MiG Pilot: The Final Escape of Lt. Belenko

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As he had done every day except Sunday during the past four weeks, Lieutenant Viktor Ivanovich Belenko awakened himself early to watch what the dawn might reveal. The first light was promising, and upon seeing the fiery, blinding sun rise, he knew: almost certainly this would be the day. Above the vast forests of pine, cedar, birch, and poplar stretching along the Pacific shores of the Soviet Far East, the sky was azure and cloudless. The magnificent weather meant that barring mistakes, malfunctions, or some other vagary, in all likelihood he would fly as scheduled. Probably he finally could attempt the supreme mission which rain, fuel shortages, or bureaucratic caprice repeatedly had forestalled. If the weather held, his chances of reaching the objective would be as good as he ever could expect.

Belenko estimated it all should be over within the next six hours. At age twenty-nine, he would be either dead or reborn into a new world. He felt tension in the muscles of the arms, legs, and stomach, but the stress derived more from the complexity of the mental tasks ahead than from fear of dying. During his training as a MiG (Named for its designers, Mikoyan and Gurevich) pilot he had lived on the edge of death so long and seen sudden, violent death so often that he had given up contemplating it. He had come to regard it simply as an unfathomable phenomenon to be avoided as long as possible, but not at any price. Neither did he dwell on the infinite uncertainties and unknowns that awaited him should he succeed and survive. He had assessed them as best he could before making his decision, and there was no profit in considering them further now.

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