Richard Ira Bong: American World War II Ace of Aces
By Jon Guttman

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Dick Bong impressed his squadron mates as someone who was introverted and unobtrusive on the ground but stunningly aggressive in the air. He first showed his mettle on December 27, when the Japanese army and navy launched their first major joint air operation in the southwest Pacific, involving about 40 Mitsubishi A6M2 Zero carrier fighters, Nakajima Ki.43 army fighters (code-named “Oscar” by the Allies) and Aichi D3A1 navy dive bombers (“Val” to the Allies). As the D3As attacked Allied installations at newly seized Buna, 12 P-38s of the 39th Fighter Squadron met them. Lynch was leading 2nd Lts. Dick Bong, Kenneth Sparks and John Magnus down on the Vals when their escorts crossed the Americans’ paths. Lynch’s gunfire disintegrated one fighter, and then a Zero threatened him. Bong sideslipped, fired at Lynch’s assailant and saw it spin away, then sped earthward as three other Zeroes moved in on him, finally pulling out, as he described it, “2 inches above the shortest tree in Buna.” At that moment he caught a Val just pulling out of its dive and quickly turned it into a fireball. Too low to accomplish anything more, Bong headed back to Port Moresby to report his first two victories — the first credited to a P-38 pilot of the 49th Group. The 39th Squadron claimed a total of 12 victories, including an additional Oscar for Lynch, making him an ace, and a Zero by 2nd Lt. Carl G. Planck Jr., another 9th Squadron pilot on loan to the 39th.

On January 6, 1943, Allied coastwatchers on New Britain reported a Japanese convoy along the south shore, heading west. The next day, after 36 Curtiss P-40Ks of the 49th Group’s 7th and 8th squadrons took off to bomb the convoy, a Consolidated Catalina flying boat of the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) sank a straggling Japanese freighter and reported that the convoy had altered course for Salamaua. Meanwhile, Lynch led eight P-38s, including Bong and Planck, across the Owen Stanley Mountains to rendezvous with the P-40s, unaware of their change in course. Consequently, they missed the fighter-bombers but ran into the convoy’s 11th Sentai (army air regiment) air umbrella at 1315 hours. The 39th claimed six Oscars in the fight, including one by Bong after a five-minute duel. Returning to Dobodura to refuel, the Lightnings then took off for Lae, where they encountered another 16 of the 11th Sentai’s Ki.43 fighters at 1530. Bong and Planck damaged two Oscars on their first pass, and Bong destroyed one on his second.

During a January 8 mission escorting Boeing B-17Es and Consolidated B-24Ds over Markham Bay, Bong spotted 2nd Lt. Richard Suehr of the 39th, who had already downed two Ki.43s, hotly engaged with a persistent adversary. Bong joined in with a frontal attack from above, and Suehr saw the Oscar explode and fall 18,000 feet into Huon Gulf. In only four aerial engagements Bong had become the Fifth Air Force’s first Lightning ace, and General Kenney rewarded him with a trip to Australia for R&R.

On February 3, Bong rejoined the 9th Squadron, now fully equipped with its own P-38s. On the morning of March 2, a B-24 spotted Japanese troop transports and destroyers 100 miles northeast of Lae, and Kenney dispatched all available squadrons to attack them. In spite of heavy rain, B-17s sank two transports and dispersed the convoy formation. The punishment continued on March 3, with some 300 U.S. Army Air Forces and RAAF bombers hammering the Japanese ships. While escorting B-17s and North American B-25s to the target, Bong saw seven 11th Sentai Oscars pass below him, making for the bombers. Dropping behind one, he started it smoking with one burst and watched it crash five miles offshore in Huon Gulf. By the time the three-day Battle of the Bismarck Sea ended, 14 Japanese merchant ships and eight warships had been sunk, more than 7,000 Japanesse killed and almost 60 enemy aircraft destroyed.

he Japanese struck back on March 11, when a force of Mitsubishi G4M1 “Betty” bombers attacked the 9th Squadron’s airstrip at Horanda. The Americans scrambled up, and Bong took off just before enemy bombs landed on the strip. Pursuing the bombers, he fired into one without result and twice had to dive away from attacking Zeroes. As he pulled out of his second dive, Bong turned to engage one that was still on his tail. His rounds struck home, but when he swept past the Zero he was startled to see another plane coming at him. He fired a short burst into that antagonist, only to find seven more boring in on him. Turning right, he fired a long 20-degree deflection shot into the closest assailant. He later reported, “First two Zeros were burning

Tags: Aces, Aerial Combat, Aviation History, Historical Conflicts, Historical Figures, World War II

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