Black History WWII Combat Record
708 Out of 1.2 million. That's the combat death figure the author lands on for Black service members in the U.S. Army during World War II, and the explanation offered is that they were held back from the front lines almost completely. The sorting mechanism, per the author, was the Army General Classification Test, which everyone took, and the claim is that the tests were racist, so labor units absorbed them instead of combat roles. From there the comparison turns pointed. Roughly 33,000 Japanese Americans served, and 800 of them died in combat. A country on the receiving end of two nuclear bombings produced men who died in greater numbers in uniform. The author asks where their Netflix series is, then adds that the Japanese are truly our greatest allies. Which brings up the uncomfortable question: did America hate Black people so much that it deliberately saved them from dying in war? That's the speculation offered before any record gets examined. Start with the 92nd Infantry Division. The only Black infantry division of the war, the Buffalo Soldiers. Italy, 1944, their first combat, and the author says the reputation was immediate: low morale, instant retreats, simulation, equipment lost, and no apparent concern about any of it. Eventually they were pulled and reorganized, with White and Japanese soldiers added in. Then the Black Panthers, an all-Black tank unit. From this unit came the name for both the Marvel character and the terrorist group that loved to talk about killing White police officers. One major battle only, the Battle of the Bulge. At Tully, eleven Shermans with Black crews went up against three German anti-tank guns and a single Panther Mark IV. Nine tanks lost to one Panther. German armor was considered superior, yes, but White crews were typically trading five or six Shermans for every four German tanks. Calculate it yourself. Finally the Tuskegee Airmen, the supposed elite of the war, the ones Red Tails says never lost an escorted bomber. The author's count: 27 bombers lost across the entire war. Flying one of America's best long-range escort fighters, the P-51 Mustang, they still lost three of their own aircraft for every two Germans downed. Every other purely White fighter group on the same P-51s averaged better than two Germans per one loss. Bomber losses under escort were low, that part holds up, but by then most of the German air force had already been knocked out of the fight. One more figure. Black male soldiers were about 10 percent of the army and 56 percent of those convicted of rape. Louis Till, father of Emmett Till, was one of them: he chose army service over prison for domestic violence, raped two women in Italy and killed one, and was executed after a court-martial conviction. The author closes with the truth matters, and that he loves the Japanese people and Black people.
