Sex and Psychological Operations

John

In his book But not in Shame, John Toland tells of a Japanese campaign waged in the Philippines. He states:

The crudest leaflets featured sex. The most effective of these was a "striptease" series. First, the picture of the face of a beautiful woman was dropped from planes. Next came a view of the same woman from the waist up, with a shawl just covering her large breasts. The third showed the woman, full length, draped seductively with a shawl. In the fourth picture, the shawl was gone. The final picture showed the sex act.

Girls Booze and Food…

This is a very strange Japanese leaflet found by a 5th Division Marine sergeant on Iwo Jima. It clearly is a one-of-a-kind item since it appears to be typewritten and hand drawn. It is not exactly a sex leaflet in the true sense of the term, but it does offer surrendering American troops “GIRLS, BOOZE, FOOD, and more G-I-R-L-S.” I think we know what this Japanese propagandist is selling.

Chastity Belt

The Japanese apparently printed one of the strangest sex leaflets we have ever seen. The leaflet was depicted in The Falling Leaf, Number 132, spring 1991. It depicts a naked European woman and a chastity belt. The actual leaflet is white and yellow on a deep red background. It was dropped over Chinese troops during their invasion of Manchuria in the 1930s. An unnamed author says:

The message of the leaflet tells Chinese soldiers that European women are slovenly, of loose morals and unchaste, and because of this a soldier husband during a long war fastened a chastity belt to his wife.

The message is apparently intended to instill a feeling of homesickness and yearning and cause him to cease fighting by deserting or surrendering. We should point out that the chastity belt is mechanically correct and similar models appear on postcards from a French museum.

Remember?

This Japanese leaflet tugs on the heartstrings of American and Australian troops by depicting very kissable lips in full color on the front along with the word:

Remember?

The back has a short text message in a woman’s handwriting:

Darling, can’t you find a way to come back to me? I miss you so. I send all my love, and my kisses are on the other side of this card.

The finder of this particular leaflet mailed it home with the following comment:

This is what the Japs dropped for Christmas. They want to make us more homesick than we are. I wish that was really you on the other side.

[Author’s Note] The New Guinea campaign was fought from 24 January 1943 to 31 December 1944. So, although we cannot be sure, it seems likely that this leaflet was dropped in December 1944.

Sex was always on the minds of the United States military authorities according to Bertrand M. Roehner’s Relationships Between Allied Forces and the Population of Japan, He says that at the end of the war:

A 27 August 1945 Excerpt from an Army pamphlet destined to US occupation forces says that Japanese women have been taught to hate you. They do as their men tell them, and many of them have been told to kill you. Sex is one of the oldest and most effective weapons in history. The Geisha girl knows how to wield it charmingly. She may entice you only to poison you. She may slit your throat. Stay away from the women of Japan, all of them.

 

This calendar page was offered for sale by the estate of a former member of the U.S. 13th Air Force. It depicts a nude woman and is a bit of a mystery. It bears a December 1943 calendar and there were many propaganda leaflets prepared in the form of a calendar, but there were also many commercial calendars that bear nudes. The producer is “COM AIR SOPAC.” I am not sure if this was a propaganda leaflet or a morale booster designed for the “Anglos.” But, if not for the natives, why print the message in Pidgin English? Whatever the use, it is an interesting wartime item. The text is:

The white men who have all come together to the South Pacific by airplane now all want to wish you good friends a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

British Sexual PSYOP

The British government also authorized the manufacture of a very few pornographic leaflets during World War 2. There are three different items known to have been printed and others may exist. They were discussed in some detail by one of the major British wartime propagandists in 1972.

In an article published in the Times Literacy Supplement of January 21, 1972, Sefton Delmer talked about his "black" pornographic leaflets.

My cloak-and-dagger friends in the Special Operations Executive (SOE) were constantly clamoring for printed pornography. But I still took the same view of printing pornography as I had in France in 1939. Looking back, I do not think my unit produced more than three items of printed pornography during the whole of the war, not because I was squeamish, but simply because I did not think the effort involved on our part would be justified by the subversive effect on the Germans.

The first item was a two-page folding leaflet. Its theme was the Kaiser Germany's patriotic song `The Watch on the Rhine.' A very gloomy picture of a snow-covered grave somewhere on the Russian front, headed the first verse of the Watch on the Rhine: 'Lieb Vaterland magst ruhig sein' (`Dear Fatherland you may rest assured'). By rights that inspiring thought would be followed by a second verse. 'Fest steht and treu die Wacht am Rhein. '(`Firm and true stands the watch on the Rhine'). Instead, the picture of the soldier's grave and its reassuring caption was followed by a second page overleaf showing in color a picture of a naked girl, painted in the photographic style favored by Adolf Hitler in such beloved pictures as 'Leda and the Swan,' about to seat herself on the upright penis of some dark haired and dark skinned non-German.

Note: The actual leaflet is much more graphic.
This image was intentionally blurred so as not to offend.

Leaflet from the collection of Dr. Rod Oakland

The caption ran: 'Fest steckt's and treu der Fremdarbeiter rein.' ('Firmly and true the foreign worker sticks it in'). Depending on the region selected for this document's distribution, we alternated the word Fremdarbeiter with der Italiener or even der Makaroni.

My SOE friends ordered these leaflets by the thousand. But ironically not because they found them to be subversive of German morale, but because they found them excellent for the morale of their men distributing them!

Ellic Howe points out in The Black Game, Michael Joseph, London, 1982, that Delmer was probably mistaken about the numbers. He says:

Delmer’s SOE friends did not order these leaflets by the thousands because only the Fremdarbeiter version was ever printed (probably a maximum of 5000 copies) in the summer of 1942. The Nordisk Nyhedstjenste (underground newspaper) reported on 11 August 1944 that copies were circulating among German soldiers in Denmark.

One of these leaflets was discovered in Denmark in 1980. The finder told me at that time, "It is correct that I am in possession of a copy of 'Lieb Vaterland magst ruhig sein.' This leaflet was one of a large number of `black leaflets,' which came to Denmark during W.W.2. It was distributed in and about Copenhagen, and is mentioned in the underground press. Having gone through all official collections in Denmark, I can inform you that my copy is the only one known to be in Denmark. The exact size is 15x21 cm, and only one side is printed in color."

I received a copy of the leaflet from the owner. It shows a dead German in the snow on the front cover. The leaflet opens to show the woman and her foreign lover on the right side, the text as mentioned on the left. On the back of the folded leaflet the British have printed a long propaganda text. Boxed at the left of the page is "5,800,000 comrades have been killed, wounded, or are missing in action. At the same time on the home front, the number of foreign laborers has increased to 12,000,000."

The text on the rest of the page reads as follows, "Each year, more millions of comrades lose their life, freedom and health at the front. Each year, more millions of foreign laborers are streaming into the Reich. Foreign laborers take over the jobs of German soldiers and therefore make it possible for them to find death in the East. Foreign laborers sit in our homes. They become expert workers and craftsmen, and our German girls have to work under them. With their fast-earned money and black-market food items, the foreign laborers approach our soldier's wives and girl friends. Hunger and poverty often make our girls willing. Foreign laborers are not stupid. They learn our methods of work, find out our manufacturing secrets and industrial patents, and when the war is over, and our factories are nothing but bombed rubble, then the foreign laborers will return to their own countries with the knowledge and expertise they acquired here.

They will return to their own factories, which have not been touched by the war. When the German soldier returns home, he will find only debris where his place of work once stood. We have lost the war. We must now save what we can of the peace. Throw the foreign laborers out. End the war. Enough have died at the front. The rest of us must find work when we return home."

I spoke to one of the Delmer's master forgers, Ellic Howe, about this leaflet. The artist/cartoonist Walter Goetz who was in charge of British white propaganda to Germany for a time actually drew the vignette. Goetz was a German who became a British citizen in the early 1930s. He designed the leaflet at the personal request of Howe. The Fanfare Press of  St. Martin's Lane, London, printed it. The Chairman and the General Manager of the firm printed the leaflet after hours. Howe said that "it was not considered advisable to allow ordinary workmen to see the thing. Probably not more than a few thousand were printed. I think we made them about April of 1940." The British government partially declassified Howe's files after the war. This leaflet is coded H.316. Howe later reprinted is as H-714.

I should point out that even through Howe said Goetz drew the pornographic vignette; Sefton Delmer later stated that his wife Isabel was the artist. I don’t see any reason that Delmer would lie, so I believe that Goetz was just used to protect the wife at the time. The British loved to play their little games during and after the war. I was introduced to an Armin Hull in 1965 and putting two and two together immediately said, “Oh, you must be Ellic Howe.” He was actually annoyed. He believed his code name would be more difficult to crack

The British also started a rumor campaign (what they call a “sib”) to go along with this leaflet. Sib number N-675 states that Foreign workers in the city of Essen have a contest to see who can bed the most German wives.

A “most secret” memorandum in the British Public Record Office dated 24 March 1944 indicates that not all the government officials were willing to use sexual propaganda. The memorandum is from Delmer to Lieutenant Colonel Thurston (Head, SOE German Section). It reads in part, “The Director General has instructed me that he does not wish H-714 (Lieb Vaterland…) to be distributed. I should therefore be grateful if you would not distribute any copies of this job which you may still be holding…” He scribbles at the bottom of the note “The Director-General is too ladylike!”

Researcher Lee Richards found an archived document circulated to Special Operations Executive propaganda agents in 1942 on the subject of sexual rumors:

Those who have little opportunity for sexual experience consistently enjoy talking about it. Good sexy rumors also have the advantage that they are told and listened to in a more emotional frame of mind than many people realize, and they have therefore a deeper effect.

Everyone must gauge for themselves how dirty a sexual story can be. There is a danger of making stories so revolting that a large proportion of the hearers will never repeat them. On the other hand in certain classes you can go very far, and it should be remembered that the more lurid the setting the more firmly the rumor conveyed will stick.

Martin Herz, a Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) writer agreed with the Director-General. He said:

The enemy could easily see from the elaborateness of the leaflet (which in this case was printed in four colors) that this was Allied propaganda. Even though he might agree with the message, he would resent it since it was painful to him. Moreover, since at the same time all out “white” media were laboring hard and patiently to establish the essential honesty and forthrightness of our propaganda, some harm was probably done to the credibility of our white media.

Returning to Sefton Delmer's Time article, he continues:

The next pornographic leaflet we did was an exquisite menu for a dinner party, given by some Nazi gourmet for his friends. I cannot now remember who it was. All that I recall was that the menu included dishes way beyond the reach or even the imagination of the ordinary rationed German. Surrounding the menu was a kind of frieze rather in the manner of the old prewar cover of Punch. On close examination, however, it proved to be nothing as harmless as Mr. Punch's cornucopia of frolic. Instead it presented a sphinctrian orgy with all the figures, male and female alike, connected in pervert intimacy. I cannot think why we bothered to add this touch. The essential propaganda ingredient was the menu which provided evidence for any skeptical member of the German public how well the party priviligentsia lived when the ordinary German was forced to obey a strict system of rationing.

Delmer continues:

The third pornographic leaflet we did was never distributed. Not that SOE objected to it. On the contrary, they were lavish with praise. But an old army colonel--he had served a lifetime in Poona, an experience which had not failed to leave its mark on him--had found it on the table of my secret printer whom he had visited with a view to acquiring some of our latest philatelic counterfeits.

When he saw this particular piece of pornography, he was almost beside himself with indignant fury. I did not want to hurt the old man by challenging him to battle over an item of pornography to which in any case I attached no great importance. So I immediately withdrew it. But it was not really all that bad.

Delmer also received grief about some of the sexual propaganda broadcasts over the black British radio station Gustav Siegfried Eins. Lee Richards discusses the story in his article on Psywar.org. He mentions some of the radio station’s plot lines:

…A Hitler Youth leader had been caught violating the twelve year old daughter of a soldier

…The employment of SS men on the home-front for "race preservation"; their job being to assist wives and widows of fallen soldiers to have the children which their own man would have provided them with normally.

…An SS man called Breuter who was in charge of children who had been evacuated from bombed German cities to Czechoslovakia. He was removed from his post after being found guilty in 67 cases of assaulting little girls.

A mortified Sir Stafford Cripps attacked the radio station in a letter to Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden. He told of a broadcast he had heard:

…A named German admiral who takes home 4 or 5 sailors with his own mistress. He makes the sailors drunk and excites himself by instigating the sailors to rape his mistress in turn. All this is given in a running commentary which describes in the minutest detail the difficulties of the sailors owing to their drunkenness. Here is a typical sentence from the orgy: "...and if she gets dry between the legs, pour in butter." This is followed by the indignant comment that butter is rationed to the common people. The climax of the orgy is an even more detailed description of how the old Admiral finally works himself up into a state in which he, too, can copulate with the woman.

Delmer explained:

The pornographic element in these broadcasts was introduced deliberately, not for the sake of pornography in itself, but in order to attract listeners and gain their attention for the main objects of the station, the undermining of confidence in the regime…Reports received from American officials in Berlin shortly before America entered the war emphasised that the pornographic element in the broadcasts had attracted a listening public much wider than would otherwise have been the case...We are of course not trying to win Germans to our side by this method; we are trying to turn Germans against Germans and thereby weaken the German war machine.

Delmer threatened to abandon the station if he not did receive full backing for his work.

The success of these broadcasts has been proved on evidence available, and, if an official fiat were to demand that the character of the station should be changed, it would not be possible to continue it. No secret, subversive organisation can operate successfully if its operations are to be limited to what the moral standards of our country would require for work undertaken openly and in the name of His Majesty's Government.

The British were willing to use pornography as a weapon to defeat Hitler, so Delmer got his backing.

Charles Cruickshank mentions Delmer’s black radio station in: The Fourth Arm: Psychological Warfare 1938 – 1945, Davis-Poynter, London, 1977:

American diplomats in Berlin – while Germany and the United States were still at peace – had no doubt that it was the pornographic element in the transmissions that attracted the listeners.

He quotes a Swedish agent:

He claimed that more people listened to it than any other station in the Third Reich. It insured a regular audience by providing more or less open pornography, which attracted people already coarsened by the Nazi way of life.

Delmer later mentioned that the German army's propaganda unit had been putting out a series of leaflets purporting to expose how the enemy was retouching photographs and faking them to convey untruths. He said:

By this time, my ‘black’ printer was an expert at counterfeiting German documents, using the same type, the same paper, and the same size as the German original. So, I got him put the same title on our counterfeit, 'Wie sie falschen,' ('How they forge'). Then with a suitable text we exposed a palpable forgery of a Hitler photograph, which we attributed to the despicable treachery of an internal enemy. The genuine original photograph showed Hitler in his usual saluting posture, right arm upraised, his left resting on the buckle of his belt. The forgery, however, showed a huge penis under his left hand. Our caption read, `This is a most appalling forgery. Everyone knows the Fuhrer does not possess anything of the kind'."

 

Original German Hoffmann photo postcard and parody.

One of the most intriguing and insidious insults to Adolf Hitler was a propaganda postcard code numbered H.789 produced by Director Sefton Delmer of the British Political Warfare Executive (PWE) that showed the Führer with his penis in his hand. The postcard chosen to caricature was originally a product of Foto Hoffman of Munich. Hitler stands on what appears to be balcony with his left hand on the rail and his right hand on his waist. In the parody, his right hand is depicted holding a circumcised penis. This probably was designed to feed the rumor that Hitler was indeed a self-hating Jew. The text is a quote from Hitler’s Munich speech of 8 November 1942:

What we have, that we firmly hold.

Sefton Delmer first mentioned this postcard in an article in the Times Literary Supplement of 21 January 1972 entitled “H.M.G.’s Secret Pornographer.”

When I interviewed the British master-forger Ellic Howe in 1980 he told me that about 100 copies of the postcard were printed in late 1943 or early 1944 but they were never disseminated. He thought that they had all been destroyed. My own research later determined that 2,500 postcards were delivered on 13 March 1944. The operation was cancelled on the order of the Director General of the PWE. One agent quoted a high British official as saying that he would rather lose the war to Germany than take part in such psychological warfare pornographic endeavors.

British researcher Dr. Rod Oakland discovered one of these postcards in a private collection and mentioned it in the spring 1993 journal of the Psywar Society, the Falling Leaf.

The original image that was to be defaced by the addition of a penis

The card was depicted in a British TV documentary entitled “Sex and the Swastika.” In the documentary, PWE artist Marion Whitehorn stated that she was given a postcard by a Brigadier General at the PWE secret headquarters about 45 miles outside London and told:

You Marion will impose a penis on this card…but not too big.

What is very interesting is that the card depicted in the documentary had Hitler wearing Lederhosen with his left hand in his lap while the card we depict has Hitler in full uniform. It is unknown if two postcards were prepared, or if the first postcard was found unacceptable and the vignette on the second postcard was used instead. In a second TV documentary entitled “Sex Bomb” Whitehorn tells the story again except that this time the producers depict a postcard showing Hitler standing with penis in hand. It seems unclear if there were one or two “penis” postcards.

This may be the single nastiest personal attack on an enemy leader in any war.

According to SOE in the Far East, Charles Cruickshank, Oxford University Press, 1983; the British Special Operations Executive used “black” sexual leaflets against the Japanese in the Far East. He says in part:

The theme that the private soldier was required to endure hardship at the front for the benefit of the war profiteer was developed in an interesting series of leaflets depicting the life-style of the profiteer. Six photographs were commissioned: A profiteer at dinner waited on by pretty girls; Smoking and drinking after dinner with the girls; A communal bathing scene; Fornication; Fornication; More smoking and drinking.

The two fornication photographs caused a lot of problems and red tape for the British agents. After searching for suitable pornography without success, Asian models were found who were willing to be photographed separately in the buff. According to Cruickshank, the two photos were combined:

The subjects had to be photographed separately and the photographer is to be congratulated on a really clever bit of photomontage. It was hoped the pictures struck the right not of artistic debauchery. The background looks a bit austere to the Western eye…but with the Japanese the play’s the thing and the scenery is kept single.

The caption read: This is the way the profiteers are living at home. Soldiers, it is not for such as these that you should die. If you surrender to us you will be well-treated and your lives will be preserved to clear Japan of such scum after the war.

Years later, I read the actual Special Operations Executive file. Everything that Cruickshank said was accurate, and in addition I note the following.

About January 1944, the SOE requested a set of six pornographic leaflets. They had to deal with Scotland Yard, possibly because they were producing pornography; possibly because they needed a professional pornographer. That is not made clear. They wanted the leaflets to be sized to fit in a mortar or artillery shell and the paper to be highly glazed. The leaflets appear to have been ready by May 1944 and at that time “blocks” were forwarded with the promise of a duplicate set soon afterwards.

By coincidence, the American OSS also prepared a set of six sexual leaflets, though they were drawn by hand rather than photographed.

Sexual leaflets can sometime backfire on the originator when it is clearly wrong. This is mentioned War by Stealth: Australians and the Allied Intelligence Bureau, Alan Powell, Melbourne University Press, 1996. The author says in regard to Australian leaflets dropped on the natives of some of the small islands:

An officer noted in October 1944 that the native’s reaction to leaflets has been practically 100% with the exception of one leaflet which accuses the Japs of interfering with native women. This leaflet may even have had a damaging effect as far as can be ascertained; as enquiries among the natives reveal that the Japs did not interfere with their women.

Australian Sexual PSYOP?

Japanese soldiers are raping and robbing in Burma.

The above leaflet is very odd and one might question if it is a propaganda leaflet. It depicts a Japanese soldier with whip in hand in front of a naked Burmese woman tied to a pole. There is text in Burmese at the top and Japanese at the bottom. There is English text in the center that says: “Japanese soldiers are rapping and robbing in Burma.” I assume the leaflet was printed in error and the “rapping” should read “raping.”

The leaflet is printed on one side only which is a minor problem because we would expect both sides to be printed. The leaflet lacks a code and this is an even bigger problem. The British dropped leaflets on Burma and they used such codes as MPS, B, SB, and SBN. The Americans dropped leaflets on Burma and they used the codes CBA, CBG, CBM, CBN, CBP and 21 different variations of X.

The person who offered this leaflet also had two Australian leaflets that seem to be for New Zealand, both without codes, so perhaps this is an Australian Far Eastern Liaison Office (FELO) leaflet. In general, although the Aussies coded their leaflets, it usually did not appear on the leaflet, just the translation sheet. I cannot find any record of FELO leafleting Burma, so this item is still open to question.

The Rumor Campaign

Besides leaflets and postcards, in an attempt to raise the morale of occupied Europe and lower the morale of the German military, civilians and their allies, the secret British Underground Propaganda Committee produced well over eight thousand rumors, (they called them “Sibs” from the Latin sibalare – to hiss). Researcher Lee Richards mentions the “whisper campaign” and many of these rumors in his book Whispers of War, Psywar.org, 2010. In regard to British propaganda rumors about sexual activity in the Third Reich he lists dozens of moral-destroying rumors. I have selected a few of the more interesting ones:

4 July 1941 – German officers know the address of all the prostitutes in Amsterdam that have VD. They use them to get medical leave. It is called “krank durch Freude,” (Illness through joy).

4 September 1941 – Catholic women must offer themselves to the SS on the Day of Fructification. The Church believes that bearing children for the State is a mortal sin.

31 October 1941- The German press has been ordered to downplay stories about prison sentences for German woman who have had relations with foreign workers, just as they downplay death announcements.

21 January 1944 – A group of necrophiles among SS troops in Berlin has assembled the perfect German girl from the legs, arms and torso of air raid victims.

American Sexual PSYOP

Did the United States of America produce wartime propaganda leaflets of a sexual nature? No agent of the American espionage establishment will officially admit it. The use of sexually explicit leaflets has always been against official policy.

However, given enough time, secrets will eventually be exposed. This is exactly what happened when several wartime files and scrapbooks of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) were offered for sale thirty years after the end of World War 2. Some of these files were the personal property of former OSS agents. Others were records that had been lost or discarded when the U.S. occupation forces left Italy after the war. They had been carefully safeguarded for many years until their secrets could no longer prove embarrassing or damaging, and then placed on the auction block.

In the past, we had various hints that the OSS was involved in "black" operations to print and distribute pornographic leaflets. Quoting from The OSS document "Final Report of Production and Distribution from July 15, 1944 to May 15, 1945," we find the listing "Sex leaflets." The report states that 79,000 was produced, with distribution of 16,000 to Algeria, 3,800 to Bari, 41,500 to Brindisi, 500 to Northern Italy, 3,600 to France, and 13,500 for various special missions.

The so-called "sex leaflet" leaflet is a black and white cartoon of a high Nazi official fondling a seminude woman. The size of the leaflet is 240 x 175mm. The female is draped across his lap. Her right breast is exposed. The Nazi leers as he slides his hand under the dress of the unhappy woman. The text at the upper right of the leaflet reads:

For us at the front there is only fear and death. For the important officials at home, our women!

There is a longer message on the reverse:

Comrades! The deceit has lasted long enough! We who have been at the front for years, separated from our dearest ones, are now expected to die for the Party shortly before the end. Meanwhile, the Party bosses at home fool around with our women: It is high time that we do away with these swastika vermin! The war is lost, but we can still preserve the honor of our women! Therefore, go home, comrades! Our women need us! Our women wait for us! Signed: The Federation of Fighters on the Front.

The OSS Rome Envelope

The OSS Prints 6 Pornographic Leaflets in Rome

A second OSS propaganda operation with a sexual theme was listed in the "Final Report" under the heading of "Sex Cards and Envelopes." The report shows that there were 70,000 sets produced, with 65,025 sent to Northern Italy, 350 to France, and another 3,100 distributed in unlisted "Special" operations.

An envelope was found in a reference file of OSS material with German text on the front reading In der Heimat da gibt's ein Wiederseh'n! (We will meet again at home). This is an old German song dating back to the First World War. Beneath the title, we find in smaller print: 6 Bilder, (six Pictures). There is what might be considered a pun here because that line can also be translated as “Sex Pictures.” The envelope is colored tan and measures 150 x 100 millimeters. The OSS artist, Ed Lindner, was apparently afraid the leaflets would fall into the hands of minors, so he wrote in red pencil on the envelope in German: For men only. Below the actual envelope, he wrote on the same page that the card was mounted on, with the same red pencil, “For Adults only.” The American agent who prepared this reference file has penciled in red on the envelope Nur fur manner (For men only). Directly below the envelope on the page it was mounted on he has written in the same red pencil "Only for adults." We can deduce that he wanted the message printed on the envelope so it would not be accidentally opened by children.

The leaflets are 140 x 95 millimeters and would fit very snugly into this envelope with just a few millimeters to spare. The leaflets are extremely explicit and pornographic and are not items that a child should see. They feature themes of homosexuality, bestiality, lesbianism and child molestation.

The OSS Morale Operations Field Manual approved of the use of:

Slang, vulgarity, and pornography when consistent with cover, giving gossip and dirt, e.g., describing the sexual life of prominent enemy officials or their wives…Exploiting all social problems, especially sexual, which inevitably arise, increase of juvenile delinquency, adultery, pregnancy, venereal diseases; circulating in one enemy country political statements, jokes and satires derogatory to it.

Each leaflet bears a rather crude black and white sexual caricature, a title in Gothic print, and four lines of text in early German "Suterlin," a script taught in elementary schools until the mid-1930s. The style of the text is an artificially concocted verse. Translation is extremely difficult, and cannot be made to rhyme in English. We have attempted to capture the mood of the propagandist author.

The first shows two naked women, one sucking on the breast of the other. The Gothic title reads "New games in the home (The husband is at the front)." A loose interpretation of the script verse is:

"This picture shows your Annette,
in a game with another woman.
Your Plea for her love is in vain,
she now loves only degenerate acts!"

The second leaflet bears the same title in Gothic, but shows a naked woman standing before a mirror with a dog licking her pubic area. The text reads:

"The woman alone without a man
tries to get her pleasure any way she can.
Her clitoris itches and burns like fire,
and the dog's tongue performs miracles!"

Note: The actual leaflet is much more graphic.
This image was intentionally blurred so as not to offend.

The third has the same heading as the first two. This card shows two women having oral sex on a bed. The text reads:

"Her husband isn't here, what should she do?
Her pussy cannot always be idle.
For this reason and to defy you
she now eats another pussy!"

Note: The actual leaflet is much more graphic.
This image was intentionally blurred so as not to offend.

The fourth leaflet has a different title in Gothic: "The Party takes action (and your wife too?)." The caricature shows a naked SS man with an enormous erection saluting a photo of Hitler. On the bed is an unclothed weeping woman. By the bedside is a photo of her husband, a soldier at the front. The 'text reads:

"He threatened her so she would be nice to him
and follow him into the warm bed.
The Nazi has no conscience
and that is how he gets his sex."

Note: The actual leaflet is much more graphic.
This image was intentionally blurred so as not to offend.

The fifth leaflet has the title "HJ = Helpless Boys (Will your boy also be perverted?)." The illustration is of an adult Nazi party member holding a young boy wearing only shirt and shoes. The initials "HJ" are for "Hitler Jugend" (Hitler Youth). This was a semi-military youth organization formed by the Nazi Party. The OSS changed this to "Helpless youth" in an attempt to convince fathers at the front that their children were being perverted and seduced by members of the Nazi Party. The text reads:

"The boy and his leader
are united in love play.
Thus the leader also takes your child.
There are altogether too many games!"

The sixth and final leaflet has the same heading as the fifth. "HJ= Helpless boys (Will your boy also be perverted?)" The illustration is of an adult Nazi Party member about to have anal sex with a young boy.

Note: The actual leaflet is much more graphic.
This image was intentionally blurred so as not to offend.

"The Hitler Youth, always sharp,
also has a love life.
His leader also has seduced him:
The asshole is already stretched."

I spoke to the author of these leaflets many years after the war, and he was quite proud of them. He told me:

That very nasty set of `6 Bilder' in an envelope originated with yours truly who took to verse and rhyme to make a point perfectly clear. Nasty!

I asked him what he hoped to gain by the leaflets, since every study has shown that pornography fails miserably to demoralize the foot soldier. He answered:

The 6 Bilder were not just idle pornography. The "fun" part served, as you rightly observed, to achieve wide and rapid dissemination of the material, which was not designed simply to stimulate raging hormones. Its purpose was to stimulate second thoughts -- a nagging suspicion and discomfort as to the possibility of actual events, even though depicted in pornographic caricature. Could it be that my young son is being corrupted and violated by his Hitlerjugend fuehrer? Is my wife's yearning for sexual fulfillment satisfied by a surrogate, perhaps a neighbor's dog? Whose friend is the Nazi functionary -- the soldier's friend or the soldier's wife's? In other words, it's not the porn part of the picture that we wanted to work for us, but the message part (as subliminal as it may seem). The series of six caricatures also filled a secondary objective: wider awareness of this "underground" activity, including the Neues Deutschland movement, an expansion of, what the Nazi press so much deplored, the "Fluesterpropaganda." They wrote a long editorial about it in the Das Schwarze Corps, the official SS newspaper.

At his request I always kept the name of the American agent secret. He has now passed on so I would like to give him the credit I feel that he deserves. Ed Lindner (OSS Code name Eddie Zinder) passed away on 24 November 2007 at the age of 89. He was quite proud of the "Bilder" leaflets and always said that the pornography was meaningless; it was just a way to get the Germans to pick them up so they could be converted by the “diabolical subliminal” messages in the text.

During WWII Ed was part of the Morale Operations Company of the 2677th OSS Regiment in Italy. As such, he helped plan and organize Operation Sauerkraut, a campaign to use volunteer German prisoners-of-war to bring American propaganda behind enemy lines. Ed was a good guy and a civilian at heart. In fact, I have seen some reports where the Army criticized him for his less than military attitude. He was also an honorable man and fought at the end of the operation for his German POWs who were promised special consideration and payment for risking their lives behind the lines, only to be betrayed and sent back to the prison camp by the U.S. Army High Command.

In later years I would often call him to talk about various projects. He was very low-key and when I asked him if he wanted to appear on a TV or magazine interview with me always turned them down. WWII was a job that had to be done, and he wanted no publicity or praise for simply doing his duty.  

In 2010, Florian Traussnig of the Austrian Center for Intelligence, Propaganda and Security Studies pointed out another of Lindner’s little tricks on the envelope.

…He used impressive linguistic and “semiotic” strategies (probably based on intuition, not on academic theories) like the text-riddle of the headline “6 Bilder” (“6” is in German pronounced “sechs” [“sek’s”] and therefore homophone with “Sex”).

So, the implication is that “6 Bilder” might also be thought of as “Sex Pictures.” Eddie was always thinking!

Part of one letter Willis C. Reddick Sent Me 

During WWII, a Research and Development Department (Dirty Tricks) agent named Major Willis C. Reddick oversaw establishing the OSS printing office in a former laboratory space at 25th and E Streets in Washington DC., and later in London. His job was commanding the printers in charge of counterfeiting documents to be used by agents in the field. I once asked him about pornography. Some of his comments appear at the bottom of one letter he sent to me.

Goebbels with a Starlet

The OSS in Berne attacked NAZI Propaganda Minister Josef Goebbels in this leaflet that shows him with a semi-naked “starlet” on his lap. Goebbels was in charge of the German movie industry and he was known to use his power to have sex with many of his female stars. In this leaflet she is succumbing to his “charms” as he promises her a starring role over glasses of champagne. Notice that the leaflet is stamped “125.” That shows that it was a file copy by the Office of Strategic Services. The text is:

For Goebbels the war is not so bad
He looks for a star for a film
While others bleed to death
He is occupied with harlots

There are other leaflets that are sexual, but less pornographic. For instance, The Morale Operations Section of the OSS produced a series of sixteen leaflets entitled "Wie lange noch?" (How much longer?). The plan was to convince the populace that there was a strong anti-Nazi underground movement within Germany. Besides the leaflets, posters and gummed labels using a large "W" as a symbol were placed on German vehicles, on walls, on doors and windows, in books and other appropriate places, by agents operating behind enemy lines.

How Much Longer - Number 8

Number 8 in the Wie lange noch? series depicts a man and a naked German woman on a bed. The text is:

How much longer will these foreigners disgrace our women?

At the right of the leaflet, beneath the number “8” the author has written:

Read and pass on!

How Much Longer - Number 13

Number thirteen of the series pictures a German wife sitting on the bed with a member of the Nazi Party. On a nearby table we see a photograph of her soldier husband who is fighting on the Eastern Front. The text of this leaflet reads:

How much longer will these bedroom heroes, who always shout Heil Hitler so smartly, be permitted to pursue our women?

At the right of the leaflet, beneath the number “13,” the author has written:

Read and pass on!

Hitler's Mountain Retreat

At one time there was an OSS plan to drop pornography over the Eagle's Nest at Obersalzberg near Berchtesgaden, Hitler's mountain retreat. The OSS believed that it might drive him insane and end the war quickly. This plan went all the way to the Air Force where it was stopped when a General refused to risk a bomber and crew over the most heavily fortified area in Germany to drop "dirty pictures."

This plan came about because of a 1943 top-secret long-range psychological analysis of Hitler prepared by the OSS. The story is told in part in The Mind of Adolf Hitler, Walter C. Langer, Basic Books, NY, 1972. This was first prepared by the Morale Operations Branch of the Office of Strategic Services as a classified report titled A Psychological Analysis of Adolph Hitler during WWII. I should mention that most of the people interviewed for the report had escaped from Germany. They wanted American acceptance and may have been telling the psychologists what they thought they wanted to hear. Some of the more interesting passages in the book are:

Princess Stephanie von Hohenlohe said that one of Hitler's hobbies that is carefully hidden from the public is his love of pornography. He can scarcely wait for the next edition of Der Stürmer to appear. When it reached him he goes through it avidly. He seems to get great pleasure out of the dirty stories and the cartoons that feature this sheet.

Hitler has a large collection of nudes and according to Ernst Hanfstaengl (a former Chief of the Foreign Press Department of the Nazi Party who fled Germany) and others, he also enjoys viewing lewd movies in his private theater.

Other comments are:

On his walls are numerous pictures of obscene nudes that conceal nothing and he takes particular delight in looking through a collection of pornographic pictures that Hoffmann has made for him.

There was a general agreement among the collaborators of the report that Hitler is probably a neurotic psychopath bordering on schizophrenia. He has lost complete contact with the world about him and is still striving to make some kind of psychological adjustment that will give him a feeling of security in his social group.

Hitler's perversion is an extreme form of masochism in which the individual derives sexual gratification from the act of having a woman urinate or defecate on him.

Otto Strasser on a conversation with Geli Raubal (Hitler's niece and "the only woman he ever really loved"): Hitler made her undress. He would lie down on the floor. Then she would have to squat over his face where he could examine here at close range and this made him very excited. When the excitement reached its peak he demanded that she urinate on him and that gave him sexual pleasure.

It is amazing to think that the OSS paid for this report and apparently put some credence into its finding when not one of the agency's psychologists ever got within several thousand miles of Hitler.

Glen Yeadon and John Hawkins talk about the sexual plans to unhinge Hitler in The Nazi Hydra in America: Suppressed History of a Century. They say in part:

A London based OSS group decided Nazi Germany would implode if only its leader could be demoralized. After conducting a long psychological profile of Hitler, the group decided he could be unhinged by exposure of vast quantities of pornography. The OSS group then assembled the finest collection of pornography. The material was to be dropped by plane around the Führer-bunker. Hitler was to step outside and pick one up and immediately be thrown into a state of madness. But the Air Force liaison stormed out of the first meeting with the OSS, cursing and swearing he would not risk a single life for such an insane plan.

Another OSS plan was to feminize Hitler. A psychological report claimed:

A large feminine component to his constitution, which made him emotional, outwardly submissive, annoyingly subservient, and a full-fledged and a full-fledged masochist when it came to sex. The OSS believed that when Hitler visited the Eagle's Nest in southern Germany, the vegetables he ate came from a nearby garden. A local gardener was bribed to inject female sex hormones into the beets and carrots destined for Hitler's plate.

Nothing came of that operation.

The United States Navy also produced at least one slightly erotic propaganda leaflet. The item was produced by the Psychological Warfare Branch of the Pacific Fleet (CINCPAC). It was coded "411," and intended to create anxiety concerning conditions at home.

A photograph of a Japanese woman with one breast exposed is shown on the front. The other side contains text in violet ink on a primrose paper, 5 x 8 inches in size. The text reads:

While you continue your futile resistance against our overwhelming might, your wives, sisters, and daughters back home are daily being reduced to prostitution. These are hard times for your farmers, and badly needed money is easily obtained by selling women to brothels. Factory workers, who now have money, are always eager to pay a few extra yen for a night's fun with women. When peace comes soon, times at home will be even worse. This will be true in all countries. Unless you are at home to care for your families, many of your dearest women will be forced to become prostitutes. Can you think without emotion of your wives, daughters, and sisters submitting to the lustful embraces of jeering workers? Don't throw away your lives in vain. Your families need you!

We warn the Japanese that their women will be used as prostitute under the militarist’s reign. The form below is not propaganda. But it shows we were right. The women will be prostitutes, but apparently for the victorious Americans. I sense some irony here.

The Official Rate for Sex in the Japanese “Geisha” Houses in 1945

At the end of WWII the victorious Americans fixed the prices for sex for occupying troops with Japanese prostitutes. Before World War II, the yen traded at roughly 3.6 to the dollar. Then in 1945, the occupation forces landed and adopted a 15-to-1 conversion rate for their transactions with the Japanese. As inflation surged, they changed the rate to 50-to-1 in 1946, to 270-to-1 in 1948 and finally to 360-to-1 in 1949. Knowing the rate we see that to simply sleep over would cost about $6.50, a ‘full-time” which meant as much sex as you could handle for as long as you like was .70 cents an hour, and if you just wanted to drop in for a quickie was it was $2, which seems about right because as a kid when you heard about sex with a prostitute they always talked of $2 a pop.

    

Privately Produced Hitler Sex Photographs

There is another kind of American sexual propaganda that we should mention. During World War II, a number of faked photographs of enemy leaders were prepared to ridicule and humiliate them. There was a rumor from time to time that these were government “black” operations, but they were almost certainly privately made photographs prepared by patriotic citizens doing their small part to attack the Axis. One of the favorite targets of these “photomontages” was Adolf Hitler. We illustrate two such photographs above, each showing Hitler in close proximity to a woman’s breast. It is worth noting that the British Government actually did authorize a black propaganda photograph attacking Hitler. In that case, the Fuhrer was depicted holding his penis…which just happened to be circumcised.

The Ten Pornographic Hitler and Mussolini Postcards

The Private life of Dictators
Text in Italian, English and French

There is a mysterious set of ten pornographic postcards that depict both Hitler and Mussolini in various insulting sexual poses. The vignettes of the ten cards are all known. Eight are in horizontal format, two in vertical format. One depicts Hitler and Mussolini chasing each other around the table to see who will “bugger” the other: others depict a flying penis about to enter Hitler; Hitler and Mussolini about to be anally raped by Moroccans; Mussolini having anal sex with Hitler while he is abused by a phallic Fasces; Mussolini looking at pornographic pictures while his mistress Clara Petacci talks to a Fascist officer; Mussolini performing oral sex on a woman; Mussolini performing oral sex on a woman while Hitler watches; Hitler pointing at a woman’s naked behind; a woman performing oral sex on Mussolini; and Hitler as a prostitute near a lamppost (Lili Marlene?).

The 2020 Italian Language book Top Secret: Fake News in the Second World War, Espionage and Psychological Propaganda mentions the cards and adds that there is also a wrapper with the title The Last Secret Weapon of Hitler – Mussolini: The Corrupters of Europe.

Leandro says that instead of 10 postcards, there are 12 pornographic leaflets in the second wrapper. He says the photographs are of probable partisan or English origin and were dropped by aircraft together with other brochures with similar content over the town of Codogno in the province of Lodi to mock the German and Italian Fascists. All the leaflets are focused on Hitler, Mussolini and Petacci portrayed in obscene poses commented in Italian and English.

Notice there may be as many as three separate sets of pornography Hitler-Mussolini cards. These were black so their origin would be hidden, and we have no idea how many sets were printed, or by whom.

All of these postcards are pornographic and four have homosexual themes. They all have text in three languages; Italian, English and French. The anti-Fascist postcards might have been printed in Italy in late 1944.

The 10 cards we depict have an interesting history. Toward the end of World War II, the present owner’s father, a displaced Serbian, took asylum at the Vatican City’s refugee facility. Incredibly, these postcards were displayed at that location. He obtained a set and after the war, he took the postcards with him to Argentina and then later brought them with him when he settled in New York.

I asked the owner's surviving family what they meant by "displayed?" Their answer:

There is a family theory about the description of the postcards having been "displayed" at the Vatican's asylum unit. The Serb spoke Serbian (his nationality) and Spanish (from living in Argentina after the War) to his family. In Spanish, the word "mostrar" means "display," but it also means "show." So it's possible that rather than being on display, these postcards were shown to the Serb. That is pure speculation, but I have trouble believing that any Vatican charitable organization would put such sexual cards like those above on display.

All ten cards are well drawn and use propaganda text to embarrass and vilify the Fascist leaders. They were clearly meant to be used as postcards since the back has three lines for an address.

The Wrapper for what I believe is the Reproduction set
It seems to be designed for the American military souvenir trade
Because the wrapper is cut and torn it is possible that it originally said:
For American Soldiers in Rome

The postcards were re-issued in Naples in 1978 as “Seven unwelcome postcards of the twin regime,” by Colonnese. The “twin regime” could be the regimes of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, or could be near the end of the war where there was a regular government in the south of Italy and Mussolini’s Fascist Italian Social Republic in the north.

The back of what I believe to be the Reproduction Postcard

At the right side of the back of the reprinted cards there is a dotted box for a stamp and three lines for the address. On the left side, each card bears a printer’s imprint at the lower left in the message area that reads: Nazifascismo proibito – (the card number) – Colonnese editore, (Forbidden Nazi Fascism - (number) - Colonnese publisher). The reprinter Colonnese points to a library/bookshop in Naples, Italy, named Colonnese Editore. The bookshop was founded in 1963 by Gaetano Colonnese. It soon gained a reputation for books and journals related to the working class. “Working class” could indicate Communist and this could tie in Communist guerrillas to the anti-Fascist postcards. The reprinted set I saw had ten cards so perhaps more were added at a later date.

These reproduction cards appear to have come in a wrapper entitled “American Soldiers in Rome” with an American flag at the far left. The wrapper is made from a thick paper which could be folded around the cards.

Numbers 1 to 6 of these cards were included in the collection of John Perkins of Jersey Island, UK, that was auctioned by Stanley Gibbons in July 2014. Lot #1129 was described as follows:

Selection of six black and white artist drawn postcards on pages from a series entitled ‘Nazifascismo Proibito’ (numbered 1-6 on reverse) believed to have been prepared by Italian partisans and depicting various depraved and explicit poses of Hitler and Mussolini, also three similar designs on thin paper (proofs?) and a colored plain back card, some with overall stain spots, otherwise fine, Estimated price 120-140 pounds.

I corresponded with Perkins from about 1999 to 2004 and he was a very dedicated collector with wonderful propaganda material in his collection.

One of the Sex Leaflets with the images found on the Postcards

In addition, in October 2018 eight leaflets (not postcards) that are bear only Italian text (No French or English) were offered in a German auction.

Here is the complete set of cards, followed by the back of one of the original cards to show the absence of the stamp box.

1. Hitler and Mussolini around table: He who stops is lost. Hitler: I almost think I shall stop.

2. Hitler with flying penis: The last secret weapon has changed direction.

3. Hitler and Mussolini with Moroccans: The promised prize to the people of Morocco. Hitler to Mussolini: Now it is your turn.

4. Hitler and Mussolini with two women: They take new pre-arranged positions.

5. Mussolini looking at pornographic pictures: Fascist headquarters, Clarella: keep quiet the Duce is examining new positions.

6. Mussolini performing oral sex on a woman: The war that I prefer.

7. Mussolini performing oral sex on a woman while Hitler watches: The Corruptors of Europe.

8. Hitler pointing at a woman’s naked behind, seeming to indicate that it is not fair that she has a bigger “ass” than he is: Unloyal competition!

9. A woman performing oral sex on Mussolini: Historical meeting – Encouraging arts, talking with his inspirer.

10. Hitler as a prostitute near a lamppost, perhaps imitating Lili Marlene as a soldier walks by: Who wants me?

The back of the original Pornographic Postcards

This is a very interesting postcard set. Why were they in the Vatican? Were they sent there by the OSS as anti-Fascist propaganda, or were they privately made by some anti-Fascist or Guerrilla movement? As wartime propaganda they are amazing, but are they officially government-made or unofficially privately-made? Their value depends on proper identification.

The “Kosher Meat” card

This strange item appears to be a standard WWII British Postcard with the usual words POST CARD, For Correspondence and Address Only on the back. It was offered for sale by the Stade Auction House of Germany and estimated at 30 Euros ($34 U.S.). I don’t know how this could be sold in a store because it is very pornographic and depicts what actually looks like a German caricature of a Jew having anal sex with Adolf Hitler. The text is:

Giving Hitler some Kosher Meat

What I thought was particularly interesting is that the word “Kosher” is in Hebrew as if the card was designed to be bought be Jews to ridicule Hitler. This could be just a gag card, or it might be something governmental meant to vilify Hitler. I have not a clue.

Soviet Sexual PSYOP

Russian leaflet

Most Russian leaflets to Germany tend to be long-winded and boring. The leaflet above is just text and generally would not be very interesting except that it pretends to be a reproduction of a letter to from the State Insurance Office of Family Increase to a German male offering him the chance to have sex with multiple German women, and goes so far as to promise the award of a medal to those who perform well. It also explains that his wife will have no right to divorce and will have to take this “minor hardship as a consequence of war.” The letter explains that fertile and vigorous men are needed to keep children coming for the German war machine. Some of the more interesting text is:

German Soldiers!

The Hitler Gang is making Germany a House of prostitution.

These documents show you how your officers are spending their time.

Dear Sir:

You are assigned to District IIa, which will be more clearly described to you, comprising nine women and ten girls.

Should you however be capable of taking charge of another district besides the one you are assigned to, you will become a “deck Officer” and you will receive the “Copulation Order First Class” on a blue and red ribbon.

Additionally, we would like to mention that should you be able to take a third district you will be exempt from taxes and become eligible for a pension.

We want you to start your “blessed” work immediately after the receipt of the list and report the success of it to this office after a term of nine months by using the forms you are shortly due to receive.

Curiously, although the Russians used the term “prostitution” as propaganda, it was becoming a real problem in Germany. Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbles mentions this in his diary comment of 18 April 1942:

Prostitution in Berlin is causing us many a headache these days. During a raid we found that 15 per cent of all women arrested had VD, most of them even syphilis. We must certainly do something now about it. In the long run we cannot possibly avoid setting up a "red-light district" in the Reich capital similar to those in Hamburg, Nuremberg, and other large cities. You simply cannot organize and administer a city of four millions in accordance with conceptions of bourgeois morals.

The Soviets were prudes concerning sex and seldom resorted to female nudity in their leaflets. However, on occasion they would use or imply sexuality in an attempt to turn the common German foot soldier against the SS and Party bosses. The next two leaflets are examples of this theme.

German soldiers! At the Front…

The Soviets printed a sexual "divide and conquer" leaflet in August 1941 that depicted black-uniformed SS troops dragging German women into a building labeled "National Beschälanstalt." Below, the leaflet depicts German soldiers dying on the Eastern Front. The text is:

At the front, you risk your young life senselessly, meanwhile Hitler creates the ‘Beschälanstalten’ and turns your wife and sister into tools of lust for the officers.

This same image of the women dragged by force into the building appears on several other Soviet leaflets. "Beschälanstalt" is an old and unusual German word that indicates the place where bulls and cows are brought together to copulate. In this context, the word refers to the "Lebensborn" institutes or homes. There were rumors that in many cases these institutes were not only a place for unmarried women to bring their babies into the world, but also a place where "Aryan" SS officers could find women for their own pleasure to make racially pure, blonde, blue-eyed babies. The Soviets imply that these women are not entering voluntarily for the good of the Party, but instead, the SS force them into prostitution.

German soldiers! You Spill Your Blood…

Another Soviet image that appears on several leaflets depicts a jack-booted SS officer tearing the clothes off a German woman while her infant daughter tries to pull him away. Once again, her husband appears below, wounded and about to die on the Eastern Front. The text of this August 1941 leaflet is:

German Soldier! You spill your blood in the battle, you suffer terribly and lose everything you have; while back at home the SS rapes your woman.

The Soviets did a poor job of translating the text into German. The last two lines are written to rhyme (…lande, …Bande) but if you read them as a normal sentence it means:

While back at home your wife rapes the SS.

The swastika on the soldier’s cap is inverted, an error that the Germans were sure to find humorous and one which would discredit the veracity of the leaflet.

July 1943 issue of Front Illustrierte fur den Deutschen Soldaten

The Russian 4-page propaganda leaflet newspaper Front Illustrierte fur den Deutschen Soldaten (Front Illustrated for the German Soldiers)was published on a weekly basis from July 1941 to April 1945 and then airdropped over German troops. The newspapers were about 90% illustrations with many photographs and photomontages of a defeatist nature showing dead or wounded German troops and destroyed German war weapons and materials. Occasionally special issues would be produced with more than the usual four pages. Hardly an issue can be found that does not show rotting German corpses or burning German tanks on Russian soil. Hitler is often ridiculed, sometimes depicted with Napoleon’s hat, sometimes as a drunk, sometimes as a vulture on a mountain of corpses or sometimes leading an army of skeletons. Other Nazi leaders such as Göring, Goebbels and Himmler appear in various poses as rats, monkeys, money-grubbers and other strange creatures. Many of the illustrations were designed by the Russian artist Alexander Zhitomirsky. Besides German language editions, there were some copies of the newspaper printed in Italian, Romanian and Finnish.

The Russians generally did not care to show sexual images and they are quite rare. The issue of July 1943 depicts a dark foreign worker in bed with a beautiful blond German wife. A picture of her husband in uniform hangs over the bed with the text:

While the soldier is at the front…

Text below the picture is:

11 million foreigners live in Germany today, driven or attracted there by Hitler - meanwhile on the East Front, millions of German men fall senselessly and pointlessly.

Korean War Sexual PSYOP

We should start this section by saying that the United States fully understood that showing naked women in sexual poses was anti-productive. In fact, there were constant directives coming down from higher echelons that pointed out that sex leaflets had no effect on the North Koreans and Chinese. As a result, we find no U.N. leaflets that use pornography, though many have implications of sexuality. Major Albert C. Brauer, served in the Eighth U.S. Army Korea as Chief of the Projects Branch, Psychological Warfare Division, G3 Section (February 1951 to January 1952). He prepared a paper for Georgetown University in 1953 entitled Psychological Warfare Korea 1951. He said in regard to the use of sexual propaganda leaflets:

Sex evidently does not appeal (strange as it may seem) to the Oriental in any manner comparable to that of Americans. All Orientals I worked with held this view. They could, however, give no satisfactory explanation, nor did they know how the sex angle could be exploited against an Oriental target audience.

I conducted a simple test on three members of a POW panel who were aiding us in the preparation of leaflets, in an effort to determine if even a rudimentary reaction to sex (by our standard of measurements) could be detected. Four proposed leaflets, together with a picture of a luscious female nude, were handed to these members for any response upon which effective propaganda leaflets could be based. They took one look at the nude and without batting an eye handed it back as no good. 

Lieutenant Colonel David G. Underhill of the 7th PSYOP Group told me that using sex on a leaflet aimed at the North Koreans was a terrible idea. He said:

I did a leaflet for North Korea trying to talk about Korean culture that depicted a ballet dancer, but it was far too racy for the North Korean farmer. When we questioned the Koreans about what they thought of that leaflet we were told, “No one runs around with naked legs.” They hated another one I did with a solder saying goodbye to his wife with his right hand touching her face. A woman said, “Of course a man loves his wife, but he would never commit such a display in public.” There was even a comment made I believe by ex-POW General Walker that Korean women were so modest that when crossing a river they would flounder and drown before they would disrobe. He said that Chinese women soldiers would disrobe in public, bundle their clothing and carry it on their heads.

Brauer later gives an example of how the implication of sex can work on the enemy. He mentions a leaflet to the Chinese with the text:

To be a "virtuous man" one must have a family and a career. When will you return home to fulfill your obligations? On this foreign battleground you are the cannon fodder of the Communist aggressor. Reflect Warriors: Many of you are killed, wounded, or crippled each day. How can you expect to marry and father children?

Friends: Come over to UN lines now: Save your life so that you will live to see your parents again, marry, and have children.

He then remarks:

This leaflet was developed to heighten feelings of nostalgia in the CCF and to create concern at the lack of fulfillment of social duty generated by his being in a foreign land. The concept of filial duty or obligation is particularly important to the individual Chinese…Many of the CCF are unmarried youths from rural areas who should be especially susceptible to such an appeal. The message is crystallized in terms of marriage, tending the land, and fathering a son. This I believe, is the only way that sex can be used effectively against the Chinese Communist.

 

Leaflet 1271

An early divisive Korean War First Radio Broadcasting and Leaflet Group propaganda leaflet dated 19 January 1953 depicts a Communist Chinese soldier raping a Korean woman. Text to the right of the vignette is:

SAVE YOUR WIVES AND SISTERS FROM THE EVIL HANDS OF THE CHINESE COMMUNISTS!

Text on the back says in part:

Front line soldiers and officers often lay awake thinking of their dear ones at home – especially of their beautiful wives.

But Lee Won Sop, platoon leader of the 50th regiment, 15th Division, saw a terrible scene involving one of those wives. He wants you to know about it and the heartbreaking tears that he felt.

When Lee went back to the rear for training, he was asked to carry a message to Private Kang’s wife.

When he reached Kang’s house, he heard a woman screaming.

Lee peeped through the window and saw a Communist Chinese soldier trying to rape Kang’s wife.

At that moment, Lee realized that the true enemy of Korea is the Chinese Communist forces.

North Korean people and soldiers! The Chinese Communist dogs, by meddling in the Korean War, not only prolong the war and kill your blood brothers, but they also rape your women while Korean men fight at the front.