PAPER WAR

[Music] fighting with leaflets before the surrender in Italy the crumbling German front is further weakened by psychological warfare at a division g2 headquarters a staff officer phones a prisoner of war branch combat propaganda team requesting leaflets for use against enemy troops the team is responsible for writing printing and distribution of the leaflets after the necessary instructions and suggestions are received from g2 a text is drawn up by one of the teams propaganda writers sometimes in English for translation into German and sometimes directly in German the leaflet is Linna typed at the combat propaganda team print shop headlines are set by hand individual stereotype plates are put together to make one multiple plate for faster printing thousands of copies roll off the presses and are cut by machine this leaflet is addressed to the 350 Armen Infantry Division whose morale was considered low and the men ripe for psychological warfare the leaflets are rolled into packages which may be inserted in gun shells or dispersed by plane at the ammunition supply depot the packages are fitted into smoke shelves cardboard discs are placed in the shell to take up any slack space the shells are fired from 105 millimeter gun and the leaflets scattered in the air about a hundred to three hundred feet over the target when dispersal over enemy territory is to be by artillery observation cub planes special type bundles are made up the packages are put into the planes cockpit however before being dropped bundles are split open so that the leaflets may scatter fighter-bombers using special type bomb package containers carry thousands of copies far into enemy territory while carrying out regular tactical missions at the same time the pilot releases the load by tugging at a shock cord holding the leaflets in the bomb the leaflet loaded bomb is fastened to the bomb rack under the plane the bomb itself remains with the plane before the drop the pilot calculates the wind drifted so as to cover the target interviewing a German prisoner who has come over to our lines with a leaflet over 3,000,000 leaflets have been distributed by one propaganda team in a week interrogation reveals that most prisoners have seen or read the leaflets while many German soldiers carry the safe conduct pass for use in an emergency [Music]