Navajo Code Talkers - November 8

We are not sure how many of our friends and family know of the Navajo Code Talkers, but their image throughout the Navajo Nation is very powerful and ubiquitous. Practically everywhere we go there is a memorial or exhibit dedicated to them or a road named for them, and every museum and visitor center seems to have something about them. The most unique, perhaps, is in a Burger King in Kayenta. Owned by the son of a Code Talker, it displays a large selection of paraphernalia and descriptions of their war role. But there are many others and new ones are going up regularly.

The Code Talkers played a unique and important role in World War II and received national honors for it, and this swells the pride of the Navajo. But beyond this, military service itself appears to have a certain resonance among American Indians who provide more military recruits per capita than any other ethnic group and have been awarded 27 Medals of Honor. During World War II, almost 50,000 Indians served, representing one-third of all able-bodied Indian men between 18 and 50 years of age. This military tradition continues to this day, represented by a continued large presence in the military, and, judging by a Powwow we attended in South Dakota last year, the honored role given to the military in these events. Of course, unemployment on the reservations may play a significant role here, but a long standing desire to protect one’s homeland – interpreted as service in the US Military – probably also does as well.

Back to the Code Talkers. After the US military became aware that the Japanese were breaking the codes of battlefield radio communications they were desperate to counteract this. Someone hit on the idea (not a completely new one as Indian code talkers, not Navajo, were used in WW I) or realized that Navajo was a particularly complex language and might be the basis for secret communications. Twenty-nine Navajo were recruited into the Marines on this basis, the number eventually rose to 400. They developed a coded communications based on the Navajo language, then trained to memorize and use it on the battlefield. It was a huge success. It was never broken and played an important role in a number of major battles in the Pacific theater after Pearl Harbor. Following WW II, however, all the Navajo were sworn to secrecy as the military planned to use the code again if needed. So it wasn’t until 1968 that the Code Talkers role was made public. In 1982, they were officially recognized by the federal government and in 2000 the original 29 Code Talkers were awarded Congressional Gold Medals.