PROPAGANDA AND INFORMATION POLICY IN WORLD WAR II: MECHANISMS, INSTITUTIONS, AND STRATEGIC OUTCOMES

World War II represented an unprecedented convergence of industrial warfare and mass communication, transforming propaganda from a supplementary political tool into a central instrument of state power. This article examines the propaganda systems of the principal belligerent powers — Nazi Germany, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union — through the analytical lens of institutional design, message construction, and audience targeting. Drawing on primary documentation and established historiography, the study argues that effective wartime propaganda was not merely the product of ideological conviction but of sophisticated bureaucratic organization, psychological insight, and technological deployment. The article further explores the intersections between information policy and military strategy, demonstrating that the management of public perception was treated by all major powers as operationally equivalent to battlefield preparation. Findings suggest that propaganda efficacy depended on the alignment between the message and the lived experience of the target audience, a condition that varied significantly across different national contexts.