Activities of the Department of Propaganda and Agitation of the Kursk Regional Committee of the CPSU (b) to Work with District Newspapers in the Early Period of the Great Patriotic War

Relevance. The article deals with the specifics of the activities of the propaganda and agitation Department of the Kursk Regional Committee of the CPSU (b) to control the printed mass media of the region in the initial period of the Great Patriotic War (1941). It was especially important to prevent the disclosure of information that was a military or state secret through the district newspapers. The function of supervising this issue was assigned to the party power structures.
Purposes: to understand how the Kursk department of propaganda and agitation of the regional committee of the CPSU(b) worked when the Great Patriotic War began; - to identify the system of activity and work of the party with local district newspapers of the Kursk region in wartime conditions.
Objectives. to reveal on the example of the activities of the propaganda and agitation department of the Kursk Regional Committee of the CPSU(b) the specifics of the restructuring of the work of newspapers, taking into account the realities of wartime; to determine the range of information and facts that were censored in order to preserve military and state secrets in the initial period of the Great Patriotic War; to consider the specifics of the interaction of the party bodies of the Kursk region with the editors and editorial offices of regional newspapers.
Methodology. Within the framework of the study, chronological, problem-analytical and comparative-historical methods were used.
Results. On the basis of archival data, the analysis of the activities of the party authorities in working with the district newspapers of the Kursk region in the initial period of the Great Patriotic War is presented.
Conclusion. The author draws a conclusion about the strengthening of control by the party bodies over the work of district newspapers at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War in connection with the requirements of wartime.

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