[A.A. Cunningham]

Pilots were commissioned officers,

Not all of them. The Marine Corps alone had 131 enlisted pilots in 1952.

[RVN Airplane Driver]

I was TDY down at Rota NAS Spain in 1972 and was told that the last enlisted Navy pilot was stationed there. I saw him at the BX one time and he was an E-9.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

And there were hundreds of civilian pilots in WW II, Korea, SE Asia...