what percent of the military is black

That pressure, he said, has disappeared with Mr. Trump. By lowering the education standards of the draft, an estimated 40% … CNA Corporation. In the same year, blacks made up 17% of the DOD active-duty military – somewhat higher than their share of the U.S. population ages 18 to 44 (13%). In her neatly pressed blue dress uniform, Colonel Barr adopted the full at-attention stance to accept her orders and take the oath: Chin up, shoulders back, stomach in, arms fixed at the side, thumb parallel to her skirt seam. In interviews, African-American, Asian and Hispanic officers and enlisted service members described a feeling of not being accepted that was sometimes so intangible that many grew frustrated trying to describe it. A lawsuit filed in federal court in February by a Navy fighter pilot accused airmen and officers at the Naval Air Station Oceana in Virginia Beach of seeking to cover up institutional racism directed against African-American aviators, which he said resulted in their wrongful removal from pilot training programs. Weâve struggled to do it with women. Hispanic components combined. But in a 1995 article for The New Yorker, he spoke about the subtle racism he had experienced. Facebook: number of monthly active users worldwide 2008-2020, Smartphone market share worldwide by vendor 2009-2020, Number of apps available in leading app stores 2020, Profit from additional features with an Employee Account. But service members note that two other aircraft carriers retain the names of segregationists, John C. Stennis and Carl Vinson. You only have access to basic statistics. What percentage of the Marine Corps is black? He left the Army in September as a lieutenant colonel. ", CNA Corporation, Distribution of active-duty enlisted women and men in the U.S. Military in 2018, by race and ethnicity* Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/214869/share-of-active-duty-enlisted-women-and-men-in-the-us-military/ (last visited March 11, 2021), Distribution of active-duty enlisted women and men in the U.S. Military in 2018, by race and ethnicity*, Public confidence in the U.S. armed forces 1975-2020, Opinion of Americans on the U.S. being the No.1 military power in the world 2020, U.S. defense outlays and forecast 2000-2031, U.S. defense outlays and forecast as a percentage of the GDP 2000-2030, U.S. government - defense expenditures per capita 1995-2020, Budget and outlays estimates of the U.S. armed forces for 2021, Budget plan of the U.S. armed forces for 2021, by department and appropriation, Budget of the U.S. Army and the Overseas Contingency Operations 2001-2021, Budget of the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Marine Corps 2001-2021, U.S. military force numbers, by service branch and reserve component 2019, Active duty U.S. Department of Defense personnel numbers from 1995 to 2019, Total U.S. Department of Defense Reserve personnel numbers from 1995 to 2019, Active duty U.S. Army personnel numbers 1995-2019, Active Duty U.S. Navy personnel numbers from 1995 to 2019, Active duty U.S. Air Force personnel numbers from 1995 to 2019, Number of active duty U.S. Armed Forces personnel, by age group in 2019, Education levels of active duty U.S. Armed Forces personnel in 2018, Total deployable battle force ships of the U.S. Navy 2011-2021, Total aircraft force (includes ICBMs and satellites) of the U.S. Air Force 2002-2019, Total aircraft force of the U.S. Air Force 2018 to 2021 by type, Total number of fighters and bombers in the U.S. Air Force by type 2019, Total aircraft inventory of the U.S. Navy, by type FY 2017-2021, Geographic stationing of active duty U.S. Armed Forces personnel by state 2018, Deployment of U.S. troops in selected world regions 2019, Diagnosed diabetes among those who served in the U.S. military 2013-2014 by ethnicity, Number of soldiers in the U.S. Military by military sector, Share of active-duty married women and men in the U.S. Military in 2010, Distribution of women and men in the U.S. military in 2010, by branch, Hours per day spent on leisure and sports in the U.S. by ethnicity 2009-2019, U.S. Medicare Part B beneficiaries with diabetes who had eye exams 2017, by ethnicity, Share of married active-duty in dual-military marriages in the U.S. in 2010, U.S. DoD appropriated funds civilian employee numbers, by service branch 2010, Average benefit forecast of military retirees U.S. 2020-2030, Number of U.S. DoD racial minortity officers and enlisted by service branch 2010, Distribution of NFL regular season TV audience by race/ethnicity 2013, Home improvement - total expenditure in the U.S. 2011, by ethnicity, DIY - average expenditure in the U.S. 2011, by ethnicity, Home improvement - average expenditure in the U.S. 2011, by ethnicity, Labor force participation rate of Asian New Zealanders 2010-2020, Students who are not physically active in U.S. by ethnicity 2011-2015, Employment rate in New Zealand 2020 by ethnicity, Taiwan Strait field artillery balance as of 2019, by type, USAID on-budget assistance obligated in Afghan reconstruction 2002 - 2012, Find your information in our database containing over 20,000 reports, Tools and Tutorials explained in our Media Centre, total number of active duty military personnel. âAnd from a human standpoint, this absence sends another message that hereâs another space where we are not accepted.â. "Distribution of Active-duty Enlisted Women and Men in The U.S. Military in 2018, by Race and Ethnicity*. In this view, combat arms in the military was yet another threat. The small sniper community in the Marine Corps has often used a Nazi symbol, the lightning bolt insignia of Hitlerâs SS units, as a stand-in for âScout Sniper.â Although the Marine Corps leadership moved quickly to stamp out the symbol after a photo of a unit posing with an SS flag surfaced in Afghanistan in 2012, it still persists, Marines say, much like a secret handshake. Corporate solution including all features. In the unit, he had often talked about his black college fraternity and was viewed as an outlier in the largely white Green Beret world. The Air Force investigation ruled that he was not displaying a racist sign, although he was issued a letter of counseling for âunprofessional behaviorâ and went ahead with a planned retirement. It was a turnaround from what usually faces him in meetings at the Pentagon. Quick Analysis with our professional Research Service: Content Marketing & Information Design for your projects: Hispanics can be of any race. After graduating from Prairie View A&M University in 1993, Colonel Smiley, one of the African-American retired officers offended by Mr. Esperâs photograph on Twitter, went into artillery, a combat arms specialty. Both Colonel Barr and Colonel Bice declined to comment for this article. âI remember sitting in a review of a Ranger regiment,â General Chiarelli said. Gen. Donald C. Bolduc, who replaced Colonel Benton after the episode in Afghanistan. Americans earning less than $20,000 estimate the black percentage of the U.S. population to be 42%, and the Hispanic percentage … Five years later, President Obama appointed him the head of NASA. His evaluation from his time in Afghanistan, in 2009 and 2010, had been stellar, he said. This feature is limited to our corporate solutions. In Boston disappointed would-be volunteers met and passed a resolution requesting that the Government modify its laws to per… the reason I looked this up is they said yesterday that Obama only had 15% of the military's approval on what he is doing so I wondered if it was just the blacks ! Logistics and transportation are an outgrowth of the segregated military, when many black troops were quartermasters and truck drivers. âMy mom was crying when I joined,â he said in an interview. He called it âthe same âgood old boyâ system.". And in January, the Navy announced that its newest aircraft carrier would be the first to be named after a black seaman, the African-American World War II hero Doris Miller, who manned antiaircraft guns during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and helped save the wounded. âThe Marine Corps actually has given this a great deal of thought because we have struggled,â said Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., the Marine who is head of United States Central Command. What percentage of the military actually fight? ââCome here, Night Ranger.â That doesnât make you feel very welcome.â. Officially, the military insists that generals and admirals are chosen by strict criteria assessed by service selection boards. âYou would have thought it was 1950,â said Lt. Col. Walter J. Smiley Jr., who is African-American and fought in Iraq and Afghanistan before retiring last year after 25 years in the Army. This document provides data for five naval recruiting stations which in total reflect 1016 men entered or naval service, "of which 122 were Black" or 12% of the total. Accessed March 11, 2021. https://www.statista.com/statistics/214869/share-of-active-duty-enlisted-women-and-men-in-the-us-military/, CNA Corporation. âI watched commander after commander after commander take charge, own that, and any time they saw it, eliminated it from the formation.â, He added, âNow when I am in uniform, I feel colorblind, which is amazing.â. In October 2017, Colonel Moses was the commanding officer of the unit when the ambush in Niger occurred, killing the four American service members. Today, those numbers are 16 percent and 19 percent, respectively, a significant increase over the past half century. In 1985, 95.4 percent of black men joining the Army had high school diplomas, in comparison with 87.6 percent of whites. Like any trope, there is just enough of a glimmer of truth to make it hard to shake. In 1963, after South Carolinaâs congressional delegation turned him down for an appointment to the Naval Academy, General Bolden wrote a letter to President Lyndon B. Johnson. April 7, 2020. When a white dude is behind you doing stuff like that, it undermines you.â. General Pittard retired in 2015 after he was reprimanded after a three-year investigation by the Army inspector general for the âperception of favoritismâ in a defense contract award that went to a firm run by two of his former West Point classmates. In the Army, Hispanic high-quality enlistments are highl… Latino representation in the Navy has been rising. Please log in to access our additional functions, *Duration: 12 months, billed annually, single license, The ideal entry-level account for individual users. Last summer he traveled to Philadelphia for the annual convention of the black fraternity Kappa Alpha Psi, stumping for more African-Americans to join the Armyâs officer corps. In the same year, blacks made up 17% of the DOD active-duty military – somewhat higher than their share of the U.S. population ages 18 to 44 (13%). Fully 19% of active duty enlisted troops are black, but they make up only 9% of the officer corps. Although he made it to the rank of major general, he never got that third or fourth star, and he left the Marines in 2004. âI canât go on the street and hire somebody.â, Michael Williams, a retired Marine who wrote his doctoral dissertation on the topic, said âthe reality is, the individuals in that room with the secretary of defense represent decisions that were made 35 years ago.â, Rising to the top of the military means enduring a four-decade career of often being the only minority service member in the room, platoon or meeting. Then you can access your favorite statistics via the star in the header. âAnd Iâd say, âThank you.â Just file it away.â, Jonathan Rath Hoffman, a Pentagon spokesman, said that âwe are keenly aware of the importance of cultural and ethnic diversity in our senior-level positions.â. Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York Times. (billed annually). General Bolden flew more than 100 sorties over Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia as a Marine fighter pilot during the Vietnam War. "Distribution of active-duty enlisted women and men in the U.S. Military in 2018, by race and ethnicity*." âI exhale when I see Colin Powell.â she said. âWe always overlook things,â said Tiffeny Young, a friend of Colonel Barr, who was at the ceremony. African-Americans Are Highly Visible in the Military, but Almost Invisible at the Top, Photographs by Nate Palmer and Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York Times. The percentage of black officers in the services has remained fairly steady since 1995 — about 5%-7% in the Navy, Air Force and Marines, and 10%-15% in the Army. Please contact us to get started with full access to dossiers, forecasts, studies and international data. New, Figures and insights about the advertising and media world, Industry Outlook When he saw the photo of Mr. Trump with his all-white military leadership in October, he said he felt both frustrated and sad. The Army reported the highest rate of sleep concerns, with 10.6 percent of soldiers routinely consuming sleeping aides. So if you donât have senior leadership that makes fixing this a priority, itâs very hard to see it happening.â. In December, West Point announced that its Black Knights football team had removed from its flag the initials G.F.B.D., for âGod Forgives, Brothers Donât,â after learning that it was a slogan demanding loyalty by the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, a white supremacist prison gang. The ânonswimmerâ name, meant as a slur, refers to the ages-old trope that black people cannot swim. Latinos’ representation has been highest in the Marine Corps and lowest in the Air Force. âBut even if it wasnât meant to be racist, it undermines the seriousness of the situation. âSomething else is happening,â said Reuben E. Brigety, a former Navy submarine officer who is now the dean of George Washington Universityâs Elliott School of International Affairs. âI walk their halls, and nobody on their wall looks like me,â said Lila Holley, a former Army chief warrant officer. Project 100,000, which helped dramatically increase US troop presence in Vietnam from 23,300 in 1965 to 465,600 two years later, sharply increased the number of African American troops drafted. facts. Eric Schmitt, Thomas Gibbons-Neff, Jennifer Steinhauer and Chris Cameron contributed reporting. Seventy-five years after integration, the militaryâs upper echelons remain the domain of white men. Of the 41 most senior commanders in the military â those with four-star rank in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines and Coast Guard â only two are black: Gen. Michael X. Garrett, who leads the Armyâs Forces Command, and Gen. Charles Q. âIf we donât get greater diversification in each officer cohort, we will never catch up,â Mr. McCarthy said. Then you will be able to mark statistics as favourites and use personal statistics alerts. Some 43 percent of the 1.3 million men and women on active duty in the United States military are people of color. His portrait, they said, came as both a relief â that he was there at all â and a reminder that no one else with their skin color had made it. The pilotâs lawyer said in an interview that black airmen at the base were, among other things, given racially derogatory call signs like â8-Ballâ and referred to as âeggplantsâ in group chats on social media. What percentage of the US Army was black? Black members of the Air Force were 71 percent more likely to "face court-martial or non-judicial punishment than white air force members in an average year," the group said. When news broke in October 2017 that one black service member was among three Green Berets and a mechanic killed in an ambush in Niger, several African-American colonels who were interviewed for this article said that they knew immediately that the black service member, Sgt. The largest minority in the country are Hispanics with a share of 17.8 percent of the population, followed by Black or African Americans with 13.3 percent. But in practice, almost all of those interviewed said that finding a mentor remained crucial. If you enter the Pentagon at the Potomac River entrance, where foreign dignitaries are greeted by the defense secretary, you will walk down the E Ring hall with its portraits of the men who have led the United States armed forces for the past century. Racial and ethnic minority groups made up 40% of Defense Department active-duty military in 2015, up from 25% in 1990. He retired from the military in 2014. Heâs telling people âthis is your new boss,â and heâs not being respectful of her. General Garrett said the lack of minority leadership at the top ranks was âsomething I spend a lot of lot of time thinking about. âFrom the historically black colleges, what people do is what others who have been successful before them have done,â said General Garrett, the head of the Armyâs Forces Command. La David T. Johnson, was the mechanic. âShe was deathly against it.â. There are no perfect answers.â To get ahead, he said, African-Americans must move away from support areas and into combat. And yet African-Americans have a history of combat, from the Buffalo Soldiers who served on the Western frontier after the Civil War to the Tuskegee Airmen in World War II to the black soldiers who fought in Vietnam. This time, he was the minority in the room. âUnless you presume that ethnic minorities are just not as good as their white male counterparts, there has to be another reason.â, In the Marines, the term for a black Marine is ânonswimmer.â In the Army Rangers, it is ânight ranger.â, âI heard the name ânight ranger,â â said General Pittard, who did his Ranger training in the North Georgia mountains. âI walk their halls, and nobody on their wall looks like me.â, Lila Holley, former Army chief warrant officer. Graduates from black colleges who had successful military careers typically specialized in logistics and transportation, like moving supplies or driving trucks, and not in combat arms specialties like infantry or artillery. âWhen I was a young lieutenant, I would have commanders come up to me and say, âPowell, youâre doing great â goddamn, youâre the best black lieutenant Iâve ever seen,ââ Mr. Powell told Henry Louis Gates Jr., a Harvard professor and the author of the article. About 20 percent of the U.S. military is black, compared to 13 percent of all Americans, according to recently released Defense Department statistics. Lt. Gen. Ronald L. Bailey could not do it either. President Trump meeting with military leaders at the White House last year. A 1925 guidance for Army officers stated that black service members were a class âfrom which we cannot expect to draw leadership material.â The armed forces were not fully integrated until after World War II, a legacy that has left African-Americans without the same history of generations of family service shared by so many white enlistees. Active duty service members commit to the military full time often as a career. âItâs about whoâs going to take care of you. But it is the combat postings, particularly during the nearly two decades of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, that lead to the top leadership jobs. Colonel Barrâs friends posted a video of the actions on Facebook, and the Air Force investigated. The first black man to command the First Marine Division, from 2011 to 2013, General Bailey retired in 2017 after 40 years in the Marines, one star short of breaking the four-star barrier. âI donât know how I would feel about that.â. Blacks also increased in the officer corps; by 1983, the army had almost 10 percent, the air force 5 percent, the Marine Corps 4 percent, and the navy 3 percent. To nearly a one, the African-American service members interviewed for this article said they paused when they walked by the painting of Gen. Colin L. Powell, the first and only black chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Midshipmen scaling the Herndon Monument, an annual tradition, at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Md. But in … âYouâve got a great file except for this one evaluation,â he told Colonel Smiley. National Guard units operate on a state level. Colonel Smiley did not know. It is a continuing problem for us.â. In the Armyâs promotion system, one mediocre evaluation is enough to kill your chance for advancement. The issues of emancipation and military service were intertwined from the onset of the Civil War. The top Army officers â Gen. James C. McConville, the Army chief of staff; Gen. John M. Murray, the head of the Armyâs Futures Command; and Gen. Paul E. Funk II, the head of the Armyâs Training and Doctrine Command â are all white and were all mentored by the same man, Gen. Peter Chiarelli, a former Army vice chief of staff. The only demographic where men continue to dominate are among whites where comparing active-duty soldiers shows 53 percent are women and 71 percent are men. He went on to NASA to pilot two space shuttles, the Columbia in 1986 and the Discovery in 1990, and command two more, the Atlantis in 1992 and the Discovery in 1994. Many African-Americans saw military service not as a career but as a way to help pay for education or to help compete later in the civilian job market. The percentage of African-American military enlistees has drastically declined since the 1980s. Distribution of active-duty enlisted women and men in the U.S. Military in 2018, by race and ethnicity* [Graph]. The Army, he said, can choose from only the colonels before them. About 75 percent of America's 17- to 24-year-olds were ineligible for military service due to lack of education, obesity, and other physical problems, or criminal history in 2009, according to a report issued by the Mission: Readiness group. Dana Pittard, a retired major general, also African-American, was equally frustrated. Despite these qualifications, however, the decline in African American military enlistments during the first five years of the 21st century has been striking. Reservists support active duty by being ready and “in reserve” in case active duty troops are stretched thin and more support is needed. âBut there are a great many others, not in that picture, who are qualified, too.â, âI had aspirations of at least being a brigade-level commander, and being able to mentor other African-American soldiers.â. Graduates of the United States Military Academy at West Point during their commencement ceremony last year. By 2006, approximately 20% of the USMC was Black American and 15–18% Hispanic; more than the 30 to 31% of the U.S. ratio of minorities in the general population. Colonel Benton, who took part in approving the strikes, received a career-ending letter of reprimand. Reservists are likely to have civilian jobs outside their Reserve commitments. It was sunny and windy in Philadelphia as Mr. McCarthy, along with a majority black delegation from his office, got off the plane and traveled to the convention center downtown. Please do not hesitate to contact me. âWhen I came into the military, I came in from Alabama, and racism was a huge problem in the military â overt racism,â said General Hyten, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Photographs by Nate Palmer and Ilana Panich-Linsman for The New York TimesCredit... WASHINGTON â A photograph of President Trump and his top four-star generals and admirals, tweeted in October by Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper, was meant as a thank-you to the commander in chief. But just before Colonel Barrâs right hand went to her forehead in a salute, Colonel Bice touched his thumb and forefinger together and stretched his other three fingers downward, adopting the sign that the Anti-Defamation League says can be used to denote white supremacy. Unsurprisingly, the only category of veterans projected to increase are the post-9/11 ones. To graduate, they had to learn. Minority service members applaud two recent changes: In March, General Brown was nominated to be the next Air Force chief of staff. âWeâve struggled to do it with minorities. Those are the folks that, throughout their career, have more opportunity to be in charge.â, Some African-Americans are discouraged from combat by their families. Racism within the military appears to be on the rise. They represent 58 percent of the 1.1 million enlisted forces and 65 percent of the military’s 211,000 officers, according to 2017 Defense Department data, which was the latest available. The United States Marine Corps has never in its 244 years had a four-star general who was not a white male. The African-Americans who do become officers are often steered to specialize in logistics and transportation rather than the marquee combat arms specialties that lead to the top jobs. and over 1 Mio. Find out how recruit numbers have changed since 2006 • Get the data. Blacks make up about 17% of the Navy and less than 15 percent of the Air Force. âWhat did you do?â. The numbers were up significantly from the same poll conducted in 2018, when 22 percent of all respondents reported personally witnessing white nationalism. âThe absence of minorities at the top means the absence of a voice to point to things that should have been addressed a long time ago,â said Brandy Baxter, an Air Force veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and is African-American. General Chiarelli said in an interview that the problem in advancing African-Americans into leadership positions began long before the promotion boards started choosing top officers. Figure 2 His… Tes Solomon Kifle, an African-American who worked in the Marines mortuary affairs department, said his mother did not want him joining the military to begin with, let alone going into combat arms. Does the British military have a problem with race? In, CNA Corporation. $39 per month* News from Fort Sumter set off a rush by free black men to enlist in U.S. military units. The ceremony, attended by her friends and family and some 50 to 60 of the Air Force personnel who would be reporting to Colonel Barr, was supposed to be a celebration of her accomplishments. âItâs Americaâs military,â he said. Learn more about how Statista can support your business. âI was blown away, looking at six to seven hundred young men, and I was straining to see if I could find a single person of color.â. âYou had the feeling with Obama, that people were looking upâ and trying to impress the countryâs first black president, General Pittard said, adding that similar sentiments existed under Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton. There are people at top levels of the Pentagon who would like to see a military leadership that is more reflective of America. Update, Insights into the world's most important technology markets, Advertising & Media Outlook @Ramesses V ,, thanks for the info after reading all the stupid replies here I didnt think anyone would give a answer so thanks! Gen. Paul M. Nakasone, whose father is second-generation Japanese-American, leads the United States Cyber Command. Largest armies in the world by active military personnel 2021, Soldiers killed in action in Afghanistan 2001-2020, Fallen American soldiers in Iraq up to 2020, Countries with the highest military spending in 2019. The Army has since put Colonel Moses forward to the Senate Armed Services Committee for promotion to brigadier general, although the nomination was blocked by lawmakers in March. Colonel Moses approved the Niger mission, including a change in plans that made the mission more dangerous and led to the ambush. âThereâs not somebody pushing it,â he said. Colonel Smiley thought he was on the right track until 2011, when âthe story changes,â he said in an interview. Over 25 years, he had multiple tours in South Korea, Iraq and Afghanistan. Consider the case of Maj. Gen. Charles F. Bolden Jr., who managed to break barriers on land and in the air. Interviews with more than three dozen white, black and Hispanic service members and officers depict an entrenched and clubby system with near cement ceilings for minority groups. The military relies on many resources to recruit youths, including enlistment bonuses, educational benefits (such as the Montgomery GI Bill), military pay, and recruiters. âWe graduated 42â black cadets, General Pittard recalled. Powerful relationships are often formed early in the military. Chart. African-American officers said they had no room for error, and that episodes that had little consequence for their white counterparts ended careers for them. There is only one woman in the group: Gen. Maryanne Miller, the chief of the Air Forceâs Air Mobility Command, who is white. A recruiter came to his house a few weeks later, and he got into Annapolis. Brown Jr, the commander of Pacific Air Forces. Colonel Benton is black, and Colonel Moses is white. What percent of the US is black 2018? Ethnic minorities made up 6.6% of UK regular forces in 2010. Charles F. Bolden Jr., second from left, preparing to launch the Space Shuttle Discovery at Cape Canaveral, Fla., in 1990. newest aircraft carrier would be the first to be named after a black seaman. Despite these concessions, 90 percent of black troops were forced to serve in labor and supply units, rather than the more prestigious combat units. A one-star general later expressed surprise that Colonel Smiley was still just a lieutenant colonel and called him into his office. (April 7, 2020). Consider the cases of Col. Gus Benton and Col. Bradley D. Moses, two commanding officers, at different times, of the same elite Army Green Beret unit, the Third Special Forces Group. Register in seconds and access exclusive features. Graduates of West Point, Annapolis and Colorado Springs are typically destined for military leadership, but graduates of historically black colleges and universities are not.