World War II: Axis Propaganda Reports by the U.S. Foreign Broadcast Intelligence Service (1942 – 44)

World War II: Axis Propaganda Reports by the U.S. Foreign Broadcast Intelligence Service (1942 – 44) 

1,125 pages of reports produced by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)'S Foreign Broadcast Intelligence Service, between April 4, 1942, and October 19, 1944, composed of 132 typed reports, bound into 4 volumes covering Axis propaganda broadcasts. These reports provide an in-depth narrative and technical assessment of Axis propaganda during this period.

In addition to reports above, this collection includes a 311-page CIA history written in 1969 and declassified in 2009, covering the Service from 1942 to 1947 and a 97-page handbook on German propaganda in occupied Europe.

Foreign Broadcast Monitoring Service (FBMS)

The Foreign Broadcast Monitoring Service (FBMS) was established as part of the FCC by a Presidential directive dated, February 26, 1941. The first mandate of the FBMS was to monitor, record, translate, transcribe, and analyze shortwave propaganda radio programs that were being beamed at the United States by the Axis powers. Later, the agency had its name changed to Federal Broadcast Intelligence Service.

Contents

The reports contain news and analysis of Axis propaganda. The reports also contain information that would be useful to Allied preparers of propaganda. Comparisons are made of British and Axis radio treatment of the same events. Predictions of German, Italian and Japanese military moves through the analysis of Axis radio broadcasts are provided. Accounts of exploitation by Axis forces of racial conflict in the United States are conveyed. 

The reports give line by line analysis of several speeches given by Hitler, Goebbels, Mussolini, Japanese Premiere Tojo, and other leaders. There are comparisons made between how the BBC and Axis radio portray speeches given by Prime Minister Winston Churchill.


Foreign Broadcast Information Service. History. Part I: 1941-1947 (1969)

A 311-page CIA report written by Joseph E. Roop, an editor at the FBIS from 1942 to 1964. It was declassified in 2009.

Civil Affairs Handbook, Germany, Section 2K: German Military Government Over Europe: Propaganda in Occupied Europe. (1944)

A 97-page manual produced by the United States Provost Marshal General's Bureau.

Abstract:  This Civil Affairs handbook details the issue of propaganda in Europe during the Second World War. Headings include principal German propaganda agencies operating abroad, propaganda in combat and communication zones, transition from propaganda in combat zones to propaganda in permanently occupied territories, countries under alliance administration, territories under military administration, territories under a Reich commissar, protectorate Bohemia-Moravia, occupied eastern territories and the government general, and the reversion from permanent to provisional propaganda organizations.