During World War II, radio broadcasts were used to convey military news and to boost morale. Radio was also the perfect medium to spread propaganda to the enemy, with the aim of belittling or demoralising enemy forces and civilian populations.

Broadcasting to other nations was only part of the picture: radio was also vital for gaining an understanding of what was going on in the world. To this end, the Shortwave Listening Post was established in Melbourne in September 1939, to monitor overseas broadcasts from the Japanese and the Germans.¹ The Listening Post was located at 375 Collins Street, Melbourne, with shortwave receivers provided by the Postmaster-General’s Department in a hut at Mont Park.²

By today’s standards, the equipment was poor, with appalling static. Volunteers (monitors) were employed to glean information about events and enemy claims, passing this information on to the authorities. Due to heavy static during the day, the main listening times were in the evening, as atmospheric conditions were usually much better. This meant the volunteers could maintain their paid day jobs and perform unpaid listening duties at night.³

In June 1940 better funding meant four full-time paid monitors could be appointed. The appointees had studied French and German or Italian. A search for a Russian speaker was less successful. The few Germans and Italians with good English and an understanding of the political significance of overseas news and commentaries had mostly been interned at the outbreak of war. Later, refugees who could speak German, who also knew French or Italian, joined the service, including well-educated young German and Austrian Jews.⁴ After Japan’s entry into the war, Japanese, Cantonese and Thai monitors were employed. The monitors also needed shorthand skills to take notes from the broadcasts.⁵

Although the service was run on a shoestring basis, it ran 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in 9 languages.⁶ Through the Listening Post, the Short Wave Division provided war cabinet, service chiefs and Allied Intelligence with a flow of spot news which often scooped all other sources. Twice a day its reports were telegraphed to the Prime Minister, John Curtin, no matter where he was.

A favourite theme of both German and Japanese propaganda was that Australians were being used by their allies to further their own ends, who were totally indifferent to their fate. Exposed to their enemies, Australians were the ‘orphans of the Pacific’. The Japanese claimed that the Australians were doing all the fighting in the Pacific while the Americans were enjoying themselves in the bars of Melbourne and Sydney.⁷

Did Australians listen to enemy propaganda from Berlin and Toyko? Radio Berlin tried to create an audience by broadcasting messages to our region from Australian prisoners of war held in Germany. However, few Australians listened to Berlin, possibly because of the persistent static and the difficulty the announcers had in pronouncing names and place names.

By contrast, Japanese radio had a ready audience in the families and friends of prisoners of war held by the Japanese. After the fall of Singapore, the Japanese captured around 22,000 Australian naval and military personnel. In February 1942, they captured survivors from the sinking of the Australian cruiser Perth and other prisoners taken in New Guinea.

Relatives and friends in Australia had received no information about the prisoners since their capture except for a very little from the Red Cross, so when the Japanese started broadcasting news about these events, relatives and friends in Australia took notice. The Japanese broadcasts were the only source of information on the fate of their loved ones.

Early in the war, four Japanese-controlled radio stations — Radio Batavia, Radio Tokyo, Radio Saigon and Radio Singapore — began broadcasting names and messages from Australian prisoners-of-war and civilian internees. Radio Tokyo told its listeners that they would make every effort to give Australians news of their loved ones, giving advance notice of message times. Radio Saigon and Radio Singapore followed, including messages from some civilian internees. Shanghai Radio read many messages from civilians, while Batavia Radio read lists of names and full-length letters. Some prisoners were allowed by Radio Tokyo to read their own letters. The messages were always interspersed with propaganda, so the monitors always had to be alert.

The messages were usually incorporated into news bulletins or other publicity material. Many messages were about the same length and very concise, suggesting that they may have been completed on Red Cross cards and taken by the Japanese to broadcast on their radio stations. This was certainly an effective strategy to ensure Australian audiences listened in. A great many of the prisoners used their few lines to include names of as many of their mates as possible. An example is:

From Private Michael Doherty, VX27005 [Service number], Lakes Entrance, Victoria. Dear Mum and Dad, I am well. Jim Strachan, Bill Sykes and Joe Dawkins are well too. Love to Betty, Mike.⁸

The monitors struggled against the static to note the names correctly and to record them.

At first, Radio Tokyo included messages for Australia in its American session in the midday news. From September 1944, the station allocated 10 minutes to the reading of British and Australian messages and after 20 October, they increased the sessions to a single half-hour each week devoted entirely to the reading of messages.

Broadcasting prisoner of war messages ensured that Japan was successful in creating a regular audience in Australia. Once word spread that the messages were coming through, relatives and friends of the Australian prisoners started flocking to their radios to confirm reports picked up by neighbours.

In 1942, in response to growing concern at the number of people who were trying to listen to Japanese radio for prisoner of war and internee messages, a sub-committee of the Prime Minister’s Morale Committee was set up to consider the effects of enemy propaganda on Australians. On 3 November 1942, the chairman of the sub-committee, W. Macmahon Ball, stated: ‘It seems reasonable to assume that some tens of thousands of Australian listeners are deeply interested in these broadcasts.’ ⁹

The sub-committee recommended to the Prime Minister that after the Listening Post had recorded and transcribed the messages or letters, they should go to the armed services to have the names checked before being passed on to relatives. They also recommended that authorised broadcast sessions should be made and articles published in the press, to counter the propaganda, while adhering to censorship restrictions.¹⁰

Japanese propaganda was always included in the messages, with stock phrases about the good food and living conditions, although this was far from true. Relatives and friends found details in the messages which proved that they were genuine. Prisoners invented ways of conveying what conditions were really like: one prisoner located in a camp in a lush jungle sent a message quoting part of a line from a well-known hymn: ‘Truly this is a land where every prospect pleases’. The Japanese announcer duly read the line, unaware that the full line of the hymn reads: ‘Truly this is a land where every prospect pleases and only man is vile’.¹¹

The information collected by the Listening Post staff was widely distributed to the appropriate government departments and to all branches of the armed services. Dealing frequently with the Listening Post staff, the External Affairs Department and the Navy Office were always appreciative of their contribution to the war effort. The relatives of the prisoners-of-war who received messages had their hopes raised for at least a year or so. Radio Australia relied greatly on the Listening Post for up-to-date war news in its shortwave broadcasts, enabling it to counter any enemy claims.

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References

1. Ferber, H, 1999, ‘Listening to the enemy: Australia’s shortwave listening post in the Second World War’, Victorian Historical Journal, vol 70, no 1, p 85
2. As above, p 87
3. As above, pp 85-87
4. As above, p 86
5. As above, p 87
6. As above, p 87
7. As above, p 88
8. As above, pp 89-90
9. Meo, L D (1968) Japan’s radio war on Australia 1941-1945, Melbourne University Press, Carlton, Vic, pp 166-67
10. Ferber, H, 1999, ‘Listening to the enemy: Australia’s shortwave listening post in the Second World War’, Victorian Historical Journal, vol 70, no 1, p 85
11. As above, p 91