NAZI "DOPE"

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 108, 9 May 1941, Page 6

NAZI "DOPE"

10,000 WORDS DAILY

PROPAGANDISTS ARRESTED

The arrest of the Transocean News Service propagandist heads. Manfred Zapp and Gunther Tonn i≤ announced in a Press Association cablegram from New York. Immigration authorities, says the cable, are forestalling the possibility of fifth column activity in the event of a crisis, and have taken this action. The news service distributes thousands of Nazi "news"' stories daily. Zapp "was recently described as a small, dark, dapper man with a big beak nose anchored by a full moustache. He lived in Manhattans Waldorf-Astoria, and might have passed for a Hollywood executive, a clothing manufacturer or a prosperous refugee—an% - thing but what he really was. His companion in propaganda. Gunther Tonn is heavily spectacled, has sleek grey hair growing thin and i≤ in his middle forties. Xo. 1 Propagandist Zapp has been in plenty of trouble already. A Federal grand jury identified him last March a≤ Dr. Manfred Zapp. 38. alias Hermann Nille, alias Otto W. Hermann, son of a Ruhr steel magnate, and he was marked down as No. 1 Nazi propagandist for the United States and Latin America. The Dies Committee had detected the activities of Zapp and Tonn in September. 1940. After a close study of Zapps activities the Federal grand jury indicted the two propagandists.

That Zapp registered as a foreign agent three months later and then failed to admit his true connection with "officers and agents of the German Government" in spreading Nazi propaganda were the principal allegations. It was also charged that he concealed his underground role in publishing the German White Paper, setting forth (he contents of documents . allegedly seized in Poland which implicated Mr. Wm. C. Bullitt. United States Ambassador to France, as promising that United States would go to war for Poland. Gunther was indicted for complete failure to register. Xews on Short-wave It was revealed that the Transocean News Service received most of its Nazi-dictated news by short-wave radio. Some of this was relayed to the German vernacular Press in the United States, and crreat sections of it were disseminated for consumption by Latin America. Many LatinAmerican newspapers of the smaller class depended upon Transocean Services almost wholly for foreign news. In Mexico 25 to 30 per cent of the foreign news was siTpplied by Transocean. Thus, it will be seen that this Nazi-operated service was a powerful tool in Germany's hands, distorting the thoughts and moulding the opinions of millions. It was also shown that Transocean was not concerned with making profits. It pushed out 5000 to 10,000 . words 1 daily, irrespective of the ability of its "subscribers"' to pay. If they paid, so much the better. Reprisals in Berlin. The arrest of Zapp had sensational repercussions in Germany. The Gestapo got busy. Mr. Richard C. Hottelet. New York-bora correspondent for the United Press, was arrested and charged with spying for "an enemy Power." With characteristic thoroughness, the Gestapo refused to let either the United States Embassy or United Press representative communicate with him. But. of course, the Nazis denied that Hottelet's arrest was in any sense a reprisal for the indictment of Zapp. Washington had the eravest doubts, and the United States Embassy in Berlin was promptly ordered by President Roosevelt to make a searching inquiry. Zapp became the head of the Transocean News Service in 193S Three months later he registered in' the United States as a foreign agent. with significant omissions." For in-j stance, he overlooked his part in the distribution of CO.OOO copies of the First German White Paper and failed to reveal where he procured the copies. Out On 10,000-Dollar Bail. Federal agent.s did a deal of tun-! nelling. and cast up many earth-1 works, as devious underground trails led to the Manhattan publishing house of Howell. Soskin and Com-' pany. whom Zapp "procured" to I undertake the publishing. Thence the trail led to Ralph Beaver Strassburger. prosperous* SS-year-old Publisher of the "Times-Herald." Norris- i town. Pasadena. It was this Stra—burger who. last summer, fough; hard to get the Republican nomination for Ham Fish. According to ■ the Federal indictment. Zapp "pro-! cured" Strassburger to finance and j distribute free more than 60 000 copies of the White Paper, while concealing the fact that he had anv connecuon with the deal. Stra-<- • burger was not indicted. On his be-1 half it was pleaded that he wished , to "expose -7 the United States \m-' bassador to France for alleged war-! mongering. The testimony of Wm Soskin. given in secret before the: Federal grand jury, was not divulged. " j Meantime, with Zapp and Tonn out on 10.000-dollar bail, the Transocean News Service continued dailv to pour out its 10.000 words of Nazi pulp news. However. American journalists understood that in the event of a conviction Transocean'-. palmy propagandist days would be numbered. " j