MiG attacks became more frequent and more aggressive during the first month of Rolling Thunder. Then, on April 4th 1965 F105s attacked the Dragons Jaw Bridge in North Vietnam. The second wave was ambushed by MiG17s, which shot down two of the lumbering Thuds.

US planners who had initially assumed that the obsolete MiG17 would pose little threat to the powerful supersonic US tactical fighters received a rude surprise. In response, they commissioned a crash programme of dissimilar dogfight training called Featherduster.

Over a three month period, all of the major USAF tactical fighters engaged Air National Guard F86H Sabres in dogfights to understand their strengths and weaknesses against first generation fighters. The results were as prescient as they were astounding. In this video I explore the lessons that the TAC did, and more importantly, should have learned from this experience.

I hope you enjoy this one. I really couldn't believe what I was reading when I first came across the declassified documents. It makes you wonder what might have been...

Notes:

Antique, but brilliant forum thread on Featherduster: https://rec.aviation.military.narkive...