loose lips sink ships
/ˈlus ˈlɪps ˈsɪŋk ˈʃɪps/
loose lips sink ships proverb: saying too much or releasing confidential information can have dangerous consequences.
Proverb
loose lips sink ships
- Saying too much or releasing confidential information can have dangerous consequences.
- Loose Lips Sink Ships, said the wartime poster. Of course the ships will all sink anyway, sooner or later.2000, Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin, Anchor, published 2007, →ISBN, page 448
- ‘Loose lips sink ships,’ she spat at Dad once, when they were arguing about Grandpa, but ‘loose lips killed our son.’2014, Crystal Chan, Bird, Random House, →ISBN, page 59
Origin of loose lips sink ships
Shortening of a wartime slogan from World War II.
Words that rhyme with loose lips sink ships
Questions about loose lips sink ships
- What does loose lips sink ships mean?
- Loose lips sink ships means saying too much or releasing confidential information can have dangerous consequences.
- What part of speech is loose lips sink ships?
- Loose lips sink ships is a proverb.
- How do you pronounce loose lips sink ships?
- Loose lips sink ships is pronounced /ˈlus ˈlɪps ˈsɪŋk ˈʃɪps/.
Words near loose lips sink ships in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: loose lips sink ships (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-loose lips sink ships.ogg.
Cite this entry: “loose lips sink ships.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/loose_lips_sink_ships. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.