AnirudhaThe Meeting
Two old friends met in a restaurant called the Dong Mai. They both seemed really awkward which was followed by an awkward hug. Though there was a translator present for the conversation between Robertson and Mahoney who was surprised to see him talking in Vietnamese. Surprisingly, Mahoney said that Robertson was the same person he served with. Things were getting really complicated for everybody and there was no other way but a DNA test and Robertson was ready for that too.
No DNA Test?
But the DNA test never happened as the family refused for that. “Somebody suggested to me maybe that’s (because) the daughters don’t want to know if it’s him. It’s kind of like, that was an ugly war. It was a long time ago. We just want it to go away… I don’t know. What would compel you not to want to know if this person is your biological father?” said Jorgensen
The Results
The documentary was released and just like the viewers the whole family was convinced that this man was Robertson. The family was asked why did not they want a DNA test, they said they want to live with a belief that their father, brother, and uncle was alive. But DNA test was done and the results were really surprising. Robertson’s niece told in the interview, “The bottom line is even if the DNA test came back negative, he’s still proven to be an American. My mother will never believe he is not her brother.”
On Their Own Terms
For the DNA test, they created a GoFundMe page and people from all over the world read the story and helped the family. “We have received the results of the [nuclear] DNA test, and sadly there was NOT a match. This is very disappointing. As my mother has said, we only want to do right by my Uncle John, and if that means exploring the possibility that the U.S. government has made a mistake or that the man claiming to be my uncle is actually another lost American and doesn’t know who he is, we intend to seek the truth on our own terms,” wrote the niece on the page.
Strange Government Behavior
The government wasn’t of any help and for them, it wasn’t their problem. But behind the doors, they were being very secretive about everything. “The contact that I worked with in the government was very deceitful. I think they were trying to steer us clear of even doing this story. As we were just about to finish the film, even before Tom’s team had found John’s sister – because they had a really hard time trying to find his relatives – the government had told us that they had gotten blood samples from a brother and sister and that they were doing DNA tests. That was totally untrue, his brother was dead at the time and his sister has never been contacted by the government.” But then the truth was everybody believed that this man was Roberston. Was he? Keep reading…
A Big Fat Liar
After the documentary was released the media started their research and the other the mystery of his identity was out. This man wasn’t Robertson but was actually Dang Tan Ngoc. How did they find out, you ask? This 76-year-old Vietnamese man was actually a con man pretending to be a US veteran. He has put up the show like this even in the past and people actually believed him. But this time he hit the jackpot because he managed to fool so many people and not only that an award-winning director made a documentary on his life. The Independent found out a report from 1982, where Ngoc claimed to be Robertson. “Some Vietnam War veterans saying he could have possibly conned veteran groups out of thousands of pounds over the last 30 years,” report from the paper.