After a day of orienting himself to both American fighters and the MiGs, Belenko «flew» in combat agaist U.S. pilots and planes. In a MiG-17 and a MiG-21, he shot down F-4s at lower altitudes but was bested by them at higher altitudes. Another exercise pitted Belenko and an American in two MiG-23s, the best Soviet fighter, against an American in the F-15, the best U.S. fighter. At the outset the MiG-23s were given the advantage of higher altitude behind the F-15. At the signal «Go!» they dived toward it at Mach 2.3 to fire their missiles. Suddenly the F-15 disappeared, and Belenko yelled into the microphone to his wingman. «Hey, where is he?» Then a flash in the cockpit signaled that he had been blown up by a missile. Within forty seconds the F-15 had climbed, circled, and destroyed both MiG-23s.
In a MiG-25 Belenko took off against an F-15. Before they reached 50,000 feet, the F-15 shot him down four times, but at about 60,000 feet the MiG-25 accelerated upward and out of range of the F-15.
The combat exercises, each one of which cost $10,000, according to information given Belenko, spanned three days. The results were complex, required lengthy computer analysis, and remain highly classified. But this much can be said: While the F-15 demonstrated its clear superiority over the MiGs, Belenko as a pilot demonstrated himself to be fully the equal of the American fliers against whom he competed.
In time, Belenko visited dozens of U.S. air bases and talked with hundreds of American pilots. As an instructor, a MiG-17, SU-15, and MiG-25 pilot, he had seen dozens of Soviet air bases and spoken with hundreds of Russian fliers. In light of this unique background, he was asked to attempt a comparative appraisal of American and Soviet personnel and aircraft.
He judged that in terms of natural, individual ability the fliers of both nations are about the same. The Russians have tried to adopt American methods of selecting air cadets through psychomotor testing, and a young Russian has an enormous incentive to retain flight proficiency and thereby the enormous privileges which set him apart and far above the citizenry. In contrast with an American pilot, who may begin flight training after studying literature or sociology in a university, Soviet pilots spend years studying aviation and thus have much more theoretical knowledge. They also are generally in better physical condition because they must continuously exercise to pass a rigorous calisthenics test each year. The professional readiness of Soviet pilots probably is deleteriously affected by inordinate amounts of time wasted in political indoctrination, diversion of energies to essentially political duties in overseeing subordinates, and periodic assignments to nonmilitary tasks, such as harvesting or, as at Chuguyevka, road building.
However, Belenko believes that the main reasons the Americans may enjoy an advantage in pilot performance is that they fly more, both during and after training, and they have inherited a wealth of combat experience unavailable to their Soviet counterparts.
There are other Soviet pilots who, presented with the opportunity, would flee with their aircraft, and the Soviet armed forces in general are quite vulnerable to subversion by Western intelligence services. But were the Soviet Union attacked, most Russian pilots would fight ardently and to the best of their ability to defend not communism necessarily but their Mother Country, to which they are spiritually bound, however ill it may have served them. In his opinion, the large majority of Soviet pilots, if ordered, actually would ram hostile aircraft. With luck they might eject and survive as heroes; without it they would die as heroes, and their families would not suffer. Should they disobey an order to ram, they would be imprisoned and their families would suffer grievously.
Among enlisted personnel supporting flight operations, Belenko considers the American advantage overwhelming. The conditions of life and servitude of Soviet enlisted men are so brutal that they can barely be compelled to perform adequately in peacetime. He questions whether they could be coerced to perform adequately in the chaos and adversity of wartime. In his estimation, American enlisted personnel are incomparably better treated, trained, and motivated and probably would discharge their duties even more zealously and efficiently in wartime than in peacetime.
Finally, Belenko observes that the American air forces benefit from rapid dissemination and adaptation of new technological and tactical data. In the Soviet Union, because of a tradition of secrecy and the effects of the political bureaucracy within the military, communication of new information, much less its exploitation, is slow and difficult.
As for aircraft, Belenko's wide exposure to fighters in the United States has only confirmed what he was told in the Soviet Union. The F-14, F-15, and F-16, along with their missile, radar, and fire-control systems, are appreciably better than their Soviet counterparts, although the United States has not of its own choice developed an interceptor that can match the MiG-25 at the highest altitude.
Before his flight, Belenko was told, accurately, it would seem, that the Soviet Union planned a new version of the MiG-25 with two seats, a look-down radar, more effective missiles, and improved engines that would not accelerate out of control. He doubts, though, that any modifications can overcome the congenital limitations of weight, fuel consumption, range, and maneuverability that doom the MiG-25 to inferiority at heights below 60,000 feet.
Some of the most significant revelations from Belenko have been and probably will be kept secret indefinitely, for to disclose them would only assist the Russians in repairing the cracks and crevices he pointed out. And while telling the United States much that it did not know, he was able sometimes to show how it had seriously misinterpreted what it did know. «We asked him to look at an elaborate analysis of something our cameras detected by chance when there was an abnormal opening in clouds that normally covered a particular region. Learned men had spent vast amounts of time trying to figure out what it was and concluded that it was something quite sinister,» an Air Force officer said. «Viktor took one look at it and convincingly explained why what we thought was so ominous was in fact comically innocuous.»
Upon completion of the formal debriefings of Belenko, which lasted roughly five months, General Keegan commented: «The value of what he gave us, what he showed us is so great that it can never be measured in dollars. The people of the United States and the West owe him an everlasting debt. He grew up in a brutal, bestial society. In the military, he lived, despite his elite status, in a moral junkyard. Yet he came out of it as one of the most outstanding young studs, one of the most honest, courageous, selfreliant young men I have ever known of. I would love to have him as a pilot in the U.S. Air Force or Navy.»
Other Americans who came to know Belenko felt much the same way. But his future was far from secure. He had yet to confront the greatest crisis of his life.
CHAPTER VIII: The Final Escape
The CIA and Air Force did their best to steel Belenko against one danger that was foreseeable.
No matter how knowledgeable, perspicacious, intelligent, and helpful an escapee from the Soviet Union may be, there inevitably arrives a time when his special knowledge is exhausted. The initial, intense drama that binds interrogated and interrogators together personally and intellectually in a common cause sooner or later must end. The Americans who have been daily or frequent companions, who have formed for the Russian a kind of spiritual lifeline in a bewilderingly strange society must disperse and depart for other duties. And the Russian must begin a new life which only he can finally forge.
The KGB habitually warns military officers, Soviet civilians allowed abroad, and its own personnel that should they defect, «The Americans will squeeze you like a lemon, and once they have squeezed you dry, they will throw you into the garbage like a peel.» Unless the transition from dependence to independence is accomplished adroitly, the Russian may feel that he is being thrown away. The consequent sense of abandonment, betrayal, aimlessness, and loneliness can cause disabling depression or destructive paranoid behavior.