Origins
William Joseph Donovan formed the Morale Operations Branch of the Office of Strategic Services on March 3, 1943. Donovan admired the perceived effectiveness of Nazi propaganda and saw the United States’ lack of similar operations as a significant weakness. To that end, he created the Morale Operations branch, which used deception and subversion to undermine belief in the German Wehrmacht, Hitler, and Nazism.
Organization
The Morale Operations Branch comprised five sections: the Special Communications Detachment, the Radio Division, the Special Contacts Division, the Publications and Campaigns Division, and the Foreign Division. The Special Communications Detachment was responsible for “combat propaganda operations in coordination with the U.S. Army in Europe.” The Radio Division “conducted all black or clandestine radio programs.” The Special Contacts Division “distributed propaganda to partisan groups.”The Publications and Campaigns Division “produced leaflets, pamphlets, and whispering campaigns.” The Foreign Division “conducted miscellaneous [Morale Operations] activities abroad.” Collectively these divisions carried out psychological warfare operations for the U.S. Army.
The Morale Operations Branch had outposts in several locations across the globe. Usually these stations were close to U.S. Army combat stations or integrated into Army intelligence posts. By 1945 the Morale Operations Branch had one station in Algeria, Egypt, France, and Britain, two in Sweden, and six in Italy. The most important of these stations was in London, Britain.
The Business plan on Total Army Analysis
In this lesson you will continue to review the key agencies and major force management processes used in developing warfighting capability provided to combatant comman Review Key agencies Major force management processes Used in developing warfighting capability provided to combatant commanders for the operational environment. You will focus on the relationship between the Planning, Programming, ...
Campaigns
Leaflets
How Much Longer?
The “How Much Longer?” campaign was the first major black propaganda leaflet campaign. The campaign produced sixteen different leaflets. Each of these featured a cartoon depicting a burdensome situation and asked how much longer German citizens would tolerate it. These leaflets were “distributed throughout Italy, southern France, and the Balkans.”
Skorpion West
Skorpion West was another successful leaflet campaign. After the German defeat at Normandy, a German propaganda team located in France created optimistic leaflets in an effort to boost morale. Germany then airdropped these leaflets over their lines to bolster the spirits of the German soldiers.
The Morale Operations branch obtained copies of these leaflets and immediately produced their own facsimiles. The Germans believed these false documents were genuine and began distributing them. The first of these leaflets indicated that the German high command did not believe their soldiers would be able to hold the line and “encouraged soldiers to scorch the earth before dying in a last stand for Nationalist Socialism.” The second ordered all soldiers to shoot any officers who attempted to surrender or retreat. A third pamphlet ordered soldiers to carry out the evacuation of civilian populations by force (Morale Operations hoped that this would create traffic congestion and clog supply lines).
Ultimately the Germans denounced all Skorpion West pamphlets, including the ones that the German propaganda team had created, as enemy propaganda and ordered all troops to ignore their messages.
