An interesting modern plan to play on Japanese folk superstitions about a legendary animal was devised by the US Office of Strategic Services (OSS, forerunner of the CIA) in 1943 during World War II. Code-named “Operation Fantasia” the plot called for destroying Japanese morale by sending eerie replicas of kitsune, fox-ghosts, to frighten soldiers and citizens. One idea was to spray live foxes with radium-containing glow-in-the-dark paint. In a test of the plan, thirty glowing foxes were released in a Washington, DC, park, which did indeed terrify passersby. Ultimately the plot proved
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