Hot Books in the Cold War : The CIA-Funded Secret Western Book Distribution Program Behind the Iron Curtain

Chapter 2. Titles, Contents, Numbers, Targets, and Aims of the Mailings

Chapter 2 Titles, Contents, Numbers, Targets, and Aims of the Mailings The Minden Papers in the Hoover Institute Archives do not contain materials on the early book mailings operations in which the Munich office of Free Europe Press (FEP) played a crucial role. Fortunately, close to 40 monthly statistical reports and 36 summaries of responses received have been preserved by John Matthews, then director of the FEP Office in Munich. They cover the first three-and-half years of the book mailing project period, from July 1956 through December 1959. These reports, averaging 15 to 20 pages, contain the exact titles and the number of copies of the books and other publications (magazines subscriptions, catalogues, pamphlets, and even records) sent to each East European country, as well as the content, targets, and political aim(s) of the particular item mailed, called “message” in the reports. The messages consisted of two types of materials: books in both original languages and in translations, and reprints and translations of articles and monographs. The very first mailings in July 1956 were intentionally small, with the purpose of increasing the volume of mail into the five target countries gradually. Thus, 11 titles with a total of 6,538 messages were sent that month to Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, and Romania, with an emphasis on increasing “liberalization” by contrasting the target country with the other captive nations. These messages included 1,660 copies of various articles and cross reports on the Polish “thaw,” some translated from Nowa Kultura and various Polish periodicals and Radio Warsaw broadcasts, with the aim to “make the recipients aware of the greater freedom of expression and discussion permitted i5 Cold War.indb 23 2013.03.04. 13:37 24 Hot Books in the Cold War in Poland and to increase similar activity in the other captive nations.” 275 copies of a translation of selected poems of Adam Mickiewicz published by Noonday Press were sent to selected Polish libraries, universities , and writers. There were also other reproductions or translations of original articles in English, French, or German, such as 3,600 copies of a letter by Howard Fast from the July 12, 1956 issue of U.S. Daily Worker, in which one of the best-known communist novelists in the world described his horror at the contents of Khrushchev’s famous Secret speech. Sent to Party functionaries, intellectuals, and journalists, its objective was to indicate the disillusionment and confusion among Western Communist Party members at Khrushchev’s revelations and to promote the process of the satellite “thaw” and the popular demand for liberalization. Finally, 500 copies of a Czech Student Declaration from Prague, making sweeping demands for reform and the democratization of education and public and cultural life, were sent with the aim of giving a concrete example of the ferment in another satellite country and to increase such activity among similar student groups.1 While all policy directions came from New York, the FEP office in Munich played a major role in organizing and implementing the book project. Its head, Howard S. Weaver, a Yale friend of Sam Walker, and Warner Wolfe, an American of German extraction, were instrumental in setting up the mailing network and recruiting the motivated individuals who would deal with the publishers. They were fortunate to hire two highly intelligent young women, Martine Servot in Paris, and the Hungarian-born Daisy Finney in London, to deal with French and British publishers, respectively.2 The messages were sent in batches from 200 to 2,000 or more per titles from fictitious cover organizations (the senders’ addresses were often those of the persons mailing them) from New York and other West European cities such as London, Paris, West Berlin, Amsterdam, Athens, Rome, Vienna, and Munich. By November 1   Free Europe Press, Mailing Project, unsigned Monthly Report No. 1, July 1956, dated August 21, 1956, 1–16. Courtesy of John P. C. Matthews. All subsequent monthly reports through December 1959 come from the same source. 2   Matthews, “The West’s Secret Marshall Plan for the Mind,” 414–15, gives a good description of the backgrounds of the two ladies and their very effective modus operandi in approaching publishers and getting discounts. i5 Cold War.indb 24 2013.03.04. 13:37 25 Titles, Contents, Numbers, Targets, and Aims of the Mailings 1956, the book mailers could count on seven mailing centers in Europe and five in North America...