Within the ranks of the United States Military the term “Ace” is given to pilots who manage to shoot down five enemy planes.  The level of skill and ability necessary to achieve this dangerous accomplishment was and is incredibly rare.  

During World War II a farm boy from Wisconsin named Richard Bong became the top flying ace of the US, downing forty Japanese aircraft throughout the conflict.  He would be named the “Ace of Aces”, the deadliest fighter pilot in American history.