The Radio Front

The BBC and the Propaganda War 1939-45

Ron Bateman

• Verlag: The History Press
• Jahr: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781803990804
• Thema: Politica e relazioni internazionali
• Thema: Propaganda politica

Within seventeen years of the first public broadcast in Britain, the nation again found itself at war. As the Second World War progressed, the BBC eventually realised the potential benefits of public radio and the service became vital in keeping an anxious public informed, upbeat and entertained behind the curtains of millions of blacked-out homes.
The Radio Front examines just how the BBC reinvented itself and delivered its carefully controlled propaganda to listeners in the UK and throughout Nazi-occupied Europe. It also reveals the BBC's often-strained relationships with the government, military and public as the organisation sought to influence opinion and safeguard public morale without damaging its growing reputation for objectivity and veracity.Using original source material, historian and author Ron Bateman tracks the BBC's growth during the Second World War from its unorganised and humble beginnings to the development of a huge overseas and European operation, and also evaluates the importance of iconic broadcasts from the likes of J.B. Priestley, Vera Lynn and Tommy Handley.

WHEN RADIO CAME OF AGE

The first official public broadcast that Dione describes in her remarkable introduction was transmitted at a time when barely one in 1,200 people in Britain possessed a radio licence. Year-on-year radio ownership continued to rise and by September 1939 almost three-quarters of UK households possessed a set, with most of the remainder having access to one. For the first time in British history, virtually the entire population, including British subjects in the dominions, could experience the same event simultaneously. Not only was the BBC able to bring major sporting events to the listening public, it was able to bring royalty to the people and take the people to royal occasions. The coronation of George VI in May 1937 was broadcast to a potential audience of over 2 billion people.¹

The level of coverage that the BBC had achieved by the late 1930s was a timely milestone, for it was at this point that the radio became the medium by which people in Britain, and British subjects scattered throughout the many regions of the British Empire, would learn that they were again at war. The BBC later reflected with a measure of pride that, on 3 September 1939, those in Singapore could hear that the British Government’s ultimatum to Hitler had expired at the same time as those in London.² Thereafter began the first war in which radio would play a significant role, in more ways than anyone could possibly have imagined of a medium not too distant from its infancy. As the war progressed, the BBC evolved rapidly from being a predominantly home organisation to a predominantly overseas organisation; at its twenty-first birthday celebrations in 1943, it was widely acknowledged that the BBC effectively came of age at a time when its purpose was primarily devoted to war.

Throughout the century of broadcasting that this and other books will seek to commemorate, the BBC has generally endeavoured to be truthful, objective and tread the fine line of impartiality, alongside its stated purpose to inform, educate and entertain. Such standards were considered sacred when the BBC transitioned from a private company into a public service corporation on 1 January 1927. When the first director general, John Reith, had applied to become head of the fledgling company in 1922, he had very little idea what broadcasting was, nor any awareness of the potential power within the medium of radio. Reith successfully negotiated a significant measure of independence for the BBC – a hard-won argument that held firm until the General Strike of 1926, when he was strong-armed by Whitehall into denying striking workers and their unions a voice over the airwaves. The broadcasting company was the sole conduit of news, and was told to dispel rumours, doubt and uncertainty, and to boost morale whenever possible, inviting accusations from opposition MPs and unions that it was effectively influencing public opinion.

Reith had reservations about the corporation being used as a mouthpiece of government, but knew only too well that Whitehall had the legal right to commandeer the BBC any time it chose, and to broadcast whatever message it wanted. The Trade Union Congress was also sufficiently aware of the fragility of the BBC’s limited independence, and warned its striking members that the corporation was ‘just another tool in the hands of the Government’. Despite an insistence from Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin that the corporation had not been coerced into compliance, and that ‘the power of broadcasting had triumphantly showed itself in a searching test’, the BBC was rapidly becoming viewed as an instrument of political power.³ The corporation was savagely criticised by opposition MPs in the aftermath of the strike, including Labour leader Ramsay MacDonald, who had made repeated requests to broadcast a speech, only to be rebuffed on each occasion. The mantle of impartiality slipped again in 1931 over accusations of political bias following coverage of the general election. This time a grossly unfair imbalance of broadcasting time allotted to each of the main parties enabled a coalition government dominated by Tories to achieve a landslide victory – described by Labour leader Clement Attlee as ‘the most unscrupulous in my recollection’.^* Propaganda might have been a dirty word at the time, yet there were people who knew how to exploit the potential of broadcasting, without recourse to the murky world of lies and deception.

When Reith resigned from the BBC in June 1938, it was acknowledged that he had given the corporation integrity; people still talk of ‘Reithian principles’, and staff at Broadcasting House often joke that ‘his ghost still stalks the corridors’. As director general, Reith never sat down on the job; he always stood and had an especially tall ‘desk’ made for this purpose. Hence, his subsequent replacement, Sir Frederick Ogilvie, cannot literally be said to have taken over Reith’s seat; however, the hot seat was about to get considerably hotter. In September 1939 the BBC was placed on a ‘war footing’ and, despite retaining its freedom to create and schedule programmes, it was required to seek advice from all manner of external government bodies. Even though censorship of programmes would still be carried out at source, the BBC’s new Home Service would be monitored under the watchful eye of the Ministry of Information (MOI), and its news bulletins by an independent Press and Censorship Bureau. The corporation would also be required to support the government as an instrument of both domestic and overseas propaganda. This would require European and Overseas Service editors to engage with other more secretive bodies dedicated to enemy-directed propaganda, beginning with the Department of Propaganda into Enemy and Enemy-Occupied Countries, split between Electra House (Department EH) and Woburn Abbey, and then in August 1941 by the Political Warfare Executive (PWE). On top of this, with the constant threat of air raids and lack of available space, the corporation would become fragmented, with departments scattered among different regions of the country.

Regrettably, the new director general had little interest in propaganda, and was indifferent to its potential usefulness as a weapon of war. Shortly after taking up his position, Ogilvie informed the assistant director of programme planning, Harman Grisewood, that he believed the Germans to be ‘a very sentimental people’ and that the best thing we could do was to treat them to a rendition of Beatrice Harrison playing her cello to the sound of a singing nightingale.^* Fortunately, as recruitment intensified at the corporation in response to the demands of war, the BBC was able to utilise the exceptional talents of people who recognised the potential of radio to become a valuable instrument of national and international propaganda. Here was a medium able to reach large numbers of people simultaneously, both at home and across international borders, virtually uncontrolled. In contrast to the written word, the direct and personal approach associated with broadcasting could more effectively appeal to the emotions of the listener. The ability of radio to infiltrate enemy-held territory and to transcend the borders of vulnerable nations extended the reach of international propaganda significantly in the 1930s, enabling governments to disseminate their views to overseas audiences directly. Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini all recognised the propaganda potential of radio, and made massive use of it in influencing both home audiences and populations abroad by establishing foreign-language programmes. These were typically aimed at showcasing the supremacy of their ideologies over western democracy.^**

In contrast, successive interwar British governments remained sceptical or suspicious about the use of radio propaganda, and only later when the realisation set in that everything that was said across the airwaves had the potential to either damage morale or undermine military forces did the issue of censoring broadcasts appear on the political agenda. Among a small minority of backbench dissenters was Winston Churchill, who initially believed in the propaganda potential of radio and wanted the government to take over the BBC before Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin blocked all attempts to strip the corporation of its independence. As things stood, few in government realised that the comparatively liberal radio laws that the Baldwin Government initiated had rendered Britain particularly vulnerable to psychological warfare. As early as December 1930, workers in Britain were targeted by an appeal broadcast in English from Moscow with the aim of inciting British workers to revolt against their leaders.^4* This was an early warning for a government committed to supporting the BBC’s independent status.

Baldwin eventually came around to the view that ‘in wartime, propaganda was a necessary evil and must be taken seriously’ – a view not shared by everyone in Parliament. ‘Propaganda’ was still a deeply disparaged concept meaning lies, exaggeration, thought manipulation: all things that were considered to be ‘the stuff of totalitarian regimes’ and not something that British broadcasting should seek to emulate. ‘Britons do not want to be told what to think or feel, or to become that mutton-headed herd of sheep that Hitler believes the German nation has always been, and always will be,’ complained Harold Nicolson at the MOI. ‘Whereas the totalitarian method is essentially a short-term smash-and-grab raid upon the emotions of the uneducated, the democratic method should be long term, seeking gradually to fortify the intelligence of the individual.’⁵

As late as 1944, the BBC still referred to such practices as ‘publicity’ rather than stoop to using the ‘awful word’ that the British Government had tried to ban from diplomatic vocabulary when the original MOI was disbanded after the First World War.⁶ Such an attitude resulted in Britain significantly lagging behind her potential enemy on the eve of war, with Germany broadcasting thirty-six foreign-language programmes compared with Britain’s ten.⁷

Such an attitude illustrates the striking difference between how propaganda was being viewed by different systems of government during the interwar period. Countries already employing propaganda as a weapon of state, such as Germany and the Soviet Union, had adopted it as a tool for the exclusive use of a single political party. In democracies that typically contained two political parties with a degree of mutual respect for one another, this couldn’t ordinarily happen, for to violently attack the other’s propaganda would be viewed as a slight on the true spirit of democracy. Initially there were concerns about the tone of political propaganda in wartime Britain, especially so when the Tory peer Lord Macmillan was named as the new Minister of Information, leading Labour leader Clement Attlee to suspect that the new MOI was ‘just another arm of the Conservative propaganda machine’.^8* Attlee need not have concerned himself while Chamberlain held the reins of government, for even as late as January 1940, Macmillan’s successor, the former BBC Director General John Reith, was still seeking to understand what the Chamberlain War Cabinet regarded as being ‘the principles and objectives of wartime propaganda’.⁹

Meanwhile, by February 1939 members on both sides of the House had taken note of the considerable activity on the part of various foreign governments in the field of radio propaganda. Ministers were urged ‘to pay more attention to publicity, and to render moral and financial support to schemes which will make certain of the effective presentation of British news abroad’. By 1939, the total government expenditure on news services and publicity for foreign consumption was less than £500,000 – a fantastically small amount of money to be spent on something that could be of immeasurable importance, according to one honorable member: ‘If done correctly far less money would need to be spent on destroyers and bombers.’^10**

In contemporary study, it has become commonplace to split propaganda activities into ‘white’ undisguised propaganda, where no attempt is made to deceive, and ‘black’ deceptive or covert propaganda. Grey propaganda typically leaves the recipient guessing the identity of the source. Because the BBC tried to stick rigidly to its principles of honesty and accuracy, its propaganda broadcasts typically remained within safe limits that rarely strayed into darker territory, as ‘black’ stations typically came under the control of Department EH and eventually the PWE. However, in the heat of conflict, the government had its own specific propaganda aims and endeavoured to shield the public from bad news by censoring the BBC, by providing false information, by obstructing reporters and by encouraging the ‘softening up’ of certain news items. This course of action might have occasionally been good for home front morale, but each time it happened it effectively handed the propaganda initiative to the enemy.^*

In the first instance, it was incumbent on the BBC to help the public bear the strain of war, both as an efficient means of disseminating vital information, and as an effective filter between the grim realities of war and the anxious listener. When disaster occurred, or when situations became particularly grave, Whitehall drip fed information to the BBC in a calculated manner, and exerted pressure on the corporation to compile its news bulletins in a manner least likely to damage public morale or create anxiety. Such an approach created friction between the BBC and government ministers, especially at times when huge numbers of people were tuning in to the German broadcasts. With a seemingly irresistible appeal, William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw) became Britain’s first radio personality, sending millions of listeners running to their radio sets at the first sound of ‘Germany calling’ direct from Hamburg. Despite government pressure, the BBC refused to dignify Haw-Haw’s propaganda by issuing rebuttals, believing it would undermine its reputation as a trusted news source.

By the time of Dunkirk, the BBC had searched in vain for its own radio personality in an effort to implore the listening public to stay tuned at a peak time. After trying several uninspiring presenters, they offered the chance to the popular novelist and playwright J.B. Priestley. Little did they know that once the Yorkshireman got into his straight-talking, common-sense stride, his broadcasts would provoke a controversy that brought the political impartiality of the corporation into disrepute. Despite the official censors’ reluctance to interfere, the MOI eventually slung him off the air, to the immense disappointment of his 11 million-plus listeners, who were probably still smarting the next time they visited the ballot box. Meanwhile, Britain had inadvertently discovered its most effective antidote to Haw-Haw in the person of the incoming Prime Minister Winston Churchill, whose speeches were arguably the greatest morale-boosting propaganda the BBC ever broadcast.

Another arm of the BBC’s home propaganda illustrates the ability of radio to raise morale through entertainment at a time of deep anguish – many listeners had either lost or been separated from loved ones, including their children. When the country found itself under serious threat of invasion, the radio became an effective counsellor and a steadying influence upon the listening public, who were facing the possibility of falling into the hands of the Nazis. The merits of the BBC’s wartime variety programming is an exhaustive subject that is often mired in sentimentality and nostalgia, with limited regard for either its propaganda value or the often punishing schedule to which top-line artistes adhered. Such nostalgic reflection often presents a past recreated for entertainment purposes free from the horror of war, and can easily result in a distorted or lopsided view of history. BBC Variety utilised its premier artists in an effort to achieve its morale-boosting poten...

Inhaltsverzeichnis

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword by Richard Blair
• Introduction – Memories of the Radio Front by Dione Venables
• 1. When Radio Came of Age
• 2. Radio Prepares for War
• 3. Not the War We Expected
• 4. Striking the Right Chord – Wartime News
• 5. Courting America with ‘the Murrow Boys’
• 6. Make the People Smile Again
• 7. Crossing the Propaganda Line
• 8. Talking to Europe
• 9. The Voice of Hope
• 10. Divided Nation – Reaching out to France
• 11. Broadcasting to the Enemy
• 12. Hearts and Minds – The Eastern Service
• Epilogue – The Invasion of Europe
• Notes
• Bibliography