Cool photos M! I guess there were an awful lot of "mock ups" including weaponry. This would continue even through the Carolina Maneuvers - the objective of which was to simulate real war as closely as possible, to test & train in near battle conditions, and "weld all US Army services into a unified whole".
An engineer with the Army Ordnance Dept - Capt Lincoln Christenson's mission was to "gather specific information for his superiors related to ordnance equipment effectivesness & reliability" reported that much of what he witnessed - tactical blunders, inexperienced leadership, severe shortage of weapons & equipment, and deficiencies of armored vehicles & weapons - "convinced him of the nation's inpreparedness". (and this just before Pearl Harbor!)
Christenson reported: "sticks in the hands of troops often served as rifles, stove pipes as mortars, wooden cannons on tanks, and trucks sometimse masqueraded as tanks."
He says: Occasionally, a soldier would jump out of the bushes, pointing a broomstick rifle at an opposing soldier and shout "Bang! You're dead!".
He related a humorous incident at a ceremony honoring the govenors of North & South Carolina in which the Army was suppossed to fire a 19 gun salute using "a motley collection of cannons - some of which dated back to the Civil War." When the officer in charge gave the order to load & fire, "the first cannon went off producing a veranda shaking roar. Each successive shot was less impressive, "the very last cannon released a feeble pop - about as loud as the sound of a tire blowout - which brought smiles and a few snickers to the less controlled onlookers".