Robin Olds

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Robin Olds
July 14, 1922(1922-07-14) – June 14, 2007 (aged 84)
Col. Robin Olds with trademark mustache, Ubon RTAFB, Thailand. The missile is an AIM-9 Sidewinder with its seeker head covered.
Place of birth	Honolulu, Hawaii
Place of death	Steamboat Springs, Colorado
Allegiance	United States of America
Service/branch	United States Air Force
Years of service	1943–1973
Rank	Brigadier General
Commands held	8th Tactical Fighter Wing 434th Fighter Squadron No. 1 Squadron RAF
Battles/wars	World War II Vietnam War *Operation Bolo
Awards	Air Force Cross Air Force Distinguished Service Medal (2) Silver Star (4) Legion of Merit Distinguished Flying Cross (6) Air Medal(40) British Distinguished Flying Cross Croix de Guerre with Palm (France)

Robin Olds (July 14, 1922 – June 14, 2007) was an American fighter pilot and general officer in the U.S. Air Force. He was a "triple ace", with a combined total of 16 victories in World War II and the Vietnam War.^[1] He retired in 1973 as a brigadier general.

Born into a regular Army family, educated at West Point, and the product of an upbringing in the early years of the U.S. Army Air Corps, Olds epitomized the youthful World War II fighter pilot. He remained in the service as it became the United States Air Force, despite often being at odds with its leadership, and was one of its pioneer jet pilots. Rising to command of two fighter wings, Olds is regarded among aviation historians and his peers as the best wing commander of the Vietnam War, both for his air-fighting skills and his reputation as a combat leader.^[2]

Olds was promoted to brigadier general after returning from Vietnam but did not hold another major command. The remainder of his career was spent in non-operational positions, as Commandant of Cadets at the United States Air Force Academy and as a bureaucrat in the Air Force Inspector General's Office. His inability to rise higher as a general officer is attributed to both his maverick views and his penchant for drinking.^[3]

Olds had a highly-publicized career and life, including marriage to Hollywood actress Ella Raines. As a young man he was also recognized for his athletic prowess in both high school and college, being named an All American for his play as a lineman in American football. Olds expressed his philosophy regarding fighter pilots in the quote: "There are pilots and there are pilots; with the good ones, it is inborn. You can't teach it. If you are a fighter pilot, you have to be willing to take risks."^[4]

Contents 1 Early life 1.1 West Point and football 2 World War II fighter pilot 2.1 P-38 Lightning missions 2.2 P-51 Mustang pilot 3 Career highlights and assignments 4 Vietnam 4.1 MiG killer 4.2 Olds' mustache 4.3 Dogfighting advocate 5 Post-Southeast Asia career 5.1 Air Force Academy 1967-71 5.2 Director of Aerospace Safety 5.3 1972 inspection tour and retirement 6 Awards and decorations 7 Personal 8 Notes 9 References 10 External links

[edit] Early life

Olds was born in Honolulu into an Army family and spent his boyhood in Hampton, Virginia, where he attended elementary and high school. His father was Colonel and later Major General Robert C. Olds, a fighter pilot in World War I, former aide to Billy Mitchell, and a leading advocate of strategic bombing in the U.S. Army Air Corps. His mother Eloise died when Olds was four and he was raised by his father.^[5]

Growing up on Air Corps bases, Olds came in almost daily contact with the small group of officers who would lead the US Army Air Forces in World War II (one neighbor was Major Carl Spaatz, destined to become the first Chief of Staff of the USAF),^[6] and as a result was imbued with an unusually strong dedication to the air service, and conversely, with a low tolerance for officers who did not exhibit the same.^[7] Olds first flew at the age of eight, in an open cockpit biplane operated by his father. At the age of 12, Olds made attending the U.S. Military Academy at West Point an objective to accomplish his goals of becoming an officer, a military aviator, and playing football.^[8]

His father eventually was promoted to colonel and made commander of the pioneer B-17 Flying Fortress 2nd Bombardment Group at Langley Field, Virginia. Olds attended Hampton High School where he played high school football on a team that won the state championship of Virginia in 1937. Olds was aggressive, even mean, as a player,^[9] and received offers to attend Virginia Military Institute and Dartmouth College on football scholarships.^[10]

Instead of entering college after graduating in 1939, Olds enrolled at Millard Preparatory School in Washington, D.C., a school established to prepare men for the entrance examinations to the military academies. When Germany invaded Poland, Olds attempted to join the Royal Canadian Air Force but was thwarted by his father's refusal to approve his enlistment papers.^[11] Olds completed Millard Prep and applied for admission to West Point. After he received a conditional commitment for nomination from a Pennsylvania congressman, Olds moved to Uniontown, Pennsylvania, where he lived in the YMCA and supported himself working odd jobs. He also took and passed the entrance examination. Olds was accepted into the Class of 1944 on June 1, 1940, and entered the academy a month later.^[12]

[edit] West Point and football

As a plebe, Olds played football on a freshman squad that began the season with three losses but finished 3-4-1 while the varsity won only one game in its second consecutive losing season. As a result, the new academy superintendent, Maj. Gen. Robert L. Eichelberger, replaced the head coach (an Army officer) with Earl "Red" Blaik, a 1920 graduate and head coach at Dartmouth, who had recruited Olds in 1939.^[13]

Olds played on the varsity college football team in both 1941 and 1942. At 6 foot 2 inches in height and weighing 205 pounds, he played tackle on both offense and defense, lettering both seasons. Army's record in 1941 was 5-3-1, with wins over The Citadel, VMI, Yale, Columbia, and West Virginia, a scoreless tie with Notre Dame, and losses to Harvard, Penn and Navy. The loss to the midshipmen was followed eight days later by the attack on Pearl Harbor.^[14]

In 1942 he was named by Collier's Weekly as its "Lineman of the Year" and by Grantland Rice as "Player of the Year." Olds was also selected as an All-America as the cadets compiled a 6-3 record, beating Lafayette College, Cornell, Columbia, Harvard, VMI, and Princeton, and falling to Notre Dame, Penn, and Navy.^[15] In the Army-Navy game of 1942, which was played at Annapolis instead of Philadelphia, Olds had both upper front teeth knocked out when he received a forearm blow to the mouth while making a tackle. Olds returned to the game and reportedly was cheered by the Navy Third and Fourth Classes, which were assigned as the Army cheering section when wartime travel restrictions prevented the Corps of Cadets from attending.^[16]

In the middle of Olds' Third Class year, the academy began an accelerated program for those entering in 1940 that shortened the course of study to three years, and for those applying to the Air Corps, also provided primary flying training at nearby Stewart Field, of which 206 cadets completed the training. Olds graduated on June 1, 1943, with the Class of June 1943^[17] and received his pilot's wings personally from Gen. Henry H. Arnold.^[18]

During his Academy years Olds acquired a strong contempt for alumni networking, commonly called "ring knocking", to the degree that he went out of his way to conceal his West Point background.^[19] In 1985 Olds was enshrined in the College Football Hall of Fame.^[15]

[edit] World War II fighter pilot

[edit] P-38 Lightning missions

Lieutenant Olds completed fighter pilot training with the 329th Fighter Group, based at Grand Central Air Terminal in Glendale, California. In early 1944 he was part of the cadre assigned to build up the newly activated 434th Fighter Squadron and its parent 479th Fighter Group, based at Lomita, California. Olds logged 650 hours of flying time during training, including 250 hours in the P-38 Lightning, as the 479th trained to become a combat group. It departed the Los Angeles area on April 15 for Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, and shipped aboard the USS Argentina for Europe on May 3. The 479th arrived in Scotland on May 14, 1944, and entrained for RAF Wattisham, England, where it arrived the next day.^[20]

The 479th began combat on May 26, flying bomber escort missions and attacking transportation targets in occupied France in advance of the invasion of Normandy.^[21] Olds flew an older P-38J Lightning he nicknamed Scat, the first of many fighters bearing the name. His crew chief, T/Sgt. Glen A. Wold, said that Olds showed an immediate interest in aircraft maintenance and learned emergency servicing under Wold. He also insisted his aircraft be waxed to reduce air resistance and helped his maintenance crew carry out their tasks.^[22] On July 24 Olds was promoted to captain and became a flight and later squadron leader.

In Scat III, Olds shot down two Fw-190s following a low-level bridge-bombing mission to Montmirail, France, on August 14. Eleven days later he and his wingman became separated from the group on an escort mission to Berlin, and attacked a large gaggle of Bf-109s, estimated at 50 or more in number. Despite severe battle damage to his own plane, including loss of a side window of its canopy, Olds shot down two during the dogfight and another on the way home to become an ace.^[23][24] He made eight claims while flying the P-38 (five of which are credited by the Air Force Historical Research Agency) and was originally credited as the top-scoring P-38 pilot of the ETO.^[25]

[edit] P-51 Mustang pilot

The 479th FG converted to the P-51 Mustang in mid-September and Olds scored his first kill in his new Scat V on October 6. Promoted to major on February 9, 1945, he claimed his seventh victory southeast of Magdeburg, Germany the same day, downing another Bf-109. On February 14, he claimed three victories, two Bf-109s and an Fw-190, but the latter was later changed to a "probable".^[26]

His final WWII aerial kill occurred on April 7, 1945, when Olds in Scat VI led the 479th Fighter Group on a mission escorting B-24s bombing an ammunition dump in Lüneburg, Germany. The engagement marked the only combat appearance of Sonderkommando Elbe, a Luftwaffe geschwader formed to ram Allied bombers.^[27][28] South of Bremen, Olds noticed contrails popping up above a bank of cirrus clouds, of aircraft flying above and to the left of the bombers. For five minutes these bogies paralleled the bomber stream while the 479th held station. Turning to investigate, Olds saw pairs of Me 262s turn towards and dive on the Liberators. After damaging one of the jets in a chase meant to lure the fighter escort away from the bombers, the Mustangs returned to the bomber stream. Olds observed an Me 109 of Sonderkommando Elbe attack the bombers and shoot down a B-24, pursued it through the formation, and shot it down.^[29]

Olds achieved the bulk of his strafing credits the following week in attacks on Lübeck Blankensee and Tarnewitz airdromes on April 13, and Reichersburg airfield in Austria on April 16, when he destroyed six Luftwaffe planes on the ground. He later reflected on the hazards of such missions:

I was hit by flak as I was pulling out of a dive-strafing pass on an airfield called Tarnewitz, up on the Baltic. Five P-51s made a pass on the airdrome that April day. I was the only one to return home...When I tested the stall characteristics of my wounded bird over our home airfield, I found it quit flying at a little over 175 mph indicated and rolled violently into the dead wing (note: the right flap had been blown away and two large holes knocked in the same wing). What to do? Bailout seemed the logical response, but here's where sentiment got in the way of reason. That airplane (note: "Scat VI") had taken me through a lot and I was damned if I was going to give up on her...why the bird and I survived the careening, bouncing and juttering ride down the length of the field, I guess I'll never know.^[30]

Olds had not only risen in rank to field grade but was given command of his squadron on March 25, less than two years out of West Point and at only 22 years of age. By the end of his combat tour he was officially credited with 12 German planes shot down and 11.5 others destroyed on the ground.^[24]

[edit] Career highlights and assignments

Returning to the United States after the war, Olds was assigned at West Point as an assistant football coach for Red Blaik. Apparently resented by many on the staff for his rapid rise in rank and plethora of combat decorations,^[31] Olds transferred in February 1946 to the 412th Fighter Group at March Field, California, to fly the P-80 Shooting Star, which began a career-long professional struggle with superiors he viewed as more promotion- than warrior-minded.^[32]

In April 1946, he and LTC John C. "Pappy" Herbst (WWII ace in the CBI) formed what could be considered the Air Force's first jet aerobatic demonstration team (forerunners to the Thunderbirds). In late May, the 412th was ordered to undertake PROJECT COMET, a nine-city transcontinental mass formation flight. Olds and Herbst performed a two-ship acro routine that thrilled the crowds at every stop, the highlight being a three-day layover in Washington, D.C.. In June, Olds was one of four pilots who participated in the first one-day, dawn-to-dusk, transcontinental roundtrip jet flight from March Field to Washington, D.C. That same year he took second place in the Thompson Trophy Race (Jet Division) of the Cleveland National Air Races at Brook Park, Ohio. In this first "closed course" jet race, six P-80's competed against each other on a three pylon course 30 miles in length.^[33]

In October 1948, he went to England under the U.S. Air Force/Royal Air Force Exchange Program. Flying the Gloster Meteor jet fighter, he eventually served as commander of No. 1 Squadron at Royal Air Force Station Tangmere.^[34] However, he was not the first foreigner to command an RAF unit as widely quoted. (In 1943 Polish WW2 Ace, Stanislaw Skalski, was a commander of No. 601 (County of London) Squadron RAF.)^[35]

Olds was assigned to command the 71st Fighter Squadron, then an Air Defense Command unit stationed at Greater Pittsburgh Airport, Pennsylvania, and as a result missed service in the Korean War, despite repeated applications for a combat assignment. Discouraged and at odds with the Air Force, in which he was seen as an iconoclast, Olds reportedly was in the process of resigning when he was talked out of it by a mentor, Maj. Gen. Frederic H. Smith, Jr., who brought him to work at Eastern Air Defense Command headquarters at Stewart.^[36]

Promoted to lieutenant colonel February 20, 1951, and colonel April 15, 1953, Olds served unenthusiastically in several staff assignments until returning to flying in 1955 in F-86 Sabres. At first on the command staff of the 86th Fighter-Intercepter Wing at Landstuhl Air Base, Germany, Olds then commanded its 86th Fighter-Interceptor Group from October 8, 1955, to August 10, 1956.^[37]

Olds had administrative and staff duty assignments at the Pentagon between 1958 and 1962, then attended the National War College, graduating in 1963. Olds next became commander of the 81st Tactical Fighter Wing at RAF Bentwaters, England, an F-101 Voodoo fighter-bomber wing, on September 8, 1963. The 81st TFW was a major combat unit in United States Air Forces Europe, having both a tactical nuclear and conventional bombing role supporting NATO. Olds commanded the wing until July 26, 1965.^[37] As his Deputy Commander of Operations Olds brought with him Col. Daniel "Chappie" James, Jr., whom he had met during his Pentagon assignment and who would go on to become the first African-American 4-star Air Force general.^[38] James and Olds worked closely together for a year as a command team and developed both a professional and social relationship which was later renewed in combat.^[39]

Olds formed a demonstration team for the F-101 using pilots of his wing, apparently without command authorization, and performed at locales in Europe. He asserted that his superior at Third Air Force attempted to have him court-martialed, but the commanding general of USAFE, Gen. Gabriel P. Disosway, instead removed him from command of the 81st TFW, canceled a recommendation for a Legion of Merit award, and had him transferred to Shaw Air Force Base, South Carolina.^[40]

In 1966, Olds was assigned to the 4453rd Combat Crew Training Wing, Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Arizona, (where Col. James was now Deputy Commander of Operations) for replacement training in the F-4C Phantom fighter. His instructor was Major William L. Kirk, the 4453rd CCTW's Standardization and Evaluation officer, who had been one of Olds' pilots at RAF Bentwaters, and who later commanded the United States Air Forces Europe as a full general. Kirk also accompanied Olds to George Air Force Base, California, for training in the use of the AIM-7 Sparrow missile, duties which Olds later rewarded by having Kirk transferred to his command in Thailand in March 1967.^[41]

[edit] Vietnam

On September 30, 1966, Olds took command of the 8th Tactical Fighter Wing, based at Ubon Royal Thai Air Force Base.^[37] A lack of aggressiveness and sense of purpose in the wing had led to the change in command (Olds' predecessor had flown only 12 missions during the 10 months the wing had been in combat).^[42] The 44-year-old colonel also set the tone for his command stint by immediately placing himself on the flight schedule as a rookie pilot under officers junior to himself, then challenging them to train him properly because he would soon be leading them.^[43] In December Olds was re-united with Col. Chappie James, and they again became an effective command team (popularly nicknamed "Blackman and Robin").^[44] Olds took to the air war over North Vietnam in an F-4C Phantom he nicknamed, in keeping with his previous aircraft, Scat XXVII.

[edit] MiG killer

After suggesting the idea to Seventh Air Force commander Major General William Momyer, himself a former commander of the 8th TFW, Olds was directed to plan a mission designed to draw the North Vietnamese MiG-21s into an aerial trap, and "Operation Bolo" resulted.

In October 1966, strike force F-105s were equipped with QRC-160 radar jamming pods whose effectiveness virtually ended their losses to surface-to-air missiles. As a result, SAM attacks shifted to the Phantoms, unprotected because of a shortage of pods. To protect the F-4s, rules of engagement that allowed the MiGCAP to escort the strike force in and out of the target area were revised in December to restrict MiGCAP penetration to the edge of SAM coverage. MiG interceptions increased as a result, primarily by MiG-21s using high speed hit-and-run tactics against bomb-laden F-105 formations, and although only two bombers had been lost, the threat to the force was perceived as serious.^[45]

The Bolo plan reasoned that by equipping F-4s with jamming pods, using the call signs and communications codewords of the F-105 wings, and flying their flight profiles through northwest Vietnam, the F-4s could effectively simulate an F-105 bombing mission and entice the MiG-21s into intercepting not bomb-laden Thunderchiefs, but Phantoms configured for air-to-air combat.^[46]

After an intensive planning, maintenance, and briefing period, the mission was scheduled for January 1, 1967. Poor weather caused a 24-hour delay, but even then, a solid overcast covered the North Vietnamese airbases at Phuc Yen, Gia Lam, Kep, and Cat Bai when the bogus strike force began arriving over the target area, five minute intervals separating the flights of F-4s. Leading the first flight, Olds overflew the primary MiG-21 base at Phuc Yen and was on a second pass when MiGs finally began popping up through the cloud base. Although at first seemingly random in nature, it quickly became apparent that the MiGs were ground-controlled intercepts designed to place the supposed F-105s in a vise between enemies to their front and rear.^[46]

The F-4s and their crews, however, proved equal to the situation and claimed seven MiG-21s destroyed, almost half of the 16 then in service with the VPAF (the VPAF admitted to losing six that day), without loss to USAF aircraft. Olds himself shot down one of the seven. Follow-up interceptions over the next two days by MiGs against RF-4C reconnaissance aircraft led to a similar mission on a smaller scale on January 6, with another two MiG-21s shot down. VPAF fighter activity diminished to almost nothing for 10 weeks afterwards, thereby accomplishing the main goal of Operation Bolo: to eliminate or diminish the threat of MiGs to the strike formations.^[46]

On May 4, Olds destroyed another MiG-21 over Phuc Yen. Two weeks later, he destroyed two MiG-17s, bringing his total to 16 confirmed kills (12 in World War II and four in Vietnam), making him a triple ace. Several sources claim that Olds intentionally avoided shooting down a fifth MiG, even during at least 10 opportunities to do so, because he had learned that Seventh Air Force would immediately relieve him of command as a publicity asset.^[47] He was awarded a third Silver Star for leading a low-level bombing strike on March 30, 1967, and the Air Force Cross for an attack on the Paul Doumer Bridge in Hanoi on August 11.

His 259 total combat missions included 107 in World War II and 152 in Southeast Asia, 105 of those over North Vietnam. Scat XXVII was retired from operational service and placed on display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio.^[48]

[edit] Olds' mustache

Olds was known for the extravagantly waxed (and decidedly non-regulation) handlebar mustache he sported in Vietnam. It was a common superstition among airmen to grow a "bulletproof mustache",^[49][50] but Olds also used his as a mark of his individuality. Said Olds:

"Generals visiting Vietnam would kind of laugh at the mustache. I was far away from home. It was a gesture of defiance. The kids on base loved it. Most everybody grew a mustache."^[51]

Returning home, however, he discovered not everyone was fond of his flamboyance. When he reported to his first interview with Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. John P. McConnell (a former Strategic Air Command planner and commander), McConnell walked up to him, stuck a finger under his nose and said, "Take it off." Olds replied, "Yes, sir."

The incident with the mustache is given credit as the impetus for a new Air Force tradition, "Mustache March", in which pilots world-wide show solidarity by a symbolic, albeit good-natured "protest" for one month against Air Force facial hair regulations.^[52]

[edit] Dogfighting advocate

Olds was a strong advocate of the importance of tactical air power and maintaining conventional warfare proficiency during the Cold War, in an era when the Air Force's priority doctrine was on nuclear warfare. In 1962 he was ordered to stop writing a paper on the importance of conventional and tactical air power by his commander.

"We weren't allowed to dogfight. Very little attention was paid to strafing, dive-bombing, rocketry, stuff like that. It was thought to be unnecessary. Yet every confrontation America faced in the Cold War years was a 'bombs and bullets' situation, raging under an uneasy nuclear standoff." The Vietnam War "proved the need to teach tactical warfare and have fighter pilots. It caught us unprepared because we weren't allowed to learn it or practice it in training."^[51]

The History Channel, in its series Dogfights, recreated Operation Bolo using a computer animation for an episode entitled "Air Ambush", first telecast on November 10, 2006. Olds, then 84 years old, appeared as a commentator, and as background, dogfights he experienced as a P-38 pilot were also recreated.

[edit] Post-Southeast Asia career

[edit] Air Force Academy 1967-71

After relinquishing command of the 8th TFW on September 23, 1967, Olds reported for duty to the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in December 1967. He served as Commandant of Cadets for three years and sought to restore morale in the wake of a major cheating scandal. Olds was promoted to brigadier general on June 1, 1968, with seniority dating from May 28.^[48]

[edit] Director of Aerospace Safety

In February 1971 he began his last duty assignment as director of aerospace safety in the Office of the Inspector General, Headquarters USAF, and after December 1971 as part of the Air Force Inspection and Safety Center, a newly-activated separate operating agency located at Norton Air Force Base, California. Olds oversaw the creation of policies, standards, and procedures for Air Force accident prevention programs, and dealt with work safety education, workplace accident investigation and analysis, and safety inspections.^[48]

[edit] 1972 inspection tour and retirement

When Operation Linebacker began in May 1972, American fighter jets returned to the offense in the skies over North Vietnam for the first time in nearly four years. Navy and Marine Corps fighters, reaping the benefits of their TOPGUN program, immediately enjoyed considerable success. In contrast, by June, the Air Force's fighter community was struggling with a nearly 1:1 kill-loss ratio. Air Force Inspector General Louis L. Wilson, Jr., a West Point classmate, sent Olds to Southeast Asia to determine why Air Force pilots were less successful.

Olds toured USAF bases in Thailand (flying several unauthorized combat missions in the process) and brought back a blunt assessment. Air Force pilots, he said, "couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag." To the surprise of nearly everyone else in the room, Air Force Chief of Staff John D. Ryan (another former SAC general and often at odds with the tactical fighter community), agreed with Olds. Olds later offered to take a reduction in rank to colonel so he could return to operational command and straighten out the situation. Olds decided to leave the Air Force when the offer was refused and retired on June 1, 1973.^[53]

[edit] Awards and decorations

Robin Olds' ribbons as they appeared on his uniform at his retirement in 1973.

From top, and from left to right: Command pilot.

• Row 1: Air Force Cross; Air Force Distinguished Service Medal.
• Row 2: Silver Star, three oak leaf clusters; Legion of Merit; Distinguished Flying Cross, five oak leaf clusters.
• Row 3: Air Medals, with 39 oak leaf clusters.
• Row 4: Air Force Commendation Medal; American Defense Service Medal; European-African-Middle Eastern Campaign Medal.
• Row 5: World War II Victory Medal; National Defense Service Medal; Vietnam Service Medal.
• Row 6: [Air Force Cross (United Kingdom)]]; Croix de Guerre with Palm (France); Vietnam Air Force Distinguished Service Order.
• Row 7: Vietnam Air Force Meritorious Service Medal; Vietnam Air Gallantry Medal with Gold Wings; Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal.^[48]

[edit] Personal

Olds was one of five siblings, and briefly a stepbrother of author Gore Vidal after Olds' father married for the third time in June 1942, to Nina Gore Auchinloss. His father died of pericardial disease in May 1943 at the age of 47, just prior to Olds' graduation from West Point.^[54] In 1947, while based at March Air Force Base, Olds met and married Hollywood actress (and "pin-up girl") Ella Raines, and they had two children. Although they remained married until her death in 1988, they separated in 1975.^[55] A later marriage to Morgan Olds ended in divorce.^[56] In his retirement at Steamboat Springs, Colorado, Olds pursued his love of skiing and served on the city's planning commission. He was active in public speaking, making 21 events as late in his life as 2005 and 13 in 2006.^[57]

Olds' fondness for alcohol was well-known. John Darrell Sherwood, in his book Fast Movers: Jet Pilots and the Vietnam Experience,^[58] posits that Olds' heavy drinking hurt his post-Vietnam career. On July 12, 2001, Olds was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol and resisting arrest near his home in Steamboat Springs. Olds, briefly hospitalized during the incident for facial cuts, plead guilty in return for charges of weaving and felony vehicular eluding being dropped. Olds was placed on one year probation, and ordered to pay almost $900 in fines and costs, attend an alcohol education course, and perform 72 hours of community service.^[59]

Days later, on July 21, 2001, Olds was enshrined at Dayton, Ohio, in the National Aviation Hall of Fame class of 2001, along with test pilot Joseph H. Engle, Marine Corps ace Marion E. Carl, and Albert Lee Ueltschi. He became the only person enshrined in both the National Aviation Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame.^[60]

In March 2007 Olds was hospitalized in Colorado for complications of Stage 4 prostate cancer. On the evening of June 14th, 2007, General Olds died from congestive heart failure in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. Olds was honored with a flyover and services at the United States Air Force Academy on June 30, where his ashes will be kept. General Olds will also be remembered as the Class Exemplar of the Academy's Class of 2011, who had begun Basic Cadet Training and their first steps towards becoming Air Force officers just two days before he was laid to rest.^[61]

[edit] Notes

[edit] References

• USAF in SEA: Aces and Aerial Victories - 1965-1973 - No. 146 AFHRA
• USAF Credits - WWII -No. 85
• Boyne, Walter J. "Mig Sweep", AIR FORCE Magazine November 1998
• College Football Hall of Fame. Hall of Famers: Robin Olds includes photograph of Olds as a cadet
• Sherwood, John Darrell. (1999) Fast Movers: Jet Pilots and the Vietnam Experience, Free Press, ISBN 0312979622
• Anderson, Lars. (2004) The All Americans, St. Martins Press, ISBN 0312308876
• Fairfield, Terry A. (2004) The 479th Fighter Group in World War II: in Action over Europe with the P-38 and P-51, Schiffer Military History, ISBN 0764320564
• Michel, Marshall L. (1997). Clashes: Air Combat Over North Vietnam 1965-1972, Naval Institute Press, ISBN 1557505853
• Nordeen, Lon O. (1986) Air Warfare in the Missile Age, Smithsonian Institute Press, ISBN 0874746809
• Brigadier General Robin Olds. USAF biography

[edit] External links

• Photostatic copy of Olds' victory claim report of 14 Feb 45 with links to other reports
• Profile image of Scat VI P-51K
• "The Old Man and the Migs", TIME Magazine June 6, 1967
• Ace Pilots.com - Col. Robin Olds - Operation Bolo
• Ace Pilots.com - Maj. Robin Olds - WW2
• The History Channel - Dogfights - "Air Ambush" premiered 10-Nov-2006
• 8th Tactical Fighter Wing Vietnam Era Website

Persondata
NAME	Olds, Robin
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION	U.S. Air Force general
DATE OF BIRTH	July 14, 1922
PLACE OF BIRTH	Honolulu, Hawaii
DATE OF DEATH	June 14, 2007
PLACE OF DEATH