AFRTS programming, acquired and distributed by the AFRTS Broadcast Center at March Air Reserve Base near Riverside, California, is selected from popular commercial and public programming found in the United States (although commercials are replaced by DoD in formation and spot announcements). Most AFRTS programming is acquired with little or no charge (for performance rights or residual fees), thanks to industry cooperation dating back to AFRTS beginnings during World War II. AFRTS does not produce its own entertainment shows for television. The entertainment programming includes over 90 percent of the top-rated programs in the United States.

The AFRTS Satellite Network (SATNET) broadcasts 13 radio services and ten television channels containing entertainment, news, in formation, and sports, which are uplinked from the Broadcast Center. AFRTS provides four television services, including the primary service, American Forces Network (AFN). Additional programming includes AFN News, AFN Sports, and AFN Spectrum (a service that includes programming from PBS and cable networks such as A&E, Discovery, and the History Channel).

To provide service to DoD personnel in more than 177 countries and U.S. territories worldwide, AFRTS uses eight satellites, reaching more than 800,000 U.S. service members and their families. More than 120 U.S. Navy ships at sea also receive live television and radio channels via the Navy’s “Direct to Sailor” (DTS) initiative (created in 1997 to serve sailors and Marines specifically). The Naval Media Center participates with AFRTS in inserting unique Navy Department information programming via the DTS transmissions.

In 1996 AFRTS replaced its worldwide circuiting of videotaped programming with live satellite broadcasts of multiple radio and television channels. For many years, AFRTS broadcasts also reached a substantial “shadow” audience of U.S. citizens living abroad and citizens of host nations who viewed or listened to the programming. Although no official figures exist for the size of this shadow audience worldwide, one study of the audience in Japan found that 21 percent of the local population (approximately 25 million people) listened to AFRTS radio at least once a week. However, the shadow audience is diminishing as AFRTS has reduced its dependence on low-power, over-the-air broadcast transmissions and instead expanded its direct-to-home satellite service (where military personnel lease or purchase the service from the base exchange) and cable distribution within military installations. Nevertheless, one could safely conclude that the formerly enormous presence of AFRTS broadcasts worldwide probably played an important role in in formal English-language instruction and in fostering a general acceptance of U.S. cultural products worldwide.

AFRTS’s history can be traced to several small radio stations established by servicemen in Panama, Alaska, and the Philippines near the start of World War II. Following the success and popularity of these small operations, the Armed Forces Radio Service (AFRS) was established by the U.S. War Department on May 26, 1942, with the intent of improving troop morale by giving service members a “touch of home.” The military also sought to provide a source of information to U.S. servicemen that would counter enemy propaganda (such as that found in the broadcasts of Axis Sally and Tokyo Rose), although officials denied the move was an attempt at counter-propaganda.

During the war, AFRS programs proved enormously popular with the troops and were made financially possible largely through the contributions of radio and film stars, who donated their time regularly without charge. Two of the more popular programs were Command Performance and Mail Call, which presented such stars as Bob Hope, Jack Benny, Clark Gable, Red Skelton, Bing Crosby, Dinah Shore, and the Andrews Sisters, among many others. Although these stars unselfishly gave of their time to contribute to the patriotic war effort, their careers most certainly did not suffer from the exposure of a somewhat captive audience. By the end of the war, there were nearly 300 AFRS radio stations operating worldwide (however, that number decreased to only 60 some four years later). Since that time, the number of stations continues to increase and decrease, depending on the level of U.S. military commitments worldwide.

Television came relatively late to the AFRS, considering the enormous impact the medium was having on American society. The impetus to introduce television, in fact, came from the need to address serious morale problems in the Strategic Air Command. Armed Forces Television (AFT) got its start at Limestone Air Force Base, Maine, in 1953, and after much success in helping to reduce absences without leave, court martials, and the divorce rate at this military installation, AFT was officially joined with the AFRS in 1954 to become AFRTS. AFRTS introduced color television in the early 1970s and was one of the first broadcasters to begin using satellites for live news and sports, doing so as early as 1968.

The AFRTS maintains that its programming is provided “without censorship, propagandizing, or manipulation.” The first notable exceptions to that claim surfaced during the Vietnam War period. From 1963 to 1967, AFRTS was instructed by Defense Secretary Robert McNamara to broadcast news-analysis programs produced by the United States Information Agency (USIA)—material that was widely recognized as propaganda. The more serious challenge to AFRTS’s noninterference claims came from broadcast outlets and journalists in Vietnam itself. Although AFRTS and various military policymakers maintained that censorship of programming was prohibited, numerous controversies arose (both public and internal) over news, quotes, and specific words and phrases that were kept off the air due to AFRTS guidelines. According to a history of the AFRTS commissioned by the service for its 50th anniversary, such restrictions even included “the editing of President Johnson’s comments that the command believed were inaccurate.” Justifications for such restrictions most often included the desire to avoid injuring troop morale, helping the enemy, or offending the host nation’s sensitivities.

Although the broadcasting arm of AFRTS still maintains its claim to no censorship, it admits that local AFN stations have the right to “change the schedule to avoid broadcast of the offending programming” in some host nations. The direct broadcasting of American news programming via SATNET created problems for AFRTS broadcasters in nations particularly sensitive to criticism (such as Korea and the Philippines), but AFRTS contends that the move to new distribution systems to military households has alleviated this problem.