---
title: Beware... Drink only approved water
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/beware-drink-only-approved-water-1944/
description: 'War Department training poster: a helmeted soldier lies at a bank staring wide-eyed at a canteen cup, while in the water below him a skull is reflected.'
section: Collection
---

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3. Beware... Drink only approved water

**Content note:** Shows a human skull reflected in a pool of water beneath a staring soldier. This object is shown as it was published. [Why](https://propagandaarchive.org/about/#as-it-was)

[![Beware... Drink only approved water, 1944 US poster: War Department training poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/beware-drink-only-approved-water-1944.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/beware-drink-only-approved-water-1944.jpg)

# Beware... Drink only approved water

War Department training poster: a helmeted soldier lies at a bank staring wide-eyed at a canteen cup, while in the water below him a skull is reflected, under 'Beware... Drink only approved water'. The skull in the water is a direct fear-appeal about untreated water, closed by the slogan 'Never give a germ a break!'

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
BEWARE..
Drink only
approved water
NEVER GIVE A GERM A BREAK!
BEWARE, DRINK ONLY APPROVED WATER
Approved War Department Graphic Training Aid 8-15
WAR DEPARTMENT - 12 OCTOBER 1944
Reproduction without permission prohibited
Distribution: Continental: In accordance with Part II, ASF Cir. No. 313, 1944 and Section I, ASF Cir. No. 181, 1944. Overseas: T of Opns (10), Depts (10), SvC (10), Base Comds (10), Island Comds (10), Det Comds (10), Sectors (10), Base Sectors (10), Armies (1), Corps (1), D (1), R (1), Sep Bn (1), [illegible]
```

[← Before, never give a germ a break!](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/before-never-give-a-germ-a-break-1944/) [Beware of carbon monoxide →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/beware-of-carbon-monoxide-1944/)

## More propaganda examples that use the same techniques

- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (Dutch Republic · 1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Engraving of a hanged, bare-breasted Taino woman, burning huts and people being killed by Spanish soldiers.
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Kingdom of Great Britain · Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Proclamation de Sonthonax en créole, Cap-Français (Proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax in Creole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sonthonax-proclamation-creole-1793/) (France · Aug 29, 1793 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating). Content note: Colonial-era proclamation on slavery and emancipation in Saint-Domingue; speaks of slaves, whips and 'Nègues' in period terms.
- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
- [Brolej Žemajčiaj! (Brothers Samogitians!): hand-painted broken-cross poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/brolej-zemajciaj-broken-cross-1862/) (Russian Empire · 1862 · Fear appeal, Transfer)