who was brigadier general robin olds
why did he become a legend and how did he become a legend of the united states air force
and why did he end up being the only pilot in vietnam with a bounty on his head hello i'm
colin heaton former soldier sniper and marine and former history professor today we'll be discussing
the life and career of legendary fighter pilot brigadier general robin olds on forgotten history
robin holds was born on july 14 1922 in honolulu hawaii his father was later major general robert
olds robin had an interesting fascination with aviation because his father was aided
to general billy mitchell who was court-martialed for disrespect after proving that bombers can sink
a ship robin sort of inherited that rebellious trait from his father robin later became a high
school athlete played football and earned a place at west point where he played football
and became an all-american he also trained to be a fighter pilot and he started his combat
career flying p-38 lightnings over europe out of england later transitioning to p-51 mustangs
robin was a very innovative leader at the age of 22 he was the youngest major in the u.s army air
corps later the u.s army air force and he also developed many technical innovations along with
other great fighter pilots in the u.s military such as hubert zimke of the 56th fighter group
robin holtz ended world war ii with 13 confirmed victories however his after-action report
showed that he attacked and damaged the mb262 jet but he lost contact with that jet
research in my book above the reich which has his complete interview proves that robin had
an additional victory in world war ii so his score should have been 14 in world war
ii and then later his victories were accumulated with four or more victories in vietnam
robin was very good friends with the hierarchy of the air force his father and he were friends with
general ire acre he knew general curtis lemay robin's career made him relatively famous when
he came back to the states he married film actress ella raines who was signed to several film studios
doing uh films and later in her career she would do television shows as well uh when the korean
war broke out robin wanted to go back into action and fly fighters like some of the other pilots of
world war ii frank gabreski bud mcchiron those fellas but his wife has so much political pull
through the to the studios that uh the directors and the producers of these studios to keep her
happy talk to their friends who were on capitol hill and in the pentagon and blocked robin from
ever getting combat duty in korea robin did not know the reasons why for many years until later
he had a meeting with one of the rockefellers who was an investor and he was informed that his wife
ella used her strings with the film companies and her political contacts to kill every request for
deployment to korea that he put forward finally when vietnam broke out robin was still getting
sidelined and not getting combat assignments which infuriated him as he told me personally
that he just wanted to dance upon the corpse of anyone who would let him go kill communists
well robin got his wish after he infuriated his superior officers and they sent him to
vietnam as punishment he arrived in thailand and began flying operations using the f4 phantom
therefore phantom that he flew did not have guns it was strictly a missile carrier which infuriated
him because his pilots could have chalked up more victories if they had guns for close combat
then robin finally realized that the status of the air force at that time was not what he
would consider optimal he wanted to change the tactics he saw that the f-105 thunder chiefs
were getting shot down in horrific numbers that the military hierarchy were scheduling bomb
runs on targets that were well predicted by the north vietnamese and so they simply set up their
anti-aircraft defenses and their make fighters to intercept every aircraft coming into a target zone
robin decided to create something called operation bolo what he did was he had a plan
that went all the way to the pentagon it was revolutionary but they gave him a shot robin
said to me this is either going to be my glory day or the end of my career but i had to try it
so what he decided to do was take his phantoms and impersonate f-105 thunder chiefs on their standard
flight run the migs would not come up for phantoms they would not come up for fighters but they would
come up to kill the bombers so they flew in an f-105 formation they flew and chatted openly on
the f-105 channel knowing that the enemy would be listening to this but he also had the f4s modified
to carry emission pods that the f-105 did carry that would be picked up by the north vietnamese
the deception worked beautifully robin and his fighters were jumped by the north vietnamese migs
and they totally eradicated the force without losing a single aircraft
robin would later get high praise and go visit lyndon johnson the president of the united states
and discuss the air war with him uh then of course ho chi minh was so infuriated with the publicity
that old scott we learned his name he put a hundred thousand dollar bounty on his head for
the mig pilot who could take him out robin was very insulted by this in his own words he said
damn i cost that bastard 10 times that much money just on operation bolo so he felt cheapened robin
became one of the most extraordinary pilots in american history his pilots loved him
north vietnamese wanted to kill him but finally they rotated him out they would not let him
continue flying because it was bad propaganda to have a guy with his stature captured or killed and
as he went back to the united states he continued his career and was promoted to brigadier general
he later became commandant of cadets that was at the air force academy which is newly established
and uh ended his career as a brigadier general and then he had a very interesting retirement
in colorado in steamboat springs colorado where he was interviewed along with buddy hayden one of his
friends from world war ii another fighter pilot also interviewed him above the reich he became a
living legend and is still heralded to this day by pilots in the u.s air force his tactics and
innovation became the linchpin of his legend and if you enjoyed this segment on robin olds
please click like subscribe to our channel and we will continue this interesting series on
people who made history on forgotten history and i'm colin heaton thank you for watching
you