It's March the 24th, 1945,
and high over Germany, P-51D Mustangs
piloted by Tuskegee Airmen from the 332nd Fighter Group
escort heavy bombers that are en route to Berlin.
Nearly 1,000 miles from their base in Ramitelli, Italy,
it’s the longest mission of the war for the “Red Tails”,
aptly named for the distinct crimson paint
covering their elevators, rudders and rear fuselages.
These airmen have experienced racial discrimination
from ground crews, other pilots and senior Air Corps brass,
many of which considered them unworthy and unfit
to do the jobs they’d been assigned to do,
in aircraft they thought better utilized in the hands of white aviators.
But these young men are determined to do their duty
and to prove the doubters wrong…
spectacularly so.
Scanning the sky for unfriendly company,
23-year-old flight leader Captain Roscoe Brown
sees telltale contrail plumes above and to his left,
alerting him that enemy aircraft are approaching.
Instinctively he barks a command to the airmen around him:
“Drop your tanks and follow me!”
On cue, 2nd Lt. Charles Brantley and 1st Lt. Earl Lane
jettison the 110-gallon fuel tanks affixed to the hard points under their wings.
After jettisoning the tanks, the Mustangs are lighter and nimbler,
they’ll need these advantages
if there to have any chance of surviving the impending encounter
with the more than two dozen Messerschmitt ME 262s
streaming toward them at nearly 500 mph.
From JG 7 in Brandenberg,
the 262s are the German’s twin-engined jet-powered “Wonder Weapons”.
They’re faster, better armed and more advanced
than the American piston-engined fighters
and as far as their German pilots are concerned
they are the master race who will bring victory on this day.
Moments later in a chaotic mishmash of hissing jets and roaring Mustangs,
aviators maneuver for clean shots at their adversaries.
Early on the engagement it's a stalemate,
until 10-kill Luftwaffe ace Lieutenant Colonel Franz Kulp
singles Brown’s Mustang out the crowd and accelerates towards him.
When he sees Kulp Brown is just more than half a mile away,
and he knows that outrunning the 262 is impossible.
Instead, he quickly shoves the throttle forward
sending fuel into each of the Packard Merlin’s 12 cylinders.
It responds with a deafening roar as nearly 1,500 horsepower
surge through the crankshaft to the massive 4-bladed propeller.
Powered up, Brown turns into Kulp’s aircraft
to negate its speed advantage.
Now he’s at eight o’clock to Kulp’s twelve,
and the unlikely opponents are hurtling towards one another
at a combined speed of over 1,000 mph.
Brown squeezes off three long bursts from the six .50 caliber machine guns in his wings,
peppering the starboard side of Kulp’s jet.
Almost immediately flames burst from the stricken 262
and large chunks of fuselage fly into the air.
Inside, his cockpit filling with smoke
and the flight controls unresponsive to his commands,
the wounded ace pops the canopy and bails out.
Next it’s 2nd Lt. Brantley’s turn to make history.
Not one to be outdone, he circles the periphery of the melee
waiting for a lone 262 to wander into his path,
and it’s not long before one piloted by another ace,
Oberleutnant Ernst Wörner does just that.
But this engagement is over even quicker than Brown’s.
Outmaneuvering the more experienced pilot flying the technically superior aircraft,
Brantley fills the jet with .50 caliber rounds
killing Wörner and becoming the second Black pilot of the day
to engage and shoot down a vaunted ME 262 –
and the skirmish is far from over.
Using his exceptional eyesight,
1st Lt. Lane spots a single 262 that’s broken from the pack 2,000 yards away.
At its controls is Lieutenant Alfred Ambs
with seven confirmed kills under his belt.
Instinctively, Lane yanks the Mustang’s stick to the left
then back tugging the machine into a tight turn.
Straining to keep the faster German plane in view as it speeds away,
both man and machine are nearing their limits.
In addition to sheer strength and the Mustang’s maneuverability,
Lane relies on a new K-14 lead-computing gunsight to get his bullets on-target.
At such speed and range he’ll have to fire well ahead of the shark-shaped jet
rocketing through the sky.
The 262’s distinct silhouette is barely in his gunsight,
but hoping the spanking new gadget works as promised
he squeezes the trigger unleashing three short bursts.
Tracer rounds stream through the sky in great sweeping arcs,
and fractions of a second later slam into the 262.
Again there’s smoke and damage as bits of airframe break off,
and though he can’t be sure, Lane thinks he sees the pilot bail out.
What is certain is that the 262 is going down, and fast.
Diving, Lane watches it crash into the Fatherland
before being engulfed in a puff of coal grey smoke.
Wary of maintaining altitude and conserving precious air speed,
he pulls up at 17,000 feet
and scans the sky for avenging 262s
hellbent on settling the score for their fallen comrade.
Ambs having escaped the 262
floats down to earth in his parachute and comes to rest entangled in tree branches.
He’s rescued, but never takes to the skies again.
On that day the 3 “Red Tails” served their country well
by shooting down three German jets on just one mission
and in doing so also chalked up a victory against discrimination.
Brown is largely credited with being the first pilot to ever shoot down a jet,
and he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for his service.
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