July 14, 1950

The mobile radio unit “Barbara” used to broadcast Radio Free Europe’s first program on July 4, 1950, to Czechoslovakia. "Barbara" was not one vehicle, but a set of seven vehicles: studio van, the transmitter van, generators, a fuel supply truck, jeep and trailer, camping and housekeeping equipment, and a flatbed truck for the antenna towers. 

Beginning on July 4, 1950, the first programs to Czechoslovakia only consisted of music and spot announcements advising the listener that full programming of news and commentary would begin on July 14, 1950.  On that date, “Barbara” also sent its first broadcast to Romania.

The Murder of Slovak Exile Matúš Černák in Munich in July 1955 ©

Matúš Černák, born on August 23, 1903, in Turčianske Teplice, was a former Slovak Minister to Berlin in World War II, a Slovak National Council Abroad (SNCA) representative in West Germany, and a listed CIA informant. Černák was arrested by the American military in Bavaria, Germany, in 1945 and handed over to Czechoslovakia. He was sentenced to prison. After his release in 1948, he escaped Czechoslovakia to Bavaria. 

He was critical of Radio Free Europe's Czechoslovak Service for not representing the true interests of the Slovak people. Černák later was a joint author of a statement criticizing Radio Free Europe for “suppressing the majority (i.e., Slovaks),  recruiting personnel among communists, betraying routes of escape from Czechoslovakia, and demoralizing their listeners with American jazz.”

 

He was killed by a package bomb explosion in a Munich post office on July 5, 1955. Černák was buried in Munich’s Waldfriedhof cemetary in a ceremony attended by German Chancelor Konrad Adenauer. In 1991, his remains were sent to a cemetery in Bratislava, Slovakia.

 

The Bavarian State Criminal Office promised 5,000 DM, and later 10,000 DM for providing any information that would lead to arrest and prosecution. The police investigation revealed that the explosive package was filed at Frankfurt’s Main Train Station at the post office. It was reportedly sent by a man between the ages of 40-45, 1.65-1.70 cm tall, slim figure, dark hair, a dark beard, and reportedly spoken in broken German with a Slavic accent. The package was sent to the Slovak National Council.

 

On July 6, 1955, the Bavarian Minister-President Dr. Wilhelm Hoegner broadcast a statement in which he said that his police thought it likely that “this was the work of one or another of the exile groups in Germany.”

 

Bratislava Slovakia Radio on July 9, 1955, called the bombing “Gangster warfare in the Underworld of traitors.” 

 

There was comprehensive spread newspaper coverage in the United States and Germany of the bombing. For example, in the US, some grassroots newspapers carried headlines, "Hunting Bomb Slayer of Anti-Commie," "Bomb in Mail kills Anti-Communist Hero," and "Bomb Assasin of Slovak Leader is hunted at Munich."

Michigan Congressman Alvin Morell Bentley made remarks before Congress on July 7, 1955, including this statement, “I personally feel sure that an investigation will substantiate the fact that this is merely another of a series of Communist terrorist activities.”

 

Also, on July 7, 1955, in Munich, there was a press conference of the “Democratic Exile Union (DEU),” an association of Slovak, Romanian, Georgian, Cossak, and Hungarian émigrés. There were more than 50 German and foreign newspapermen and news agency representatives. Černák was a leader of the DEU. The conference was called to discuss his death. In a prepared statement, Černák was called "an idealist whose strength came from his Christian faith ... He died for the cause of freedom for his Slovak people, for whom he joined the ranks of martyrs."

 

On April 13, 1959, in Vienna, Austria, there was a four-hour meeting between an unidentified Czechoslovak intelligence officer and a CIA officer. That was followed up by a message to CIA headquarters about the meeting, part of which included: 

 

Czech Intelligence Service (StB) did blow up Matúš Černák. Operation conceived and run by Intelligence Service man Rudolf Baloun, who was under CTK (news agency) cover. The bomb was made in Prague, delivered to an unknown agent, probably a German, by Baloun in a meadow near Hallein, Austria. (Redacted) drove the car, and a third man, probably Lubomir (or Ladislav) Kubicek, who then TDY from Prague, went along. The agent did not know the package contained a bomb. I mailed it as instructed. When newspapers headlined Černák death, the agent got jitters, went to Vienna, went to Legation, and packed off to CSSR. (Redacted) says the purpose bombing was to create discord between Slovak separatists and Czech nationalists in Munich immigration. Adds bombing not now totally taboo, such proposals no longer approved. 

                        

Circumstantial evidence pointed to an agent who allegedly mailed the package to Černák, as Kurt Baumgartner, code name “Berthelot.” Reportedly, when Baumgartner read the news in the newspapers about the circumstances of the bombing, he panicked and immediately went to Austria to the Czechoslovak Embassy and was transported to Czechoslovakia. His StB case officer, Lieutenant Kubiček (code name “Kautský”), reportedly was awarded 2,000 Czech Crowns for “successful implementation of operative actions abroad.”

 

Baumgartner lived quietly in Prague in an apartment provided by the StB, received monthly payments, provided translations, and gave German lessons until he died in 1987. For more information about Černák and Slovak nationalism, see Chapter 9 in 

 

 

 

Press Release July 3, 1950, on the first broadcast of Radio Free Europe July 4, 1950

Press Information

For Release July 3, 1950

 

“Radio Free Europe” to Penetrate 

Iron Curtain Tomorrow

 

The American people, and the exiled leaders of Eastern Europe, will speak to the enslaved peoples behind the Iron Curtain tomorrow with a new and powerful voice as Radio Free Europe takes to the air using its newly completed European transmitters.

 

Owned and operated by the National Committee for Free Europe, Inc., a group of private American citizens, Radio Free Europe will broadcast the true story of freedom and democracy to the eighty million people living in communist slavery between Germany and Russia. Freed of diplomatic limitations, the broadcasts will be hard-hitting.

 

“A prime objective of Radio Free Europe will be to bring to these peoples the voice of their democratic leaders, who have been driven into exile by Communist oppression,” said Dewitt C. Poole, President of NCFE. “At the end of the war we joined the United Kingdom and the USSR in promising these peoples that they should solve by democratic means their pressing political and economic problems. This promise has not been kept. Instead, the voices of the democratic leaders of these countries have been stilled by death, imprisonment, and exile.

 

“Now through Radio Free Europe, the numerous democratic leaders who escaped and have survived in exile will be heard by their own people once more. They will speak to the imprisoned countrymen in their own language, in the familiar tones as in a family reunited. They will give the lie to Communist propaganda and tell their listeners of the underlying struggle to ensure freedom everywhere.”

 

The Fourth of July, Independence Day, was deliberately chosen for Radio Free Europe’s first broadcast, according to Frank Altschul, Chairman of the NCFE Radio Committee.

 

“Throughout the world, ‘The Fourth’ is a pivotal date in the long history of man’s struggle for freedom, “ said Mr. Altschul. “During the ‘audience building’ period of broadcasts, from the fourth to the fourteenth – another pivotal date – the programs will consist of announcements of the station’s plans and purposes. On the fourteenth, the anniversary of the fall of the Bastille and the start of the French Revolution, full broadcasting will begin.”

1953 Presidential Committee Report on International Information Activities ©

On June 30, 1953, the Presidential Committee on International Information Activities, under the chairmanship of William Harding Jackson, former Deputy Director for Central Intelligence, submitted a report to President Eisenhower. The  Presidential Committee first met on January 30, 1953. Over 250 witnesses were interviewed, including many representatives of government departments and agencies. The Committee also consulted with members of Congress, studied classified material furnished by various agencies, and received a large volume of correspondence both from government officials and from members of the public and private organizations.”  

In addition, surveys and evaluations of both Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty were included. Specifically, on Radio Free Europe, the report read:  

 

In the original plan, the various national councils were to be responsible for broadcasts over RFE facilities to their respective countries. Since the complexities and rivalries of émigré politics made the organization of national councils difficult, it was decided to set up RFE on a non-political basis. Emigré staff were hired for competence rather than political affiliation, and programs to various countries are now identified as the Voice of Free Czechoslovakia, Poland, and so on. 

 

Although this reason for the national councils no longer exists, they do have potential value in exile relations. If the émigré leaders are prepared to create national councils of their own volition, NCFE should assist them to engage in such propaganda activities as they may be qualified to conduct. Primary attention, however, should be given to the broadcasting phase of NCFE activities. The Committee recommends that the rest of these activities be reviewed by CIA to determine whether they should be continued or modified. 

 

Some specific issues arose in connection with NCFE activities, particularly RFE. There is first the question of cover. It has been suggested that, because the present cover has worn thin, RFE's official connections be freely admitted. However, such a course would vitiate the principal reason for the existence of RFE as a separate organization. So long as its government connections are not officially admitted it can broadcast programs and take positions for which the United States would not accept responsibility. The Committee believes that the present cover is adequate for this purpose.  

 

The recommendations for radio in Chapter 4, Operations against the Soviet System, included:

 

·      All broadcast material to the Soviet system for which the United States government does not wish to accept responsibility should be handled by Radio Free Europe (RFE), Radio Liberation or other covert channels. 

·      The American Committee for Liberation from Bolshevism, Inc., should concentrate on the improvement of Radio Liberation and reduce expenditures on the émigré coordinating center. 

 

The Commission's recommendations on Radio Liberation (Liberty) included:

·      In a situation short of war, the project can probably make its greatest contribution by de-emphasizing its political activities and devoting its major effort to the improvement of broadcasts from Radio Liberation. 

·      This station should use Soviet émigrés in an effort to weaken the Soviet regime and should concentrate on the Soviet military, government officials, and other groups in the population, which harbor major grievances against the regime. 

·      The American Committee for Liberation from Bolshevism, Inc., should concentrate on the improvement of Radio Liberation and reduce expenditures on the émigré coordinating center.

 

For more detailed excerpts of the Committee Report, see Appendix E on RFE and Appendix F on Radio Liberty respectively in

Clandestine CIA Broadcasts from Greece to Albania: Voice of Free Albania (VOFA) ©

Following a week of spot announcements, the clandestine radio Voice of Free Albania began regular short-wave broadcasts from its clandestine transmitting site near Athens at 10 P.M on September 18, 1951. The programs were heard in various European cities. In addition, the station was given considerable publicity by Voice of America, BBC, Radio Free Europe, and in newspapers in the United States, including the New York Times. 

“Radio Free Albania“ is often used as the name of the clandestine station, but the official name was Voice of Free Albania. CIA’s cryptonym was HTNEIGH. CIA’s station in Italy monitored the first broadcasts. An internal CIA Information Report was distributed in November 1951 with the subject: Albanian Clandestine Radio Station and contained details of the initial broadcasts: 

·      A new Albanian clandestine radio station, which has been vigorously denouncing the Albanian Communist regime and is known as the “Voice of Free Albania,” has been heard recently on short wave.

·      The station has advised its listeners that it will broadcast instructions for sabotaging the regime.

·      Although the location of the station is unknown, it is believed that it is in Albania itself since it appears extremely well-informed on Albanian matters. 

A subsequent internal CIA Information Report included these comments:

·      It purported to be on Albanian soil and stated its sponsor to be the “Free Albania Committee.” The first bars of the old Albanian national anthem were used as a signature tune.

·      “This is the Voice of Free Albania- for Albania, for Freedom, for the Red and Black Flag.  Brothers and sisters, listen to the Voice of Free Albania; the Voice of Free Albania talks for all Albanians who love their country and want it strong and free…” This was followed by news items and commentary critical of the present Communist regime.

In September 1953, CIA’s monitoring station at Bari, Italy, reported continued jamming of VOFA. The monitoring station believed the jamming was due to the VOFA defection appeal to Albanians repeated daily. The defection appeal was, in part, “Albanians -- you are forcing the regime to the wall! Continue to demand what is due you. The despots are weakening and fearful of the next orders from Moscow. Enlightened and repentant Albanian Communists there is no security in a regime of traitors that uses scapegoats to explain its failures, but there is haven for you in the Free World.“  

One propaganda leaflet dropped into Albania contained information about the NCFA and Voice of Free Albania and included these excerpts:

         Radio Announcement

Albanians!

By means of a clandestine radio transmitter the NCFA fights to eradicate the Communist lies which fill and poison the Fatherland.  “The Voice of Free Albania” transmits each evening at 6:30 and 9 o’clock, as well as every afternoon between 1 and 2 o’clock. Through these transmissions, patriotic Albanians may hear:

The TRUTH on the filthy crimes of the Tirana Communist clique and of their Russian patrons which they serve.

The TRUTH on the strives and fight of your national Committee to bring honor and freedom to Albania.

The TRUTH of the immeasurable strength of our friends and Allies Nations in the free world. 

Albanians!

Those of you who have radios may assist in the Fight for Freedom by listening to the “Voice of Free Albania” and by passing the news secretly to a trusted friend.

It must be emphasized that everything should be done clandestinely and with the greatest protection.  You must be aware of every danger and especially the Sigurimi. (Secret police) 

In 1958 CIA decided to terminate VOFA broadcasts mainly due to the lack of a qualified psychological officer. As a result, three staff members in Athens were let go on February 28, 1958, and returned to the United States. However, CIA clandestine broadcasts continued to Albania as the “National Socialist Radio (NATCOM) that had started broadcasting in May 1957 separately from VOFA that was aimed at medium and lower level Communist Party and government officials. Its cryptonym was OBTEST 1.

For more information on VOFA and NATCOM, see Chapter 5 in

Book Review: Radio Free Europe's Crusade for Freedom: Rallying American's Behind Cold War Broadcasting, 1950-1960

Radio Free Europe’s “Crusade for Freedom”: Rallying Americans Behind Cold War Broadcasting, 1950–1960. Richard H. Cummings (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2010), 257 pp., endnotes, appendices, bibliography, photos, index. 

The Crusade for Freedom (CFF) was an early Cold War domestic propaganda campaign aimed at arousing the “average American against the Communist threat.” (1) Intensely popular at the time, citizens contributed funds, attended rallies, marched in parades, participated in essay contests, and read the Crusade for Freedom Newsletter, which described the nature of the threat and advocated means to counter it. A principal component of the public program was Radio Free Europe (RFE), a broadcast service that sent the ‘truth about communism’ to countries behind the Iron Curtain. What was kept from the public at the time was that both CFF and RFE were covertly sponsored by the CIA. The CIA role was officially revealed in 1976, but Radio Free Europe’s “Crusade for Freedom” adds details not made public at the time. 

Author and former RFE officer Richard Cummings admits that some might consider CFF and its radio operations as a fraud on Americans. But his view is that if they were a fraud at all, they were benign and probably contributed to a Cold War anti-communist consensus. His book is devoted to documenting that position. 

Cummings focuses on CFF and RFE from their planning stages in 1949 until CFF was terminated in 1962. RFE continued to function under CIA sponsorship until 1967, when RFE came under independent management, an arrangement that exists to this day. Cummings first describes the program’s origin and goes on to review the bureaucratic and financial conflicts that persisted throughout its existence. Finally he looks at the program’s clandestine elements. 

The book treats the public side of CFF in some detail. This includes discussion of an extensive publicity campaign involving Hollywood celebrities, the news media, and political, industrial, and military figures. Here we read about the support of Eleanor Roosevelt, Bing Crosby, Ronald Reagan, General Eisenhower, President Truman, Walter Cronkite, President Kennedy, and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, to name a few. Defectors from the Soviet bloc were pressed into service. Col. Joseph Swiatlo of the Polish secret service is a case in point. In RFE broadcasts he informed those behind the Iron Curtain how the KGB dominated the security services of the bloc countries. The CIA role in CFF and RFE was exposed by journalist Drew Pearson in March 1953 (95). Fulton Lewis Jr. added critical remarks in 1957, noting “Dulles doesn’t want it known.” (171) Cummings explains how these events were dealt with and how they led to the demise of CFF in 1962.

Radio Free Europe’s “Crusade for Freedom” is well documented and contains a useful chronology of major events. Cummings does not comment on the overall value of CFF, but judging from this history, it is unlikely that anything like it could be attempted successfully today. 

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 55, No. 2 (Extracts, June 2011). P.88 

 https://www.cia.gov/static/73256583aaade1b84a8161f66ec20c72/Intel-Officers-Bookshelf-55.2.pdf

June 17, 1953, Berlin anti-Communist Riots, and Radio Free Europe ©

On June 16, 1953, workers in East Berlin rose up in protest against government demands to increase productivity. Within days, nearly a million East Germans joined the protests and began rioting across hundreds of East German cities and towns. The protest was brutally put down on June 17, 1953, by the Soviet and East German military.

 

Although Radio Free Europe (RFE) did not broadcast to East Germany (German Democratic Republic), it reacted to the events in Berlin. As worked out its top policy advisors—Lewis Galantiere, then policy advisor in the New York office, and William E. Griffith, political advisor at RFE, Munich—RFE had developed a technique of what was called “chipping away” at the Communist power structure: aiming at the day when the gradual evolution of the captive nations would bring them nearer to the free open societies of the West. “Peaceful liberation” through “liberalization” became the RFE broadcast strategy.

 

Lewis Galantiere wrote a Special Guidance no. 12-A for Radio Free Europe: “On the Situation in East Berlin.” He advised the RFE staff that neither the United States nor NATO could be expected to act on the election-year Republican platform of Liberation. Furthermore, in 12-A, he warned RFE broadcasters to refrain from encouraging armed resistance by their listeners.

 

We do not advise other Eastern European workers to follow the example of the workers of East Berlin. We advise them only to take heart from what has happened there and to make note of it for the future…they should always be careful not to resort yet to overt acts which might only result in defeat, further suppression, and enslavement.

 

RFE—must avoid inciting the population of its target counties to similar actions at this time. We must remind our audiences that premature demonstrations of resistance will lead only to ruin and despair, for they are sure to be put down ruthlessly by the Soviets and their puppet stooges. [W]e do not want them to endanger themselves needlessly at this point. (Galantiere: The Lost Generation’s Forgotten Man)

 

The Free Europe Committee rejected Galantiere’s Special Guidance and FEC’s political advisor Reuben Nathan wrote a new 12-A guidance, with CIA input entitled “The Opening of a New Phase,” which, in part, stated that the people of Eastern Europe should “prepare for effective resistance,” that it was time “to call Moscow’s bluff,” and “nothing less than the freedom of the captive people is acceptable.”  William Griffith and Paul Henze (RFE deputy political advisor in Munich) reportedly were furious when they saw Nathan’s Guidance 12-A and ridiculed it as: “the ‘stupid’ hare-brained’ advice of U.S. government and FEC “psy- warriors.” RFE’s Director Bill Lang even threatened to resign over it. Former Radio Free Europe Director Dr. A. Ross Johnson wrote:

When unrest broke out in East Germany in June 1953, RL Munich officials on their own initiative, sought to organize loudspeaker appeals to Soviet forces in Berlin and carry German-language interviews intended for the East German population. The Office of the High Commissioner for Germany put a stop to both initiatives, which it viewed as needlessly provocative before they could materialize. [T]his was one of several cases at RFE in the early 1950s of conflict between Munich executives and broadcast chiefs, on the one hand, and New York policy officials they disparaged. (Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty; the CIA Years and Beyond) 

 

Was the CIA involved in provoking the riots in Berlin? The answer is no:

 

The issue of direct American (particularly CIA) involvement in support of the disturbances has received much attention. Some have speculated that because Eleanor Dulles was in Berlin during this time as a State Department desk officer, Allen Dulles, her brother, and the new CIA di­rector, may also have been there, but he was not. Actually, like its KGB counterpart, the CIA base in Berlin was completely surprised as one Berlin Operations Base (BOB) reports officer put it, "We were caught flatfooted!" Some East Berlin agents contacted their BOB case officers in West Berlin to report on the events, but as soon as the border closed, this kind of firsthand information was no longer available. The CIA German mission was equally surprised. Chief of Mission Gen. Lucian Truscott was in Nurem­berg at the time with his deputy, Michael Burke, and his assistant, Thomas Polgar, discussing Czech cross-border operations with the US military. They read about the riots in the evening editions of newspa­pers on the train ride back to Frankfurt. (Battleground Berlin: CIA vs. KGB in the Cold War, pp. 169-170)

 

Listen to a RIAS (Radio in the American Sector) report live from Potsdamer Platz, including gun fire: Berlin:http://www.rias1.de/sound4/timeline_nachrichten/1953/1953-06-17-r-schuesse_am_potsdamer_platz-2_.mp3

 

For more English information on the riots in Berlin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_German_uprising_of_1953

 

A memorial to the June 17, 1953, uprising is in front of the Federal Ministry of Finance building in Berlin: “The glass image, which as has been sunken into the ground, shows a photo of strikers marching to the building known at the time as the House of Ministries. The roughly pixelated photo has been blown up several times its original scale. Information panels report what happened before and during the protest march.“