THE PURPOSE OF PRCPAGANDA [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR]
Sta,—May I, as a journalist who, by education and training, has some knowledge of German mentality, add a short com- ment to the excellent article on " The Purpose of Propaganda " in your issue of last week? Your correspondent writes, with only too much truth, that " the German mind has been so poisoned by false prophets as to be almost impervious to the quiet voice of reason," and goes on to say that " we must stir their emotion."
I suggest that we cannot reach the hearts and feelings of the Germans without first piercing through the thick blanket of lies which has obscured their minds, that this should be one of the main objects of our propaganda, and that it requires much more precisely informed and aggressive methods than those used so far.
Every German official pronouncement should be torn to bits by some equally responsible spokesman on our side, and shown up for the tissue of lies and specious half-truths it in- variably is. Whenever possible—and this would prove to be almost always the case—patent contradictions between these statements and previous ones should be forcibly nailed down. The bombast about Nazi achievements should be countered with incisive demonstrations, proved by official German docu- ments, of the hollowness or sheer mendacity of these pretensions.
Just to show by one example what I mean : Goebbels and his scribes never tire of praising Hitler for the Stahlung, or improvement of public health, brought about by the regime. Now, official German statistics prove that the number of cases of infectious diseases of all kinds has increased considerably in the Reich ; the cases of diphtheria, e.g., have almost doubled, passing from 77,34o in 1933 to 149,424 in t938, and subsequent deaths from 4,837 to 8,329 (in 1936, the last figures available); those of dysentery passed from 2,865 in 1933 to 7,545 in 1937 ; more important still, during this same period, infantile mortality has increased by 12.5 per cent. for boys and 20 per cent. for girls of less than five years of age, and by 25-30 per cent. for those of from five to fifteen years of age.
This is, of course, only one instance, but hundreds, of greater political import, might be found every day. A good beginning was made by Lord Halifax showing up, in his last speech, the " self-encirclement " of Germany, but, as events have shown, much more compelling words are needed to make an impression on German minds, on which English Parlia- mentary eloquence, with its love of circumlocutions, is entirely lost. I am afraid that Goebbels' coarse, uncouth and brutal jeers are much better suited to German mentality than our own more courteous methods, and that, if we want our propaganda to succeed, we shall have to adapt them to it and to make reason speak with a loud, unmistakable voice, for auf einen graben Klotz gehort ein grober Keil!—Yours
Previous page
