From The Washington Post obituary:Dubbed “the Vietnamese James Bond,” he drew on his military training to hijack planes, twice dumping tens of thousands of anti-communist pamphlets over Ho Chi Minh City. Urging residents to take up arms against the government, he performed a similar pamphlet drop above Havana, where his rented Cessna was shadowed by Cuban MiGs as he flew back toward South Florida...
Dubbed “the Vietnamese James Bond,” he drew on his military training to hijack planes, twice dumping tens of thousands of anti-communist pamphlets over Ho Chi Minh City. Urging residents to take up arms against the government, he performed a similar pamphlet drop above Havana, where his rented Cessna was shadowed by Cuban MiGs as he flew back toward South Florida...
Among Vietnamese Americans, Mr. Tong’s reputation largely stemmed from his actions on Sept. 4, 1992, when he boarded an Air Vietnam flight carrying 155 passengers from Bangkok to Ho Chi Minh City. Placing a noose around a flight attendant’s neck and wielding a plastic knife, he soon made his way into the cockpit, according to news accounts and the Aviation Safety Network.
Mr. Tong said he had a bomb strapped to his body — it was actually a set of binoculars taped to his leg — and forced the pilot to descend to 500 feet, reduce speed and circle Ho Chi Minh City. He spent half an hour throwing sacks of pamphlets out the cockpit window.
“People of Saigon — fill the streets!” they read, according to a translation in the Philadelphia City Paper. “Occupy the radio and television stations! Ask the police to join the revolution or return to their barracks. An overseas invasion force is on the way! I will soon be there to lead the fight. Await instructions!”...
Mr. Tong eventually threw himself out the window, using a secondhand parachute he had purchased in Bangkok to land safely in a swamp. None of the passengers or crew were injured, and Mr. Tong was arrested within two hours.
“Put me on trial,” he told interrogators, according to a Wall Street Journal profile. “I want to be sentenced to death.” Instead of martyrdom, he was sentenced to 20 years in prison, released early in 1998 as part of a general amnesty.
He returned to the United States a folk hero: A Vietnamese magazine in Houston had solicited poems written in his honor, and a California radio station held daily readings from his 300-page autobiography, “Black Eagle,” which took its name from the fighter squadron he served in at the close of the Vietnam War...
An unchastened Mr. Tong went on to broaden his fight against communism, dropping leaflets over Havana on New Year’s Day 2000 that urged Cubans to rise up against “the old dinosaur Fidel Castro.” They were signed, “Commander in Chief of the Revolutionary Anti-Communist Forces of the World.”...
[L]ater that year traveled to Thailand, where he hijacked a twin-engine plane and flew to Ho Chi Minh City. Again, he dropped anti-communist pamphlets, this time on the eve of a visit from President Bill Clinton...and was sentenced to seven years in prison.
Mr. Tong escaped in 1980 and embarked on a 17-month trek through Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia, traveling by bike, bus, rail and foot. He eventually swam at night across the Johore Strait to Singapore, hailed a cab and arrived at the U.S. Embassy to request asylum. Read the full obituary here.
No comments:
Post a Comment