The members of the 332d Fighter Group and the 99th, 100th, 301st, and 302d Fighter Squadrons during World War II are remembered in part because they were the only African-American pilots who served in combat with the Army Air Forces during World War II. Because they trained at Tuskegee Army Air Field before and during the war, they are sometimes called the Tuskegee Airmen. In the more than sixty years since World War II, several stories have grown up about the Tuskegee Airmen, some of them true and some of them false. This paper focuses on nine myths about the Tuskegee Airmen that, in light of the historical documentation available at the Air Force Historical Research Agency, and sources at the Air University Library, are not accurate. That documentation includes monthly histories of the 99th Fighter Squadron, the 332d Fighter Group and the 477th Bombardment Group, the 332d Fighter Group’s daily narrative mission reports, orders issued by the Twelfth and Fifteenth Air Forces, Fifteenth Air Force mission folders, and missing air crew reports.
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