I heard this when I was in Vietnam. We called it the golden BB. Theoretically possible, but I would say 99.9% improbable, and would be the luckiest shot the dude ever took. Who knows for sure if it’s EVER happened?
There’s a WW2 story about an American pilot that got a kill with his pistol after parachuting from his burning fighter when the Japanese pilot came around to finish him off, so who knows.
I heard the Golden BB philosophy too from three Air Force FAC guys when I drove the bn FAC track in 3/33 AR in Germany.
They said Army thinks “Big sky, little bullet, AF thinks, Golden BB”, lol.
Well, multiply 0.1% by the number of light arms shots taken at warplanes.
That said, in any one instance it is a lot more likely the plane suffered some sort of mechanical or electrical failure.
As noted, the Red Baron was taken out by infantry.
The more interesting story is last week Russia shot down its own SU34M.
I’ve never seen the Su34M in person, but there are only 10 in existence. Well, 9 now. Most updated ground attack plane they have.
I suspect it got its IFF beacon jammed or a spoofed, which is VERY bad news for the Russian Air Force.