Figure 27: Malingerer's Black. One of the favored targets of block propaganda is the malingerer. Suspicion of successful malingering inevitably hurts the morale of a unit. Even if the enemy's instructions are not followed, the troops may suspect genuine psychoneurotics of having faked their troubles. Almost all participants in World War II issued such instructions; the Allied samples are not available for publication. This is a Japanese leaflet from the Philippines, 1944-45.
Such an outline would be useful only if it were applied in common-sense terms, without turning each item into an elaborate project and thus losing the woods in the trees. In most cases, it would suffice to state the item briefly for reference and study in the order of the entries. When poorly trained help is available, it is of course necessary to print or mimeograph a form to be used.
It is as vain to prescribe a propaganda analysis procedure without knowing the user as to prescribe an office filing system while knowing neither the nature of the office nor the kind of files kept. In time of war, subordinate commanders in operational areas will need to keep files at a minimum, while rear echelon or national facilities may be able to keep files of enormous range and thoroughness. In the recording of a large number of propaganda items, however, the material becomes hopelessly unmanageable unless there is some standardized system for organizing it. Mere alphabetization leads inevitably to the question, alphabetization of what?, and the analysis function can be exercised more readily in terms of the sources of propaganda than in terms of its incidental topics.
Identification of Enemy Plans and Situations.
In war, the action sought is something militarily harmful to the enemy—strikes against his production, panic in his population, complaint from his consumers, mistrust from his newspaper readers and radio listeners (resulting in eventual subversive or negative action on their part), surrender of his troops, disunity of his political leadership to be expressed in deadlocks, and so on. In pre-belligerent or peacetime propaganda, the action sought is against the war-making capacity of the audience—against war itself, if the propagandist feels that his own population is in no immediate danger of being infected by defeatism.
Estimating the Enemy's Propaganda Situation.
For example, if the Germans stop talking about rations for Jews (in the World War II situation), it may be that their own people, filled with anti-Semitic poison, have been protesting the issuance of rations. Alternatively, it may mean that the Nazi authorities have just cancelled Jewish rations and are letting the Jews starve or are murdering them overtly. If the Germans follow this up with an item on the poor barley crop, it may be that they are preparing the sentimental and humane listeners in their own audience for the announcement of Jewish starvation. If they run Paris-quisling accounts of Jewish hoarding, and of Jews concealing large quantities of food, it means that they are almost certain to be under pressure to explain their Jewish policies and that, therefore, two factors face the German propagandist: first, he must get ready to announce the attack on the Jews; second, he thinks that the Jewish situation is going to arouse anti-Nazi sentiment even in Germany (if these are German-language programs) and he is therefore compelled to defend something because public opinion is believed by him to be against it. Out of a silence (no further news on rations), a domestic item (poor barley crop), and a foreign item (Paris Jews allegedly hoarding), it is possible to reconstruct a whole situation. The reconstruction may fall, if other interpretations arise, but it provides a starting guess.
The situation of enemy morale is often reportable through propaganda analysis long before it can be described by eyewitnesses. Omissions of attacks on the Church may indicate that the religious problem has become touchy. Failure to attack Communism may mean that the government is seeking a diplomatic deal with a Communist state. Mention of children may refer to the fact that parents complain of cold schools, bad food, absent doctors. Good morale is shown by a quiet tone in propaganda; bad morale is shown by extremes, whether of silence or of great vehemence. It is useful to know what the enemy propagandist thinks he is doing, what he considers the obstacles to his propaganda. Such considerations inevitably get to be embodied in the propaganda itself. A tone of extreme defiance, poor international cooperation, war bluster and so on may often spring from the desire to divert a hungry or discontented home public from its real worries at home to imaginary worries abroad.