During the Viet-Nam war, Robert DuBois was drafted into the US armed forces. Upon recieving his induction notice, DuBois fled to Canada - not because he had a moral objection to war, but because he was afraid of dying.

Dubois' younger brother Michael reported for induction in his place, passing himself off as Robert. Michael DuBois was sent into combat in Viet Nam where he lost both his arms and legs.

On learning of his brother's lost limbs, Robert DuBois went insane through guilt. He spent years inand out of psychiatric hospitals in Canada and became obsessed with the Viet-Nam war.

Finally, Robert was contacted by people on behalf of Lex Luthor who saw in him a pawn to be used in the assassination of Superman. The operatives of Luthor - under the direction of a man named Kimberley - played upon Dubois' fixations with VietNam in order to condition him psychologically to want to kill Superman. They also equipped Dubois with an arsenal of advanced scientific weapons, which included a gun that fired needles of Kryptonite.

Calling himself Bloodsport, Dubois went to Metropolis, claiming both he and his brother had seen action in Viet Nam and that they had both been wounded out there. Professing anger at the citizens of Metropolis for the way they were "wasting" the freedom that he and his brother had fought to earn, Bloodsport began to indiscriminately shoot into the crowd, killing dozens of innocent people.

In his first clash with Superman, Bloodsport wounded the man of steel with his Kryptonite needle gun. After recieving medical attention, Superman returned to the fray. Even Luthor was outraged at Bloodsport's murder of so many innocent people, and he too tried to stop the crazed killer. Superman managed to cause Bloodsports teleportation device to malfunction, meaning the villain had no more access to his weapons. Bloodsport then threatened to detonate his power pack and potentially take out 10 square miles of the city.

However, Jimmy Olsen had managed to track down Michael Dubois and the paraplegic managed to convince his brother to lay down his weapons.