title: Mig Pilot: The Final Escape of Lt. Belenko
author:  John Barron 
description: I was so blown away by this book I had to meet Viktor in person and now count him as a personal friend. The book is factual in every respect and is difficult to put down once started. John Barron is an excellent author and did a first class job of writing Viktor's story. In addition to an exciting escape story it reveals why the Soviet Union had to collapse of its own ineptitude, deceit, and corruption. It details humorous incidents such as army pilots' mess-hall riots due to bad food. Mig Pilot is also a biography of an exceptional man whose intelligence saw through a lifetime of brainwashing. The story is humorous in places and engrossing from beginning to end. It starts right out with Viktor's desperate and harrowing escape flight to freedom in his top-secret Mig-25 Foxbat, then in subsequent chapters details the life events that led to his courageous decision to "go for broke" and make his live-or-die dash to freedom. It illustrates how America probably could have given the Soviets all of its top secrets and they would have found a way to screw up making use of them.Viktor is not only a first class pilot, he is also a true hero. Don't lend this book to anyone and expect to get it back.
zlib_text: 
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ![](images/00002.jpg)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  TWO
  
  MY HATRED NOTWITHSTANDING, I HAD to admit Dimitri Beli-whatever was pretty
  smart. After they'd carted us off to the airport to and onto the Academy's
  private jet, he'd taken one look at the two of us whispering and ordered us
  separated.
  
  "Don't let them talk to each other," he warned the guardian who escorted me to
  the back of the plane. "Five minutes together, and they'll come up with an
  escape plan.”
  
  I shot him a haughty look and stormed off down the aisle. Never mind the fact
  we had been planning escape.
  
  As it was, things didn't look good for our heroes—or heroines, rather. Once we
  were in the air, our odds of escape dropped further. Even supposing a miracle
  occurred and I did manage to take out all ten guardians, we'd sort of have a
  problem in getting off the plane. I figured they might have parachutes aboard
  somewhere, but in the unlikely event I'd be able to operate one, there was
  still that little issue of surviv