Scope and Content Note
The papers of Saul Robert Kleiman (1918-2004) span the years 1935-1983, with the bulk of the material dating from 1943 to 1945. The papers are mostly in English and Japanese, with Burmese, Kachin, Shan, and other ethnic Asian languages. The collection is arranged largely according to the groupings established by Kleiman: biographical information, correspondence, Office of War Information files, research files, submissions for awards, and writings, and therein alphabetically by type of material or topic.
The largest portion of the papers relates to Kleiman's service with the United States Office of War Information (OWI) during World War II and pertains to psychological warfare and the use of propaganda in the Far East. The Office of War Information files contain correspondence, memoranda, propaganda in various languages with English translations including leaflets, newspapers, printed matter, broadsides, and ephemera, interrogations of prisoners of war, reports on the effectiveness of propaganda, newsletters, newspaper clippings, and Japanese propaganda in the Philippines. The files also contain personal papers relating to Kleiman's duties and his daily diary. The personal correspondence from the war years also contains information relating to his propaganda activities. Kleiman's writings contain drafts of articles and a radio program he wrote during the war.
On April 3, 1943, Kleiman arrived in New Delhi, India, and was attached to the China-Burma-India Theater (CBI), until June 1, 1944. His papers, however, were grouped under Burma-India. In May-June, 1943, he traveled to Burma and Assam, India, to make a study of the area of CBI-projected operations, to establish liaisons with the American and British military commanders in the area, and to arrange distribution channels for CBI-projected leaflets and other propaganda. Kleiman's multipage report discusses opium distribution in Burma, plans for Burman reconstruction, interviews with British and American military officials, events in the Hukawng Valley and attitudes of the Kachins, propaganda strategy, and the vegetable seed program that dropped seed packets by airplane. He also submitted an intelligence report detailing the speeches and activities of Eddie Rickenbacker during the captain's tour through the Assam area. Also chronicling some of Kleiman's activities in the CBI is his daily diary dating from March 1944 through May 1944. The diary discusses design and production of leaflets, use of Nisei to translate leaflets into Japanese, scheduled drops of leaflets, a radio broadcasting project, use of a public address system to broadcast propaganda, problems with supplies, resettlement of Kachin refugees, and meetings with military personnel. Further material on the CBI is under the heading of leaflets produced in other areas.
Even though China was part of the CBI, Kleiman's files on Yenan, actually Yan'an, were kept separately. Material on this area consists of leaflets and reports. The reports are comprised of intelligence reports on the Eighteenth Group Army of the Chinese that was a combination of the Eighth Route Army of Chinese communists and the New Fourth Army, and a series of "Yenan Reports" submitted by Francis McCracken Fisher, chief of the China Division, OWI, covering psychological warfare findings at and about Yenan from 1944 to 1945.
From June 2, 1944, until May 13, 1945, Kleiman was attached to the Southwest Pacific Area. He surveyed the New Guinea combat zones in June and July, and in early September 1944 arrived in Hollandia, New Guinea, to set up a psychological warfare operation at the headquarters of General Douglas MacArthur and the Sixth Army. There Kleiman was in charge of all forward operations for the OWI in the Southwest Pacific Area and director of leaflet production for the Sixth Army. On October 20, 1944, soon after General MacArthur's landing, Kleiman also landed at Red Beach on Leyte Island in the Philippines. He put on the first Voice of Freedom radio broadcast from the Apache (radio broadcasting ship). Propaganda operations were then moved inland to Tacloban. The close timing of his arrival in New Guinea and his landing on Leyte Island is probably why Kleiman combined the two areas in his files. Material consists of leaflets, correspondence, reports, interrogations of prisoners of war, radio broadcasts, and the basic military plan for psychological warfare in the Southwest Pacific Area. Under the heading of Leyte Island, Philippines, are propaganda newspapers and bulletins produced in the Philippines including the Leyte Shimbun, Leyte-Samar Bulletin, Leyte-Samar Free Philippines, and the Voice of Victory.
On February 8, 1945, Kleiman flew into the Philippine capital of Manila where he stayed until May 13. Material relating to his efforts there includes leaflets and the newspapers Manila Free Philippines and Airborne Edition Free Philippines. Of interest among the usual reports on the effectiveness of the leaflets and Japanese morale is a report on Chinese guerrilla organizations on Luzon and their activities.
The Office of War Information files also contain a group of uncategorized material, scrapbooks, and propaganda from the Asian and European theaters of war. Items in the uncategorized material, consisting of documents either designated by Kleiman as miscellaneous or found loose, are the same type of material housed in the categorized files. In all probability, the loose items were originally part of the categorized material. The scrapbooks were presented to personnel who had worked in propaganda in the Far East and contain runs of propaganda leaflets and newspapers. Propaganda from both theaters of war include leaflets, broadsides, magazines, pamphlets, and ephemeral items (called novelties by Kleiman) that include matchbooks, matchboxes, leaves of soap, and sewing kits, all marked with propaganda.
A large part of the personal correspondence relates to Kleiman's activities during World War II. There are letters to and from his first wife, Elnora H. Kleiman, with friends serving in the war and at home, and with his colleagues in the OWI. The correspondence with his colleagues is the same type Kleiman filed in the Office War Information files and often discusses propaganda and the war. Of interest are discussions on how to phrase propaganda so that conquered peoples understand that the Americans are freeing them from the Japanese and not from European colonizers. Correspondents include Frederic S. "Fritz" Marquardt, Barbara R. "Bobbe" Monroe, and Marshall Darrow "Marsh" Shulman.
Rounding out the collection are clippings of articles written by Kleiman from 1935 to 1955, biographical material, and his research files for articles written after the war concerning United States-European relations.