History That Doesn't Suck - 206: American Propaganda: Cap’s Debut, Capra’s War Docs, and Casablanca

Episode Date: May 22, 2026

“Will young, freewheeling American boys take the iron discipline of wartime? … In my judgment the answer is Yes! ... if the answers they get are worth fighting and dying for.” This is the story of propaganda on the home front.  The word “propaganda” has some messy connotations, but it’s fundamentally about pushing a narrative, which can be good or evil. Leaders on all sides of the war thought about how to spur the populace to join in the war effort, and in America, it fell to entertainers and artists to really rally the nation to war.  They utilized every form imaginable: films, comics, cartoons, posters, anything. Movie and comedy stars put on road shows for soldiers. Animation studios enlisted beloved cartoon figures like Donald Duck and Bugs Bunny to sell war bonds, and even invented the hilariously inept Private Snafu to teach soldiers what NOT to do. Captain America, on the other hand, was born ready to punch Hitler’s lights out. We’ll also cover that unassailable masterpiece, Casablanca, as well as some propaganda aimed at US soldiers from the other side: the siren known as “Tokyo Rose.”  ____ Connect with us on HTDSpodcast.com and preorder Prof. Jackson’s new book go deep into episode bibliographies and book recommendations join discussions in our Facebook community get news and discounts from The HTDS Gazette  come see a live show get HTDS merch or become an HTDS premium member for bonus episodes and other perks. HTDS is part of Audacy media network. Interested in advertising on the History That Doesn't Suck? Contact Audacyinc.com. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey, Professor Jackson here. As we approach America's 250th, many may feel our hyper-partisan discord means that the Republic is failing, but I see it differently. Though our divisions are tough, they're not new, and I argue, prove the American experiment works. My new book, Been There and Done That explores how historical challenges, fake news, contested elections, and political violence are familiar. It's a candid yet hopeful history, showing how past principles can't.

guide us toward a still more perfect union. The book publishes June 16th. Pre-order now from your preferred retailer. Details are at hdspodcast.com slash book. And thank you for supporting HDDS. This episode is brought to you by FedEx. These days, the power move isn't having a big metallic credit card to drop on the check at a corporate lunch.

The real power move is leveling up your business with FedEx intelligence. and accessing one of the biggest data networks powered by one of the biggest delivery networks. Level up your business with FedEx, the new power move. It's early in the still dark morning on an unspecified day in June, 1942, and Norman Rockwell is lying in his bed at home in Arlington, Vermont. His wife is sleeping soundly. But Norman? Not at all. The lanky, thin-haired painter and illustrator is tossing and turning, suffering as creative minds are want to do, as he obsesses over an idea that's so close to perfect, but just not there.

You know, let's allow the tortured artist to wrestle with his mental demons for a minute, while I give you some background. Here's the deal. Norman Rockwell and his likewise illustrator buddy, Mead Schaefer, or Shafe, as Norman calls him, both want to do their part in the war effort. But they aren't young men. They were born in the 1890s. Yeah, the previous century. So enlisting isn't the answer. But that's fine. Both feel they can contribute more with a paintbrush than a gun.

They want to produce some war-supporting posters for Uncle Sam. And Norman has an idea. He wants to bring to life those four freedoms that President Franklin Roosevelt proclaimed in his annual message on January 6, 1941. The Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, and Freedom from Fear. Yes, I'm sure it sounds familiar. We heard that speech in Episode 189, and FDR used these four freedoms as his basis for pushing Americans to build that British supporting arsenal of democracy that he had called for but a week before that. They surfaced again later that same year, 1941, in August, when FDR and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill,

issued their Atlantic Charter, which Norman has been contemplating. He sees protecting these cherished freedoms as America's reason for fighting, and he wants to convey that in art. But how? How does one make something as abstract as different concepts of freedom, a concrete visual in his style, his illustrative realism? This is his thing, but getting it right, that's what has him tossing and turning. But enough background.

Let's get back to our famed illustrator. It's now about three in the morning. Suddenly, Norman shoots up like a rocket as an idea strikes him. And that idea is his dear neighbor, Jim Edgerton. At a recent town meeting, nearly everyone supported a proposal to build a new school. Everyone except Jim. He was brave enough to stand and speak against the popular measure. And likewise, the rest of Arlington's citizens were brave enough to hear him out.

No one shouted him down. They let him speak. And now, at 3 a.m., with a war raging that raises questions of whether democracy and its attendant values are worth defending, this memory of a simple town meeting hits Norman-like lightning. This, this is his illustration of the freedom of speech. Simply a man standing and speaking as his fellow citizens sit and hear him out. That's the visual. And surely, this is the answer for all four freedoms.

Illustrate the ways in which his little town in Vermont quietly lives and enjoys these very freedoms every day. Filled with energy, Norman charges down the stairs. He's got to call Schafe and share his epiphany. No, wait. It's 3 a.m. Can't place a call at this hour. He'd disturb all the other households on Schafe's party line.

He'll have to do this in person. Dashing outside, the gangly illustrator grabs his bike and rides down the country road to Sheaf's house. Ripped from his slumber, Shafe comes to the door and as the two carry on with their pre-dawn chat, he's filled with just as much excitement as Norman. Yes, this communicates what America is about and what America is fighting to preserve. In following days, Norman makes an initial sketch of all four freedoms. He and Sheaf traveled to Washington, D.C., where they offer their drawings as posters to the U.S. government. Now, according to Norman, the Office of War Information flatly rejects him in Schafe, saying the OWI plans instead, quote, to use fine artmen, real artists, close quote.

Whether this is true will later be debated, but what we do know is this. Ben Hibbs at the Saturday Evening Post loves the Four Freedoms concept, and after six weeks, grueling months of starts and stops. Norman delivers four oil paintings. One of a family gathered around the Thanksgiving table as a grandmother places a large turkey on it. The freedom from want. One of a mother lovingly tucking in soundly sleeping children, clearly unfettered by the horrors the onlooking father was just reading about in the newspaper still in his hand with a headline about bombings. The freedom from fear. One of earnest contemplating faces and clasped hands, but from different faiths, as indicated by a rosary in one and a book in another,

the freedom of worship. And finally, a man standing in a crowded town hall, his lips parted in speech as the seated audience listens respectfully. Yes, Norman's 3 a.m. Epiphany, now on campus, the freedom of speech. Welcome to History That Doesn't Suck. I'm your professor, Greg Jackson, and I'd like to tell you a story. Published by the Post between February and March 1943, Norman Rockwell's Four Freedoms proved to be his most famous works. Moreover, with American troops coming off of grueling fighting on Guadalcanal in the Pacific, and still eating sand in their fight against the desert fox in North Africa,

Norman's timing couldn't have been better. His striking oils are a vivid reminder of what this war is about, and serve as morale-boosting healing bomb. Government agencies and publishers alike produce millions of reprints, while the Treasury Department sends the original oil paintings on tour, raising what Norman reports to be $132,992,539 worth of war bonds. Yes, Norman, I think you can and did contribute more to the U.S. war effort with a paintbrush than a gun.

That is some fine profit. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hold up. Norman Rockwell? Propaganda? Okay, before you come at me with a pitchfork, like an American Gothic farmer, I assure you, I love Norman Rockwell's work. But how do I enjoy art that I'm also calling propaganda? Let's take a step back. What exactly is propaganda? Let's start with the propaganda master who makes our skin crawl the most. Dr. Joseph Goebbels. We met this Nazi with a PhD in literature back in episode 184, and in 1929 he gave this definition. Propaganda has only one object to conquer the masses. Every means that furthers this aim is good. Every means that hinders it is bad.

Okay, and just who or what are the masses? Well, he clarifies this in his 1934 book, bow for Berlin, in which he adds that, masses are unformed stuff. Only in the hands of the political artists do the masses become a people, as a people, a nation. For Dr. Goebbels then, propaganda is the narrative that forges a nation, and good and evil aren't questions of truth, but whether the narrative serves the cause. Yeah, gross. Conversely, director of the U.S. Office of war information, Elmer Davis. Yes, the same agency Norman Rockwell claims passed on his four freedoms posters, believes that his agency's job is to tell the truth. He believes in relying on

entertainment, because when people watch a movie, quote, they do not realize that they are being propagandized, close quote. I posit that all of this is true. Propaganda can and has been used to do great evil. But at its core, propaganda isn't about pushing good or or evil. It's about pushing a narrative, which may be good or evil. And just because we might like or agree with the narrative being shared, like, say, that fighting for a democracy is right, that doesn't make it not propaganda. And so, today's tale is America's World War II propaganda, its narrative rallying the nation to war. To that end, we'll read a comic about a new superhero, ready to sock a lay off in The Kisser.

We'll catch up with an old director friend of ours from past episodes using the silver screen to explain why we fight. And then, using Entertainment the OWI Way, we'll head to a beautiful movie palace to see one of my favorite films, Casablanca. And spoiler alert, I will give away the ending, but if you haven't seen this over 80-year-old movie by now, sorry, that's on you. After Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman steal our hearts, we'll see what Bugs Bunny and Donald Duck are up to.

Meet a zany joke of a soldier, teaching U.S. servicemen what not to do by, in fact, doing it all wrong, then encounter propaganda aimed at U.S. soldiers but created by the axis. These would be the broadcasts of that Siren of the Pacific Radio Waves, Tokyo Rose. Finally, we'll wrap all of this up with a little reflection on American propaganda as a whole. Hoof, posters, comics, film, radio, we've got a lot of ground to cover. So let's get to it, and we do so by heading back to shortly before the U.S. joined this second World War. Rewind. As we know from episodes 188 and 189, late 1930s to early 1940s Americans are divided people when it comes to World War II.

On the one hand, the America First Committee advocates for not getting sucked into a another European war, for isolationism. On the other are those aligned with President Franklin Roosevelt who believe that the nation must support the already-out-war British in their fight against a continent goblin dictator. But FDR isn't waging this pre-Purl Harbor war of opinion alone. As Germany, Italy and Japan wreak havoc, American artists working in various mediums, can't help but join the fight. The first explicitly anti-Nazi work to grace the same. The first explicitly anti-Nazi work to grace the silver screen is the Warner Brothers film Confessions of a Nazi Spy. Made at the behest of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, the movie is a fictionalized telling of a nonetheless real Nazi spiring uncovered

in New York. It's a bold movie to make in this still isolationist year of 1939, bold enough that arsons puts some theaters showing it to the flame. But comedy actor Groucho Marx has nothing but respect for the brave filmmakers behind it. He declares, I want to propose a toast to warners, the only studio with any guts. This is only the start of a flood of anti-Nazi works that followed the invasion of Poland that September. In January 1940, the Three Stooges portray and mock Adolf Hitler in their short film, You Nazi Spy. In October, Charlie Chaplin rocks a toothbrush mustache as he brilliantly and not so subtly

mocks the furor in the film, The Great Dictator. Moving from the silver screen to the page, Theodore Geisel, or Dr. Seuss, as this children's author and political cartoonist is best known, takes one hard swing after the next at Naziism in the nation's newspapers. One such cartoon from these still isolationist years depicts a mother wearing a sweater that, in a clear nod to the isolationist America First Committee,

has America first emblazoned on the chest. With one child seated on each side of her, the mother holds a book titled Adolf the Wolf, which the caption tells us reads, quote, And the wolf chewed up the children and spit out the bones, but those were foreign children, and it really didn't matter, close quote.

The mother's face beams as she reads, utterly failing to note her own children's terrified expressions. But it isn't just traditional political cartoons making commentary. With a cover date of March, 1941, belying his actual relay state of December 1940, a new and colorful superhero is ready to take the fight to Hitler. He's the work of two Jewish artists from the Lower East Side in New York City, Joe Simon and Jacob Kurtzburg, or Jack Kirby, as he prefers.

This creative set, both at timely comics, have created a star-spangled hero who, on his very first cover, is punching the daylights out of the furor. You know what? I've got a dime. I'll buy us a copy of this first issue so we can get lost in its fictional pages. It's an unspecified day, 1941. We're at or near a U.S. Army base called Camp Lehigh. And General Charles Manor is just coming home from an exhausting, demoralizing day. A new bomber plane undergoing testing exploded into flames. No survivors. And to make matters worse, George Maxen of the Maxon Aircraft Corporation, was there to see it.

One of the loudmouths at the camp, private Steve Rogers thinks it was sabotage. But who knows, that's something to look into tomorrow. For now, the white-haired general with an equally white mustache, is happy to melt into his chair by the fire and rest for the evening. Huh, what's this? A box on his desk. A gift. He opens it. It's a red skull?

With a letter, no less, saying this is his last night on earth. Huh, ridiculous. Dismissing it as a quote-unquote flimsy joke, he turns around and tosses the note into the crackling fire. Just then, from the corner of the room, a hideous, taunting voice calls out. General Manor. The white-haired military man turns and can hardly believe his eyes.

A hideous figure with a bright red skull, deep yellow eyes, and clammy green hands wearing a baggy brown jumpsuit with a massive white swastika on it. Stocks toward him. It's none other than the red skull. In swift, two-panel mood, the monstrous figure leaps forward, grabbing the general by the throat and pinning him to the ground. Charles Manor grasps and gasps as his terrifying assailant cackles out. Peer into my eyes, General.

Look at death. It's already over. But one panel later, the swastika wearing skull stands over the General's uniformed corpse, still cackling. As the red skull crosses the name General Manor off a list, the deceased officer's wife enters. The hideous brute shows no remorse as he mocks the sorrowful woman and tosses her across the room, all appears hopeless.

But then, like an angry tornado, as the pink colored caption box tells us, a savior dies into the frame, tackling the red skull with power and fury. It's the once frail young man turned into a hero by a super soldier serum at the start of this comic. The one and only Captain America. Weilding a striped and star-spangled triangular shield, The muscular, chiseled freedom fighter in red, white and blue, now goes head to head with this velvet villain. Oh no!

The red skull has him, and is forcing Captain America to look into his eyes. But just then, another figure appears on the scene, delivering a hard kick to the red skull. It's our hero's sidekick. Bucky, freed from the evil clutches of the red skull. Cap is back in action. He delivers one punch after another, and then, pow! He punches the red skull so hard, the hideous red mask shatters. The mask falls away, revealing the red skull's true identity.

It's none other than George Maxen, the maker of the plane that was sabotaged earlier today. But he won't be caught alive. George rolls over on his own deadly, hypodermic needle. Cap and Bucky leave. The FBI's G-men arrive to find a letter addressed to George Maxen, alias the red skull. That explains everything. It reads, When America is within the fold of the Greater Reich,

the post of the minister of all American industry shall be the reward of your excellent spy work. And it signed, the Fuhrer. And so, the Red Skulls defeated. Steve Rogers and Bucky are relaxing back at Camp Lehigh. Nonetheless, the duo's fight against Adolf has only begun. as the last panel tells us, but the work of Captain America is never done

as they plunge into new exploits against America's enemies. Watch for the next issue. Captain America catapults to fame, right up there with Batman and Superman, both of whom are also turning their eyes to the European conflict. And hey, I hope you aren't too disappointed that we didn't get to see Cap actually slug Hitler in those pages. Alas, as any comic fan will tell you,

the cover isn't canon. But that does bring up a problem that comics will face throughout the whole war. Why can't these superheroes just end the war? Well, Captain America is a human with super strength, so putting him anywhere in Europe, the Pacific, or the states, to dodge bolts is no problem. Superman is trickier.

His comic writers have to find reasons to keep Superman in the fight, winning it, but not ending it. They have Clark Kent attempt to enlist, accidentally use his x-ray vision during the eye exam, and get dismissed for a terrible vision. Uh, sure, that works. As we heard about in the previous episode, once the war effort begins back home, these superheroes begin selling bonds and stamps, encouraging Americans to do the same. Even after Joe Simon, Jack Kirby, and a young nobody named Stanley Lieber, or Stan Lee to use a perhaps more familiar name and list, their comic creations remain central to morale,

both on the home front and the actual front. Meanwhile, Hollywood is only going deeper into the fray, and I'm not just talking about its entertainment. I mean that in a literal way. After the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, the U.S. Army takes steps to ensure it can protect the California coast from any similar Japanese aerial attacks by requisitioning Walt Disney's studio lot in Burbank, California, to use as an anti-aircraft base. But fun as that quirky example of a Disney defensive position might be, Hollywood studios are serving the war effort far more by doing what they do best, making movies. This is particularly true as U.S. Army Chief of Staff, George C. Marshall, seeks to educate Uncle Sam's GIs. As the military recruits and

relies on the draft, he knows that these new soldiers need more than orders. They need to understand why they're fighting, why they're sacrificing. But even as George makes textbooks covering U.S. history, civics, democracy, and international relations widely available to the rank and file, he thinks that film might be a more universal, more dramatic way to convey all of this. And so, he looks to a filmmaker who can help Americans understand why we fight. It's the morning of an unspecified day, somewhere between late February and early March, 1942. Following an escort, a square-jawed movie director with slick black hair, and a recent commission, Frank Capra, walks through what he calls the labyrinth ways of the Pentagon. Yes, that, Frank.

It's been a while since we first met him in episode 118 as a sick and scared kid arriving from Italy at Ellis Island. But he's all grown up now, one of the biggest names in Hollywood, the recipient of multiple Academy Awards. But none of that steadies him today. It's Mr. Frank Capra, not his fictional Mr. Smith, who's now gone to Washington. And not to deal with Congress, but with someone far more intimidating. U.S. Army Chief of Staff, General George C. Marshall. As instructed, Frank steps inside George's office. Seated at his large wooden desk with lionhead treading.

roars. The white-haired, blue-eyed chief of staff only gives him a quick look. Dry-mouthed. Frank manages to eke out. Major Capra, sir. As he sits, the filmmaker can't help but imagine casting George as a serious-minded Oki living through the last decade's dustbowl. Finally, George sets down his pen. Now turning his intense concentration on Frank. He gets straight to the point. Mr. Capra, you have an opportunity to control. contribute enormously to your country and the cause of freedom. Are you aware of that, sir? Remembering an earlier directive from his escort to shoot straight with few words,

Frank blurts out. Well, General Marshall, I mean if you're asking me, does it scare the heck out of me? I'll have to say, yes, sir, it does. George doesn't break into a smile, but he cracks a little. The general then explains more fully, Within a short time, we will have a huge citizens' army in which civilians will outnumber professional soldiers by some 50 to 1. What is in question is this.

Will young, free-willing American boys take the iron discipline of wartime? In my judgment, the answer is yes. If they are given the answers as to why they are in uniform, and if the answers they are given are worth fighting and dying for, I want to nail down with you a plan to make a series of documented factual information films that will explain to our boys in the Army why we are fighting and the principles for which we are fighting. Frank replies cautiously. General Marshall, it's only fair to tell you that I have never before made a single documentary film.

In fact, I've never even been near anybody that's made one, Capra. I have never been Chief of Staff before. Thousands of young Americans have never had their legs shot off before. Boys are commanding ships today who a year ago had never seen the ocean before. I'm sorry, sir. I'll make you the best damned documentary films ever made. And with that response, the white-haired general finally cracks a real smile. I'm sure you will.

You know, I have to say, I love George Marshall's observation that freewheeling American boys will take to the iron discipline of wartime if they are given answers as to why they are in uniform. He's basically saying the same thing that we heard the Revolutionary War's legendary drill master, Baron von Steuben, say about continental soldiers back in episode 10. Quote, the genius of this nation is not in the least to be compared with that of the Prussians. Austrians or French. You say to a soldier do this and he doeth it, but I am obliged to say, this is the reason that you ought to do that.

And then he does it. Close quote. Huh. 170 years later and U.S. military leaders are still finding that the American people hold a deep sense of personal freedom, yet have a willingness to step up and serve if the cause is just. Well, Frank sets out to, to prove the cause is just.

Watching Lenny Riefenstahl's pro-Nazi film, Triumph of the Will, just as we did in Episode 184, Frank intends, he tells us to, quote, use the enemy's own films to expose their enslaving ends. Close quote. He means that literally. Relying on three million feet of Axis footage, Frank cuts and splices the foe's own work into his seven-part documentary series, Why We Fight. The first film, Prelude to War, explains the path to this conflict, highlighting both the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and the German invasion of Poland. Using footage of marching German troops, our narrator, the ironically Canadian-born, Walter Houston, asks,

Why are we Americans on the march? Is it because of... Explosions then roar amid footage of Axis attacks on Pearl Harbor and Allied nations. The film ends with an answer to why we fight that couldn't be more clear. Speaking as a world map engulfed by swastikas and the rays of the Japanese rising sun filled the screen, then cutting to images

of Emperor Hirohito, Adolf Hitler, and Benito Mussolini, and scenes of the evil they've caused, destroyed homes, work camps, book burnings, war, and more. The narrator tells the watching soldiers, For this is what we are fighting. Freedom's oldest enemy. The passion of the few to rule the many. This isn't just a war.

This is a common man's life and death struggle against those who would put him back into slavery. We lose it and we lose everything. Our homes. The jobs we want to go back to. The books we read. The very food we eat. The hopes we have for our kids. the kids themselves.

They won't be ours anymore. That's what's at stake. It's us or them. The chips are down. Two worlds stand against each other. One must die. One must live. 170 years of freedom decrees our answer.

The troops are thoroughly inspired by Frank Capra's films. But what about the rest of America? After all, civilians back home need to know that the possible death of a brother, father, husband, or son is for a worthy cause, and Hollywood's ready to help with that messaging too. Pivoting away from films that could be read as anti-war, like 1939's Gone with Wind, which is filled with post-Civil War devastation, tinseltown crinks out movies focused on the terrible necessity of war, like 1941's Sergeant York. Yes, as in Alvin, York, the god-fearing pacifist doughboy, whose both shooting and POW-W capturing bravery during World War I, garnered a Medal of Honor, as you likely recall from episode 143.

At the insistence of the real Sergeant York, Hollywood's leading man, Gary Cooper, portrays Alvin, teaching the public that, despite the terrible price of war, fighting men and death are both necessary to achieve peace. The role lands Gary an Academy Award for Best Actor. Now, pro-war propaganda isn't Hollywood acting entirely alone. Uncle Sam has a guiding hand in the process. Formed on June 13, 1942, the Office of War Information, or the OWI for short,

has previously unprecedented control over what hits America's theaters. Under its guiding hand, American media, ranging from the radio to the press and film, are expected to perform the duty of both informing and inspiring the public. Oh, and is film important? As OWI director, Elmer Davis puts it, the movie industry is, quote, the most powerful instrument of propaganda in the world, whether it tries to be or not. Close quote. It's hard to argue with the statement. Hollywood cranks out 500 films annually, while raking in about $80 million per week. The OWI keeps a watch on all of Tintel Town's entertaining offerings, including, or perhaps especially, those storytelling films about the war, like Atlantic

Convoy, Army Surgeon, and Wake Island. Nor is this watchful office hesitant to offer suggestions. For example, Paramounts so proudly we hail about the siege of baton, returns from the OWI with a note that the dying army nurse should have a line about how the Japanese spread like a disease. That said, the OWI's hand isn't as strong. as all of this might sound. In fact, Hollywood faces fewer restrictions than most wartime industries. As long as the movie doesn't give away military secrets, studios can, in theory, ignore such notes and release what the office deems,

quote-unquote, ill-conceived atrocities. And sometimes they do. For instance, Paramount's Lucky Jordan, which tells the tale of a draft-dodging thief, inspired to repent of his ways, and join the cause after some Nazi spies, up a sweet grandmother. The OWI expresses concern, fearing that the audience will come away, thinking the only reason to fight the Nazis, is because they're mean to grandmothers, not core ideological

differences. Yeah, Paramounts execs lose zero sleep about this one. They release the film anyway. All that to say, whether OWI influenced or not, 1940s Hollywood ensures that the message of sticking it to old Adolf and the rest of the Axis powers, comes across in everything, from the dark dramas the moon is down and hangman also die, to Irving Berlin's Armed Forces Musical, This is the Army. But enough talk about the movies, let's watch one. Come on, I've already got us tickets for a hot new Warner Brothers flick. It's just before noon, Thanksgiving Day, November 26, 1942.

Showing our tickets to the attendant, we're just stepping into the beautiful Hollywood Theater on 51st and Broadway in New York City. Soon we enter the foyer. And to say this space is gorgeous is an understatement. A washed in red and gold. This foyer is a massive. Baroque meets Rocco style, three-story rotunda,

encircled by eight fluted columns leading to a cherub-filled ceiling mural with a breathtaking chandelier. Nor does the auditorium itself disappoint. Oh, please, after you. Again, rich, red, gilded gold, and columns, yes, and now, even more ceiling murals and a still more opulent chandelier. But also, there are some 1,600 multi-tiered seats. Truly, this Warner

Brothers owned theater doesn't only show art on the screen. It is a work of art itself. Oh, this is our aisle. I know, the guy inhaling popcorn will just have to pull his legs in. We're in the center orchestra. Anyhow, this is the premiere of the new The most Warner Brothers film, Casablanca. The plot revolves around a love triangle and Nazi collaborationist Vichy French Morocco. Now, it wasn't supposed to come out until next spring, but as we know from episode 200, Dwight Eisenhower and the boys landed on the shores of Vichy French-controlled North Africa this very month, November, 1942. Yeah, Operation Torch.

So Warner Brothers couldn't let that perfect PR alignment pass them by. They bumped up the release. and the New York City-based French liberation organizations, France Forever, and the Fighting French Relief Committee, couldn't be more delighted as sponsors of the premiere. Ah, here are our seats. And perfect timing. The movie is starting.

As the opening credits fill the screen, that Masayez fills our ears. Yes, the French national anthem, or rather the anthem of France's fallen Third Republic. A martial air from the Revolution of 1789, its lyrics literally call on French citizens to take up arms against the ferocious soldiers of tyranny, slay them, and let these villains impure blood water the fields of a free France. Little wonder that it's banned inoccupied and vichy France.

Without even uttering a word, the film has already declared itself pro, liberty, egalite, fraternity, and anti-Nazi. We now watch as the world spins toward Europe. An omnipotent narrator tells us that. With the coming of the Second World War, many eyes in imprisoned Europe turned hopefully or desperately toward the freedom of the Americas. Closing in on Paris, the map fades to a montage of travelers. Lisbon, the narrator tells us,

is the embarkation point to freedom in the new world. But refugees must travel a circuitous path first. Paris to Marseilles, across the Mediterranean to Iran, then by train, or auto, or foot, across the rim of Africa to Casablanca and French Morocco. Ah, that's Nazi-aligned Vichy French Morocco, and Casablanca, which isn't just the jumping point to Lisbon, but a city renowned for its corruption, pickpockets,

and rapidly shifting allegiances. These realities are quickly reinforced, as we learn that two German couriers, carrying letters of transit, have been murdered. These unassigned letters that mysteriously enable their bear, to fly from Casablanca to Lisbon, even against the Nazi or Vichu regime's wishes, serve as our plot device. And against this background, leading authorities descend upon the most popular nightclub in this dishonest city, Rick's Cafe American. These include our villain,

Nazi Major Heinrich Straser, and a more middle-ground character, the local police captain, a Frenchman as opportunistic and amorally witty as he is charming. Louis Renaud, a sweeper. A sweeper. montage displays the club's drinking, gambling, and black market clientele. And then we meet him. Our protagonist, Rick Blaine. Played by the not so tall but dark and dashingly handsome, Humphrey Bogart, Rick is quickly established as a man who never gets too close to anyone or anything. He doesn't drink with customers. Women swoon for him, never the other way around. But is there more to Rick than his cold exterior lets on? As Louis tells Rick, that resistance fighter, Victor Laslow, and his beautiful companion must not be permitted to flee,

cool, confident Rick, asks, with a cigarette in hand. Louis, whatever gave you the impression that I might be interested in helping Laslo escape? The colorful captain answers, Because, my dear Ricky, I expect that under that cynical shell you're at heart to sentimentalist. He then cites some of Rick's pre-war work, arming the Ethiopians against fascist Italy. fighting against fascism in Spain. Hmm, I sense foreshadowing. Things move quickly.

The desperate Ugarte entrusts Rick with the letters of transit, those carried by the dead couriers, then is immediately arrested. Meanwhile, into the club walks Victor Laslo, accompanied by a woman who stops Rick's loyal pianist Sam Cole, played by Hollywood's legendary brunette beauty, Ingrid Bergman. This is Ilsa Lund.

the love of Rick's life in pre-Nazi Paris. We now have our love triangle. After a tense, awkward meeting between all parties, the Nazi major, the French captain, the resistance fighter, Rick, and the woman who clearly still loves and remains loved by both of the latter. Rick sits alone at his bar. He casually mentions, it's December 1941, and without him ever uttering the words Pearl Harbor,

we can't help but wonder about its impact on this lonely American. As we stew on this, our handsome, white-tucks-wearing protagonist despondently utters one of his many famous lines. Of all the gin joints and all the towns and all the world, she walks into mine. A flashback shows us Rick and Ilsa madly in love in Paris. Until the day the city fell, when she vanished, leaving only a cryptic note saying she wasn't coming to the train station. We'll learn why later. Back in the present, Rick has the letters of transit, but won't give them. to the woman who shattered his heart.

The tension builds. Rick rigs his roulette table to help a desperate refugee couple win their way out of Casablanca. Ah, another glimpse of his buried humanity. Disappointed that he can't take advantage of the woman.

Now that she and her husband have money, Louis charges over to Rick. As I suspected, you're a rank sentimentalist. Victor Laslo now approaches Rick privately asking for those letters. He cites the same pre-war evidence of Rick's goodness, Louis raised earlier. Rick remains unmoved. He wants to hurt Ilsa the way she hurt him.

But their conversation is interrupted by drinking Nazis singing, Vécht am Rhein. It's an old German song celebrating German valor against the French and their age-old fight over lands along the Rhine River. To sing this here, in French Morocco, is a naked act of dominance. Victor won't have it. Marching over to the band, the resistance leader demands they play the forbidden French national anthem, La Marseillaise. The band looks over direct, who oh so subtly nods.

The band plays. Victor sings at the top of his lungs. The Nazis respond by singing all the louder. But the club's international clientele, refugees, robes, the morally adrift, none of them can take it any longer. In a surge of anti-Nazi patriotism, they rise to their feet and drown the Germans out. Defeated on the field of melodic battle, the Germans sit. The camera then finds Yvonne, a mostly background character with tears stream. Real tears. The tears of an actual French actress and refugee playing a refugee.

And as the scene ends, she cries out. Vive la France. Vive la democracy. In the scenes that follow, Rick sacrifices everything, sending Ilsa and Victor to Lisbon with the letters, shooting Major Strausser, seemingly dooming himself, all with the most quotable lines in American cinema, including, Here's Looking at You, Kid. And just as Rick seems destined for a concentration camp, a morally charming Louis finds his soul. He saves Rick, calls him not only a sentimentalist, but a patriot,

and punctuates his own conversion by dropping a bottle of water labeled Vichy in the trash with disgust. As the two walk off into the night, Rick exclaims, Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. And behind them what plays? That same tyranny smashing martial air so hated by Nazi Germany, so central to this entire film. La Maceaise. That was a great.

movie. I bet it's a real contender for best picture next year at the Oscars. But Hollywood isn't just boosting the war effort on the big screen. It's also enlisting. By the end of 1942, about 4,000 film workers or roughly 22% of studio employees have joined the armed forces. Of the 900 actors swelling the services ranks, you might recognize some names like Clark Gable, Jimmy Stewart, and, within the first weeks of 1943, Paul Newman. While some of these men will serve on the battlefield, or in the skies in Jimmy Stewart's case, many work to bolster morale, doing traveling performances both stateside and overseas. Comedian Bob Hope discovers that he loves performing for the troops so much

that he will continue to do comedy shows for them well after the war is over. Of course, some of the biggest morale boosts come from women like Betty Grable and Rita Hayworth, whose pinups decorate the front of planes in almost every American soldier's tent from North Africa to Midway. But Betty Grable isn't the only star decorating the front of airplanes. That honor also goes to Donald Duck. That's right. Animation studios are hard at work pumping out cartoons.

Warner Brothers Bugs Bunny sings Irvin Berlin's parody of his own song, Any Yam's Today, which the famous songwriter has now turned into Any Bonds Today. At the same time, while Disney Studios, Sublimates its less than stellar box office returns from Fantasia with war films like Four Methods of Flesh Rividing and The Thrifty Pig. More importantly, they do the animation for Frank Capra's Why We Fight series. And to really get butts in seats, they toss in Donald Duck.

As Walt himself puts it, quote, At our studio, that's the equivalent of giving you Clark Gable. Donald Duck is known by the American public. He'll open doors to theaters. Close quote. Donald has many war-driven adventures. In The New Spirit, he learns his patriotic duty. It's essentially the same plot as Frank's prelude to war.

But hey, if it works, it works. In DeFure's Face, a short that uses Spike Jones and his city slickers rendition of the song by the same name, Donald unhappily lives under the Nazi regime, working in an artillery factory, hiling every picture of Hitler on a conveyor belt, and reading Minkof at gunpoint. every night. And in spirit of 43, to justify higher taxes to pay for the war effort, Donald is confronted and asked if he wants to forget our fighting men. To this, America's beloved animated duck replies, no sir, as our narrator reminds us that every dollar you spend for something you don't need is a dollar spent to help the axis. But some of the most popular animated shorts

aren't meant for the eyes of John Q. Public. Soldiers have a lot to learn, and who better to teach them than the worst animated soldier in the whole U.S. Army? It's no particular day, but sometime in 1943. We could be at any one of hundreds of theaters, auditoriums, rec centers, or chapels with projector screens on any military base

from Mountain Home, Idaho, to Des Moines, Iowa, or, say, the single-story theater building, F.A. 946 at Fort Berry in Sausalito, California. Soldiers are piling in, ready for some news and entertainment. The soldiers quiet down as the projector fires up. No, this isn't a featured film. It's a series of shorts and newsreels provided by the Army Navy Screen Magazine. Right now, the men are getting news from abroad. It's exciting to be able to see actual footage from the war. But as they watch, anticipation builds for the private snafu cartoon. Yes, snafu meaning, as we learned in episode 201, situation normal, all fouled up.

Yeah, the men get a good laugh at that definition. They all know the other word. So who is this unfortunately named cartoon character? Created by Major Frank Capra, drawn by the Warner Brothers animation team, same folks that make Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd, and written, or at least early on, by none other than Theodore Geisel, or Dr. Seuss, if you prefer, Private Snafu is, as his name implies, the goofiest, most inept, incapable joke of a service member in the U.S. military.

He's hilarious, but more than that, Private Snafu is actually military education, hidden in entertainment. The men cheer as the screen fills with a shorn-headed, big-eared, soldier in a loose-fitting uniform, bounding away from bass, telling us in rhyme. I just learned a secret. It's a honey. It's a pip. But the enemy is listening, so I'll never let it slip. Because when I learn a secret boy, I zipper up my lip. The men laugh as private snafu turns into a silhouette, displaying his baloney loaf of a brain wrapped in a chain with a padlock. Even this inept soldier with half a brain can keep a secret, it seems.

But as he skips into town, everything from cats to horses and lampposts turn out to be hiding posts for the Axis powers evil-looking spies. They know Snafu's got a secret, and they're going to find it out. Inadvertently giving hints about his secret as he struts about town, our half-wit of a private stops at a bar. Raising a shot in a toast, Snafu assures us, I'm a sound and silent soldier, just as steady as a rock. Here's to my little secret with its chain and padlock. Tossing the shot aside for the whole bottle instead, Snafu silhou silhoues again.

As liquor fills his insides, a vapor rises to that baloney brain, melting the chain and padlock and unzipping his big mouth. He hits on a beautiful blonde and mentions shipping out to Africa. Wait, a blonde? Yes, a German spy. But inebriated snafoo doesn't realize it, even as she sends a message to Adolf Hitler himself. We next see our drunken private covered in lipstick marks with his femme fatal sitting on his lap.

He stammers out to her. It's full of wonderful evening and I'd like to say some more. But I got to get a move on now. I sail it half a bad for. An X-ray reveals her bra doubles as a swast-cooker. covered Nazi radio transmitter. Snafoo's been booby-trapped. And the message again goes to Adolf.

The enemy has all they need now. As Snafu sits on board the ship the next day, Nazi U-boat suddenly appear. Ah! They fired torpedoes. The ship manages to escape, but not Snafu. He's fallen overboard. Encircled by the U-boat fleet, he's struck by a fury of torpedoes and blown straight to hell.

Inside a boiling pot in the fiery afterlife, Snafu asks the audience. A horned Hitler, who's sitting next to him and holds up a mirror? Snafu sees himself, but then his reflection changes. It becomes the backside of a horse. Yes, a horse's ass, because that's what a drinking, loose-lipped servicemen is. What more is there to say? but that's all for us. I'm sure you can see how private snafu was a huge hit with American trainees.

And while the U.S. armed forces have to teach their troops how to not get killed and how to protect valuable information, Uncle Sam's continuing to teach his boys not only how, but why they're fighting. That's right. Frank Capra's still at it with his Why We Fight series. And beyond explaining the need to protect democracy, he's also tasked with introducing soldiers and sailors to their enemies. While the two films about Germany and Japan won't be released until 1945, it's pretty clear that America's made a distinction between the two major access powers from the get-go. Here is Germany, provides a call to action, emphasizing the commonality between the Germans and Americans, and perpetrating the trope of the good German. It encourages troops to uproot a culture of violence and aggression in Germany, to help reform the German people in order to join the society. of man. On the flip side, know your enemy, Japan, systematically strips away parts of Japanese

culture that Americans may deem as, quote unquote, civilized in order to help troops not feel guilty about waging war. Frank employs constant reminders of what he frames as Japan's barbaric Mongol heritage, suggesting that Japanese society functions as it did in the Middle Ages, even though the country is technically modernized. The narrative warps traditional Japanese religious practices into war-mongering beliefs. Yeah, I trust you can see the difference here. But none of this is to say that the Axis don't propagandize right back. We heard about Dr. Joseph Goebbels and the Ministry of Enlightenment and Propaganda in previous episodes,

and Japan acts similarly, promoting its own national interest in occupied territories. But the most well-known form of propaganda out of Japan is actually meant directly for American soldiers. I think it's about time for us to tune in our radio, and listen to the famous Tokyo Rose. It's about six in the evening, Monday, August 14, 1944. We're on the beaches of the island of Guadalcanal, an island in the Solomon Islands. Yes, we'll most definitely talk more about this small patch of land in the Pacific later. But for now, all we need to know is that we're joining U.S. Marine Don Heapner

at a supply base on this small Pacific island. With the sun setting on his workday, it's time to crack open a can of spam. And out of the loudspeakers, placed in the high palm trees, the radio crackles out the familiar tones for the start of these Marines' most hated and enjoyed program. Zero hour. I say we're with Don and Guadalcanal, but we could just as easily be with the chief radio man, J.M. Eekberg, on board the Sargo-class submarine, USS Seawolf, or on the Essex-class aircraft carrier, USS Franklin, with Captain James Shoemaker, or almost any place with the radio in the Pacific. Just about every sailor, soldier, and marine in the Pacific listens to this most notorious DJ, known as Tokyo Rose. Okay, time out. Let's get some context.

Tokyo Rose is what the Allied forces call several different female radio personalities broadcasting for the Japanese, mainly on Radio Tokyo's program, The Zero Hour, intentionally attempting to demoralize Allied soldiers. The program plays popular American tunes, like, Speak to Me of Love, love, and Love's old sweet song, but the hosts also make sure to ask the men aboard these ships, or on the beaches, if they're willing to die so far from home, covered in mud and mosquitoes. They tell these American boys that their girls back home have been unfaithful. They brag about the strong Japanese army that will never surrender, and they always report on the number of Allied ships sunk by the Japanese fleet.

Starved for a female voice and happy to ascribe all sorts of sexy attributes to the unseen announcer, the men don't find the propaganda believable or demoralizing enough to pass on good music and active imaginations. As our Marine, Don Heibner puts it, quote, Tropical Moonlight affected all of us to the utmost, and we young bucks yearned for feminine companionship during those long balmy nights, close quote. Similar personalities broadcast everywhere. Germany has access Sally and Lord Ha Ha. The poet, Ezra Pound, broadcast for fascists on Radio Rome. Similar to Lord Ha Ha Ha, Tokyo Rose is not any single person and is mostly a myth.

But the woman who most closely embodies her is Iva Taguri. Iva was born in L.A. in 16 and enrolled at UCLA in 1940, but she left for Japan in July, 1941. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, she elected to stay in Japan for the duration of the war. In November, 1943, she began her job with Radio Tokyo. as a typist. Meanwhile, the Japanese took three POWs with a broadcasting background. An Australian named Major Charles Cousins, an American, Ted Ince, and a Filipino, Norman Reyes. All three were tortured and forced to put their broadcasting experience to use running the

propaganda program Zero Hour for Radio Tokyo. The head of the program, Charles Cousins, decided to maliciously comply by making a program where all the obvious propaganda is placed in one single segment, and the rest is all pleasant music and reading letters from POWs. In a real Hogan's hero's plan, they insist on using the instrumental opening to the song, strike up the band, and ask the audience to sing along. The Japanese don't know the song, but every soldier happily sings. There is work to be done. There's a war to be won. Come on, you son of a gun, take your stand. Iva is elevated from typist to DJ because the Japanese think her American accent will make soldiers homesick, dreaming of the girls they left behind.

She gets the name Orphan Ann or Annie, after the American cartoon character, later claiming to take the name because she also feels homeless between Japan and America. She takes to calling her listeners my favorite orphans, a choice that is oddly morbid and works against her at her future trial. But with that background, why don't we listen in for ourselves? Let's break away from the beaches and instead head to the broadcast room of Radio Tokyo and see one of Iva's turns at the mic. It's still six in the evening, August 14th, 1944. But now we're in Studio 5 of Radio Tokyo.

Sitting across from Charles Cousins at a table with their scripts ready to speak into the microphone placed before them, Ted Ince and Norman Reyes are set up to drop records on cue. From a window, Japanese authorities watch over them. And so, Charles starts off the broadcast. with the usual propaganda that he's placed purposefully here at the top. On the Indian Burma Front, the Japanese forces inflicted tremendous blows on the enemy troops of over 30,000 in battles around Nijikina. Within a period of five months up to the end of July, the enemy suffered the loss of more than 15,000 men, including those killed, wounded and taken prisoner.

When Charles says, enemy, in this instance, keep in mind he's talking about allied troops. That sounds really bad. 15,000 troops lost. And it's not very far from the truth. But keep in mind that Radio Tokyo won't be reporting on the nearly 85,000 Japanese troops that died from disease, losing the fight to the Indian Army. Okay, that's enough news.

Let's hear from the famed Tokyo Rose. Hello, you fighting orphans of the Pacific? How strict? This is after her weekend and, back on the air strictly under UNR. Deception okay? It better be because this is all request night. The first request is made by none other than the boss.

And guess what? He wants Bonnie Baker. A second request is sending by a roaming bone head of an orphan. They want Tony Martin of all people to help him forget the mosquitoes and dirty rifles. Well, you know, obliging any. watching and now it can be told. That's how these broadcasts go. Occasionally you'll hear mention of things like mosquitoes and dirty laundry or sadness

over being away from home. But mostly it's Iva introducing songs. After the war, public outrage over Tokyo Rose leads to her trial. Charles, Ted, and Norman testify on her behalf, but Iva is convicted of treason and sentenced to 10 years at the Federal Reformatory for Women in Alderson, West Virginia. President Gerald Ford will pardon her in 1977, and she'll manage her father's shop in Chicago until her death in 2006 at the age of 90. So, we've come to the end of our tale of America's World War II propaganda, a tale of the U.S. effort to harness movies, comics, cartoons, and more for the war effort. This really is total war, and every nation, allied and access alike, is doing their best to convince their citizens to buy their sides' narrative.

But as we reflect and close, I do think that when it comes to propaganda, there's one final distinction worth making between the Nazi regime's amoralism and the United States heavy lean on entertainment. Dr. Joseph Goebbels had the power of a totalitarian state behind him. But in the United States, the OWI couldn't stop or change all works of art or media that it disapproved of. Norman Rockwell tossed and turned in the night with an idea on his own Accord. Frank Capra volunteered, the artists, writers, and filmmakers, the entertaining men and women who made Captain America come to life and brought us to tears in a gin joint in North Africa. They personally believed in the American story, in liberty, in democracy, in the four freedoms.

And that belief is precisely what made their work so damn effective. The best propaganda doesn't feel like propaganda. And the reason America is a reason, America's World War II propaganda so often clears that bar as that, for many of the people making it, it wasn't propaganda at all. It was conviction. And I suppose that's why I love Norman Rockwell's Four Freedoms and Warner Brothers, Casablanca, because I share their conviction. I can own that bias. Vive la democracy. But in the name of that very conviction, we can't give America a pass on all of its war propaganda. There's a dark side too. One built on racist stereotypes intended to dehumanize the Japanese people so thoroughly as to justify not only war abroad, but internment at home. Yes,

next time we'll starkly face one of America's greatest failures of World War II and the 20th century. Japanese internment. History That Doesn't Suck is created and hosted by me, Greg Jackson. Episode Research and Written by Greg Jackson and Will King. executive editor Riley Newbauer. Recording of La Marseillaise, generously provided by Mediatique Musicale de Paris, Christian Edapierre, V de Paris. Production by Airship. Audio editing by Mohamed Chazade. Sound design by Molly Bach. Theme music composed by Greg Jackson. Arrangement and additional composition by Lindsay Graham of Ayrship. For bibliography of all primary and secondary sources consulted in writing this episode, visit htdDSpodcast.com. H.TBS is supported by fans,

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