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Still classed as a gunnery instructor, Major Richard Ira Bong, top U.S. fighter ace, landed last week with the first Army planes to be based on Leyte. When Jap planes were sighted, five hours later, Dick Bong went out to help intercept, soon scored a kill. By week's end he knocked down two more, bringing his total...
With belated but well verified credit for a 28th kill which he had made before he left the theater, Bong's two kills last week brought his total to 30. In the great U.S. ace race, Dick Bong was out in front again...
Richard Ira Bong came home last spring with 27 enemy planes to his credit, the country's leading ace. Soon cornfed, snub-nosed Dick Bong told home folks at Poplar, Wis. that he was through with combat flying. Lieut. General George Kenney had grounded him "because he didn't want to see me get killed." Major Bong settled down to a quiet life at gunnery school, while in Europe Lieut. Colonel Francis S. Gabreski shot down 28 planes, passing Bong's record. (Later, Gabreski was captured...
Last week came the news which surprised no one. Back on duty in the Southwest Pacific as a gunnery instructor, Dick Bong was in battle again. He had led Lightning fighters on a 1,500-mile raid to Balikpapan, the longest fighter operation ever attempted in the theater. Over Borneo 20 Jap planes had jumped U.S. heavy bombers. Bong and his P-38s piled in and drove them off. Instructor Bong's personal score: two Japanese planes...
Major Richard Ira Bong, who shot down 27 Jap planes in the Southwest Pacific, passed through Salt Lake City on a commercial airliner, complained that he could not sleep. Reason: he was airsick...