Activities of Soviet Information Bureau abroad during Great Patriotic War: Effectiveness and Ideological Priorities

Abstract

The article provides an overview of the main arguments by which the author defines the key role of the Soviet Information Bureau in the deployment of Soviet information and propaganda activities in the international arena during the Great Patriotic war. The paper contains a detailed description of the leading direction of the impact of this state organization on the public opinion of the alliance and neutral countries; it refers to the preparation and placement on the pages of foreign media of thousands of articles, essays, reports, etc. The author draws attention to the discrepancy between the huge number of texts prepared by the Information Bureau for foreign media and their low quality, that is, having clearly insufficient propaganda impact on foreign readers. Based on the analysis of the documents found in the archives, it was concluded that most of the materials sent abroad were not published. The researcher points to the reasons for the lack of adaptation of articles and essays of the Soviet Information Bureau to the requirements of the Western information market; among them there are ideological engagement of authors, lack of highly professional staff of writers and journalists, formalism in the work of the Soviet Information Bureau. However, the author emphasizes the importance of the initiatives of the Soviet Information Bureau for the international promotion of outstanding achievements of the Soviet people in the struggle against fascism.