"Red Tails"

One of the first African American pilots were nicknamed the Tuskegee Airmen, they made up the 332nd Fighter Group and the 477th Bombardment Group of the air force. The TA was founded in 1941 but Ceased operations in 1946. The TA was founded due to the racial segregation of the previous African Military Units. This was done in order to keep African American pilots would not work with other white aviators. The training for the African American pilots was hard since they had to find flight schools which would accept black applicants. Also, the War Department set up a system which would only accept applicants with higher education to ensure that only the most intelligent African Americans would have the chance to join. Due to strong racial tensions the army to build another airfield for the African American pilots which consisted of 47 officers and 2000 enlisted men. Een with the new airfield and trined men with the segregation of the time the army had to recruit technical vocations. One of them was the army recruiting African American flight surgeons which was a new thing since befor this unit there was never an African American flight Surgeon. The only units of the TA which saw combat was the 99th Pursuit Squadron and the 332nd Fighrer Group. Even though only two units saw combat the 99th unit earned three Distinguished Unit Citations which were operations over Sicily, Monastery Hill, and for defending/escorting bmbers. For the 332nd earned 96 Distinguished Flying Crosses and a Distinguished Unit Citation. Even though the Tuskegee Airmen were one of the best and most decorated pilots the airforce has ever seen they still had to combat racism even after the war. Even with their toils after the war the "red tails" on March 29, 2007, received the Congressional Gold Medal.