This is old!
I don't mean the photo. If it's legit, it's obviously old.
But this is old to the internet. I remember seeing this many years ago.
the NY Post is specifically formatting their page to keep from direct linking to their image content, but you can find it elswhere on the internet.... because like I said, this is not a new thing.
There's probably a simple explanation.
First of all, they had two-way radios back in the 1940s. They were large and cumbersome however. Even transistor radios weren't invented yet. So that is out. You wouldn't even see a speaker that small in the 1940s, if I am correct.
However, he could easily just have something small and flat in his hands and be raising it to scratch an itch or fidget with an irritation.
