Japan News No. 230- 26 October 1944

Just like the Germans and most other war-waging nations of WWII, the Japanese used the concept of a weekly newsreel as an important propaganda tool. Under the premise of “news“, the images and reports shown were carefully select to convince the common people that Japan was winning the war. In 1939, the Motion Picture Law was introduced, requiring the showing of newsreels before and after all cinema movies. In April 1940, the newsreel production was centralised in Japan, with the forced merger of all big publishing companies newsreel departments into the Japan News Film Corporation, which, from that point on, would produce Japans only newsreel- the “Japan News“. These newsreels were produced untill the end of the war. This is issue No. 230 from late October 1944. It focuses on a series of American air raids on Taiwan, commonly known as the “Formosa Air Battle“ from October 12th to October 16th. While in reality, the Americans damaged a lot of