Nichols’s assistant escorted No to a small apartment where a futon had been placed on the floor for him. Bleary-eyed but jubilant, No lay down and reviewed all that he had accomplished in one day: flying clear of Kim Il Sung, escaping a dead-end future in North Korea and finding safety in the West. As an unexpected bonus, the Americans had been kind to him, even complimentary. One interrogator told him that someday he could become president of South Korea.

The Americans, though, had pestered him about reward money—what he knew and when he knew it—and they did not seem to believe his answers. It was irritating and confusing.

When No awoke at 7 a.m., a morning newspaper had been placed next to his futon. He read a story aboutthey would never have trusted the Americans enough to risk being shot down.

Finally, he knew that Communist pilots did not understand how much $100,000 was worth. The reward would have been much more tempting, he thought, if the Americans had promised a good job in America.

No also realized that it did not matter what he thought. His life—and his befuddling future as “Moolah Man”—was now in the hands of the U.S. government.

***

Thirteen time zones away from No and the MiG, the president of the United States was ticked off by Operation Moolah and its vulgar financial inducements.

Dwight D. Eisenhower had run for president in 1952 in part on the promise to end the Korean War. He did not want the fighter jet and worried that its theft might