Brown’s tour with the 606th was not his first
experience with the T- 28 in Southeast Asia. The
Air Force had been directed in 1960 to decide
what aircraft in the inventory could be used for
counter-insurgency operations and had chosen
the vast fleet of T-28A trainers at Davis-Monthan.
Utilizing R1830s taken from recently retired
HU- 16 Albatross amphibians, North American’s
conversion was designated T-28D, and deemed
suitable for use by smaller air forces, though
both the airframes and engines were weary from
the start. The 4400th Combat Crew Training
Squadron was established at Hurlburt Field in
Florida. In May 1962, then-Lieutenant Brown
arrived in South Vietnam as part of what was
called “Farm Gate,” a detachment of the 4400th
CCTS that would train South Vietnamese pilots to
fly the T-28C and fly operations with them. “We
were supposed to always have a South Vietnamese
person in the airplane with us,” Brown explained.
“At first that meant having a pilot, but pretty
Evolution of an Under-Rated Warbird
THE NORTH AMERICAN T- 28 TROJAN
;e T- 28 Trojan was originally developed as the SN2J-1 in 1946 for the
U.S. Navy to replace the SNJ Texan. ;e design, however, was not accepted by the Navy. North American had better luck with the Air Force
and the Navy eventually got the message and bought some hairchest-ed T-28s of its own. ;en the big trainer branched out, grew fangs and
began showing up in combat theaters where it wasn’t supposed to be.
;e trainer became a ground attack terror.
soon it was anyone. I had a South Vietnamese
cook who really liked to fly and he’d go with me
every chance he had.” Brown’s first tour in South
Vietnam lasted six months; by 1964 the Air Force
was officially out of the T- 28 business in Southeast
Asia, with the replacement of the airplane in the
VNAF by the Skyraider.
Most of the Farm Gate missions were in support
of the U.S. Army Special Forces and many were at
night when their strategic hamlets were attacked.
They had flown some missions against what was
becoming the Ho Chi Minh Trail in 1962-1963,
but official Air Force missions against the Trail
didn’t begin until 1965. Captain Jack Drummond,
a C-130 pilot at the time, arrived at DaNang that
summer. “We started working ‘Blind Bat’ missions,
dropping flares for B-57s. I watched the Ho Chi
Minh Trail being built, from there on. When we
first went up, no one was flying at night, and the
North Vietnamese were driving with their lights
on.”
T-28C: Flown in 1955,
the 299 T-28Cs featured
a strengthened rear fuselage, strengthened landing
gear and semi-recessed
tail hook for arrested
landings, and were used
for advanced and carrier
qualification training. ;e
10 foot, 1-inch prop of the
T-28B was replaced by
a shorter 9-foot, 4-inch
prop to give more deck
clearance. Several modified T-28Cs with underwing stations for ordnance
were transferred to the
Vietnam Air Force (VNAF)
in 1962-1963, serving in
the training and ground-attack role. Seventy-two
T-28As were converted to
T-28C standard to meet
attrition in the 1960s. ;e
T-28C left service in 1984.
PHOTOS COURTESY OF ROBERT F. DORR
T-28A: Designed for a
1948 Air Force request for
a T- 6 replacement, the
T-28A featured a tricycle
landing gear and was
powered by an 800-hp
R1300, to replicate the
underpowered takeo; and
landing characteristics of
then-contemporary jets.
It served with the Air Force
from 1950-58, with 1,194
produced by 1953. r e
T-28B: ;e T-28B was adopted by the U.S. Navy in 1953, powered by a 1,425-hp
R1820-9HD or R1820-86A Cyclone with a redesigned cowling. ;e T-28A two-blade
Aeroproducts propeller was replaced by a 10 foot, 1-inch three-bladed Hamilton-Stan-dard prop. 489 T-28Bs were produced in 1954-55; they remained in service until 1984,
used for primary, basic, and instrument instruction.
