Semper Fidelis, Code Talkers

by chuckofish

While staying on the Navajo Rez in Monument Valley we were reminded several times of the Navajo code talkers of WWII fame. You will recall that this was the ingenious idea of using the Navajo language to write an unbreakable code–one of America’s all-time great secret weapons. After Pearl Harbor, and because the Japanese had broken all the codes previously sent over the radio waves, the Marines were desperate to find a secure way to communicate vital information with precious little time. After several successful tests, the Navajo language was approved as a communication code.  

But we wondered, who originally had this brilliant idea?

Well, I looked into this and it was Philip Johnston, the son of a Christian missionary, who had grown up on a Navajo reservation and had learned the language in his youth. In fact, Johnston became so fluent in the (very difficult) Navajo language that he was asked in 1901 at age 9 to serve as an interpreter for a Navajo delegation sent to Washington, D.C., to lobby for Indian rights. Philip was the Navajo/English translator between the local Navajo leaders and President Theodore Roosevelt.

Johnston said he came up with the idea of enlisting Navajos as signalmen early in 1942, when he read a newspaper story about the army’s use of several Native Americans during training maneuvers with an armored division in Louisiana. The article also stated that, during World War I, Native Americans had acted as signalmen for the Canadian army to send secure messages about shortages of supplies or ammunition.

Shortly thereafter, Johnston contacted the military with his idea: “My plan is not to use translations of an Indian language, but to build up a code of Indian words. Let’s imagine this code included terms such as ‘fast shooter’ to designate a machine gun, and ‘iron rain’ for a barrage. Navajo personnel would be thoroughly drilled to understand and use these substitutions.”

I mean, brilliant.

During the course of the war, about 400 Navajos participated in the code talker program. Their hard work was not recognized until after the declassification of the operation in 1968.

President Ronald Reagan gave the Code Talkers a Certificate of Recognition and declared August 14 “Navajo Code Talkers Day” in 1982. President George W. Bush presented the Congressional Gold Medal to the four surviving Code Talkers at a ceremony held in the Capitol Rotunda in Washington in July 2001.

To my knowledge Philip Johnston was never recognized with a medal or special ceremony for his great idea. But hats off to him.

If you would like to read more about this, check this and this out.