Content note: Painting of a barefoot, half-clothed mother and two children before a burning village, kept whole. This object is shown as it was published. Why
If Chinese Communists Flood into Vietnam (Vietnamese poster)
A Vietnamese-language poster in which a barefoot mother clutches an infant and a naked child beside a tree while a village burns behind her in the rain. The headline starts 'If Chinese Communists flood into Vietnam...' and the red line completes the threat: nowhere to shelter. The harm is conditional and imminent, and the protection offered is resistance to the invasion the headline describes.
- Date
- October 3, 1951
- Period
- Cold War
- Made by
- U.S. Department of State, International Information Administration (records later held by the U.S. Information Agency)
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- State
- Regime
- Truman Administration
- Leader
- Harry S. Truman
- Audience
- Foreign public
- Event
- First Indochina War
- Techniques
- Fear appeal
- Source
- Unidentified Source blurred: contractors, cutouts, buried disclosure
- Source
- U.S. National Archives (NAID 5729937); image copy via Wikimedia Commons, retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (U.S. government work)
U.S. Department of State / U.S. Information Agency. National Archives, Record Group 306 (NAID 5729937). Item page: Use Restriction Unrestricted.
Text on the object
NẾU TRUNG.CỘNG TRÀN SANG VIỆT.NAM... NGƯỜI VIỆT SẼ KHÔNG NƠI DUNG THÂN. HÃY CHỐNG TRUNG.CỘNG XÂM.LĂNG !
If the Chinese Communists flood into Vietnam... Vietnamese people will have nowhere to take shelter. Resist the Chinese Communist invasion!
Printed with a full stop inside the compounds 'TRUNG.CỘNG', 'VIỆT.NAM' and 'XÂM.LĂNG'. An artist's signature at lower right is [illegible]. FRAME translation (machine, not fluent-reader verified).
