Foreign Relations of the United States, 1948, Eastern Europe; The Soviet Union, Volume IV

811.42700(R)/4–2048

The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Smith) to the Secretary of State

[Extracts]

confidential
No. 364

Moscow, April 20, 1948.

The Ambassador refers to the cultural and informational program of the Department and has the honor to forward herewith a technical report and recommendations concerning the transmission of the Voice of America radio programs to the Soviet Union.¹ This report was prepared by Mr. Jean Seymour, radio engineer at Munich, following his temporary assignment to the Embassy from April 7 to 16 for the purpose of testing the signals relayed from Munich and making recommendations for their improvement.

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As for political measures to counter the jamming of the programs, the Embassy believes it would be wise to postpone any action until the interference becomes obnoxious enough to seriously interfere with the intelligibility of the broadcasts. There is the possibility that the interference thus far heard is merely an experiment and that if it fails, for technical reasons, the Soviet authorities may abandon the attempt. In this event it would appear to be better to have ignored the initial jamming. If the present jamming continues for another month, or if it increases in effectiveness, then it is recommended that the fullest possible publicity be given to all the world including the Soviet Union. At that time it would be appropriate to broadcast to the USSR a statement along the lines suggested in the Department’s telegram number 383 of April 7.²

Even if it were technically feasible to jam Soviet broadcasts (jamming those beamed to European countries would be most harmful to Russian interests), the Embassy does not believe it to be wise policy in view of the unfavorable effect it would have on world opinion regarding the unequivocal traditional American stand on freedom of information.

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1. Report not printed. The Embassy in the Soviet Union and the Department of State became concerned in 1948 over the increasingly poor reception of the foreign language radio broadcasts of the Voice of America in the Far East regions of Siberia and in the parts of the Soviet Union nearer to Europe. Some of the trouble was believed to result from deliberate attempts at jamming. It was also believed that some radio stations in the Soviet Union were operating on frequencies too close to those used by the Voice of America, thereby causing interference in the reception of programs. The Embassy recommended the careful investigation of the difficulties, followed by all possible remedial measures to forestall a diminution of the audience listening to the broadcasts. The receptions were closely monitored by the Embassy. By early May the interference was found to be increasing, but still spotty: at times it was largely ineffective; at other times it was strong enough to spoil reception in whole or in part. The Embassy also reported on the growth of attacks against the operations and programs of the Voice of America in newspaper and periodical articles. The technical details, and the notes exchanged, on these vexations are generally to be found in documents in the files of the Department of State under 811.42700(R) and 811.76.
2. Not printed. The Department was considering making a special announcement over the Voice of America to inform its listeners that, because of deliberate attempts at jamming the broadcasts, they might have to search for the programs on different frequencies. The programs in the Russian language would not be curtailed. (811.42700(R)/4–248)