The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST” MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1939. Warfare by Propaganda

Northern Advocate, 18 September 1939, Page 4

The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST”

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1939. Warfare by Propaganda

Registered for transmission through the post as a Newspaper

TO a very great-extent the present war has developed into a war of propaganda. The value and importance of this weapon were discovered by the Allies during the last war, and it was cleverly exploited, Lord Northcliffe lending his talents to the cause, with the result that much important work was done in influencing opinion in neutral countries—and particularly America toward a sympathetic attitude to the Allied cause, while at the same time a different form of propaganda was introduced into Germany and had some bearing on the ultimate collapse of the national morale.

Since then all nations have learned a great deal, and the employment of publicity has been raised to a high stage of refinement, while in addition a new and important medium has become available in the form of radio.

All the belligerent nations are now bombarding the ether with radio announcements, which, if nothing else, are worded so as to give the most favourable impression of their own viewpoint.

Carrying the thing a little further, the Germans have apparently gone to the length of stage-managing interviews with prisoners of war, one being the New Zealand airman, L. H. Edwards. It was welcome news in New Zealand that Edwards is still alive, but the manner in which an interview with him was broadcast to the world, less for the purpose of relieving the anxiety of his relatives than to give an impression of German humanity towards war prisoners, was quite without precedent.

Statements to the press, too, frequently have a propagandist flavour about them. It has become an accepted principle in modern warfare that sources of information must be controlled, and the days of the old adventurous war correspondent picking up news by direct observation on the field of battle and despatch ing it to his paper by the most enterprising and speedy methods possible, are gone forever.

In modern conditions it is doubtful if the war correspondent can serve any useful purpose. Even in the last war his activities were considerably circumscribed. It is true that ceitain correspondents, notably Philip Gibbs and Ashmead Bartlett, mjade names for themselves, the latter by revealing some truths about the Gallipoli campaign, but, for the most part, war correspondents were subject to a rigid censorship, and had to respect it or risk something more than the mere disapproval of the military authorities. To-day, however, it is doubtful if independent war correspondents will be allowed near the scene of action at all. Where campaigns are waged in such well-defined zones as the Western Front, it seems that the battlefield will be regarded as sacrosanct territory into which no authorised person may enter.

The modern agency for the dissemination of war news is the Ministry of Information, or its equivalent, but it is a necessary concomitant of this system that news is portioned out according to strict official censure, and the public is told only what the authorities think it should know. The system is not without its serious drawbacks and disadvantages, but it is necessary to accept the view that its good points outweigh its faults. Primarily, it prevents important information from reaching the enemy.

Just how serious this danger is was shown prior to the landing on Gallipoli in 1915, when the Caiio newspapeis published advance news of the proposed landing of the British. A secondary purpose that can be served by control of news and information is the cushioning of the public against the shock of defeat. In 1916 the full truth of the Battle of Jutland was not learned by the public for some time.

Yet, if the system becomes merely an agency for suppression and understatement, it cannot retain its yitality and value. In the Ipng run the truth must prevail. Subject to the reservation that ‘ important practical information must be guarded at all costs, it should be a cardinal point in the distribution of news that above all the system should be honest. It cannot be honest if it withholds news of genuine public interest, or if it allows the public to have merely a vague conception of what is going on. There is obviously a feeling in England that the Ministry of Information has lately been making these mistakes, and, as a result, there had been sharp criticism. The mere fact that this criticism is permissible is a healthy sign. It would ceitainly not be permissible in Germany. Perhaps, as a result of it, fuller snd more explicit news will henceforth be issued.