Wolf Guts was one of 11 Lakota, Nakota and Dakota code talkers from South Dakota. During the war, they transmitted messages from an Army general to his chief of staff in the field using their native language, which the Germans and the Japanese could not translate.
People came from around the country to pay their respects at his funeral. Gov. Mike Rounds asked that flags be flown at half staff in Wolf Guts' honor.
Clarence Wolf Guts learned the Lakota language as a child. He was in the 11th grade when Pearl Harbor was attacked. Some of his school friends had died in the attack. He joined the military to see what he could do for America and felt honored when approached to be a radio operator with some of his friends. Her and his buddies were highly guarded during the Pacific island hopping campaign. The Japanese never broke the Lakota code and Mr. Wolf Guts and all four of his friends made it back.
During World War II, the use of Code Talkers thwarted the efforts of the Axis Powers to intercept messages, as the syntax and tonal qualities of the native languages were so complex that no message transmitted by any code talker was ever decoded by the Axis Powers.
