Thomas F. (hardtack) - , reviewed on 11/1/2023 + 2701 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

Chester Nez was a Marine code talker during World War II. As a former Marine myself, I laud his service as a Marine, his courage and his sense of duty to a country which didn't always treat him fairly. I was especially impressed by his acknowledgement that his forced instruction to learn English at a severe boarding school later allowed him and others to serve as code talkers. What they did during the war cannot be understated.

The U.S. wasn't the only country which tried its best to beat native inhabitants out of their culture. For example, Australia, my mother's country, did the same to its aborigines. Fortunately, both countries have admitted their mistakes and attempted to atone for them.

However, I do have a problem with some of Nez's memories. The author states in her introduction that when Nez's memories differed with official documentation, she went with his memories. I wondered about this at the time. Later, I came to believe she was trying to alert us to the fact this elderly man might have some problems with his memories.

For example, Nez relates how in November, 1942, when he, with the 2nd Marine Division, landed on Guadalcanal to relieve the 1st Marine Division, there was extensive fighting on the beachhead. He recalls Japanese bullets coming close and wading through American and Japanese bodies and parts of bodies in the surf. Never happened. Perhaps the elderly Nez was recalling another island assault. By November, 1942, the U.S. had control of the waters in and around Guadalcanal during the day. This is when the 2nd Marine Division and some U.S. Army units came ashore. There was no resistance to that landing as the Japanese Navy only ventured into those waters at night, and the Japanese army had been pushed well back from the Henderson airfield beachhead.

Nez also mentions throughout the book that he and other Navajo code talkers were not allowed to even tell their families of their role in the war until the 1960s. Yet on page 215 he 'remembers' that soon after World War II ended a Japanese newspaper revealed the role of the Navajo Marines.

I'm glad Nez and other surviving code talkers finally received awards and praise. Aside from some of his memory problems, this is a interesting book about some wonderful Marines. During the war, the Marine Corps realized these valuable men needed to spend all their time transmitting messages, so they were assigned Marine bodyguards. A Hollywood movie about these men leads viewers to believe the bodyguards were also suppose to kill any code talkers about to be captured by the Japanese. Nez states in the book the Corps never denied this. Frankly, I find it hard to believe that story, especially as a few code talkers were captured.

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