Don't talk about troop movements: If you tell where they're going... They may never get there
A large dark photo-montage of a soldier in helmet and pack climbing into a train car, with a line of soldiers waiting on the platform at lower right. Yellow text reads 'If you tell where they're going... They may never get there', with 'Don't talk about troop movements' below. The fear-appeal links a spoken detail directly to the soldiers' deaths.
Propaganda techniques used in this poster
- Date
- 1943
- Period
- Second World War
- Made by
- Office of War Information
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- State
- Regime
- Roosevelt Administration
- Leader
- Franklin D. Roosevelt
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Warn or inform
- Themes
- Home front, Security and surveillance, 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)
Office of War Information. National Archives and Records Administration, RG 44, 44-PA-374 (NAID 513826).
Text on the object
If you tell where they're going... They may never get there DON'T TALK ABOUT TROOP MOVEMENTS [imprint:] OWI Poster No. 54. Additional copies may be obtained upon request from the Division of Public Inquiries, Office of War Information, Washington, D.C. [imprint:] U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE : 1943-O-[illegible]
