including Cautious Crusade: Franklin D. Roosevelt, American Public Opinion and Nazi Germany, 1941-45 (2001); Selling the Korean War: Propaganda, Politics, and the Press in the United States, 1950-1953 (2008); The War Beat, Europe: The American Media at War against Nazi Germany (2017); and The War Beat, Pacific: The American Media at War against Japan (2021). His articles appear in such outlets as Foreign Affairs, History Today, the Sydney Morning Herald, and The Spectator.
Casey applied the "Page 99 Test" to his new book, The Sceptic Isle: How the British Government Sold the Second World War, with the following results:
In Britain, World War II is remembered as the “People’s War.” Crucial to this image is the notion of the so-called “Blitz spirit,” when people in all parts of the country kept calm and carried on, despite the relentless nature of the nightly German bombing raids. Yet this was only one aspect of what had happened. As the propagandists knew only too well, beneath this surface unity there remained plenty of unrest, much of it directed at them whenever they sought to massage the war news.Learn more about The Sceptic Isle at the Oxford University Press website.
While The Sceptic Isle covers Britain’s entire World War II experience, page 99 specifically addresses a key element of the argument as it relates to the Blitz.
By November 1940, the British public had come to dislike and distrust the complex blend of censorship and public relations on the nightly air attacks. On the one hand, the government had prohibited the press from publishing not just casualty figures, but also the names of towns outside London and Liverpool, as well as specific locations that had been hit. On the other, it had sought to “play up” the destruction of “places to which special sentiment attaches” or that enjoyed “outstanding ‘news value,’” such as schools, churches, and hospitals.
The first two months of the Blitz had already seen a rise in corrosive gossip, including the belief that London “casualties are really ten times bigger than what we are told.” Then came the disastrous German raid on Coventry on November 14. Here, the survivors, dazed after the first attack and scared of a repeat, engaged in a particularly vigorous bout of speculation, resulting in “strongly exaggerated rumours about casualties and damage which quickly spread to the surrounding countryside.” Yet still the government tried to clamp down hard, placing a cordon of soldiers ten miles around the city to stop anyone, including reporters, from entering the stricken city.
Small wonder that the British public were often sceptical about what they were told. Page 99 offers a perfect illustration of government censorship and propaganda and its most brazen.
The Page 99 Test: When Soldiers Fall.
The Page 99 Test: The War Beat, Europe.
The Page 99 Test: The War Beat, Pacific.
--Marshal Zeringue