How many men start out as an F-86 pilot during the Korean
War and then become a writer over the next 50 years? James Salter wasn’t prolific, but great
nonetheless. I had already read what has
been considered his best works, Light Years, All That Is and A Sport and a Pastime
I’m generally not “into” war novels (although will never
forget reading Herman Wouk’s The Winds of
War and War and Remembrance, tears
streaming down my face reading the concentration camp chapters), so to this
point I had avoided Salter’s first novel, The
Hunters. Perhaps this is also because
I had seen the movie version on Turner Classic Movies, staring my favorite film
noir actor, Robert Mitchum (also with Robert Wagner and May Britt). The novel is very different from the film,
hardly bearing any resemblance, other than a story of F-86 fighter pilots
during the Korean War. Salter’s novel is
so superior, but of course it’s literature, not Hollywood. Salter must have agonized over the changes
that were made to his novel for the screen version.
Cleve Connell arrives at Kimpo air base at the height of
the Korean War. There, the F-86 pilots
do a dance of death with their MIG-15 enemies.
Connell learns this dance means to hunt or be hunted, kill or be killed,
a path to fame or ignominy.
The wonder of flying, only decades after flight itself
was pioneered by the Wright Brothers, is encapsulated by Salter, an experienced F-86 pilot. This novel could not have been written
without that credential or by a person indifferent to the joys of flying. Cleve is ready for one of his early missions,
congregating with the other pilots while waiting to go out to his “ship” as
they referred to their F-86’s: He was not fully at ease. It was still like
being a guest at a family reunion, with all the unfamiliar references. He felt
relieved when finally they rode out to their ships. Then it was intoxicating.
The smooth takeoff, and the free feeling of having the world drop away. Soon
after leaving the ground, they were crossing patches of stratus that lay in the
valleys as heavy and white as glaciers. North for the fifth time. It was still
all adventure, as exciting as love, as frightening. Cleve rejoiced in it.
Cleve fantasizes about turning his flying skills into a
sport, becoming an ace (5 kills). He romanticizes
to his wingman, while being aware that it’s not necessarily the best prepared pilots
who become aces: Odd. Everything about this ought to be perfect for you and me. Here we
are, by sheer accident, in the most natural of worlds, and of course that means
the most artificial, because we're very civilized. We're in a child's dream and
a man's heaven, living a medieval life under sanitary conditions, flying the
last shreds of something irreplaceable, I don't know what, in a sport too
kingly even for kings. Nothing is missing, and yet it's the men who don't
understand it at all that become its heroes.
By then, though, he is already transitioning into some
self doubt, even after a brief burst of confidence after his first kill. Soon he sinks into an even larger sinkhole of
remorse, and finally finding an acceptance of his self worth in the end. He is tormented, directly or indirectly by his
arch rival, Pell, a man he learns would claim unsubstantiated kills or even put
his wing-man in harm’s way to get a kill….he
hated Pell. He hated him in a way that allowed no other emotion. It seemed he
was born to, and that he had done it from the earliest days of his life, before
he ever knew him, before he even existed. Of all the absolutes, Pell was the
archetype, confronting him with the unreality and diabolical force of a
medieval play, the deathlike, grinning angel risen to claim the very souls of
men. When he dwelt upon that, Cleve felt the cool touch of fear. There was no
way out. He knew that if Pell were to win, he himself could not survive.
But these opportunities for wins frequently were the
consequence of just sheer luck. The
squadron flew three or four missions a day and pilots are not assigned to
all. Some came back their noses
blackened, the fuel tanks dropped, indicating a dog fight while others do not
see MIGs during the entire mission. Cleve’s
pick of the litter tended to be in the latter category while Pell’s were in the
former, so no wonder.
The Hunters is
a well developed novel, gathering momentum to the end, becoming so compelling one
can’t put the book down the deeper you get into it. Although a war novel, it is written by a then
young writer whose prose, you can tell, would lead him to greatness, not in the
air, but on the page.
