Our Defective Propaganda
The Ministry of Information has yet again been the target for criticisms, first at the Labour party conference, and then in a speech by Commander King-Hall. The latter, whatever his other capacities, has himself undoubtedly that of " putting it across," and was talking here of what he knows. But the sins and failures of the M.o.I. in its present phase result less from its personnel than from its constitution. If it is to render anything like the help to our cause which Dr. Goebbels renders to the German, its Minister must possess something like the status that Dr. Goebbels has. That is, his post must be re- garded as the headship of a fighting department not less impor- tant for victory than any of the other three ; and its occupant must be a really leading member of the Government with a seat in the War Cabinet and the closest relations with the Prime Minister. At present, just as the B.B.C. is constantly being blamed for what it has to take as dictated by the M.o.I., so the M.o.I. itself has to hand on what is doled out by the Service Departments. The ways of the latter are often past searching out. Take for instance, the manner in which the naval losses around Crete were announced in successive driblets at consider- able intervals. In itself the driblet method may be defended as preventing the enemy from learning our weaknesses till we have had time to make them good. But, if so, why reserve for the latest driblet the loss of H.M.S. `Hereward.' whose survivors had come ashore and been captured on an Italian-occupied coast? The enemy knew all about it. Why keep the British public in ignorance ?
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