American historians readily accuse National Socialist Germany for 'brainwashing' their citizens with propaganda, yet they ignore the fact they had this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Office_of_War_InformationThe United States Office of War Information (OWI) was a United States government agency created during World War II. The OWI operated from June 1942 until September 1945. Through radio broadcasts, newspapers, posters, photographs, films and other forms of media, the OWI was the connection between the battlefront and civilian communities. The office also established several overseas branches, which launched a large-scale information and propaganda campaign abroad. From 1942 to 1945, the OWI reviewed film scripts, flagging material which portrayed the United States in a negative light, including anti-war sentiment.
You will remember America entered ground combat against Germany in 1942 with Operation Torch:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_TorchOperation Torch (8–16 November 1942) was an Allied invasion of French North Africa during World War II. Torch was a compromise operation that met the British objective of securing victory in North Africa while allowing American armed forces the opportunity to begin their fight against Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy on a limited scale.
About the OWI:
At the onset of World War II, the American public was in the dark regarding wartime information. One American observer noted: "It all seemed to boil down to three bitter complaints...first, that there was too much information; second, that there wasn't enough of it; and third, that in any event it was confusing and inconsistent". Further, the American public confessed a lack of understanding as to why the world was at war, and held great resentment against other Allied Nations. President Roosevelt established the OWI to both meet the demands for news and less confusion, as well as resolve American apathy towards the war.
The OWI's creation was not without controversy. The American public, and the United States Congress in particular, were wary of propaganda for several reasons. First, the press feared a centralized agency as the sole distributor of wartime information. Second, Congress feared an American propaganda machine that could resemble Joseph Goebbels' operation in Nazi Germany (facepalm). Third, previous attempts at propaganda under the Committee on Public Information/Creel Committee during WWI were viewed as a failure. And fourth, the American public favored an isolationist or non-interventionist policy and were therefore hesitant to support a pro-war propaganda campaign targeting Americans.
But in the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor, the need for coordinated and properly disseminated wartime information from the military/administration to the public outweighed the fears associated with American propaganda. President Roosevelt entrusted the OWI to journalist and CBS newsman Elmer Davis, with the mission to take "an active part in winning the war and in laying the foundations for a better postwar world".
About Davis:
In 1928 he [Davis] published the novel Giant Killer, a retelling of the Biblical story of David.
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As Director of the Office of War Information, Davis recommended to Roosevelt that Japanese-Americans be permitted to enlist for service in the Army and Navy and urged him to oppose bills in Congress that would deprive Nisei of citizenship and intern them during the war. He argued that Japanese propaganda proclaiming it a racial war could be combated by deeds that counteracted this. Davis has been termed one of the "unsung forefathers" of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, an all-Nisei combat unit in the war.
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Davis was also instrumental in loosening censorship rules that forbade the publication of images of dead GIs on the battlefield. Until late 1943, the U.S. Office of Censorship permitted the media to publish only images of blanket-covered bodies and flag-draped coffins of dead U.S. soldiers, partly for fear that Americans would be demoralized if they had any graphic understanding of the human price being paid in the war. The government also restricted what reporters could write, and coverage was generally upbeat and bloodless.
Wow, they even had a literal Office of Censorship (more on that later):
The Office of Censorship was an emergency wartime agency set up by the United States federal government on December 19, 1941, to aid in the censorship of all communications coming into and going out of the United States, including its territories and the Philippines. The efforts of the Office of Censorship to balance the protection of sensitive war related information with the constitutional freedoms of the press is considered largely successful.
Moving on:
In conjunction with the War Relocation Authority, the OWI produced a series of documentary films related to the internment of Japanese Americans. Japanese Relocation and several other films were designed by Milton S. Eisenhower to educate the general public on the internment, to counter the tide of anti-Japanese sentiment in the country, and to encourage Japanese-American internees to resettle outside camp or to enter military service. The OWI also worked with camp newspapers to disseminate information to internees.
What a slap in the internees' faces. They probably sanitized the footage to make it look like the inmates were living well.
Davis has some words about his methods for propaganda:
The OWI Bureau of Motion Pictures (BMP) headed by Lowell Mellet worked with the Hollywood movie studios to produce films that advanced American war aims. According to Elmer Davis, "The easiest way to inject a propaganda idea into most people's minds is to let it go through the medium of an entertainment picture when they do not realize that they are being propagandized." Successful films depicted the Allied armed forces as valiant "Freedom fighters", and advocated for civilian participation, such as conserving fuel or donating food to troops.
The Americans even had their own Gleiwitz Incident:
One of the most astounding of all OWI operations occurred in Luxembourg. Known as Operation Annie, the United States 12th Army Group ran a secret radio station from 2:00–6:30 am every morning from a house in Luxembourg pretending to be loyal Rhinelanders under Nazi occupation. They spoke of Nazi commanders hiding their desperate position from the German public, which caused dissent among Nazi supporters. Further, they led Nazi forces into an Allied trap, and then staged an Allied attack on the Annie Radio office to maintain their cover.
Of course, the OWI was not without controversy:
From 1942 to 1945, the OWI's Bureau of Motion Pictures reviewed 1,652 film scripts and revised or discarded any that portrayed the United States in a negative light, including material that made Americans seem "oblivious to the war or anti-war."
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Some of the writers, producers, and actors of OWI programs admired the Soviet Union and were either loosely affiliated with or were members of the Communist Party USA.
All in all, it is reminiscent of the great lengthss taken by Herr Minister Goebbels to disseminate propaganda, though this propaganda (like all Western propaganda) is false.
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