Voices In The Darkness - Pasta blanda

DARKNESS The Story of the European Radio War BY E. TANGYE LEAN LONDON SECKER AND WARBURG FOREWORD THIS is not a guidebook, handbook or Official History of the War. I have been too much involved in it to be impartial. I wanted as far as possible to write only of what I had heard with my own ears, choosing Germanys offensive against France instead of her attack on Jugoslavia, reporting speakers on whom I had my own notes, and where my languages gave out and my ignorance of different audiences set in, it did not worry me that the treatment became sketchy. The German Radio stood no chance of a fair hearing from me who listened to it as a counsel for the prosecution, and the news-service from London, which made up nine-tenths of the B. B. C. output, is represented only by a few inadequate paragraphs. News loses most of its interest a few hours after its birth, but all good radio tends to make less good reading, and the best propa ganda is sometimes boring after six months. I have tried to save the reader the boredom and monotony which are part of the propaganda war. I did not want to sacrifice a script by Thomas Matin for the sake of one of the more numerous and representative, but less memorable talks by, say, Tangye Leah. Other details which are subjective or inaccurate include my views on various speakers, the inadequate attention to Moscow and the sketches of exiled announcers, which had to be scrambled for obvious reasons. I have to thank Mr. Kurt Hubschmantt, of Picture Post, for the unofficial photographs taken in the B. B. C Mr. Bernard King, of . the News Chronicle, for arranging them Mr. Arthur Fhdps, who drew the maps, and Mrs. R. A. Martin for compiling the index. I have had theinvaluable help of Mr. Weidenfeld, co-author of The Goebbeh Experiment, and without his erudition I should have had to leave bigger gaps in the story. E. T. L. November 1942 CONTENTS PAQ1 THE OPINING SOUNDS 7 THE WAR IN GERMAN 25 The Battlefields 25 The German Machine 27 Studio 5 37 The Front Line 47 Radio Criminals 51 How to Speak to Germany 64 Dawn Culture and Revolvers 68 Army, Navy and Workers 79 Comments and Commentators 86 THE RADIO MAP 91 THE WAR IN FRENCH 104 Ferdonnet and the French Collapse 104 Political Warfare Documentary in Sieburg and the French Recovery 142 TECHNICALITIES 171 Jamming 171 The Mote and the Beam 176 Ears to the Sky 180 Ears to the Ground 183 EUROPE UNDER THE RAUBORDNUNG 187 Colonel Britton in English 189 Colonel Stevens in Italian 193 THB FULLY OCCUPIED 200 I. The Western Seaboard 203 n. Towards the Soviet Union 206 ni. Russian Steamroller 211 tv. The Preoccupied 2x8 COMMENTS, CRITICISMS, CONCLUSIONS 224 APPENDIX I . . . ., . . . . 239 APPENDIX II ........ 240 241 MAPS GERMAN OFFENSIVE IN 1941 90 THE ATTACK IN FRENCH iio B. B. C. OFFENSIVE EVE OF 1943 186 THE LISTENERS 219 ILLUSTRATIONS With due acknowledgment to Copyright holders FACIKO VAOB THE FRONT LINE. B. B. C. Frontispiece OLD JITTBRFOOT TUNES IN TO LONDON. ..... 56 DIFFERENT GERMANYS Thomas Mann. Paul Popper ...... 80 Friedrich Siebuig. Jonathan Cape, Ltd. .... 80 GERMAN STUDIO IN THE B. B. C Author ..... 8z B. B. C. EUROPEAN CONFERENCE N. F. Newsome Director and his Editors. Author . . 96 CENTRAL NEWS DESK OF THE B. B. C. EUROPEAN SERVICE. Author . 97 OUTSIDE BRUSSELS TOWN HALL, May 1940 . . . . .128 GERMAN ARMS-WORKER LISTENS TO THE ATTACK ON FRANCE . . 129 DEMONSTRATION ORGANIZED BY DB GAULLE FROMLONDON, LYONS, July 14, 1942 144 GERMAN PROPAGANDA AGAINST FRENCH SPEAKERS IN LONDON . . 145 SHORT-WAVE AERIALS. B. B. C. . . . . . .176 MONITORS AT WORK. Weekly Illustrated ..... 177 LONDON CALLING EUROPE ON THE AIR. Author . . .192 COLONEL STEVENS AS THE ITALIANS SEE HIM AND IN REALITY. Author . 193 EUROPES ELDER SPOKESMEN. B. B. C. 208 EDITORS OFFICE IN LONDON BEFORE THE PROGRAMME m CZECH...