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The Ace of Spades is commonly thought of as the highest-ranking card in the deck of playing cards, although the actual value of the card varies from game to game. In popular myth and folklore, it is also known as "The Death Card."The Ace of Spades has been employed, on numerous occasions, in the theatre of war. In the Second World War, the soldiers of the 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the American 101st Airborne Division were marked with the spades symbol painted on the sides of their helmets. In this capacity, it was used to represent good luck, due to its fortunate connotations in card playing. All four card suits were used for ease of identification of regiments within the airborne division following the confusion of a large scale combat airborne operation. Battalions within the regiments were denoted with tic marks or dots, marked from top clockwise; Headquarters at the twelve o'clock position, 1st Battalion at the three o'clock, et cetera.

Some twenty years later, the Ace of Spades was again used by American soldiers — this time as a psychological weapon in the Vietnam War. US troops erroneously believed that Vietnamese ancient traditions held the symbolism of the spade to mean death and ill-fortune and in a bid to scare away NLF soldiers without firefight, it was common practice to leave an Ace of Spades on the bodies of killed Vietnamese and even to litter the forested grounds and fields with the card. This custom was erroneously believed to be so effective, that the Bicycle Playing Cards company was asked to supply crates of that single card in bulk. The crates were often marked with "Bicycle Secret Weapon"

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