Cold War Broadcasting: Impact on the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe

Chapter 11: Ceauşescu’s War against Our Ears

229 CHaPter 11 Ceauşescu’s War against our ears germina nagat “Dear comrades from Censorship, please let this postcard go. We love music, and music has no fault.”1 if censorship can be defined as “the knot that binds knowledge and power,”2 then the secret services established under communist regimes provide the best illustration of censorship at its being most distorted and pathological. although complete state control of information through censorship and state propaganda is common in any totalitarian regime, it was a major task of the secret services under communist rule. although its main purpose was to maintain the political status quo, its scope was unprecedented and the instruments of control were extreme. the ironclad control applied to any information coming from any source, especially from abroad. the communist censorship worked underground, crossing the borders of its own jurisdiction, and employing the devious and brutal means of the secret police. to achieve the goal of total control, everything was allowed and all laws could be broken. the game had no rules, only exceptions. the censorship of the romanian secret service, the securitate, was prompted by two key elements. one was the increasingly bad internal situation, and the other was the growing popularity of Western radio stations , especially radio free europe. as daily life became increasingly difficult, Ceauşescu’s regime lost the support and the tolerance of its peo1 message sent by a romanian teenager to radio free europe’s music program, presented by andrei Voiculescu. 2 a good introduction to the history of censorship, in which the particular case of the communist secret services could eventually be integrated, is sue Curry Jansen’s book, Censorship—The Knot That Binds Power and Knowledge (new York: oxford university Press, 1991). i4 J&P.indb 229 2010.07.05. 7:54 230 ple, many of whom began turning to new sources of information. this led to radio free europe’s acquiring amazing credibility and influence among romanians. as a result, the securitate’s policy regarding foreign radio stations, especially radio free europe, moved from routine surveillance to open war, waged both inside and outside the country. the securitate stopped at nothing to stem the spread of information inside the borders , and annihilate its sources abroad. By the end of the 1970s, violence was already the securitate’s favourite modus operandi against employees and listeners to radio free europe. By making victims of both journalists and listeners, the securitate created a complicity in suffering that propelled radio free europe into a leading position in the 1989 revolution. the attempt at complete censorship failed gloriously; it was radio free europe that broadcast the romanian revolution live. it took the securitate a long time to acknowledge the impact of Western radio stations. initially, oversight of Western broadcasters was routinely assigned to the division of external information (die), whose main task was to keep tabs on romanian emigrants, especially journalists , and on their families who had remained in romania. However, by the end of the 1970s, Western radio had become a major preoccupation of division 1 (internal counterintelligence). radio free europe was the main enemy in the ideological war of the romanian communist regime against Western media. the ratings of one progressed during the confrontation alongside the brutality of the other. the secret service could not forbid people’s preferences, or the existence of radio broadcasts, but it correctly understood the link between information and political control. the romanian service of radio free europe began broadcasting in 1950. after 1973, rfe was openly funded by the united states Congress through the Board for international Broadcasting. as stated in 1973, its main function was to promote the application of the universal declaration of Human rights (article 19). nonetheless, the romanian secret police declared that the activities of all Western stations broadcasting to eastern europe consisted of “espionage and promotion of anti-state activities .” their view was fueled by the assertive anti-communism of radio free europe and its oversight by the Cia in its early years. it also explains why the securitate targeted romanian ex-politicians, bankers, businessmen and their families as clandestine radio listeners during the huge wave of political imprisonments in the 1950s. the secret police commonly associated listening to clandestine radio news programs i4 J&P.indb 230 2010.07.05. 7:54 231 with a “traditional” audience: highly educated people with families or contacts in Western europe—where they would emigrate if...