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General Dynamics – M61 Vulcan 20mm Cannon By Steve Pace

Open gun bay with an M61A1 cannon installed on a Luftwaffe F-104G Starfighter (725 rounds) in the Museum of Aviation and Technology in Wernigerode (Saxony-Anhalt, Germany). Photo by Michael Wolf

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Air-to-air combat between fighters in WW II and the Korean War was waged with single-barrel guns — primarily .30 and .50 caliber machine guns and 20 millimeter cannon or combinations thereof. The Lockheed P-38 Lightning, for example, brought four guns to bear with its nose-mounted array of four .50 caliber machine guns and single 20mm cannon. America’s two leading aces, Richard Ira “Dick” Bong and Thomas Buchanan “Tom” McGuire Jr., used their P-38s to down...

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