Then, Captain Stephen Ritchie, flying his F4 Phantom II, picked up a quick radio report Migs were heading his way.  Almost instantly he saw he was head on with a Chinese Mig Fighter, each closing in toward each other at over 500 miles per hour.  He was facing death itself in excess of 1000 mph. An instinctual small movement of the controls by Cpt. Ritchie kept his aircraft from an explosive collision in the humid Southeast Asian skies.  They crossed within feet of each other.  What happened in the next few seconds could fill a novel.  In those seconds Cpt. Ritchie shot down two Mig Fighters and began his destiny to becoming the first Air Force ace in Vietnam.

The Dallas Composite Squadron was honored to have Brigadier General Stephen Ritchie spend the  evening and present invigorating  moments of heroism above the unforgiving jungles of  Vietnam.

Brigadier General Stephen Ritchie demonstrating the maneuvers he had to do instinctively to shoot down five Mig Fighters during the Vietnam War.

In front of an audience of approximately sixty (60) people, General Ritchie gave a very motivating presentation of his background at the USAF Academy, his flight training experiences and eventually his combat experiences in Vietnam.  He spoke of numerous aerial engagements, focusing on two in particular, which led him to become the only USAF fighter ace since the Korean Conflict.  The two engagements he spoke of occurred within a time span of approximately one minute, forty-nine seconds. 

In 1972, General Ritchie (then Captain Ritchie), was flying on an easterly heading when he heard a radio call amongst all of the "radio chatter" which was the usual routine when multiple engagements were going on.  The normal radio call to identify targets and vector the aircraft to intercept would have been something like turn heading .....roll out.... bogies ahead.  Instead the call, which came from an AWACS aircraft over 100 miles away, stated..."Steve, they're two miles north of you."

At this point he immediately turned his F-4 Phantom to the north,  jettisoned his external fuel tanks and prepared for instant engagement.  The two aircraft passed about 1000 feet apart at a speed of about 600 mph.  General Ritchie knew that Mig pilots always fought in pairs and that a second Mig had to be close.  He dove his F-4 phantom towards the thick vegetation below.  His aircraft had a jungle camouflage paint scheme making it difficult for an enemy aircraft to see him from above as he blended in with the terrain below.  General Ritchie was right.  As soon as he was on the deck, a second Mig 21 passed overhead in the hunt.

General Ritchie had two hostile aircraft to contend with.  He yanked his aircraft up sharply, pulling approximately 4 Gs.  Under the strain of the maneuver he was able to get in position to fire his missiles, he took the shot.  The missile did not release from the rails right away and he thought if it did he would surely miss hostile aircraft.  After a few expletives, and before the first missile launched , he fired a second projectile.  Finally, both missiles exploded out of their rails and the first erupted dead center of the Mig 21 fuselage.  The second missile exploded in the center of the Mig's fireball.  Ritchie's adrenaline was pumping.

No time to breathe, General Ritchie had the second Mig 21 still to contend with.  The Mig pilot was pulling away to the right (which is unusual in that most pilots will turn left as it is easier to pull the stick to the  left rather than to the right.)  General Ritchie pulled his aircraft into a 5 G left climbing turn