George Washington's Dirty Tricks: How the American Hero Fooled the British at Yorktown

Not all battles are won by superior firepower or numbers - sometimes stupid strategies win out over sheer force. Iain McGregor recounts five skirmishes in history when theft, misdirection and manipulation ensured victory.

In 217 BC, Hannibal completely trapped the Roman soldiers in Lake Trasimene.

On the morning of June 21, 217 BC, during the Second Punic War (218–201 BC), the Roman army of the consul Gaius Flaminius marched along the northern shore of Lake Trasimene in central Italy. They were approaching what appeared to be the camp of a retreating Carthaginian force led by Hannibal Barca, then about 30 years old and Rome's most dangerous enemy. The Romans believed that they were on the verge of a decisive battle. In fact, they walked into one of the largest ambushes in military history.

The crisis had begun the previous autumn, when Hannibal had achieved the seemingly impossible, crossing the Alps with his multinational army and war elephants, and then defeating the Roman forces at the Battle of Trebia in December 218 BC. Determined to restore Roman prestige, Flaminius pursued the Carthaginian forces south through Italy.

As Livy (Titus Livius) observed in his History of Rome, written two centuries later, Flaminius was "more concerned with victory than with prudence or the gods." Instead of avoiding war, he encouraged persecution, burning fields, destroying crops, and leaving a clear trail of destruction. Hannibal knew exactly the type of opponent he was facing: ambitious, aggressive, and desperate for victory.

Thus, in choosing the place for his inevitable conflict with the Romans, the Carthaginian general, as a Greek, "selected the ground with great skill," noted the scholar Polybius in his histories in the following century. A narrow road stretched north between the lake and the wooded hills. During the night, 40,000 to 50,000 of Hannibal's men hid on the heights while a smaller but visible force blocked the road ahead. When the Roman column, probably 25,000 to 30,000 strong, marched into the Carthaginian camp shortly after dawn, the trap was sprung.

Carthaginian infantry, desperate cavalry, Iberian warriors, and Gallic tribes attacked simultaneously from the front, flanks, and rear: as Livy described the attack, "the enemy appeared on all sides." Before many Romans even realized that the battle had begun, the units were isolated. Ancient sources state that 15,000 Romans—including Flaminius himself—were killed and thousands more captured. The battle lasted only a few hours.

Hannibal's victory at Trasimene was particularly remarkable in that the battle was virtually won before the first spear was thrown or sword drawn. By manipulating Roman expectations and turning the land into a weapon, he convinced his enemy to make a fatal assumption about how the conflict would unfold. Few commanders in history have clearly demonstrated that the most decisive battlefield can be the mind of the opponent.

Using diplomacy, deception, and a secret firearm, Byzantine forces broke the siege of Constantinople in 717-18 AD.

In August 717, one of the most ambitious military campaigns of the early medieval world was launched. The Umayyad Caliphate, a powerful Islamic empire stretching from Spain to Central Asia, sent a massive campaign to capture Constantinople (now Istanbul), the capital of the Byzantine Empire.

Muslima bin Abdul Malik, one of the most experienced commanders in the Arab world, led this attack. Many contemporary sources indicate that his army numbered over 100,000 men, supported by a fleet of 1,800 ships, although the exact figures are still disputed. The prize was great. Constantinople commanded the Bosphorus, controlled key trade routes between Europe and Asia, and was the political and spiritual heart of the Christian East.

The landscape of the city looked dark. Years of political instability had weakened the Byzantine Empire, and its new ruler, Leo III Izuri, had ascended the throne only a few months earlier. But Leo realized that direct military resistance would not be enough. Instead, he instructed Byzantine diplomats to quietly exploit the differences between the besiegers and their allies, while his intelligence networks monitored Arab movements and concealed their true resistance defenders. As one account notes, Leo had already shown his talent for deception: before becoming emperor, he had encouraged Arab hopes for cooperation in capturing the Byzantine capital—before turning the tables and seizing the throne for himself.

In addition to a knack for forgery, the Byzantines possessed one of the most carefully guarded weapons in history. Military Secrets: A mysterious incendiary compound known as "Greek fire," the exact composition of which is still unknown. This ship, which was propelled by pipes installed on warships, continued to burn even on water. The Arab sailors expected a conventional naval battle followed by a siege to weaken the siege of Constantinople. Instead, they caught their ships in flames. The physical damage was severe, but the psychological impact was arguably greater.

As fall turned to winter, the siege became a race of endurance. The invaders expected Constantinople to weaken. Instead, logistical problems, disease, and an extremely harsh winter devastated his forces. Reinforcements and supplies did not arrive in sufficient numbers, while Byzantine diplomacy convinced the Bulgars, led by Khan Troll, to attack the Arab forces operating around the city.

After a year of fighting, the siege collapsed in August 718. Thousands of besiegers had perished, much of the Umayyad fleet had been destroyed, and the surviving Muslim forces retreated. Constantinople had survived.

This victory preserved the Byzantine Empire for another seven centuries and halted the expansion of the caliphate in southeastern Europe. It also showed that deception, information and psychological warfare can be as decisive as powerful armies. By convincing a stronger enemy to misunderstand the city's strength and secret weapons, Leo III won one of the most important defensive victories in history.

In 1781, George Washington tricked enemy leaders into finding the wrong way to overrun the British stronghold of Yorktown.

By 1781, the American War of Independence had been going on for more than six years. Britain still had the most powerful navy in the world, controlled major coastal cities, and had approximately 30,000 troops in North America. Many British politicians believed that the rebellion could still be suppressed. Within months, however, a carefully orchestrated deception forced the entire British field army to surrender—effectively ending the war.

The key figures involved were General George Washington, commander of the Continental Army, and his French ally, General Jean-Baptiste Donatin de Vimore, Comte de Rocambo. During the summer of 1781, both men encountered General Sir Henry Clinton, the British Commander in Chief in North America, near New York City.

Everything indicated that New York would be the target of the next Allied attack. Troops moved, supplies piled up, and information leaks reinforced this impression. It was a bluff. As Washington reported, "If we do not deceive our men, we will never deceive the enemy."

Clinton saw what Washington wanted him to see. In fact, Allied commanders were secretly preparing to attack elsewhere. Their real objective was to defeat General Lord Charles Cornwallis, who had built a force of between 8,000 and 9,000 British and German troops at Yorktown, Virginia. Yorktown, on the York River that flows into the Chesapeake Bay, seemed safe as long as the Royal Navy maintained control of the coast. The entire Allied plan depended on preventing the British High Command from recognizing the danger until it was too late.

In August, with British attention focused on New York, Washington and Rocambo began moving more than 4,000 American troops and a similar number of French troops south. At the same time, the powerful French fleet under the command of Admiral François-Joseph Paul de Grasse headed for the Chesapeake. On September 5, de Grasse defeated a British relief fleet at the Battle of the Chesapeake, blocking Cornwallis' escape route and trapping his forces.

By the end of September, some 17,000 Franco-American troops besieged Yorktown. After a three-week siege, Cornwallis surrendered on October 19, 1781, surrendering more than 7,000 troops—one of the largest British surrenders of the 18th century. The next day, he wrote to Clinton: "I have the feeling to inform your Excellency that I am compelled to give up the posts at York and Gloucester, and surrender the forces under my command."

Yorktown was not merely a military victory, but a victory of deception. Through carefully managed information, strategic misdirection, and close Franco-American coordination, Washington convinced the British command to focus on the wrong battlefield at the decisive moment. Britain continued the war until the Treaty of Paris in 1783, but after Yorktown, the political will to continue the war virtually disappeared.

Defying offensive expectations, the German Kaiserschlacht managed to break the Allied lines on the Somme in 1918 - at least for a while.

In early 1918, Germany spied a slim chance to win the First World War. The collapse of Imperial Russia and the signing of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on March 3, 1918 allowed Germany to transfer about 50 divisions from the Eastern Front to the West. For the first time in years, the German high command believed it could achieve local supremacy. However, General Erich Ludendorff and Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg knew that this advantage would be short-lived.

Since the declaration of war against Germany on April 6, 1917, the United States had been steadily building up its presence in France, with about 10,000 American troops entering France daily by the spring of 1918. As Ludendorff put it: "We must attack at the first moment...before the Americans can throw strong forces into the scale. We must defeat the British."

The German strategy to achieve this goal was the Kaiserschlacht, a series of attacks designed to break the stalemate on the Western Front. The opening strike, Operation Michael, was launched at 4:40 a.m. on March 21, 1918, against the British Fifth Army along the Somme. Success depended on achieving something almost unheard of after years of trench warfare: complete tactical surprise.

From 1914, major attacks were usually followed by several days of artillery bombardment that advertised the attack long before it began. Ludendorff sought to subvert these expectations. Troops were secretly concentrated behind the front, wireless communications were limited, and dummy positions were used to conceal preparations. Most importantly, more than 6,600 German guns carried out a surprise bombardment designed to cripple enemy headquarters, artillery batteries, and communications, rather than simply destroying trenches. Behind the artillery, elite stormtrooper units were trained to penetrate weak points, bypass trenches, and penetrate deep into the Allied rear.

The effect was dramatic. Shrouded in thick morning fog, German forces broke through British positions and advanced further than any army on the Western Front since 1914. In some places, they were driven nearly 40 miles west, capturing tens of thousands of prisoners and threatening the vital railway center of Amiens. Allied commanders were shocked by the speed and scale of the attack.

However, surprise alone could not bring victory. German infantry overran their supply lines, communications broke down, and elite stormtrooper groups suffered heavy casualties. Although the attack gained considerable territory, it failed to destroy the British army, capture the English Channel ports, or divide the Allied coalition. By July 1918, Germany's final reserves were largely spent and Ludendorff was unable to withstand the onslaught of the Allies.

The Kaiserschlacht was ultimately defeated, but it was a turning point in military deception. Surprise was no longer a battlefield trick employed by a talented commander. It was an industrialized system that included information, communications, logistics, artillery science, and carefully coordinated operational planning. The offensive didn't win the war, but it showed how modern armies can manipulate enemy expectations on a massive scale.

Heavy artillery could not be mounted and fired on the jungle-covered hills above Dien Bien Phu—or so the French believed in 1954.

After almost seven years of war against the communist-led Viet Minh rebels in what is now Vietnam, France was struggling to maintain its colonial control over Indochina. After a decisive battle, French General Henri Navarre, appointed commander-in-chief in May 1953, confirmed the capture of Dien Bien Phu, a remote valley in northwestern Vietnam near the Laos border.

Launched under Operation Castor in November 1953, the plan seemed simple: establish a heavily fortified air-supplied base, then lure the Viet Minh into a conventional battle in which French artillery, armor, and air power could destroy them.

At first, everything went according to plan. The French garrison under the command of Colonel Christian de Castries eventually numbered about 16,000 soldiers, including French regulars, foreign legionnaires, Moroccan and Algerian units, and Vietnamese auxiliaries. The base was divided into strengths with female code names including Beatrice, Gabrielle, Anne Marie, Dominique and Isabelle. The French were sure that they had chosen the battlefield well.

However, General Võ Nguyên Giáp, the Viet Minh commander, had already begun to turn this assumption into a fatal weakness. His deception involved reinforcing French beliefs about what was and was not possible in the region. For example, French military planners thought that heavy artillery could not be deployed on the steep, forested hills surrounding the valley.

However, in late 1953 and early 1954, some 50,000 to 70,000 laborers and porters helped move Viet Minh artillery, ammunition, and supplies through the mountains and dense jungle. Many loads were carried by bicycle, handcart or pure muscle. The guns were dismantled, dragged uphill and hidden in fortified caves and camouflaged positions overlooking the valley.

The French knew that the Viet Minh had artillery. What they failed to understand was where Jiap intended to place it. Colonel Charles Pierrot confidently stated before the battle: "No Viet gun can fire three rounds before being destroyed by my artillery."

This illusion was shattered on March 13, 1954, when Viet Minh artillery suddenly opened fire. Within hours, Beatrice's outpost was overrun. French airfields were quickly rendered unusable, while anti-aircraft guns made air resupply increasingly dangerous. A castle designed to dominate the valley found itself trapped inside. As the siege continued, Giap used trench systems that moved closer and closer to the French positions, replicating World War I tactics.

After 56 days of fighting, on May 7, 1954, the French garrison fell. More than 10,000 French soldiers were captured and the total casualties on both sides were over 30,000. The defeat shocked France, precipitated negotiations at the Geneva Conference, and led to the partition of Vietnam at the 17th parallel later that year.