershing did have manpower, and for that the Allies were thankful. As long as Pershing allowed his units to be dispersed among the French and British, the Americans could be supported with minimal stress on the Allied logistical system. After all, both the French and British were short of infantry. The problem came when the Americans insisted on their own sector of the front and their own offensive operations. That meant Allied units had to be moved out and American troops moved in. It also meant that Allied artillery, aircraft, trucks, and tanks had to allocated to support the AEF. All of this required detailed coordination, and that, in turn, meant that many people had to know the plan. Thus it was not surprising that there had been a lot of talk. The American demands created an inherent security risk, and it could be assumed that the Germans would find out about it.

The St. Mihiel offensive had been agreed upon during a conference of the Allied military leaders in late July. To the Allies, particularly the French, the German-held St. Mihiel salient was a thorn in their side. The protrusion in the line threatened French communications from west to east along the rail line between Paris and Nancy. Additionally, there was some risk for any Allied offensive in the Meuse-Argonne region, just to the west of the St. Mihiel salient. The farther an Allied advance progressed, the more they would expose their rear to German troops poised in the bulge. To the Germans, the salient had been an important piece of real estate in 1915-17. It was far enough south so that it protected the strategic rail junction of Metz. It also provided a forward defensive zone that shielded the German-held Briey iron and coal region, and the French had been unsuccessful in repeated attempts to win it back. Finally, the German high command had considered the St. Mihiel region as a possible postern gate for a sortie should Ludendorff decide on another offensive in the West.

All told, the St. Mihiel salient appeared to be important enough to justify a major Allied attack, but some speculated there was another aspect to the offensive. Considerable doubt as to the proficiency of the Americans existed among the higher circles of the British and French commands. Some Anglo-French officers believed that the Americans were unsophisticated neophytes in the arena of modern European-style warfare. Pershing and the AEF staff were closely watched by their allies. American soldiers had performed well under French and British command, but U.S. officers, particularly the older ones, did not always evidence professional qualifications. The Americans sensed this attitude on the part of their allies, and AEF officers were imbued with a desire to do well in the first significant American-led offensive on the Western Front. If the Germans were forewarned of the American attack, things could go badly and the French and British might well have their suspicions confirmed. Because the attack on the St. Mihiel salient was so important, it was vital to confuse, mislead, and deceive the Germans up to the actual attack hour. Doing so would be difficult since the replacement of French troops in the sector with Americans involved the movement of six hundred thousand soldiers.

Pétain made good on his offer, and Pershing received French assistance for the deception operation. Conger’s bogus order, for instance, was probably compromised in a hotel where the French knew that a German agent was on the staff. But the main effort to deceive Ludendorff’s intelligence officers had to be made by the Americans. Soon after Pershing had communicated with Pétain, the American commander called in two of his staff officers, Maj. Gen. James W. McAndrew, his chief of staff, and Colonel Conger of the intelligence staff, and outlined his plan. The idea was to fasten the Germans’ attention on a possible American offensive through the Belfort Gap, which separated the Vosges and Jura Mountains and would be about 125 miles southeast of the actual attack near St. Mihiel. Easily identifiable American reconnaissance activity and perhaps troop movements in the Belfort region would be necessary. The French proceeded to spread rumors that the Americans were planning an attack from Belfort toward the German town of Mulhausen, just west of the Black Forest. Only four American officers were to know of the ruse: Pershing, McAndrew, Conger, and the AEF chief of operations, Brig. Gen. Fox Conner.

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