was the first of over a dozen live
radio programs broadcast by
Japan
Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...
during the
Pacific War
The Pacific War, sometimes called the Asia–Pacific War, was the theater of World War II that was fought in Asia, the Pacific Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and Oceania. It was geographically the largest theater of the war, including the vast ...
. To reach a large geographical area these transmissions included
shortwave radio
Shortwave radio is radio transmission using shortwave (SW) radio frequencies. There is no official definition of the band, but the range always includes all of the high frequency band (HF), which extends from 3 to 30 MHz (100 to 10 me ...
frequencies in the 31 m band. The program featured
Allied
An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...
prisoners of war
A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held Captivity, captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610.
Belligerents hold priso ...
(POW) reading current news and playing prerecorded music, and sending messages from POWs to their families back home and to Allied soldiers and sailors serving in the Pacific theater. These messages were interlaced with demoralizing commentary and appeals to surrender or sabotage the Allied war effort. ''The Zero Hour'' also featured the female announcer dubbed
Tokyo Rose.
''The Zero Hour'' was the brainchild of Major
Shigetsugu Tsuneishi
Shigetsugu (written: ) is a masculine Japanese given name. Notable people with the name include:
*, Japanese samurai
* Yonekura Shigetsugu (died 1575), Japanese samurai
{{given name
Japanese masculine given names
Masculine given names ...
, who joined the
Japanese Imperial Army's 8th Section G-2 (
Psychological Warfare) unit as the Army representative to the Information Liaison Confidential Committee, which oversaw the coordination of the nationalized news agencies, in November 1941. His first effort was a propagandistic photographic magazine called ''Front'', based on the format of the American magazine ''
Life''.
Major Tsuneishi established an office at
Radio Tokyo (NHK) and issued orders to the NHK Overseas Bureau's American, European, Asian, Editorial and Administration Divisions through Bureau Chief
Yoshio Muto. Thereafter, all news broadcasts became official announcements of the
Japanese Imperial Army General Headquarters (GHQ). The American Division radio announcers section was headed by
Yuichi Hirakawa, a native Japanese with a degree in Dramatics from the
University of Washington.
Tsuneishi acquired a veteran radio announcer with the capture of
Australian Army Major
Charles Cousens, who had been a popular and highly regarded news commentor in
Sydney
Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...
before the War. During an interrogation at the General Staff HQ in
Tokyo on August 1, 1942, Tsuneishi made it clear to Cousens that he had to broadcast for the Japanese or face execution before putting him to work at 6 p.m. that same evening. Cousens was subsequently tasked with writing and broadcasting "radio essays" on the need to have high ideals as a human being, collections of platitudes with no
propaganda
Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...
value.
References
External links
Broadcasts of ''The Zero Hour''* ''The Zero Hour'' show 8-14-1944,
music with "Ann the Orphan,"
Iva Toguri D'Aquino, a Japanese-American dubbed "
Tokyo Rose" by the American military
{{DEFAULTSORT:Zero Hour (Ww Ii)
Propaganda radio broadcasts