Special thank you to Ray Robinson and Jeff White for sharing the latest script from Wavescan program.
Jeff: In 1987, a movie was released with the title ‘Empire of the Sun’. You may have seen it. The movie tells the story of a young British boy who grows up in pre-War Shanghai, and then endures captivity by the Japanese. Shanghai was a very interesting international city in those days, and Ray Robinson has been looking into the radio broadcasting scene there. Ray?
Ray: Thanks, Jeff. During the pre-World War II period, the city of Shanghai in China was indeed an important international city. These days it is listed as the world's largest city, with a population now in 2025 in excess of 30 million people. However, the beginnings of Shanghai go back more than a thousand years when it was just a small trading center.
After the Opium War in 1842, Britain was granted trading rights in Shanghai. Soon afterwards, other European powers and America were also granted the same trading privileges in Shanghai, with each country being given its own territory, a ‘concession’, in an area to the north of the city. One of the initial purposes of the concessions was to confine foreigners to an area of their own, but under the terms of the Treaty of Nanking, the western citizens in Shanghai were also granted extraterritoriality, basically equivalent to what we recognize today as diplomatic immunity from the jurisdiction of local law. In 1854, the U.K., France and USA created the Shanghai Municipal Council to serve all their interests, but in 1862 the French concession dropped out of the arrangement. The following year, in 1863, the British and American concessions merged to form the Shanghai International Settlement, which eventually expanded to contain residential areas for England, Germany, Italy, America and Japan.
Shanghai thus truly became an international city, and by the 1930’s, 14 foreign powers had entered into treaty relations with China, and their nationals also became part of the administration of the settlement – all except the French, who continued to remain separate. In 1925, the area occupied by the International Settlement was just under nine square miles, with over 1 million people living there.
In the movie Jeff mentioned, ‘Empire of the Sun’, it showed that in parts of the British residential area, the streets and housing looked very similar to southern England, and if you didn’t know you were in China, you could be forgiven for thinking you were in an upscale neighborhood of Surrey or Buckinghamshire, except that, as well as the upper middle class people who lived there, the houses had Chinese servants inside.
When radio stations were first established in Shanghai, each of the foreign concessions within the Shanghai International Settlement established its own station, though mostly with Chinese callsigns. Many of these stations were heard throughout the world on shortwave.
A few struggling experimental stations with irregular callsigns were launched on medium wave by commercial enterprises in the Chinese area of Shanghai in the mid-1920’s, but most of them failed soon afterwards. More substantial medium wave stations began to appear on the radio dial in the early 1930’s, and these were all licensed with callsigns in the X series.
The first shortwave station in Shanghai was launched in 1931 on exactly 5000 kHz and given the regular callsign XCTE. But, like the Chinese medium wave stations, this shortwave station also disappeared soon afterwards.
Japanese forces first invaded China and occupied Shanghai in 1937 – widely considered to be the start of the Second World War in Asia. However, each of the foreign concessions in Shanghai was permitted to retain its area of influence and to continue its regular activities, at least for a while. American Marines prevented Japanese patrols from entering the International Settlement in 1938, but early that year, the Japanese occupation forces did take over a medium wave station previously owned by a Japanese merchant in Shanghai. This was station XQHA, with 250 watts on 580 kHz.
During the Pacific War, there were five different and important international shortwave stations located in Shanghai, all owned and operated by different nations.
Early in 1939, station XMHA was installed in the American concession in Shanghai with its identification announcement as “The Call of the Orient.” Then, early in 1942, this station was taken over by the Japanese, although it retained the same call sign and identification announcements, XMHA and “The Call of the Orient.” This station was monitored frequently by Arthur Cushen in New Zealand for news and information of interest to the South Pacific.
Early in 1940, a station with the call sign XGRS was installed in the German concession in Shanghai. It is presumed that XGRS stood for “German Radio Station.” Programming from this station was violently anti-British, and it carried significant news and information from both Germany and Japan.
At the same time as the Germans were installing XGRS in 1940, the Italians also erected a station in their concession with the call sign XIRS; and likewise, it is presumed that XIRS stood for “Italian Radio Station.”
In their separate concession in the mid-1930’s, the French erected a medium wave station (some years before the hostilities broke out in Europe), and this station identified with a French call sign, FFZ, rather than a Chinese call sign. Then, early in 1940, they added a 400 watt shortwave unit. When the Nazi occupation of France took place in June 1940, this station became the Asian voice of the Vichy government.
Again as depicted in the movie ‘Empire of the Sun’, the Shanghai International Settlement came to an abrupt end in December 1941 when Japanese troops stormed in immediately following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.
For a period of a year or so, a clandestine shortwave station in Shanghai, presumed to be operated by the Japanese, purported to be located “somewhere in India.” This station used the on-air identifications of “The Voice of Free India” and “The Voice of Indian Independence,” and it was first noted in New Zealand in March 1942. The station was heard frequently with two channels in parallel. Towards the end of the same year, programming was revamped and the station then identified as “The Voice of the Indian Independence League.” With India under British rule at the time, it is very likely the purpose of the station was to foment unrest in India and draw British forces away from their attacks on the Japanese in Burma, Malaya and elsewhere.
When peace was declared in Europe, in May 1945, Japan took over the German station in Shanghai and gave it a new call sign, XGOO. When the war in the Pacific ended in August 1945, the station went silent, until the Chinese took control of it in the November, and again gave it a new call sign, this time XORA. And, this 5 kW crystal-controlled transmitter was the only shortwave station that remained on the air in Shanghai after the war, up until the Communist Revolution in 1949.
Thus for at least half a dozen decisive years around the middle of the last century, many of the major powers involved in the conflict in Europe and Asia were represented on the shortwave scene in Shanghai.
Back to you, Jeff.
(Wavescan)
