English,” the Associated Press reported. “He said he would spend part of his reward money to study political science at the University of Delaware, part to support his mother who escaped to South Korea in 1950 and the rest to help rebuild South Korea.”

But in San Francisco, No did not actually say the words reporters and the newsreel attributed to him. When he landed in the United States, he did not know how, when or if he would get the reward money or what he would do with it. At the press conference in San Francisco, it was his official escort and translator, the army captain James Kim, who explained No’s supposed plans. Without No’s knowledge or approval, Kim answered reporters’ questions in ways that suited the publicrelations interests of the Eisenhower administration. No never intended to move back to South Korea or send money to help rebuild that country, and he never told the press that he would do so.

***

A week after coming to the United States—more than eight months after he stole the MiG—No finally learned what the Eisenhower administration was going to do with his moolah.

A bank vice president laid it out for him in the main office of Riggs National Bank on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. At the time, Riggs was the leading bank in the nation’s capital. Eisenhower banked there, as did Vice President Richard Nixon, more than 20 previous presidents and most of the city’s embassies and diplomats. Riggs later marketed itself as “the most important bank in the