This is the incredible story of the Navajo Code Talkers of World War II! We'll talk a little about the history of the Navajo and how the United States really wanted them to forget their heritage, and especially their language. Navajo children were sent to boarding schools and forced to learn English, so much so that they were punished if they spoke any of their native language at school. Of course, they still spoke Navajo (an extremely complex language that you have to learn from birth or you have no chance) at home. Forward to WWII, the US needed a truly unbreakable code for its invasion of Japan. 29 Navajo men were recruited into the Marines to create the Navajo Code. They used their words (like potato for grenade), plus a Navajo word for every letter of the English alphabet—creating a 400+ word code that truly was never once cracked! Learn more with us!
This is the incredible story of the Navajo Code Talkers of World War II! We'll talk a little about the history of the Navajo and how the United States really wanted them to forget their heritage, and especially their language. Navajo children were sent to boarding schools and forced to learn English, so much so that they were punished if they spoke any of their native language at school. Of course, they still spoke Navajo (an extremely complex language that you have to learn from birth or you have no chance) at home.
Forward to WWII, the US needed a truly unbreakable code for its invasion of Japan. 29 Navajo men were recruited into the Marines to create the Navajo Code. They used their words (like potato for grenade), plus a Navajo word for every letter of the English alphabet—creating a 400+ word code that truly was never once cracked!
Learn more with us!
Sources:
Code Talker: A Novel About the Navajo Marines of World War Two - Joseph Bruchac - https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/code-talker-a-novel-about-the-navajo-marines-of-world-war-two_joseph-bruchac/246548/item/3819967/?
Code Talker: The First and Only Memoir By One of the Original Navajo Code Talkers of WWII - Chester Nez with Judith Schiess Avila - https://www.amazon.com/Code-Talker-Memoir-Original-Talkers/dp/0425247856/
Who Were the Navajo Code Talkers? - James Buckley, Jr, - https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/537742/who-were-the-navajo-code-talkers-by-james-buckley-jr-illustrated-by-gregory-copeland/
Hi Friends! Our transcripts aren't perfect, but I wanted to make sure you had something - if you'd like an edited transcript, I'd be happy to prioritize one for you - please email doomedtofailpod@gmail.com - Thanks! - Taylor
Taylor: My chat GPT talks to me. My husband and I were talking yesterday
>> Taylor: In the matter of the people of the State of California vs. Orenthal James Simpson, case number BA097. And so, my fellow Americans, ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for you.
>> Farz: We are live. Taylor, how are you?
>> Taylor: Good. How are you?
>> Farz: Good. I'm very upbeat and positive.
>> Taylor: I love it. My husband and I were talking yesterday because his chat GPT. They're very professional, and mine were, like, friends. Like, does yours use emojis? And talks to you? Yeah, like, his doesn't. His is, like, a thing. So I asked it a question about a sink, and we, like, had a whole conversation about it, and then at the end, it said, enjoy your new sync era. And Juan was like, I can't believe it talks to you like that. Yeah.
>> Farz: Yeah. Well, I also, like, just talk to it every now. And I sound like a crazy person now, but every now and then when I'm bored, I'll, like, literally just talk to it. I'll be like, tell me. Tell me a funny joke. It's like, what about this? And, like, tell me joke, you know?
>> Taylor: Yeah. No, I think. I think most people. I think a lot of people do.
>> Farz: I was. I thought most people probably just use it like a secondary version of Google where they just type their question and then that's it. But, like, I'm, like, sharing screenshots with it, like, hey, what do you think of this?
>> Taylor: And, yeah, my. My nail lady uses as a therapist, if you told me that.
>> Farz: Seriously? Yeah.
>> Taylor: Well, so, yeah, I mean, you can be like, I pretend that you're a behavioral therapist. I'll probably be like, well, not officially, but I help you.
>> Farz: Interesting.
We'll talk about how AI destroyed humanity in a future episode
All right, well, lessons learned.
>> Taylor: Anyway, we'll talk about how AI destroyed humanity in a future episode that we.
>> Farz: Will record from our more enriched humanity. Taylor. That's okay.
>> Taylor: Or that. And. Or. And. Or. Because we are doomed to fail. We talk about history's most notorious disasters and epic failures twice a week.
Taylor: We should just watch Terminator 2 and talk about it
And I'm Taylor, joined by fars, and today is my turn.
>> Farz: And you're gonna cover Skynet.
>> Taylor: I should. God, I should just. We should just have an episode where we just watch Terminator 2 and talk about it.
>> Farz: Why don't. Why don't we.
>> Taylor: I don't know. Nothing's stopping us. We can do whatever we want.
>> Farz: Yeah, it's like Doug does movies. Like.
Everything I read says Navajo. I've always said Navajo. So I read three books this week
>> Taylor: So I read three books this week. They're short. One was literally a children's book, but, like, a children's chapter book. But I am not going to make you guess. I am going to tell you the story of the Navajo code talkers in World War II.
>> Farz: This is. This is also a Nick Cage movie, isn't it?
>> Taylor: It is. I did not watch that movie, though I should have. It's called Windtalkers. I'll get around to it. But I read Code Talker, a novel about the Navajo marines of World War II by Joseph Brukok. I read Code Talker, the first and only memoir by one of the original Navajo code talkers of World War II, Chester Nez, with Julia Scheiss Avila. They were together. And then I read kids book who Were the Navajo Code Talkers by James Buckley Jr. Everything I read says Navajo. It is hard for me to not say Navajo because that's what I always said. But I'm going to try to say Navajo, not that that is even the right word, if that makes sense.
>> Farz: I've always said Navajo.
>> Taylor: Now I can't remember which one am I supposed to say?
>> Farz: No, you say Navajo. But I think the way you're supposed to say it is Navajo.
>> Taylor: Okay, now I'm gonna. I'm gonna say Navajo. I'm gonna try.
>> Farz: Okay.
>> Taylor: Okay. That's what I mean to say. I'm sorry if I. If I mess up.
>> Farz: I. I think it's fine. I think it's like Nevada versus Nevada. Like, I don't think it matters.
>> Taylor: Yeah. Because I do say Nevada and I'm from Nevada, so I think that's part of it too, right?
>> Farz: That is definitely a part of it.
The Navajo contributed to World War II via the code Talkers
>> Taylor: Okay, so now I can't remember I'm supposed to say, but the Navajo. Right. Okay, they are. I'm gonna talk about who they are, their history. Their history is part of the United States and their contribution. Contribution to World War II via the code Talkers. Do you know a lot about them?
>> Farz: I know nothing about them, actually. I don't even know. Like, the words actually don't even blend in any. Like, I would assume that they're breaking Native American code language in Germany, but I don't know why they would. So I know nothing.
>> Taylor: Okay, cool. I've also been watching a lot of the X Files. This is unrelated, but in the X Files, every episode they say something and then they describe it. So. So it was kind of just like this, where I'd go fars, what do you know about the Navajo code talkers? And you would say, you mean the elite group of people, da, da, da, da. And you would like, answer it. Like anyone has a conversation like that. But that's what they always do in the X Files. And I Was like, it'd be funny if you knew it and you said the answer like that.
>> Farz: Yeah, well, unfortunately not.
>> Taylor: Anyway, so the Navajo people actually call themselves the Dine people. They. It just means the people. So in their language, they are the Dene. The Spanish name them Navajo. There's a couple places that it comes from. There was, like, an area they called the Apache de Navajo. And the Navajo comes from the Tiwa language. That means a large area of cultivated lands. So it just kind of, like, came together, and now we say Navajo. Most likely, they came to the Southwest via, like, Alaska and Canada about a thousand years ago, possibly because there was, like, a volcano that made it really dark up there and they came down, which we've heard of.
>> Farz: Southwest being what, like California? Arizona?
>> Taylor: Yes, Arizona. Not California, but they're like Arizona, New Mexico, like that area.
>> Farz: Texas. Were they Texas?
>> Taylor: No.
>> Farz: Okay.
>> Taylor: More like in that, like, between, like, Arizona, New Mexico. Utah is where they are right now.
>> Farz: Okay, okay.
>> Taylor: Yeah. Largely, they hunted and gathered. They started to raise sheep and such when the Spanish came over and like, introduced those animals to them. And then they did a lot of, like, sheep herding and would have, like, little towns where they would be able to trade and things like that. So of the many issues that happened when the Europeans came to the Americas is they would, like, make deals with different tribes and different people and assume that they spoke for everyone, you know, so they would make a deal with, like, one Navajo chief, but he was, like, the mayor of his town. He wasn't, like, the chief of all of them. And, like, that was not communicated, and, like, no one really understood that. So they would, like, go into people's homes and be like, well, this guy said we could do this. And they'd be like, we don't listen to that guy. You know, so there's a lot of, like, you know, miscommunication and exploitation of the Native American peoples in general. We know. So in the 1860s, Kit Carson. Have you heard of him?
>> Farz: No.
>> Taylor: He's. They named Carson City, Nevada, after him. And after this, I feel like maybe we should try to petition to not have that be named Carson City because he was ordered to destroy just a ton of native land and a ton of native people. And him and his troops, as they were moving west, were doing just that. They. In 1864, the Navajo had their own version of the Trail of Tears. We talked about the Trail of Tears before. So the Cherokee had to move out of the Northeast. This was moving all of the Navajo people to, like, one area, like, in kind of in New Mexico? Nine. It's called the Long Walk. Nine thousand people had to walk 300 miles in, like, the New Mexico weather. So sometimes it was cold, sometimes it was hot, and a lot of people died on the way. There's stories of, like, women giving birth on the trail and then just being, like, shot because they were, like, slowing everybody down.
>> Farz: How long did that take?
>> Taylor: Probably a long time. It's called the long walk. I don't know exactly how long got it.
>> Farz: More than a jaunt.
>> Taylor: A while. Yeah. Yeah. That's where they started to build their reservation where they were trade. But it was. Still wasn't nice. They were like, trapped. They were trapped there. They were like. They moved them all to one spot. They wouldn't let them leave. They were afraid of any retribution. They didn't have a lot of food. The Navajo, like, in their history, they call it the. They call it the fearing time, basically, a time where everybody was scared. It was awful. So in 1868, they were able to gain control of their own area. And the Navajo Nation still exists today.
As of 2020, there are almost 400,000 registered Navajos
It's in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. As of 2020, there are almost 400,000 registered Navajos in the United States. And about half of them live in the Navajo Nation. So it is like an area that is, like, pulled out of those of those states that is actually, land wise, bigger than 10 other United States states. But it's not a state. It's like a Navajo Nation.
>> Farz: Yeah. It's a sovereign.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: Territory. I think I've been through there as I drove, probably Louisiana and Dallas. I think I've driven through there. Because this all sounds very familiar.
>> Taylor: I think it's in the. I think it's. That's exactly the path that you would take is to go through it. I'd love to do a whole episode on that right now. It's super interesting. I'd love to go. But in 1868, they're able to gain control of at least that area, but they're sort of confined there. So once they're there. Also, the US Government is still obviously super involved, and they send all of the children to boarding schools. They, like, force them to send their children to these boarding schools. Basically, they're going to boarding school to erase all of their Navajo traditions. Like, they get there and they're wearing, like, their beautiful clothes and they have their long hair, and they're like, all different, and they're talking in Navajo and they're excited to be around other kids and all these things. And then they, like, immediately they cut their hair, which is, like, they don't. You. They don't do that in their tradition. And if you cut your hair, you have to burn the hair that came off because it's, like, sacred and a part of you. But they just, like, cut all their hair, like, throw it in a pile. So like, really upsets the kids, obviously. And they make them all wear uniforms, so they kind of make all the same. And they say, you cannot speak Navajo at all. Like, not even a little bit. You can't even say hi to each other in it. And they do it in, like, the way that a lot of these. These things have been done that you've heard where, like, they just, like, yell at you in English until you understand English, which is terrible.
>> Farz: Yeah, it's like the Catholic School of teaching.
>> Taylor: Oh, yeah. They're also Catholic. Exactly.
>> Farz: There you go.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So one of the schools is called Fort Defiance, which is a fort in, like, New Mexico, Arizona land. And some of the Nevho code talkers went to boarding school there specifically. So if they speak Navajo in boarding school, they get their mouths washed out with this, like, brown soap. And everybody talks about it because they remember it, like, how terrible it was. Like, literally getting your mouth. We talked about before getting your mouth washed out with soap. And their hair was cut and their names were changed. So obviously, we see this all the time with, like, people who come to another country where you don't speak their language, and they try to tell you their name, and they Americanize it or they Westernize it or they whatever. And they make the name sound more easy to understand. But they did things like, like, Chester, Nez, who's the guy whose book I read? Nez just means tall. And then they say, like, who's your dad? And he's like, oh, he's like the tall guy. That's how you, like, call him. Okay. Then your name is Nez, and they gave him the name Chester. So they gave them names like Washington. They gave them names like, you know, just, like. You know that kind of name. There's a ton of them named John. They just, like, gave them the name John and then ran out of John. They would, like, do other names as well.
>> Farz: Yeah. John Rambo was Navajo Nation.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So a lot of them are. A lot of them are also have the last name Begay. B, E, G, A, Y. Because Begay means son of. So they say, who are you? You say, I'm son of Da, Da, Da. And they're like, great, that's your last name. So of the 29 original code talkers, three of them are begay. It doesn't mean they're related. It just means that, like, they just wrote that down when they went to boarding school. What? Go ahead.
>> Farz: No, I was just gonna say acknowledge. Right.
>> Taylor: So another thing also, the Navajo is a matriarchal society. So when you get married, you move in with your wife and her family. And if you. If your wife dies, you stay. So, like, the. You. You want to have daughters, it's like the opposite. So also, when they're asking these kids whether your dad's name, they were confused because they would never say their dad's name. They would say their mom's name. You know, so another thing, as well. And they were also, like, wanted to get. They want to talk to each other because they're from all different places, and, like, they're cousins and they're exc. That they would just get in so much trouble if they.
Taylor: Navajo is impossible to learn unless it's your first language
If they spoke in any Navajo at all. They also had to be Catholic. Like I said, the kind of. Just added Catholicism on to, like, their older religions. And they also just, like, didn't get a lot of food, you know, like, they treated them pretty. Pretty terribly. Yeah.
>> Farz: It sounds like a concentration camp.
>> Taylor: Yeah. For these poor children. And the whole time they're telling them, like, you'll never be as great as a white guy. You know, like, but try your best.
>> Farz: I think they also did that at the concentration camps.
>> Taylor: Yeah. Most. Yes. Yes. So these kids are being told again and again and again and again. You cannot speak Navajo. It is. It is bad. You have to just forget it. You have to, like, learn English. And they do learn English, but a little bit about Navajo, the language. It is almost. Not even. Almost. It is impossible to learn unless it is your first language. You. It. There's no. It's not written. There's no grammar books. Like, there might be some things now that could help you, like, sound it out in English or, like, with English letters, but it isn't. It was never written. It was just, like, a totally oral language. And unless you're born Navajo, you just can't learn it. There are white people who came to the Navajo nation when they were kids, when they were, like, 2 years old, 1 years old and learned enough to, like. They called it trade Navajo, where they could, like, talk to people at, like, the trading post, but they could not be code talkers. Some of them tried, but they didn't speak it well enough. Like, that's how hard it is. Like, if it's not your first language. You will never learn it.
>> Farz: Real quick, Taylor, should we, at this point, say what a code talker is? Because you're using the word code talker, and I don't totally know what that is.
>> Taylor: Oh, sure. Well, yeah, they're going to develop a code using Navajo and use it in World War II.
>> Farz: Got it. Because it's a language that is almost a dead language. And if it's not a dead language, it's definitely one that nobody outside of the Americas can speak.
>> Taylor: Exactly.
>> Farz: Okay, thank you.
>> Taylor: Exactly. So, yes. So, yeah, it's impossible to learn. It's a tonal language, so you have to be, like, very precise with the words that you say. And there are things that are like. The example they use in Chester Nez's book is there's a different verb for picking something up depending on the texture of the thing you're picking up. So if I'm like, I'm picking up this feather and I'm picking up this cactus, the word pickup is different, you know, so just like, little things like that that, like, you wouldn't know unless you were born and that's the first thing you spoke. That's, like, literally the only way to learn it. So, yes, to answer your question, in other wars In World War I, specifically, the United States used Cheyenne, Cherokee, Comanche, Ho Chunk, Osage and the Yaktung Sioux languages to. To talk in, like, a code they would use. They would just, like, have people talking in those languages over the airwaves, and eventually those would be broken because there would find someone who spoke Cherokee or they'd find someone who spoke Comanche and be able to, like, say what they were saying. So it sounded hard, but it really was, like, able to. You were able to figure it out. And for the most part, you know, a lot of. A lot of Native Americans fought in both World War I and World War II and every other war that we've had, so. Because, you know, they signed up to defend their homeland. And it was known that we did this during World War I. So in between World War I and 2, Japan sent a lot of people to the United States to learn those languages. So there were Japanese people who could speak Comanche, who could speak Cheyenne, who could speak those, like, languages, because they were expecting us to try to speak in those languages over the airwaves and get around them. Right.
>> Farz: It would suck to have done all that and learned all that. And they're like, they're doing it in Navajo now. It's like, s***.
>> Taylor: And they didn't use Navajo because it was so complicated. They were just like, no one's going to do this. Forget it. You know, so they didn't use it. Another thing that happened in between World War I and 2. So the Navajo came back from World War I or all of the. Everyone came back from World War I. And then we're in the Great Depression. And in the 1930s, the US government wanted to control trade and the land in the Navajo Nation. So they did a thing called the Livestock Reduction act, where they killed, like, half or more of all the livestock in the Navajo Nation. And a lot of people were just, like, thrust into poverty because they lost their livelihoods. Half of their income had come from that. Women lost livelihoods because they would use it for, like, crafting. Use, like, wool and such.
>> Farz: Why do they do that?
>> Taylor: Because they said that they wanted to control. Like, there's a couple things during the Great depression that I don't 100 understand, where they, like, burned crops to, like, try to control prices. And they were trying to. They said that the. The Navajo livestock was, like, ruining the land.
Navajo tribe drafted code to help communicate during World War II
But I don't know if that's true. Like, I'm not 100. It was, like, a means of control. But that was also just a terrible thing that people remember, Okay, I will someday try to figure out why they did that during the Depression. But now it's the 1940s, and we're headed into World War II. There are about 50, 000 registered registered Navajos. They are now the largest of the nations of the Native American nations in the United States. And it is. And we talked about, you know, technology rapidly increases during war. At the beginning of the war, you have wildly different technology than you have at the end of the war. And one of the things that they were going to need were wildly new codes and ways to dispel information. They did not use it in Germany. This is after Germany has surrendered and we're just in the Pacific going after Japan. So in 1941, the day after Pearl harbor, the Navajo Tribal Council passed a resolution declaring their loyalty to the United States. The resolution said, the Navajo Tribal council and the 50,000 Navajo Indians of the Navajo tribe hereby pledge our wholehearted support to the President of the United States and to our nation. In this crisis. We resolve that the Navajo Indians stand ready, as they did in 1918, to aid and defend our government and its institutions against all subversive and armed conflic and pledge our loyalty to the system which recognizes minority rights and religious freedom. So they jump in right away.
>> Farz: Nice.
>> Taylor: Before we Even declared war. They were like, we're in. We're gonna. We're gonna be there. So Navajo people start enlisting. There will be, in the end, about 400 code talkers and then a bunch of other Navajos that were actually just like other parts of the military. They never really would rise up to anything like Pasica colonel, but. But they were very, very active. So now I'll tell you what the code is. So the code is like a secret code developed in Navajo that was impossible to break. It wasn't just talking in Navajo. It was coded in Navajo and not written down. So you had to be able to understand it in a different way. Basically, what they did is transmitting codes, as we know, is time consuming. You have to send the code, they have to crack, break the code, figure out what you want to do, and then recode it and then send it back. So that takes a really long time to do. And there is a man named Philip Johnson. He's a World War I veteran, and he had the idea to use Navajo. So in this case, just like you said, only 30 people in at this time, outside of the Navajo Nation could speak it at all, like, even a little bit. So definitely none of them are Japanese. They did not take it at all. They tested a Navajo translation, just, like, saying words over the thing. And it took 20 seconds because they're just translating, so it just looks super easy. And they're like, okay, let's give it a shot. Major General Clayton B. Vogel wanted to enlist 30 Navajo to. To make the code, and he ended up with 29. So no one remembers where that 30th guy went. Maybe he quit. But they're called the original 29.
>> Farz: So real quick, okay? So they're not just speaking in Navajo.
>> Taylor: No.
>> Farz: They're speaking in a coded language. Yeah.
>> Taylor: I'm gonna tell you about him.
>> Farz: Okay. Okay.
>> Taylor: Yeah. So he put out a call. I need 30 young Navajo men. They need to be between the ages of 18 and 32. Of the 29, at least two of them lied about their age. They didn't really have birth certificates, so one of them was 15. One of them was 35. But they were, you know, mostly in that age group. They needed to speak fluent Navajo and English, like, perfectly. And they were told there's a secret mission that only Navajo can do. We you to do it. And so they signed up. They said, great, I'll do the secret miss Secret mission. And they did basic training at Camp Pend Camp, Camp Pendleton. And they were really good at it. It was normal for them in the Navajo Nation to walk, like, 20 miles a day to do stuff and carry stuff. So they're really good at, like, military marching and things like that. The one thing they were not good at was swimming, because they're not really swimming people because they live in the desert. So they had all had to learn how to swim as well, because they're going to be, like, deployed to Iwo Jima and, like, have to get off boats. So they go through basic training, and after that. Most people get to go home after basic training, but these guys didn't get to go home. They got. They just stayed. Camp Pendleton. They locked them in a room, kind of. They put them in a room and said, we need you to develop a code that only a third of you can understand and that you'd be able to teach other people knowing that, like, Navajo isn't written down it. All of the things. And so what they came up with. So here's what the actual code is. It is 400 words in the code, plus an Alphabet, plus some double letters. So words like the Navajo word for iron fish, that was a submarine. Right. The Navajo word for turtle, that meant tank. And that was, like, you would never be able to put that word, whatever it is for tank in. In her turtle in Navajo and get the word tank out of it, you know, like, it's not. There's. It doesn't come from a language that, like, also, they.
>> Farz: They probably didn't have those words either. So they probably.
They had to create new words to the code as they got new things
They had to create the code because.
>> Taylor: Yes, that's part of it, too, is they had to keep adding to it as they got new things. You know, like when these guys joined, they were given World War I guns with bayonets. And then, like, later, you know, they get better guns.
>> Farz: Right?
>> Taylor: Yeah. There's, like, new things that they've never heard of before. So they have to keep adding new words to the code. The other part of the code is spelling things out. So they had a Navajo word for every letter of the English Alphabet. So, for example, the Navajo word for ant meant A. So if you're spelling out a word, you would say like, ant instead of, like, for a to be able to spell that word. But that word, like, doesn't sound anything like a. They also did some double letters for common things.
>> Farz: So, like, it only worked because they were bilingual. It only worked because they could actually translate that into English from the Navajo way of saying that word.
>> Taylor: Yes.
>> Farz: So in Farsi, ant is mucha. So if someone were to say that, my mind clicks into okay, you're talking about ants. Okay, now I gotta take that word that it starts with an M in Farsi and translated to an A.
>> Taylor: Okay, exactly, exactly. So some of the letters, they had double ones. Like, E is the most common letter in the English language. And you could, like, potentially crack a code if someone's doing, like, double E's, like, looking for the different letters. So they would have some words that had. Some letters, had two words. So, like, an example that Chester Nez uses in his book is, like, they were like, hey, you want to get a beer? Like, they're just kind of joking around. But for beer in Navajo, you could say birdie, eagle, egg, rain. But, like, in. In Navajo. And then they would, like, in their heads, they, like, knew it, and they'd be like, beer, you know, interesting. Okay, so, like, that's how they were like. And then you're right that they, like, could translate it immediately in their heads so they didn't have to, like, write it down or think about it or whatever. They, like, knew immediately, like. Okay, when you say iron fish, you mean submarine? When you say. You're spelling out this word, it's like, it happened so fast because they. They practice and practice and drilled and drilled and talked in code to each other and, like. But they weren't allowed to tell you what they were doing. So other Marines would be like, what are you guys doing? They'd be like, oh, we're just speaking Navajo. But they were, like, perfecting the code.
>> Farz: So what is the situation in which you would do the spelling thing as.
>> Taylor: A word as opposed to the word, like, Guadalcanal?
>> Farz: Okay. Something comes up and you haven't drilled it, so you got to spell it.
>> Taylor: Okay, yeah, yeah. Like Iwo Jima. Like, you'd have to. Maybe they made a word for it eventually, but, like, they would spell that out or they, like, spell the names of people if they needed to. Things like that. And again, it's tonal, and nothing is. Nothing is written down. And so you can picture, like, today or even, like, I feel like from World War II movies when I picture someone, like, doing. Doing a code. A picture, like a guy in, like, a signal room getting Morse code, you know, and, like, writing it down. And also we talked about, like, Virginia hall would have her little radio, like, in an attic in France and, like, you know, Morse code over to. To England as well. But in this case, they would be, like, on the ground with the Marines. And I feel like we think about Normandy all the time, and I think of, like, storming A beach, you know? But they stormed the beaches constantly in, like, Japan and the islands. The islands around Japan. And, like, you would have to jump off your boat, hold your radio above your head, and, like, the water will be up to your chest, and you have to, like, run onto the beach, and there'd be, like, dead bodies floating by you of someone you were just talking to, you know, and you're, like, trying to. To get up there and all those things. So you have to, like, be able to do it under super intense pressure.
>> Farz: Not to go into old man corner here. But this is, like, a great example of why our generation is, like, so soft and weak. Like, we can order food delivery to our house. Like, yeah. Anyways.
>> Taylor: No, I thought about that a lot, too, because I was like, we. I was like, I know we give. We give him a lot. We give him a lot of s***. But, like, also, our grandpas were able to climb off boats with guns and, like, watch their buddies die. Like, that's not great.
The Navajo code was incredibly hard to crack. Wildly hard. You know, listening to like a little bit in my book
>> Farz: I biked. I biked 1.5 miles to and from my workout studio yesterday, and I had to take a nap for, like, three hours when I got home.
>> Taylor: Yeah. Wildly hard. So they took them to the Pacific because they needed to capture the islands of, like, Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, to be able to move up to Japan. This is, like, right before we drop our bombers when we're over there as well. So also, like, the Pacific islands, while beautiful, are, like, really humid. There's mosquitoes everywhere. One of the guys talks about how there's, like, giant crabs, like, the ones that eat Amelia Earhart, everywhere. They're like, this is. You're always wet, you know, like, everything. You never dry. It's just, like, a whole thing.
>> Farz: Yeah.
>> Taylor: So they're living through all of that, and they can't tell anybody what they're doing. So in Navajo, like, you never really, like, talk about yourself for, like, gloat, something really part of their culture. But they still. But they were allowed to do none of that. So they couldn't tell anyone about the code, anyone how what they were doing was really important. They were just like, we're regular Marines, which also is great. Thank you for your service. But also, like, they just weren't allowed to talk about the. The code. They two of the original 29 stayed back to continue to teach. So eventually they. They did teach about 400 different people Navajo, the code. But they brought them over to the islands, like, Guam, that area. The first time they tested the code over the actual airwaves. People freaked out on the US Side because they thought that the Japanese had it. Had it like gotten into their airwaves or things. And they had to be like, no, no, no, it's Navajo. And then they had, before they, they did anything, they had to say, like, Arizona from like now on. So they like knew that it was them. Like they're starting their own code, which I feel like people would crack that earlier, but whatever. And I was like, oh my God, they're such nerds that they don't know what Japanese sounds like and what Navajo sounds like. And then when I was listening to it, I was like, okay, I could see how you could think this might be Japanese. You know, listening to like a little bit in my book, I don't have any examples. I'm not even gonna try. But then I was like, oh, I'm listening to this book at 2.5 speed. If I slow it down, it sounds insane. But also if I slow down the English, that sounds insane because it's not my vibe. So the answer is, I get why they might have thought it was. It was Japanese. Yeah, but. And I was like, did they talk fast when they were doing their code? I feel like probably, but you have to be precise. But you also have to be fast.
>> Farz: And you're Talking about like 18 year old kids from Wisconsin. Like, yeah, they probably aren't going to decipher Japanese from Mandarin from anything.
>> Taylor: Yeah, so they like the. They also each of the code talkers because they were so important, because they needed to get messages from island to island. You know, it had to be unbreakable. It had to be able to do it. Things that are like, there is a sniper. Anything from there's a sniper on this tower. Because they were going to these places where the Japanese had like dug in miles and miles into the island and they had like literally were like dug into the ground, had foxholes, they were hiding in trees. Like, there's one time when there was an earthquake and there all of a sudden all these Japanese soldiers were falling out palm trees on the island. They didn't even know they were there, you know, so they're just sharing all this information with, with each other. And they also had bodyguards for a couple reasons. Like probably to make sure they didn't fall into enemy hands, you know, but also to keep them safe because they were super important and because every once in a while, another US soldier would think that they were Japanese and try to kill them.
>> Farz: Rough. Rough going.
>> Taylor: Yeah, so it was. That was rough. They were invaluable At Guadalcanal and Iwo Jima, they also. Oh, I said that. That they. The swimming part, they. In. Also, in Navajo, you don't spend time with a dead body. Like, that's not really part of their culture as well. So it was really hard for them. Obviously, it was hard for everybody. But, like, you know, literally, your buddies are dying, you know, and there's, like, dead bodies everywhere. And in, like, the Navajo tradition, if someone dies in your hogan, which is your. You never go. You never live there again. No one ever lives there again.
>> Farz: I kind of get that.
>> Taylor: I don't know where people die then. But also, you know, so that was like, a huge.
>> Farz: Does that mean you just take. When they're, like, on their last breath, you just take them out in the yard?
>> Taylor: Right. I thought about that yesterday, and I don't know the answer to that.
>> Farz: That's not good either.
>> Taylor: Yeah, so the first.
Navajo code talkers helped Marines take Iwo Jima during WWII
So at one point, the Japanese were like. They figured out somehow that it was Navajo, and they captured another Navajo soldier. And that guy, he survived the war, but he was like, crack this code. He was like, I can tell you the words they're saying, but I don't know what it means, you know, which.
>> Farz: Is why I. I thought it was. I thought they were literally gonna just be speaking in Navajo because the language was so rare. But the fact that they turned into a code as well is, like, very impressive.
>> Taylor: Yeah, exactly. They had, like, learned another language on top of their language.
>> Farz: Yeah, yeah.
>> Taylor: So they were invaluable in Iwo jima. The first two days of Iwo Jima, they transmitted 800 messages over two days with no mistakes. So just, like, back and forth war plans. Where are the guys? What are you seeing? What's going on? Where. Usually those things would take, like, an hour to do each message, and they could do it instantly because they were just talking to each other. You know, 13 of the code talkers were killed in action. Some of them were killed, you know, just by, like, enemy fire, because they're just, like, fighting from foxhole to foxhole. Major Howard Connor, Signal Officer of the 5th Marine Division at Iwo Jima, said if it were not for the Navajos, the Marines would never have taken Iwo Jima. We couldn't have done it without. Without them. You'll also remember Ira Hayes. He was not a Navajo. He was a Pima. But he's what, the Native American in that famous Iwo Jima picture of them with the flag.
>> Farz: Oh, nice.
>> Taylor: Which, by the way, was staged.
>> Farz: I heard that was staged. Yeah.
>> Taylor: Yeah, I guess, like, the guy wanted the original flag, so they wanted to do it again. And I think that man, Ira Hayes, has a pretty sad, sad life after this. But there were, you know, just to say there were plenty of other Native American people that were in the war as well. So they stayed all the way through the Pacific War until. Until the Japanese surrendered and it was over. A lot of it. The stuff that I was reading about, like, the end of the war that I think would be interesting to talk about later is, like, you know, how they, like, really believe the Emperor Hirohito was God. And, like, when he talked and when he actually, like, said that he was surrendering, people, they didn't believe it because they'd never heard him right. You know, like this wild stuff and how the Japanese are just, like, fighting till. Till the last man. But the war ends and they go home. Some of them stay in the military and have military careers, but a lot of people just go home and they cannot talk about their code. It's used a little bit in Korea and Vietnam, but they were also, like, pretty sure they were about to head into another hot war with Russia. So they were like, we have to keep this secret. So they went home, and their paper said this guy was a regular Marine, whatever. Nothing that, like, this person, like, was able to strategically create this code and do these things under this immense pressure and all these things. They couldn't tell anyone about it. And they didn't. They kept it a secret.
>> Farz: Yeah, it's like the CIA, where like, every spy that dies is just, like, a black star.
>> Taylor: Yeah, exactly.
>> Farz: We'll never know.
>> Taylor: Yeah, like, what they did. So it was kind of hard for them to get jobs. Also, they obviously encountered tons of racism when they got home. So they would, like, be on their way home in their military uniform and, like, try to go to a restaurant, and they'd get kicked out because it would be like, no Indians here. You know, like, that was still happening all over. And then a lot of them also, they couldn't get the GI Bill because to help them, like, build a home or go to college because it didn't count on the Navajo Nation. So they were like, oh, you can build a house, but you can't build it there. You know, stuff like that that, like, made it hard.
>> Farz: Wait, so they could build a house? They just couldn't do it because Navajo Nation is a sovereign entity. And, yeah, okay.
>> Taylor: Even though they fought for the United.
>> Farz: States, but it's a sovereign nation, but.
>> Taylor: They fought for the United States. You Know what I mean? Like they. And they weren't, they weren't in like the Nava, the Navajo military. They were in the United States Marines.
>> Farz: But wouldn't the sovereign nation have to grant exemptions to allow them to build a home there?
>> Taylor: No, no, no. They could like physically build a home. But the GI Bill is supposed to help them give them money to build a home.
>> Farz: But they were trying to build a home on the Navajo Nation land.
>> Taylor: Right. But they didn't get that money from the GI Bill. So they could do it. They just didn't get that like boost that you would get if you built anywhere else. Okay, that makes sense.
>> Farz: Yeah, but it's not, it's. The money was to build a home in America. Yeah, I guess, but it's as different legal entity.
>> Taylor: But they fought for America. I don't know. I feel like they should get it, but there's probably a case for them not getting it.
>> Farz: That's like me trying to get money to build a house in Costa Rica. It's like.
>> Taylor: No, no, no.
>> Farz: Like this is the GI Bill. Like it's.
>> Taylor: But after you've risked your life for the Costa Rican army and they gave everybody else money, I don't know, I made it harder for them.
>> Farz: Okay, stick with that.
>> Taylor: Sure.
In 1968, it finally became declassified. So they were able to talk about what they did
Also, a lot of them had ptsd, but they couldn't talk about it obviously, which is like probably everyone who came home from wherever, there's a lot of ptsd, they would do. A lot of them did ceremonies at home where they would have like, it's like a several day long ceremony where you try to like get the bad thoughts out of you and like people come to your house and you work in it together. So a lot of them just did that because they weren't able to like talk about what they had done, but they knew that they had like, you know, obviously they had like terrible dreams all the time because they were in war. Chester Nez, one of the guy whose book I read, he went to school, art school, got married and he had some personal troubles. Some of his kids passed away early. But anyway, he lived his, lived his life and a lot of them just kind of went off and live regular lives. In 1968, it finally became declassified. So they finally were like, we're not going to use a code anymore. So they were able to talk about what they did and their families were like shocked that they had done this. Like they didn't know that they had created this code and how important it had been. And Chester Nez's dad was still alive, which is nice. He got to know what, what happened. People like, knew that they had done stuff. They didn't know how exciting it was and how important it was. A lot of. They have a lot of stuff dedicated to the Navajo Code talkers now. In 1982, Reagan declared Aug. 14 as National Navajo Code Talker Day. There's a bunch of ceremonies and celebrations. There's a brown statue of them at the Navajo Nations Veterans Memorial in Window rock, Arizona. In 2001 the original 29 Navajo Code Talkers were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal and all of the rest of them. So the other 300 and such were rewarded. The received the silver medal. On July 26, 2001, George Bush gave the gold medals to four of the five remaining code talkers. So a lot of them had passed away, but there were five left. 4. The fifth one was too sick to make it, but. But they got that. So they go around, you know, I think they're all. They're all dead by now. But they went around talking about what they had done and how proud they were. Especially I think underneath the thing that was like the American government as much as possible to erase me speaking this language. And then it became very important. You know, it's like kind of their, their main thing Chester Nez talks about in, in the book Reading. He was one of the original 29. He talks about blessing himself. He brought corn pollen to the beaches and Guadalcanal to kind of bless himself. And they would pray to the Catholic God and old gods just to be able to like help protect their country, meaning the United States and like that land. And then also like their, their friends and family. And then I have a prayer that they would say a lot of them would repeat when they were in, in battle. This prayer is the. It's in English. And so just to know, it's probably more beautiful in Navajo, but it is called walk in beauty prayer. This is a short version, but it's still pretty long. But this is what a lot of them would say to each other as they were psych themselves up to do this in beauty. May I walk all day long. May I walk through the returning seasons. May I walk beautifully. Will I possess again beautifully Birds beautifully joyful birds on the trail marked with pollen. May I walk with grasshoppers about my feet. May I walk with dew about my feet. May I walk with beauty. May I walk with beauty before me. May I walk with beauty behind me. May I walk with beauty above me. May I walk with beauty below me. May I Walk with beauty all around me May I walk in old age Wandering on a trail of beauty Lively. May I walk in old age Wandering on a trail of beauty Living again may I walk My words will be beautiful. So they would say that to each other to get them through.
>> Farz: They should have augmented that to be something along the lines of in the swamps, covered in mosquitoes. Bandwalk.
>> Taylor: Exactly. It is a totally different alien environment. But, yeah, I feel like someday I'll watch Wind Talkers and a Cage movie.
>> Farz: We got. Come on, we gotta support our boy Nick.
>> Taylor: We do. So we can get out. He can buy some more castles and such. But. Yeah, isn't that cool? I don't know.
>> Farz: I never. I never knew that. So I only knew the. The Nick Cage movie. And I never watched that, so I never. Yeah, I never actually knew anything about this. We learned a lot in school about, like, the Native American cultures in Texas. I forgot who they are now. I mean, I don't ret information at all.
>> Taylor: But you always, like. I feel like every American kid did a report Florence. To do what? On the Shoshone. You know, we did.
>> Farz: We did dioramas. We did a lot of dioramas. I remember wigwams were a big part of my youth, and so.
>> Taylor: Exactly, exactly. I feel like the Navajo, I feel an affinity for, like, that was my, like, third grade project. Who.
>> Farz: Who were the ones in Texas?
>> Taylor: I don't know. It's probably a fair amount of them. I mean, obviously, Texas is huge.
Texas is unique in a lot of ways, despite the colonization aspect
Like, you could find out, like, what Native land is Austin on? So. Yeah, like, Austin is on. It says traditional. Various groups. There's like, the Ton. The Tankawa live in Central Texas, and the Comanche and Apache move through the area. That's what UT says.
>> Farz: Yeah. We got Comanche, Apache, Cato, Karen, Kawa, Tankawa, Wichita. Well, Wichita's the Native American world. That's a Kappa. There's a lot.
>> Taylor: Yeah, no, absolutely. Like, it's a lot. And I'm sure it also, like, you know, I think that the history is simplified, you know, like, because we put them into a bucket like all the Navajo, but they weren't all the exact same until we, like, push them all in the same direction, you know, because it was just like, small groups and they probably changed a bunch.
>> Farz: Yeah, eventually. H*** geneality is a component of all this stuff. Right. Well, called that. Called assimilation in modern terms, but. But sweet. No, that was very informative. Did not know that. And now I do.
>> Taylor: Yeah, now you do. Super, super cool. I feel like it's something that, like, My dad used to always talk about getting a second job as a Navajo co talker. So I feel like I've heard about it a lot because my dad always brings it up, like my whole life. And like, without knowing a lot of details, he just talked about it a lot. I don't know why.
>> Farz: Yeah, it's. It's interesting. Like, despite the colonization aspect of most things, I think Texas is unique in a lot of ways. And I think one of the ways is unique is that you don't go very far without being reminded of like, Native American culture.
>> Taylor: California, I think, is very similar as well.
>> Farz: Yeah, like, I'm thinking about like the. My. I'm looking at some of these paintings and these artworks about that captured Native American life. And I'm like, I've. I see these everywhere I go. Like bars, restaurants, hotels. It's, it's. It is ubiquitous here.
>> Taylor: Yeah.
>> Farz: Which is good.
>> Taylor: Yeah, it's good.
>> Farz: I did go to this one store, it's called Pinto Ranch Taylor, and they had. They sell a lot of like, higher end stuff that I can't afford. And one of the stuff they had was this like, beautiful, beautiful statue. It was very. It was kind of abstract, but. But it was mostly of like a Native American chief. And it was just like position in the middle of stores. Like, wow, that's a really, like, that's cool. Like, I mean, it looked very unique. It didn't look like a typical statue of a person. It was like he was. He was turning from feathers into a chieftain with like the headdress on and everything. It was really, really interesting. Then I looked down and it was for sale for $120,000. I was like, I gotta get the out of here.
>> Taylor: I also in. In the novel that I read, it was, they said, and I'm sure this is true, that, you know, they would call all of the Navajo chief, they would like, nickname that, like, hey, Chief. And like, one of the guys got sick of it. He goes, hey, Mr. President. And they were like, okay, we get it.
>> Farz: Is that why we say chief to people now?
>> Taylor: Yeah. I don't think it's like, not racist. I think it was like you would just say that to like the one native person you knew and you're like, troop interesting. Okay. But yeah, like this after doing that, which is funny. Yeah.
>> Farz: Sweet.
Taylor: Unification Church is famous for doing mass weddings
Anything else to read off where we sign off?
>> Taylor: Yes. Once again, thank you to Nadine and Juan for joining our Patreon. And then I also had another thing I wanted to add from last week. I forgot to tell you that. You know how I said that Grafton, New Hampshire, with the Libertarians was kind of like the Anabaptist going to Munster?
>> Farz: Yeah.
>> Taylor: I think that I forgot to tell you is that before the Libertarians went to Grafton, the Moonies went to Grafton. Do you know who the Moonies are?
>> Farz: No.
>> Taylor: So they're this, like, church. They call themselves a Unification Church, which is like, a part of Unit. It's like. It's a cult, essentially, but essentially it is a man named. A Korean man named Soon Moon. He's not alive anymore, but he would, like, obviously take everybody's money and, like, they would have to, like, give up all of their things and, like, you know, do everything for this man. And they are famous for doing these, like, mass weddings. If you ever look them up, it's like 200 people getting married at the same time. And they just, like. I watched a documentary about it a long time ago, but it was like someone was like, oh, yeah, I'm going to England to meet my husband. Like, they never met. They just, like, pair people up and have them get married in these mass. Mass weddings. So it was just, like, another reason that Grafton for somehow, like, attracts these people who want to, like, live on the fringes and do different things.
>> Farz: I remember this. I remember when I was a kid and the news covered these mass weddings. I never knew there was more of a story behind it. But as with everything, there is. While Moons was sentenced to federal prison in damage. Okay, this guy sounds like he was pretty bad.
>> Taylor: Yeah, I don't think. Yeah, all right. But that is it.
>> Farz: Sweet. All right, thank you. Write to us, tell us what you think@dubnafilpodgmail.com on all the socials at Dubnafl Pot, and we'll join you again in a week. Thank you, Taylor.
>> Taylor: Thank you.