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Navajo Code Talkers
By MT Sgt. Murrey Marder
Corps Combat Correspondent
Reprinted by Admission of The Marine Corps Gazette
Through the Solomon’s, in the Marianas, at Peleliu, Iwo Jima, and almost every
island where Marines have stormed ashore in this war, the Japanese have heard a
strange language gurgling through the earphones of their radio listening sets a
voice code which defies decoding.
To the linguistically keen ear it shows a trace of Asiatic origin, and a lot of
what sounds like American double talk. This strange tongue one of the most
select in the world is Navajo, embellished with improvised words and phrases for
military use. For three years it has served the Marine Corps well for
transmitting secret radio and telephone messages in combat.
The dark-skinned black-haired Navajo code talker, huddled over a portable radio
or field phone in a regimental, divisional or corps command post, translating a
message into Navajo as he reads it to his counterpart on the receiving end miles
away, has been a familiar sight in the Pacific battle zone. Permission to
disclose the work of these American Indians in Marine uniform has just been
granted by the Marine Corps.
Transmitting messages, which the enemy cannot decode, is a vital military factor
in any engagement, especially where combat units are operating over a wide area
in which communications must be maintained by radio. Throughout the history of
warfare, military leaders have sought the perfect code- a code that the enemy
could not break down, no matter how able his intelligence staff.
Most codes are based on the codist’s native language. If the language is a
widely used one, it also will be familiar to the enemy and no matter how good
you code may be the enemy eventually can master it. Navajo, however, is one of
the world’s “hidden” languages; it is termed “hidden,” along with other Indian
languages, as no alphabet or other symbols of it exist in the original form.
There are only about 55,000 Navajos, all concentrated in one region, living on
Government reservations and intensely clannish by nature, which has confined the
tongue to its native area.
Complicating the Navajo language, there are dialect variations among the tribes,
and in some cases even dialects within a tribe.
Except for the Navajos themselves, only a handful of Americans speak the
language. At the time the Marine Corps adopted Navajo as a voice code it was
estimated that not more than 28 other persons, American scientists or
missionaries who lived among the Navajos and studied the language for years,
could speak Navajo fluently. In recent years, missionaries and the interior
Department’s Bureau of Indian Affairs have worked on the compilation of
dictionaries and grammars of the language, based on its phonetics, to reduce it
to writing. Even with these available it is said that only persons who are
highly educated in English and who have made a lengthy study of spoken and
written Navajo can acquire fluency from prepared texts.
One of the reasons, which prompted the Marine Corps to adopt Navajo, in
preference to a variety of Indian tongues, as used by the AEF in the last war,
was a report that Navajos were the only Indian group in the United States not
infested with German students during the 20 years prior to 1941, when the
Germans had been studying tribal dialects under the guise of art students,
anthropologists, etc. It was learned that German and other foreign diplomats
were among the chief customers of the Bureau of Indian Affairs for the purchase
of publications dealing with Indian tribes, but it was decided that even if
Navajo books were in enemy hands it would be virtually impossible for the enemy
to gain a working knowledge of the language from that meager information. In
addition, even ability to speak Navajo fluently would necessarily enable the
enemy to decode a military message, for the Navajo dictionary does not list
military terms, and works used for “jeep,” “emplacement,” “battery,” “radar,”
“antiaircraft,” etc., have been improvised by Navajos in the field.
The adoption of code talkers by the Marine Corps stemmed from a request for
Navajo communicators by Maj. Gen. Clayton B. Vogel then Commanding General,
Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet. A report submitted with his request said a
Navajo enlistment program would have full support of the Tribal Council at
Window Rock, Arizona, and Navajo Reservation.
Acting on this request the Marine Corps’ Division of Plans and Policies in March
1942 sent Col. Wethered Woodworth to make a further report on the subject, and a
test was made at the San Diego, Calif., and Marine Base to determine the
practicality of Navajos as code talkers.
The test revealed that the Navajos who volunteered for the experiment could
transmit the messages given, although with some variation at the receiving end
resulting from the lack of exact words to transmit specific military terms. For
example, “Enemy is pressing attack on left flank” would come out “the enemy is
attacking on the left.”
Proper schooling in military phraseology, it was believed, could correct this
variation, and the following month the Marine Corps authorized an initial
enlistment of 30 Navajos to ascertain the value of their services.
The enlistment order required that recruits meet full Marine Corps physical
requirements and have a sufficient knowledge of English and Navajo to transmit
combat messages in Navajo. The recruits were to receive regular Marine training,
attend a Navajo school at the Fleet Marine Force Training Center, Camp Elliott,
Calif., and then receive sufficient communications train to enable them to
handle their specially qualified talent on the battlefield.
All the recruits spoke the same Navajo basically, but there were certain word
variations. In Navajo, the same word spoken with four different inflections has
four different meanings. The recruits had to agree on words, which had no shades
of interpretation, for any variation in an important military message might be
disastrous. As might be expected in any group of youths, they were not equal in
education or intelligence. Some of the military terms were very complex to the
unschooled, all had to be able to understand them thoroughly in order to
translate them into their native language. Some were not easily adaptable to
communications work. It was difficult in several instances for non-Navajos to
instruct the recruits in Marine Corps activities; a few marine instructors were
unable to cope with the typical Indian imperturbability.
On the other hand, many of the recruits were well educated, intelligent and
quick to learn. A number had worked for the Bureau of Indian Affairs as clerks,
and almost of the Navajos had the highly developed Indian sensory perceptions.
There were some recruits like PFC Wilsie H. Bitsie, whose father is district
supervisor of the Mexican Springs, N. Mex., and Navajo District. Bitsie became
an instructor in the Navajo School at Camp Elliott for a time, and helped work
out the much needed military terms. He went on to join the marine Raiders and at
New Georgia his Navajo ability helped the Raiders maintain contract with the
Army command at Munda white the marines knocked out Japanese outposts in the
jungle to the north.
Other code talkers went with the Third Marine Division and the Raiders to
Bougainville. There some manned distant outposts, maintaining contact in Navajo
by radio. It was found best to have close friends work together in teams of two,
for they could perfect their code talk by personal contact.
The men in their units learned that in addition to their language ability the
Navajos also could be good marines. They could do their share of fighting and
they made good scouts and messengers.
There had been concern in some quarters that dark skinned Navajos might be
mistaken for Japanese. In the latter days of the Guadalcanal action one Army
unit did pick up a Navajo communicator on the coastal road and messaged the
marine command: “We have captured a Japanese in marine clothing with marine
identification tags.” A marine officer was startled to find the prisoner was a
Navajo, who was only bored by the proceedings.
The code talkers went on into more campaigns, proving their ability, and the
Navajo quota in the Marine Corps rose from 30 to 420. At their TBXs they
transmitted operational orders, which helped us advance from the Solomon’s to
Okinawa.
It was found that the Navajos are not necessary at levels lower than battalions.
For messages between battalions and companies the extra security is not required
and speed is the paramount issue.
The III Amphibious Corps reported that the use of the talkers during the Guam
and Peleliu operations “was considered indispensable for the rapid transmission
of classified dispatches. Enciphering and deciphering time would have prevented
vital operational information from being dispatched or delivered to staff
sections with any degree of speed.”
At Iwo Jima, Navajos transmitted messages from the beach to division and Corps
commands afloat early on D-day, and after the division commands came ashore,
from division ashore to Corps afloat.
Last April authority was granted to establish a re-training course for Navajos
at FMFPac. Under this plan, five code talkers are taken from each division to
attend an intensive 21-day course, which gives emphasis to plane types, ship
types, printing and message writing, and message transmission. These Navajos
then return to their divisions to instruct the remaining men. It is emphasized
that code talkers work out successfully only where interest is shown by the
command and where training continues between operations.
As for the Navajos themselves, they probably are not any more enthusiastic about
the concentrated schooling than most young marines would be about schooling, for
they are amused at being regarded as different from other marines.
On rare occasions, though, they do lapse into some typical Indian gyrations.
Ernie Pyle, in one of his last dispatches from Okinawa, described how the First
Division’s Navajos had put on a ceremonial dance before leaving for Okinawa. In
the ceremony, they asked the gods to sap the strength of the Japanese in the
assault.
According to the later report, when the First Division met the strong opposition
in the south of Okinawa, one marine turned to a Navajo code talker and said,
“O.K., Yazzey, what about your little ceremony? What do you call this?”
“This is different,” answered the Navajo with a smile. “We prayed only for an
easy landing.”
Preston Toledo and cousin Frank, Marine Artillery Regiment, Pacific
Notes About Book:
Source: Indians In The War, By Ulian H. Steward, United States Department of the
Interior, Office of Indian Affairs, Chicago, Illinois, November 1945
Notes about Online Publication: This manuscript has been ocr'd and heavily
edited. Many of the Native American words have been reproduced as clearly as
online publication will allow us, but not all are exactly the way they were in
the original work. The structure of this manuscript has been changed to allow
better online presentation.
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