Were the Murrow Boys Warmongers?

Abstract

Drawing on scholarship on framing, sourcing, and propaganda, this content analysis complements historical research on the golden age of foreign correspondence in the United States. Using the propaganda typology proposed by the Institute of Propaganda Analysis during the time that this research captures, the analysis could not find support for the thesis that the forefathers of broadcast journalism—Edward Murrow and the reporters he recruited to cover World War II for CBS Radio—used blatant pro-war propaganda in their foreign correspondence. The study also investigates the use of peace journalism versus war journalism framing. The analysis lends support to the growing body of literature on the relationship between sourcing and framing. The findings are important because very little actual analysis of World War II broadcasts has been conducted by previous scholarship. Most accounts are anecdotal, and much of the historical work on “the Murrow Boys” was written by Murrow's colleagues and supporters. By picking and choosing specific scripts, authors can make almost any argument they would choose. But this research project goes back to the source itself, the war broadcasts, and undertakes a systematic analysis of how the stories were reported. The results are surprising and show that while Murrow favored US intervention in World War II, he was not a propagandist.