Radio Television Libre des Mille Collines

from http://huzapress.com/

In my post on radio station bombings [LINK] the Rwandan civil war got a single entry: "1994 - (4/18) RPA shelled the RTLM station in Rwanda". Host Noheli Hitimana lost a leg in that bombing. But there is so much more to be said about that one bullet point. To quote Judge Navanethem Pillay:

“You were fully aware of the power of words, and you used the radio – the medium of communication with the widest public reach – to disseminate hatred and violence….Without a firearm, machete or any physical weapon, you caused the death of thousands of innocent civilians.”

The BBC once described the genocide in Rwanda as "100 days of slaughter." But it is true that 800,000 people were killed over a period of just 100 days in 1994. It you are trying to imagine the scope of the tragedy, that's almost 15% of the entire population.  The population curve tells the story: Over a million Rwandans fled to the neighboring countries of Tanzania, Burundi and Democratic Republic of Congo, at the time called Zaire. About 600,000 returned by 1995. Another 1.7 million remained in refugee camps until at least 1996. Many died of cholera. More here.

In any country it takes a lot to pit one population violently against another. There were many factors and many different agitators and the obvious legacy colonial reasons. But in every account I've read, the name of one radio station appears repeatedly: Radio Television Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM). It broadcast from July 8, 1993 to July 31, 1994 or 358 days, just over 1 year. But understanding how it was so effective at inciting so much violence requires a bit of context.

I'll step out of media studies here to point out a key historical cause. Belgian forces took control of Rwanda and Burundi from Germany in 1916. They were much more hands-on colonialist than Germany had been. Though both the Germans and the Belgians were big on Tutsi supremacy, and emphasized that the Hutu and Tutsi different races. In 1935, Belgium introduced identity cards labeling residents as either Tutsi, Hutu, Twa or Naturalized. Prior to that it had been possible for individuals to become honorary Tutsi.  Identity cards effectively ended social mobility for the non-Tutsi.

It's also important to grasp how little radio was in Rwanda even in the 1990s. Starting 1963 (possibly 1965) Germany funded the construction of Radio-diffusion de la Republique Rwandaise a.k.a. Radio Kigali and leased the land. They also gave Rwanda major assistance in setting up it's own 50 kW short-wave service which opened with three studios in 1968 as Radio Rwanda. (This was a trade for the right to build their own Deutche Welle station at Kigali.) 

Note: Some sources also cite a 1961 founding date. I suspect that's actually the founding of the Rwanda Broadcasting Agency (RBA).  In his book Broadcasting in Africa, Sydney W. Head wrote that in 1974 that Kigali was still the only domestic service in Rwanda. Even then the station only broadcast 94 hours a week in a mix of French, Kinyarwanda, and Swahili. Regardless, The Kigali lease expired in 2016 and the German government returned even the Deutche Welle station to the Rwandan government in a small ceremony [LINK].

Radio Muhabura was created in 1991 and broadcast from Uganda, but it covered all but the southern end of Rwanda. It promoted armed resistance against the "extremist" Rwandan government and promoted resistance against "Hutu power" and opposed the Habyarimana government. It's reach was significantly undermined by broadcasting solely in English. 93% of Rwandans speak Kinyarwanda and about 6% speak French, and less than 10% spoke English. (This changed much after 2008) More here.

Radio Television Libre des Mille Collines began broadcasting in July of 1993. The DJs spoke in Kinyarwanda and played pop music 24/7. It was designed for mass appeal and it found a large and young demographic.  It developed an audience of young Rwandans, who later made up the bulk of the Interahamwe militia. But when planning for RTLM began in 1992 by Hutu hard-liners, it was to be only the third domestic service in Rwanda. So with Radio Muhabura unintelligible, and Radio Rwanda spouting unappealing MOR programming they didn't have to try too hard  to win listeners. At the time, their claim was that Radio Rwanda was too non-partisan despite the growing popularity of Rwandan Patriotic Front's (RPF) and Radio Muhabura. But even then, Radio Rwanda was still the only national domestic station. More here.

The station was allegedly funded by Felicien Kabuga. [Kabuga is still at large] The ruling party, the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development (MRND) coordinated fundraisers with RTLM. But the RTLM wasn't just right-wing, it was completely radicalized. RTLM even railed against the peace talks between the RPF and President Juvenal Habyarimana.  RTLM existed to incite hatred between ethnic groups. Radio hosts referred to the Tutsi people as inyenzi (cockroaches) or as inzoka, (snakes.) Ironically the Rwandan government had committed themselves to a ban against "harmful radio propaganda" in the UN's March 1993 joint communique in Dar es Salaam.

But the programming on RTLM wasn't just rabid racist ranting. The RTLM maintained a thin facade of civility, and substance even airing vile propaganda; a strategy employed by many far right news sources like Afd, FPO-TV, Zur Zeit and Fox News. You can read some transcripts here. Though it was bombed in April of 1994, engineer Joseph Serugendo salvaged equipment and relocated the station to the top of Mount Muhe close to Gisenyi.  There it continued to broadcast through the end of July. More here. Below I list off some prominent staff (management, engineers and hosts) and their current status:

• Ferdinand Nahimana - 30 years in prison
• Jean-Bosco Barayagwiza - Died in 2010
• Gaspard Gahigi - 12 years in prison
• Phocas Habimana - Assumed dead
• Ferdinand Nahimana - Life in prison
• Joseph Serugendo - Died 2006
• Ananie Nkurunziza - Still At large
• Georges Ruggiu - 12 years in prison (early release 2009) 
• Felicien Kabuga - Still At large
• Valerie Bemeriki - Life in prison
• Noheli Hitimana - Died 2002
• Hassan Ngeze - 35 years in prison

There are numerous books about this event. Allan Thompson wrote two actually, titled The Media and the Rwanda Genocide, and Media and Mass Atrocity it's well worth the effort to read more if you made it this far. Thompson gets into the area of media accountability in that vast gray area we live in between censorship and propaganda. Ulrich B. Neumann wrote one on a similar topic but more focused on the aftermath, with a bit more lengthy title Media and Reconciliation: Rwanda's Reconciliation Process and the Potential of Post-Conflict Journalism. The book Conspiracy to Murder: The Rwandan Genocide by Linda Melvern is particularly detailed about the funding of RTLM. There is a lesson here about the power of media. Rather then be ineloquent, I'll quote Judge Navanethem Pillay again:

"We are now are now experiencing the whispers of hate speech in South Africa, it is very important to know that at the highest level, it was declared a crime if it mounts to [incitement]. So, I am recounting these experiences... because I want to inspire you to be resilient and to work hard and to serve the greater good because nothing can be more gratifying than that."

The Baltic Chain and Radio

Today Hong Kong is trying to "unshackle" itself from China. On August 23rd in 2019 supporters of their pro-democracy movement linked hands across the island, creating human chains on both sides of the city's harbor that they stretched for almost 25 miles.

These protests were inspired a a similar, but much larger historic protest, in the Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. On Aug. 23, 1989 approximately two million people joined hands forming a chain 419 miles long. (some estimates say 1.5 M) It stretched from Tallinn in Estonia, through the Latvia capital Riga, to Vilnius in Lithuania.

The protest was referred to as the "Baltic Chain" or the "Baltic Way" or even the "Chain of Freedom."  The Soviets called it "nationalist hysteria" driven by "extremist elements" promoting anti-socialist and anti-soviet agendas. Were outsiders were exploiting nationalism with the goal of independence? Well that last bit turned out to be true.

Coordinating two million people is no small feat. They disseminated information through regional organizations like the Latvian Popular Front, the Reform Movement of Lithuania, and the Popular Front of Estonia and via clandestine broadcast services, like Radio Free Europe, VOA and the BBC despite Soviet jamming efforts.

President Gerald Ford strongly supported funding for Radio Liberty and Radio Free Europe in speeches in 1974. These broadcasts were elevated to a new status in November of 1983 when they were incorporated into a separate Baltic radio division called the Baltic States Service of Radio Liberty. For more on that please read Jonathan Conde's 2018 masters thesis [LINK].

The Baltics had largely industrialized Post-WWII under the Soviets. They post 1968 moved directly into commercialism. In 1967 the Estonia Stereo was developed at Tallinn Radio-Electronics. It was the first stereophonic radio set in the whole USSR, [model Estonia-005] and it was manufactured at the Red RET plant in Tallinn between 1969 and 1973.  Between 1971 and 1972 car sales in Estonia quintupled. But the media was still strictly controlled, and the internet was decades away.  As Peeter Vihalemm wrote in his paper Media Use in Estonia, "During the period of glasnost, when the multi-party system did not yet exist and the underground centers were weak, the media was the main mechanism of mass mobilization " [LINK].

The Book Estonia Life Stories by by Tiina Kirss and Rutt Hinrikus gives the story of Asta Luksepp. 

"Before leaving I stopped by at home and adjusted the radio to the right wavelegnth for my mother.  We gathered at the market square in Elva... Our assigned place in the chain was between Nuia and Viljandi. We kept driving toward Latvia until it was 7 o'clock. We stopped the buses and joined other folks from Vorumaa. There were so many people that we could not fit in one line, so we formed parallel chains. We were all moved to tears. We had radios along, and thus could follow the orders coming from Tallinn."

So what radio stations broadcast the signals and the events? According to Peeter Vihalemm, most of them.  "...the two-million-person demonstration “Baltic chain”, organised on 23 August 1989, the 50th anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, was not only directly broadcast on all radio and TV channels in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, but it was also organised and managed with the assistance of the media."  The weakness of the Soviets in this moment and the popularity of the independence movement is hard to overstate. The Estonians, Lithuanians, and Latvians expected reprisals and for the most part... they did not come, not that day anyway.

The reprisals came when Estonia made the big move for independence and started printing up their own Estonian Passports, then declared independence on August 20th 1991. Moscow sent in the tanks.  Thousands of citizens the Tallinn radio and TV tower to prevent it's use for Soviet propaganda. Radio operators jammed the elevator and threatened to turn on the oxygen-removing fire-suppression system on the soldiers. Bullet holes dating from the Soviet coup attempt of 1991 are still visible at the base of the tower.

While the people of Hong Hong fight their own fight, in Lithuania they commemorated the 30th anniversary of the Baltic Way with a radio art installation. It was conceived of by two young artists, Viaceslavas Mickevicius and Ieva Makauskaite who worked with Lithuanian national broadcaster LRT.
The radio installation, entitled "One Wave" is made up of more than 2,000 old radios that will play a trilingual song known to be the anthem of the Baltic Way entitled "The Baltics are waking up". According to EuroNews, Mickevicius, who was 5 years old in 1989, wondered how they managed to organise the protest. "It appeared that the main role was played by the radio. Special radio broadcasts helped to coordinate the rally," said Viaceslavas Mickevicius, one of the two artists.

Radio Free Shostakovich

On August 9th , 1942 a piece-meal orchestra performed Dimitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich's famous "Symphony No. 7" in Leningrad (St. Petersburg). Notably the city was under siege by the Nazi's.  If you're a WWII buff you may have already noted that this was in the middle of the 900-day prolonged siege called appropriately the Siege of Leningrad.It lasted from September 8th, 1941 to January 27th, 1944. The performance was broadcast live on Radio Leningrad. Loudspeakers also broadcast the performance throughout the city.  More here.

In his paper Bolshevik voices, Bradley Trinkner described it as follows:

"Perhaps one of the most important roles radio played during the war was in Leningrad during the hard blockade winter of 1941 – 1942. As the Germans strangled the city and its residents faced the reality of a Russian winter without heat and food, Leningrad radio continued to broadcast. With thousands dying of starvation around them and the situation appearing bleak, tuning into the city’s radio let residents know that people were still there and the resistance continued."

Shostakovich and his family had been trapped in Leningrad since the Finnish army cut off the rail lines in August 1941. On September 2nd he took to Radio Leningrad to announce that he had finished the score of two movements of a large symphonic composition. He said "Why am I telling you this? So that the radio listeners who are listening to me now will know that life in our city is proceeding normally."  The city was being bombed by the Germans at that very moment. Things were decidedly not normal, these were propaganda broadcasts, be there no doubt. But he continued to write and completed the Adagio by September 29th.

The work was premiered in Kuybyshev on March 5th 1942 with the The Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra. The microfilmed score was flown out. The symphony received its broadcast premiere in Europe by Sir Henry J. Wood and the London Philharmonic Orchestra on 22 June 1942 in London. The North American premiere took place in New York City on 19 July 1942, by the NBC Symphony Orchestra under Arturo Toscanini.

But performing live in Leningrad was going to take more preparation.  The well-established Leningrad Radio Orchestra had been founded in 1931. But war, famine and disease had taken it's toll. Only 15 members of the original Leningrad Radio Orchestra were available, some had died, others had left to fight. Leningrad was starving. Reputedly the first rehearsal broke up after just 15 minutes, as the performers were too weakened to do more. Karl Eliasberg's Leningrad Radio Orchestra had to be supplemented with musicians from different Russian regiments along the front. Posters went up, requesting all Leningrad musicians to report to the Radio Committee. Orchestra members were given additional rations, perhaps as an incentive, perhaps so they'd play better. Nonetheless, Eliasberg threatened to withhold rations for any dissenting players.

Symphony No. 7 is Shostakovich's longest work,  usually taking upwards of 70 minutes to perform. To improve the odds of an uninterrupted performance The Russian army "neutralized" all points of Axis enemy fire and Soviet cannons were silent for the duration. Despite their efforts some bombs and projectiles were still heard. After the German invasion on June 22nd 1941 Radio Leningrad took to the air at 6:00 AM with a program announcing instructions for the populace during air raids. Radio Leningrad was had become accustomed to broadcasting in these conditions. They began their radio broadcasts-at a different time every day in order to confuse the Germans who were trying to jam their signals. More here.

Shostakovich had dedicated his symphony to the people of Leningrad, who went on to endure another year and a half of siege before the Soviet army broke through the encirclement in January 1944. After the war, Symphony #7 debuted in Germany on December 22nd 1946 with Sergiu Celibidache conducting the Berlin Philharmonic.

Foreign Media Ownership

Even in today's political climate this makes no goddamned sense. The incumbent regime in the U.S. has been making an effort to limit illegal immigration. (We can discuss their motivations some other time.) They also made changes to visa programs to limit green card workers. We can logically infer that the Tepublican party wants both less legal immigration and less illegal immigration to the USA.  Whether right or wrong that constitutes a vaguely coherent policy position. However at the same time they are lifting foreign media ownership regulations. (...And foreign political donations) So their policy is that foreigners can't come here to live an work, but they can own our media outlets and thereby control both domestic print and broadcast content? This is where bad policy breaks down into incoherence.

Until 2013 the limit on foreign media ownership was just 25%, a minority share.  In November of 2013, the FCC decided to adopt a case-by-case approach, allowing larger shares of ownership. In February of 2017 they formally raised that cap not to 49% or 51%, positions that would indicate tolerance for a bare bare minority or a nominal majority share, but straight to 100%. [More here] If Robert Mugabe wanted to buy a U.S. newspaper... he could do that. Before being replaced by Ajit Pai, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler admitted that it’s unclear how many other foreign citizens have a stake in U.S. radio stations. The FCC does not keep a comprehensive accounting of foreign station ownership because stations do not have to disclose some smaller and/or nonvoting interest holders.

In March of 2017 the first foreign media owners in the U.S. were an Australian couple with roots in Alaska. They bought more than two dozen radio stations. Richard and Sharon Burns wholly own Frontier Media and it increased their interest in 29 radio stations in Alaska, Texas and Arkansas from 20 percent to 100 percent. Admittedly they're a quaint couple. Sharon Burns co-hosts a morning show on 105.1 KTKU,  and Richard Burns hosts a show on 1330 KXXJ-AM. More here.

But also as a result of those policies, the Russian government has began moving into U.S. media outlets. Notably in 2014 the Russian Duma has passed a law, reducing the foreign ownership cap for print publications and radio and television outlets from 50% to 20%. It was passed by with a vote of 430-2. With that in mind it's hard to see this as anything other than deliberate media influence. [More here] Their first purchase was a repeater in downtown Washington D.C. W288BS, operating on 105.5 FM. It airs a political talk radio channel called Sputnik. Russian state television presenter Dmitry Kiselyov said that Sputnik would continue their tradition of Soviet propaganda to counter “aggressive” pro-American bias of the western media. More here.

So far Radio Sputnik has been focused on the Washington D.C. market in the U.S. They sublease W288BS from Reston Translator, LLC. In November of 2017 they began broadcasting on 1390 WZHF-AM and the Justice Department made the owner of the station, John Garziglia, register as a foreign agent. [More here] The station began as Voice of Russia broadcasting on WTOP-HD2 (103.5-HD2) in about June of 2013. Interestingly WTOP wasn't given the same treatment 5 years ago.

 As you might imagine, the Democrats were not enthralled with this change. Representatives Frank Pallone, Anna Eshoo and Mike Doyle asked FCC chairman Ajit Pai to investigate. A spokesman for Pai declined to comment. But Pai is a completely evil empty suit and that is to be expected.  FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel [D], said: “These are important questions. They deserve answers.” No answers have been forthcoming.  More here.

Voice of Oromo Liberation Radio

The Oromo Liberation Front was founded in 1973 by Oromo nationalists to promote self-determination for their people. The Oromo people are an ethnic group that are mostly found in Ethiopia but also parts of Kenya and Somalia. This is no splinter group. There are 35 million Oromo people in Ethiopia alone, constituting that nations largest ethnic group.  The OLF operates a shortwave radio station, SBO (Sagalee Bilisummaa Oromoo) or VOL (Voice of Oromo Liberation), in Berlin.

Let's talk a little history. The nation of Ethiopia grew out of lands controlled at different times by the the Kingdom of Aksum, the Aussa Sultanate, Zagwe dynasty, Mudaito Dynasty, the Yejju Oromo dynasty, and the Giyorgis II Empire all before 1890. Europeans looked at the whole horn of African and called it Abyssinia starting around 600 ACE. This becomes more of a problem later.

It was Emperor Dagmawi Menelik II that formed a country resembling modern Ethiopia starting around 1889. Menelik was of Oromo ancestry as was Gugsa of Yejju. Menelik did much in the way of modernization. He was big on road construction, electricity and education and a system of central taxation. He also founded their new capital of Addis Ababa, the new capital of Abyssinia. Abyssinia?  Yes, Menelik advertised that he was Abyssinian, and descended directly from Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. (This is despite the fact that there is no historical evidence for a Queen of Sheba existing contemporary to Solomon.) For more information check out A History of Ethiopia by Harold G. Marcus.

This is probably the key point of understanding as to why this radio station exists. The OLF do not consider the Oromo to be Abyssinian. The OLF believe the Oromo are the original inhabitants of "Oromia" and that the Abyssinians are colonialists no different than Italy was in WWII. Despite the historical accounts they believe Yohannes and Menilek were also Abyssinians. The OLF claim, dubious as it is, sets the stage for the Oromo and the Abyssinians to be defined as separate ethnic groups. With that in mind, lets fast forward to the 1900s.

Haile Selassie I, who ruled starting in 1916 didn't squelch this conflict. Selassie was also Oromo and under his reign the Italian colonialists returned.  But Selassie did found the nations first radio station in 1941. He broadcast from Addis Ababa in 1935 looking for help with those aforementioned Italian fascists. The British fought alongside Ethiopians and drove Franco back to his boot-shaped peninsula. Selassie's station returned to the air as Radio Addis Abeba in 1941 using an EIAR (Ente Italiano Audizioni Radiofoniche) transmitter on 9620 kc with regular broadcasts in Arabic, Amharic and English. Radio Guide magazine recorded that they signed on May 9th, 1938 which is later than most accounts. In the 1950s the Imperial guard began broadcasting as well.

Ethiopia didn't exit WWII well. Across the border in Eritrea, the Italians built a transmitter called Kagnew station and the Americans took it in 1942, they renamed it Radio Marina. The USA supplied more transmitters in the 1960s, installing one in Harrar, another on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, and a 50 kW 40 miles south of Asmara actually inside Eritrea.  That Asmara transmitter had to operate at low power to avoid interference with Kagnew station. At this time AFRTS was transmitting from Kagnew.

In 1943, Radio Mogadishu was built in Somalia at the same time as Radio Djibouti, both broadcasting in Somali. They both became pro-independence outlets when Ethiopia invaded Somalia. Russia instigated some of this selectively sending aid to pro-communist governments in the region. The Derg, a Communist military junta governed Ethiopia, from 1977 to 1987. The Oromo liked The Derg even less than Selassie. The Derg was replaced by the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, which was overthrown in 1991 by the EPRDF (Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front,) which has been the ruling political coalition ever since.

In Modern Ethiopia there are four political parties one of which is the Oromo Peoples' Democratic Organization. But the The EPRDF opposes liberal democracy, liberalism in general, and views free market capitalism as decadent. The party still owes much to the ideologies of Mao which were not media-friendly. So while having some Oromo membership, the OLF feels understandably unsatisfied. The Ethiopian government considers them a terrorist group. Nonetheless, the OLF has offices in Washington, D.C. and Berlin and is a member of the UNPO (Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization.)

In Ethiopia there are presently ten radio broadcast stations, eight AM and two shortwave. The most popular of these are Radio Ethiopia, Radio Fana, Radio Voice of One Free Ethiopia, and the Voice of the Revolution of Tigray. None of these stations broadcast in Oromo language. The OLF began operating a shortwave radio station, SBO (Sagalee Bilisummaa Oromoo) or VOL (Voice of Oromo Liberation), in Berlin in 1996. SBO is on the air six days a week on 9,485 KHz.

YANK's AFN Radio Guide

I have a few issues of Yank magazine from 1943 and 1944. The official name was "Yank, the Army Weekly." It was published from June 17, 1942 through December of 1945. At it's peak, there were 21 different versions being printed in 17 countries with a circulation of over 2 million copies. There were different editions for Britain, India, Philippines, Pacific, Continental, Far East and others. Because of that wide distribution and popularity, you can find most issues on eBay today for between $5 and $10.  All of the 1944 issues contain an AFN radio guide, and all of those guides list a mix of highlighted programs . But all of them list either Yank's Radio Weekly, or Yank Radio Edition. But there is little information available about that program. I found the answer in the British Edition of the March 12, 1944 issue.

"We are indebted to the American Forces Network for making possible a new half-hour radio program sponsored by Yank, and called Yank's Radio Weekly. It's to be strictly an ETO feature, and will be broadcast this, and every other Saturday from 11:30 until 12. The announcer, assuming he can keep the London fog combed out of his larynx, will be Pvt. George W. Monaghan of the American Forces Network. You can tune in on this new venture by dialing 1375kc, 1402kc, 1411kc, 1420kc, 1447kc, 218.1m, 213.9m, 212.6m, 211.3m, and 207.3m"

AFN produced other programs as well, Duffle Bag, and On the Record which also appear in the Guide. George Monaghan wasn't British. He was an American from Connecticut. He had been broadcasting since 1938, and had previously been an announcer on 1200 WTHT-AM in Hartford. More here.  The book This is the American Forces Network by Patrick Morley goes into more detail about Monaghan, and the relevance of other AFN DJs like Johnny Kerr. Their style was a big departure from the BBC style of the era. It's worth the read.


But back to the guides. Let's be clear, the guide was not a radio schedule. It was just a list of highlighted programs, times and frequencies.  Some of my copies are British editions and you can see they give different frequencies. I am sure that not all 17 countries editions had radio  guides. Both of my 1943 issues lack the guide but that may be specific to the edition. I scanned and included a selection below:


A115 - NOVEMBER 12 1944 (National Barn Dance, Amos & Andy, Mildred Baily Show, American Band of the AEF, Music Hall, Command Performance, Yank's Radio Weekly, Football)

A122 - MAY 14 1944 (Jack Benny Show, Command Performance, Fred Allen Show, Bob Hope Show, Charlie McCarthy Show, Yank Radio Edition, Take The Air)

A123 - JULY 09 1944 (National Barn Dance, Hit Parade, Duffle Bag, Gay Nineties Revue, Bing Crosby, Kay Kyser, Yank's Radio Edition, Amos & Andy)

A124 - JULY 16 1944 (Bob Crosby, Combined Orchestrations, Burns & Allen, Bob Hope, GI Supper Club,  Fred Allen, Yank's Radio Edition, Conducted by Faith)

A125 - SEPT 17 1944 (Andre Kostelanetz, Village Store, GI Journal, Fred Allen, The American Band of the AEF, Bob Crosby, Yank's Radio Weekly, Eddie Condon's Jazz Session)

A126 - SEPT 24 1944 (Comedy Caravan, Amos & Andy, GI Journal, Music by Freddie Martin, Conducted by Faith, Duffy's Tavern, Yank's Radio Weekly, Saturday Night Serenade)

Radio Azadliq means Radio Liberty

The word Azadliq (that is Azadlıq in cryllic) in the Azerbaijani language means Freedom or Liberty. There is a popular newspaper in Azerbaijan named Azadliq. In the city of Baku lies the biggest city-center square in the country, Azadliq square. [LINK] Prior to 1991, the square was named Lenin Square which leads to my third example: Radio Azadliq.

Radio Azadliq is just another name for Radio Free Europe (RFE) or Radio Liberty. The station broadcasts programs in many languages: Albanian, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Bosnian, Belarusian, Chechen, Crimean Tatar, Dari, English, Georgian, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Macedonian, Montenegrin, Pashto, Persian, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Tajik, Tatar, Turkmen, Ukrainian, Uzbek... Notice that Spanish, French and Italian aren't on there. RFE has always targeted Western Europe.

The division between the Russian sphere of influence and the West has a special relevance in Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan first declared independence in 1918, breaking loose of the Russian empire in it's post WWI collapse. But Azerbaijan has oil. So after the rise of communism,under Lenin, Russia attacked, and an estimated 20,000 Azerbaijani soldiers died defending their 2-year old country. This soviet control remained status quo until 1991, when following Russia's economic collapse, Azerbaijan declared independence again. The Soviet response was more muted this time. They supported a military coup which installed a soviet-era former government. But Azerbaijan retained a somewhat independent-ish media until about 2007. More here.

In 2007 came the arrest of more than a dozen reporters critical of the regime. Newspapers were shut down, crushed by lawsuits. In 2008, the government of Azerbaijan  imposed a ban on all foreign media broadcasting in the country, including BBC, Evropa-Plus, Voice of America, and RFE, effective  January 1st, 2009. Radio Azadliq lost their 101.7 FM signal, more here. RFE continued on with a local office, but with content only available on shortwave, satellite or online.  More here and here.

Annually the regime created new restrictions on freedom of the press. They passed new laws banning photography without permission, anti-libel laws, bogus "hooliganism" rules. In 2011 at least 50 domestic and foreign journalists were harassed or attacked in 2011 in Azerbaijan. Then came the big 20014 crackdown.  The government has accused the station and its employees of espionage and of being a foreign-financed entity. The first charge is bogus, but the second charge is entirely true. Radio Free Europe has been financed by the American government since it was founded in 1953. The Baku office only opened in the 1990s.

The police raided the that same Baku office and seized computers, flash drives, documents and other materials, and then sealed the premises. A dozen employees of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty in Azerbaijan were arrested on December 27th and detained for up to 12 hours of questioning and/or torture. Officials even detained the station’s cleaning woman.

Afterward, Radio Azadliq stubbornly continued it's programming. The regime responded by blocking their website and and some social media platforms. In 2016 Radio Azadliq’s daily program Azadliq A-Live was been taken off air by Kanal-V, a satellite television channel is broadcast over the Turksat 1C 420 Satellite. No explanation was given. Now limited to Facebook and Youtube, Radio Azadliq still presses on. More here.

La Voz del Cuba Independiente y Democratica

Fidel Castro has been dead for about three months now.  So I was wondering about the state of the anti-Castro pirate radio stations. There are some in Miami, but those are local to Miami. They usually lack the power to reach the island of Cuba.  But there was only one remaining still active outside the USA: La Voz del Cuba Independiente y Democrática (CID).

Today they also have a nice website http://www.cubacid.org/ Comically they bought their domain through the U.S. company Godaddy, and it appears to be hosted on Amazon Web Services. The URL was set up in 2006 via ValueWeb. (ValueWeb, a member of Affinity Internet, Inc., used to advertise in PC Mag back in the 2000s.)  Their two main data centers back then were in Fort Lauderdale, FL and El Segundo, CA. [There's that Florida connection again.] So while their domain registry is "secret" it's American origins are not. It's CIA funding is harder to prove.

As clandestine broadcasters go, they always seemed to have a big budget. A note on the use of the word "clandestine" as opposed to "pirate."  Pirates are usually just self-funded enthusiasts. Clandestine broadcasters are government funded. They are propaganda outlets. Neither is legally licensed, but clandestine stations may be tolerated by a regulatory agency government as they may be operated or funded by another branch of the same government. More here.

La Voz del CID was first reported in to be operating from a horse ranch in Miramar, FL back in 1981. It was an unusually professional operation with two Heathkit transmitters rated at 490 watts housed in a van. The FCC still shut it down that year, remarking "This outfit has some big money behind it, they even buy time from stations in Venzuela and other countries (Dominican Republic)..." Today the same group claims a slightly different origin:

 "In October 1980 the CID was founded in Venezuela with the support of the government of that country and its two major political parties: Acción Democrática (Social Democrats) and COPEY (Christian Democrats). The Congress was attended by hundreds of Cubans and Venezuelans who approved the Caracas Declaration in which the organization commits itself to: 'fight for the establishment in our country of a society devoted to freedom and human dignity, totally democratic and sovereign, socially balanced and Fair."

The Miami Times states plainly [SOURCE] that Radio CID was founded by exile leader Dr. Haber Matos Garsault. To their credit he is a long time member of it's executive committee whose names at least used to be on their website.  The copyright notice at the bottom gives it away "Publicado por Huber Matos Araluce en 07" CID is rumored to be operating from Guatemala, at other times it may have broadcast from Nicaragua, Venezuela, Honduras, Costa Rica and/or El Salvador. At different times the political climate in any of these nations (or jamming from Cuba) may have required their relocation so any or all of those may be true. CID hints at some of that in the below:

 "From its beginnings, the CID strategy consisted in an effort of political persuasion aimed at the population, the Armed Forces and members of the Castro regime in order to create among all Cubans a climate of national reconciliation and faith in the future of Cuba. In 1981, with the support of the Venezuelan government, the CID began to transmit to Cuba La Voz del CID. The schedule was continuous 24 hours a day, seven days a week. During his more than 10 years of uninterrupted work he achieved a large audience in Cuba." 

They were off air in 1982 but returned 1983 with a set of well-produced programs.  Their shows were re-broadcast on both Radio Rumbos in Venezuela and Radio Clarin in the Dominican Republic, in addition to their own transmitted located "somewhere" in Central America.  According to SWL DXer and writer, Gerry Dexter CID claimed that its annual production and broadcasting costs exceeded US$750,000 - which came from "American foundations, businessmen in Latin America and individual contributions" According to Lawrence Soley in the book Clandestine Radio Broadcasting (1986) During the war in Nicaragua, La Voz del CID cooperated with CIA-backed Radio Quince de Septiembre. This is probably where the suggestions that they broadcast from Nicaragua or El Salvador originated. (Matos lived in Costa Rica which may be where that rumor originates.)

Everything changed for CID in June of 1994. CID began to purchase airtime over Miami-based shortwave station WRMI... then stopped. WRMI owner Jeff White spilled the beans. "Nobody will admit it, of course, but there are a lot of rumors here in Miami that La Voz del CID has long been funded by the CIA and that their funds were cut off several months ago... They've been appealing for money publicly here in Miami among the Cuban-American community to keep the station on the air" More here.

After a few weeks, it returned to its usual 9941.65, 6305, 7340 and 11940 kHz frequencies but in August 1997, it went silent again. Rumors circulated again that it was suffering from financial problems. CID returned in December 1997 and reappeared on WRMI. At the same time, CID member Enrique Encinosa was hosting a half-hour talk show on 1140 WQBA-AM. CID has not broadcast on WRMI since at least 2015 and their own signal was last heard on 6305 kHz. Perhaps they feel the future is now assured, and their clandestine radio station is no longer needed or perhaps it was actually the death of Haber Matos in 2014 that was more pivotal than even the retirement of Fidel.

The Voice of the Caliphate

Around December 1st 2015 a new radio station appeared on 90 FM in the in the remote Achin district of Nangarhar, Afghanistan. It called itself Sadai Khilafat Radio, the "Voice of the Caliphate" and broadcast ISIS (Daesh ) propaganda in Pashto, Dari, Farsi and Arabic. The station only managed to broadcast a hour of programming per day. In addition to the propaganda against both the Taliban and the Afghan government, they also aired interviews, and acappella music. More here and here.

The conservative theology of the group prohibits the use of instruments so they are unwilling to air recorded music and presumably to use production music. This choice must make the station a bit of a drab listen compared to any of the other 170 radio stations in Afghanistan. Their propaganda was mostly aimed at motivating young Afghani men to join Islamic State.With little television, and even less internet radio is the main source of information and entertainment in the country. More here and here.

Islamic State only announced the arrival of their Afghanistan franchise in January 2015. So their first radio station took almost an entire year to get running. By December 17th the Afghanistan's Ministry of Communications and Information Technology announced they had found the station but the governor of Nangarhar suggested that it was over the border in Pakistan. On December 31st a report appeared on VOA that the station was being successfully shut down. [SOURCE] It wasn't jammed or shut down and it also wasn't in Pakistan. On February 1st of 2016, a total of four U.S. drone strikes, hit the radio station killing 21 IS members, including the eight who operated the radio station. More here and here.

A Silver Brick

On September 30th 1951 the president of Radio Free Europe (RFE) General Charles Douglas Jackson spoke in Reno NV. It was part of the "Crusade for Freedom" campaign by RFE.  There were 1,500 people in the Reno high school gymnasium. Radio station 1230 KATO-AM carried his speech live.  The vent went on for three hours and Clark Gable wielded the gavel to auction off a silver brick bearing the words "Nevada 1951." It was only one small part of the RFE "Crusade for Freedom" which financed their operations. Jackson toured the country and held TV network events on ABC, CBS and NBC.

Back in 1951 the silver brick was won with a high bid of $800 by casino and hotel magnate Charles W. Mapes Jr.  Then Mr. Mapes donated the brick back to RFE and it was taken to Las Vegas the next day where it was auctioned off again in front of a crowd of 2,000 at Elks stadium. This process was repeated at least fifty times, even once at the tiny Smith Valley Rotary Club in Wellington, NV where it only went for $21. The process seems so Normal Rockwell that you can overlook the fact that Charles Douglas Jackson was a spook that worked for the CIA for almost 50 years.

In official RFE history they usually refer to the man as C.D. Jackson. (I'm not sure if anyone actually called him that.) If you recall, RFE was created by the National Committee for a Free Europe (NCFE), a CIA front organization formed by Allen Dulles in 1949. The NCFE included a mix of government spooks and moneyed business men from banker Frank Altschul to Reader's Digest owner DeWitt Wallace. The first chairman of the NCFE was diplomat and spook Joseph Grew, Jackson was it's second from 1951 to 1952. His speech at that rally was mostly about the evils of Communism.

"Truth is Communism's deadliest enemy. If the United States can win the cold war against Communism in Europe, the world stands a good chance of avoiding a shooting war. America's chief hopes for winning the cold war must be pinned on such innovations as radio networks and balloons, which carry messages of truth behind the iron curtain."

So, however you feel about the efficacy of it's mission or accomplishments, you have to concede first that the RFE was a U.S. government-controlled propaganda outlet. This a common use of resources by all governments. Given the ability to present information in a self-interested manner, most nations, businesses and individuals will do so. The criminality lies in the scope and scale. The important thing here is that the story about the silver brick was not a fund-raiser. It was a marketing ploy.  Propaganda was broadcast on the radio in Europe, but in the U.S. it was a pantomime.

ABSIE Doodle Dandy

Five weeks before D-day, ABSIE (the American Broadcasting Station in Europe) made its debut on the air airwaves of Europe. They began with the opening bars of the song Yankee Doodle. It didn't spin down until July of 1945. It was a large scale radio propaganda effort in wartime, and even William Paley, the head of CBS, helped ABSIE with the project planning for the OWI  (Office of  Wartime Information) More here.

The idea was to build a radio station powerful enough and near enough to the front, that the signal would reach German and European listeners. It began in 1942 under director Brewster Morgan from CBS and engineer Richard Condon. Station manager Saudek was from NBC, and the chief of the ever-important German-language desk Rober Nauer from from WLWO-AM. Work was halted that year as much of the initial team was pulled off ABSIE to build out AFRN. They didn't return to the job until the Fall of 1943. Despite the blitz, their London studios were ready by April of 1944.

It's hard to tell but when the Psychological Warfare Division (PWD) of SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force) got involved things got more serious. SHAEF was founded in the spring of 1943 and their PWD department was keen on propaganda, radio propaganda and by extension ABSIE. SHAEF/PWD was headed by US Brigadier-General Robert A. McClure who had previously commanded the PWB (Psychological Warfare Branch) of  AFHQ (Allied Forces Headquarters) for Eisenhower. It was SHAEF that oversaw airdropping remote transmitters into Zeesen, Obisfelde, Wiederau and Munich so all of Germany could receive the BBC and ABSIE.

RCA built ABSIE four medium wave transmitters and they leased six shortwave transmitters form the BBC. The 10 transmitters made them more difficult to jam and easier to receive on mainland Europe. Much of the staff came directly from OWI: French journalist Pierre Lazareff.. later the publisher of France-Soir, Alfred Puhan.. later a U.S. Ambassador and many others. These foreign language desks were core to it's mission. Reaching Europeans with vital information helped them organize resistance. At it's peak it had a multilingual staff of about 250 employees. It also rebroadcast popular BBC and VOA programs. More here.

 Their last broadcast was on the 5th of July in 1945. Before they played Yankee Doodle, Director Elmer David made a statement declaring their mission accomplished and that the BBC and VOA would continue on. the book The Psychological Warfare Division, Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force covers some of this in great detail.

RADIO FREE EUROPE

This image is courtesy Thom over at the AFRTS Archive Blog.

With the recent tensions between the United States and The Russian Federation of late I though tit might be worth revisiting the existence of Radio Free Europe (aka Radio Liberty). The radio service was actually founded a noticeably after the end of WWII. It wasn't a tool of the West against the Nazis. It was used as a tool against the Communists during the cold war funded by the CIA. Germany surrendered in May of 1945, Japan in august of the same year.  There was quite a lull in hostilities before RFE began broadcasting propaganda in 1949.

Also note that RFE is still broadcasting today. They still maintain 20 local bureaus in countries throughout Europe, and a corporate office in Washington D.C. Their coverage area includes: Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia, Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgzstan, Macedonia, Modolva, Montenegro, Russia, Serbia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. Pretty much the only part of Western Europe they aren't in is Romania and Bulgaria. RFE was headquartered at in Munich, Germany, from 1949 to 1995. The address must have seemed less politically appealing after German reunification as the headquarters were moved to Prague in the Czech Republic.

Their broadcasts have not been static. They have expanded and contracted as European Communism ebbs and flows. The RFE ended broadcasts to Hungary in 1993 and stopped broadcasts to Poland in 1997.  In 2004 RFE they stopped broadcasting to Estonia, Latvia, Slovakia, Croatia, Bulgaria, and Romania. But in that time they also added Kosovo and Macedonia. 

These days the  CIA is a few steps removed their programming department. The RFE answers to the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors. But back to their origins. They were founded by the National Committee for a Free Europe in 1949. They were later renamed the Free Europe Committee (FEC.) That committee was not comprised of the French underground. It was a public-private partnership of the CIA and certain corporations. The Wilson Center has more information on that here. But some names you might recognize form those early days include Frank Altschul, Frederic Dolbeare.  Dwight Eisenhower, Lucius D. Clay, Cecil B. DeMille, Charles Douglas Jackson, Allan Dulles and Henry Luce. More here.

Armstrong Williams

You may or may not know the name Armstrong Williams. If you know it, you either live in Washington D.C., and/or you were paying attention when his big scandal hit in 2005. IT was about 10 years ago that USA Today used a FOIA request to look into some dubious Bush Administration spending. it turned out that Williams was paid $240k by the U.S. Department of Education, to promote George W. Bush's Education plan a.k.a. the No Child Left Behind Act. The contract with Williams was part of a $700k contract between the U.S. Department of Education and the public relations company, Ketchum Inc. The GAO had some harsh words about this. [SOURCE]

This violated the publicity or propaganda prohibition for fiscal year 2004 because it amounted to covert propaganda. As a result of this violation, the Department also violated the Antideficiency Act, 31 U.S.C. § 1341. 

Strangely Williams was not jailed or fined, and the Department of Education was merely admonished.  In fact, Williams continued on with his career as a broadcaster and commentator as if nothing had happened at all. He currently writes for the Washington Times, the Hill, RightSideWire.Com, and JanMorganMedia.com among others. His eponymous Armstrong Williams radio program continues in syndication. It's heard on 620 WGCV-AM, The SiriusXM Urban View, and on 105.9 GEMS-FM, Nassau, Bahamas.But there used to be more. His radio career survived the scandal but not inertia. These are the last refuges of a personality soon to depart the medium.

Williams began his radio career at WOL-AM in Washington, D.C. in 1991.  Four years later his show was syndicated by The Talk America Radio Network. In 1998 the Salem Radio Network syndicated his now national program into 26 markets including St. Louis and Washington D.C.  In 2002, he joined the lineup at 1600 WWRL-AM in New York City.  In 2008 he added a nightly talk show on XM Satellite Radio on the Power 128 channel.

So his radio chops are legit. But what about the scandal. How does a middle market radio host end up getting three quarters of a million dollars to shill for the man? Well let's say it wasn't' the first time, or the last time. In 2005 he took money from the tobacco lobby to attack the FDA. [source] At the time his program was on 60 radio stations. But I think it all goes back to his peculiar interview with Trent Lott in 1998. Back then Williams had a cable TV show. The interview was on Fathers day and the topic was homosexuality. I was a bit of a problem for Lott. On the Armstrong Williams show, Lott equated homosexuality with alcoholism, kleptomania and sex addiction. It was received poorly, but received very heavy coverage.

More recently he's begun buying up media holdings: WJSU-TV, WCFT-TV, WMMP-TV, WEYI-TV, and WWMB-TV.

WJNT Vs. Cuba!

This is the tale of how AM radio interference from Cuba helped propel the allocation of FM translators to AM stations in the U.S. Let start with this little tidbit on a document posted on the State Department website. It's referred to in other documents as the Federal Communications Commission's Observation of TV Marti.

Cuba withdrew from NARBA (North American Radio Broadcasting Agreement) decades ago, and the US has separate agreements with Canada and Mexico rendering the document only binding for a few island nations. It's effectively moot. But still we manage to fight with Cuba. In 1982 we began bombarding Cuba with Radio Marti on 1180 and it's VOA programming. This was actually a replacement of a prior propaganda station operating on 535 kHz and 1605 kHz. [SOURCE] Cuba was understandably irritated by this and began jamming 1180 with a loud humming noise. The problem was so foreseeable that the Broadcasting Board of Governors, under the Regan administration, set out in the following paragraph that they were allowed to lease time on other stations should Radio Marti be successfully jammed. More here.

But Radio Marti was not successfully jammed. But at least three other U.S. stations were: 1180 WJNT-AM in Jacksonville, MS; 1180 KGOL-AM in Humble, TX; and strangely 1160 WCRT-AM in Nashville, TN. Today you wont' find an AM station on 1180 AM within 700 miles of Miami. And the nearest one is WLTT-AM, a daytimer near Wilmington, NC. Radio Marti is why. It's not just the Cuban jamming, the two stations in tandem effect all reception near that frequency.  More here.

The stations caught in the cross fire all won themselves consolation prizes. WJNT now operates at night on WJNT-FM1 at 103.3, a 500 watt Nighttime-only FM booster. It's been operating under an STA since1999. WCRT-AM got WCRT-FM1 operating on 98.7 at 75 watts. But KGOL didn't fare so well. The station was not allocated an FM translator. Back in 1982 NAB threw a fit and claimed that Cuba was jamming signals on 570, 670, 1040, 1160, 1380 and had the ability to "cripple more than 200 stations in 34 states." A pretty dubious claims since they couldn't even successfully jam Radio Marti. Even in 1987 the New York times wrote "The noise is annoying, but it does not block the programs." However, the events did broach the engineering topic of FM translators for AM stations a coverage tactic which continues today. Thank you Mr. Regan.

Ferrell's Confidential Frequency List

The Confidential Frequency List was first compiled then Oliver Perry Ferrell and, later, by Geoff Halligey, then finally Kevin Nice. Ferrell is rumored to have died in a car crash on I-95 in Connecticut before 1997. Robert B. Grove compiled a Confidential Frequency List for Gilfer Associates first in 1972 and at least through 1976, which went into multiple editions. It is unclear how so it may be connected to the Ferrell series. It is possible the series actually began with Grove.back to that in a second.

Gilfer Associates in Park Ridge, NJ published the books until Ferrell's death prior to 1997.  It's also worth noting that via Gilfer Ferrell also published other books, Guide to RTTY frequencies, collection of Radioteletype Frequencies. Ferrell was also the CEO of Gilfer associates. It seems impossible that he'd deliberately launch one series of Confidential Frequency lists then another co-branded with his surname. I assume for that reason that Grove edited the first two editions, then Ferrell took over and eventually put his name on the tin.

The book featured a very short introduction and a bit of information on the mechanics of shortwave radio and gear. The rest of the book for hundreds of pages was just a frequency directory by frequency, focused on HF activity between about 4 KHz and 28 KHz. More here. Below is a list of what I believe to be the correct years for the various editions and authors.

• First Edition -1972 - Gilfer Associates by Robert B. Grove
• Second Edition - 1976 - Gilfer Associates by Robert B. Grove
• Third Edition - 1979 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Fourth Edition - 1980 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Fifth Edition - 1982 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Sixth Edition - 1986 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Seventh Edition -1988 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Eighth Edition - 1992 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Ninth Edition - 1994 - Gilfer Associates by Oliver P. Ferrell
• Tenth Edition - 1997 - PW Publishing by Geoff Halligey
• Eleventh Edition - 1999 - PW Publishing by Geoff Halligey
• Twelfth  Edition - 2001 - PW Publishing by Kevin Nice
• Thirteenth Edition - 2003 - PW Publishing by Kevin Nice

In the UK, Bill Laver printed at least eight editions of his own Short Wave Listener's Confidential Frequency List. This complimented his other directories of Marine, VHF/UHF, and RTTY frequencies. Laver threw in the towel in 1994. By all reports the Ferrell's own series ended in 2003. There is no comparable modern publication, even the Klingenfuss Guide to Utility Stations has been out of print for a few years. [SOURCE] In some ways this has been supplemented by lists and boards online, but the lack of a canonical source limits their utility. The Farrell's books remain interesting historically, and some of these old stations still operate. Copies of most editions can get picked up used on eBay for just a couple bucks.

Radio Tikrit

One of my favorite historical topics is radio propaganda. It plays into my own personal beliefs on bias and the nature of truth. It's not news to anyone that America funds radio propaganda today or yesterday or in 1966.  While the popularity of radio is on the wane at home, it still comprises the core of media delivery in most 2nd and 3rd world countries and especially among the rural illiterate. While the Voice of America programming is out-of-the-closet so to speak, most of our propaganda efforts are not. Take for example Radio Tikrit.

In 2003 the United States infiltrated Iraq with radio propaganda hostile to Saddam Hussein via a shortwave station called Radio Tikrit. Its transmissions were first logged outside Iraq by Bjorn Fransson in Sweden on February 3rd. That Spring, numerous news outlets identified it as "Black Propaganda." This means only that it comes from a covert source. Even though in this case the source was obvious, it never identified itself.  The distinction rapidly became moot as the US invaded Iraq the following March. Not only was that not covert, it received 24/7 news coverage on all five networks. More here.

Programming on Radio Tikrit began as very friendly to Saddam, very similar to programming on Ba'ath party regime-run oulets. Tikrit is the city of his birth so it is assumed that was a deliberate link to establish credibility. Then gradually it's programs became critical of the dictator. It fixated on the poverty of Iraqis and eventually it even called on the Republican Guard members to be insubordinate and desert. More here.

Radio Tikrit broadcast on 1584 kHz from 1900-2100 GMT. BBC news described their signal as patchy because of "co-channel interference." I don't think that's what was causing the interference. The nearest big station on that frequency is the 1-Kw station MAKU in Iran.  Only days later the Australian paper "The Age quoted a source describing the signal as "...so strong that it dominates the frequency, even in parts of Europe." Despite massive radio infrastructure losses in the Gulf War, Iraq did have jamming capabilities... and in fact with some irony did operate one out of Tikrit. I believe it was being jammed.

Radio Tikrit was almost certainly run by the same group that funded and ran the Iraqi National Accord. The group is assumed to have received CIA funding. It broadcast two propaganda stations Two Rivers Radio at 1566 kHz and Radio Al Mustaqbal at 1575 kHz. Notice how close those two are to Radio Tikrit. Tikrit also broadcast only while the other two stations were off air. Most sources assume all three transmit from the same 50kW array in Kuwait. More here.

You Can't Do Business with Hitler

Sometimes I read about radio history and feel like some cranky mischievous character like Joe Bussard has planted some false information as a prank. Much to my surprise I was able to corroborate this information through multiple reputable sources. There was once a radio program called "You Can't Do Business with Hitler."  Seriously, there were at least 56 episodes run between 1942 and 1943.

• Heads They Win - Tails We Lose
• Broken Promises
• No American Goods Wanted
• Two for Me One for You
• Mass Murder
• Spoils of Europe
• 1000 Year Reich
• Living Dead
• Anti-Christ
• Pagan Gods
• Swastikas over the Equator
• Money Talks with a German Accent

The program was written and produced by the radio section of the Office of War Information (OWI) the propaganda office of the U.S. military in that era. John Flynn and Virginia Moore starred in the program which aired on at least 790 radio stations. The scriptwriter was Elwood Hoffman and the director was Frank Telford. Elwood script wrote for other propaganda programs in that era including  six episodes of  "This Is Our Enemy", and three episodes of "American Portrait." He wrote some more mundane material for Cavalcade of America and of all things... The Columbia Workshop. More here.

It as based on an autobiographical book by Douglas Miller published in 1941. MIller was a Rhodes Scholar from Denver. His book ended up sixth on the nonfiction best-seller list for 1941. Miller was an attache with the American Embassy in Berlin from 1924 to1939. (some sources say 1925-1929) By the time he resigned he was staunchly opposed to the Nazi regime and in the mood to write some anti-Nazi propaganda. More here.

The title was actually a repudiation of statements by Charles Lindbergh. Yes, that same Lindbergh. It wasn't terribly quotable "I believe this nation is well able to take care of itself economically."  But Lindbergh was advocating for isolationism... and Miller wanted into WWI.  So they found themselves very much at odds. But we already know who won that argument with the public.

Korean Radio Propaganda Extravaganza

Too little hay is made of radio propaganda outside wartime. Some consider the rhetorical bluster of the increasingly marginalized Rush Limbaugh "propaganda."  I'm not interested in that tonight.  I want to narrow the focus to radio propaganda following the cessation of military conflict: post-war radio propaganda. Think of Germany and Japan Post-WWII, Vietnam, Korea.. etc. But much as we and our post-war adversaries continued to broadcast questionable political material throughout the cold war, there are certainly other guilty parties who engage in the same activities following the end of other wars that didn't really have anything to do with the U.S. In other words: America isn't always the source or the target of radio propaganda.

*For ease of use, I'm going to refer to South Korea as ROK (Republic of Korea) and North Korea as DPRK (Democratic People's Republic of Korea.) I do note with some irony that North Kora is neither a republic nor democratic, but acronyms are expedient.

In the US what we call the Korean War or military action that was waged from June of 1950 through July of 1953 was both a civil war between the ROK and DPRK and also a  proxy conflict between the US and soviets in the Cold War. China and Japan have their own opinions as well. They have been at war with or the property of one or more of their neighbors since at least 1894.. which is to say they are no strangers to propaganda.

Only days ago the ROK "resumed" broadcasting propaganda across the DMZ. [Source] But even whether this is new ongoing is a politicized topic. Sources sympathetic to the DPRK state that broadcasts restarted back in May. Further specifying that the broadcasts stopped in 2004 after the "inter-Korean friendship accord" what the ROK called the "Sunshine Policy" but broadcasts resumed in 2010.

The station in question, Voice of Freedom (VOF) transmits on both FM and shortwave. While the FM signals Probably only reach a few miles into DPRK territory, shortwave signals travel much further. Voice of Freedom is produced in Seoul and then relayed via the military’s Mungunghwa 5 satellite to six FM transmitters along the DMZ.  The DPRK responded at first with low tech jamming and has ramped that up to white noise and multi-pulse jamming. VOF is presently broadcasting FM to the DMA on 101.7 MHz, 103.1 MHz, 107.3 MHz and on Shortwave at 6135 kHz. Comically one of it's DJs has a blog here. (I really hope that's real.)

The tradition of blasting radio propaganda at each other begins more-or-less with the establishment of the demilitarized zone along the divided along the 38th parallel, later along the demarcation line. That was in 1945 after the end of WWI. Anna Wallis Suh (aka Seoul City Sue) began announcing for the DPRK on "Radio Seoul" from HLKA studios daily in 1950. She later joined the staff of Radio Pyongyang a powerhouse of DPRK propaganda since about 1945. that station has it's origins in AFRN station JBBK.That station now operates as Voice of Korea (VOK) which broadcasts on AM, FM Shortwave and on the Thaicom 5 satellite.  Also notable is the unsanctioned South Korean pirate radio group Free North Korea (FNK). Since 2004 this mix of geeks and defectors have produced  pre-recorded 30 minute propaganda programs broadcast illicitly to radios dropped inside the DPRK by balloon.