re: More Badass- Chuck Yeager or Robin Olds?

Both major league badasses. No sense trying to put one over the other.

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Can you say triple ace

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Yeager has 11.5 kills, including 5 on a single mission. Of course, two of those happened without firing a single bullet because a German pilot panicked when Yeager got on his six and turned directly into his wingman and they both bailed out. One of Yeager's 11.5 kills is because he popped out of the clouds one day and unexpectedly found himself above a German airfield lined up on a Messerschmitt on final approach, ripped it open with his cannons, then popped back above the clouds and kept trucking.

Yeager did the more historic things, but I think Olds was the bigger badass in the grand scheme of things. Olds did shite like putting bomber jamming pods on Phantoms loaded for bear and flying along the bomber routes so he could convince the North Vietnamese that his flight of Phantoms was just another formation of unescorted bombers. The Americans didn't have enough jamming pods to outfit both bombers and their escorts at the time, so the escorts without jammers had been turning back when they got close to the NVA SAM sites so they wouldn't get shot down while the bombers with the jammers continued on. The North Vietnamese would send fighters up to attack the unescorted bombers mercilessly.

Olds planned well and on the day of his trap, it was overcast. The Vietnamese couldn't see the planes from the ground, but on their radar screens, they saw what looked like light bombers with jammers and sent their fighters up. When they popped through the clouds, though, they found themselves face to face with fully armed F-4s with bad attitudes instead of Thunderchiefs loaded down with bombs. They were murdered until they were dead by one of the greatest American Air Force commanders that ever lived and his merry band of reapers. For over two months after that, the Vietnamese didn't dare send a fighter up to intercept a light bomber.

However, if we're going to be talking about American WWII fighter pilot badasses with outlandish names, we're going to be talking about Dick Bong. 40(!) confirmed kills.

Met them both, several times(beat Yeager at pool,) Yeager is a class A douche. Olds is a fighter pilots’s fighter pilot, and a leader of men. Olds by a million.

WWROD Olds by a mile. Still see What Would Robin Olds Do wrist bands and morale patches on every base.

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I know people are calling, Yeager a jerk and whatnot, but that doesn't diminish his accomplishments. I don't care if he's a jackass.

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Yeager is the "Ty Cobb" of legendary pilots.

Olds was amazing, best American aviator ever.

Erich Hartmann (he of 352 Kills) just called in from Combat Pilot Valhalla to say he has Olds’ and Yeager’s lunch money.

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college football HoF

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I'd completely forgotten that Olds is in the HoF.

Chuck

Here's my Yeager story:

When my nephew was about 12, he went up to Wisconsin for the EAA Fly In with his uncle and grandfather from my SIL's side of the family. He met Chuck Yeager signing books and asked him to personalize a note to his grandfather (my father) who served in the Air Force during the Korean Conflict and was a huge Yeager fan. Apparently, Yeager was kind of pissy about it, but reluctantly wrote "To Jack" and signed his name.

My nephew gets back to New Orleans and gives his grandfather an autographed copy of the Yeager's latest book. My dad was genuinely excited just to have the book. He opens it up and sees the "To Jack" and signature and just about loses it. I've never seen him so excited. He asked my nephew "You got to meet Chuck Yeager!?! That's great! That's a real honor! What was he like" My nephew, God bless him, either didn't recognize my father's idol worship or didn't give a frick and tells my father, "I wasn't that impressed." I started cracking up laughing and my father is stunned, saying "What!?! What do you mean? The man broke the sound barrier! What do you mean you weren't that impressed?" My 12 year old nephew then tells my dad, "All I'm saying Paw-Paw is that if you'd met him, you'd say he was kind of a dick."

From ~1970 until the day he died, if my father heard Jane Fonda's name, he'd say "That commie bitch." After my nephew's experience in ~1992, if Yeager's name came up, he'd say "My grandson met him once and said he's kind of a dick." But I think he still admired Chuck Yeager.