Britain, America and Anti-Communist Propaganda 1945-53

308 Pages·2004·3.33 MB·English

by  Andrew Defty

Britain, America and Anti-Communist
Propaganda 1945–53
In the Cold War battle for hearts and minds Britain was the first country to formulate a
coordinated global response to communist propaganda. In January 1948, the British
government launched a new propaganda policy designed to ‘oppose the inroads of
communism by taking the offensive against it’. A small section in the Foreign Office, the
innocuously titled Information Research Department (IRD), was established to collate
information on communist policy, tactics and propaganda, and coordinate the discreet
dissemination of counter-propaganda to opinion formers at home and abroad.
This book demonstrates that propaganda was a primary concern of the postwar
Governments of Clement Attlee and Winston Churchill, and traces the implementation of
Britain’s new propaganda policy at all levels from the Prime Minister to British
diplomats in the field. It reveals the formidable array of opinion formers mobilised to
support the IRD’s anti-communist campaign including intellectuals, politicians,
churchmen, and the BBC, and encompasses British anti-communist activities within
NATO and in various Cold War confrontations in South-East Asia, the Middle East and
behind the Iron Curtain. It also reveals for the first time the extent of Britain’s
involvement with US anti-communist propaganda activities such as Radio Free Europe.
Andrew Defty was awarded his PhD by the University of Salford in 2002. He is a
graduate of Salford’s MA in Intelligence and International Relations, and has lectured on
intelligence, US-UK relations and the Cold War. This is his first book. He has published
articles in the journal Intelligence and National Security and is editor of the newsletter of
the Security and Intelligence Studies Group (SISG).
Cass series: Studies in intelligence

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Britain, America and Anti-Communist Propaganda 1945–53
The Information Research Department
Andrew Defty
Britain, America and Anti-
Communist Propaganda 1945–53
The Information Research Department
Andrew Defty

LONDON AND NEW YORK
First published 2004 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxfordshire OX14
4RN
Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York NY
10016
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.
“ To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of
thousands of eBooks please go to http://www.ebookstore.tandf.co.uk/.”
Transferred to Digital Printing 2005
© 2004 Andrew Defty
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or
by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission
in writing from the publishers.
The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the
information contained in this book and cannot accept any legal responsibility or liability for any
errors or omissions that may be made.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been
requested
ISBN 0-203-49519-5 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-60953-0 (Adobe eReader Format)
ISBN 0-7146-8361-2 (Print Edition)
In loving memory of Michael Hodgson
Contents

List of plates viii
Foreword x
Acknowledgements Xi
List of abbreviations xiii

Introduction: historians, the media and British Cold War propaganda 1
1 The origins of Britain’s anti-communist propaganda policy, 1945–47 26
2 Launching the new propaganda policy, 1948 63
3 Building a concerted counter-offensive: cooperation with other powers, 1948– 103

50
4 ‘Close and continuous liaison’: British and American cooperation, 1950–51 144
5 A global propaganda offensive: Churchill and the revival of political warfare 189
6 A new strategy of political warfare 229
Conclusion 253

Bibliography 263
Index 283
Plates

1 Ralph Murray, head of the IRD from 1948 to 1951 130
2 John Peck, head of the IRD from 1951 to 1954 131
3 An IRD basic paper with the removable cover-slip still attached 132
4 A cartoon in the IRD serial, Inside Soviet China 133
5 Strip-cartoon serialization of Orwell’s Animal Farm 133
6 Edward W.Barrett, US Assistant Secretary of State for Public 134

Affairs, 1950–52
7 C.D.Jackson, Eisenhower’s Special Assistant for psychological 134

warfare
8 Gordon Gray taking the oath of office as Director of the 135

Psychological Strategy Board in 1951
9 President Truman dedicating the US Coast Guard cutter Courier 135
10 Truman and Churchill, in the Oval Office in January 1952 136
11 Balloons being released to transport Radio Free Europe leaflets 136

into Czechoslovakia in the early 1950s
12 Foreign journalists on a tour of British defence institutions 137
13 The NATO Caravan of Peace in Portugal in 1954 137
The author would like to thank the following for permission to reproduce photographs: 1
and 2, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office; 3, 4, 5 and 12, the Public Record Office;
6, the Harry S.Truman Library; 7, the Dwight D.Eisenhower Library; 8, 9 and 10, the
United States National Archives; 11, Radio Free Europe; 13, the North Atlantic Treaty
Organisation.