ts. The number of black officers rose to 411, an (p. 407)
increase of 10 percent over the previous year, and black airmen to
25,523, an increase of 15 percent, although the proportion of blacks
to whites continued to remain between 6 and 7 percent.[16-32] Some
eighteen months later only one segregated unit was left, a 98-man
outfit, itself more than 26 percent white. Negroes were then serving
in 3,466 integrated units.[16-33]

[Footnote 16-32: _Air Force Times_, 10 February 1951.
These figures do not take into account the SCARWAF
(Army personnel) who continued to serve in
segregated units within the Air Force.]

[Footnote 16-33: Memo, DepSecAF for Manpower and
Organizations for ASD/M, 5 Sep 52, SecAF files.]

There were several reasons for the universal application of what was
conceived as a limited program. First, the Air Force was in a sense
the captive of its own publicity. While Secretary Symington had
carefully delineated the limits of his departmental plan for the
Personnel Policy Board in January 1949, he was carried considerably
beyond these limits when he addressed President Truman in the open
forum of the Fahy Committee's first formal meeting:

As long as you mentioned the Air Force, sir, I just want to
report to you that our plan is to completely eliminate
segregation in the Air Force. For example, we have a fine group
of colored boys. Our plan is to take those boys, break up that
fine group, and put them with the other units themselves and go
right down the line all through these subdivisions one hundred
percent.[16-34]

[Footnote 16-34: Transcript of the Meeting of the
President and the Four Service Secretaries With the
President's Committee on Equality of Treatment and
Opportunity in the Armed Services, 12 Jan 49, FC
file, which reports the President's response as
being "That's all right."]

Later, Symington told the Fahy Committee that while the new program
would probably temporarily reduce Air Force efficiency "we are ready,
willing, and anxious to embark on this idea. We want to eliminate the
fundamental aspect of class in this picture."[16-35] Clearly, the
retention of large black units was incompatible with the elimination
of class