Nguyen Toon

Not to be confused with Nguyễn Tuân.

Nguyen Toon (Nguyễn Tuân) or "Colonel Toon" or "Tomb" was a mythical North Vietnamese fighter pilot and flying ace who allegedly shot down 13 American aircraft during the Vietnam War. According to legend, he was killed in action on May 10, 1972, by the U.S. Navy F-4 Phantom crew of pilot Lt. Randy "Duke" Cunningham and radar operator Lt.(jg) William "Irish" Driscoll.^[1]

Toon/Tomb's name arose during the latter part of the war, being known to U.S. Navy (if not Air Force) aviators. Photos of North Vietnamese MiG-17s and MiG-21s, most notably being a MiG-17 with the bort number 3020 (the same Mig-17 which was confirmed shot down on May 10, 1972 by Cunningham and Driscoll), as well as a MiG-21 with bort number 4326, each bearing numerous red victory stars, occasionally have been identified as his aircraft. However, it was normal practice in the Vietnamese People's Air Force to add victory stars to an aircraft for all claims made while flying that aircraft regardless of the pilot assigned to fly it. The photo of 4326 was captioned in a Vietnamese official magazine as having been flown by at least nine airman, six of whom received the title "Hero of the People's Armed Forces".^[1] The most basic aspects of Toon/Tomb's life and career were never published, nor was his photo ever released. Apart from those mysterious facts, ethnologists have noted that neither Toon nor Tomb is a Vietnamese name.^{[citation needed]}

It is more likely that something similar to Toon or Tomb was a radio callsign, and a corrupted version of the story got out.^[1] Much of the information the U.S. obtained about the North Vietnamese air force came from "SigInt" or signals intelligence, monitoring enemy radio transmissions. In the years after the war during the 1990s, American military officers visiting Vietnam have said that some of their Vietnamese hosts privately admitted to them that Colonel Toon/Tomb actually never existed and that he was a long-standing, successful propaganda fabrication.^{[citation needed]}

See also

• List of Vietnam War flying aces
• Vietnam People's Air Force

Notes

1. ^ ^{a b c} Ethell and Price 1990, pp.189–190.

References

• Ethell, Jeffrey and Alfred Price. One Day in a Long War. London:Guild Publishing, 1990.

Further reading

• Toperczer, István, "MiG-17 and MiG-19 Units of the Vietnam War", Osprey Publishing Limited, Botley, Oxford, UK, 2001, ISBN 1-84176-162-1.

External links

• North Vietnamese Aces