Censorship in World War II (Switzerland)

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The censorship during World War II in Switzerland included both civilian and military communications. The Press and Radio Message Department (APF) was responsible for civil censorship , and its sections were subordinate to either the Army Command or the Federal Council. For this purpose, the APF worked together with the post, telephone and telegraph companies (PTT) , since the PTT had the necessary technical knowledge. The military censorship that affected the mail of interned foreign army members was the responsibility of the Swiss Army Field Post Office . The field post forwarded the mail to a specially created censorship office in Bern for control .

Civil censorship

During the Second World War , free postal traffic was basically guaranteed for the Swiss population. However, if a person or an organization in Germany was identified as potentially dangerous, the political police could initiate a so-called mail block, with the result that mail from and to the person or organization could be intercepted and checked. In order to enforce the mail bans, monitoring lists with the names of the people and organizations were sent to the respective district post offices. The political police, on the other hand, were responsible for opening letters and parcels. The PTT therefore started the mail and from the persons concerned and passed it on to the political police.

Based on an instruction from the press and radio communication department, Swiss Post was commissioned to randomly inspect locked mail from abroad or abroad. Although postal traffic with foreign countries was generally permitted, according to the instructions of the APF, all postal traffic from Switzerland to other countries and from abroad to Switzerland was subject to controls and could be censored if necessary. Excepted from these regulations were consignments from and to authorities of the Confederation, the cantons, districts and municipalities as well as consignments from and to foreign embassies in Switzerland , the League of Nations , the International Labor Organization , the Bank for International Settlements , the permanent representations at the League of Nations and the International Red Cross . Suspicious mailings were not allowed to be opened by the postal staff, but had to be sent to the Federal Prosecutor's Office for inspection. The aim of the censorship process was to prevent foreign espionage and propaganda.

The PTT was only involved in the censorship process of the foreign press, but not the domestic press. Press products that appeared to violate the censorship regulations were forwarded by the postal staff to the PTT General Directorate and from there to the Federal Prosecutor's Office for control and any censorship measures . At the end of February 1940 the review of foreign press products was sent to the "Foreign Press Section" of the APF. Lists of potentially dangerous propaganda material were sent to the respective county post offices.

At the beginning of the war, the PTT was also responsible for telephone and telegraph censorship, as it had the necessary infrastructure, trained staff and the necessary experience. Communication between the embassies, for example, was monitored. Telephone traffic from the German, French, Italian and English embassies was particularly eavesdropped. The PTT trained the personnel required for the “Telegraph and Telephone” section of the APF and also made the premises and technical equipment available to them. “Unwanted conversations” should not be interrupted, but rather the content should be recorded. Some PTT employees and the “Telegraph and Telephone” section of the APF were responsible for ensuring that, for strategic military reasons, for example, no weather reports were sent by telegram. In regions where there was no military censorship, the PTT was tasked with carrying out telephone surveillance. From a technical point of view, however, it was not possible to control all conversations and interrupt them if necessary. Because around 60% of the telephone connections could be made by yourself and did not require a connection by a telephone operator .

Because the censorship brought a time lag, this had a negative effect on the stock exchanges and foreign exchange transactions. Therefore, on November 10, 1939, bank telegrams were subjected to post-censorship. However, some banks took advantage of the post-censorship to transmit messages with forbidden content, which is why all bank telegrams were subjected to the previous censorship again on July 14, 1943. With this decision, all telegraphers and companies - with the exception of the embassies and consulates - were legally equal again.

According to the field telegraph order, the telephone connection with foreign countries should have been interrupted in the event of war and the telegraph connection should have been monitored by a censorship authority. At the express request of the Head of the Railway and Postal Department , Federal Councilor Marcel Pilet-Golaz , the Federal Council left it to monitor telephone traffic.

Military censorship (interned mail)

After the first internees were admitted to Switzerland in June, the field post organized their mail traffic. During the war, a total of around 24 million items were sent from and to the more than 100,000 war internees.

On June 25, 1940, the Commissar for Internment of the Army Command ordered the censorship of incoming and outgoing internment mail. The censorship office in Bern started its work just one day later. The censorship office was often overloaded by the high volume of mail, which led to delays in delivery. The field post director, Colonel Hans Frutiger , therefore applied for the abolition of the general censorship of interned mail on August 21, 1940 and demanded that it be restricted to certain groups of people. Although he repeated his request several times, Frutiger was unsuccessful throughout the war.

According to the postal order, which had to be posted on all letters in the internment camps and was translated into numerous languages, the internees were not allowed to use civil post, to have mail sent to private addresses or to use a pseudonym. All letters to and from internees were sent to the censorship center in Bern by the field post from their internee post office in Münchenbuchsee , later in Gümligen , and were only allowed to be delivered as soon as a censorship strip with the inscription "Opened, censorship center for interned mail " was attached. A corresponding stamp was attached to postcards. The camp commanders checked packages on site in the camp. If they found written communications or printed matter, they also sent them to the censorship office. The mail was transported by the civil post , with which the camp commanders agreed fixed pick-up times.

Those responsible for the field post repeatedly complained that the censorship could be bypassed without any problems and was therefore ineffective. Internees could, for example, frank their letters and put them in a civil post office box, which, despite strict controls, could not be prevented.

The military censorship in Switzerland was lifted on December 20, 1945. Most European countries lifted censorship for war internees much earlier.

Remarks

  1. ↑ Bern, PTT archive: PAA-00541: Post blockage 1944 Basel.
  2. ↑ Andreas Keller: The Political Police as part of the Swiss state security . In: Basel studies of law . Row B: Public Law, No. 50 . Basel 1992, p. 22 .
  3. ↑ Bern, Federal Archives: E4320 (B), order regarding the organization and service of the military post censorship. P. 2.
  4. ↑ Bern, Federal Archives: E4320 (B), To the Army Staff - Group Front News Section.
  5. ↑ Bern, Federal Archives: E4320 (B), Press and Radio Message Department in the Army Staff, Colonel Hegetschweiler.
  6. ↑ Bern, PTT archive: PB-106-1d-1980, Vol. 1: Subject lecture on the occasion of a training course in 1980
  7. ↑ Bern, PTT archive: PB-106-1d-1980, vol. 1: Propaganda material dangerous to the state March 7, 1940
  8. ↑ dodis link: Letter from BAR E4450 # 1000/864 # 7057 * .
  9. ↑ dodis link: BAR directive E4450 # 1000/864 # 6069 * .
  10. ^ Letter from P. Wittmer to the General Directorate PTT . Federal archive E4450 # 1000/864 # 6069 *. Bern September 5, 1939.
  11. ↑ Monitoring of telephone traffic . Federal archive E4450 # 1000/864 # 6069 *. Bern February 28, 1940.
  12. ↑ dodis Link: Writing . Federal archive E4450 # 1000/864 # 7057 *. Bern October 22, 1943.
  13. ^ Letter from Wittmer to the telegram censorship offices in Geneva, Bern, Basel, Zurich . Federal archive E4450 # 1000/864 # 6069 *. Bern November 10, 1939.
  14. ^ Letter from Wittmer to the telegram censorship offices . Federal archive E4450 # 1000/864 # 6069 *. Bern July 14, 1943.
  15. ↑ dodis Link: Letter, Bern Federal Archives E4450 # 1000/864 # 7057 *. April 21, 1943.
  16. ^ Letter, Wittmer to Federal Councilor Eduard v. Steiger . Federal archive E4450 # 1000/864 # 7057 *. Bern September 6, 1943.
  17. ^ Hans Frutiger: The Swiss Field Post in active service 1939-1945 . tape 1 . Bern 1946, p. 295-296, 319 .
  18. ^ Hans Frutiger: The Swiss Field Post in active service 1939-1945 . tape 1 . Bern 1946, p. 300-301 .
  19. ^ Hans Frutiger: The Swiss field post in active service 1939-1945 . tape 1 . Bern 1946, p. 305-313 .
  20. ^ PTT, Post-217 A 0341, Post Service of Internees. Instructions for the camp commanders (December 1944)
  21. ↑ PTT, Post-217 A 0346 1, quarterly reports from the field post director to the army command (3rd quarter 1940)
  22. ^ Hans Frutiger: The Swiss Field Post in active service 1939-1945 . tape 1 . Bern 1946, p. 302 .
  23. ^ Hans Frutiger: The Swiss Field Post in active service 1939-1945 . tape 1 . Bern 1946, p. 302 .