The erstwhile enemy of the Usaf and US Navy during the nine years of American involvement in the Vietnam War, the Vietnamese Peoples' Air Force (Vpaf) quickly grew from an ill-organised rabble of poorly trained pilots flying antiquated communist aircraft into a highly effective fighting force that more than held its own over the skies of North Vietnam. Flying Soviet fighters like the MiG-17, and -19, the Vpaf produced over a dozen aces, whilst the Americans managed just two pilots and three navigators in the same period.

Author Biography

Mark has illustrated several books in both the Aces and Combat Aircraft series. Since switching mediums from airbrush to Mac art he has produced some of the best profiles Osprey has ever used. Iain Wyllie is one of Britain's leading cover artists. Since becoming a full-time aviation artist he has created over 40 cover artworks for Osprey's hugely successful Aircraft of the Aces and Combat Aircraft series. Istvan Toperczer is a flight surgeon with the Hungarian Air Force. In his spare time, he has become one of the few individuals from outside Vietnam to be given open access to the files of the Vietnamese People's Air Force. He has made several visits to Hanoi, and other Vietnamese cities, in the past five years, and has interviewed many of the leading aces from the war years.