History
Unraveling The Šmid Death Story
Timothy Garton Ash, reviewing several books on 1989 for the New York Review of Books, wrote that “An erroneous report on Radio Free Europe (RFE) that a student called Martin…
Report from Moscow: An Eyewitness View of Soviet Putsch
This story was originally published in the August/September 1991 issue of “Shortwaves,” an RFE/RL internal publication. What follows is an eyewitness account of the failed attempt by Soviet hardliners in…
Glória: RFE’s Portuguese Launchpad Over The Iron Curtain
Within two months of Radio Free Europe’s (RFE) first transmission in July 1950 via the 7,500kw mobile shortwave transmitter affectionately known as “Barbara,” the executives that established RFE were already…
Holzkirchen: RFE’s First Medium Wave ‘Voice of Freedom’
May 1, 2021 marked the 70th anniversary of Radio Free Europe’s (RFE) first medium wave broadcast, from Munich, Germany to Czechoslovakia.
Miroslav Kopt And The Secret Radio That Political Prisoners Built
Czechoslovak citizen Miroslav Kopt was arrested in 1954 and brutally interrogated by communist authorities before being sentenced to 10 years in prison for treason.
‘Listen, Listen! This is Radio Azatlyk.’
“Listen, listen! This is Radio Azatlyk,” said Myrat Tachmyrat, announcing Radio Liberty’s first Turkmen language broadcast on March 1, 1953.
Barbara: The Original Voice Of RFE
Barbara represents everything Radio Free Europe has represented for the past seventy years.
Havel Fellow Brings Havel Legacy To Russian Audiences
This spring, Ivan Beliaev, a 2014 Havel Fellowship alumnus, published Vaclav Havel: Life in History, a biography of the playwright, dissident, and first president of post-Communist Czechoslovakia Vaclav Havel.
Former RFE/RL Lithuanian Service Director Kestutis Girnius Reflects on RFE/RL Reporting in 1989
In an interview with RFE/RL, former RFE/RL Lithuanian Service Director Kestutis Girnius, who was director from 1989 to 2002, reflected on RFE/RL’s role in covering the dramatic changes that swept…
Ferdinand Peroutka: Mr. Czechoslovakia
On May 1, 1951, respected Czech journalist and first RFE Czechoslovak Service Director Ferdinand Peroutka began the first official transmission from Radio Free Europe (RFE) headquarters in Munich, saying, “This…