Syark Air Force (SAF) - 1/72 HobbyMaster USAF F-4C Phantom II s/n 63-7680, Col. Robin Olds "Operation Bolo" 8th TFW, Ubon Royal Thai AF Base, 2 Jan 1967

Col. Robin Olds with trademark mustache, Ubon RTAFB, Thailand. The missile is an AIM-9 Sidewinder with its seeker head covered.

1/72 HobbyMaster USAF  F-4C Phantom II s/n 63-7680, Col. Robin Olds "Operation Bolo" 8th TFW, Ubon Royal Thai AF Base, 2 Jan 1967

Late night posting in my blog. The Legendary F4C Phantom II from USAF 8th TFW that have been joined Operation Bolo 1967 during Vietnam War. Operation Bolo was a deception-based mission during the Vietnam War devised to lure fighter aircraft of the Vietnam People's Air Force (VPAF) Không Quân Nhân Dân Việt Nainto battle where the odds were stacked against the defenders. The mission was planned in response to North Vietnamese tactics during the Operation Rolling Thunder aerial-bombardment campaign where in MiGs were used to attack heavily loaded fighter-bombers while circumventing their fighter escorts.

Bolo pitted the F-4 Phantom II multirole fighter against its rival, the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 interceptor, and was considered to be one of the most successful combat ruses of all time,[1] eventually prompting VPAF pilots and strategists, as well as Soviet tacticians, to re-evaluate the tactics and deployment of the MiG-21.

Colonel Robin Olds was the commander of the 8th Tactical Fighter Wing and an experienced fighter pilot who had become a double ace in two tours over Europe during World War II. He was sent to Southeast Asia to revive the performance of the 8th TFW and he did so from the cockpit. Five days after he arrived at Ubon, the 8th TFW lost an F-4C to an air-to-air missile shot from a MiG-21, the first such loss in the war. This followed two other F-4 losses to MiGs in the two weeks prior to Olds taking command - equal to the number of F-4s lost in the previous 12 years. Olds was upset by the sudden negative trend, but was also convinced that his pilots could take on the MiG-21 and prevail if the MiGs could be drawn into the air on even terms. His idea for Operation Bolo was relatively simple: substitute Phantoms armed with air-to-air missiles for the bomb-laden F-105 strike aircraft and lure the MiGs into a dogfight.

Credit : Wikipedia