Flying Tigers? Flying Sharks is more like it for wartime heroes

Ever wonder how WWII's American Volunteer Group got its nickname "The Flying Tigers" when the noses of their P-40 Tomahawk fighters were decorated to look like ferocious sharks at full snarl?

It took more than 50 years for the Pentagon to fess up to the actual truth about the 100 American pilots and mechanics who flew under the radar to form the storied fighting group that helped China shoot Japanese bombers out of the skies over Kunming, Yunnan province, in the months before Pearl Harbor and after.

Namely, that it was a covert operation, approved at the highest levels of the White House by executive order, in flagrant violation of US neutrality and hidden from Congress.