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WWII Propaganda Films
I have always been interested in propaganda and it's various methods of use, both good and bad. The WWII film series "Know Your Enemy" is just one of many I have viewed recently. One of them in the part on Germany is titled "Feldzug en Polan", or campaign in Poland, which I was watching last night. I have seen it before, but never before in English translation like I did last night. It is a very clever spin of events of September 1939 which make it appear (quite believably to Germans) that Poland was the aggressor and cruel 'master' to the German speaking people...committing one act of barbarism after another, while the good Adolf Hitler tried "repeatedly" through peaceful means to resolve the problem. One scene in particular stuck with me, as the announcer says "Germany has tried unsuccessfully to save the innocent civilians of Warsaw...Now the guns will do the talking!"..and they go on to blast the city's inhabitants with a massive artillary barrage.
By today's standards and media, this film would be ludicrous in it's content and easily disputed via live internet transmissions, CNN and the rest...but think back to 1939! If you lived in Germany you received your news by newspapers or, if you were fortunate...a small radio with limited reception. It would have been very easy for the propaganda ministry to conduct a very effective campaign of misinformation. Also, I believe that most people want to be patriotic (then and now) and are willing to believe what their government tells them about foreign policy. I say this partly because it has been easy for me in the past to issue a blanket condemnation of the German people without really digging into the possible reasons why they were so willing to believe Hitler's lies. Good propaganda/Limited access to information played a HUGE part in World War Two!
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