The Armed Forces Radio Service had been created by the War Department as a means to entertain and inform the Troops. The service was run "by G.I.s for G.I.s."

AFRS was centered in Hollywood, not only close to the resources of the entertainment industry, but there was also a lot of military training and staging in the area during the early days of the Second World War. AFRS programming was developed for "Local" broadcast in the various theaters of the war. On Jul 4, 1943 the first AFRS broadcast in Europe was played over borrowed equipment. As the Allies moved East after D-Day AFRS stations were set up in most liberated cities.

Programing from the States was sometimes send by shortwave but this was unreliable. The preferred method was to prerecord programming on transcription disks then mail them to the various stations.