That’s how many enemy aircraft these five American pilots shot out of the sky between 1941 and 1945.
Not damaged, not probable, confirmed, destroyed.
Over 1,400 American fighter pilots qualified as aces during World War II, but only five of them racked up kill counts so high that their names appeared in enemy intelligence reports.
Today we’re ranking them.
Number five was a drunk, a liar, and a mercenary.
He was also one of the deadliest pilots who ever lived.
Number three became an ace twice in the same day.
Number two died trying to pass number one.
And number one, he killed more enemy aircraft in a single mission than most aces killed in their entire careers.
This isn’t about Hollywood portrayals or dramatic speeches.
This is about confirmed aerial victories, documented mission reports, and the cold mathematics of who put more enemy planes in the ground while keeping themselves in the air.
Let’s count down the five most lethal American fighter pilots of World War II.
But before we start, if you want to see who takes the number one spot, hit that like button right now.
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Now, let’s start with number five.
Number five, Colonel Gregory Papy Boyington.
Gregory Boington was not a good man.
He was an alcoholic.
He lied about his kill count.
He abandoned his first wife and three children.
The Marine Corps considered him a discipline problem.
He was also one of the most lethal fighter pilots America ever produced.
Boyington earned 28 confirmed aerial victories across two wars and two air forces.
Six of those kills came before America even entered the conflict, flying as a mercenary for the Chinese government against the Japanese.
The remaining 22 came as a Marine Corps fighter pilot in the Solomon Islands.
Here’s what makes Boington’s story unique.
In 1941, Boyington was a washedup marine pilot drowning in debt and alcohol.
He resigned his commission and joined the American Volunteer Group, better known as the Flying Tigers, a mercenary unit fighting for China under the command of Clare Chenol.
The Flying Tigers flew P40 Warhawks with shark teeth painted on the nose.
They were paid $500 for every Japanese plane they shot down.
It was legalized killing for money, and Boyington was good at it.
He claimed six aerial victories with the AVG before the unit disbanded in July 1942.
When America entered the war, Boington rejoined the Marine Corps.
They needed experienced pilots, and despite his problems, Boington had something most pilots didn’t.
He had already killed Japanese aircraft.
He knew how they flew, how they fought, and how they died.
In September 1943, Boington took command of Marine Fighter Squadron 214.
The unit was a collection of replacement pilots and misfits that nobody else wanted.
Boyington called them the Black Sheep.
The name stuck.
At 31 years old, Boyington was a decade older than most of his pilots.
They called him papy because of his age.
He called them idiots, but he taught them how to survive.
Boyington’s leadership style was unconventional.
He drank heavily.
He ignored regulations.
He flew with a hangover more than once.
But in the air, he was coldly efficient.
His technique was simple.
Dive on the enemy from above.
Fire at close range and keep moving.
Never turn with a zero.
Never slow down.
Hit them before they see you and be gone before they can react.
Between September 1943 and January 1944, Boington shot down 22 Japanese aircraft in just 84 days of combat.
On January 3rd, 1944, he tied Eddie Rickenbacher’s World War I record of 26 total victories.
That same morning, Boyington was shot down over Rabal.
His wingman saw his Corsair hit the water.
The Marines listed him as killed in action.
He wasn’t dead.
Boington had been pulled from the water by a Japanese submarine and spent the next 20 months as a prisoner of war.
He was beaten, starved, and tortured.
The Japanese never told the Americans he was alive.
When the war ended in August 1945, Boyington walked out of a prison camp weighing 110 lb.
He returned home to discover he’d been awarded the Medal of Honor in absentia.
The citation credited him with 26 kills, but post-war analysis confirmed 28.
Boington’s life after the war was troubled.
The drinking continued, the marriages failed.
He wrote an autobiography called Ba Ba Black Sheep that was turned into a television series in the 1970s.
He died in 1988 at age 75, 28 confirmed aerial victories, a mercenary who became a Marine, a drunk who became a legend, a prisoner who came home.
Gregory Boyington was not a hero in the traditional sense.
He was something more complicated.
He was effective.
Number four, Colonel Francis Gabby Gabreski.
Francis Gabreski almost didn’t become a pilot.
His flight instructor told him he didn’t have the touch to be a pilot.
The man who would become America’s leading ace in Europe was nearly washed out of flight training before it began.
Gabreski was the son of Polish immigrants from Oil City, Pennsylvania.
When Germany invaded Poland in 1939, it wasn’t abstract news.
It was personal.
His parents’ homeland was being destroyed, and Gabreski wanted revenge.
In 1943, he did something no other American fighter pilot had done.
He requested assignment to a Polish fighter squadron attached to the Royal Air Force.
For months he flew Spitfires alongside Polish veterans who had already been fighting the Luftvafa for years.
He didn’t score any victories during this time.
But he learned something more valuable than kills.
He learned how experienced combat pilots stayed alive.
When Gabreski joined the 56th Fighter Group in February 1943, his fellow pilots resented him.
He hadn’t trained with them.
He hadn’t shipped with them.
He was an outsider with opinions about how things should be done.
His promotion to squadron commander over more senior pilots made things worse.
Then he started killing Germans.
Gabresk’s technique became well known among American pilots.
He called it the close kill.
While other pilots opened fire at 400 yards, Gabreski held his fire until he was within 100 yards, sometimes 50.
At that range, with eight 50 caliber machine guns, he didn’t need to be a good shot.
He just needed to be close enough that he couldn’t miss.
On November 26th, 1943, Gabeski earned the Distinguished Service Cross for a mission that exemplified his aggressive style.
Leading a bomber escort near Oldenberg, Germany, his squadron was attacked by Messid 110s.
Gabreski singled out the lead aircraft and attacked from deadest stern, firing short bursts until the enemy exploded.
Large pieces of the messes bounced off his canopy and smashed into his wing.
Any sensible pilot would have headed home.
Gabreski climbed back up and shot down a second 110.
Fellow pilots gave Gabreski, Hub Zama, and David Schilling the informal nickname the terrible three, a testament to their aggressive reputation within the 56th Fighter Group.
By July 5th, 1944, Gabreski had scored 28 aerial victories, making him the highest scoring American ace in Europe.
He was scheduled to rotate home.
His war was over.
But Gabreski heard there was one more mission scheduled, and he couldn’t resist.
On July 20th, 1944, Gabeski led a strafing attack on a German airfield near Cooblins.
Flying too low, his propeller clipped the ground.
The P47 cartw wheeled across a German field.
Gabreski survived, evaded capture for 5 days, then spent the rest of the war in Stalagl one on the Baltic Sea.
Here’s the number that defines Gabreski’s war.
28 aerial victories in 166 combat missions.
But his story didn’t end there.
In Korea, flying F86 Sabers against MiG 15s, Gabeski shot down six and a half more enemy aircraft, becoming one of only seven American pilots to achieve ACE status in two wars.
The man who almost washed out of flight training retired as a colonel with 34 and a half total aerial victories across two conflicts.
The instructor who said he didn’t have the touch was wrong.
Number three, Commander David Mccambbell.
David Mccambbell didn’t start the war as a combat pilot.
He was a landing signal officer, the man who stood on the deck waving paddles to guide planes onto aircraft carriers.
His war began in 1942 aboard the USS Wasp when a Japanese submarine put three torpedoes into her hull near Guadal Canal.
Mccell survived the sinking and was sent home to train other landing signal officers.
Most men would have been grateful for the safe assignment.
Mccell wasn’t most men.
In September 1943, at age 33, he formed Fighter Squadron 15 and trained them for combat.
In February 1944, he became commander of Air Group 15 aboard the USS Essex.
His pilots called themselves the Fabled 15 and they would earn that name.
On June 19th, 1944, during the Battle of the Philippine Sea, Mccell achieved what only a handful of pilots in history have done.
He became an ace in a single day.
In the chaos of what American pilots called the Great Mariana’s Turkey Shoot, McCambell shot down five Japanese Judy dive bombers in the span of 9 minutes.
Later that afternoon, he went up again and shot down two more zeros over Guam.
Seven victories in one day.
Most aces don’t achieve that in their entire careers.
Mccell did it before lunch.
But October 24th, 1944 is the day that made Mccell legendary.
It was the beginning of the Battle of Lady Gulf, the largest naval battle in history.
That morning, radar aboard the Essex detected an incoming Japanese strike force.
Not 10 aircraft, not 20.
Approximately 60 Japanese planes were inbound.
Mccell had been forbidden from flying fighter missions by Rear Admiral Frederick Sherman, who thought the air groupoup commander should focus on coordinating attacks rather than seeking personal glory.
But that morning, with only seven Hellcats ready to launch against the incoming strike, Mccell ignored his orders and climbed into his cockpit.
What happened next became one of the most remarkable aerial engagements of the Pacific War.
Mccell and his wingman, Lieutenant Junior Grade Roy Rushing, were among the first to intercept the Japanese formation.
Though other American fighters operated in the broader combat area, Mccell and Rushing bore the brunt of the initial engagement.
For an extended period, they tore through the Japanese formation repeatedly.
Mccell shot down nine aircraft.
His wingman downed another six.
together.
Two American pilots destroyed 15 enemy aircraft and helped break up the attack before it could reach the fleet.
According to Mccambbell’s postwar account, when he finally landed, his six machine guns were nearly empty and his fuel tanks were critically low.
He had to land on the USS Langley because Essex’s deck wasn’t clear.
Mccell became the only American airman to achieve undisputed ace in a day status twice.
His nine kills in a single mission set a United States record for aerial victories in one engagement.
Air group 15 destroyed 315 aircraft in aerial combat and another 348 on the ground, more than any other air group in the Pacific.
McCell finished the war with 34 confirmed aerial victories, making him the United States Navy’s all-time leading ace.
He’s also the highest scoring American ace to survive the war.
Bong and Maguire both died in 1945.
Mccell lived until 1996, reaching the rank of captain before retirement.
The destroyer USS McCell was named in his honor.
When you become the only pilot to become an ace twice in a single day, they name ships after you.
Number two, Major Thomas Maguire.
Tommy Maguire wanted one thing more than anything else in the world.
He wanted to beat Richard Bong.
He wanted to be America’s ace of aces.
That obsession drove him to become the second highest scoring American pilot of the war.
It also killed him.
Maguire grew up in Sebring, Florida, the son of divorced parents.
He attended Georgia Institute of Technology to study aeronautical engineering before enlisting as an aviation cadet in 1941.
By August 1943, he was in New Guinea flying P38s with the 475th Fighter Group.
On August 18th and 19th, 1943, Maguire achieved ACE status over the course of two days of intense combat.
Flying top cover for bombers striking Weiwok, his formation was attacked by Japanese fighters.
Maguire shot down three aircraft the first day, including two Oscars and a Tony.
The following day, he downed two more near the same location.
Five kills in 48 hours.
The kid from Florida had arrived.
From that point forward, Maguire hunted kills with single-minded intensity.
He named his P38 Pudgy after his wife Marilyn, and he flew it into combat with the kind of controlled aggression that impressed his superiors and worried his wingmen.
Here’s a story that captures Maguire’s character.
In July 1944, Charles Lindberg arrived in the Pacific as a civilian technical adviser.
The most famous aviator in the world wanted to observe combat operations.
According to pilots who served alongside them, Maguire treated Lindberg like any other new arrival, assigning him routine duties and wingman positions, regardless of his celebrity status.
Lindberg flew combat missions with Maguire’s unit.
The civilian adviser wasn’t officially supposed to engage the enemy.
He shot down a Japanese plane anyway.
By December 1944, Maguire had accumulated 38 aerial victories.
Richard Bong had 40.
The race was on.
On Christmas Day 1944, Maguire earned the Medal of Honor, leading a squadron of 15 P38s over Luzon.
His formation was attacked by 20 aggressive Japanese fighters.
In the swirling dog fight that followed, Maguire repeatedly flew to the aid of his embattled comrades, driving off enemy aircraft while himself under attack and at times outnumbered 3 to one.
His guns jammed.
He kept fighting anyway, forcing a Japanese plane into his wingman’s line of fire.
The next day, he shot down four more aircraft in a single engagement, bringing his total to 38.
Two more kills would tie Bong.
Three would make him the ace of aces.
On January 7th, 1945, Maguire led a volunteer fighter sweep over Negros Island in the Philippines.
It was supposed to be a routine patrol.
They found a lone Japanese Oscar near Fabrica airfield.
What happened next changed American fighter pilot history.
During the engagement, another Japanese aircraft entered the fight.
Maguire attempted a hard turn at low altitude to help a squadron mate.
His P38 was still carrying external fuel tanks, which affected its handling characteristics.
At low altitude, with limited room to recover, the aircraft stalled.
Maguire’s plane flipped and crashed.
America’s second highest scoring ace died instantly.
He was 24 years old.
Maguire Air Force Base in New Jersey bears his name.
The Medal of Honor was awarded postumously.
His widow Marilyn received the news that her husband, the man who had painted her name on his fighter, would never come home.
38 victories, two kills short of the record.
The man who wanted to be number one died trying.
Number one, Major Richard Bong.
Richard Bong killed more enemy aircraft than any American pilot in history.
40 confirmed aerial victories.
That’s not opinion.
That’s documented fact.
Bong was candid about his limitations.
He admitted he was a poor shot at long range.
So he compensated by flying closer to the enemy than any textbook recommended.
His technique was straightforward.
Get behind the target, close to pointblank range, and fire until the enemy stopped flying.
What he lacked in marksmanship, he made up for in nerve.
Bong grew up on a farm near Popppler, Wisconsin, the eldest of nine children born to a Swedish immigrant father.
Male planes flying over the family farm sparked his interest in aviation.
By the time he enlisted in the Army Air Corps in 1941, he had accumulated 36 hours of flight time mostly in a biplane at the local airport.
At Hamilton Field, California, Bong demonstrated the daring that would define his career.
In one infamous incident, he flew his P38 under the Golden Gate Bridge, buzzed Market Street in San Francisco at low altitude, and blew laundry off a woman’s clothes line in Oakland.
General George Kenny, commander of the Fifth Air Force, called Bong into his office.
Instead of court marshalling him, Kenny gave him a choice.
Report to the woman whose laundry he scattered.
Help her with her washing.
hang it back on the line and mow her lawn or face formal charges.
Bong did the laundry.
Kenny later said, “If you didn’t want to fly down Market Street, I wouldn’t want you in my Air Force.” When Kenny shipped out to the Pacific in September 1942, he handpicked Bong as one of 50 P38 pilots to join his command.
It was one of the best personnel decisions of the war.
On December 27th, 1942, Bong scored his first two aerial victories over Buna, New Guinea.
A zero and an Oscar fell to his guns in the same engagement.
He was awarded the Silver Star.
From that point forward, Bong accumulated victories at a remarkable pace.
Ground crews painted rising sun flags on his fuselage as fast as he could earn them.
By September 1943, he had 28 confirmed kills, making him the top American ace in any theater.
On April 12th, 1944, Bong shot down his 26th and 27th Japanese aircraft, becoming the first American pilot to surpass Eddie Rickenbacher’s World War I record of 26 victories.
He was promoted to major and sent home for a publicity tour.
He couldn’t stay away.
In September 1944, Bong returned to the Pacific as a gunnery instructor.
He wasn’t required to fly combat missions.
General Kenny had expressly ordered him not to seek out the enemy.
Bong flew anyway.
During his final combat tour, he voluntarily participated in 30 more missions and destroyed 12 more Japanese aircraft.
His Medal of Honor citation reads, “In part, though assigned to duty as gunnery instructor and neither required nor expected to perform combat duty, Major Bong voluntarily and at his own urgent request, engaged in repeated combat missions, including unusually hazardous sorties over Balik PPen, Borneo, and in the Lee area of the Philippines.
By December 1944, Bong had reached 40 victories.
General Kenny finally grounded him for good.
200 combat missions, over 500 combat hours, 40 confirmed kills.
America had its ace of aces.
Bong went home to Wisconsin, married his sweetheart Marjgerie, whom he had immortalized by painting her photo on the nose of his P38, and took a job as a test pilot for Lockheed.
On August 6th, 1945, the same day the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima, Major Richard Bong climbed into the cockpit of a P80 Shooting Star jet fighter.
It was a routine test flight.
It would be his last.
During the takeoff sequence, Bong failed to engage the aircraft’s auxiliary fuel pump.
The P80s jet engine required this pump to maintain fuel pressure during climbout.
Without it, the engine-driven pump couldn’t deliver enough fuel on its own.
The engine flamed out at low altitude.
Bong attempted to eject, but he was too low.
The parachute didn’t have time to deploy.
America’s greatest ace died from a procedural error on the same day the war effectively ended.
He was 24 years old.
Newspapers the next morning ran his obituary alongside the headline announcing the bombing of Hiroshima.
The man who had survived 200 combat missions against the Japanese was killed by a forgotten switch.
The Richard the Furbong Veterans Historical Center in Superior, Wisconsin preserves his memory.
Bong Bridge connects Wisconsin and Minnesota across the St.
Louis Bay.
The man from the Wisconsin farm who wanted to fly became the deadliest American pilot who ever lived.
40 confirmed aerial victories.
A record among American pilots that has never been broken.
Let’s add them up.
Boyington 28, Gabeski 28, Mccell 34, Maguire 38, Bong 40.
Total 168 enemy aircraft destroyed by five American pilots, five men, 168 kills.
And the Axis powers learned that American fighter pilots weren’t just brave.
They were methodical, aggressive, and absolutely lethal in the sky.
But here’s the real question.
Did we get the ranking right? Should Mccell be higher because he achieved more kills per mission? Should Maguire be number one because he died chasing the record? Drop a comment right now and tell us your ranking.
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Thank you for watching.
These pilots deserve to be remembered for what they actually did in the cockpit, not what Hollywood turned them into.
Five men, 168 enemy aircraft, and a record that among American pilots still stands eight decades later.
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