The Real Cloaking Device

This is a Klingon Cloaking Device:



No really. If you look closely, you can see the name is printed right there on the side. It's basically a box full of pinball parts, and during the 1980s it was strapped onto A-7 Corsair II aircraft of the 4450th Tactical Group as a way to keep the F-117 Nighthawk a secret.

In brief, the pilots who flew the stealth fighter still needed to deploy, go through operations, etc., but they couldn't do it in the F-117, as that aircraft was still the Most Secretest Secret Ever at the time. So they deployed in A-7s, practicing the tactics they would use in various large scale exercises. To simulate the conditions under which they would operate in a war deployment, the A-7s were rigged with the "cloaking device" and all personnel at the airfields were told that it contained super-secret equipment. Anyone approaching the aircraft or "cloaking device" was subject to be stopped with deadly force.

It was an effective way of simulating the operational requirements of the F-117 while still keeping the plane itself secret. In that sense it really was a "cloaking device," in that it made the F-117 disappear in plain sight. Quite ingenious, actually.

Full story here.