Lieutenant Randy “Duke” Cunningham with his back-seater Willie Driscoll, score the second of three air victories achieved during a single mission, making them the only US Navy Aces of the Vietnam War.
During 1968–71, MiG-17 skirmishes were rare. Airfield attacks had driven most of the 80-strong force into its Chinese safe havens, and occasional clashes with MiG-21s brought three kills for US Navy crews flying the newly-acquired F-4J and a VF-92 F-4B loss to top MiG-21 ace Nguyen Van Coc. The “bombing halt” from November 1968 gave the VPAF time to repair its airfields and regroup its fighter units, which by 1972 could muster more than 130 MiG-17s and 30 MiG-19s. New initiatives were planned, including MiG-17 attacks on Seventh Fleet warships on April 19, 1972.
As the war heated up again in January 1972, leading to the North’s spring invasion of South Vietnam, US Navy clashes with MiGs also resumed in quantity. The first success in 22 months went to VF-96’s Lt Randall “Duke” Cunningham and Lt(jg) Willie Driscoll when they downed a MiG-21MF on January 19. Cunningham’s previous RIO, Lt Lynn Batterman, noted that his pilot was utterly focused on MiG killing. “He worked harder than the average pilot and was better than average because of it. He and I were the only crew to consistently check out and re-read the secret manuals we had on MiGs (we even had some MiG repair/NATOPs manuals) that were controlled by the skipper, Cdr Al Newman”.
Squadron-mate Lt Matt Connelly, a double MiG-17 killer, recalled, “Between the 1970 and 1971–72 cruises, VF-96 undertook the Topgun academic syllabus. We flew tactics hops against Topgun jets, as well as other dissimilar aircraft, including USAF F-106s. During our turnaround missile shoot, VF-96 expended the entire West Coast training allowance for missiles. This did not make us popular with Westpac staff, but it later paid handsome dividends”.
Following Cunningham’s January kill, things went quiet again for almost two months until, on March 6, Lt Garry Weigand and Lt(jg) Bill Freckleton of VF-111 claimed the first MiG-17 destroyed by an US Navy Phantom II since November 1967. This particular success was a good example of the F-4’s versatility. Limited maintenance provision and small aircraft numbers meant that Phantom IIs often had to be launched without fully operational systems. Bill Freckleton remembered, “It was not unusual in our air wing (CVW-15) to launch at least one aircraft in a section with a known, pre-launch radar discrepancy”. Their F-4B “Old Nick 201” had no radar, and wingman Jim Stillinger’s jet had a “search only” capability.
Instead, the Phantom II crews relied on the skill of Red Crown fighter controller Chief Radarman Larry Nowell on board USS Chicago (CG-11), which was sailing just off the North Vietnamese coast in the Gulf of Tonkin. Nowell, who was eventually credited with assisting in the destruction of 12 MiGs in 1972, guided the section of VF-111 jets to a point where they could visually ID the approaching MiG-17, whose well-trained pilot engaged Stillinger in a turning fight. He rolled out level, “dragging” the MiG behind him, which enabled Weigand and Freckleton to launch an AIM-9 into its afterburning tailpipe. Too low to bail out, Snr Lt Hoang Ioh was killed when his MiG hit a hillside and exploded. This two-on-one tactic was recommended by Topgun instructors.
May 1972 was a remarkable month for Seventh Fleet F-4 units, as they destroyed 11 MiG-17s, three MiG-21s and two MiG-19s in just 18 days of combat. VF-51’s Lt Cdr Jerry Houston and RIO Lt(jg) Kevin Moore scored the first of three kills (the remaining two were MiG-21s claimed by VF-114) on May 6. A former F-8 expert, “Devil” Houston had flown Have Drill MiG-17s, and was therefore fully conversant with the jet’s control problems at low altitude and high speed. With fellow senior flight leader Lt Cdr Chuck Schroeder, he heard strike leader (and Topgun pioneer) Lt Cdr Jim Ruliffson call out a MiG-17 that was closing on the tail of an A-6A Intruder flown by CVW-15 CO Cdr Roger Sheets. Both the US Navy bomber and the MiG were flying at low altitude down a karst valley. Accelerating to a position behind the “Fresco”, Houston waited for the A-6 to break and give him an AIM-9 shot.
“CAG Sheets decided not to break until he saw that my missile had fired – the ultimate decoy”, explained Houston. “It worked, but only because at the last minute (approaching minimum firing range, and in total frustration) I decided to fire, despite there being a chance that the weapon could have been locked onto CAG’s A-6. I didn’t know that he couldn’t hear my frantic calls to ‘Break and get the hell out of there’!
“All he heard was the transmitted Sidewinder tone. Our ex-US Marine Corps F-4B was old, and had a history of radio problems. On this particular occasion the Sidewinder tone was also transmitted, effectively blocking out the rest of our transmission.”
Fortunately, Sheets broke at the right moment, but the MiG pilot (probably Nguyen Van Bay the Younger) could not make his control-locked aircraft turn. The AIM-9 blew off its tail at an altitude of just 100ft and the “Fresco” crashed.
Cunningham and Driscoll’s first MiG-17 victory followed 48 hours later. As his wingman Lt Brian Grant described it, the engagement was a “classic over-water CAP vectored onto an overland MiG target”, except that the latter had set a trap which Grant detected in time to make “a course reversal that placed Randy Cunningham behind me in a position to down his second MiG, conveniently trapped at my ‘six o’clock’”.
As the MiG pilot opened fire on Grant’s “Showtime 101”, Cunningham fired an AIM-9G to distract it while RIO Driscoll monitored two MiG-17s that had reversed their course and started to fire shells at “Showtime 112”. Having this time acquired a missile lock tone, Cunningham quickly loosed off a second AIM-9 that disintegrated the MiG. “It was as classic a ‘mutual support’ textbook fight as we had practised in training”, recalled Brian Grant.
May 10 yielded 11 claims by US fighters, with seven of them being MiG-17 kills credited to US Navy Phantom IIs. Five VPAF pilots were lost. The first two fell to Lts Matt Connelly and Lt Tom Blonski (see cover art caption for full combat description). During the same Alpha strike, Cunningham and Driscoll, armed for flak suppression, ran into MiGs from three VPAF bases over the Hai Duong target. They were in search of revenge for an audacious MiG-21 kill achieved by VF-92’s Lt Curt Dosé and Lt Cdr Jim McDevitt over Kep’s main runway that morning.
Within a minute Cunningham’s “Showtime 100” had downed an attacking MiG-17, having forced it to overshoot into his AIM-9 range. Minutes later he spotted four F-4s trapped in a “wagon wheel” with eight MiG-17s. As VF-96 XO Cdr Dwight Timm emerged from the “wheel” with three MiGs on his tail, Cunningham attempted to come to his rescue, but was in turn set upon by two MiG-19s from above and four more MiG-17s from behind. Manoeuvring violently to shake off his pursuers, Cunningham got Timm to sharply break away from the “Frescos” that were trailing him. This cleared the way for “Showtime 100” to down a second MiG-17 with another AIM-9 shot.
Cunningham’s tail was protected by Lt Steve Shoemaker and Lt(jg) Keith Crenshaw, who saw another “Fresco” moving into a firing position behind “Showtime 100”. They destroyed the VPAF jet with a single AIM-9. Yet another MiG-17 then began to fire cannon rounds at Cunningham in a head-on pass. The latter used his Topgun training to deal with the new threat, pulling the F-4 in a vertical climb in order to throw off the “Fresco” pilot’s aim. Surprisingly, the MiG pilot followed suit, and two further vertical climb and rolling scissors manoeuvres left both fighters short of speed, but with the MiG behind the F-4J.
Resorting to desperate measures during the third climbing pursuit, Cunningham cut the throttles and briefly extended his airbrakes, throwing the MiG out in front of him. The VPAF pilot, probably at “bingo” fuel, sought to dive away towards Kep, but Cunningham managed to push the nose of his almost stalling F-4J over and fire an AIM-9 that caused enough damage for the MiG to crash into the ground and confer ace status on Cunningham and Driscoll. They were the first Americans to achieve this accolade in the Vietnam War, and the only Naval Aviators to do so, period.
Heading back out to the shore, Cunningham was pursued by yet another MiG-17, sitting close behind him and possibly firing his cannons. Matt Connelly swung over towards it, fired an unguided AIM-7 from his “radarless” F-4J and scared the MiG away. Two more MiG-17s and a MiG-21 sought to engage the harassed fighter as it neared the coast, but “Showtime 100’s” fate was probably determined by a SAM explosion near-miss that damaged its hydraulics. Fighting to maintain control of the failing systems by using afterburner and extreme rudder-induced rolls, the crew was finally forced to eject, and rely on HH-3A helicopters from HC-7 to return them to Constellation.
The seventh, and last, MiG-17 to fall victim to a Sidewinder that day was hit by a VF-51 F-4B flown by Lts Ken Cannon and Roy Morris in a one-on-one clash with a pilot that Jerry Houston described as a “damn tough and experienced opponent”. The MiG was about to ease in behind Chuck Schroeder’s F-4B when “Ragin’ Cajun” Cannon caught up with it and fired.
