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American Morning

Honoring Navajo Code Talkers

Aired July 26, 2001 - 09:18   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: And now a story about secrets from WWII, a secret code first of all developed by Navajo code talkers. Not only was their secret code successful and so key in some certain WWII battles, the whole operation and the whole code was secret until 1968.

But now some of those Navajo code talkers are being honored in a special way today in Washington, D.C. and our Eileen O'Connor is here to tell us more about that -- Eileen, good morning.

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

Well, there are 29 in the original group and one of them said that they were literally put into a room and told by the military to come up with a code that couldn't be broken in the Navajo language, to be used to interpret field commands on the front lines and where open communications often mean that enemy ears could be listening.

The Japanese were never able to crack the code in the Navajo language on the front line. It was key in many critical battles.

Today, more than 50 years after the war has ended, they will be getting a Congressional gold medal awarded to them by President Bush.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHUCK MELSON, USMC CHIEF HISTORIAN: For the code talkers, the real pinnacle of their service, you know, the real proof of the program was how well they performed in combat. Iwo Jima was in February 1945. for the Marine Corps, it was the largest marine battle of the war and because of the nature of the fighting, communications was critical, and I think you'll have found the code talkers spread throughout the division, particularly in the forward units, the front line units and in the units that were charged with talking to aircraft and naval gunfire at sea. And they weren't in a position to be relieved. They couldn't rest. They couldn't take cover.

They allowed messages to be passed what's called in the clear without the Japanese having a real hope of decoding what they were saying. It wasn't until 1968 that it was declassified, that they were allowed to talk about it as something other than state secrets.

So I think that gave them an added burden that maybe their compatriots didn't carry with them. They really weren't given any special recognition and most of them, I don't think, wanted special recognition, other than that they had done their duty and that they had survived because there was a lot of people that they knew did not survive.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'CONNOR: Now, with me is Senator Jeff Bingaman and one of the original code talkers, Chester Nez. Thank you for joining us. We're honored to have both of you.

Senator Bingaman, you're a Democrat from New Mexico. This has been an important issue for you. How long did it take for you and why did you start this quest to get these men honored?

SEN. JEFF BINGAMAN (D), NEW MEXICO: Well, it just was obvious that this was a chapter of our military history that had not been given sufficient attention and that there were some real genuine heroes here that deserved recognition and accordingly we came up with the idea of doing a gold medal and then silver medals for those who came after, the code talkers who came after. And we're glad that Congress agreed to do this and that the president is going to give the awards.

O'CONNOR: And Mr. Nez, what, you're being honored as a hero. But out of the 29 there are only how many left?

CHESTER NEZ, ORIGINAL CODE TALKER: Five of us left. Four of us came and one was ill and he could not make it.

O'CONNOR: So is this a little bit bittersweet for you, this recognition?

NEZ: It is, I think, one of the greatest honors that was bestowed upon the code talkers. I'm really happy about it.

O'CONNOR: And Senator Bingaman, could you also tell me that, the resolution, we're looking at some of the wording of the resolution, as passed, says that the code talkers were so successful that some code talkers were guarded by their fellow marines, whose role was to kill them in the case of imminent capture by the enemy. Wow. That is an incredible statement. Where did you find that? Is that true?

BINGAMAN: That's information the marines gave to us. The, obviously the ability to transmit messages between units was absolutely vital and the welfare of an entire unit could depend upon the message not being intercepted and not being translated. So it was very important that the code be developed. It was also important that it not fall into enemy hands, and that's what the marines were trying to accomplish.

O'CONNOR: Because the marines have actually said that perhaps that wasn't really the case, that this wasn't an order that they really wanted carried out. Mr. Nez, did you realize when you were doing this how critical you were to the war effort in the Pacific?

NEZ: Yes. When they first told us, when we went into the Marine Corps, we didn't know what we was going to do. But after we got out of boot camp and went to a place called Camp Elliott, which is now Camp Pendleton, and that is the first time that we had found out that we was going to use our own language to translate in the combat area, to make up a code. And all of the 29 marines that I went in, we got together and made a code in our own language.

O'CONNOR: And how many words were in that code?

NEZ: There were, I think, over 400 or 500 words that we made up at that time.

O'CONNOR: And you had to memorize all of those under incredible stress?

NEZ: We minimized them and everything was up here, packed. And it was secured that way. And nobody knew. The Japanese pulled all of their hair out trying to decipher the code. They never did. It's one of the hardest languages to learn in all language, as a Navajo. That's why we was never decoded or deciphered.

O'CONNOR: Well, thank you very much for your service. We are really honored to have both of you here today.

And we are going to be giving you some more information about the code itself with another code talker in the next hour. We're also going to be giving you live coverage of that Congressional gold medal ceremony. President Bush will be here at 1:00 Eastern Time -- back to you, Daryn, in Atlanta.

KAGAN: Eileen, thank you very much, and congratulations to you, Mr. Nez, and the other code talkers being honored today.

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