The logic of his later career in fashion and his wartime service in deception share a common root: both are fundamentally about the management of visual appearance to create a desired impression in an observer. The fashion designer manages clothing and styling to create an impression of elegance, authority, or identity. The deception specialist manages vehicles and equipment to create an impression of military presence and capability. The specific domains are entirely different, but the underlying perceptual logic is the same.
Blass never made much of this connection publicly, as far as the available record shows. His wartime service was classified for most of his professional career, and by the time it could be discussed, he was established enough that it was a biographical curiosity rather than a career-shaping revelation.
## Lessons Not Learned Publicly
The classification of the 23rd’s work for half a century had a specific consequence that is worth noting directly: the lessons of the Ghost Army were not available for the kind of open professional learning that most military history generates.
Military histories written in the postwar decades, including the official Army histories of the European theater, could not fully describe the 23rd’s operations. The histories were written by professionals with access to classified material, and they were written carefully to avoid revealing what was classified. The result was that the public historical record of the European campaign in World War II had a gap in it — not just for general readers, but for the broader community of historians and analysts who study military operations to draw lessons.