Don't be a sucker! Keep your mouth shut
Security poster: a large orange fish with a wide eye leaps toward a bare fishhook on a line, above the slogan 'Keep your mouth shut'. The word 'sucker' names both the fish and the person who talks. The sheet implies that careless talk gets a person caught, and calls the reader a 'sucker' if he does not comply.
Propaganda techniques used in this poster
- Date
- 1944
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- War Department, Adjutant General's Office
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- Military
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Mixed
- Purpose
- Warn or inform
- Themes
- Security and surveillance, Home front, War and the military
- Event
- World War II
- Regime
- Roosevelt administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 44, World War II Posters, retrieved October 4, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (U.S. government work)
War Department, Adjutant General's Office. National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44, 44-PA-146 (NAID 513593).
Text on the object
DON'T BE A Sucker! KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT W.D., A.G.O. "Sucker" Security Poster. Additional copies may be requisitioned as prescribed in AR 310-200, 1 May 1943, as changed by Changes No. 2, 15 September 1943. [imprint: U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE : 1944 — O-595823]
