800.20293/5
The Third Secretary of Embassy in China (Service) to the Ambassador in China (Gauss)18
I. Introduction
The phraseology of the Department’s telegram19 is rather broad: It requests “a brief description of the chief propaganda, psychological warfare and morale agencies operating in Free China”.
[Page 203]It is assumed that this refers to Chinese agencies having headquarters in Free China but possibly also carrying on work in occupied territories or abroad.
Accordingly, I have made no attempt to describe foreign propaganda efforts in China—now being conducted openly and officially (with Chinese cooperation) by American, British and Russian agencies, and possibly (but necessarily very much under cover) by the Axis countries. I have also omitted Chinese Communist activity which, outside of the Special Border Area in North Shensi and some of the North China guerrilla districts, is extremely limited and must be conducted in secrecy.
Difficulty of Obtaining Information
The situation as regards work of propaganda type is extremely complex. Organizations and agencies doing (or intended to do) propaganda, psychological warfare, or morale work are numerous and redundant. There are no comprehensive published reports of their work or organizational set-up. And the general Chinese attitude, especially since most of the organizations involved belong to either the Army or the Party, is one of secrecy and distrust of foreign inquisitiveness.
Mr. F. M. Fisher of the Foreign Information Service of the United States, attached to this Embassy, has remarked that although the subject is one in which he has been interested since coming to Chungking as a press correspondent eighteen months ago—and especially so during the past six months that he has been engaged in the promotion of American propaganda and psychological warfare work in China—he has been unable to get from the Chinese, with whom he must coordinate his own work, any clear idea of the scope, organization and activity of their agencies in this field.
II. Background
A description of Chinese propaganda and related work requires as background a brief consideration of recent political history and the present political, social and economic situation in China.
The first of these is the Kuomintang dictatorship. This has given the party a monopoly of all propaganda, even within the Army. Education is frankly identified with propaganda.* The press is controlled. [Page 204] All propaganda takes on a political character, and the strengthening and perpetuation of the Kuomintang’s position becomes one of its primary objectives.
A second, but related, factor is the situation growing out of the break-down of the “united front”. The truce with the Chinese Communists and other left-wing elements, made after the Sian incident at the end of 1936, became genuine and apparently whole-hearted cooperation in the early stage of the war with Japan. That conflict provided a powerful rallying force. There was real effort to arouse and unite the people, and great activity in propagandizing and organizing guerrilla operations in the areas close to and under Japanese occupation. In this spontaneous outburst of enthusiastic war work, the country’s leading writers and artists (most of them left-wing) and the Communists took a major part. Many people—even within the present government—look back on this period as that of the government’s greatest efficiency and effectiveness.
For reasons which need not be discussed in detail here, there was a reaction which dates roughly from the moving of the government away from Hankow in the Fall of 1938. The Kuomintang apparently became jealous of the growing influence of the Communists and subjected them and the left-wing to a growing repression which, culminating in the clash with the New Fourth Army, has led to the present situation of suspicion and near hostilities. The effect was to kill much of the active, creative propaganda work which was being done and to give Kuomintang propaganda a strong anti-Communist bias.† To certain sections of the Party, combatting Communism became an important, if not the most important, part of propaganda work. The vitality and vigor of anti-Japanese propaganda and psychological warfare activity has declined since this time.
A third factor is the effect of general war-weariness and economic difficulties. After five years of war there has come an inevitable letdown of morale and enthusiasm. The capital is now located far from the almost inactive fighting fronts. Communication and transportation are extremely difficult. Supplies are difficult to obtain—even paper and printing present great problems. Inflation has brought a tremendous increase in costs. The result is that many organizations, which for a time did more or less effective work, have greatly reduced their activity or become moribund.
A recent development greatly affecting propaganda work among Chinese in the occupied areas and abroad was the seizure by the Japanese in December, 1941, of the foreign settlements at Shanghai and Tientsin and the capture of Hong Kong and “south sea” cities. [Page 205] In all of these places there was a Kuomintang subsidized press and extensive propaganda and secret service activity, some of which might be considered a psychological warfare against the Japanese and their puppets. Immediately after occupation by the Japanese, the persons engaged in this work were arrested or forced to flee. As a result, work in the occupied areas is admittedly at an almost complete standstill.
A fifth factor, mentioned because it adds to the difficulty of a clear survey, is the Chinese tendency to multiply organizations without limiting their functions or unifying their control. We find that almost every department in the government and major Party organization has its own propaganda or publicity branch. And despite the original complexity of the Government-Party structure, there has been a tendency, as the war progressed and new situations arose, to superimpose on the existing framework new and often vaguely defined organizations. For instance, the recently established National General Mobilization Council has a “Culture Branch”, presumably to initiate and coordinate propaganda in support of the national mobilization effort. The steady bureaucratic growth seems, in many cases, to have increased confusion, divided responsibility and reduced initiative and effectiveness.
III. General Summary
Considering only the main propaganda agencies, we find the field divided, generally speaking, among four organizations:
The Central Publicity Board works throughout the country but its special sphere is the civilian population in the non-fighting zone referred to by Chinese as the “rear area”. Through its foreign department it also engages in propaganda abroad and controls news going-out of China. Its propaganda objectives are governed by the fact that it is strictly a Kuomintang organization and there are indications that it does not very effectively reach the great uneducated mass of the people, especially the rural masses.
The Political Board is a department of the country’s supreme military organization whose special field is propaganda, morale building and political indoctrination of the troops. Considerable importance is given to its work and it is under rather reactionary political control.
The War Area Party Affairs Commission is an independent agency under the military command nominally charged with propaganda and political work in the fighting and guerrilla zones but actually most concerned in checking the spread of Communist influence there. Inertia and other factors are reported to have greatly reduced its effectiveness.
The Overseas Board is a Kuomintang agency for political work among the Chinese colonies abroad. It seeks to inform them of China’s “war of resistance,” to win their active support, and to combat any influence of Japanese puppet and non-Kuomintang elements. Its work has been greatly reduced by the course of the war.
In summary, it may be said that propaganda work among at least the educated and the troops, though political in character, is fairly extensive.
The principal psychological warfare agencies are:
- The Central Publicity Board and
- The Political Board, both mentioned above.
It appears, however, that their efforts have been desultory and on a small scale, and that little work of this nature is being done at the present time.
The chief morale agencies appear to be:
- The New Life Movement and associated organizations
- The Spiritual Mobilization Movement
- The Political Board, mentioned above, and
- The National Troop Comforting Association
None of these appears at the present time to have much influence among the population as a whole. The New Life Movement, originally intended to be a mass movement, has turned to several rather restricted fields of social service connected with the war. The Spiritual Mobilization Movement is practically moribund. The work of the Political Board is extensive but limited to the Army. The National Troop Comforting Association is likewise limited to the Army and has no continuous program.
[Here follows a detailed description of the agencies mentioned above.]
- Copy transmitted to the Department by the Ambassador in China in his despatch No. 540, July 24; received September 11.↩
- No. 471, June 3, 1 p.m., not printed.↩
- The Ministry of Education might with justification be called the most important and extensive propaganda agency. This is borne out in numerous public statements such as the recent broadcast by the Minister of Education, Ch’en Li-fu, to the occupied territory emphasizing the importance of “San Min Chu I education” of children and youth. The Ministry does not seem to be directly within the field of this survey but its own concept of its mission, its strong political and nationalistic character, and its influence, through selection of textbooks and control of primary, secondary, and to a slightly lesser extent of higher education, should be noted. [Footnote in the original.]↩
- See, for instance, the Embassy’s despatch no. 478 of June 22, 1942, on the subject: “Anti-Communist Propaganda”. [Footnote in the original.]↩