In it's continuing effort to rewrite history and remove anyone not white and male....
A two-man team of Navajo code talkers attached to a Marine regiment in the Pacific relay orders over the field radio using their native language. Photo: Corbis via Getty Images
Articles about the renowned Native American Code Talkers have disappeared from some military websites, with several broken URLs now labeled "DEI."
Why it matters: From 1942 to 1945, the Navajo Code Talkers were instrumental in every major Marine Corps operation in the Pacific Theater of World War II.
How it works: The Defense department's URLs were amended with the letters DEI, suggesting they were removed following President Trump's executive order ending federal diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
Exclusive: Navajo Code Talkers disappear from military websites after Trump DEI order
A two-man team of Navajo code talkers attached to a Marine regiment in the Pacific relay orders over the field radio using their native language. Photo: Corbis via Getty Images
Articles about the renowned Native American Code Talkers have disappeared from some military websites, with several broken URLs now labeled "DEI."
Why it matters: From 1942 to 1945, the Navajo Code Talkers were instrumental in every major Marine Corps operation in the Pacific Theater of World War II.
- They were critical to securing America's victory at Iwo Jima.
How it works: The Defense department's URLs were amended with the letters DEI, suggesting they were removed following President Trump's executive order ending federal diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
- The Internet Archive shows the deleted Army pages were live as recently as November, with many visible until February or March. None are shown with error messages until Trump took office.
- "In the rare cases that content is removed that is out of the clearly outlined scope of the directive, we instruct components accordingly."
- The statement did not address whether the Code Talkers are considered divisive DEI figures that "erode camaraderie and threaten mission execution."
- Choctaw soldiers flummoxed German troops during World War I's deadly Meuse-Argonne Offensive.
- At Utah Beach, Comanche troops created terms that didn't exist in the language: Bombers were "pregnant airplanes," tanks were "turtles" and Adolf Hitler was "Po'sa taiboo" — "Crazy White Man."
- Meskwaki Code Talkers were sent to North Africa after 16% of the tribe's Iowa population enlisted during World War II. As of Monday, the word "Meskwaki" no longer appeared on the DOD's website.
- At Iwo Jima, six Code Talkers sent more than 800 messages without any errors.
- Meanwhile, the Code Talkers' function was predicated on diversity in the military; languages with more widespread use couldn't have provided effective encryption.
- That proclamation has also been removed.
- Profiles of Iraq combat veterans from Arizona, Louisiana and Nevada; a paratrooper with the 173rd Sky Soldiers; and a Cherokee Brigadier General from Oklahoma.
- A chronicle of Native American women who served, including a medic who died while fighting Colorado's Storm Mountain Fire in 1994.
- A news alert that an Oglala Sioux South Dakota National Guardsman had obtained an exemption to wear his hair long in accordance with his religion.
- A few mentions also remained on the DOD site, on photo captions and speech transcripts.
- The Army's deleted pages were generally posted during the past two years; older references remained on the site.
- Civil War nurses.
- Prominent Black veterans and units, including the Harlem Hellfighters, the 761st Tank Battalion and 555th Parachute Infantry.
- A Latino airman who coordinated mental health support for military personnel. The deleted story is titled, "Embraced in America, airman pays it forward."
- The 54th Massachusetts Regiment, depicted in the film "Glory."
- The Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) of World War II.
- Utah Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson asked Trump last week to return Utahn Seraph Young — the first woman to vote in America — to Arlington National Cemetery's website after the removal of a list of notable women buried there.
- The Army restored a page Saturday about the celebrated Japanese-American 442nd Infantry Regiment after outcry over its disappearance.
- The implication that his was a "DEI medal" drew ire as details from Rogers' citation circulated online.
- He was wounded three times during a massive assault on a support base in Vietnam when he refused medical care and repeatedly ran into enemy fire to lead counterattacks.
- The page was restored within the past day.
