start what - listening? watching? what? & where? how do I get there?

It's amazing how films are taken as documentaries. Even these have inaccurate library pictures. Such as Hellcats in a Midway documentaries. I suppose they are entertainment primarily. Such as Memphis Belle movie. Strangely there is a contemporary video of the last flight of the Memphis Belle relatively uneventful.

Of course institutional racism was rampant in United States in 1940s . There's much evidence of this in all of the services. Though I think you have got a good balance in your video.

I think you should be commended for tackling the subject. Not too many are willing to stare down the barrel of popular opinion.

I agree v much with your premise.the boastful nature of America is never a shock to me.sadly since they have lost every war after results are a better guilde than there boasts.

I think that's a very interesting perspective. Were they more diligent to the their duty for fear of harsher reprimands? It's more than possible. Thanks.

@@johnbrewer8954 you hit the nail directly on the head.

A lot of their success was due to their tactics not necessarily orders…truth be told the over all goal of US fighters WAS to shoot down as many German fighters as possible …the 8th airforce primary mission was to destroy the Luftwaffe and render it combat ineffective…it’s one of the reasons the European invasion didn’t happen sooner …until the Allies had complete air superiority the invasion would be on hold …even the bombing missions were targeting aircraft manufacturers and their part suppliers …truth is by the time the Red Tails were in the theatre the Luftwaffe was already lacking in skilled pilots …you can see equivalent numbers from soviet pilots around the same time…hell even in the pacific theater you saw similar performances from US and British pilots because the axis skilled pilots were all dead say but a select few

Or they were just damn smart and didn’t care about their personal accolades..nah..that makes no sense.

Did he know they were black?

I read an interview of Chuck Yeagar, in 'Scale Modeler', a model builder magazine. Everyone commented how shocking his behavior was. As if he was speaking to people not worthy of his time. Things he claimed were countered by eye witness. But what I really don't like about Yeagar was how he allowed /misinformed , the makers of 'The Right Stuff' movie to call him the "Ace of Aces". A title he was not even close to achieving. No simple excuse for that one, in my opinion.

Yep I in college I roomed with the son of a Tuskegee airman. Everything you said is spot on

Thanks for sharing your recollections of your father. Sounds like a very brave man, in all senses of the word!

The stats I read showed that, mission-for-mission, the Red Tails lost about *half* as many bombers as the other units that flew as escorts. I heard the Tuskegee Airmen actually took offense to the USAAFs story that they *never* lost a bomber to enemy fighters. They felt like the propaganda cheapened their real achievements.

Spoke with a Red Tails pilot at an air show and he affirmed your comments. When I related my father's story he didn't take umbrage, just the opposite. Fine fellow.

You just a negative bigot why not talking about your coward grandfather

Facts may not be the best place to do it, but overcompensation is an absolutely valid way to compensate for both past and current oppression, though doing so with money and land and perhaps oil deposits is a better way than with facts.

If you get to FL between Tampa & Orlando. Fantasy of Flight . They have a redtail plane restored to historic flying condition. Where the original Pilot was present for its first return to the air. (Sadly he could not fly it). They have a video of this, some of his story…. They did a very good job. Deserve the respect they should have gotten on day #1.

@@alan6832 keep holding that hand out

@@coachfezz1137 you too ahole!

@Renegade Urban Media Source I got to live with one of them. My father was a Red Tail.

Take your grievances to George Lucas. This film was HIS baby.

@@disruptor109 It was his baby in the beginning. By the time it was finished it was heavily compromised and he knew it, and tried to avoid being associated with it.

That's an interesting point, thanks George.

Once in awhile they would strap bazookas to them. But that's more of an exception proving the rule thing.

@@jtjames79 Or they would drop grenades, sometimes keeping them with the pins pulled in glass peanut butter jars, which would hold down the arming levers. When the jars broke or upon hitting the ground, when the grenades bounced out of the jars, the arming levers would fly off and "BOOM" would go the grenade--or so I was told. Very dangerous, but "What, haven't you ever seen a light bomber before??"

I heard of an artillery spotter mounting bazookas to a Piper Cub in WW2. In the Vietnam War, some of those spotter planes carried rockets to mark targets for the bombers. I don't know how common white phosphorus was for these rockets, but it seems like it should make a great visual marker in any lighting condition: You'd see smoke in daylight, or a white glow in low light. Woe to the guy who gave away his position firing on the wrong spotter, because there was more than one time a forward observer had WP rockets and decided "#*% you, now you die in a fire".

"they were discriminated against therefore they were better" LMFAO lolwut

By the end of the war they were credited with shooting down 3 German jets. They were getting that credit from white officers that looked at their mission reports with skepticism, because they were looking for excuses to *can* them. Where some other units exaggerated their kill counts (e.g. assuming a plane went down when it actually escaped and landed) the Red Tails could not.

No, they weren't "as good." In fact, they actually kinda' sucked.

Huh ? Wie kannst du so etwas sagen? Spinnst du ?

@@VagoniusThicket he didnt die when he was shot down, he lived for a good 70 years after.... I dont understand whats so crazy of me to say?

@@VagoniusThicket Say something like what? He just said he was surprised

Not every bomber formation was intercepted by fighters. some of the escort fighters were a lot higher and further out to intercept the enemy fighters before they got close to the bombers. so the fighters close to the bombers were not needed very often. So as the red tails were mixed in close to the bombers very few fighters go to the formation they were escorting. hence why they didnt lose very many. Problem with being in so close ur resirtited on firing at enemy planes as a very big chance u would hit 1 of ur own bombers and u cant manouver as well and lose the speed and height advantage. So what most lilkely happend was red tails were considered bad pilots so were told to stick to the bombers while the more experianced pilots flew further away to intercept enemy planes before they got close to the bombers. Same happened in the UK with Polish pilots who were in the RAF. they were held back a lot cause they were considerd bad pilots as they lost in Poland and lost again when they joined the French airforce. before leaving France to join the RAF after France fell. But once they were released for action they became the best 2 squadrons in the RAF and most of them became aces within a few sorties. Only reason why they failed in Poland and France was cause the planes they had were junk.

That's an interesting point indeed.

Facts.

Brave men without a doubt.

@@CalibanRising Heroes! By any definition.

This is why you go to historians for history not to Hollywood for history

Hollywood history is often a sore point over here in the UK. For example there's a film about a US submarine capturing a German U boat and it's enigma machine. If you believe the film it's the first enigma machine captured. Except the British had captured Enigma before the US even joined the war. All told the Brits captured 13, the Canadians 1 and the Americans finally captured 1 in May 1944.

@@alanclague2333 and don't forget it was too polish mathematicians who were smart enough to lay the foundations of breaking the code

If anyone believes they are better they have to DO better.

Equal performace is extremely unlikely, just as races are hardly ever perfect ties. the difference can be random chance, but they almost always exist.

There is much better pilots. Look up the black sheep. Every other pilot was a Ace.

@@Surefire346 Black sheep had far easier pickings.

@alan6832 Thats not true. The Germans at that time of the war lost all of there experienced pilots and aces. They had young guy with a much lower amount of training and no experience.

I have never met a RedTail pilot that I know of. But I did meet 2 D-Day survivors (Omaha Beach) and a Battle Of Britain pilot. I consider them also legends. God rest all these legends souls and may they RIP.

Thanks for watching Paul.

Too bad god didn't help stop the white hatred

Tuskegee airmen had to be better than the American counterpart at everything

And yet they still werent all that impressive. How sad.

While your point definitely holds water it has to be added that Galland had to fulfill his part with Me 109s, planes that would just run out off steam after flying a single tight turn. The one thing the 109 was good at was flying fast in a straight line, so it needed room to do its escort work kind of effectively.

Exactly. Smart pilots flew above and behind the bombers or a few miles in front of them. The experienced bomber pilots knew this.

You are correct. Galland himself said that the death of Luftwaffe effectiveness was when the P51's were allowed to roam ahead of the bombers. Plus the P51's great loiter time over German territory allowed the Mustang to effectively neutralize Luftwaffe effectiveness. Although the P47, with two wing tanks could get deep into German territory, the P47's loiter time was way too short to be as effective as the P51 on the Luftwaffe.. The P47's time to shine was post D-Day, when the P47's were based on French airfields, negating the range problem, allowing the P47's tremendous firepower and bomb-carrying ability to utterly demolish ground targets more effectively than any other fighter aircraft. The P47's ground destruct record in Europe from June 1944 to May 1945 remains untouched up to modern times and to say it was astounding is an understatement.

@@63DW89A I would recommend Greg’s Airplanes video on the topic. The fact was that the P47 had the range and capability to escort the bombers, but due to Air Force politics, specifically the reign of the Bomber Mafia, they were denied access to the drop tanks that they could have used. Also, by the time the P51D entered service, the air war over Europe, and the destruction of the Luftwaffe to the degree necessary to establish air superiority over the English Channel for Operation Overlord had largely been done, and by P47s. I can link the video if you are interested.

@@wilsonriley1856 I've already watched it. As much as I have liked Greg's technical stuff, in this case he has erred in judgement in falling under the erroneous conclusions of THE BOMBER MAFIA (2021) Malcomb Gladwell. Gladwell was not alive during WW2, and unfortunately like many modern "historians", Gladwell suffers from "presentism" where the modern historian is looking at the past using his modern perspective, and that presentism flaw causes major distortions, misunderstandings and errors by the modern historian attempting to walk in the shoes of the past. After seeing Greg's error in judgement touting THE BOMBER MAFIA, I now question many of Greg's other "facts", and will now be forced to carefully evaluate his other videos on WW2 aircraft, which up to "THE BOMBER MAFIA error" I had thought were very accurate. Let's look at historical facts. The P47 had been in Europe since late 1942, and up thru December 1943, had not made a dent in Luftwaffe air control over occupied Europe. The horrendous losses by 8th Air Force bomber up to December, 1943, not only caused 8th AF command to suspend daylight bombing, but clearly prove the P47 was not capable of "Air Superiority" over the Luftwaffe at all. The Luftwaffe controlled where the 8th AF went in occupied Europe, and the P47 could do very little about it, and that is why 8th AF daylight bombing was suspended after the horrific Schweinfurt losses of OCT, 1943. The P47, with drop tanks could fly to Berlin, but after the tanks are dropped, the fighter's internal fuel supply determines how much loiter time is available to inflict damage on the enemy. This was the P47's "Achilles Heel". P47 large fuel consumption, and rapid burn off of remaining internal fuel severely limited the P47's loiter time over Germany, not allowing the P47 much time to damage the Luftwaffe. The P47's time to shine would be after D-Day, when being flown from captured French airfields, negating the range problem, allowed the P47 to become the incredible ground destruction machine it really was. The P51 not only had a larger internal fuel supply, it was also much more aerodynamic and fuel efficient than the P47, which allowed the P51 incredible loiter time over Germany to damage the Luftwaffe. While your statement is correct, about the P51D arriving after Luftwaffe effectiveness was neutralized, you neglect to mention that it was the P51B and P51C that had accomplished the neutralization of Luftwaffe effectiveness in the relatively short time from FEB-1944 to MAY-1944. The P51D would not arrive in large numbers until roughly JUL/AUG-1944. The historical facts show that in the critically important months before D-Day, it was the P51B and P51C that effectively neutralized Luftwaffe effectiveness, allowing D-Day to occur in June 1944. General Eisenhower had informed new 8th AF commanding General Jimmy Doolittle in JAN,1944 that the Luftwaffe had to be neutralized before the D-Day landings could occur. Gen Doolittle then informed 8th AF Fighter Command that Fighter Command's primary mission was the destruction of the Luftwaffe, even above the mission of bomber protection. Fighter Command then began allowing P51B/C's to range far in front of the bombers, to hit Luftwaffe fighters early, ahead of bomber contact. Luftwaffe General Adolph Galland, always asserted (repeatedly) that when the 8th AF took the P51B/C's off close bomber protection, and allowed the P51B/C's to range far ahead to hit the Luftwaffe ahead of bomber contact, that that was the beginning of the death of the Luftwaffe. From roughly DEC-1942 to MAY-1945 (29 Months), P47's shot down 3570+ Luftwaffe aircraft in air-to-air combat. From JAN-1944 to May-1945 (17 Months) P51B/C/D/K's shot down 4950+ Luftwaffe aircraft in air-to-air combat. The P51 kill record over 17 months pretty well speaks for itself as to why the P51 took control of the skies from the Luftwaffe in the first half of 1944.

Great suggestion. It's actually already on my list after hearing about on the WW2 podcast. Just need to find a moment to read the book about them. Thanks!

The Aztec Eagles were underappreciated and are largely forgotten which is a travesty.

I had a book on the subject....The men who flew were typical fighter jocks, in a great fighter bomber....Very interesting.

Barrel roll “away” quickly? A barrel roll ends with the plane on the exact same line it started, heading in the exact same direction it started, without ever changing the heading it is travelling in. So if you “barrel roll away” from another plane you’ll just end up on the other side of it…. If you came down behind another plane and did a barrel roll to escape after shooting at them, you’d just end up in front of them. This makes zero sense. Sounds like a real group of amazing aviators who totally knew what they were doing and didn’t just end up barrel rolling into the enemies guns and making up stories about themselves. Because it sounds like they don’t even know what they’re claiming to have done. Press X to Doubt.

I once caught a fish that was this big. 🐮💩

black people dont have huge egos

@@NeuKrofta That's just not true.

Ah yes, I remember that being shown in the earlier movie.

Thanks Jim!

@@CalibanRising I figured the destroyer killer had to be in a P-39, with the cannon. My guess was pretty close as it was not in the Mustangs as in the movie, and not quite sunk, but no, not with cannon armed P-39 either, though I learned here they did fly them.

The other issue about "acedom" is that only a few bros, like 10% or less will EVER become aces. Even in a target rich environment like late war Germany or Japan. Air/Air is TEAMWORK-period.

Thanks for watching Matt

Almost every historical movie does this with the protagonists and the group they represent, often with white achievements elevated and minorities downplayed, whitewashed or the actual agency of minorities are replaced with a white savior. Overcorrections are the inevitable response to those who have seen that play out time after time--whether in movies, novels, textbooks, popular books on history, bad faith academic works or ancient aliens on the "history" channel--and assume its history repeating itself. And there are those who know it’s an overcorrection "based on a true story" but have seen so many other historical figures portrayed as more legendary than they were--often as a strategy motivated to a degree to perpetuate false group stereotypes--they feel it's justified (an unfortunate yet necessary proportional response to create some balance by fighting fire with fire). And there are those who are motived primarily to reduce false and negative stereotypes and/or provide role models to the young thus historical accuracy isn't a major concern because the public good they envision is far more important. Sometimes the benefits occur; sometimes they backfire; and will usually be a mix which will change over the decades (the 1995 movie being an illuminating example). Yet it's constantly happening in the other direction and there's been a 300 year very strategic avalanche of lies, distortions and misinformation falling over the world that we are nowhere near digging out. The public memory of history---fed though countless mediums today--will always be messy and manipulated by those with resources and an agenda (often those ironically claiming loudly to be the standard bearer of truth, or an antiracist, or will use the ruse of holding up their liberal political credentials as if that's proof that they aren't bigoted and unethical). Since historical sources are scattered and every minute documents are being analyzed for the first time that casts doubt or disproves a conventional historical belief there will always be myths that are spread unintentionally due to the evidence available. And since us humans only have 24 hrs in the day, have jobs, have lives to live, NFL games to watch and lack a photographic memory (i can't even remember all the Kardashian sisters) this phenomenon isn't ending any time soon. Damn, i didn't think i'd write that much. If you read this far, the point made by Matt Williams is true, insightful and thoughtful, yet it's only part of the truth. Excellent video.

Cheers for watching John.

Much appreciated!

I agree. I see what this is all about. Funny I don't see this type of scrutiny on anyone else's records or missions.

@@haroldborders3749 I, too, am watching this with a high degree of skepticism. Let's see a similar analysis on other units.

lotts have been...well known that fighters over stated kills in the pacific...im sure it was not all on purpose and both sides did it...the thing with the 99th is that its far more popular then most squadrons...pappy boyington was popular and he has been scrutinized ALOT lol

@@haroldborders3749 no....look at boyington..

Thanks for the correction. I guess I've just being using "blockbuster" as a synonym for "sensationalized Hollywood movie". I know better now.

Other b24 bombers said other wise.. your grandfather lived so they did something... did he say they lost any bombers cause they did nothing???????

No, that myth was USAAF propaganda. ...And it actually offended *some* of the Tuskegee Airmen. They felt that it cheapened their real accomplishments.

@@danielcamacho1913 as it should...

When it comes to war movies, I tend to leave the textbook at home and just enjoy it for what it is.

If you do find the details, feel free to pass them on.

@@CalibanRising something people don't often realize about armor is that smaller weapons Can penetrate if you keep hitting the same spot over and over again enough times. This is actually the same physics used by many armor piercing tank rounds (the discarding sabot darts). if you pour enough .50cal ammo through the same spot in very short order, and happen to get lucky enough to perhaps hit a particularly week spot such as a seam, and then also get lucky enough to actually hit something volatile behind that, you can potentially sink a ship. given the few cases of this, it is likely that few cases resulted in all such ideal conditions lining up. Yet, many submarines were sunk or damaged to the extent they couldn't dive by strafing. But all claims need to be verified of course.

@@SoloRenegade WWII Destroyers are notorious for having little or no armor at all; they were made of steel plates and aluminum, which can be penetrated by .50cal bullets. And yes, concentrating fire on on location can penetrate even some armor, but concentration was not wholly necessary when taking on a destroyer.

Yes I've read about that; the pilot came straight down, in a vertical or near-vertical dive, and fired his .50s down the stacks.

Given the Japanese torpedoes used liquid oxygen, they tended to cause significant fires when damaged, I imagine that the fighters hit a torpedo in the launchers and that started a major fire which would have cooked off other the torpedoes, or other ammunition.

That's an interesting second point.

I've been featured and quoted in two newspaper articles, and was featured in one segment of an on-the-street TV news interview. NOT ONE of them could resist a bit of editorializing plus a large dash of sensationalizing. It seems to be the nature of the beast. Historians have one hell of a difficult job to do because they often rely upon the usual secondary sources (reporting). Even primary sources have their own lean on and accents to events.

Another reason not to dispute it might be if the military threatened to disavow you and take away your VA benefits. ...As they did to some black soldiers and sailors who served early in the war, and came back warning other black men if they joined the military they'd be cooks and busboys, and any random white guy could treat them like 💩

Interesting. I'll have to try and find the story.

If they where using rockets it could have happened.

@@steveb6103 At the Battle Off Samar a Japanese destroyer exploded and sank because something touched off its torpedoes--the quickest way to destroy a warship is making its magazine go BOOM! Destroyers are called "tin cans" for a reason.

F6Fs had mounts to carry HVARS which, while designed as anti-tank rockets, could be effective against lightly armored ships.

Wikipedia has James Peck as an ace with details of his life as you report

I have Jr., and I didn't know Sr has one.

@@vernonrobinson1685 I may be mistaken and remember sections from the Homestead book for a biography. Have read a number of books on WWII history focused on African-American units and contributions. I read a number of them from military libraries over 50 years ago when I was a dependant with access so memory not perfect.

@johnlowell5905 Just checked, Sr does have a biography written by Marvin Fletcher

@@vernonrobinson1685 Good to know my memory was correct, I'm 70 so I have reason to wonder.

Truth be told.

They were very sluggish taking off or landing. Often other fighters would fly top cover at those times.

The channel "Greg's airplanes and automobiles" has videos that cover this topic in excruciating detail, if anyone wants the full explanation.

The Germans soon realised that allied fighters were hanging around waiting for jets to land and set up “ flak lanes” to protect them. Risky business.

Ernst Udet a German fighter ace from WW1 was shot down whilst landing in an ME262 in the final days of WW2 by a British Free French fighter ace Pierre Closterman who was flying a Hawker Tempest

Thanks for watching James, I totally agree with you!

Thanks for those insights. I had a feeling Momyer was of this mindset but had to leave it as an open question.

@@CalibanRising I had a book published and my wife was afraid that the negative comments in it towards Momyer, all made by other people, might get me into trouble. But by the time it came out all involved had passed on, including Momyer. It's always tricky.

It was such a cartoonish movie, with such silly characters, people who don't know history can see that movie and not only conclude that it's propaganda, but conclude the black fighter pilots themselves were fiction. Once I realized that, the movie was doing the real pilots even more disservice than I thought.

me2...i was hoping it would be more realistic...instead they just made a cartoon...

I did have a read about Peck but was led to believe he may not even have been in Spain at the time. I didn't have time to really dig into it so decided to leave it open ended for now.

@@CalibanRising Certainly it gets less plausible the later in the war it's alleged to have happened

My mother's first cousin was a B24 navigator in the 449th BG in Italy, 15th Air Force, 716th Bomb Squadron who was killed by flak on Aug 27th 1944. Yep, flak took a heavy toll on US bombers in WW2, a much heavier toll than most people who've never done the research understand, when they see the number of bombers lost to "enemy action" they immediately assume that means they were all shot down by fighter's, not hardly the case. The fact is the Germans not only had excellent AA guns but they used radar for targeting as well making them very effective, his plane was hit twice within 2 seconds at 23,000 ft traveling around 225 MPH or so, that pretty good shooting and that comes from someone who was an Air Defense gunner in the Army back in the 80's, the fact is for the 1940's that was about as good shooting as was possible back then. His crews mission list reads just like the one of your fathers, railroad marshaling yards, bridges, aerodromes, oil refinery (Ploiesti Romania 3 times) with missions from Italy up into southern Germany and Austria. Shot down on their 20th mission during a run on a railroad bridge in Ferrera Italy, 3 of the crew, the pilot and I think the two waist gunners, parachuted out and survived the shoot down but only the pilot survived the war, the other 2 died in German POW camps before the war was over. The pilot went on to have a remarkable life, after the war he went to college on the GI Bill and got a degree in aeronautical engineering and worked for NACA and eventually NASA and was not only a part of the Apollo program but before that flew as a test pilot with Neil Armstrong.

to busy trying to stay alive

You're welcome!

Yes, statistics show they provided the most effective bomber escort of the European theater. B-17s had more defensive guns than a B-25, and still needed fighter escorts. Mission-for-mission, compared to other escort units, the Red Tails lost a lot less bombers to enemy fighters.

Thanks for that added information!

Glad you enjoyed it

All war movies are mostly boasting, but the hatred by white America was REAL!

Thanks for the feedback

in what way?

It was entertaining film.

On the one hand, it included some nice attention to detail in certain areas. On the other hand, it was, at best, the video game version of WWII air combat (with the flight model set to “casual”), and had a needlessly melodramatic, caricaturized story. Never mind the complete misrepresentation of fighter doctrine and tactics. I went into it hoping for a legit war movie about Colonel Ben Davis and his men. Instead, every character was fictional. Why do a movie like that if you’re not going to tell the story of the real men it’s supposedly about? And don’t get me started on the movie’s B-17s that explode if you so much as look at them…

@@cdfe3388 short answer? We're not making a documentary like it's, "Victory at Sea." That doesn't sell many tickets or popcorn. As for the characters? That may have largely to do with getting the rights and dealing with Estates.

Red tails are leagends