«I will show you,» replied the general, picking up a rock, holding it to his ear, and then handing it to the captain. «Listen to the noise the rock makes.»
The captain listened and threw the rock away. «No, it makes no noise at all.»
«You see, that is why you are still a captain. A general told you a rock makes noise, and you said no to a general.»
To protect himself, the lieutenant colonel always emphasized with mock seriousness that such sayings represented misconceptions. Belenko was to learn, though, that each originated in reality.
After he commenced his duties as an instructor, the Party decided to expand and accelerate pilot training without, however, increasing the number of personnel and aircraft allocated for training. Previously one instructor had at his disposal two MiG-17s, two flight engineers, and four enlisted mechanics to teach three students. But with the same resources Belenko had to teach six students, and in good weather he flew incessantly, taking them up successively throughout the day. Flying still was fun, although not as much fun as when he flew alone. After the fortieth or fiftieth loop of the day, a loop was not so interesting.
The serious problems all occurred on the ground. Belenko did not just supervise the twelve men under him. He was held personally accountable for their behavior twenty-four hours a day. He was supposed to regulate, record, and report their every action and, insofar as possible, their every thought, to know and watch every detail of their lives, including the most intimate and personal details. And he had to draft and be prepared to exhibit for inspection by political officers at any time a written program specifying precisely what he was doing daily to develop each of his subordinates into a New Communist Man.
Having landed for the ninth time on a day that had begun at 4:00 A.M., Belenko was exhausted. Dusk was settling, and a light drizzle starting to fall, when a messenger — there were no telephones — delivered a summons from the political officer.
«So, Comrade Lieutenant, we see that you do not know your men; you do not know how to educate them.»
«I do not understand, Comrade.»
«Read this, and you will understand.» The KGB had uncovered a letter written by one of Belenko's mechanics, a twenty-year-old private, to his parents. The soldier recited his miseries — the sparse, repulsive rations, the congested barracks, the practice through which second-year soldiers extorted food from first-year soldiers by pouncing upon the recalcitrants during the night, covering them with blankets, and beating them mercilessly.
«Do you see what a dark shadow such a letter throws over our Army?»
«But, Comrade, look at the date. The letter was written ten months ago, long before I was here.»
The point was unarguable, and the political officer was flustered, but not for long. «Let me see your program for this man.»
Belenko handed over the notebook he always was required to keep with him. «Your failure is clear. There is not one mention here of the works of Leonid Ilyich [Brezhnev]. How can your mechanic develop politically without knowledge of the thoughts of the Party's leader? You see, Comrade Lieutenant, you have not worked very productively today.»
You pig, I ought to smash in your fat face. I flew my ass off today, flew all to hell and back. I did one hundred rolls, sixty dead loops, sixty Immelmanns. What do you know about work? I'd like to put you to work in an aircraft. You'd puke and fill your pants in one minute.
«Comrade, I see my mistake. I will try to do better.»
Belenko repeatedly was upbraided because of the behavior of one of his flight engineers, who was an alcoholic. He stole, drank, and sometimes sold the alcohol stored in copious quantities for the coolant and braking systems of the MiG-17. Now everybody in the regiment — the commander, the officers, the men, Belenko himself — at times drank this alcohol. Not only was it available and free, but became the alcohol was produced for aircraft, it was more purely distilled than the standard vodka produced for the people. In fact, the aircraft alcohol was so valued on the black market that in the regiment it was called white gold. The trouble was that the flight engineer drank so much and continuously that he staggered around all day, frequently making a spectacle of himself and, as Belenko's superiors stressed, setting an «improper example.»
Belenko talked several times to the engineer, who was sixteen years older than he and had been in the service twenty-two years. He reasoned, he pleaded, he threatened, he appealed, all to no avail, because the man in his condition could no more stop drinking than he could stop breathing.
Finally, Belenko was rebuked for «leadership failure.» In response he wrote a formal letter recommending that the engineer either be provided with psychiatric treatment or be dismissed from the service. The next morning a deputy regimental commander called Belenko in and told him that if he would withdraw the report, his reprimand would also be withdrawn, and the flight engineer transferred. Amazed, Belenko shrugged and complied.
Training standards inevitably suffered under the intensified pressures to graduate more pilots. In his training Belenko had flown 300 hours — 100 in the L-29, 200 in the MiG-17 — and these had been «honest» hours — that is, they actually were flown. Now cadets were flying only 200 hours, and not all these were «honest.» There also was a slight slippage in the quality of pilot candidates, and although five of Belenko's students were able, the sixth was beyond salvage. He simply lacked the native ability to fly. Belenko dared not allow him to solo in a MiG-17, and whenever he entrusted him with the controls, the results were frightening. Though he personally liked the cadet, Belenko formally recommended his dismissal. Another uproar and demand that he rescind the recommendation ensued. But this time Belenko in conscience could not accede. Aloft, the cadet was a menace to everybody and to himself. Even if he learned to take off and land, he never could do much else except fly in circles, and his every flight would be a potential disaster. Thus, the issue and Belenko ultimately were brought before the regimental commander, who also tried to induce retraction of the report. Failing, the commander announced that he himself would fly with the cadet and pronounce his own judgment. Most likely he intended to overrule Belenko, but he was sufficiently shaken upon landing to concur, reluctantly, that dismissal was the only option.
Belenko spent the better part of a month completing the mountains of paperwork requisite to dismissal. In the process he finally comprehended why no one in his own class had been expelled, why second-year soldiers who preyed on neophytes were not prosecuted, why the flight engineer was not cashiered, why the cadet would not have been dismissed had he not been egregiously hopeless.
Party had decreed that a certain number of qualified pilots would be trained in a given time. The Party had decreed that pilots, officers, soldiers, all would be transformed into New Communist Men. That was the plan. A commander who publicly disciplined a subordinate or dismissed a student risked the wrath and punishment of the Party by convicting himself, ipso facto, of incompetence, of undermining the plan.
The consequent fear created a system in which problems were masked and perpetuated, rather than eliminated, and it spawned corruption or a psychological environment in which corruption flourished. Prior to an inspection by senior officers of the Air Defense Command, Belenko was scheduled to perform a complicated one-hour exercise in which he and a student in another MiG would intercept and down a third MiG. The exercise would be recorded on the films of gun cameras and chronometer tapes for examination by the inspectors. But the morning of the planned exercise, the sky was filled with thunder and lightning.
Nevertheless, a deputy regimental commander ordered them to fly. «What! That's impossible.»