Associated Press Had Photo Deal with the Nazis

On July 13, 1942, officials of the Associated Press notified the U.S. censorship office of an arrangement to exchange photographs with Nazi Germany. The deal, negotiated at the end of 1941, was approved by the head of the office, Byron Price, a former AP executive editor who had been recruited by President Roosevelt for the job.

After the United States declared war on Germany in December 1941, AP's American staff members were arrested and interned for five months before being deported in a prisoner exchange. The AP German picture service was seized, handed over to the German Foreign Ministry and put under control of a Waffen SS photographer, Helmut Laux.

AP shared pictures of U.S. war operations and Allied advances, which were reviewed by Hitler and published in Nazi publications. According to a report on the agreement released by AP in May 2017, “with one exception, the AP images appeared in German publications through this arrangement were unaltered by the Germans, but the captions were rewritten by the Germans to conform to official Nazi views.”

The news service also offered photos of Hitler and German military activities taken by Nazis, allowing them to spread their propaganda. At least 10,000 photos were traded in Lisbon and, later Switzerland, via diplomatic pouch with the help of another AP correspondent.

Although the exchange necessitated dealing with the Nazi regime, it was the AP's belief then and now that the photos gave the U.S. public a much fuller picture of the war than could have been obtained otherwise, says the AP report, Covering Tyranny, The AP and Nazi Germany: 1933-1945.  That included scenes of fighting on the Russian front, the results of bombings of German cities and Germany's falling war fortunes.

Sources: Michael Rosenwald, “A WWII Secret: AP had photo deal with the Nazis,” Washington Post, May 11, 2017;
David Crary, “AP releases in-depth review of its coverage of Nazi Germany,” Associated Press, (May 10, 2017).