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p An official document entitled "The Mission of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty Broadcasts" states: "As media of news and news analysis, RFE and RL observe high professional standards of accuracy, objectivity, timeliness..." It is further stressed that the broadcasting of these stations "is international in the breadth of its coverage, its freedom from national or sectarian bias, its dedication to the open communication of accurate information and a broad range of democratic ideas".^^1^^

p Reorganization Plan No. 2 of 1977 outlined in a message from President Carter to Congress, dated October 12 the same year, pointed out that "VOA news will be accurate, objective and comprehensive".^^2^^

p The charter of the Deutsche Welle radio station says that it "shall present to listeners abroad a complete picture of political, cultural and economic life in Germany .... The information shall be complete, truthful and objective".^^3^^ The objectives of the BBC are defined in similar terms.

p In practice, however, these radio stations not only fail to observe but grossly violate the principles laid down in their charters.

p The content of the programmes of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty is determined by the political aspirations of Ronald Reagan, who is calling for a crusade against communism and socialism, by their specially selected staff and by their close ties with the CIA and other centres of psychological warfare.

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p Very few people in the West and still fewer in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe believe that the governments of the United States, Great Britain and West Germany spend hundreds of millions to inform the audience in socialist countries through the Voice of America, the BBC, the Deutsche Welle and other radio stations of the major events in the world with the utmost accuracy, objectivity and timeliness.

p In 1978 Robert Daniels, professor of history at the University of Vermont, analysed the work of Radio Liberty, in particular, the quality of its Russian service programmes. In his view "... the overall impact of programming is to give RL the appearance of being an emigre organ beamed at other potential emigres".^^4^^ Professor Maurice Friedberg, chairman of the department of Slavic languages and literatures of the University of Illinois, who also took part in the survey, felt that "the very hostile tone of some of the programmes" should be changed.

p The New York Times, which also made inquiries into what RFE and RL were beaming to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe stressed in its editorial of April 1, 1977:

p “In recent years, the Congress has openly funded the two stations and allowed them to continue, under tighter policy regulations, to focus on the domestic affairs and debates of the Communist nations...”^^5^^

p In May 1984 Theodore Stanger, the Bonn bureau chief of the Newsweek magazine, met James L. Buckley, President of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, "to discuss whether the hard-line anti-communism of the Administration has affected the objectivity and the long-term mission of RFE-RL". Stanger pointed out in particular that "...your broadcasters are refugees and they have deep personal interests in what’s going on back home". Didn’t that pose a built-in objectivity problem?⁶ Buckley agreed that such people "can become emotional”.

p Senator William Fulbright has said that Radios Free Europe and Liberty were simply a part of a system—a system of falsehood and deception, a system of conspiracies aimed at misleading not only the American people but anyone who would listen.

p It is a fact that the audiences of RFE and RL are steadily shrinking. According to reports in the US press, although it is very difficult to say how many people actually listen to these stations, the general opinion is that the number of their listeners is quite small.

p But no sooner had Radio Liberty staff included in their broadcasts several programmes on historical subjects which 64 were presented more or less objectively in an effort to attract more listeners, than there came a peremptory admonition, this time from observer Jack Anderson who pointed out in The Washington Post on April 14, 1981 that the federally funded broadcasters "echoed the Soviet line... Whether these broadcasts are the result of sabotage or merely stupidity is not clear. But an eyes-only memo charges that the station’s Russianlanguage broadcasts ’are damaging not only to Radio Liberty’s reputation but also to the US interest as a whole’. ...Some broadcasts are openly .anti-democratic and anti-Western, such as several criticizing the ’political freedom’ of Western Europe as responsible for the persistence of terrorism.”

p The memo, titled bluntly "Radio Liberty Russian-Service Broadcasts Damaging to the United States", was prepared for the Board for International Broadcasting, which oversees the station.

p The memo’s author "found that American management has lost effective control" over the radio station’s activity. "He recommended that an American ’with the requisite linguistic, political and historical background’ be named director of Radio Liberty, a post that has been vacant for 34 of the last 44 months.”^^7^^

p This particular columnist is clearly not in the least concerned that broadcasting should observe the standards of "reliability, authority, accuracy and objectivity," of which the bosses of the Western mass media talk so much.

p Jack Anderson did not reveal anything startling in his column. He only stressed once again the strict conformity of Radio Liberty’s policy concerning information and propaganda with the policy of the US Administration. Contrary to the claim quoted by Anderson, "American management" has never lost "effective control" over the work of the radio station. As for the causes of the "serious anomalies" in the activity of RL, which is equally true of RFE, they are much more fundamental and far-reaching than Jack Anderson and some other advocates of a hard-line policy towards the USSR and East European countries claim them to be.

p The theoretical and practical specialists of US radio propaganda and psychological warfare believe that the real reasons for the low level of effectiveness of programmes beamed to socialist countries are quite different.

p They include, above all, the lack of inspiring ideals in the West. John B. Whitton, the Princeton University professor, writes:

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p “A major criticism, often heard, of our programme in the field of information and propaganda is the failure to formulate a definite, conscious purpose. ... In contrast, the communist bloc appears to know just where it is going." Whitton goes on to quote Lasswell, who wrote in 1942: "Slogans like the ’Four Freedoms’ are not enough unless they are completed by slogans that point to the operating rules of a society that puts freedom into practice. We are in a war of ideas, but we have not found our ideas." And Whitton continues: "This is as true today in the Cold War. Our policy has been too negative, its programmes and slogans almost always a mere response, or reaction, to the more imaginative initiatives of the Soviets.”^^8^^ In addition Whitton stresses that "...the rich and powerful United States has offered no inspirational ideal or positive social programme"^^9^^.

p George Allen, former USIA Director, has written:

p "In the eyes of the world, the United States is ’Mr. Rich’. Everyone already knows that we have the highest standard of living in the world. The more we tell them about it, the more we aggravate the problem. Three-fourths (one may say ninetenths) of the people of the world are poor. ...We talk a good deal about evolution instead of revolution ... but the miserably poor want to turn the world upside down—today. They regard the United States as basically in favour of the status quo. All rich people are supposed to be that way.

p “More significant, perhaps, is the fact that Moscow is regarded by most of the poor people around the world as the friend of the poor and of the rebel... In a nation motivated by revolutionary fervour, including countries which have recently become independent and those undergoing rapid social change, there is great enthusiasm for planning for the future. Five, seven, and ten-year plans are popular. People are told to sacrifice present living standards for future benefits to the nation and to their children. Emphasis on consumer goods for the present generation seems disloyal, unpatriotic, and even immoral. ...Russians, who are pictured as sacrificing themselves today for the benefit of their children of tomorrow, are somehow regarded as more admirable than profligate Americans.”^^10^^

p The attractive force of the Soviet Union’s ideas in foreign countries and the United States’ lack of such ideas was commented upon by the Time magazine, which wrote on March 9, 1981:

p “The difference has caused, observers say, the American image to be capitalistic, imperial, and elitist while the Soviets 66 are perceived as ‘pro-people’.”^^11^^ Robert Goheen, former US Ambassador to India, who was born in India, told a Time correspondent:

p “The Soviets have created an image of a country that is non-threatening and supportive of India. Because of a record of more than 30 years, Soviet ships in the Indian Ocean are perceived as benign, whereas American ships raise the threat of a superpower confrontation.”^^12^^

p Many US propaganda experts believe that one way out of this situation should be the replacement in American propaganda material of such words as “capitalism” and “ imperialism” which are unpopular with the peoples of the world with words like "private property" and "free enterprise" and the dropping from the vocabulary of such words as “socialism” and “communism” and their derivatives. Back in 1964, for instance, C. L. Sulzberger wrote in The New York Times:

p “A research report of the United States Information Agency has ruefully discovered that the more our propaganda advertises the virtues of ‘capitalism’ and attacks ‘Socialism’, the less the world likes us. It is small comfort to argue that what we mean by these words is different from what most foreigners mean. Confused semantics make bad public relations.

p “Having analysed conclusions of its poll-takers in both hemispheres, the USIA study observes: ’Capitalism is evil. The United States is the leading capitalist country. Therefore the United States is evil.’ It would be difficult to exaggerate the harm that this line of thinking has done. ...

p “Capitalism is a dirty word to millions of non-Marxists who see ‘Socialism’ as vaguely benevolent. When the USIA sampled foreign opinion it found that to the majority ‘Socialism’ did not mean government ownership and was not necessarily related to Communism. Rather it seemed to imply a system favouring welfare of common people.

p “Most foreigners apparently don’t regard ‘capitalism’ as descriptive of an efficient economy or a safeguard of individual rights. To them it means little concern for the poor, unfair distribution of wealth and undue influence of the rich. ...

p “USIA found an impressive percentage of the British, West Germans, Italians, Japanese, Mexicans and Brazilians have a favourable opinion of ‘Socialism’ and a strongly unfavourable opinion of ‘capitalism’. ...

p “ ‘Capitalism’, abroad, is frequently a pejorative word. Efforts to purge it of negative connotations by phrases like ’people’s capitalism’ have failed.

p “But ‘Socialism’ is chic. ...

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p “Leopold Senghor of Senegal says ’Socialism is a sense of community which is a return to Africanism’. Julius Nyerere of Tanganyika insists ’no underdeveloped country can afford to be anything but “Socialist”’. Tunisia’s Habib Bourguiba claims Mohammed’s companions ’were Socialists before the invention of the word’.

p “The study concludes that foreigners attribute to the USA ’a high degree of capitalist exploitation and of capitalist power over the society as a whole, as well as (USIA’s own italics) a great absence of those social welfare measures which, to them, are the decisive criterion of Socialism’.’"*^^3^^

p Former USIA director, George Allen, also did not deny that this verbal device could change the situation and make US propaganda not only more affirmative but also more attractive. He admitted that "... when we say ’private enterprise’ to a Latin American he immediately thinks our real aim is to help American firms increase their operations in Latin America. ... Moreover, it is not helpful for VGA and other United States communications media to use capitalistic phraseology in talking with Latin Americans. ... Here again, we must be realists. The word ‘capitalism’ and the phrases which go with it are not good image-producing symbols for us in Latin America.”^^14^^

p This conclusion was later accepted and vigorously acted upon by all mass media not only in the United States but in most other capitalist countries. Such terms and concepts as “imperialism”, “capitalism”, "class struggle", “exploitation”, “communism”, “socialism”, "socialist democracy" and so on were banished from the political propaganda vocabulary of the Western radio services. At the same time the propagandists and specialists in psychological warfare in the West change or distort the real meaning of a term or concept. For example, the concept "national-liberation movement" has been replaced by the word “terrorism”.

p When he declared "ideological war" on the socialist community President Reagan found himself virtually unarmed. All the exertions made by Western philosophers, sociologists and economists to advance ideas or theories which would be constructive and consistent enough to stand up to Communist ideology—the theory of scientific Communism—were futile. The theories of "industrial society", "postindustrial society", "consumer society" and "technotron society," which were evolved in the late 1950s and 1960s, all met with failure. The economic crises of the 1970s and the early 1980s finally put to rest the myths about "economic stages" and "industrial society”.

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p The 1980s have seen the further crumbling of all structures of capitalist society. The ideological crisis holds a special place in this process. The objective logic of capitalist development relentlessly raises questions to which bourgeois ideology can no longer find the answers. As the Italian political scientist C. Mongardini writes in his article "Ideological Change and Neoliberalism", "...ideology loses its primitive innovative force. It has, in effect, already given all that it could give to the development of society: it has finished modifying reality. On the contrary, it is reality in the phase of decline which begins to modify the ideology.”^^15^^

p Capitalist ideology comes into conflict with reality and this, as C. Mongardini puts it, causes "... the changes in attitudes of the new generation, which seems increasingly more doubtful about progress as we have seen it and increasingly more sceptical about a world order that is rationally comprehensible"^^16^^.

p Similar pessimistic conclusions were made by Richard Loewenthal, the well-known right-wing theoretician of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, who wrote, in particular:

p “The crisis of Western culture... should be viewed, along with the crisis of the West’s position in the world and the ecological crisis, as the third deep (modern) historical crisis born of the destructive consequences of Western society’s dynamics.”

p The degradation of bourgeois democracy, the collapse of illusions regarding civil rights and freedoms, the loss by the traditional bourgeois parties of the political trust of the masses and the colossal scale of corruption are some of the facts testifying that bourgeois ideology has no solid basis.

p Today bourgeois ideology is also in conflict with man’s moral values. Paul Johnson, a British political scientist and former editor of the New Statesman magazine, who is the author of numerous books and a convinced advocate of capitalism, wrote disconsolately in the conclusion to his article characteristically titled "Is There a Moral Basis for Capitalism? Dissenting Thoughts in a Collectivist Age": "It takes nerves these days to suggest there can be a moral basis for capitalism, let alone to argue that capitalism provides, on the whole, the best economic structure for man’s moral fulfilment.”^^17^^

p Robert Dallek, professor of history at the University of California, wrote in his substantial study Ronald Reagan. The Politics of Symbolism that Reagan’s anti-Soviet attitude arises from inner conservative tensions about government authority and social change. "For Ronald Reagan the world outside the 69 United States is little more than an extension of the world within...

p “In the eyes of Reagan and other conservatives, the communism of the Soviet Union represents the end point, the logical culmination of dangerous currents—big government, atheism and relaxed moral standards...”^^18^^

p Reagan has strengthened the President’s power, curtailed the democratic rights of American citizens, expanded the practice of state interference in their private lives and filled the ideological vacuum with brute force and ideas which nourish the aggressive nature of the country’s foreign policy and militant anti-communism. Many political scientists in the West regard as dangerous for the future of the entire world Reagan’s attempts to promote militant anti-Sovietism and anticommunism to the level of official US ideology. These attempts are aimed at fomenting fear of, and hatred for, the USSR. The US Administration eagerly snatches at every opportunity to throw dirt at the Soviet Union, to present it in a negative light.

p Their unappealing objectives and lack of ideas are compensated by the Western mass media and special services, especially the foreign language radio services of the United States, with sophisticated propaganda devices and new methods of psychological warfare. An example of such activities is given in an excerpt from the book The Man Who Kept the Secrets. Richard Helms & the CIA written by Thomas Powers:

p Frank Wisner, Deputy Director for Operations, CIA (1952- 1958), "built his propaganda apparatus into a large but delicate instrument which he called his ’mighty Wurlitzer’.  [69•*  In its overt, white version it consisted mainly of two huge radio operations based in Germany, Radio Liberation (after 1956, Radio Liberty),which broadcast to Russia in fourteen languages, and Radio Free Europe, which broadcast to the satellite countries. They provided the bass notes; the treble was played by propaganda assets throughout the world, from CIAfunded newspapers in English and other languages to local publishers, editors, and reporters who could be counted upon to plant CIA stories from time to time. ...Wisner’s boast was that he could sit down at his mighty Wurlitzer and play just about any tune he liked, from eerie horror music (Moscow is planning a purge of the Western parties!!!) to light fantasias.”^^19^^

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p The chief aspects of this broadcasting activity are misinformation, deceit and attempts to instill mistrust in the ideals of socialism and communism and foment national discord and religious prejudices. A parallel course of action entails ignoring, distorting or belittling the achievements scored by socialist countries in the social, scientific, cultural and other spheres. Every effort is made to put stress on the shortcomings and negative aspects by playing up facts taken from the press and radio broadcasts of socialist countries.

p US radio stations broadcasting to other countries have completely abandoned what seems to be their primary task: keeping the listeners informed about life in the United States. They hasten first of all to talk about Soviet domestic and foreign policy in all seriousness and in a manner which is repellent to many Soviet listeners.

p The activity of US radio stations is a vivid example of US interference in the internal affairs of the Soviet Union:

p (a) by focusing the attention of the audience on the difficulties and problems of the Soviet Union’s economic development, by exaggerating them out of all proportion, by giving their own interpretation of measures aimed at strengthening the social and public order in the country, these radio services display their open intention, as instructed by the US Administration, to awaken in the Soviet people an acute sense of dissatisfaction, discontent with the existing state of affairs and on this basis to discredit the system of government in the USSR and incite dissent;

p (b) by giving moral support to dissidents in the Soviet Union, providing them with false information and promoting anti-Soviet arguments, the radio stations seek to enlist the sympathy of broad circles in the West for them and thus exert influence on public opinion in the USSR in ways which run counter to its national interests;

p (c) by saturating their programmes with the summaries or verbatim reports of statements made by opponents of the economic and political system in the USSR, the radio stations infringe upon the sovereign right of the Soviet authorities to determine their own domestic policy.

p The American radio stations address their subversive propaganda not to the Soviet people, who reject them and would not listen to them, but to a negligible and alien group of dissidents. The so-called "civil rights movement" in the USSR was not generated in the course of social development or by any essential needs but was conceived by US intelligence 71 experts at Langley and inspired by outside efforts for purposes hostile to the Soviet Union.

p The Russian language services of Radio Liberty and the Voice of America speak put against the internationalist friendship and unity of the Soviet peoples and endeavour to sow the seeds of national discord, alienation and enmity under the cover of appeals for national identity, independence and sovereignty.

p The prevalence, for instance, of topics concerning the Soviet Union, especially domestic matters, in the programmes of Radio Liberty and the Voice of America, prepared and presented with the help of emigres, turncoats, defectors, renegades, war criminals and other “experts” hostile to the Soviet Union, proves the deliberate intention of the programme-writers to make the fullest possible use of the opportunities offered by radio broadcasting to undermine the unity of Soviet society and discredit the Soviet social system. This is the purpose, for instance, of programmes about socalled dissidents, the "persecution of Jews", discrimination against believers and other slanderous reports about the alleged violation of human rights in the Soviet Union. This manner of broadcasting is especially typical of Radio Liberty.

p This has been confirmed, in particular, by a report to Congress of the General Accounting Office dated March 2, 1981, which stated that the station’s monitoring department recorded in 1979 alone 335 instances when its broadcasts contained false information; provocative statements, appeals for desertion, downright slander and scandalous rumours. The GAO prepared memoranda for the US Administration on the basis of these facts, one of which, for instance, described the tone of a certain programme as instigative. Radio Liberty continued to broadcast the same kind of “information” in the years following, especially after Reagan’s advent to the White House.

p Of late the broadcasters of Radio Liberty, acting in accordance with the recommendations and instructions of the US special services, have been increasingly provocative in their insinuations, openly instigating listeners to violate Soviet law.

p For example, on May 5, 1983, a Radio Liberty programme in Ukrainian incited Soviet citizens to perform religious rites in public places, where they would interfere with the normal pace of life and inconvenience the majority of people contrary to Soviet laws which limit the performance of religious rites to their appropriate places such as churches, chapels, temples, etc.

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p In its coverage of events in Afghanistan, the Voice of America spreads misinformation by way of false "on-the-spot reporting". For instance, Robert Fisk, a correspondent of the Times (London), while reporting from Kabul in February 1980, heard a VOA broadcast from Washington, D.C. The announcer said that fierce fighting was going on at the Bela Hissar Fort in the centre of Kabul where Afghan soldiers were in conflict with Soviet troops. Fisk, with a clear view of the area from his hillside hotel balcony, saw this scene: "...there was no smoke or fire, no sound of car horns from the city’s traffic. Nor was there fighting. The Bela Hissar was peaceful. There were no Soviet troops to be seen and the Afghan army was evidenced only by a soldier drinking tea in the main street... Not to put too fine a point on it, the Voice of America was talking rubbish.”^^20^^

Nevertheless, the Reagan Administration and the Board for International Broadcasting think that the radio propaganda conducted by Radio Liberty against the peoples of the Soviet Union is not sufficiently aggressive, hard-hitting and insistent.