# A 1952 American poster in Korean answering the germ-warfare charge Dated 8 May 1952 in the National Archives file, this Korean-language photo poster from the State Department's information program answers the Communist charge that UN forces used germ weapons. It quotes Acheson calling the charge ridiculous and says the Communists refused a Red Cross inquiry (NAID 5729959). - Home - Archive - A 1952 American poster in Korean answering the germ-warfare charge Germ Warfare: 공산주의자들의 거짓은 탈로되었다 (The Communists' Lies Have Been Exposed) (Korean poster distributed in Asia) A 1952 American poster in Korean answering the germ-warfare charge 1952 Korean-language U.S. information poster answering the germ-warfare charge with Acheson, Trygve Lie, and the Red Cross. NARA NAID 5729959. ## Techniques named on the archive record TestimonialTransfer DateMay 8, 1952Made byU.S. Information Agency (predecessor: State Department International Information and Educational Exchange Program), Propaganda Posters Distributed in Asia seriesMediumPosterCountryUnited StatesRegimeTruman AdministrationNARANAID 5729959; Record Group 306SourceUnidentified Source blurred: contractors, cutouts, buried disclosureSourceU.S. National Archives (NARA), Record Group 306, Propaganda Posters Distributed in Asia , retrieved October 3, 2026SourcePublic domain (U.S. government work; NARA RG 306) U.S. Information Agency / Department of State, May 8, 1952. National Archives, Record Group 306 (NAID 5729959, 306-PPA-59). Object, image, and catalog record from the FRAME archive. Text on this page is CC BY 4.0. Image rights are as the archive records. Full record at propagandaarchive.org Dated 8 May 1952 in the National Archives file, this Korean-language photo poster from the State Department's information program answers the Communist charge that UN forces used germ weapons. It quotes Acheson calling the charge ridiculous and says the Communists refused a Red Cross inquiry (NAID 5729959). ## What the poster prints Three portraits run across the top: Secretary of State Dean Acheson, UN Secretary-General Trygve Lie, and the Soviet delegate Jacob Malik. Below are photographs of a field hospital under the UN flag, Red Cross delegates, a prisoner receiving an injection, a wounded man on a stretcher, and a man spraying a shed. Korean captions carry the argument. 공산주의자들의 거짓은 탈로되었다 국제적으로 중립적인 단체로 알려진 적십자는 그원인여하를 불문하고, 그 비난을 조사함과 동시에 병자를 구호하는 책임을 지겠다고하였다 유엔직원들도 이에 동의했다 Headline and one paragraph, FRAME transcription; some syllables are uncertain in the hand-set type. Full record at propagandaarchive.org. NARA RG 306, 306-PPA-59, NAID 5729959. The Communists' Lies Have Been Exposed The Red Cross, known as an internationally neutral body, said it would take responsibility for investigating the accusation and, at the same time, relieving the sick, whatever the cause. UN officials agreed to this too. The archive's machine translation by Claude, not verified by a fluent reader. ## The argument it makes The poster's case has three parts. Officials of standing deny the charge. A neutral body offered to investigate and the accusers refused. The UN side treats sick and wounded prisoners. The archive tags it with testimonial and transfer: the denials of named officials, and the standing of the Red Cross and the UN, are lent to the American side. The strongest part of the argument is the offer of an inquiry. An accuser who refuses neutral inspection gives the public reason to doubt the accusation, and the poster says so. The weakest part is its close, which, in the archive's translation, says the whole world knows the UN stands for "health and truth" and that those who know its health work "know the Communists are liars." That is a conclusion stated as a fact, and the poster supplies only official word for it. ## Who issued it The record names the State Department's international information program, whose poster files passed to the U.S. Information Agency, in the series "Propaganda Posters Distributed in Asia." The archive classes the source as blurred: the sheet itself does not say an American agency made it. This is one of several language editions in the archive, including Tagalog and Vietnamese versions. Related State Department sheets: Kremlin's Words and Deeds and The World's Largest Prison. For a privately fronted anti-communist campaign of the same years, see the archive's Crusade for Freedom and Radio Free Europe study. ## Sources - FRAME object record, "Germ Warfare: 공산주의자들의 거짓은 탈로되었다 (The Communists' Lies Have Been Exposed)," 8 May 1952. U.S. Information Agency (predecessor: State Department International Information and Educational Exchange Program). - U.S. National Archives, Record Group 306, Propaganda Posters Distributed in Asia, 306-PPA-59, NAID 5729959, retrieved by the archive 3 October 2026. Rights as recorded: public domain (U.S. government work). Canonical: https://americanpropaganda.org/collection/germ-warfare-korean-1952/