to the general public. That is why America obstinately goes on making shortwave broadcasts. And there must still be a great many short-wave receiving sets left in Japan." The representative of the External Affairs Section of the Home Ministry added: "When the Communications Ministry made its recent investigation, several hundreds of short-wave sets were found, and there may still be several thousands of sets that have not been discovered." The representative of the Japanese Board of Information contributed the following: "Propaganda never enters the country in such a form that you can say 'This is propaganda.' Take for example a newspaper article. A newspaper, whose mission is the reporting of news, cannot but print that 'Roosevelt has sent a message to Congress containing such and such points.' But suppose, for example, that Roosevelt said in the message 'America can build five merchant ships a day,' that naturally comes in. Now it is just that point that is propaganda. People begin to think, 'if America can build five merchant ships a day, it is terrible'." The CHAIRMAN. These are broadcasts in the Japanese language to Japan? Mr. DAVIS. There are some in English and some in Japanese. There are also many listeners elsewhere, especially in Shanghai, both among the Japanese and among Chinese, who collaborate with the Japanese. They are greatly given to playing the stock market, and they depend on us for news because they know that is true news and not the sort of thing they would get in a Japanese broadcast. Mr. TABER. Is your Wall Street Edition pretty good? Mr. DAVIS. I think so, for their purpose. The CHAIRMAN. What about Japanese propaganda and your measures counteracting it? Mr. LATTIMORE. Japanese propaganda is very active throughout the eastern area and throughout the islands. We have people with General Stilwell's Army working particularly on combatting propaganda. We have people in Australia taking propaganda into the islands with them. (Discussion off the record.) REQUESTS FOR ENLARGED PROGRAM FROM JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF AND STATE DEPARTMENT The CHAIRMAN. The enlargement of your program, I take it, has been based upon directives from the Joint Chiefs of Staff? Mr. DAVIS. Yes; and on specific requests from military commanders. The CHAIRMAN. Has it been approved by the Department of State? Mr. DAVIS. Yes, sir; in that connection, Mr. Chairman, I will offer a letter which has been received from the Secretary of State. The CHAIRMAN. You may read that letter and we will include it in the hearing. Mr. DAVIS. This is a letter received today from the Secretary of State: The Honorable ELMER DAVIS, Director, Office of War Information, Washington, D. C. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, MY DEAR MR. DAVIS: It is a pleasure to thank you for the valuable assistance which you and your collaborators in the Office of War Information have given the Department of State in recent months in paralleling closely in the field of propaganda the policies of the Government in the political field. I have particularly in mind the close collaboration of your Office with this Department in respect of several delicate and important international relationships which have required the most carefully integrated teamwork of the political and propaganda, not to mention the military arms. I have found that I could count on the support of your office both in Washington and through your outposts in the far-flung corners of the earth. I look forward to continuation of this cooperation to the end that together we can meet the efforts of the enemy to divide us from our associates in the war, to inflame the neutrals against us and thwart our efforts to maintain the good name of the United States among other peoples of the world. Sincerely yours, CORDELL HULL. DIRECTION OF PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE The CHAIRMAN. Are the plans for psychological warfare operations under the direction of the military in which you participate based upon plans and requests given to you by area commanders for the various theaters? Mr. DAVIS. Psychological warfare plans come under the general jurisdiction of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but the theater commander has a good deal of authority in the matter in his theater. RELATIONS WITH UNITED NATIONS RELIEF AND ADMINISTRATION REHABILITATION The CHAIRMAN. Have you any relations with U. N. R. R. A.? Mr. DAVIS. No; we have no direct relation with them at all that I know of. We loaned them one or two men to help give out information on their conference in Atlantic City because they were shorthanded. The CHAIRMAN. Those men have been returned? Mr. DAVIS. Yes; they have been returned. The CHAIRMAN. You merely sent the men there. You had no conferences with them or had no arrangements with them as to operations? Mr. DAVIS. No connection with them. Our foreign news service reported all of those conferences very extensively for our audiences abroad, who were naturally much interested in the deliberations and decisions; but that was a mere news operation. We wanted to make sure that the people overseas got all the information they wanted, which might have been sent much less completely by regular press agencies. GERMAN PROPAGANDA The CHAIRMAN. Has there been any change in the type of German propaganda in recent months, that is propaganda that is being supplied the countries they occupy and that is going out to neutral countries and to nations opposed to Germany in the war? Mr. DAVIS. The principal change in German propaganda in recent months has been along the line of what we call strength through fear. Goebbels is doing his best to make the German people believe that if they lose this war they will be enslaved. We are doing all we can to make them understand that there will be a future for the German who behaves, particularly after the bad characters have been eliminated. Propaganda in the occupied countries is largely based on trying to scare them at present. They have tried their best in the occupied countries to divide the population, setting one group against another by building to some extent on the jealousies between various nations. The CHAIRMAN. What part of your function is to interpret the enemy news and enemy propaganda? Whose duty is it to check on all the radio material coming out of Germany and endeavor to analyze it, particularly military information? Mr. DAVIS. That is done for various purposes. It is done for the use of our Overseas Branch by the Bureau of Overseas Intelligence. Then the Foreign News Bureau of our Domestic Branch receives a great deal of the material for distribution to the press here. They receive reports of what the enemy is saying to other countries; so that a direct piece of propaganda aimed at the United States can be checked against what they are saying to others. We keep constant check on those enemy news stories and watch the propaganda line of the enemy to see if it is effective. BACKGROUND OF DIRECTOR DAVIS Mr. WOODRUM. Your background is that of a newspaperman? Mr. DAVIS. To some extent. I was 10 years in that business and I was in the radio business about 3 years. I was an unemployed author for about 15 years. Mr. WOODRUM. Immediately before coming with O. W. I. where were you? Mr. DAVIS. I was in radio, with Columbia. Mr. WOODRUM. A radio commentator? Mr. DAVIS. A radio commentator; yes. Mr. WOODRUM. Have you a firm belief in the freedom of the press? Mr. DAVIS. I have. Mr. WOODRUM. Even in wartime, as the Director of the Office of War Information, do you believe that there should be as much latitude and freedom of the press now in handling the news as the war situation and the security will permit? Mr. DAVIS. Yes, sir; I do. Mr. WOODRUM. And you try to practice that. Mr. DAVIS. We have nothing to do with the suppression of the On the contrary we have had quite a lot to do with getting news. out war news. DISCUSSION OF THE "HANDBOOK OF THE AMERICAN GOVERNMENT" Mr. WOODRUM. A short time ago some comment was made on a book published by the Office of War Information called Handbook of the American Government, republished in Great Britain. I asked you for a copy of each edition. If you can let me have it I would like to have a copy of that English edition. I would like to have you make some comment on those two publications, stating the origin of them and the purpose, and what the Office of War Information had to do with them. Mr. DAVIS. The American edition, which has been sent only to our outposts overseas, was something comparable to the World Almanac. It was a collection of information, largely current information, with a brief historical review of the United States, for reference. Its use is comparable to the use that is made of the World Almanac, for example. I have observed in the public prints that there seems to have been some misunderstanding of the purpose of this handbook. It was a reference book intended largely for use in aiding foreign newspapermen, who are naturally more interested in recent occurrences than of those of the remote past. For example, there is only one line in that book devoted to Ericson's discovery of America. The CHAIRMAN. I notice that there is no account of what he said when he was interviewed by the press on his arrival here. Mr. DAVIS. No, sir; there is nothing about that. We could have filled whole pages with the story of what Leif Ericson did. But that would not be a matter of much current interest. The handbook, so far as historical matter is concerned, devotes most of its space to events of very recent years. I believe there has been some objection that the proportion of space we give in one of our charts to the legislative and executive branch of the Government is out of proportion. Well, the legislative branch of the Government consists of the Senate and the House, of course, whereas the executive branch is divided into many different agencies which often come up in the news in foreign countries and about which they will want a fuller explanation. I believe the Congressional Directory itself devotes more space to the functions of the executive branch than those of the legislative branch. PUBLICATION IN GREAT BRITAIN Mr. WOODRUM. So much for the handbook itself. What about this edition that was published in Great Britain, and what did the Office of War Information have to do with that? Mr. DAVIS. We gave them permission to publish it, even though permission for publication was not necessary. I think any Government publication is outside of copyright, is it not, Mr. Kuhn? Mr. KUHN. Yes. We were asked, as a matter of courtesy, whether we would object to Hutchinson & Co., a private commercial British publisher, publishing it, and we replied, of course, that we would be happy to get British circulation for facts about America in this way. Mr. WOODRUM. Did any of the funds of O. W. I. or the American Government go into the publication of that book in any way, shape, or form? Mr. KUHN. Only in the edition that was written by our News and Features Bureau in New York and revised by the Publications Bureau for the use of our staff overseas. Mr. WOODRUM. No; I mean in the foreign publication. Mr. KUHN. No, sir. Mr. WOODRUM. It had nothing to do with it? Did you advertise that volume in any foreign paper? Mr. KUHN. No, sir; it was advertised by Hutchinson & Co., and not by us in any way. Mr. WOODRUM. I am talking about your own copy here, that you published yourself. I notice in a red sticker on the back of it: Restricted. This publication is not for distribution in the United States or to American civilian or military personnel overseas. What is the explanation of that, Mr. Davis? Mr. DAVIS. In the appropriation act last year, Congress provided that we should not spend any money on publications or pamphlets for distribution to the people of the United States. We are merely complying with the expressed intent of Congress. We have felt that it was permissible to give copies of this to Members of Congress who asked for them, one copy per Member; and that it was also not the intent of Congress to forbid us to issue single copies to newspapermen on request. But beyond that there has been no distribution whatever in the United States of any publication or poster prepared for overseas use. Mr. WOODRUM. Is the republication which was made by Hutchinson & Co. in London exactly the same as the American document? Mr. DAVIS. I confess I have not studied the two in detail. Mr. KUHN. May I answer that, Mr. Woodrum? The Hutchinson edition is a somewhat shortened version of the edition which we got out for our own staff. Mr. WOODRUM. Otherwise it is the same? NEW POLICY OF RELEASING WAR NEWS Mr. LUDLOW. Mr. Davis, you spoke rather briefly about a new policy of releasing war news. I have seen quite a bit of it in the papers. I wonder if you could comment a little more fully on that, Mr. Davis? Mr. DAVIS. Hereafter, when any news is withheld in a theater of war by the theater commander, he must make a full and immediate report of the incident to the War Department in Washington which will advise us. Then his action will be reviewed by the Office of War Information and the War Department together to see whether we concur in his view. You see, originally, at the beginning of the war, most of the news of military operations was released in Washington by the War Department and the Navy Department. Increasingly it has come out in the field, however, so that now practically all of the War Department news and a good deal of Navy news is released by the theater commanders in the various theaters of, war. The Office of War Information being in Washington, we found that we had no opportunity to intervene with these gentlemen and present our views as to what ought to be released. Accordingly we have now made arrangements so that if theater commanders withhold news for considerations of security or any other reason, they will report immediately to the War Department which advises us. Then we go over it with War Department officials to see if we think that the theater commander was wrong and the news should be released now; or if it should be held for a few days longer; or whether we concur in the view that it would be in the national interest to hold it up for a considerable length of time. I may say that I do not think this last will very often be the case, but there will be a number of cases where it will be a matter of military security to hold up news for a few days. For example, take this affair of the transport planes. Orders were sent out, at our suggestion, that all similar incidents should be reported |