THE CHINA MAIL, JUNE 5, 1937.
Not A Shot Has Been Fired. Not A Man Has Been Killed. But Unless The Tower Of Babel Is Silenced
HITLER
hate.
This
Means
TLER, Franco, Mussolini and... It is, in fact, a war of propa and
Blum sing their hymns of im-propaganda.
Mr. Eden rushes to Geneva, trying to put a spot of salt on the tail of that elusive Dove of Peace.
I was at Croydon airport when he left for the Continent recently, There was a smile of confidence on
his face.
ན་
But that night, as I turned the dials of my radio, I wondered if that confidence wasn't misplaced.
Unfortunately there is war already in the ether. It is a rival war waged by giant rival radio
powers of Europe.
1
Here are the facts:
For the past four weeks I have,
cer from the Soviet
War!
Because Franco is not satisfied
She is often used on news bulletin with the way he is putting out propaganda to England because, you propaganda over the radio he ran a see, she went to school in the Isle "pirate" station.
of Wight, and knows how to talk to the old college chums!
"Achtung, 'Achtung, Hier spricht Moscow," says the German, announ- three nights a week. The giant voice and identified it as Florence on 401 headquarters I heard this five nights running,
drowns the chain of twelve pro- metres. It would appear that Mus- twenty-four hours a day. paganda stations which Hitler runs solini's radio is being lent to aid the
Zeesen, Franco cause.
nineteen miles south-east of Berlin, is the Nazi radio centre.
Is the B.B.C. doing anything about it? Ask Lady Bridgeman, a B.B.C. Governor, who committed Milan (368 metres) is another herself to saying: "The Foreign Italian station which spends more Office, is anxiously discussing whe- My radio log book shows that than three-quarters of its program- ther the B.B.C. should broadcast in from the Zeesen stations Nazí pro me the broadcasting in Spanish and foreign tongues."
:
By Kenneth Ullyett
paganda is put into sixteen hours English, telling the word how grand out of the twenty-four. They im- is Spain under Franco's regime.” pinge on the B.B.C.'s transmissions to the Empire.
Radio listeners in the "far-flung Dominions" those "mad dogs and
Women are partly to blame 'for' this radio war.
Nothing happens. Down at the lonely village of Tatsfield the B.B.C. has a world-wide set of receivers. Every propaganda broadcast, every jamming of B.B.C. or. political stations is checked, entered in a log book and sent up to Broadcasting House. So far Whitehall has not asked for the B.B.C.'s help.
They don't think radio propaganda matters.
But listen to this.
The B.B.C.'s slogan used to be:
Russian and Italian stations use Englishmen who go out in the mid- women announcers -to cajole the on an all-wave set, been keeping a
đày: sun,” come back to their radios world into listening. radio watch on Spain, Italy, Ger- at eventide to listen to Big Ben and many and Russia-the chief com- Bach via the B.B.C. Empire stations; Pretty Jelena Bilbija used to do "Nation Shall Speak Peace Unto batants. You have only to twist the or to German folk songs, Nazi news the children's hour Belgrade. Nation." It even appeared under the dial of your own radio almost any bulletins, "Hitler Youth Calling," Now she's Chief Announcer too, and headline of their official journal. evening to Rome, Berlin, Hamburg, and reams more propaganda stuff so-called "news bulletins," suitably attractively presented from Zeesen. distorted in facts, drop from her
Bologna or one of the six broad casters in Moscow:
war in full cry.
You'll hear the
at
ruby lips!
Blonde Gitta Natter is a useful For eight whole evenings the Hit-propaganda girl at Budapest. She From Rome, only two days ago: ler war-cry stations were hard at can face the microphone in English, "Bilbao has fallen. The victorious it telling the Dominions how lucky German, French and Hungarian.
Fascist army sweeps on.”
From Seville: "Members of
are the Colonies under German rule!. Night and day propaganda is kept the up to tell Africa, New Zealand and
British House of Commons talked even South America how Germany's
like a lot of offended virgins discussing the bombing of nica."
Cologne was broadcasting fascist propaganda,
when
colonial administration has been when
praised by such eminent. men Guer- Cecil Rhodes and Roosevelt.
as
The radio announcers forget to subtle say that this was before Hitler was
born. But
radio propaganda down
never stops for the truth.
swept the 550 kilowatt broadcaster of Moscow and "jammed" the speech.
The B.B.C. loses hands down on this great propaganda racket. While staid, Oxford-trained Portland-place
I shifted down the wavelengths to announcers address the Empire with
1 RO, Rome's international short- dignity, German crack- microphon wave station.
an-
The' crisp voice of a woman nouncer was rattling the war sabres
men, in fluent English, sa listeners all. Here is the me of your own choice.
They put the friendly touch into broadcasts to solitary bush dwellers Australia. The broadcasts from
and telling sheer lies about Britain's German stations, in English, to the foreign policy. This station is Pacific zone are couched in friendly heard by over 8,000,000 short-wave "Tans” in America.
are
with dance music to listen
slang Dominions listeners
to subtle Nazi propaganda.
Radio has tightened the tension. The queerest radio stories I have of neighbouring nations. The B.B.C. heard during last month were from is lucky to get through the maels Spain. Broadcasters in the but- trom of the ether. German stations cher's yard have been going all out to tell the world their side of the as London Re- of the same power; a
story. gionals or any of the B.B.C. Na
tionals
and Russian stations of five
The Government's radio stations
times the power, can be switched are better heard in Europe than are
over at once to “jam” a tran sion or put over propaganda.
Franco's. The hour-by-hour bulle- ting on Potato fones's escapade bor- dered on the ridiculous,
A few months ago they scrapped that slogan and substituted a Latin one--Quaecunque.
So even the B.B.C. knows that na- tion does not speak peace unto na- tion any more.
Cook
by
Gas