Donald Duck’s Bad Nazi Dream and Four Other Disney Propaganda Cartoons from World War II

Dur­ing World War II, all hands were on deck, even in Hol­ly­wood. Many of Amer­i­ca and Britain’s finest film­mak­ers, from Hitch­cock to Frank Capra, were recruit­ed to cre­ate pro­pa­gan­da films to sup­port the war effort. And the same went for Walt Dis­ney, who turned his lov­able car­toon char­ac­ters into good patri­ots.

In 1942, Dis­ney released “Der Fuehrer’s Face,” an anti-Nazi pro­pa­gan­da movie that bol­stered sup­port for the war, and even­tu­al­ly won the Acad­e­my Award for Best Ani­mat­ed Short Film. Then, a year lat­er, came The Spir­it of ’43, which fea­tures Don­ald Duck help­ing Amer­i­cans to under­stand why they need to pay their tax­es. Oth­er wartime Dis­ney shorts include Don­ald Gets Draft­ed (1942), The Old Army Game (1943), and Com­man­do Duck (1944). They all appear below.

The Spir­it of ’43

Don­ald Gets Draft­ed

The Old Army Game

Com­man­do Duck

Note: Der Fuehrer’s Face and The Spir­it of ’43 appear in the Ani­ma­tion sec­tion of our col­lec­tion of Free Movies Online.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

The Sto­ry Of Men­stru­a­tion: Walt Disney’s Sex Ed Film from 1946

How Dis­ney Car­toons Are Made

Disney’s Oscar-Win­ning Adven­tures in Music