PROPAGANDA WAR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 January 1943, Page 4

PROPAGANDA WAR

HANDLING OF BRITAIN’S CASE

METHODS AND RESULTS.

J. B. PRIESTLEY’S REVIEW.

For the last two and a half years I have been doing propaganda for the British war effort, writes J. B. Priestley, in the London “Observer.” Altogether I must have written or broadcast about 500,000 words, and these have gone to almost every part of the world. Cables, letters, press-cuttings have come in return from almost every part of the world. All these are watched so that the effect of our overseas propaganda is carefully estimated. Consequently it may be assumed I have come to know something about the methods and results of our . propaganda. .The people who undertake it have not an easy hand to play. There are only three high cards in it. They are “Britain standing alone defied the Nazis,” the victory of the R.A.F. in the Battle of Britain, and—in spite of many grave faults of direction and organisation—the amazing productive effort of the British people, who have, in relation to their numbers, created a greater bulk and range of war industry than any other people. This last heartening fact is still not generally known either here or overseas, though a certain booklet called “Britain at War,” now beginning to circulate overseas, may do something to help. <-

THREE GOOD CARDS. These are three very good cards, but unfortunately there is also a lot of rubbish in the hand. The man who knows the game will do his best to ignore it. But much of our propaganda, based on this- rubbish, not only does us no good, but often does us positive harm. It leaves the people at the other end less convinced of our good faith, intelligence, strength, and chances of victory. And though we may not make as many mistakes as we did, we seen to learn with painful slowness. For example, the Russian correspondent of the “News Chronicle” has recently told us what a bad effect one number of our new propaganda magazine in Russian, with its unfortunate inclusion of a couple of pretty pictures giving an air of tranquility, has had on the Red Army. The recipients of propaganda are so, ready to notice even a single slip of this kind.

CUSTOMERS’ CHOICE. * The trouble is that most of our propaganda has to be done under the ultimate direction of men considered by the highest authorities to be “sound fellows who won’t go off the ra il s -’’ And unfortunately what it regarded as sound here is regarded as unsound almost everywhere else, and what our allies or potential allies want to read or hear are not men still on rails, but men who have gone off them. At the same time it appears to be always worrying our Tory backbenchers that so much of our propaganda should be done by what they call “Lettish, pinkish intellectuals.’ Now Lettish, pinkish (though it seems healthier than blueish or yellowish) intellectuals are never chosen for their charm. Nobody loves them for themselves alone. Why then are they chosen for these important tasks? Only because the people at the other end want to read or hear them. They are the customers’ choice. There is no contradiction here. Certain jobs may be allotted to Lettish, pinkish types, but the direction of our propaganda in general is still left to the sound, blueish fellows. And these men cannot help taking their stand on pre-war Britain. But the prestige of pre-war Britain was deplorably low. Again, that rich, leisured, sporting country house life, which is still freely offered as a specimen of our national culture, is not much admired abroad, where the local rich who aped the “milords” were never great favourites. Furthermore, it is hard for the typical British Tory to find; friends among people outside this island who are likely to fight or rebel against the

Fascists. Our sound fellows, in fact, tend to have just the wrong “contacts.” MISSIONARY ACTIVITY. In his excellent ‘Warfare by Words,” Mr Ivor Thomas, M.P., tells us that propaganda must not only be based on policy, depend on good intelligence, and be truthful, but also be regarded as a form of missionary activity. “In the lack of burning sincerity akin to religious faith is found the chief defect in British propaganda today,” he adds, after warning us, sensibly, that there is danger in carrying the technique and the mentality of the advertising profession into the field of propaganda' But to have a mere negative aim— Down with Hitler and let’s get back to Goodwood or the dole —does not make a sufficient or a firm foundation for missionary activity. It is difficult for the propagandist to come away from Westminister filled with a burning sincerity akin to religious faith. The sight of monopoly capitalists disappear, ing into private rooms in Mayfair hotels, there to entertain on Vast “expense sheets,” does not inspire most of us with the necessary glowing fervour. OLD WORLD DEAD. ’

But we learn that Mr Eden has cried out to his constituents at Leamington, “The old world is dead.” How much can be made of that in propaganda? Very little, in my opinion. If Mr Eden really wishes to help our propaganda, then I feel he must turn from words to deeds. Now if his department suddenly behaved as if the old world were really dead, if it became the Foreign Office to a vital democracy, if it made important appointments that obviously contradicted its old notion j that diplomacy belonged to a small select class, then that would be rich food for those working on British propaganda. Some of us would be glad to toil day and night splashing this good news around the world. But it is what is done in Whitehall and not what is said in Leamington that really counts. Our propaganda has to go out to a large number ofwery sceptical people, who were not brought up on British history books.

ALLIES AGAINST FASCISM. It is always better to take a line and not try to please everybody. (That is, unless you prefer the Goebbels technique). Now it is quite true, as various official persons have pointed out to me from time to time, that there are people abroad, to whom our propaganda is directed, who are afraid that we in Britain are drifting too far to the Left. But such people are not worth comforting. They will never, in my view, make good allies against Fascism. They are mostly potenital Quislings. The hard core of resistance to Fascism is never found among such people. Therefore, their existence is a poor excuse for not basing .our propaganda upon positive democratic aims, for not talking straight to the common folk everywhere, who know very well _ that Fascism is not some old-fashioned, nationalistic nonsense but a gigantic attempt, on the part of power-crazy groups, to suppress and then wickedly exploit the ordinary people. iJ

NEWS DEADLIER THAN BOMBS. It has been quoted before, but cannot be quoted too often. I refer to the following passage from Howard Smith’s “Last Train From Berlin,” where, after telling us that we cannot offer the German people merely what we had before the war, he goes on to say:

For instance—if I may suggest specific details of a plan to knock the Nazis lop-sidedlwithout firing a . single bullet more than we would ordinarily fire —why not nationalise those Welsh mines we promised to nationalise during the last war, but never nationalised? Why not do it tomorrow morning? The mere publication of the fact would kill more Nazis than a thousand bombs on Germany. You, who have not been in Germany and forced to read reams of Nazi propaganda every day, have no idea how often the Nazis have used those mines to show how few’ real ideas England possesses for a better world.” . . .

Probably he overstates his case, being a young enthusiast. But I have an idea that good propaganda is more easily made, and wars more easily won, by young enthusiasts than by old cynics.