Ability Was 1st Black West Pointer’s Weapon : Military: Retired Air Force Gen. Davis tells of being ostracized as a cadet.

Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Benjamin O. Davis Jr., the first black to graduate from West Point this century, had a simple answer when asked how he was able to serve his country through three wars and still put up with racism in and out of the military.

“I did my duty,” he said.

The general uses two hearing aids these days, perhaps a concession to his 78 years. But he still stands ramrod straight. He was in San Diego Friday to promote his autobiography, “Benjamin O. Davis, Jr.: American.” The book is a chronicle of Davis’ success in overcoming racial barriers to serve a distinguished 38-year military career.

“There is still a large segment of the public that is not aware of the problems that confronted blacks throughout their lives. These problems were in their worst form prior to 1970,” Davis said during an interview at the Aerospace Museum in Balboa Park.

Davis is perhaps best known for his command of the all-black 99th Fighter Squadron during World War II, which trained at Tuskegee Army Air Field. The squadron went on to prove itself in air battles against German pilots over North Africa and Italy.

Many black officers who entered the military after World War II, including Army Gen. Colin Powell, credited the Tuskegee airmen with breaking down racial barriers in the military.

The squadron overcame substantial roadblocks in the pilots’ quest for a “chance to show the world what we can do.”

“Yes, it would be fair to say that we were sent to North Africa in 1943 with expectations that we would fail,” Davis said.

A 1925 report prepared by officials at the U.S. War College--that Davis sarcastically said was prepared by the military’s “best and brightest officers” of the time--had concluded that blacks did not have the intellectual capacity or physical skills to be fighter pilots.

In this day and age it is difficult to conceive the racial barriers that Davis faced when he entered West Point in 1932 as the only black cadet. He was shunned by other cadets and went through four years at the academy without interacting with his peers. The class of 1936 included retired Army Gen. William Westmoreland, who commanded U.S. forces in Vietnam.

Although Davis said that the West Point experience did not leave him bitter, he also said that “someone should have had the guts to go to the commandant and say, ‘This is wrong.’ ” In the intervening years, a few of his classmates have approached him and apologized for the silence he endured at the academy, Davis said.

“But it’s quite an indictment from the superintendent on down that they permitted it to happen. But they did, and nobody corrected it until President Truman issued an executive order in 1948 integrating the armed forces,” Davis said.

He added that, “I certainly would not go to a West Point reunion.”

Davis said he dealt with the racism in the military in his own way, quickly adding that “my way worked.” He recounted a 1945 incident at Freeman Field, Ind., when 100 black officers rebelled after they were denied entry to the whites-only officers’ club.

“That approach to the problem wasn’t going to work. My way did work. I demonstrated through performance the worth and value of black airmen to the armed forces,” Davis said.

U.S. officials point to the success of Operation Desert Storm, which was directed by a black general and included a wide representation of blacks in all branches of the military, as proof that racism has been overcome in the military.

However, Davis, who still has close ties to the military, said racism remains a problem in the U.S. military. He said that Pentagon officials have told him that officers frequently ignore racial problems in their commands.

“I tell you that when it’s also an absolute fact that things are better today in the military then they’ve ever been before. . . . This is the greatest nation in the world, but we still have problems with racism,” he said. “The problem remains right now, at this point.”