West – East Entanglements During the Cold War: Shortwave Broadcasting and Propaganda from and to Portugal

Abstract

Portugal became the centre of an entangled airwaves ensemble during the Cold War. In order to demonstrate this, the article develops along two lines. First, it details how the Portuguese dictatorship, with ideological connections to fascism, allowed the construction in its territory of one of the most powerful retransmitters of Radio Free Europe (RFE), responsible for airing anti-communist propaganda to Eastern Europe. The collaboration between the Portuguese dictator and the National Committee for Free Europe, mediated by US diplomatic officials, played an important role in the development of the operations of RFE in the country. Second, the article demonstrates how Portugal became the target of shortwave broadcasts operated from abroad, aimed at spreading pro-communist and anti-fascist sentiments in Portuguese society. Some of these stations were established by the political opposition that used the airwaves to undermine the dictatorship.

KEYWORDS:

• Radio Free Europe
• broadcasting history
• Cold War
• Colonialism
• propaganda
• transnational media

ORCID

Nelson Ribeiro http://orcid.org/0000-0003-4724-550X

Notes

1. Cummings, Radio Free Europe’s ‘Crusade for Freedom’.

2. Johnson, Radio Free Europe.

3. Cronqvist and Hilgert, “Entangled Media Histories.”

4. Documents from the Hoover Institution were made available to the author by A. Ross Johnson.

5. Constitution of 1933, Article 8.

6. Ribeiro, “Censorship and Scarcity.”

7. Antunes, Kennedy e Salazar, 31.

8. Puddington, Broadcasting Freedom, 36.

9. Johnson, Radio Free Europe.

10. Ibid., 19.

11. Bischof, Voices of Freedom.

12. Puddington, Broadcasting Freedom, 5–6.

13. Cummings, Radio Free Europe’s ‘Crusade for Freedom’; Johnson, Radio Free Europe; Mickelson, America's Other Voice; Puddington, Broadcasting Freedom.

14. Puddington, Broadcasting Freedom, 291.

15. Johnson, Radio Free Europe, 21.

16. ‘Aide Memoire,’ 19 December 1950, in Oliveira Salazar Archive [AOS]CO/NE-2C1.

17. Gregory Thomas, ‘Memorandum of Negotiations, January – April 1951’, 10 April 1951, in Hoover Institution Archive.

18. ‘Conditions of the License Contract’, August 1951, in Hoover Institution Archive.

19. Ibid., Article 8.

20. Letter from Gregory Thomas to RFE headquarters, 10 March 1951, Hoover Institution Archive.

21. Letter from Gregory Thomas to RFE headquarters, 24 February 1951, Hoover Institution Archive.

22. Letter from Gregory Thomas to RFE headquarters, 10 March 1951.

23. ‘Conditions of the License Contract’, Article 1.

24. Letter from the President of the National Committee for a Free Europe, John Ricardson, Jr., to Gregory Thomas, 21 May 1962, in AOS/CO/CM-3

25. Raret, “Annual Report – 1951”, in AOS/CO/CM-3.

26. Memorandum from Mr. Rogers (Executive Assistant), 7 November 1956, Open Society Archive.

27. Several letters from Tito Arantes to Salazar written between 1955 and 1960, in AOS/CP-013.

28. Puddington, Broadcasting Freedom, 220.

29. Several documents of the RFE Engineering Department, in Open Society Archive.

30. Raret, “Annual Report – 1954”, in AOS/CO/CM-3.

31. Raret, “Annual Report – 1955”, in AOS/CO/CM-3.

32. Letter from the President of RARET, Mr. Alberto G. Peixoto e Cunha, to the Minister of the Economy, 8 November 1955, in AOS/CO/CM-8.

33. ‘Conditions of the License Contract’, Article 7.

34. Memorandum from Mr. Kellen to Mr. Geiger, 1 July 1956, Open Society Archives.

35. Johnson, Radio Free Europe, 47.

36. Colt, Radio Free Europe.

37. Johnson, Radio Free Europe.

38. Kind-Kovács, Radio Free Europe, 71.

39. Colt, Radio Free Europe, 78.

40. Johnson, Radio Free Europe.

41. Colt, Radio Free Europe, 93.

42. Rosas, “O Estado Novo.”

43. Rodrigues, Kennedy-Salazar.

44. Ibid.

45. Raret, “Annual Report – 1961”, in AOS/CO/CM-3.

46. Santos, Portugal e a NATO.

47. Raret, “Annual Report – 1963”, in AOS/CO/CM-3.

48. Antunes, Kennedy e Salazar.

49. Wasburn, Broadcasting Propaganda.

50. Ribeiro, “Undermining a Dictatorship.”

51. As an example see "Rádio Moscovo", O Avante, November 1956.

52. Ribeiro, “Undermining a Dictatorship.”

53. Transcript by the political police of the broadcast of 16 April 1958, in AOS/CO/IN-10A.

54. Ribeiro, “Undermining a Dictatorship.”

55. Ibid.

56. Oliveira, “Rádios Clandestinas”.

57. Perdigão, O PCP visto por Dentro.

58. Ibid.

59. Raby, Fascism and Resistance.

60. Oliveira, “Rádios Clandestinas,” 811.

61. Ribeiro, “Undermining a Dictatorship.”

62. Cádima, Salazar, Caetano e a Televisão.

63. According to transmission announcements in brochures published by Voice of Liberty and in O Avante newspaper.

64. Broadcast of Voice of Liberty, February 1968, in FPLN, Textos da Voz da Liberdade.

65. Badenoch, Fickers, and Henrich-Franke, (eds). Airy Curtains in the European Ether; Classen, (ed). Transnational Broadcasting in Europe 1945-1990; Ribeiro and Seul, (eds). Revisiting Transnational Broadcasting.

66. Cronqvist and Hilgert, “Entangled Media Histories.”

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by FCT-Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia/Portugal 2020: [Grant Number PTDC/COM-CSS/29610/2017].

Notes on contributors

Nelson Ribeiro

Nelson Ribeiro, Universidade Católica Portuguesa; E-mail: [email protected]