NARRATOR: The skies above
North Vietnam erupted into the fiercest air
combat of the war, brutal supersonic
dogfights As kills mount, one US pilot pursues
a life or death quest for a coveted title,
the first Air Force fighter ace of the Vietnam War. [engine sound] Using state of the art
computer animation, you're in the cockpit with
America's finest pilots. As F-4 Phantoms challenge
communist MiG-21s. Experience the battle. Dissect the tactics. Re-live the dog fights. [music playing] April 16, 1972,
American combat forces have been committed to the fight
in Vietnam for eight years. Today four US Air Force F-4
Phantoms call sign Basco orbit 18,000 feet above Laos. The Phantoms are waiting
to escort B-52 bombers into the heart of North Vietnam
in a dramatic escalation of the air war. There's been a mix up, the
B-52s are still on the ground. And the Phantoms
are burning fuel at a rate of 150
pounds per minute. To reduce drag, flight
leader Fred Olmstead orders the Phantoms to jettison their
empty center line fuel tanks. Still the reduced weight
won't buy enough time. Phantom pilots know
that there is nothing that you can do in
a phantom to save that big, beautiful aircraft. Burn all a few you got. We had to make a decision. NARRATOR: Olmstead
has two choices-- wait for the B-52s and
risk running out of fuel, or use their fuel for the
flights secondary ignition, hunting for North
Vietnamese MiGs. Olmstead chooses the
MiGs, the Blue Bandits He turns the
Phantoms 180 degrees. Basco flight is
now on the prowl. Flying number three is
Olmstead's good friend, Dan Cherry. DAN CHERRY: Fred makes a turn
and heads right for Hanoi. And we start pushing the
power up and picking up speed. And we cross that border
into North Vietnam. Almost exactly at that precise
time that we ingress into North Vietnam from our orbit in Laos. My back-seater picked
up two Blue Bandits. NARRATOR: Basco flights audio
transmissions were recorded a remarkable historical
record of air-to-air combat in Southeast Asia. BASCO 1 BRAVO: Basco has two
bandits on the nose at 20. BASCO: Copy that. MAN: The bandits and another 20. BASCO 1: Let's get
rid of them, Basco. Two silver MiGs-21s are 20
miles out and closing head on at the phantoms. Olmstead isn't backing off. He orders Basco flight
to stay on course. FRED OLMSTEAD: They march
right down the radar scope from 18 miles to 12 miles
to 10 miles the eight miles. DAN CHERRY: I didn't
see them at the time. And Fred said, there's two
silver MiGs-21s there, Dan. And I said something really
clever and smart like, where? BASCO 1: There's a
MiG-21 there, Dan. BASCO 3: Where? BASCO 1: Right up
over your head, Dan. BASCO 3: Oh, joy. Two Blue Bandits
just went by us. And that's when the
fight really started. NARRATOR: Olmstead and
his wingman give chase. He rolls his F-4 Phantom into
a climbing turn and swings around 180 degrees. Olmsted and his wingman
are maneuvering to get above and behind the bandit
into a firing envelope. Cherry and his
wingman stay in trail, protecting Olmstead 6 o'clock. Then Cherry spots a third
bandit, a camouflage MiG-21 ambushing Fred
Olmstead from behind. DAN CHERRY: We've gone through
about 90 degrees of turn when my wingman, Greg Crane,
spots the camouflage MiG right off of our nose. NARRATOR: The North
Vietnamese have set a trap, and flight leader Fred
Olmstead is the target. The stage is set for
a legendary dogfight. A battle on the cutting edge
of a dramatic turnaround in the Vietnam air war. Americans are in the
skies above North Vietnam for the first time in
three and half years. In October 1968, seeking
to de-escalate the conflict and bring the North Vietnamese
to the conference table, then President Lyndon Johnson
declared bombing off limits above the DMZ separating
North and South Vietnam. The north used the
bombing halt to build up its military capability. By 1972, they're ready
for a major offensive. They stream hundreds of
thousands of troops and armor down the Ho Chi Minh trail. PHIL HANDLEY: They had massed
approximate 200,000 troops there, north of the DMZ,
has 20 divisions, 600 tanks. And to put that in perspective,
that's the same size, roughly, as the German army had
during the Battle of the Bulge. NARRATOR: In March,
the North Vietnamese surged south across the DMZ. The fate of South Vietnam
rests in the hands of American airmen. April 9, 1972, for the first
time in the Vietnam conflict, American B-52 bombers crossed
the DMZ into the north. They pound supply lines
and troop concentrations, feeding the communist advance. The gloves are coming off. In addition to dropping
bombs, F-4 pilots have another mission-- protect lumbering
B-52s from enemy MiGs. We remember the
Warning that was issued by the chief of staff. And he's said
something in the effect that if any new hot
shot F-4 drivers let a B-52 get shot
down by MiG, you won't be able to drive
a taxicab anyplace. NARRATOR: To American airmen
the most dangerous aerial threat is the MiG-21. First introduced in
1956, the MiG-21, like its MiG-15 and
MiG-17 predecessors, is renowned for its
speed and agility. But unlike its swept
wing predecessors, the MiG-21 employed a
triangular delta wing, an attractive design for
a supersonic fighter, combining low drag
and structural weight with excellent supersonic
maneuverability. It was a formula
one racer, if you want to think of it that
way, turned extremely sharp. It had a big afterburner,
strong and big thrusting afterburner engine. It could turn very,
very quickly very well. It was hard to see. No real smoke, no
smoking engines. NARRATOR: The MiG-21
is armed with heat seeking air-to-air missiles
and two 23 millimeter cannons. It's lethal in close encounters. In contrast to the sleek
MiG, the massive two-seat F-4 Phantom was designed
for the Navy in the late 1950s as a long
range fleet defense fighter. In 1962, it was adapted
for the Air Force for both air-to-air and
air-to-ground missions. The Phantom was armed with four
long-range radar-guided AIM-7 Sparrow missiles and up to 4
short-range heat-seeking AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles. It could also carry up to
16,000 pounds of bombs, rockets, and napalm. Two after-burning
J-79 turbo jet engines make the F-4 a fast and
versatile heavy hitter. You'll never ever, ever forget
what it was like to start those big J-79 engines up, and had
just a little bit of power, and feel that big old phantom
taxiing out, shaking, rumbling. And you just knew you had
strapped on a very, very masculine piece of equipment. It was massive. It looked like a combat plane. NARRATOR: Capable
of reaching speeds over 1,400 miles per hour,
the F-4 is 100 miles per hour faster than the MiG. But the lightweight MiG
with its tight turn radius at high altitude
has the advantage in horizontal maneuvering,
while the F-4's power has the advantage in
vertical maneuvers. With American Phantoms
and B-52s on the attack, North Vietnamese pilots
respond aggressively. They abandon their traditional
hit and run attacks. Now they turn to
challenge the Americans. There's going to be
blood in the sky. Fred Olmsted and his winning
man are in the middle of it. They've fallen for
a trap and chased after two silver MiG-21s. A third camouflaged MiG-21
has jumped on their tail. MiGs sometimes used
camouflage paint schemes for this kind of mission. Staying low with camouflage
made it virtually impossible to see him when we're
looking down in the jungle. NARRATOR: The silver
MiG-21s are here. Olmsted and his
wingman are here. The camouflage MiG streaks
in on their tail here, but he doesn't see Dan
Cherry right behind him on his 6 o'clock. Cherry and his wingman streak
forward and engage the MiG. DAN CHERRY: I rolled
out, saw him, and just headed right for him. And he broke left and went
right into a cloud bank. BASCO 4: 130 near
the cloud, Dan. On your nose, Dan.Reverse
back to the left. OK, he went into the cloud. DAN CHERRY: Going into
a cloud in North Vietnam is a scary proposition. I'm thinking, man, I don't
want to go in that cloud. But I was not going to lose
this opportunity either. NARRATOR: For American airmen in
the hostile skies of Southeast Asia, an innocent looking
cloud can be a death trap. Vietnamese radar operators
can track the F-4s through the clouds to launch
surface-to-air missiles against them. The F-4s Force can
electronically detect the SAM launch, but can't visually
avoid the missile. There's also the danger
of mid-air collision. Cherry and his wingman
know the risks involved. The American airmen are
enveloped in a gray foreboding mist, but the F-4s
pressed the attack. April 16, 1972,
American airmen are in the skies of North Vietnam
for the first time in four years. Dan Cherry and his
wingman, Baby Beef Crane, have chased a MiG
into the clouds. [engine sound] Visibility is zero, a
fighter pilot's worst enemy. The pressure is
much too intense. Cherry aborts. I couldn't stand
it any longer. And I said, I'm not staying
in this cloud any longer, MiG or no MiG. So I'd look all around and my
wingman confirmed his position. So the feeling then was
we've lost this guy. Suddenly, Baby Beef calls
out, MiG 2 o'clock, 4,000 feet above, climbing right turn. It's a lucky break. The MiG bursts through the cloud
bank right in front of him. BASCO 4: Oh, we're
right behind him now. We're right behind him. Go in behind him. NARRATOR: Cherry peers skyward. The MiG has lost
speed in his climb. He's directly in
Cherry's killing zone. Cherry pinches his nose up
trying to gain a missile lock. His first MiG kill is
right in front of him. DAN CHERRY: Things seem to slow
down in their motion to where everything became really clear. NARRATOR: Cherry gets good tone. The infrared seeker head
of the AIM-9 Sidewinder growls in the pilot's headset
when it gets a lock-on. Cherry strains to see the
missile track, nothing. He quickly launches
a second sidewinder. Again, no missile tracking. The missiles have launched,
but Cherry doesn't know it. The MiG's high-G turn has
defeated the missile seeker head. I'm really angry. I mean, here, in my
whole life, I've never seen a MiG this close before. And I have this opportunity
to get this guy, and I've got an airplane
that's not going to work. NARRATOR: Desperate,
the MiG noses over into a spiraling dive. He's hoping that his tight
turns will prevent Cherry from getting another lock on. Cherry and his wingman kick
over into a diving chase. From 25,000 feet,
the three planes hurtle toward the ground. The Americans have the
weight and thrust advantage. Baby beef has
nose-to-head in the dive. Cherry clears him to take the
lead, rolling to the outside, making way for his wingman. BASCO 4: You've got it, Beef. NARRATOR: Beef can't use
a heat-seeking Sidewinder. The MiG's turning too tight. He knows it can't
lock in a high-g turn. He fires a radar-guided Sparrow. Something's wrong. It drops like lead. DAN CHERRY: Then he fires
another one and it does ignite, but it goes into a huge
corkscrew out to the right. Then the third
missile, he fired. And it was tracking really well. And I thought, man, this
is really looking good. NARRATOR: Beef's third missile
streaks through the sky, another radar-guided Sparrow. The Sparrow tracked steadily
on the descending MiG. The MiG breaks hard right. The 500-pound missile
should follow, but it darts past
without detonating. Cherry and Beef have
fired five missiles. All have failed. It's a problem that's plagued
the F-4s since the beginning of the war. Developed in the mid-1950s, the
heat-seeking AIM-9 Sidewinder relies on infrared homing. First generation Sidewinders
are plagued with problems. They're prone to interference
by clouds and rain, and often lock onto bogus
heat sources like the sun. With an effective
range of two miles, the Sidewinder is best employed
against short-range targets. Its long-range counterpart
is the AIM-7 Sparrow, whose maximum range of
28 miles is far greater than the Sidewinder. Introduced in the late
1950s, the Sparrow uses radar instead of infrared. It must be actively tracked
to the target by the F-4's back-seater, the Weapon
System Officer or Wizzo. But the Sparrow is
virtually useless against fast maneuvering targets
inside a 5,000 foot radius. STEVE RITCHIE: During the war,
there were over 200 occasions where someone fired
a Sparrow missile. It never came off the airplane. Of the ones that did
come off the airplane, the kill rate was 0.11. Another was 11 out of
the 100 were victorious. NARRATOR: The Phantom air
crews have another problem. Air Force fighter pilots
as opposed to their Navy counterparts received
little or no training on how to maneuver against small
fast adversaries like the MiG. FRED OLMSTEAD: What did I learn
in my training about MiG pilots is a very simple answer. I learned virtually nothing. The experience we
received in training was not against any
dissimilar type aircraft. We only saw other fellow
Phantoms with the same flying characteristics that we had. DAN CHERRY: The most
effective air-to-air training we had was done illegally. And we would go out and fire
bombing mission or our radar low level navigation mission,
and save some fuel at the end, and then fight with each other. So whatever skills we had when
we went in there were developed by hook or crook. NARRATOR: Thrust into
his first dogfight against an actual
miG21, Dan Cherry is on a steep learning curve. He races through his options. Two of his missiles have failed. But he's determined
to kill the MiG. DAN CHERRY: This is going to
sound weird, but I'm thinking, I'm going to ram this guy. That's the aggressive feeling
that I had at the time, was that I was not going
to let this guy get away. NARRATOR: The MiG has
lost airspeed in the turn. Cherry and Beef pitch
up and roll vertically to keep from overshooting. As they descend once
again on the MiG, cherry calls for the lead. BASCO 3: Break out, Beef. I've got him wired. Yeah, he's breaking. Break left, Beef. I've got him. Basco 4, take left. BASCO 4: OK. Go get him, Dan. I kept telling Greg to get out
of the way, and I'm in burner. And I'm trying to close on him
because I'm ready to shoot. I'm ready to try to shoot. NARRATOR: Cherry slides past
the Crane and fires a missile. DAN CHERRY: Lo and behold, that
big AIM-7 Sparrow comes out of there. And it does one of these
like a barrel roll maneuver like this at first. NARRATOR: The sparrow appears
to be tracking off course. But then to Cherry's relief,
it rides the Phantom's invisible radar
beam to the target. It's 65-pound warhead detonates,
ripping the right wing from the airplane. Cherry watches the plane
plummet in a fireball. BASCO 3: Got him. I got him. Look at him go down. I see the chute. I see the chute. NARRATOR: From the flames, the
MiG pilot miraculously appears underneath his parachute. Cherry roars past his
vanquished opponent DAN CHERRY: I made a little
jink with the airplane to miss the MiG pilot
and his parachute. We went up by him-- well, within 500 feet of him. And I remember clearly his legs
sticking out straight like this and the black flying
suit he was wearing, the black flight suit on. NARRATOR: Dan Cherry has
killed his first MiG. BASE: Roger, understand you
got a kill on a blue bandit. BASCO 3: Basco 3,
that's affirmative. BASE: Basco 3, roger. NARRATOR: But the
fight isn't over. 10 miles away Cherry's
good friend, Fred Olmstead, is chasing down
two enemy MiG-21s. He's in for the
fight of his life. FRED OLMSTEAD: Right
down there is no doubt. We're going to
have an engagement. We're going to have a
very serious dogfight. And somebody's not coming home. NARRATOR: April 16, 1972,
F-4 Phantoms are dueling communist MiGs in the most
intense dogfights of the air war. Fred Olmstead is on
the tail of two MiG21s. The enemy's streamline
their fighters for battle I then remember distinctly
seeing silver objects coming down in front of me. And they pick up their
center line tanks. NARRATOR: Then unexpectedly,
the lead MiG rolls inverted, diving earthward. FRED OLMSTEAD: He was gone. He was out of the fight. That man-- it was my
airplane and my wingman against their wingman. NARRATOR: Olmstead and
his wingman are here. The MiG leader has just
bugged out leaving his wingman to fend for himself. Olmstead bores in for the kill. The lone MiG jinks down and
into a left turn, a classic MiG ploy. He wants to lure Olmstead
into a horizontal fight, where the more maneuverable MiG
can out turn the Phantom. FRED OLMSTEAD: Once
I saw that turn, I was confronted
with a choice here-- whether or not to
try and turn with him and get the gun sight on him,
or try and accomplish what I had learned in the past. And I said I'm going to fight
this guy in the vertical. I'm not going to get out there
and try and turn with this man. NARRATOR: Olmstead pitches
vertically then rolls over into a dive. The move allows him to
stay behind the MiG, while keeping his airspeed up. He'll avoid a turning fight
where his heavy phantom will dissipate crucial airspeed or
energy at a far greater rate than the lightweight MiG. It's an effective
maneuver called lagging. FRED OLMSTEAD: I've found that
I can accelerate coming down because gravity
was working for me, pull inside, and use my
increased energy to close the distance that way. NARRATOR: Olmsted and his
wingman repeat the maneuver several times. The horizon tumbles as the
planes jockey for position. Losing sight of his
attacker, the MiG reverses his turn to
reacquire visual contact. But the reversal slows him
down and allows Olmstead to close within missile range. Olmstead's radar-guided
AIM-7 Sparrow gains lock. Olmstead fires. The missile streaks toward the
MiG at twice the speed of sound and plows through
the MiG's right wing. Incredibly, the
MiG keeps flying. I don't know weather the
missile meant partially detonated or perhaps it was
just the impact that absolutely saw that wing off. But that's what I had. I had a MiG with about
a half of a right wing in a spiraling left
hand turn at that time. NARRATOR: Olmstead
presses the attack. He fires a second missile. It doesn't track. Sparrow three
armed missile away. It hit him right
atop a canopy, right through the canopy. And then I got a pure absolute
explosion because the airplane just exploded. It looked like two miniature
nuclear fire balls actually. And it just spiral
right down from us. BASCO 1: Red Crown, Basco 01. RED CROWN: This is Crown, go. BASCO 1: Scratch another MiG21. NARRATOR: Fred Olmstead has
killed number two for Basco flight. What began as an important B-52
escort mission has resulted in two confirmed MiG kills. In 1972, the North Vietnamese
have less than 60 MiGs in their Air Force. Thanks to Fred Olmsted
and Dan Cherry, they've lost 3%
of their fighters. On the ground, the
determined North Vietnamese continue their offensive. In May 1972, the
bombing campaign intensifies dramatically. B-52 sorties are doubled from
1500 in March to over 3,000 in May. F-4s are employed for bombing
strikes and strafing runs against North Vietnamese
infrastructure and troop positions. The massive new aerial offensive
is called Operation Linebacker. PHIL HANDLEY: There were much
greater numbers of aircraft involved. It was a massive campaign that
probably did more damage in two weeks than the rest of the
damage done in an entire war in North Vietnam. NARRATOR: The
strategic objective is to both blunt the
North Vietnamese advance and to bring them back to the
negotiating table in Paris. There's a renewed
sense of purpose among the American airmen
including captain Steve Ritchie. After graduating number one
in his flight training class, Ritchie served his first tour
in Southeast Asia in 1968. He then returned
to the States where he became one of the youngest
flight instructors in Air Force history. In 1972, he returns to Vietnam. STEVE RITCHIE: I
don't think any of us felt like we could sit here
and live this good life here in America, while our
friends and our colleagues were back in Vietnam. NARRATOR: Steve Ritchie racks
up his first two big kills in the opening weeks of
Operation Linebacker, one on May 10, another on May 31. Richie is proving himself
a skilled dogfighter. As Linebacker rolls
on through June, Ritchie flies in support of
dozens of strike missions. July 8, 1972, on routine
combat air patrol, Ritchie will tangle with a flight
of lethal MiG-21s and plunge into one of the most astounding
dogfights of the Vietnam War. July 8, 1972,
pilot Steve Ritchie leads a flight of
four F-4 Phantoms call over t of Operation Linebacker, the
war's biggest bombing campaign. Their mission is to
protect B-52s from MiGs. On this mission,
the Americans are able to tap into the enemy's
command and control network, an intelligence
coup that's driving the success of Linebacker. They can hear the control
that was talking to pilot. They could hear what
the pilot was saying. And so you knew where they
were, what they're looking at, where they're coming from. NARRATOR: Steve Ritchie
and Paula flight are heading towards Hanoi. Suddenly combat control
crackles in his helmet. MiGs are in the air
somewhere below. Ritchie drops down to
search for the enemy. He can't find them. They could be anywhere. Then another warning
comes over the radio. I got a call indicating
that they had us insight, and they were cleared to fire. And that information at best
was about 40 to 60 seconds old. And we had no visual, so
that get your attention. NARRATOR: If he stays straight
and level, he's a sitting duck. Richie takes evasive action
by making a hard right turn. The radio calls out
another warning. This one is ominous, two
MiGs, two miles to the north. The MiGs are on Ritchie's
6, the killing zone, but he still can't see them. Ritchie's best choice is to
turn directly into his attacker and try to get a visual. He banks left, stays
in the turn and swings 180 degrees, head on
against the unseen enemy. His head swivels in the
cockpit, scanning the sky. Visible for a
fraction of a second, a MiG-21 flashes by
at 600 miles per hour. STEVE RITCHIE: We pass canopy
to canopy, about 1,000 feet from each other, doing about
600 miles an hour each, closing at about
1,200 miles an hour. Just subsided, I could actually
see the pilot in the cockpit. NARRATOR: The pilots of a
North Vietnamese Air Force were trained by the
Russians and Chinese. Their skill level varied widely. Throughout the war
it was strongly suspected that volunteers
from North Korea, China, and the Soviet Union
were in the cockpits of some communist planes. Richie knows there's
another in the air. They've split up
setting a trap for him. The first has
streaked past Richie. If he turns to follow, the
second MiG will be on his 6. But Richie doesn't bite. He drops altitude and
waits for the second MiG to show his hand. And he does. Now, Ritchie makes his move. He pulls into a hard left turn. 6.5 Gs plaster
him into his seat. He strains to keep an
eye on the second MiG. The MiG banks right,
an unorthodox move. I was very surprised about
halfway through this turn, after losing sight
during the turn, to see the number two in a
right turn level and high. Most of us who fly fighter
airplanes prefer to turn left than right. We prefer a left traffic pattern
to a right traffic pattern. It's more comfortable to
do this than it is this. NARRATOR: The two planes are
now angling towards each other in what pilots refer to as
the high crossing position. In order for his
missile to get a lock, Ritchie needs to
get behind the MiG. He rolls to the inside causing
the MiG to shoot past him. Ritchie is now on
the MiG's tail. It's a brilliant move. Ritchie pulls hard right out of
the roll and gets a radar lock. It then takes four
seconds for the radar to feed the information
to the missile. BASCO 1 BRAVO: 1,001 1,002 1,003
1,004, which is a long time. Squeeze the trigger,
nothing happens. It's another second and a half
until the missile comes off the radar. NARRATOR: Ritchie commits
a second missile Pilots often ripple fire the Sparrow
because of its failure rate. First missile went through
the center of the fuselage of the MiG, second missile
went through the fireball. NARRATOR: The explosion sends a
wall of debris hurtling through the air. . Richie's headed right for it. He rolls up to steer clear. It's too late. Debris punches into his
left wing, gouging the skin. Ritchie clutches the stick,
the big Phantom shrugs off the insult. Ritchie
firewalls the throttle. The fight's still on. His number four, Tommy
Fiesel, is in trouble. He's got a MiG on his 6 o'clock. Richie is here. Tommy Fiesel is here. He's in a tight circling turn
with a MiG-21 on his tail. The MiG's tight turning
radius will eventually put him in a position
to shoot down Paula 4. Ritchie sizes up the situation. He's going fast. If he engages too
soon, he'll overshoot. The best time to get
on the MiG's tail is when it's moving away from
him, and he can match its turn. Richie's number four and
the MiG21 pass in front. It's time. Richie pounces. The MiG21 is now
predator and prey. The MiG-21 sees Richie. He aborts the chase,
brakes hard and down. Put the MiG in the gun sight,
auto [inaudible] lock with the trigger on
the left throttle, immediate lock on,
1,001 1,002 1,003 1,004, squeeze the trigger. NARRATOR: The 12-foot long
sparrow blazes off the Phantom at 1,200 miles an hour. The sparrow rocks to the right. And then, like a
spear, it buries itself deep in the MiG's belly. [engine sound] [explosion] In a stellar display
of airmanship, Steve Ritchie downs two MiG21s
in just one minute and 29 seconds. Everything that had
studied, learned, experienced, worked for 30 years
all came together and gelled in an
instant in time. So it was by far the most
perfect mission that I was ever involved in. NARRATOR: Paula flight
rejoins and heads for home, Udorn, Thailand. When they arrive the
celebration begins. STEVE RITCHIE: Actually, I
flew a couple of victory rolls over the field, which
is kind of traditional. And we had a party at
the club that night you would have enjoyed. NARRATOR: Steve Ritchie is
on the cusp of greatness. He has tied renowned veteran
pilot Robin Olds with four MiGs to his credit. Ritchie needs just one more
kill to join the coveted ranks of American fighter aces. But the quest could
cost him his life. Steve Ritchie's double
kill on July 8, 1972 is hailed as one of the
war's great dogfights. Now, he needs just
one more victory to become the Air Force's
first and only ace pilot of the Vietnam War. There was a whole
lot of attention because the Navy had an ace;
Air Force didn't have an ace. There was a lot of pressure. NARRATOR: August 28, 1972, Steve
Ritchie leads a flight of four F-4 Phantoms, call sign Buick. They're combat air patrols
mission is winding down when he gets word of MiGs in the air. STEVE RITCHIE: I was Northwest
of Hanoi beginning to get low on fuel, turns out MiGs
were southwest of Hanoi. And were being
vectored back to Hanoi. NARRATOR: As flight
lead, Ritchie's phantom is equipped with a
little black box that makes a big difference in
air-to-air combat against MiGs, the APX-81, officially
known as the Combat Tree or just Tree to airmen. Tree is an IFF, Identification
Friend or Foe Transponder system. All military aircraft
carry transponders that send and receive
identification information to air traffic control
and friendly planes. But Tree is unique. It can read the
enemy's transponder. Tree-equipped Phantoms can
tell if a blip on their radar is a MiG and shoot them out
of the sky from miles away. STEVE RITCHIE: We got the tree
contact way out, two MiG-21x coming back, non-maneuvering. They're about 5,000,
maybe 8,000 feet above us, started this climbing turn in
the direction on the radar. NARRATOR: Ritchie has used
technology to get in position. But he must get a visual
before he can fire. Under those circumstances, the
cardinal rule is to never fire. If there's any chance
there could be a friendly in the forward-flying sector. NARRATOR: The aircraft hurtle
in, their closing speed a blistering 1,500
miles per hour. Ritchie fires two missiles. But at these staggering
closing speeds, the missile can't
maintain radar lock. They streaked away harmlessly. The MiGs take no evasive action. They're focused on reaching
the sanctuary of Hanoi's antiaircraft defenses. Ritchie must make his kill soon. The MiG's roar head on
past the climbing F-4s. Ritchie orders a left brake. They swing around 180 degrees
and zero in on the MiG's tail. I'm now supersonic doing
about one point to mock. They're still subsonic. And I've got a radar lock
on, fired two missiles. The first one appeared to go by
on the right side of the MiG. And he broke left,
which solved the problem for the fourth missile. NARRATOR: The MiGs abrupt
maneuver slows him down. He drifts into the Sparrow
missile's effective range. The missiles warhead
detonates on impact. Steve Ritchie becomes
the first Air Force pilot ace of the Vietnam War. STEVE RITCHIE: The number two
MiG and that flight of two did a wave down to the ground. And I elected not to try to
go after that MiG due to fuel. And I have debated that in
my mind many, many times over the years whether or
not we should try that. NARRATOR: Ritchie
and Buick flight head south for friendly
airspace as word reaches the airbase
at Udorn, Thailand. The Air Force now has an ace. STEVE RITCHIE: We came in and
actually did a low airshow over the field. NARRATOR: In this
rarely seen interview, Steve Ritchie
recounts the mission. STEVE RITCHIE: Picked
him up high at 11:00 on almost the head-on pass. And from there,
maneuvered into 6 o'clock and fired a few missiles. We're lucky enough
to get a kill. NARRATOR: Operation
Linebacker thunders on. The Paris Peace talks
resume in late August. The devastating air assault
has taken a heavy toll on North Vietnamese
transportation, oil supplies, and power generation. PHIL HANDLEY: The North
Vietnamese simply did not think we had the will or
our president had the will to bring the force of our
attacker down upon them, miscalculated. NARRATOR: On October 22, North
Vietnamese concessions in Paris lead to a cessation of bombing
strikes over the 20th parallel. But the talks break down
again two months later. On December 14th,
President Nixon sends Hanoi an
ultimatum, come back to the negotiating table
within 72 hours or the bombing resumes. There is no response from Hanoi. On December 18th,
Operation Linebacker Two commences, and B-52s head north. 200 B-52s, half the
Strategic Air Command, are committed to the fight. By December 29th, the big
bombers have flown 729 sorties and dropped over
15,000 tons of bombs. The North Vietnamese
returned to the negotiations. And on January 23, 1973, a
peace agreement is signed. Thanks in part to phantom
pilots, the war in Vietnam had finally ended. American airmen down 193
MiGs in the air-to-air combat against a loss of
89 of their own. STEVE RITCHIE: Those of us out
on the point of the spear, so to speak, very much rely on
each other to get this job done and to survive. So we develop a very, very
unusual bond with each other. DAN CHERRY: We had a mission. We work the details of
the plan ahead of time. And we executed
it to perfection. And then to have the added
bonus of a couple of MiG kills as well is
pretty neat experience. FRED OLMSTEAD: Being a MiG
killer is a life-shaping event, I would say. You feel honored to be part
of a very, very elite group of fighter pilots going back
to World War I, World War II, Korea you name it. And the men that can claim
to have won aerial victories and dogfights are an
illustrious group. So it is an honor
and a privilege to be part of that group.
