# The Public Eye Is on You: a 1955 conduct poster that watches the soldiers

An English-language poster distributed in Asia and filed with U.S. Information Agency posters, catalog date 4 February 1955. Four large eyes frame cartoons of armed soldiers dealing with civilians, with the words "Be courteous," "Be fair," "Be honest" and "Be firm" (NAID 6949066).

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      The Public Eye is on You, soldiers' conduct poster (English poster distributed in Asia)

      The Public Eye Is on You: a 1955 conduct poster that watches the soldiers
      The Public Eye Is on You (1955): four eyes frame soldiers at a checkpoint, a car stop and an arrest, with "Be courteous, fair, honest, firm." NAID 6949066.

## Techniques named on the archive record

Glittering generalities
      DateFebruary 4, 1955Made byU.S. Information Agency (predecessor: State Department International Information and Educational Exchange Program), Propaganda Posters Distributed in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East seriesMediumPosterCountryUnited StatesRegimeEisenhower AdministrationNARANAID 6949066; Record Group 306SourceUnidentified Source blurred: contractors, cutouts, buried disclosureSourceU.S. National Archives (NARA), Record Group 306, Posters in Asia, Latin America, Middle East , retrieved October 4, 2026SourcePublic domain (U.S. government work; NARA RG 306) U.S. Information Agency / Department of State, February 4, 1955. National Archives, Record Group 306 (NAID 6949066, 306-PPB-165).
      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

  An English-language poster distributed in Asia and filed with U.S. Information Agency posters, catalog date 4 February 1955. Four large eyes frame cartoons of armed soldiers dealing with civilians, with the words "Be courteous," "Be fair," "Be honest" and "Be firm" (NAID 6949066).

## What the sheet shows

Each of four large eyes frames a cartoon of armed soldiers with civilians. In one they calm a quarrel. In another they check a pass at a checkpoint. In a third they refuse a banknote at a car stop. In the last they arrest a handcuffed man. Arrows carry four rules, and a line at the foot sums them up.

The Public Eye is on You..

BE COURTEOUS

BE FAIR

BE HONEST

BE FIRM

Uphold Your People's Confidence

[in scenes:] PASS; CHECKPOIN[T]; #10; POST No. 1; 711

[boxed mark:] I&E DIV

Transcription in the FRAME record; the archive notes that the scene lettering is partly cropped by the drawing. Full record at propagandaarchive.org. NAID 6949066, local id 306-PPB-165.

## No army named, no country given

Its catalog date is 4 February 1955, and NARA keeps it in Record Group 306 among the posters the U.S. Information Agency distributed in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. The maker line credits the agency along with the State Department program that came before it. The only issuer on the face is the boxed "I&E DIV" mark. The record does not name the army the poster addresses or the country where it hung, and FRAME classes the source as blurred.

## Eyes on the soldier for once

FRAME tags it glittering generalities: four virtue words beside four scenes, with watching eyes as the prompt. The archive files the purpose as mobilize or secure compliance, and the themes as war and the military, and security and surveillance.

The eyes are the interesting part, because of which way they look. The 1942 home-front sheet He's Watching You put a German helmet and a pair of eyes in front of the public. This one tells armed soldiers that the public is watching them. The checkpoint, the refused banknote and the arrest are all moments where an armed man holds power over an unarmed one, and the poster says that power is on display and answerable.

That is a principle a free country should want any army to learn. Courtesy, fairness and honesty at a checkpoint are what separate a soldier from an occupier. The footer even ties the rules to the people's confidence, not to a commander's order. The limits are the usual ones for this file: the poster's sender is not on its face, and "be firm" is left undefined on a sheet that shows a handcuffed man.

An earlier sheet with the same "I&E DIV" mark, These Are the New Huk Tactics, warned soldiers about guerrillas. More of the agency's overseas sheets are on the USIA posters abroad hub.

## Sources

- FRAME object record, The Public Eye is on You, soldiers' conduct poster (English poster distributed in Asia). Catalog date February 4, 1955.

- U.S. National Archives, Record Group 306, Posters in Asia, Latin America, Middle East, item NAID 6949066, 306-PPB-165, catalog.archives.gov, retrieved by the archive October 4, 2026. Rights as recorded: public domain (U.S. government work).

Canonical: https://americanpropaganda.org/collection/the-public-eye-is-on-you-soldiers-conduct-asia-1955/