A female Naval aviator with the Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 32 became the first woman in the U.S. military to earn an aerial victory. The aviator, who the Navy has not named, shot down one of the one-way attack drones fired by Houthi forces against commercial ships passing through the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, using an F/A-18F Super Hornet.
Strike Fighter Squadron 32 deployed on the aircraft carrier the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower when the Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group was sent to the Middle East in October 2023. The group, consisting of the carrier, its support ships and a carrier wing, took part in missions to intercept missiles and one-way attack drones fired at merchant ships.
It’s not clear when specifically the fighter pilot scored that aerial victory. The military considers downing aerial drones as an aerial victory. It’s not a new distinction — the Royal Air Force credited shot down Nazi V-1 rockets as kills during World War II.
“The success of the entire squadron over the past nine months is a testament to all the members of the command and their friends and family at home that support them,” Cmdr. Jason Hoch, leader of the squadron, said in a Navy release. “I couldn’t be prouder of the Swordsmen’s performance day-in and day-out in incredibly demanding conditions. We proved over and over again that the flexibility a carrier strike group brings to the fight is unmatched, and that is solely due to the highly trained and motivated Sailors who go above and beyond the call of duty each and every day.”
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According to the Navy, Strike Fighter Squadron 32 (known as the “Fighting Swordsmen”) fired more than 20 air-to-air missiles against drones. The fighter squadron also used nearly 120 air-to-surface weapons in airstrikes on Houthi-controlled parts of Yemen. Earlier this month, the Navy released a breakdown of just how many strikes the Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group carried out during its nine months deployed to the Middle East. Aircraft assigned to the group fired 60 air-to-air missiles and 420 air-to-surface missiles and bombs.
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It’s also not clear if the unnamed aviator only scored one air-to-air kill, but there’s no indication from the Navy that she made ace status like Amelia “Buns” Nakamura. Anti-drone and missile intercept operations in April, when Iran attacked Israel with more than 300 munitions, likely led to Air Force pilots with the 494th Fighter Squadron and 335th Fighter Squadron achieving ace status — five or more aerial kills. The Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group and its air wing did not participate in that mission.
The unnamed female aviator is the first American military pilot to score an air-to-air kill, but not the first woman overall to do that in history. During World War II, a Soviet pilot took that distinction. Sources dispute whether Lt. Lydia Litvyak or Lt. Valeriya Khomyakova was the first to get an aerial victory, but both got confirmed kills. Litvyak would become one of two Soviet women to reach “ace” status during the war, getting at least five aerial kills before her death in 1943, although the total number is also disputed.
On a wider level, the Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group expended 770 munitions during its operations around Yemen, including the 480 done by the air wing. The rest were missiles fired by the ships. That included interceptions of Houthi missiles and drones, targeted strikes on launch and radar sites and multinational bombing campaigns on cities and ports controlled by the Houthi movement.