MiG Pilot

by John Barron

  Anna invited Belenko to a Washington restaurant to meet her husband, an urbane, older man who was highly informed about the Soviet Union and spoke Russian confidently. Because Belenko was conditioned to believe that American presidential elections were meaningless, all candidates being puppets of the Dark Forces, he listened with surprise and interest as his host talked about the contest under way between Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. Anna favored Carter; her husband, Ford. They discussed, then debated, then ardently and angrily argued about the qualifications of the two candidates.

  Wait a minute. Maybe elections here do make a difference. At least they think they do, and they are not fools.

  It was the carrier, or rather, what he deduced from the carrier, that finally shattered the image of America instilled by the Party. He and Gregg landed on its deck in a small plane about 100 miles off the Virginia capes. The captain welcomed Belenko by saying that the United States Navy was proud to have him as its guest. He could see anything aboard the ship he desired; any question would be answered. But the captain believed that first he should watch the launching and recovery of aircraft, the essence of carrier operations.

  As Belenko stood by the landing control officer, the fighters plummeted, thundered, roared down straight toward him. Bam! Screechl They hit the steel deck and crashed into the arresting gear. Then, with a tremendous roar that vibrated his body, the afterburners of a fighter ignited, and it shot off the deck, dipped toward the sea, and rocketed out of sight This, every ten seconds!

  No show could have been more spectacular to Belenko. The technology of the ship, the planes, the diverse individual skills of the crew were incredible. But that was not what was most meaningful. Everybody of all ranks participating in the operation relied, depended on, indeed, trusted their lives to everybody else. Nobody abused anybody. They all were one team, and it couldn’t be any other way. You couldn’t terrify, intimidate, threaten, or coerce men into doing what they were doing. They had to want to do it, to believe in it. They couldn’t do it under the influence of drugs or alcohol. And this was real. The Dark Forces did not not construct this carrier or recruit and tram men just to put on a display for him. Now he was inclined to believe what he saw and was told.

  “Do you have a jail on this ship?”

  They showed him the brig — five or six immaculate cells with standard Navy bunks — which happened to be empty.* In answer to his questions, the captain enumerated some of the offenses for which a sailor might be confined — drinking alcohol, smoking marijuana, assault.

  “Why is your jail empty?”

  “Maybe we’re lucky. We don’t have much trouble aboard this ship.”

  “How many people do you have on this ship?”

  “About five thousand officers and men.”

  It’s a small city, and nobody is in jail!

  Noticing the insignia of the cross on the shirt collar of an officer, Belenko asked if the crew was required to profess faith in God.

  The captain replied that although Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish chaplains regularly conducted services, crew members were free to attend or not and that religious beliefs or the lack of them was entirely a private matter of individual conscience.

  Belenko wanted to know if the chaplains additionally functioned as political officers, and the captain did not at first understand what he meant.

  “Who tells your men how they must vote?” He realized that the laughter the question caused was real and spontaneous. If nobody can even tell the soldiers [enlisted men] how to vote, then they do have some freedom here.

  The carrier was the flagship of an admiral who presented Belenko with a fleece-lined leather jacket worn by Navy pilots. He said he hoped Belenko would wear and regard it as a symbol of the appreciation and comradeship U.S. Navy fliers felt toward him. The gift and words so affected him that he spoke with difficulty. “I will be very proud of this jacket”

  He was so proud of the jacket that throughout the day he carried it with him wherever he went. All life had taught him that left unguarded, such valuable apparel certainly would be stolen.

  “Viktor, leave the damn jacket here,” Gregg said as they started from the cabin to see the evening movie.

  “No, someone will steal it.”

  “Nobody will steal it. This is not a pirate ship.”

  “No, I know somebody will steal it.”

  After much argument, against all good judgment and under vehement protest, Belenko reluctantly obeyed and left the jacket on his bunk. During the movie he fidgeted and worried. “I think I’ll go back and see about my jacket”

  “Sit still. Your jacket is all right.” Later Gregg slipped away to the cabin and hid the jacket in a closet

  Returning from the movie, Belenko saw that the worst had happened. “You see! I told you! I told you! They stole it!” Gregg opened the closet, and Belenko grabbed the jacket, clutched, hugged it, and did not let it out of his sight again.

  The excellence, abundance, and variety of food in the enlisted men’s mess did not bespeak exploitation of a lower class or reflect a national scarcity of food The provision of such food — and nowhere except aboard the 747 had he tasted better — was consistent with the Air Force officer’s remark at the Air Force base about the importance of caring for people.

  The admiral in his cabin opened a refrigerator and apologized that he could offer only a soft drink or fruit juice. Surely an admiral can have a drink in his own quarters if he wants? “No, I’m afraid we all have to abide by the rules.” The reply was consistent with what Father Peter had told him about the law.

  Everything I’ve seen is consistent. Every time I have been able to check what the Party said it has turned out to be a lie. Every time I have been able to check what Father Peter and Anna and Gregg say it has turned out to be true. Something is very right in this country. I don’t understand what it is, how it works. But I think the Americans are much farther along toward building True Communism than the Soviet Union ever will be.

  A couple of days after they flew back from the carrier, Peter recounted to Belenko all the Soviet Union had been saying about him and all it was doing to recapture him. “They realize that we will not give you up and that their only chance is to persuade you to return voluntarily. So, almost daily, they demand from us another opportunity to talk to you. They’re being rather clever, if brutal, about it. They know they can’t do anything to us directly. Therefore, they are trying to pressure us indirectly through the Japanese. They’re seizing Japanese fishing boats, threatening and harassing the Japanese in every way they can. And I’m afraid they won’t stop until we let them see you once more.”

  “What do they say?”

  “Oh, it’s all bullshit. They say they’re not sure the man they saw in Tokyo was you and that, in any case, they did not have long enough to determine whether you were acting voluntarily or under duress.”

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “Only you can decide. You do not have to meet them. But the Japanese have been valiant and steadfast throughout, and it would be a big service to them if you would.”

  “All right Let’s get it over. But I tell you, and you can tell them, this is the last time.”

  Peter and several other CIA officers, including a couple of unfamiliar, tough-looking characters who comported with his original concept of CIA men, led Belenko to the anteroom of a conference hall at the State Department. “We will be waiting right here and will come immediately if there is trouble. We have made sure that they are in no way armed. You will be safe. Just be yourself.”

  Waiting in the conference chamber were MinisterCounselor Vorontsov, the chief Soviet representative at the Belgrade conference on human rights, a Soviet physician, and a KGB officer, who posed as a diplomat at the Soviet Embassy in Washington.

  As soon as Belenko entered, Vorontsov warmly clasped his hand. “It always is good to meet a man from our Mother Country.” Immediately trying to establish psychological control, he said, as if he,
rather than the State Department, were in charge of the meeting, “Please sit down, and let’s talk freely and openly. Now, we know that something happened to your aircraft and that you did not land in Japan voluntarily.

  “We know that in Japan you tried to protect your aircraft by firing your pistol,” Vorontsov continued. “We know that the Japanese employed force against you and clamped a bag on your head. We know that the Japanese put you in prison and drugged you with narcotics. We know that your actions and movements have not been voluntary.

  “Your wife and son, all your relatives are grieving, crying, longing for you. Here, they have sent letters and photographs for you.” Vorontsov laid them on the table before Belenko, who ignored them. Vorontsov pushed them closer. Belenko looked away from them and glowered directly into Vorontsov’s eyes, provoking, he thought, a flicker of anger. But Vorontsov, a forceful man, retained his composure and went on, calmly, seductively.

  “We want you to know that despite all that has happened and even if you did make some mistake, you will be forgiven completely if you return to your Mother Country, to your family, your native land, the only land where you ever can be happy. You need not be afraid. I reiterate and promise on the highest possible authority that you will be forgiven.

  “Let me give you an example. A Soviet major defected to the United States and, after meeting with us, chose to return to our Mother Country. Later he went to the American Embassy in Moscow and assured the Americans that he was free and not being punished.”

  At this an American, a cool young State Department official whom Belenko had not previously noticed, burst into laughter. “That is not true, Mr. Vorontsov.”

  “That’s the trouble with you Americans,” Vorontsov shouted. “You never believe us.”

  “Not when you lie like that”

  Returning to Belenko, Vorontsov said, “My comrade, if you wish, you may leave this room with us right now, and tomorrow you will be in Moscow reunited with your family in your Mother Country. And you can continue your career as a pilot.” Here Vorontsov beamed. “In fact, I am authorized to assure you that you can become a test pilot”

  Belenko stood up. “Let me speak clearly and finally. All I did, before and after I landed in Japan, I did voluntarily. The Japanese were kind to me and helped me very much, although it was very difficult for them to do that. They gave me no drags of any sort. They did not put a bag on my head. They used no force against me. They protected me. Everything I have done, I have done of my own free will. In the United States nobody is keeping me by force or against my will. It is my own wish to be in the United States. I will not return.”

  Belenko turned to the presiding State Department official. “Although I understand there is a rule that only one Soviet representative may speak to me, I would like to waive that rale and invite the doctor here to ask me any questions he wants because I am absolutely healthy.”

  That was obvious to the doctor, who seemed somewhat embarrassed, but he had to go through the motions.

  “Do you have a headache?”

  “No.”

  “Have you been taking any medicine?”

  “No.”

  “How do you feel?”

  “Great.”

  The doctor looked for guidance from Vorontsov, who now began speaking heatedly. “Our foreign minister is discussing you with Secretary Kissinger and at the highest levels of the American government because we know they are using force and keeping you against your will.”

  “No, they are not using force or keeping me against my will. I will not return to the Soviet Union.”

  “What did happen, then? Why did you do this?”

  “You can investigate and find out for yourself why.”

  Vorontsov resumed his unctuous manner. “You will decide to return. When you decide, just call the Soviet Embassy, and you will be welcome back.” The KGB officer laid his card on the table.

  “I have made my decision. I will not return. I will stay in the United States. There is nothing more to discuss.”

  The State Department official rose. “All right, gentlemen. It seems to me that our meeting is concluded.”

  As Belenko walked out, Vorontsov called to him, and there was in his tone a confidence, a sureness that slightly disquieted Belenko. “We know that you will return. We will get you back. You will come someday.”

  The CIA officers waiting outside each solemnly shook hands with Belenko. “I know that was very hard for you,” Peter said. “You are a good and brave man, Viktor.”

  They drove across Memorial Bridge and into Arlington National Cemetery, then slowly wended their way along narrow lanes among the graves. “What are we doing in the graveyard?” asked Belenko.

  “We are making sure that the KGB cannot follow us.”

  “What! You mean you have those bastards in this country, too!”

  “Yes, and it is prudent always to bear that in mind. You will have to bear it in mind for the rest of your life.”

  From the cemetery, shrouded in beauteous autumn leaves, they commanded a grand view of Washington, which in the late afternoon sunshine looked resplendent. Belenko thought of his new life and a little of his old.

  Could they ever get me back? Would I ever go back? No, of course not.

  CHAPTER VII

  Unwrapping the Present

  For a decade the mystery of the MiG-25 had kindled the gravest of debates, doubts, and apprehensions in the West. The existence of the plane, what was known and unknown about it, had affected defense budgets, aircraft design and production, strategic thinking, and high political decisions of the United States.

  On the basis of the best Western evaluations of Soviet technology, the United States did not understand how the Russians in the 1960s could produce a fighter capable of flying at Mach 3.2 and carrying four heavy missiles to an altitude of 80,000 feet — something not even the newest U.S. fighters introduced in the 1970s could do.

  Were the fundamental estimates of the level of Soviet technology wrong? Had the Russians secretly achieved momentous breakthroughs in metallurgy, engine, and airframe design, perhaps even avionics, that endowed them with a capacity to attain air superiority over the West? Was the MiG-25 already the best interceptor in the world, as Secretary Seamans said and doubtless believed? Did it already give the Russians a measure of air superiority? If the answers to such questions were affirmative, then the West was in trouble from which it could extricate itself only through costly and urgent efforts, that large segments of the public, disgusted by Vietnam and enamored with detente, might not support. If the answers were negative or largely so, then the United States could allocate resources more efficiently and intelligently to counter real rather than nonexistent threats. So one of the greatest gifts Belenko brought was the opportunity to answer definitively these long-standing questions.

  To safeguard Belenko and talk to him securely, the CIA established what appeared to be a medical laboratory in a large office building. People could enter and leave the building without arousing curiosity, no one from the general public was likely to wander into the “laboratory,” and anyone approaching could be observed while walking down a long corridor that led to the one entrance. There was, however, a second, hidden exit. And in keeping with the practice of compartmentation, very few people in the CIA itself would know where he was working.

  Belenko rose early and made breakfast in time to receive his English tutor, Betsy, who came daily to the apartment at seven. To him, she was a happy sight — stylishly dressed, slender, bright, and eager to teach. They were the same age, liked each other, and worked hard.

  After traveling different routes from day to day and periodically checking against surveillance, Belenko and his escort, sometimes Nick, sometimes Gregg, arrived at the office to begin interrogation and debriefings around nine-thirty. No matter how lacking is the evidence to support the conjecture, there always are those willing to speculate that any Soviet defector is actually a controlled Soviet agent dispatched to
confuse and confound by purveying false or deceptive information. In any case, prudence dictates that counterintelligence specialists satisfy themselves as to the authenticity and veracity of the defector. One means of so doing is to ask a variety of questions, innocuous, sensitive, arcane, to which the answers are already known, and the initial interrogations of Belenko were heavily laced with such test queries.

  “By the way, how do the Russians remove snow from the runways?”

  “We use a kind of blower made from a discarded jet engine. If it doesn’t succeed or if there is ice, the whole regiment turns out with shovels and picks.”

  That was correct. So were all of Belenko’s other answers, and they corroborated the conclusions of Anna and Peter. Not only was Belenko keenly intelligent, highly knowledgeable, and ideologically motivated, but he was telling the truth. And once the CIA certified him in its own judgment as bona fide, the excitement of unraveling the mystery of the dreaded MiG-25 began in earnest, in America and Japan.

  The Americans needed to ascertain first what the MiG-25 Belenko delivered represented. Was it an obsolescent aircraft whose production had been discontinued? Were more advanced models than he flew extant? Was the MiG-25 being superseded by a newer, higher-performance aircraft?

  The Russians first flew a MiG-25 prototype in 1964 and began assembly-line production in the late 1960s. After the commanding general of the Soviet Air Defense Command was killed in a MiG-25 crash in 1969, they halted production for about a year but resumed it in 1970 or 1971. Periodically they modified the aircraft, eliminated flaws, and upgraded capabilities. Far from considering the plane obsolete or relegating it to a reconnaissance role, the Russians in 1976 regarded the MiG-25 as their best high-altitude interceptor. And MiG-25s along with MiG-23s were replacing all other aircraft assigned to the Air Defense Command (MiG-17s, MiG-19s, SU-9s, SU-15s, and YAK-28s).

  The MiG-25 Belenko landed in Hakodate had rolled out of the factory in February 1976, and the date of manufacture could be deciphered from the serial number stamped on the fuselage. The plane thus was one of the latest models and embodied the highest technology then in production. It was the plane on which the Russians intended to rely as a mainstay of their air defenses for years to come.