Analysis of information sources in references of the Wikipedia article "Colonel Tomb" in English language version.
Readers familiar with American military aviation may have heard of the legendary Vietnamese ace, Col. Toon (or Col. Tomb). Why is he not listed here? Because, he was precisely that, "legendary"... he was a figment of the American fighter pilots' imagination and ready room chatter. (In fairness to the Americans, "Col. Toon" may have been shorthand for any good Vietnamese pilot, like any solo nighttime nuisance bomber in WW2 was called "Washing Machine Charlie.")
The existence of Colonel Toon in the mind of an American pilot may have provided a psychological comfort zone if a North Vietnamese pilot should out-fly him or, even worse, shoot him down... Why does this controversy – and others like it – continue to plague the memory of the Vietnam War? Possibly because losing a war is psychologically devastating... Toon may not exist, but what he represents as a way of dealing with the psychological trauma of warfare, is all too real.
Some sources have argued that the famous North Vietnamese flier was a complete fabrication. Hanoi propagandists supposedly conjured up the deadly ace to bolster morale on the home front or possibly to scare American pilots. Others claim that the mythical pilot wasn't a concoction of enemy publicists at all, but rather a figment of American pilots' imaginations.
The American aviators called their adversaries "Gomers," after the hapless TV character Gomer Pyle. Cunningham says he saw the pilot "...with his beady little Gomer eyes, Gomer hat, Gomer goggles, and Gomer scarf."
I could see a Gomer leather helmet, Gomer goggles, Gomer scarf...and his intent Gomer expression," Cunningham writes in his book about the air war. "I began to feel numb. My stomach grabbed at me in knots. There was no fear in this guy's eyes as we zoomed some 8000 feet straight up.
Both crew were seen to eject and to land only about 100 yards apart. Lt Rudloff was temporarily blinded during the incident and was taken to the Hanoi Hilton but he had no further direct contact with his pilot... A report that Cdr Blackburn committed suicide by swallowing a cyanide pill circulated after the prisoners returned from Hanoi, but this seems fanciful and cannot be substantiated. His remains were handed over by the Vietnamese government on 10 April 1986 and positively identified in November of that year.
On 10 May 1972, Captain Harris was flying his F-4E PHANTOM on a combat mission over North Vietnam when he was attacked by a MiG-19. The flight leader of the mission observed Captain Harris' aircraft burst into flames shortly before it crashed. There were no radio transmissions heard from the stricken aircraft, and no one in the flight saw any parachutes or received any emergency beeper signals. In August 1978 the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (S.R.V.) unilaterally turned over the remains of Air Force Captain DENNIS EDWARD WILKINSON, the Weapons Systems Officer aboard the F-4E. The remains of Captain Harris were returned in 1997.
The American aviators called their adversaries "Gomers," after the hapless TV character Gomer Pyle. Cunningham says he saw the pilot "...with his beady little Gomer eyes, Gomer hat, Gomer goggles, and Gomer scarf."
