🔷 Bolo!

Operation
Bolo

This week marked the 59th anniversary of one of the most famous Air Force missions of the Vietnam War, led by a fighter pilot known for his large bulletproof mustache.

What

On January 2, 1967, a package of 56 F-4 Phantoms (plus tankers, airborne radar, and jamming support) took to the skies to execute Operation Bolo.

Led by legendary fighter pilot Robin Olds, over a 12-minute period, they took on 8-9 MiG-21s (depending on the source) and downed 7 of them.

Those lop-sided numbers don’t tell the whole story, though.

The Backstory

The North Vietnamese had been using their new (and few) MiG-21s judiciously, explicitly targeting the Air Force’s F-105 “Thud” fighter-bombers. The strategy:

1. Threaten the F-105s so they jettison their bombs (no bombs = no threat), or

2. Get them anchored in a dogfight (the F-105 was built for speed, not maneuvering), and

3. Avoid F-4 Phantoms at all costs

Oh What

Making matters worse was the graduated response campaign fittingly named Rolling Thunder, which imposed restrictive Rules of Engagement (ROE), limiting the Air Force's ability to strike airfields, radars, or early warning sites.

The North Vietnamese could literally see every attack coming.

Combined with hit-and-run tactics, the MiGs were tallying kills—and driving the morale of frustrated U.S. fighter pilots into the dirt.

To kill a MiG meant it needed to be airborne and somehow get drawn into an engagement with the F-4—the fighter that the North Vietnamese were explicitly trying to avoid. 

Surprise!

The solution was to trick the MiGs into a fight by disguising F-4s as F-105s.

Jets would fly F-105 strike routes up to Thud Ridge, use F-105 radio calls and F-105 jamming pods along the way so the North Vietnamese could see them. Except they weren’t F-105s—they were F-4s in disguise.

The verifiable combination of radar tracks, ELINT, and COMINT would draw the MiGs into the sky to engage the wrong jets.

Robin Olds pitched the plan to his boss, Gen. William Momyer, and the mission was approved on Dec. 27th, 1966.

On Jan 2, 1967, it went off without a hitch.

An Air Force-owned NSA-operated C-130B-II Silver Dawn was listening to the MiG-21 pilots in real-time. Declassified transcripts of the intercepted comm include these translated gems:

• “The sky is full of F-4s!”

• “Where are the F-105s? You briefed us to expect F-105s!”

• “I’d like to come down now!” 

Fool me again: A variation of this ruse was repeated again days later. A pair of F-4C Phantoms mimicked an unarmed RF-4C photo reconnaissance mission profile and shot 2 MiG-21s down.

The Aftermath

In the span of 96 hours, over half (9 of 16) of all the MiG-21s had been shot down.

The North Vietnamese were forced to pause flight operations and regroup, paving the way for months of more permissive strike operations—and sky-high morale.  

Operation Bolo: a constant reminder to the tech-centric Air Force that the real advantage is the deadly combination of technology and tactics.

Bolo: Stuff You Should Know

1. The mission was named after the Filipino bolo cane-cutting machete, which doubled as a martial arts weapon

2. The mission comprised a whopping 96 fighters—56 F-4Cs, 24 F-105s, and 16 F-104s (half were in support roles)

3. Of the 56 fighters who engaged in Operational Bolo, only the 26 in the west package entered the target area, and only 12 F-4s ever saw a MiG. But those 12 F-4s racked up 7 kills

4. The 7 kills required upwards of 28 missiles fired—par for the course for weapons reliability at the time

5. The plan was led by Robin Olds, but devised by wing tactics officer, Captain John “JB” Stone—he recruited two 1LTs to help plan the whole thing

In That Number

216

The Navy revealed it will require 216 jet trainers to replace its aging T-45 Goshawk fleet under the Undergraduate Jet Training System (UJTS) program.

The official RFP should drop later this month, and the Navy intends to have a winner on contract by early 2027.

TRIVIA

What was the state of Robin Olds’ famous facial hair when he led Operation Bolo?

A) peach fuzz
B) work in progress
C) full combat mustache
D) what mustache?

On the Radar

New Air Force Drone Unit. The Air Force will establish a new Experimental Operations Unit (EOU) this spring to operationalize low-cost, one-way attack (OWA) drones. Following the CCA EOU model, this second EOU will develop tactics for fixed-wing, attritable systems and inform units of action in the 2030 timeframe.

• The Merge’s Take: This signals a break from all other Air Force efforts in that this is a ground-launched, not air-launched, effort. Initial indications are that this EOU will focus on Group 3 drones that operate at the 600-1,000-mile range. It will be interesting to see how this matures, DOTMLPF-wise. There are no conventional Air Force units that exist to do this mission, which is likely why Air Combat Command is partnering with Air Force Special Operations Command on the EOU.

China’s Merchant Fleet Flip. Two cargo ship reveals occurred over the holidays that are hard to miss, but easy to confuse. The first was the arsenal ship, a civilian cargo ship packed with container-based missile launchers and radars. The second was the drone carrier, which packed the cargo ship with rail-launched Group 5 drones.

The Merge’s Take: Look closer at the hull number. This is the exact same ship showing off 2 vastly different militarized configurations of a cargo ship—in one of the busiest locations for cargo ship traffic in the Pacific. Expect to see more of these emerge as the game of white-force shipping obfuscation escalates.

New BBG “Battleship.” The US has officially launched the Trump-class battleship program, a centerpiece of the Navy’s new Golden Fleet plan. The 880-foot 35,000-ton BBG(X) vessel will feature 128 vertical launch systems (VLS), rail guns, and laser weapons. The Navy aims for 20-25 ships, with the lead vessel (USS Defiant) entering service by roughly 2037.

• The Merge’s Take: The USS Defiant is projected to cost a whopping $13.5B, which is the price of an aircraft carrier, and is highly unlikely to survive politics (or budget wars) long enough to ever see the water.

• The Merge’s Spicy Take: Is it even a battleship? It has the length of an Iowa-class battleship, but is 20,000 tons lighter due to a presumed lack of armor. Better to take the Chinese cargo ship concept and install a ton of VLS containers on the deck of LHA-class amphibious assault ships.

They Said It

“The reunification of our motherland, a trend of the times, is unstoppable.” 

— Xi Jinping, President of China, during his annual New Year’s Eve address in Beijing

The remarks followed the end of Justice Mission 2025, a 2-day large-scale live-fire exercise that simulated a blockade around Taiwan involving 35+ ships, including 4 amphibious assault ships, and 130+ sorties flown by fighters, bombers, and early warning aircraft.

Note the last of the 4 stated exercise goals: three-dimensional external line deterrence.

That is not typically included in China’s exercise rhetoric, but sounds like a direct response to Japan’s recent remarks that a blockade near Taiwan could constitute a “survival-threatening situation.”

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Knowledge Bombs

• Kongsberg acquired Zone 5 Technologies to produce affordable, high-volume strike missiles

• EraDrive closed a $5.3M funding round for autonomous satellite flight modules

• HavocAI completed the world’s first autonomous cross-domain mission without GPS

• Boeing was awarded a $8.6B contract for 25 F-15IA jets to Israel

• L3Harris was tapped to produce 60 hypersonic motors for Kratos

• Long Wall unveiled Cyclops, a low-cost exoatmospheric interceptor

• Germany approved a record $59B military package for thirty major defense projects

• Kongsberg won a $240M US Air Force contract for Joint Strike Missiles for F-35s

• China unveiled its stealthy CH-7 flying wing drone

• The FCC blacklisted foreign drones and critical components, reinforcing the Pentagon’s Drone Dominance initiative

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ANSWER
D. Robin Olds was famous for his mustache during his tour in Vietnam, but when he led Operation Bolo—the mission he’s most famous for—he had not yet decided to grow a mustache.