Such Men As These

This title offers the gripping true-life exploits of Navy combat pilots during the Korean War - heroes who inspired James Michener's classic book "The Bridges at Toko-Ri". In 1951, James Michener went to Korea to report on a little known aspect of America's stalemated war: Navy aviators. His researc [...]
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This title offers the gripping true-life exploits of Navy combat pilots during the Korean War - heroes who inspired James Michener's classic book "The Bridges at Toko-Ri". In 1951, James Michener went to Korea to report on a little known aspect of America's stalemated war: Navy aviators. His research-inspired novel about these pilots became an overnight bestseller and, perhaps, the most widely read book ever written about aerial combat. Using Michener's notes, author David Sears tracked down the actual pilots, many of them older veterans of World War II, to tell their riveting true-life stories. Called back into service, many of these Navy pilots left behind young families and budding careers to risk their lives in perilous airborne combat above the cold mountains of Korea. From icy, windswept decks of aircraft carriers, they crossed a cold sea and treacherous mountain terrain to strike heavily defended Communist dams, bridges and tunnels. During these pulse-pounding aerial strikes there was often just one path in and one path out - where well-entrenched North Korean antiaircraft gunners waited to shoot them down.Pilots who survived the enemy guns still had to return across the same cold sea to land on their carriers. Wounds or damage to their aircraft might force them to crash behind enemy lines or into near- freezing water where survival time was measured in minutes. In either case, for rescue, they depended on the selfless heroics of helicopter pilots flying what was then a new, fragile and largely untested craft. Enemy gunfire and frigid seas took an enormous toll: at least one carrier aviation squadron comprised of reservists lost half its pilots during a six month deployment. Michener's experiences off the coast of Korea were to provide him a trove of compelling characters, hair-raising exploits and wrenching tragedies. He saw pilots risk all - including their own lives - both to take out daunting targets and save the lives of downed comrades. Near the conclusion of his novel, "The Bridges at Toko-Ri", Michener would have one of his characters - a crusty, plain-spoken navy admiral - express in wonder a question that likely haunted Michener as well: 'Where do we get such men?'"Such Men As These" answers the admiral's question by profiling the actual events and people, some more improbable and stirring than Michener's fictional versions - men such as Jesse LeRoy James, the first African American Navy pilot, and Neil Armstrong, the first astronaut on the moon. It is filled with action-packed accounts of combat and unforgettable portraits of the pilots whose skill and sacrifice in the Korean War made epic history.