Essay About Navajo Code Talkers And Use Of The Navajo Language

• A new set of Navajo Code Talkers are being drafted to become commanders of the 1st Division of Combat Support Group (CCSG). These new leaders were created after our men had committed suicide during the Mexican Revolutionary War. In their first deployment of the 1st Division to Iraq, the 1st CSG members have performed great work but have been mostly unqualified for the job. These new officers also have been trained in what it means to sacrifice to win.”

This is an introductory essay about the Navajo Code Talkers, because the Code Talkers came from the same family as the Native Americans. I am also from a small community so I took the idea of the tribe as a concept instead of a personal

“Natives”, the most feared and loved group of our time is at the heart of how we organize this brave group of heroes. As the Indian-American community today puts it, “We are all equal . . . All of us have a common heritage as well as a lot of responsibilities because we have different skills. Some are not just leaders, but also people with a common purpose and hope. They often carry out important missions in a very specific way. These include helping the local Native Americans defend a reservation from an invading force. They also carry out their missions through military force.”

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• A new set of Navajo Code Talkers are being drafted to become commanders of the 1st Division of Combat Support Group (CCSG). These new leaders were created after our men had committed suicide during the Mexican Revolutionary War. In their first deployment of the 1st Division to Iraq, the 1st CSG members have performed great work but have been mostly unqualified for the job. These new officers also have been trained in what it means to sacrifice to win.”

This is an introductory essay about the Navajo Code Talkers, because the Code Talkers came from the same family as the Native Americans. I am also from a small community so I took the idea of the tribe as a concept instead of a personal

Prior to the use of the Navajo language as code there had only been one other instance when a native language had been used as code. It was used once in the First World War but instead of it being the language of the Navajo Indians it was Choctaw. “Wartime communications using American Indian languages had been successful during the First World War, one of the most notable examples being the 141st Infantrys use of Choctaw Indians to transmit messages in Europe”( “Coded Contributions” History Today, Jul 91). Even prior to this there are oral traditions about a secret Navajo warrior language that was used in the seven and eighteenth centuries. His coded language was used so that enemies would not be able to hear and understand what was being said.

The United States was in desperate need of a new code in the Pacific Theatre because the other codes were being broken and or took to long to be deciphered and passed along. “Previous codes were so complex that military leaders complained they took hours to decipher. The Navajos could encode, transmit, and decode a three-line English message in 20 seconds” (“Navajo Code Talkers Honored with Medals; Language Stumped Japanese during WWII” The Washington Times, 7/27/01). The key to this code was that it was entirely oral, nothing was ever written down. Thus the entire code had to be memorized which would not prove to be too difficult since it was Native Navajos speaking their own language. Some translations were rather simple bombs for example reminded the code talkers of eggs so they used their word for eggs chosea-ye-shi. The native word for frog; chal was used as code for an amphibious assault. “A bomber plane now was jeeshoo (buzzard), a submarine beeshloo (iron fish), and a battleship was lootsoh (whale). Britain became Tota (between the waters), India Ee (white clothes), and Germany Beeshbich aahi (iron hat). Each letter of the alphabet underwent a similar transformation. In the code wolachii (ant) stood for a, shash (bear) for b and mosi (cat) for c” (Dinй). On a more comedic note “Descriptive Navajo names for enemies and enemy leaders were coined. Adolf Hitler was Daghailchiih (Moustache Smeller).” (“Coded Contributions” History Today, Jul 91)

It is ironic that the very language white Americans and settlers and missionaries have been urging and forcing the Navajos to stop using since their arrival would be need by the “whites” in order to be successful. Perhaps more ironic was that it was the son of a protestant missionary that came up with a proposal for the idea. This man was named Philip Johnston. He had grown up on a Navajo reservation in New Mexico. “His proposal reached the desk of Major General Clayton B. Vogel, Commanding General of the United States Marine Corps Amphibious Corps, Pacific Fleet, in February of 1942” (“Coded Contributions” History Today, Jul 91). From this proposal Johnston brought four Navajos to Vogels office and had them translate from their native tongue to English and than back again. Vogel was impressed and requested the permission to recruit 200 Navajos, he was granted 30.

The year in 1942 and recruiters have traveled to reservations in Arizona and New Mexico. “Principally from boarding schools at Fort Defiance, Arizona, and Fort Wingate and Shiprock, New Mexico” (“Coded Contributions” History Today, Jul 91).” It is important to remember that this was WWII and at time the credentials for being able to enlist were not strict at all. You were supposed to be eighteen years of age or have parent consent, but this was not a concrete rule. Thousands of soldiers were enlisted and fighting long before they were eighteen years of age.

“…but his parents would not consent because he was only sixteen. During lunch break at the Fort Defiance Indian Health Service Hospital where the physical examinations were being given, he wandered over to the recruiters table. On it were the files of all of the young volunteers. His was set to one side with a note that parents will not consent. He slipped his file back underneath the rest, minus note, and by the time his seventeenth birthday rolled around, he was in the Pacific” (“Coded Contributions” History Today, Jul 91).

However there were a few more criteria for these code talkers, not only did they need to fluent in Navajo and English, moreover they had to be in the shape to be relaying messages and maneuvering on the battlefield. Also “The equivalent of a tenth grade education was found necessary. White recruits, whose fathers owned reservation trading posts, often volunteered, but could not be accepted because they spoke what the Navajos called trading post language dealing with flour, shoes and sugar, not the complex every day conversations among fluent Navajo speakers” (“Coded Contributions” History Today, Jul 91). The limit of 30 recruits was met however one did drop out of the program and the remaining 29 made up the 382 platoon of the US Marine Corps.

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When the first soldier to move to Navajos is killed by a grenade-ridden enemy with no time to move (A.J. Dominguez/AP)

By the year 1941, approximately 13% of American troops were expected to be from Navajo Nation. Over the next decade, the rate of emigration from the native American tribe continued to decline, with rates averaging only 6.4% for those moving to Canada (R.H. Jackson), the smallest percentage since 1947. For this reason, few in favor of ending the migrations continued to remain in Navajos, and to this day many remain in the reserve group. During this period, the majority of US troops (about 50%) were in the reserve, although a small share went to those from the other tribes. Nearly all US troops in Europe and North and South America had migrated to the Canadian frontier in the 1930s, a time when most of the Europeans remained, including the Irish.

During World War II, the Canadian Forces were forced to take in a large amount of native American troops that left Canada in 1945 to join the US Military Academy in Hamilton, New York (R.H. Jackson). In 1950 a Canadian Air Force base in New Jersey reopened after 20 years (R.H. Jackson, Dec 29, 1951). As the number of Canadian soldiers deployed to the US declined and the number of Canadians who fought in the war increased, all of Canada remained in the reserve reserve. Today, the number of Canadian units in the Reserve Reserve is estimated to be 1,400.

The majority of active-duty service members are now from indigenous communities and tribes outside of the US, including all Native American troops stationed at US military bases (F.F., U.S. Army, (R.H. Jackson, Nov 24, 1951), H.N. Jackson, Jan 1, 1952).

The majority of American enlisted men are Native American, a significant source of manpower for the Indian and Alaska Native governments (L. W. Allen, Mar 31, 1951); it also facilitates the maintenance of the national armed forces; and the majority of active-duty men are enrolled in government-sponsored schools, universities, and post-secondary institutions.