Richard Stephen Ritchie

In 2015, along with other American Aces, he was awarded a Congressional Gold Medal.

Ritchie logged over 4,000 flying hours in his Air Force career. He retired from the Air Force in 1999.

Promoted to brigadier general in the Air Force Reserve in 1994, he became the mobilization assistant to the commander of Air Force Recruiting Service. For six years, he traveled across the United States, speaking to approximately 1,100 audiences in support of Air Force recruiting efforts. He also flew more than 100 air show performances in the T-38 Talon. He retired in January 1999, after flying in his last air show at Randolph Air Force Base, Texas.

He joined the Colorado Air National Guard and continued his military duty in a flying status while pursuing his civilian career, later transferring to the Air Force Reserve. In 1985, he was appointed director of the Office of Child Support Enforcement, reporting to the Secretary of Health and Human Services. In 1987, he was assigned to the Mobilization Policy and Plans Directorate at the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

A political conservative, Ritchie opted to leave active duty following Vietnam, in 1974, joining the Air National Guard and running for Congress from North Carolina at the urging of U.S. Senator Barry Goldwater. However, he lost in the wake of the Watergate Scandal, during which time Republican party newcomers were challenged to get elected. He held various executive positions in private life, including six years at the Adolph Coors Company (now Coors Brewing Company) and the Heritage Foundation, where he was special assistant to Joseph Coors.

Ritchie volunteered for a second combat tour in 1972 and was assigned to the 432nd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing at Udorn Royal Thai Air Force Base, Thailand. Flying F-4 Phantom IIs with the famed 555th ("Triple Nickel") Tactical Fighter Squadron he shot down his first Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 on 10 May 1972, scored a second victory on May 31, a third and fourth on July 8, and a fifth on August 28. All of the aircraft he shot down were MiG-21s, and all were shot down by the much-maligned AIM-7 Sparrow radar-guided air-to-air missile. Ritchie became the United States Air Force's first and only pilot ace of the Vietnam War.

Ritchie's final victory came August 28, 1972, while leading "Buick" flight, a MiGCAP for a strike north of Hanoi. During the preceding month Seventh Air Force had instituted daily centralized mission debriefings of leaders and planners from all fighter wings called "Linebacker Conferences." Ritchie had just started his flight of Combat Tree Phantoms on its return to base (Ritchie was flying the F-4D, AF Ser. No. 66-7463, in which he had scored his first kill). Red Crown, now the nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser USS Long Beach, alerted the strike force to "Blue Bandits" (MiG-21s) 30 miles (48 km) southwest of Hanoi, along the route back to Thailand. Approaching the area of the reported contact at 15,000 feet (4,600 m), Ritchie recalled recent Linebacker Conference information that MiGs had returned to using high altitude tactics and suspected the MiGs were high. Buick and Vega flights, both of the MiGCAP, flew toward the reported location.

After completing 339 combat missions totaling over 800 flying hours, Ritchie returned from his second combat tour as one of the most highly decorated pilots in the Vietnam War. His combat achievements earned him the 1972 Mackay Trophy for the most significant Air Force mission of the Year, the Air Force Academy's 1972 Jabara Award for airmanship, and the 1972 Armed Forces Award, presented by the Veterans of Foreign Wars for outstanding contributions to the national security of the United States.

In 1969, he was selected to attend the Fighter Weapons Course at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, becoming, up to that point, the Air Force Fighter Weapons School's youngest-ever instructor at age 26. He taught air-to-air tactics from 1970 to 1972 to the best USAF pilots, including Major Robert Lodge, who later became his flight leader in Thailand and himself shot down three MiGs.

Assigned to the 480th Tactical Fighter Squadron, 366th Tactical Fighter Wing at Da Nang Air Base, South Vietnam in 1968, Ritchie flew the first "Fast FAC" mission in the F-4 forward air controller program and was instrumental in the spread and success of the program. He completed 195 combat missions.

Following his graduation from the U.S. Air Force Academy, Ritchie was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force. In August 1964, he entered Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) at Laredo Air Force Base, Texas, and finished first in his class in 1965. His first operational assignment was with Flight Test Operations at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, where he flew the F-104 Starfighter (he was one of the few Second Lieutenants selected to fly it). Two years later he transitioned into the F-4 Phantom II at Homestead Air Force Base, Florida, in preparation for his first tour in Southeast Asia.

Ritchie was described by his peers as being a jock, and by General Robin Olds, who admired him greatly, as being "brilliant" but thinking himself "God's gift" (cocky and egotistical). According to one of the intelligence officers of the 555th Tactical Fighter Squadron, Ritchie was often lacking in self-discipline, with a personal trademark of using too much Old Spice cologne. (Ritchie's retort was that the pilots' locker room was too odoriferous.)

A competition to become the Air Force's first Vietnam ace developed between Ritchie and Captain Jeffrey S. Feinstein of another of the 432nd's squadrons, the 13th TFS, who scored his 3rd and 4th kills on July 18 and July 29. Each had a claim denied by Seventh Air Force's Enemy Aircraft Claims Evaluation Board, Ritchie and DeBellevue for a claim of a MiG-21 on June 13, and Feinstein for a claim June 9.

Brigadier General Richard Stephen "Steve" Ritchie (born June 25, 1942) served as an officer in the United States Air Force and the Colorado Air National Guard, and a general officer in the Air Force Reserve. Ritchie joined Navy Commander Randy Cunningham as the only two pilots (along with three airborne weapon systems officers) among the five American aces during the Vietnam War. Ritchie is a recipient of the Air Force Cross, the second highest military decoration that can be awarded to a member of the United States Air Force.

Ritchie was born June 25, 1942, in Reidsville, North Carolina, the son of an American Tobacco Company executive. He was a star quarterback for Reidsville High School, despite breaking his leg twice, graduating in 1960. In 1964, he graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering Science from the United States Air Force Academy, where, as a "walk-on", he became the starting halfback for the Falcons varsity football team in 1962 and 1963, playing his final game in the 1963 Gator Bowl.