From the S&S archives: An Air Force ace blossoms over North Vietnam

SAIGON — The aerial battle 30 miles west of Hanoi lasted some five minutes. When it was over Monday morning, Capt. Steve Ritchie, 30, became the U.S. Air Force's first Vietnam fighter ace with five MIG 21 kills to his credit.

"It was a long and involved engagement," Ritchie said at a flight-line press conference Tuesday. "We had a problem getting him in our sights. But when I saw the MIG go down in a fireball I knew it was my fifth."

Ritchie and his weapons systems operator, Capt. Charles B. DeBellevue, 51, of Lafayette, La., were alerted by Allied ground radar that Communist jets were closing in on F4 Phantom bombers targeted against a military storage area near the North Vietnamese capital. Flying cover for the strike force, Ritchie and his backseater broke off to meet the threat.

"He came in at 11 o'clock high," said the ace. "Then the contact changed from head-on to a rear quarter attack."

The MIG 21, judged to be the most sophisticated jet in the North Vietnamese Air Force, outmaneuvered the first two radar-guided missiles shot by the Phantom. It was caught as it banked right attempting to avoid a second pair.

Initially there were two enemy aircraft in the high-altitude engagement, Ritchie said, but one MIG was scared off when the first set of missiles was fired.

Monday marks the 181st enemy jet destroyed by American air crews since June 17, 1965, and the 50th reported downed this year.

"Getting that fifth MIG was all I thought about since July 8th," he said. "I was beginning to wonder if I was ever going to see another MIG. You have to be in the right place at the right time."

The Reidsville, N.C., native is a 1964 graduate of the Air Force Academy where he played defensive halfback. In 1963 he started in the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, Fla., which the Falcons lost to the North Carolina University Tarheels.

He and DeBellevue have flown together as a team for nearly six months and credit their ability to work together for their successes. In July they downed two Soviet-made jets in a classic dogfight over the North.

Ritchie has joined the club started by Navy Lts. Randy Cunningham, 30, and Willie Driscoll, 25, who in May became Vietnam's first pair of aces. Until that time, Col. (now Brig. Gen.) Robin Olds had held the record of four MIG kills established in 1967.

DeBellevue has assisted in four kills and just missed being an ace himself. He took leave from the 432nd Tactical Reconnaissance Wing in May and the same day Ritchie bagged his second MIG. The weapons systems officer said now he is the one who is looking for that fifth fighter.

"While he had a visual contact with the MIG, I was feeding him additional information off the radar screen," DeBellevue said. "We can communicate with a few key words."

With 340 missions, 160 of which were flown over North Vietnam, Ritchie will leave Southeast Asia and return to the United States. He leaves behind what he admits to be one of the greatest challenges for a pilot.

"It's the most rewarding job there is in the Air Force. Combat with an enemy plane is the ultimate experience in flying."

Another Air Force MIG killer, Capt. Jeff F. Feinstein, 27, of East Troy, Wis., also has four MIGs to his credit and narrowly missed becoming an ace with Ritchie Monday.

Their wing commander, Col. Scott G. Smith, 41, of Tampa, Fla., said Feinstein had a radar lock-on for an attack against an enemy jet a mile and a half away. "But there were too many friendlies in the area," Smith continued, "and by the time we got a visual on the bandit, it was not possible to make an attack. I think we scared him. He ran home. The big thing, if they don't bother the strike force, we're delighted. Killing MIGs is a bonus."

"Quite a bit of shooting down MIGs is being in the right place at the right time," said Ritchie. "and I've been very lucky to be just in that position on five different occasions. So I feel very, very fortunate and very humble about the whole thing."

Asked how tough are the North Vietnamese pilots, he replied, "I think quite a few of them are very tough. I think they're just like we are. They have their good pilots and the ones that aren't quite so good. The ones that I've been up against have been pretty tough. Overall, American pilots are better, better trained."

Ritchie is scheduled to go to the United States in late September for speaking engagements, including one before the Air Force Association convention. In the meantime, the Air Force said, he'll be back flying Wednesday, trying for his sixth MIG.

Meanwhile, in Reidsville, the father of America's newest ace said his son is a natural flyer who "believes that what he's doing over there is worthwhile."

Ned C. Ritchie, an assistant office manager for the American Tobacco Co., received a telephone call from his son Monday night.

"He was very pleased," the father said.

Ritchie and his wife, Margie, had last heard from their son when he downed his fourth plane in May. "He never mentioned the possibility of becoming an ace, but I guess it was on his mind," the elder Ritchie said.

Mrs. Ritchie said she had never quite learned to suppress the fear that her son might be shot down himself. "But he never mentions fear. He'll write about what it's like to fly in bad weather, but he'll say he likes it."

Ritchie said his son held told them in March, when the Air Force first started flying regular combat missions over North Vietnam, that "it was something the U.S. should have been doing a long time ago."

The elder Ritchie, who flies a private plane, says his son's interest in flying developed at the Air Force Academy, and not at home. "He was never interested in it while he was here."