TRANSCRIPT OF BROADCAST BY FULTON LEWIS, JR.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP63T00245R000100220158-2
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 19, 2004
• Sequence Number: 158
• Publication Date: January 2, 1958
• Content Type: TRANS

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TRANSCRIPT OF BROADCAST
By
Fulton Lewis, Jr.
Station WGMS at 7-7:15 P. M.
2 January 1958
About the Crusade for Freedom and the so-ca.lled Radio
Free Europe, 1 have reported to you before on the nine-page
document which the paid money raisers have put out in the name
of the Crusade for Freedom by way of self-justification to their
directors and officers and sponsors who are getting jittery.
This was not given to the press, you understand, it was just
circulated within the family, so to speak, and the people who
put it out seemed very much disturbed when they found that some
of the "family" had passed their copies on to me for comment.
There are a couple more of their denials which I would
like to deal with tonight--one having to do with a statement
I made that "from the beginning, Radio Free Europe has been
loa.ded with pinkos. Its origin coincided with the Communist
take-over of Czechoslovakia." The answer which the Crusade
made to that is as follows: "The voice of free Czechoslovakia
was founded precisely because the Communist take-over of that
country denied the people a free radio and a free press. Mr.
Lewis' charge of pinkos is absurd. The Czechoslovakian em-
ployees of Radio Free Europe go through the same rigorous
screening process as do all other employees both American
and exile."
My other statement along the same line was as follows:
"One of the early organizers of Radio Free Europe informs
me that from the outset it has been systematically manned
by many confirmed Marxists and for that reason he finally quit
in disgust." Their reply is as follows: "No Marxists now
or ever have manned Radio Free Europe." Now just in terms
of general reality this last statement is ridiculous on its
face when you consider that the organization has more than
2,200 employees in it but that's just my observation and my
opinion and I don't ask you to go on that.
Lets have some facts. The largest organization of Czech
and Slovak exiles in the United States is the Alliance of
Czechoslovak Exiles with headquarters in Chicago. It is not
some front whoop of intelligentsia although there are some
very intellectual and cultured individuals in it. It is
not a front group of politicians or ideologists.
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It is much more a rank-and-file movement of people who came
to this country under the displaced persons law, and it
represents rank-and-file thinking of the great bulk of refu-
gees from that country in the United States. In May of 1952,
at the time the National Committee for Free Europe was being
set up in New York, this organization held a meeting in Chica-
go, at which time it adopted unanimously a resolution of pro-
test which it sent to the Free Europe organizers in New
York against the recognition of the so-called Council of
Free Czechoslovakia,which was the group that had been selec-
ted by Hubert Ripka and brought into the United States on
the 14 blank visas which the State Department gave him, which
I told you about last night. Ripka was a man who devised
and ordered the expulsion of the Sudeten Germans from Czech-
oslovakia.. He was an ardent collaborator with Moscow. This
Council of Free Czechoslovakia which he selected and brought
into the United States--and incidentally they were brought
in without even any security check despite what the Crusade
statement says--this Council of Free Czechoslovakia was
placed on the Free Europe payroll and was made the policy-
making group for the Czech desk of the Free Europe propa-
ganda program.
I want you to remember that this resolution of protest
by the largest organization of Czechoslovakians in the United
States is not a resolution of today and afterthought. But
it was passed at the very origin of Radio Free Europe in
1952. It was a warning to the committee then of what it,
the Committee on Free Europe, was doing. A copy of it was
sent to the Under Secretary of State here in Washington.
Other copies were distributed to newspapers, important per-
sonalities and radio.
The body of the resolution reads as follows: "The
present representation, the people whom Ripka selected,
cannot establish connection with anti-Communist forces in
Czechoslovakia, but on the contrary it will psychologically
ill affect the peoples at home who will not have any
ideological cause for resistance. Czech and Slovak nationals
see in the majority of the people, who today illegally de-
clare themselves to be speakers for the nation, the same
people who (1) continually violated the constitution of the
Czechoslovak Republic; (2) against the interests of inde-
pendence of the Czechoslovakian Republic did not seek suf-
ficient cooperation with the free world but knowingly were
leading the state into becoming a satellite of the USSR;
(3) took active part in the proclamation of nationalizing
decrees, thus suppressing economic freedoms; (4) introduced
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the retributional decrees through which many a judicial crime
and miscarriage of justice was committed; (5) following the
request of Moscow, forbade the existence of traditionally
democratic political parties always known as anti-Communist
and anti-Soviet, which up to the Nazi occupation of Czech-
oslovakia represented more than 50 percent of the popula-
tion; (6) Abridged freedom of speech, press and right of the
people to peacefully assemble and petition the government
for a redress of their grievances, allowing these basic rights
to be exercised in a one-sided trend only; (7) against the
welfare of the people voted against taking part in the Marshall
Plan and even before the Communist coup'd'etat concluded a
submissive economic treaty with the USSR which formed the
basis for today's Soviet exploitation of Czechoslovakia."
That's the end of the seven points characterizing the
people whom Ripka had selected and whom Radio Free Europe was
in the course of establishing as its Czechoslovakian policy
staff. Then the following additional paragraphs: "The above
described facts paved the way to the Communist coup d'etat
of 1948. Yesterday's fellow-travelers of Communism,through
whose tragic political errors the whole nation has been en-
slaved and lives under a permanent threat of a national Katyn,
who are represented in the composition of the Council of Free
Czechoslovakia, do not enjoy the confidence of the resisting
part of our nation nor of the exiles who as a result of their
political activities have lost everything except their relent-
less repudiation of socialism and Communism. These are the
reasons which forbid every true patriot of Czechoslovakia
from having confidence in or from cooperating with this un-
democratic, clandestinely formed and unrepresentative or-
ganization.. It is our moral duty to ra.ise this voice of
documenta.ry protest and to refuse any and all responsibility
for the composition of the Council of Free Czechoslovakia.
We firmly believe that in this grave hour it is in the in-
terest of the United States of America to protect the nation-
al resistance against Communism in Czechoslovakia from being
exterminated. On the contrary, it is in the interest of the
United States to give support to the peoples of Czechoslovakia
in their righteous struggle, so that a state of affairs may
soon develop that will be in harmony with Christian traditions
and the spirit of civilization, with human rights and demo-
cratic principles, liberty and justice for all."
To me, Ladies and Gentlemen, that sounds like very good
American talk, the kind of talk that the great Radio Free
Europe is supposedly putting forth itself, the kind of talk
it is supposed to be inspiring behind the iron curtain. But
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did the powers of Radio Free Europe in New York pay any heed
to this? On the contrary, they ignored it. They went ahead
against the warnings and the pleadings and installed Hubert
Ripka and his 14 Communist collaborator pals as the sponsored
and financially supported Council of Free Czechoslovakia
under the Free Europe Committee; and American citizens every-
where were solicited and have been ever since for "truth
dollars" to support these self-serving politicians who were
part and parcel of the sellout of Czechoslovakia to Communism.
Now let's return to the current statements. In the
light of this resolution of 1952, which I just read to you,
let's go back to the current statements by the Crusade for
Freedom: "Mr. Lewis', charge of pinkos in Radio Free Europe
is absurd. No Marxists now or ever have manned Radio Free
Europe." I leave it to you as to whether I or the Crusade
is telling the truth. That's the top of the news as it looks
from here.
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