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Navy A-4 pilot shooting down MiG-17
During the Vietnam War, there was a division between naval aviators by “community,” and there were few times when a flier changed from one to another. The “fighter community” was divided between the F-8 Crusader and F-4 Phantom, while the “attack community” was divided between the A-1 Skyraider and the A-4 Skyhawk until the Skyraider was taken off operations in 1968. According to the book The Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club by Thomas McKelvey Cleaver, one pilot did make a change between communities. Lieutenant Commander Ted “T.R.” Swartz, an F-8 Crusader pilot, made the decision in 1966 to request transfer to attack aviation, as he later explained it:
“Because the attack guys were doing most of the work. They were going over the beach and getting all the action, while the fighter guys were out in the BARCAP once or twice a day not doing a damn thing except flying in circles. Basically, what I wanted to do was go where the action was… The job was going in and stirring up the enemy, making them burn, bleed and blow up.”
Returning to flight duty
That fall, Swartz was returning to flight duty after a tour as a landing signal officer (LSO). “I asked my detailer to do me a favor and send me to Lemoore. I didn’t care where or who, just send me to Lemoore. If you went to a Lemoore squadron, you were going west.” He ended up in VA-76 “Spirits,” part of CVW 21, which went aboard USS Bon Homme Richard in November 1966 and arrived in Southeast Asia in January 1967. They were just in time to take part in strikes on previously off-limits targets in Hanoi and Haiphong. With the air war heating up, the VPAF made more appearances. Over the course of 1967, naval aviators shot down 17 MiGs, of which ten fell victim to pilots of CVW-21.
For Swartz, the difference between air-to-air and air-to-mud was one of emotion:
“When you’re in a no-shit dogfight with somebody else – who can put a weapon on you and blow you out of the sky – it’s kind of like just before you go out on the ballfield or get in the ring with somebody, whereas I never got apprehensive flying over the beach. I would feel more comfortable once the guns started or the SAMs came up because you knew they were worried and awake and you knew where they were. I was always worried when nothing happened, and was always waiting for something to happen because then it was time for action, the adrenaline ran, and you were ready and working.”
Zuni rockets
On May 1, 1967, Swartz drew the assignment of flak suppression for an Alpha strike against Kep airfield, which had finally been placed on the list of allowed targets the previous month. His wingman was Lieutenant John Waples:
“Our specific job was to pound some flak sites on the north side of the runway while the bombers took the middle of the runway. We all rolled in together and Waples and I saw a couple of MiGs taking to the runway. We shot at them as well as the flak sites. Just as we pulled off, my eye caught a pair of MiG-17s coming in from right to left. There wasn’t anything we could do about it, because our paths were going to cross, and I was going to cross right in front of them. If I turned right to meet them head-on, I’d run into the whole strike group, and if I turned left, which I had to do to stay the hell out of the way of the strike group, I had to accept them on the inside of my turn on the left hand side.”
Swartz had three Zuni rockets left in the pack under his starboard wing. “The Zuni package carries four rockets that can be fired in single or ripple, and the book says fire all of them at once. I put one package on single and saved three; I felt naked there with nothing and the MiGs around.” He accepted the fight with the MiGs inside his turn. “I looked back over my shoulder and saw the two of them shooting – a 37-millimeter, that really gets your attention.” He maneuvered into a high-G barrel roll at 425 knots.
Not meet with universal acclaim
“This is very difficult to follow, and as the airplane came over the top, the MiGs were off my right shoulder. I poked one Zuni at the wingman and missed, poked another one and missed, and then poked the third. Blind-ass fucking luck because all the skill and science about the gunsight was garbage. After getting the one guy I went after the leader with my 20-millimeter, which had just a few bullets because the space had been used for the electronic warfare stuff. The gun kept jamming, and you’re not supposed to recharge it, but I recharged it about four times. Then I realized how incredibly dumb it was to continue this because I could get shot down over a field where I shot down a guy, and they’d come after me with pitchforks. So I turned right and got the hell out of there.”
Swartz’s accomplishment did not meet with universal acclaim. “My ass was chewed out and the captain of the boat damn near wanted to court-martial me for saving the Zunis.” Other attack pilots believed that by not firing all his Zunis at the flak sites, and taking out a gun, he was putting the bombers in danger. In the end, however, T.R. Swartz was awarded a Silver Star as the only Skyhawk pilot to shoot down a MiG-17.
The Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club is published by Osprey Publishing and is available to order here.
Photo credit: U.S. Navy , U.S. Air Force, screenshot from YouTube video
