Censored War

In Warsaw last week Associated Press Correspondent Lloyd Lehbras got one of those scoops that every reporter dreams of. While he was telephoning the A. P. man in Budapest, German planes appeared over Warsaw, and Correspondent Lehbras dictated an exciting eye-witness account of the raid, which the A. P. promptly relayed to the U. S. Excerpts:

"I am telephoning this dispatch to Budapest with the phone in one hand and a gas mask in the other. . . . I can hear the wail of power-diving fighting ships and can see 14 German bombers slowly, steadily following the course of the Vistula River. . . .

"The German air raiders now are coming back, after making a wide circle. . . . I can see puffs of anti-aircraft fire.

"Although the raid is still on, there is no panic. Across the street from me, hundreds of inhabitants are watching fascinated on roof tops. . . .

"Some German bombers appeared to have fallen into the Vistula.

"From time to time I can hear the explosion of fallen bombs.

"They are dropping close by us now. . . . "Tremendous explosions are shaking the city . . . ."

Other correspondents may be lucky enough to send such stories of this war, but it is not likely, for, 24 hours after war began last week, censorship had clamped down over Europe. In Berlin the Army Command announced that no foreign correspondents would be allowed to stay at the front and that all those now in military areas must leave. War communiques would be issued once a day. From time to time groups of correspondents would be taken "wherever activities were especially interesting." Berlin censored all dispatches, but correspondents reported no evidence that they had been suppressed or distorted.

In Moscow and Rome "responsibility censorship" continued; i. e., correspondents knew that if they sent news that was dangerous or too antagonistic they would be expelled. Chances were that it would become increasingly difficult to report developments impartially.

Paris has a theoretical censorship, even in peacetime. Last week this censorship began to function actively, but dispatches came through with fair speed.

In London, the day war began, censors walked into the Communications Office and took possession. Telephone service beyond the British Isles was suspended. Since formerly news from Europe to the U. S. cleared through London, this meant the imposition of British censorship over nearly all war news. As the censorship began to delay dispatches, the Associated Press and United Press ordered their correspondents on the Continent to file their stories directly to New York, but even then they were hours late. By the fourth day of the war virtually nothing was known of its military progress, and it looked as if this might be not only the worst but the worst-covered war in recent history.

In the U. S. the press accepted the fact it was a censors' war. Atrocity stories began to appear. The New York Times and the Philadelphia Inquirer installed front-page boxes warning readers that most war news was propaganda.

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