EDITOR'S LETTER

Peter MacDonald Sr., John Kinsel Sr., Thomas H. Begay. They're all that's left. The only survivors of the 400 Navajo men who trained as Code Talkers during World War II. Like so many other heroes of that era, they embody "The Greatest Generation." As Tom Brokaw wrote: "They answered the call to save the world from the two most powerful and ruthless military machines ever assembled." In the decades since, there has been considerable debate among historians about the role that Hirohito played during Japan's militaristic period. However, in the wake of Pearl Harbor, our editor, Raymond Carlson, was clear in his thinking. In March 1942, on page 2 of this magazine, he wrote an open letter to the emperor. It runs for more than a thousand words, but it's summed up by these two sentences: "Mr. Hirohito, just tell your boys to have their fun while they can, because trouble is coming. Yes, sir, Mr. Hirohito, trouble is coming." The worst of that trouble would come from Oppenheimer's hidden bunker, but the Code Talkers left a mark of their own. Eighty years later, their secret language remains the only unbreakable code in the history of warfare, and it began on a hunch in Southern California. Like most Americans, Philip Johnston was worried about the news coming out of the Pacific. In particular, he was alarmed that the enemy was using radio operators who spoke like Iowa farmers to infiltrate the Allied forces' voice networks. Johnston, the son of a missionary, had lived on the Navajo Nation as a boy, and spoke the language. Understanding its complexities, he figured it would be indecipherable to the enemy, so he shared his thoughts with an officer at Camp Elliott near San Diego. Although skeptical at first, the Pentagon eventually agreed and launched the project. Cosey Stanley Brown, one of the original recruits, described how they did it. "We decided to make a new Navajo language where we substituted and changed words around. We came out with a mixed-up language that not even other Navajos could understand." At the end of the war, the project was classified "Top Secret," and for the next 23 years until the files were unsealed in 1968 the general public knew nothing about the Navajo Code Talkers. That is, unless they were readers of Arizona Highways. Turns out, we'd revealed the secret 25 years earlier. In our June 1943 issue, at the height of World War II, we pub-lished a piece titled The Navajo Indian at War. It was a summary of the Navajos' many contributions to the war effort. The story was written by a government official named James M. Stewart, who was the superintendent for the Navajo Indian Service in Window Rock. About halfway into the piece, he spotlights the Code Talkers: "The U.S. Marine Corps has organized a special Navajo signal unit for combat communication service. A platoon of thirty Navajos was recruited in the spring of 1942. Its members were trained in signal work using the Navajo language as a code. The thirty Navajo Marines performed their duties so successfully that the plan was expanded, a recruiting detail was sent back to the Navajo Reservation in the early autumn, and by early December, 67 new boys were enlisted. Two members of the original detachment went back as corporals to assist in explaining the work to eligible Indians. Corporals John A. Benally and Johnny Manuelito have made good in the Marine Corps ... they are neat, poised, keen-eyed and fit. In movement and in manner they give the impression that they understand their business the business of making trouble for the enemy." I stumbled upon that paragraph while doing research for a book I'll be writing about the history of this magazine. This is unbelievable, I thought. I read it. And then I read it again. I couldn't believe it. It was like finding a first printing of the Declaration of Independence behind a $4 painting at a Pennsylvania flea market. I was surprised, too, that I'd never heard about the leak. There are hundreds of anecdotes echoing through our hallways. But not that one. I have so many questions, with little hope of getting any answers there's no file in our vault labeled "The Breach of National Security, June 1943." I may never know how it came to be, or what the response might have been from the Pentagon, but I do know that two months after publishing that information, Mr. Carlson, a patriot to the core, stepped down as our editor and joined the Army. "Naturally, I am sorry to leave this most interesting work," he wrote in his farewell column, "but I am proud that maybe my nickel's worth can be of help to my country along the way to victory." "A hero," Bob Dylan said, "is someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom." Raymond Carlson was a hero. So were the 400 brave Marines whom we honor on August 14 National Navajo Code Talkers Day. On behalf of everyone at Arizona Highways, I salute the memory of those great men. And to Peter MacDonald Sr., John Kinsel Sr. and Thomas H. Begay, I say ahéhee'. Thank you. Your dedication and unswerving devotion to duty helped save the world. We are forever indebted.