How ‘Tokyo Rose’ Was Convicted of Treason—And Then Pardoned

Time ^ | 1/19/15 | Jennifer Latson

[DallasBiff]

Was Tokyo Rose a charming radio host or a vicious propagandist who committed treason from the DJ booth? Historians still haven’t settled the matter. She was convicted in 1949 but received an official pardon on this day, Jan. 19, in 1977, when the case for treason appeared less clear-cut than it had in the bitter years after World War II.

Iva Toguri d’Aquino was born in the U.S. to Japanese parents and, by all early accounts, she grew up as a devoted patriot. She earned a degree in zoology from UCLA in 1940 and had begun doing graduate work there when her life took a fateful turn. She visited Japan — either to visit a sick aunt or to study medicine, depending on whether you believed her account or the government’s — and became stuck there when war broke out.

The trouble began when she took a job as a wartime DJ for Radio Tokyo, playing popular, if sappy, American music, punctuated by banter that was either playfully entertaining or a deliberate attempt to undermine the morale of U.S. troops — again, depending on whose version you believe. Although she broadcast by the name of “Orphan Ann,” d’Aquino was more popularly known as “Tokyo Rose.”

[Inyo-Mono]

I remember my Dad telling me how Tokyo Rose announced his Army Air Corps squadron of B-24s arrival in the Philippines and warning them that they wouldn’t last long.

[Fiji Hill]

There was no Tokyo Rose. The Japanese used about 20 female broadcasters, most of whom were Japanese, but none of them used that name.

[Fiji Hill]

You can actually hear a broadcast of The Zero Hour, a variety show on Radio Tokyo featuring Iva Toguri broadcasting as Orphan Ann, from August, 1944, on Youtube. The show begins with the news--"the fighting news for the fighting men"--and then Ann plays records such as My Resistance Is Low by Orrin Tucker & His Orchestra (1940). All of the songs are "Oldies" that came out before Pearl Harbor was bombed.

[dfwgator]

Speaking of songs, I always enjoy listening to “Charlie And His Orchestra”

I like this one in particular

“German Submarines”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8I0DDE8Tafs

Apparently Churchill enjoyed it as well.

[Antoninus]

The Brits had Vice Chancellor Rudolph Hess and didn’t even execute him.

Hess flew to Britain in 1941 on a vain peace mission which was his own brain child. He sat out the rest of the war in Britain and was give a sentence of life imprisonment because he had nothing to do with war crimes post 1941.

By all accounts he was something of a nut.

[SunkenCiv]

[Brave search results from AI]

Mildred Gillars
American Nazi propagandist (1900–1988)
Mildred Gillars, also known as “Axis Sally,” was a prominent German female broadcaster during World War II. Born in Portland, Maine, Gillars moved to Berlin in 1934 and worked as a radio broadcaster for Nazi Germany, disseminating propaganda to American troops. She was notorious for her broadcasts, which alternated between swing music and messages aimed at unsettling her listeners, often by stoking fears about their loved ones back home. Gillars was the first woman in U.S. history to be convicted of treason and served a sentence of ten to thirty years, from which she was paroled in 1961.

[additional links]

https://www.history.com/news/6-world-war-ii-propaganda-broadcasters

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ezra_Pound#Antisemitism,_social_credit

[Larry Lucido]

:)

And I thought that

Patty Hearst heard the burst of Roland’s Thompson gun and bought it

[Glad2bnuts]

No kidding, and then after WW 2 we let Communism take it over. The only reason we were worried over Japan vs China, was it was Britains former playground and minion. The early 20th century Presidents coveted Britains Empire, and we have spent many trillions of dollars trying to recreate it, and even improve on it. It has been a disaster.

[Fiji Hill]

I haven't heard that one before.

Here's one that I really like.

Thanks for the Memory--Charlie & His Orchestra (1941)

[Fiji Hill]

Hitler apparently promised to give Great Britain to Mussolini. Perhaps he sent Rudolf Hess over there to get it for him.

Mussolini's Letter to Hitler and Hitler's Reply--Carson Robison (1942)

[Glad2bnuts]

I never understood why he was kept in prison for life. Until the war was over, I can understand. If it was because he lost the war, maybe some American generals of officials should have been jailed for losing Vietnam, and the war against Afghanistan.

[dfwgator]

LOL, the Italians got their asses kicked by the Greeks, and you think they could have run Great Britain?

[Reily]

Speer expressed contrition and did it so well he avoided execution.

[dfwgator]

He was the ultimate conman. He clearly knew what was going on at the death camps.

[Reily]

Yes but he made it work. His book is an interesting if self-serving read.

[dfwgator]

Also, I do think they wanted to keep one insider alive to talk about what happened behind the scenes.