Another encounter was reported by the 1st Lt. Harris Boyce of the 35th Squadron. Two MiGs overflew his 3-plane patrol and seconds later they were streaking down the Mustangs from behind. The F-51s broke right, Boyce yanking his machine around in the tightest 180 degree turn he could manage to come around behind one of the MiGs. He reported numerous hits before the jet streaked north, out of control, over the Yalu. The entire encounter lasted three minutes. Again, no crash or explosion was observed and Boyce had to content himself with a "probable"–and his life.

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The next day, November 8, two flights of F-80Cs from the 51st Fighter Interceptor Wing watched as six MiG-15s took off from Antung, crossed the Yalu at high altitude and began diving on them in pairs. Since the first reports of MiG attacks a week earlier, the Shooting Star pilots had been itching to match their mettle with the new Soviet fighters and eagerly turned into their attackers, causing them to break wildly. Five of the MiGs streaked for home, but a sixth dived away and 1st Lt. Russell J. Brown of the 16th Squadron discovered that his straight-winged F-80 could not only keep up, but that he was gaining on the MiG. Realizing his error, the MiG pilot pulled his plane out of the dive and into a climb, but Brown did not give him a chance to bring his superior climbing speed (10,100 feet-per-minute) into play. Lining the Mig up, Brown peppered it with a five-second burst and saw his riddled adversary dive out of control, smoking and flaming, into the ground. Brown had been victorious in the first jet-versus-jet combat in history.

The next day, Task Force 77’s carrier air groups were ordered to bomb rail and highway bridges at Sinuiju and highway bridges near Hyesanjin, 200 miles upstream. The attack was carried out by a F4U Corsairs and AD Skyraiders. with a top cover of F9F Panther jets. The force detailed to hit Sinuiju was attacked by Chinese MiG-15s from Antung air base, which then were themselves jumped by the F9Fs. During the engagement, one of the Communist jets fell to an F9F flown by the commander of VF-111 from the carrier Philippine Sea, Lt. Cmdr. W.T. Amen–first blood for the Navy.

It was clear that the only effective counter to the MiG jet fighter threat would be another jet but despite their initial successes, the F-80 and F9F both lacked the speed and climb to do the job. The MiG-15 was 100 mph faster than the F-80 and a full 300 mph faster than the prop-driven F-51. Although six MiGs were credited to Shooting Stars in the course of the war, 14 F-80s would be lost to the swept-wing jets.

Fortunately, the MiG’s match would not be long in coming. On the same day Brown scored his historic victory, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff made their decision to commit the best American jet fighter operational to the Korean front–the North American F-86A Sabre. Salt water damage in transit delayed the arrival of the Sabre-equipped 4th Fighter Interceptor Group at Kimpo until December 13, but the unit flew its first training flight–actually an operational patrol–on December 15 and, on December 17, Lt. Col. Bruce H. Hinton led four F-86As on a sweep of the Yalu, using F-80 radio call signs and flying F-80 patterns to ensure that any MiGs would not be shy about coming up to play. Four did intercept the formation near Sinuiju and were as surprised as Hinton had hoped they would be as the Sabres tore into them at a speed approximating the MiGs’ own. A brief fight ensued before the MiGs retired in haste, short one of their number, and Hinton returned to Kimpo to do the first of hundreds of victory rolls that Sabre pilots would perform over the next two-and-a-half-years.

Meanwhile, new events had taken place to further alter the course of the war. After three days of continuous bombing and rocket attacks, all bridges across the Yalu were down except one–the tough railroad bridge at Sinuiji. A week later, the entire effort was nullified when the river itself froze over. By the first week of December, the ice was thick enough to lay railroad tracks on and support supply trains.

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