052 - War Paint IV

Marks of a Fighter

During the course of World War II, fighter pilots kept tallies of confirmed kills (enemy planes shot down) along the fuselage of their plane. While pilots in Europe simply used hatch marks to tally their wins, the American fighter pilots used enemy flag insignia to tally their confirmed kills.
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Often, a row of five confirmed kills (denoting a flying ace) would complete a row and the second row would commence with the sixth confirmed kill. Also, for the few pilots to have the opportunity to fight in both the Pacific and

European theaters, they would also score a row of Nazi insignia alongside the Japanese Rising Sun flags.

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But what, exactly, does it take to become a Flying Ace?

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Although becoming a Flying Ace may sound easy, it most certainly is not. For each confirmed kill, that meant someone had to die. It wasn’t much different than the gunslingers of the Wild West, except the fight was constant and danger lurked behind every cloud.

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Fighter pilots had many things to take into consideration before, during, and after each dogfight. First, they had to have full mastery of their plane. They had to know how much and what kind of weaponry their plane carried. If they didn’t know how much ammo they had, they could use it too fast and be left defenseless. Some ammo belts consisted of incendiary rounds, which were designed to explode on impact. Sometimes, they used armor-piercing shells, made for more durable planes.

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That meant the Ace also had to know his opponent. Some planes, like the A6M zero were fast and maneuverable, meaning they could win in a turning war against the heavier American planes like the P-40s and F4Fs. However, in a head on battle, the paper-covered wings of the Japanese fighters were no match for the ironclad bodies of the American planes.

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Taking all this into consideration, a pilot still had to know how to fly his plane. Aces used maneuvers like scissor-turns or barrel-rolls to get into the best position to win the dogfight. Later, these Aces would develop more maneuvers as they mastered their planes – and ultimate – they mastered the skies.

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