Middle East Command Camouflage Directorate

Middle East Command Camouflage Directorate
"A marvellous system of camouflage": A Crusader tank in its 'Sunshield'
Active	1941–1943
Country	United Kingdom
Branch	Royal Engineers
Role	Military camouflage training & operations
Garrison/HQ	Helwan, Egypt
Nickname(s)	Camouflage
Engagements	Siege of Tobruk El Alamein
Commanders
Notable commanders	Geoffrey Barkas

The British Middle East Command Camouflage Directorate (also known as the Camouflage Unit or Camouflage Branch) organised major deception operations for Middle East Command in the Western Desert Campaign of the Second World War. It provided camouflage during the Siege of Tobruk; a dummy railhead at Misheifa, and the largest of all, Operation Bertram, the army-scale deception for the decisive battle of El Alamein in October 1942. The successful deception was praised publicly by Winston Churchill.

These operations contributed to victory by diverting enemy attention from real targets to dummy ones, wasting enemy ammunition, preserving vital resources such as the single water desalination plant at Tobruk, and deceiving the enemy as to allied strength and intentions. Operation Bertram may also have been the last ever army-scale physical deception, since subsequent major deceptions, including those for the D-Day landings in Normandy, have included electronic measures.

The unit was led by the film director Geoffrey Barkas, with a team of professional artists recruited as camouflage officers or "camoufleurs". The team included the artist Steven Sykes, the first Camouflage GSO2 in the British army.

The unit's leader, Geoffrey Barkas (1896–1979) served in the 1915 Gallipoli campaign and then in the later part of the Battle of the Somme in France, where he won a Military Cross. Between the wars, Barkas was a filmmaker, working as a writer, producer, and director. In 1937, Barkas joined Shell-Mex/BP under its publicity director Jack Beddington, who guided Barkas into military camouflage. In May 1940, he was rapidly drafted into the Royal Engineers by Beddington's brother Freddie, with a summary 10-day basic training course, followed by a camouflage course. He developed his thinking in Northern Ireland in 1940, teaching, running demonstrations, and writing an instructional pamphlet.