[1] After passing out from Sandhurst, Oliver was commissioned into the Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment on 24 December 1920.
[4] He was deputy director of Military Operations at the War Office later in 1942 and then brigadier on the General Staff at 9th Army HQ in the Middle East from 1943.
[4] He was made Commandant of the British Sector in Berlin in 1954 and Vice Chief of the Imperial General Staff in 1955.
[4] He was principal staff officer to the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Relations from 1957 to 1959 and British High Commissioner to Australia from 1959 to 1965.
[4] He was also a member of a committee set up in 1968 to review arrangements for Rhodesian passports following the Unilateral Declaration of Independence by Prime Minister Ian Smith in 1965.