Dorrance, 1973, $?, ISBN 0-8059-4590-3, 170 pgs., softback

My copy is the 15th printing, and the book says they've sold 30,000 copies over the years. I bet the recent movie had a good effect on book sales.

Oddly enough, at one point in the book Paul refers to "Operation Touch" instead of "Torch" when noting the invasion of N. Africa. One wonders how that could escape through 15 printings.

In any case, this reads like a visit to a museum, as if you are reading the text of panels next to objects. There are a considerable number of first person accounts stitched together with a sparse narrative. Pages 153-167 contain Marine Corp documents. Newspaper articles, letters, and other transcribed documents are liberally used.

In all, 450 Navajo were trained as code talkers, and 420 graduated by WWII's end. They were indeed a "secret weapon" for the Marines--unbreakable and fast coding for battlefield communications. Their story is interesting.

Paul does an adequate job, but when you're the only book on a subject.... The good news is that it's short, first person accounts abound, and the translations for war words are interesting. A fortification ("An-na-sozi") is really "Cliff Dwelling." It sounds a little like Anasazi, the tribe who did dwell in adobe houses set in cliffs, so that makes sense. Artillery ("Be-al-doh-tso-lani") is "Many big guns." Dive bomber ("Gini") is "Chicken Hawk." And so on.

In many ways, this could be a better-written work. As it stands now, it's a nice amateur work carried along by a compelling story.