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American Morning

Marines Motion Picture Liaison Discusses World War II Navaho Code Talkers

Aired July 26, 2001 - 11:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: A new movie is coming out in the fall. It is called "Windtakers." Director John Woo and actor Nicolas Cage dramatize the real-life drama of the Navajo code talkers. The specially recruited Marines gave invaluable service to America's World War II effort.

In Washington, the 29 original code talkers are being honored with Congressional Gold Medals today, and our Eileen O'Connor is on Capitol Hill, with more on that.

Eileen, good morning, again.

EILEEN O'CONNOR, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Daryn.

The code talkers say that they created about 500 words that were used to relay orders on the front lines, where open communication lines meant that enemy ears -- the Japanese, in particular -- could listen in. The Japanese were never able to crack the code. And their service was actually critical, the Marine Corps, says in many of the battles that they fought in the Pacific theater.

As you said, 29 of the original will be given the Congressional Gold Medals, and the others -- about 350 -- will be given a Silver Medal at a later ceremony.

With me is Captain Matt Morgan. He is the United States Marine Corps motion picture liaison.

Hollywood has been long honoring these men for their bravery through film. So let's first take a look at that film that you mentioned, the John Woo film starring Nicolas Cage, called "Windtalkers."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Your mission is to keep your code talker alive. But should he fall into enemy hands, your mission is to protect the code at all costs. You understand me?

CAGE: Yes, sir, I do.

(END VIDEO CLIP) O'CONNOR: That order is echoed in the language of the resolution that Congress passed, and the resolution reads, "The code talkers were so successful that so some code talkers were guarded by fellow Marines whose role was to kill them in case of imminent capture by the enemy."

Captain Morgan, is that true?

CAPTAIN MATT MORGAN, U.S. MARINES: It's definitely a very intense concept, but the Marine Corps really doesn't have any documented evidence that any radio operator or cryptologist was ever assigned any type of personal protection.

O'CONNOR: So is that language actually going to be included in the ceremony today?

MORGAN: Is it's currently in the Congressional Record. I am not certain of the remarks for the resolution, but I think that that will be avoided purposefully, because the Marine Corps is pursuing a change to the Congressional Record on that particular subject.

O'CONNOR: But it's true that the Marine Corps had to send Marines with the code talkers when they were transferring from unit to unit, because there was some confusion about them, whether or not they might be the enemy. Tell us a little bit about that.

MORGAN: Absolutely. You have to remember the makeup at the Marine Corps in the early and mid-1940s. You have a lot of young white men in these types of units, and they had never been exposed to a Native American, and oftentimes, the code talkers were confused for Japanese. When we were moving between units, they had to assign them an escort, usually, just so the other Marines knew that this individual was a Navajo and an American and not simply a Japanese wearing a Marine uniform.

O'CONNOR: In fact, there were some incidents where they were captured by Marines?

MORGAN: Yes, absolutely. They were sometimes detained because of the confusion created.

O'CONNOR: Tell me about the critical nature of their role? How critical was it in Marine Corps history, and why was it Congress that really pushed this train on honoring them, and not the Marine Corps as much?

MORGAN: Well, in order for the Marine Corps to win all those battles that are such a proud part of our history, we had to be able to do three things effectively: shoot effectively, move tactically, and communicate. And at the time, before the war started, we could not communicate effectively because we had no good voice codes that didn't take a lot of time. Most of the codes that we were using at the time would take a great deal of time to encode and then later decipher.

So the Marine Corps was able to go to the Navajo nation and recruit Navajo who created a voice code. And once we used that code in combat and we were able to pass orders in real time, we could get those orders, and they were safeguarded from eavesdropping by the Japanese.

O'CONNOR: Why didn't you push earlier for this kind of medal?

MORGAN: We're really proud that the code talkers are being honored today, and anytime any Marine is honored, then every Marine is honored. And the code talkers are an integral part of a team. But what won those battles for us in the Pacific was the team that the Marine Corp had, and we are very proud that they were part of our team.

O'CONNOR: And the code talkers say that they, too, are very proud of being part of the team and of being honored here today.

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