The greatest ace in the European Theater of WW2 flew a P-47
The P-47's original design was by a Russian, "trapped" in the US by the 1917 Russian Revolution.
I knew a P47 pilot. He had some great stories. I asked him what was the scariest thing they did and he told me attacking trains. They had to fly parallel over the tracks at low altitude right above the train, which made them easy targets for the anti-aircraft guns the Germans mounted on top of the cars. One of their guys got hit by machine gun fire and came back with over 100 bullet holes in his plane. One tough bird.
He also told me one reason they didn’t use P47 for escorts was they looked too much like Folke-Wulf 190s from the front. Nervous bomber gunners had a habit of shooting at them in the heat of battle.