The current United States regime is cutting many vital services. In it’s wisdom, it defunded a true jewel of democracy – Radio Free Europe.
Radio Free Europe (RFE) began in 1949, to broadcast news, current events, politics, and, interestingly, jazz to the eastern European countries trapped behind the iron curtain.
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a media organization broadcasting news and analyses in 27 languages to 23 countries across Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and the Middle East. Headquartered in Prague since 1995, RFE/RL operates 21 local bureaus with over 500 core staff, 1,300 freelancers, and 680 employees. Nicola Careem serves as the editor-in-chief. […]
Jamming The Soviet government turned its efforts towards blocking reception of Western programs. To limit access to foreign broadcasts, the Central Committee decreed that factories should remove all components allowing short-wave reception from USSR-made radio receivers. However, consumers easily learned that the necessary spare parts were available on the black market, and electronics engineers opposing the idea would gladly convert radios back to being able to receive short-wave transmissions.
The most extensive form of reception obstruction was radio jamming. This was controlled by the KGB, which in turn reported to the Central Committee. Jamming was an expensive and arduous procedure, and its efficacy is still debated. In 1958, the Central Committee mentioned that the sum spent on jamming was greater than the sum spent on domestic and international broadcasting combined. The Central Committee has admitted that circumventing jamming was both possible and practised in the Soviet Union. Due to limited resources, authorities prioritized jamming based on the location, language, time, and theme of Western transmissions.
Highly political programs in Russian, broadcast at prime time to urban centers, were perceived as the most dangerous.
Seen as less politically threatening, Western music such as jazz was often transmitted unjammed.
Nicola Careem is a multi-award-winning journalist with over two decades of experience and a track record of facilitating independent and trusted news in places of conflict and tension.
She has covered six wars from the ground — including leading teams in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, the Palestinian territories, and Yemen.
[…] She ran the BBC’s operation from Kabul as Afghanistan fell to the Taliban and the organization’s coverage of the devastating COVID-19 outbreak in India. Most recently she played a pivotal role at CNN as their Director of Coverage during the first six months of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
RFE/RL’s mission is to promote democratic values by providing accurate, uncensored news and open debate in countries where a free press is threatened and disinformation is pervasive. RFE/RL reports the facts, undaunted by pressure.
On March 15, 2025, the United States Agency for Global Media terminated grants to RFE/RL and Radio Free Asia following a directive from the Trump Administration. On March 18, RFE/RL sued USAGM and two USAGM officials to block the grant termination.
In response, WLBOTT decided to counter our regime’s very repressive, very stupid move by creating our own Tower of Liberty: Radio Free WLBOTT.
But within hours of making our announcement, the regime caved and restored funding to RFE. We don’t know if they caved due to the fear of having to listen to our inane AM banter, or because a Federal Judge told them to cut it out.
Here are 10 behind-the-scenes or lesser-known tidbits about Radio Free Europe (RFE) that you likely won’t find on their official website—but which add flavor, context, and a touch of WLBOTT-style curiosity to their story:
1. CIA Origins Cloaked in Mystery: RFE was covertly funded by the CIA during the Cold War, and many of its early broadcasts were part of psychological operations (PSYOPs) designed to demoralize communist regimes.
2. Coded Messages to Spies: Some broadcasts contained subtle coded phrases or song choices used to send signals to operatives behind the Iron Curtain.
3. Underground Fan Clubs: In Eastern Bloc countries, RFE broadcasters became underground celebrities. People hosted secret “listening parties” to hear uncensored news and Western music, often with curtains drawn and radios hidden under blankets.
4. Nickname: “Radio Free Danger”: Within the U.S. intelligence community, some jokingly referred to RFE as “Radio Free Danger” due to the risks it posed to its staff—many of whom were threatened, harassed, or surveilled.
5. The Prague Bombing (1976): The RFE offices in Munich were bombed by a terrorist hired by Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu. It was one of the most direct attacks on a Western media outlet during the Cold War.
6. Outtakes and Bloopers Exist: Recordings exist (tucked in archives or private hands) of flubbed lines, technical glitches, and broadcasters accidentally switching between English and their native tongues mid-sentence. Some of these tapes were legendary among staff.
7. Musical Espionage: RFE was known for sneaking in banned Western music—jazz, rock, and protest songs—especially those by The Beatles, Bob Dylan, or Joan Baez. These broadcasts were seen as rebellious acts of cultural defiance.
8. Paranoia in the Cafeteria: Staff members in Munich were often warned not to speak too freely, even in the cafeteria, due to the possibility of being bugged or infiltrated by double agents posing as janitors or techs.
9. Ghosts of RFE Past: There are rumors of a “phantom broadcaster” who would take over an abandoned shortwave frequency late at night to read banned poetry and literature. Some called it “The Whispering Channel.”
10. Unexpected Listeners: Years later, declassified documents revealed that top Soviet and East German officials themselves often listened to RFE—not just to monitor it, but to get actual news they couldn’t get elsewhere.
Motivated by the Beatles’ Back in the USSR, Brezhnev knew that power was the ultimate aphrodisiac….
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout That Georgia's always on My, my, my, my, my, my, my, my, my mind
Oh, show me 'round your snow-peaked mountains Way down south Take me to your daddy's farm
Let me hear your balalaikas ringing out Come and keep your comrade warm I'm back In the U.S.S.R
You don't know how lucky you are, boy Back in the U.S.S.R - The Beatles
