Page 3 - BG Charles E. McGee

Brig. Gen. Charles McGee Live Video Debrief
Tuskegee Airman Interviewed in “Onward, Upward”
By Chuck Sweeney
https://www.dfcsociety.org/pages/ogta-debriefs
Timing is everything and the timing of the live debrief of Tuskegee Airman Brigadier General Charles McGee, USAF (Ret.) took several twists and turns before its fantastic conclusion on September 2nd.
There were several events that occurred prior to that memorable day, with the first significant one occurring on Dec 7, 2019 when he turned 100 years old. The next event happened on Feb 4, 2020 when he was promoted to Brigadier General by President Trump in the Oval Office and then he and his great- grandson Iain Lanphier were called out by President Trump during the State of the Union Address.
Lew Jennings wrote a great story about these
events in the Summer 2020 edition of the DFCS News Magazine.
Our original plan in 2020 was to have a few more Premiers of the Steve Pisanos Documentary “The Mettle Behind
the Merit” that was filmed by John Mollison and funded by DFCS member John Calamos. That plan was completely trashed by Covid 19.
The next step was to try some virtual interviews, called “Debriefs”, of DFCS members. The first two debriefs were of Pat Owen and Bruce Huffman as test cases, to work out the bugs and see if it was a viable concept. As in doing anything new, there were a couple of minor problems that were easily resolved. There was a small charge to watch the first two interviews and the viewing audience was relatively small, which was fine as we were just getting our feet wet.
Since the reviews of the first two debriefs were positive, it was decided that we would plan on an expanded program of monthly debriefs, with the idea of finding a sponsor willing to pay the cost of the program for six months and viewers would not pay a fee. The names of various DFCS members were discussed and it was decided that Brig. Gen. McGee would be the first person asked to participate in the revised and
upgraded debrief. I called him to see if he was willing to
participate and, after explaining the plan and the process, he was
fully engaged as I had expected, having talked to him previously
about a possible interview for the DFCS News Magazine.
In case you don’t know the history of General McGee, he was one of the Tuskegee Airmen and they were at their best once they started flying the famous P-51 Mustang. His personal P-51 was named “Kitten”, which is what he affectionately called his wife, Frances. General McGee flew 136 combat missions in WWII, 100 combat missions in Korea and 173 combat missions in Vietnam, for a grand total of 409 missions as a combat fighter pilot. He also shot down a German fighter during one of his missions in WWII while protecting the bomber streams.
He was awarded one DFC in Korea flying the F-51 and two DFCs in Vietnam flying the RF-4C, and has been a DFC Society member since 1997.
A lot more detail on Charles McGee is contained on pages 50 to 54 of “On Heroic Wings: Stories of the Distinguished Flying Cross” which is available through our website or through Amazon. He is also enshrined at the National Aviation Hall of Fame and is a recipient of the Congressional Gold Medal.
McGee named the P-51 he flew in WW!! “Kitten”, as he affectionately referred to his wife Frances.
24 / DFCS News Magazine / WINTER 2020