In today’s military, men and women of all races work side by side in almost every conceivable mission. As the Defense Department observes African American History Month, one group of African Americans – the pilots, navigators, supply specialists and more who made up the Tuskegee Airmen – is noted for its contribution to the progress that led to desegregation.
The Air Force Association saluted the Tuskegee Airmen during the 2009 Annual Air & Space Conference and Technology Exposition. They produced a video that can be viewed here.
Anticipating that the United States could be drawn into World War II, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s administration started a pilot training program in 1938 that would train a reserve force of aviators, according to the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force’s website, http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil. Even after that, African Americans were barred from flight training until 1940. That year, the Selective Training and Service Act outlawed racial discrimination in the draft.
“Civil rights organizations and the black press exerted pressure that resulted in the formation of an all African-American pursuit squadron based in Tuskegee, Alabama, in 1941,” reads the National Park Service Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site’s website, http://www.nps.gov/tuai/historyculture/index.htm. “They became known as the Tuskegee Airmen.”
The Tuskegee Institute, originally known as The Tuskegee Normal School for Colored Teachers, was founded by Booker T. Washington in 1881. By 1940, the school had a respected aeronautical engineering program, including facilities, instructors and a climate that allowed for year-round flying, leading the Army Air Corps to choose it as a training center for African-American pilots, according to the National Park Service website. Nearly 1,000 pilots were trained there by the end of World War II.
The Air Corps announced the formation of its first African-American combat unit, the 99th Pursuit Squadron, in March 1941. The unit’s flyers trained at Tuskegee while its ground crews were trained at Chanute Army Air Field, Ill., according to the Air Force website. Both groups were kept segregated from their white counterparts.
At Tuskegee, the pilots took their initial flight training at the school’s Moton Field, which is now the home of the Tuskegee Airman National Historic Site. Following the initial phase, they transitioned to advanced training in military aircraft at Tuskegee Army Airfield, which was established July 23, 1941. Capt. Benjamin O. Davis – one of only two African-American line officers in the Army, was chosen to lead the squadron. Davis’ father was the only other African-American line officer at the time.
“Led by Davis, Tuskegee's first group of five men graduated as fighter pilots on March 7, 1942,” reads the Air Force website. “The 99th Pursuit Squadron added personnel and trained for a year before finally being sent to North Africa in the spring of 1943. They were attached to the 33rd Fighter Group at Fordjouna, Tunisia.”
The unit saw its first action June 2, 1943 over the Italian island of Pantellaria and scored its first victory against the German Luftwaffe July 2 of that year. As the unit’s combat tour continued, Davis returned to the U.S. to lead the 332nd Fighter Group, which absorbed his former command into a group of four African-American squadrons.
“They left their P-40s and P-39s in favor of the robust P-47 Thunderbolt, and later the sleek P-51 Mustang,” reads the Air Force website. “Davis, now a colonel, returned to lead the group. He was known as a strict disciplinarian and urged his men to prove themselves in combat as the best reply to racism.”
From June 1944 until the war’s end, the 332nd Fighter Group escorted 179 bomber escort missions. On one particular mission, they shot down 13 German fighters. On another, the group’s 39 planes were attacked by more than 100 German fighters. They shot down five German plane’s while losing only one of their own.
Later in the war, the 332nd Fighter Group, by then known as the “Red Tails” because of the color of their planes’ tail fins, faced some of the Luftwaffe’s jet fighters. On a B-17 escort mission to Berlin and back March 24, 1945, they were attacked by 25 German ME-262s, according to the Air Force website. They shot down three of the new jets and lost only one P-51, completing the 1,600-mile mission and earning the unit the Distinguished Unit Citation.
“When the war in Europe ended, the 332nd Fighter Group had shot down 112 enemy aircraft and destroyed another 150 on the ground,” the Air Force website reads. “Also, they knocked out more than 600 railroad cars, and sank one destroyer and 40 boats and barges. Their losses included approximately 150 killed in combat or in accidents. During the war, Tuskegee had trained 992 pilots and sent 450 overseas. By any measure, the Tuskegee experiment was a resounding success.”
More than 10,000 uniformed and civilian personnel supported those pilots, from bombardiers and navigators to cooks and supply specialists, according to the National Park Service website. The breadth of military specialties needed to support the Tuskegee Airmen helped set the stage for the military’s desegregation.
“Their participation helped paved the way for desegregation of the military that began with President Harry S. Truman's Executive Order 9981 in 1948,” the website reads. “The civilian world gradually began to integrate and African-American entered commercial aviation and the space program.”
Dr. Roscoe Brown Jr., who commanded the 100th Fighter Squadron and shot down one of the German jet fighters in March 1945, spoke at a Black History Month Opening Breakfast Feb. 1 at Joint Base Andrews, Md. He said he and his fellow pilots’ experiences throughout the Tuskegee Experiment showed that African-American could do anything.
"Everything we went through proves African-American can do anything anybody else on the planet can do," Brown said. "Black history month is about the excellence of African-American. As we know, African-American have contributed mightily to the history of this country."