UK to use invisible tanks by 2012

London, Nov 3: Britain"s Ministry of Defence has said that secret trials of an invisble tank have passed off successfully, and predicted that it would be ready for service by 2012.

According to The Herald Sun, the new technology uses cameras and projectors to beam images of the surrounding landscape onto a tank. The result is that anyone looking in the direction of the vehicle only sees what is beyond it and not the tank itself.

A soldier who was at the trials said, "This technology is incredible. If I hadn't been present I wouldn't have believed it. I looked across the fields and just saw grass and trees - but in reality I was staring down the barrel of a tank gun."

How the technology works in combat is very sensitive, but the Defence Ministry is believed to be also testing a military jacket that works on the same principles.

It is the type of innovation normally associated with James Bond.

The brains behind the technology, Professor Sir John Pendry, said the next step was to make a tank invisible without the cameras and projectors.

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