it's the afternoon of the 2nd of January 1967 in Thailand 28 f4c Phantoms of the US Air Force's eighth Fighter Wing known as the wolf pack are taking off and form up into seven flights of four aircraft each each flight has been assigned cor signs of American Automobile Brands olds Ford Rambler Lincoln Tempest Plymouth and the Italian scooter brand Vesper the first four Phantoms in old's flight briefly Circle until the Third flight Rambler is in the air the formation then turns North to follow the same Ingress route that f105 Thunder Chiefs use when carrying out
bombing missions against North Vietnam however the objective for today's mission is not to destroy enemy infrastructure this is Operation bolo a carefully planned trap to destroy dangerous North Vietnamese mig21 interceptors a quick word from this week's sponsor World of Tanks A free-to-play online combat game where you can fight in 800 tank destroyers artillery light medium and heavy tanks fight using your own tactics rushing ambushing or sniping your opponents across different terrains such as Open Fields steep hills forests deserts or Urban centers feel like a real tank commander in an armored Thunder Run in historically accurate
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of the premium tank Centurion Mark 5/1 RAC or 100,000 credit conf compensation if you already have this tank in your garage the air war in Vietnam is not going well for the United States beginning in March of 1965 the US Air Force and US Navy have been attacking North Vietnamese War infrastructure as part of Operation Rolling Thunder however the aerial campaign has suffered from faulty planning and the North Vietnamese defenses have proven more deadly than expected the US Air Force and navy took heavy losses in failed attacks on Dragon's jaw bridge in early April of
1965 and in June 1966 alone North Vietnamese anti-aircraft defenses shot down 43 American aircraft to make matters worse United States military planners severely underestimated the effectiveness of the small Vietnam people's Air Force or vpaf following the first vpaf kills in the attack on the dragon's draw this problem has only got worse in the first 10 months of 1966 North Vietnamese migs have forced 77 American strike aircraft to jettison their Munitions before reaching their targets a further nine US aircraft have been shot down in air-to-air Combat versus 24 migs for the Americans a lackluster kill ratio
of only 2.6 to1 the fast and agile mig21 proves to be the biggest threat to Rolling Thunder strike packages North Vietnamese Mig 21s execute hit and run attacks which are taking a heavy toll on American strike aircraft especially the f105 Thunder Chiefs to counter the mig21 threat Colonel Robin SS the eighth fighter Wings flamboyant Commander has come up with a daring plan Colonel SS is one of the most influential pilots in the United States military having earned double ace status in the skies above Europe during the second world war his outspoken manner earned him many
enemies in the Air Force but his superiors recognized that his unorthodox and aggressive tactics are exactly what the underperforming eighth Fighter Wing needs upon taking command of the wolf pack in the summer of 66 s and his wing tactics officer Captain JN Stone get to work tackling the Mig problem the migs will need to be destroyed in aerial combat due to North Vietnamese airfields being off limits to Rolling Thunder bombing raids by winter they have come up with an idea that will evolve into operation bolo named for a Filipino machete which can look deceptively harmless
to enemies until it is too late operation bolo is an unconventional plan in essence the 28 Phantoms of the eighth Fighter Wing will disguise themselves as f-105s on their way to bomb Targets near the North Vietnamese capital of Hanoi this West force will overfly vpaf airfields to bait the m21s into the air where they can be destroyed meanwhile an East force of 28 Phantoms from the 366th Tactical Fighter Wing flying out of dang Airbase will cut off their escape route to China to get the enemy to commit the West Force Phantoms are outfitted with QRC
160 jamming pods usually only carried by f105 these jamming pods protect the Thunder Chiefs from enemy surfac to AAR missiles but North Vietnamese radar could recognize the electronic signature emitted by the pods outfitting the Phantoms with the jamming pods will hopefully bait the enemy into attacking what they think will be the slower heavier Thunder Chiefs rather than the US Air Force's Premier fighter on the morning of the second January 24 f105 Thunder Chiefs escorted by 16 f104 star Fighters strike North Vietnamese Sam sites near the airfields in order to clear the way for the Phantoms
by 300 p.m. the olds flight led by Colonel SS himself has arrived above the fuken Airfield just north of Hanoi old school's out green up on the radio usually the code for f105 to arm their bombs in the hope that enemy radio operators are listening in however they find the area devoid of enemy aircraft and the Airfield obscured by heavy clouds knowing they might only get one shot to make this deception work SS orders his flights to Circle at 18,000 ft the later flights have been times to arrive above the Airfield 5 minutes apart to
allow the flight before to engage at will with their missiles yet just as Ford flight is about to arrive a phantom call sign olds 03 detects a mig21 17 M away closing fast from 12:00 just as the flight is about to engage the Mig Dives underneath the Phantoms and back into the dense Cloud layer seconds later three m21s appear climbing through the clouds the North Vietnamese interceptors appear almost at random with one popping up behind old's flight and the other two ahead of the Phantom the enemy has taken the bait and the fight is on
Colonel SS leads the formation in a hard turn to port to maneuver for a favorable firing position the Phantoms drop their fuel tanks and prepare for the dog fight the American Pilots Must Destroy the enemy aircraft with their missiles because the f4c Phantom does not have guns SS lines up on a MIG to his 12:00 and fires two am7 e sparrows for a minimum range but neither guides onto the target he then launches two am9 Sidewinders but again the missiles fail to track this continues a pattern of American Air toar missiles acting unreliably in the
tropical climate of Southeast Asia the mid 21 to the rear of the flight opens fire on olds 03 with its cannons but misses Alo 2 piloted by first lieutenant Ralph hetan launches Two Sparrows at the migan front the first simply falls off the rail and doesn't ignite but the second achieves lock and smashes into the mig's tail sending it into an irrevocable flat spin there is no time to celebrate as the mig21 behind the flight continues to fire with its cannons break left we've got one at six shouts vetan and three of the Phantoms turn
sharply to the left causing the mick to overshoot the formation old o4 piloted by Captain Walter radaker does not break and fires off a Sidewinder that blows the enemy aircraft out of the sky another Mig climbs through the clouds directly in front of Colonel SS eager to finally get a kill in his first dog fight with a jet fighter he launches two more sidewinders one Rockets pass the enemy aircraft without exploding but the other scores a direct hit and sends the Flaming Mig tumbling out of the sky the first engagement has lasted less than 2
minutes when Ford flight arrives in the area old's flight begins to withdraw from the area due to low fuel just as two more Mig 21s move to attack the four Phantoms of Ford flight they assume almost the same attack formation as the previous group of vpaf aircraft one to the rear and one to the front flight Commander Colonel Daniel James Jr hesitates in engaging the enemy interceptors to avoid hitting old's flight which is retreating beneath them James leads the formation in a left turn followed by a hard right turn to shake the M 21 behind
them he orders for3 and foro 4 to break right but finds himself right next to a third Mig which has appeared from the clouds he later recalls we were so close that besides the red stars in the wings I could clearly see the Pilot's face James executes a role to place himself behind the mig21 and fires a Sidewinder but the Mig evades it with a hard left turn however the North Vietnamese pilot has put himself directly in front of Captain ever at raspbury in Ford o02 Colonel James fires another two Sidewinders which both Miss but
raspbury splashes the Mig with a Sidewinder of his own the last two migs flee back into the clouds just as for flight is relieved by Rambler flight the Americans have so far shot down four for no loss led by Captain John Stone a co-architect of operation bolo Rambler flight arrives and stone immediately spots a pair of migs popping up from the clouds below he leads the Phantoms in a dive and tries to fire a sparrow but the missile frustratingly fails to ignite however Stone persists and fires a second Sparrow which successfully tracks and destroys a
MIG two more Mig 21s are spotted behind the first pair and cross directly in front of the Phantoms major Philip comes follows them to the left and fires Two Sparrows one fails to ignite while the other fires and tracks exploding amongst a mig's tail it explodes in midair while first lieutenant Lawrence Glenn launches a sparrow of his own at another Mig swatting the enemy aircraft out of the sky however North Vietnamese groundbased air defenses now fire five sa2 Sams at the aircraft of Rambler flight forcing them to retire the last four flights of phantoms arrive
on station as scheduled but no more enemy aircraft are spotted the dog fight has lasted just 12 minutes the eighth fighter Wings Phantoms have shot down seven Mig 21s almost half of the vpa's current Fleet of 16 the Americans have suffered no losses upon Landing back at ubon Airbase the pilots hold up their fingers to indicate how many enemy aircraft they shot down operation bolo is a massive success and the same strategy will be replicated by the 555th Tactical Fighter Squadron 3 Days Later two more Mig 21s are shot down for no loss forcing the
North Vietnamese to ground their entire Interceptor Fleet for 4 months while they retrained their pilots in new tactics Colonel Robin olds will end the war with four kills having purposefully avoided becoming an ace in order to remain in combat his bold new tactics have injected life back into the American war effort as the US Air Force kills 15 enemy aircraft in January of 1967 for the loss of only one in return Thanks to this week's sponsor World of Tanks join 100 million players online by using my link in the description to download and enjoy the
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