Watch HDToday. An ace fighter pilot captain expects to get leave, but instead is ordered to Washington, where a colonel explains that mounting casualties among fighter pilots require new, battle-tested tactics in combat. The captain sets out to train a group of young and relatively inexperienced pilots in the new methods. Fighter planes are used as both attack aircraft and as escorts for heavy bombers, and a variety of flight patterns and defensive and offensive maneuvers are explained to the young pilots.