Methods of concealment and deception in hunting and in warfare has been practiced since antiquity. Camouflage has become a complex military tool that involves concealment and deception. We readily think of concealment as the merging of troops, weapons, and equipment. However, camouflage also evokes deception in which decoys are created to mislead an enemy as to intention, to give a false idea of strength, or to draw the enemy's attention from a real attack.

Pre-twentieth-century warfare involved camouflage. There is the famous Greek story of the Trojan horse. In 212 B.C., Greeks constructed a false beachfront with straw and supported by a light structure. When Roman forces assaulted the "beach," they floundered and were cut down by the defending Greeks. The Scottish King Robert I (1274-1329) had his troops dig hidden pits with which to trap English cavalry at the battle of Bannockburn in 1314. Dummy forts and artillery...