Walter Indyke helped decode a message indicating Pearl Harbor was to be attacked.
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Walter A. IndykeArmy Lieutenant Colonel
Walter A. Indyke, 94, a retired Army lieutenant colonel who was on the operations team that intercepted and decoded the Japanese transmission indicating the attack on Pearl Harbor was imminent, died Aug. 13 of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease at HCR ManorCare in Potomac. He was a longtime McLean resident.
Col. Indyke was born in Jamesburg, N.J. He served in the District with the Army Signal Corps during World War II.
In addition to helping intercept and decode the Pearl Harbor transmission, he was on duty in 1942 when Gen. Jonathan Wainwright sent his message to President Franklin Roosevelt that he would surrender at Corregidor in the Philippines.
He also helped provide communications for the Atlantic Charter Conference, D-Day landings in Normandy and the Cairo, Yalta and Potsdam conferences.
Immediately after the war, he served with Gen. George C. Marshall's "mediation mission" in Shanghai and with the Army of Occupation in Germany. He also attended the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.
Col. Indyke received his bachelor's degree in communications from the University of Maryland in 1953. He retired from active duty in 1958. From 1959 to 1965, he worked for the Navy Department before being appointed a U.S. representative in communications to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, with postings in Paris and Brussels.
He then worked at Army Materiel Command in Alexandria, specializing in electronic countermeasures, until retiring a second time in 1975.
In retirement, Col. Indyke was a member of the Military Officers Association of America and the Polish-American Society.
Survivors include his wife of 67 years, Stella K. Indyke of McLean; three children, Donna C. Indyke of Brussels, Gregory G. Indyke of Bel Air, Md., and David K. Indyke of Waldorf; three sisters, Anne Robak of Lakewood, N.J., Helen Konopacki of South River, N.J., and Mary O'Brien of McLean; a brother, George Indyke of Milltown, N.J.; and three grandchildren.
-- Joe Holley
