This series examines broadcasting by the Imperial Japanese Army and Navy in the “southern occupied territories” during the Pacific War. Part III explores the reality of broadcasting propaganda employed in the Philippines and Burma (now Myanmar).
In 1942, the Japanese armed forces seized Manila, the Philippines in January and Rangoon, Burma in March, following which the employees of Japan Broadcasting Corporation were dispatched to these territories one after another for broadcasting propaganda. Local stations were established in the Philippines under the control of “broadcast administrative bureau in the Philippines”: Manila Broadcasting Station (January 14, 1942), Cebu Broadcasting Station (November 1, 1943) and Davao Broadcasting Station (November 3, 1943). In Burma, Rangoon Broadcasting Station was launched under the control of “broadcast administrative bureau in Burma” (August 15, 1942).
Raising the banner of overthrowing western colonialism and liberating Asia, the Japanese armed forces became more and more committed to “pacification work for local residents” and “hostile propaganda.” Radio stations in the Philippines aired programs for local residents centering on music as well as hostile broadcasts against the U.S. Army Forces Far East, (USAFFE) while the station in Burma aired broadcasts for local residents aimed at instilling the Japanese culture and hostile broadcasts against India.
Nevertheless, both territories were among the fiercest battlefields, and neither of the broadcast administrative bureau in the Philippines nor in that in Burma was able to broadcast the Imperial Rescript of the Termination of the War. As Japan’s war situation gradually worsened employees of Japan Broadcasting Corporations were running around in the mountains to escape or forced to fight as combatants, and many of them died on duty. Broadcasting stations in the southern occupied territories took part in the cultural propaganda for spreading the concept of Greater East Asia Co–Prosperity Sphere but eventually dispersed without achieving its goal and with an enormous number of casualties.