.gif)
The Hunters (novel)
Encyclopedia
The Hunters is James Salter
's debut novel
about USAF
fighter pilot
s during the Korean War
, first published in 1956
. The novel was the basis for a 1958
film by the same name starring Robert Mitchum
and Robert Wagner
with a very different storyline.
Under his birthname James A. Horowitz, Salter himself was a fighter pilot with the rank of Captain who saw combat from February to August 1952. He kept a detailed diary
of his tour and the novel closely follows a chronology of events he experienced as an F-86 Sabre
pilot with the 4th Fighter-Interceptor Wing
, based at Kimpo Air Base
, Korea
.
Salter was 31 when he published the novel and made his protagonist, Captain Cleve Connell, the same age. He describes 31 as being "the end for him" as a fighter pilot: "...not too old, certainly; but it would not be long. His eyes weren't good enough any more. With an athlete, the legs failed first. With a fighter pilot, it was the eyes." Salter himself resigned from the Air Force soon after the publication of The Hunters to pursue an alternate passion, writing.
, Japan
, Captain Cleve Connell restlessly waits for assignment orders completing his transfer to Korea. Billet
ed for four days in a warehouse
, he has tired of seeing Tokyo
– and of watching others come and go – and his clean laundry is nearly gone. He walks to dinner at the Officers Club
reflecting on his ability as a flyer (he's a good one, with a reputation among his peacetime peers), his reluctance to leave the Air Force although pressured by civilian friends to do so, and his desire to test himself in combat. He senses that his feelings of time lost and lack of accomplishment are corrosive.
He shares dinner with a fellow pilot en route to the war and while they are discussing women, the war in general, and the tedium of waiting, a group of loud young lieutenant
s enters the club. One stands out from the rest, however, emanating cool confidence amidst their obvious insecurity, and mildly harasses a pretty Japanese bar waitress. Cleve's companion chastises the lieutenant, who reluctantly backs down, resisting just enough that Cleve catches his name in the discussion: Pell. Cleve shrugs aside the episode and the next morning receives his orders.
He arrives in Korea on a frigid afternoon and despite a feeling of exhilaration, his first impression of Korea is a dreary, impoverished country made drearier by the slow-moving military bureaucracy. Assigned to an elite fighter
wing
at the primitive Kimpo air base, Cleve arrives to find it abuzz with an outgoing mission
and talk of a bad end to a bad week: the leading ace
in the wing has just been shot down and killed. He meets pilots he knew in Panama
, just after the end of World War II
, including Carl Abbott, now a major
. Cleve is mildly shocked to find that his young comrade of just a few years ago now looks old, out of shape, and lacking in spirit. Though genuinely glad to see Cleve, Major Abbott's effectiveness as a combat pilot is gone; he has been put out to pasture and does not care.
That evening, in the officers club, he greets his wing commander, Colonel Imil, a former squadron commander in Panama. Imil is a larger-than-life personality who shows off Cleve to the veterans as a "real fighter pilot", and enthusiastically introduces him to Colonel Moncavage, a former ace just returned to flying. Moncavage's cool response prompts Imil to goad him, revealing a competitive friction between the two commanders.
, the only MiG pilot to best Imil in a fight. Desmond reassures him that Casey Jones isn't seen on missions any more, his tour apparently over.
Cleve begins flying missions as Desmond's wingman. They encounter MiGs in large numbers on one mission and although seemingly everywhere, the clashes are so fleeting that Desmond's flight is unable to ever catch up to any. Cleve has a feeling afterwards that perhaps his flight was "playing it safe" and makes the mistake of saying so to Desmond, offending him. At the post-mission debriefing, they learn that a pilot, Robey, has claimed his fifth MiG. Another pilot asks Desmond, "Did he really get this one for a change?", prompting Desmond to relate to Cleve that Robey had once gotten Imil to cajole a reluctant wingman
into confirming a kill he had not witnessed. Even so, Cleve notices that news of the fifth kill gets around quickly, and that he, like everyone else, feels a "mystic fulfillment" at being a part of the same fight.
Imil makes Cleve a flight leader despite his having flown just eight missions. The flight consists of two veteran pilots, DeLeo and Daughters, and two untried replacements, Billy Hunter and Pettibone. All are aware of his reputation as a flyer and accordingly respectful, but it becomes apparent that he has been made flight lead because the flight has yet to shoot down any MiGs. Though nothing goes wrong in their first mission together, he is left with the strong feeling of a "wasted mission", until he learns that nobody in the wing saw any MiGs. Just as he is about to recover his good humor however, he encounters a new pilot in their barracks and assigned to his flight, Ed Pell, the loud lieutenant from Japan. Cleve is acutely disquieted. Pell upsets the balance of things; Cleve becomes uncomfortably aware that he is the leader, and much is expected of him.
A quarter of the way through his tour, he has yet to see combat, and on days when the wing is in a fight, Imil chides him for missing it. Trapped by a feeling of helplessness, his growing self-doubt begins to gnaw away his confidence as he fears he is not just unlucky but possibly lacking something vital. The feeling worsens when Major Abbott, about to be exiled from the Wing, comes in to say goodbye and begins sobbing uncontrollably, possibly foreshadowing his own fate. Other missions go by without combat until one day Colonel Moncavage, who also had lacked success, shoots down two MiGs, eviscerating Cleve emotionally.
The arrival of spring brings a long spell of bad weather that shuts down almost all combat missions. Cleve and DeLeo decide to go on leave
to Japan "to enjoy civilization". The night before the leave they head into Seoul
for a steak dinner at the plush officers club of Air Force Headquarters, where they run into Abbott who insists with a pitiful obsessiveness on hearing the details of Cleve's MiG kill. Cleve realizes that the other pilots hated Abbott because they saw themselves in him.
Reaching Tokyo, their leave starts as a typical R&R
with martini
s and steak for breakfast, followed by an afternoon nap, then an evening of hopping from cocktail lounge to cocktail lounge. DeLeo disappears to make a phone call and while he's gone the fragrance of perfume from a passing woman makes Cleve realize that he has suppressed all physical desires. DeLeo has booked them a night at Miyoshi's, a well-known Soapland
-style brothel
, that is spent in samisen
music, saki
, the baths, and sex
with two young Japanese women. Cleve waxes philosophically about such luxury in contrast to their spartan existence in Korea, and DeLeo warns him that while "trying" (to get MiGs) is enough for DeLeo, he knows it won't be enough for him.
The next night while making the rounds of the clubs, they run into a former friend of Pell's during cadet training, an obvious admirer whose drunken praise confirms all of Cleve's misgivings about Pell's deviousness and ambition, and he knows he has entered "a dark, ultimate battle." The next day, as a favor to his father, he searches for and finds Miyata, a Japanese artist, whose brother was a friend. Despite losing his life's work in the fire raids, Miyata is not only not bitter but seems above the miseries involved in living. They find a common interest in film
s and Miyata introduces Cleve to his daughter Eiko.
He spends the next day with Eiko. She draws him out, asking him about his ambition. He replies that he has chased many ambitions of his own choosing but now has had one forced on him: to become an ace. He explains that he knows it is the result of a fatal pride but that flying fighters becomes first a sport and then a refuge. Finally he tells her that he wants to be remembered for something, a real performance akin to her aspiration to act in a great movie, and that in the final analysis his ambition is "Not to fail." Beyond that, he has no answers. With two days of his leave remaining, they make plans for the next day.
Back at his hotel, he hears important news. There was a big fight the day before over the Yalu River
, with eight MiGs shot down and three pilots lost, including Desmond. He feels sickened and helpless having missed it again, but there is more: Casey Jones is back. DeLeo tries to talk him out of it, but Cleve immediately goes back to Korea, followed by his reluctant, disgusted wingman.
Behind his back, Pell undercuts Cleve with the other rookies of the flight. His resentment of Pell blinds Cleve to Pell's intentions when Daughters tries to support him, plus he is distracted by all the talk regarding Casey Jones. He wants to be free of competing for MiGs but he's only too aware that he's expected by everyone, even Daughters and DeLeo, to match Pell's accomplishments. Cleve's flight is scheduled for three missions the next day, a reconnaissance
and two MiG sweeps. He assigns himself to the sweeps and puts Daughters, with Pell as wingman, on the early morning reconnaissance, where nothing is likely to happen.
To his anguish, the recon flight is jumped by six MiGs and shoots down two. Worse, only three ships of the flight return. They ran into Casey Jones, DeLeo says, who had him cold a dozen times but never fired. Daughters — with only a handful of missions to go — was shot down in flames. Pell got both MiGs and DeLeo accuses him of failing to do his assigned job: warning Daughters that MiGs were behind him. Pell protests his innocence, but when Cleve tells him he's going to ground him for abandoning his leader, Pell just smirks confidently. Imil, caring only about MiG kills, supports Pell and angrily accuses Cleve of trying to wreck the outfit, insinuates that he's shirking combat, and says that he "and that Italian...have got it in for Pell". Cleve realizes he's lost Imil's support. Imil lionizes Pell, and when the new ace tries to ease his conscience with rationalizations of how Daughters might have gotten himself killed, Imil refuses even to listen.
Pell is sent to Japan as a reward for making ace and, curiously, asks that Hunter and Pettibone accompany him. No one except Cleve realizes (or cares) that Pell is making them acolytes to undermine Cleve's authority. Cleve imagines Daughters' terror at being shot down, and in the realization of his own mortality, comes to believe that his salvation will be in killing Casey Jones. When Pell returns, now a celebrity, he holds court for the other pilots, using Hunter as his Boswell
. Cleve comes to hate Pell in a way that seems to wipe out everything else from his life, and when Imil admits he was wrong and tries to apologize, Cleve doesn't back down from his desire to ground Pell, angering the colonel even more. DeLeo finishes his tour; two new pilots join the flight and immediately become Pell's disciples. Hunter, who has ambitions of his own, remains loyal to Cleve, but clearly admires Pell.
The MiGs try to corner them, but Cleve is determined to take the fight as far south as he can, in case the MiGs are also low on fuel. In their twisting, evasive turns they get off some bursts, descend to an altitude where their jets perform better, and the MiGs lose their advantage. Cleve seizes an opportunity and closes in behind Casey Jones. The fight becomes a battle of wills and descends near the ground, where Casey tries an impossible diving maneuver. Cleve somehow follows him through it and shoots him down.
Their fuel tanks nearly empty, Cleve and Hunter climb to 40,000 feet to attempt to glide back to base, a too-common practice. He notifies Kimpo about their dire situation. Imil asks if they got any MiGs. Cleve tells him "they" got one. Out of fuel and without power, they try to land. Cleve makes it, but the less experienced Hunter stalls and crashes just short of the field.
Imil wants to know about the kill; Cleve is intoxicated, knowing it was Casey Jones. Then he learns Hunter was killed in the crash and that his own gun camera
failed to function. Imil laments there is no way to confirm the kill. Cleve tells him it doesn't matter; it was Casey Jones. Pell objects strenuously that there is no way to confirm the kill. Imil, who has proclaimed that no one less skilled than himself could ever get Casey, quickly agrees with Pell.
Cleve responds in a way he had never conceived possible, and finds his destiny. "I can confirm it," he declares suddenly, "Hunter got him."
Two missions later Pettibone loses sight of Cleve, who does not return to base. Pell, back after his seventh kill, tells a correspondent interviewing him that Cleve was one of the best, who taught him everything about air combat, but never got lucky himself. Cleve was like his brother. "But don't write any of that," he says.
Note: these are the character names in the 1990s re-release edition. Several names were changed from those used in the original edition.
(New York Times Book Review), but until the next-to-last chapter, scenes involving flying are few and brief. Most of the progress of the narrative takes place in dialogue or in Cleve's impressions, where the journey is more through his soul
than the combat missions. Salter's prose has been characterized as "spare... but also lush", and relies heavily on simile
in descriptions of surroundings and impressions.
He occasionally employs the patois
of the air war in Korea to give the flavor of the experience, but does not use technical jargon
at all. In the entire text neither the designation "F-86" nor the nickname Sabre are ever mentioned, the slang
term "ships" used instead, and only once is "MiG" expanded to be "MiG 15" and that in a character's dialogue. In all flying scenes, the point of view is that of the pilots, not the airplanes, using the nominative pronoun
"they".
Salter's biographer William Dowie calls The Hunters a "variation on the theme of man's desire for glory in the face of death." In giving the MiG kill, which is his finding of glory, to Billy Hunter, Cleve transcends his own ambitions and finds instead something more "authentic": leadership, the part of himself he had feared was lacking."
Dowie also notes that the protagonist of The Hunters was originally called "Cleve Saville," as is the main character of the film adaptation. When interest in Salter's earliest novels, unavailable for decades, resulted in a 1997 re-issue of the novel, Salter made several revisions, the main of which is changing Cleve's surname to "Connell" with no indication why this was done.
As with many works based on personal and historical experience, interest has fostered speculation about real-life personalities providing the basis for characters. Salter had been a member of D Flight, 335th Fighter-Interceptor Squadron
when it was one of the leading MiG-killing units in Korea, scoring 28 victories. As with circumstances in the novel, Salter joined D Flight before its members had registered any MiG claims but unlike the novel, flew as a wingman and not as flight lead, until near the end of his tour he flew as a leader, which was the situation on July 4, 1952, when he achieved his single MiG kill on his 89th mission. This occurred ten days after the attack on the Sui-ho Dam
on which the climax of The Hunters is based, but in which no MiG combat actually occurred.
Three of the eight pilots with whom Salter flew became aces, including 2nd Lt. James Low. Low joined the flight in April, about eight weeks after Salter, after D flight's pilots had begun racking up their score. The flight leader, Captain Philip E. "Casey" Colman, had a unique policy that allowed anyone in the flight to shoot MiGs, rather than only flight and element leads. Low appears to have taken advantage of that policy to his own aggrandizement.
Almost from the first Low garnered a reputation for breaking away from his formation to pursue MiGs; his element lead, future ace James H. Kasler, was nearly shot down when Low broke away during a dogfight and shot down his first MiG. However, just as depicted in The Hunters, the 4th Wing's commander Colonel Harrison Thyng
"went to bat for him" because he wanted MiG kills. Within a month Low had scored his fifth kill, the only second lieutenant
in Korea to become an ace. A month after that, following his sixth kill, Low was sent back to the United States on temporary duty to lecture on the radar
gunsight, of which he was undoubtedly an expert. When he returned to Korea in October he found himself something of a pariah among the new leadership in the 4th Wing. He shot down three more MiG's in Korea, then was sent home, and some pilots alleged it was for losing his wingman.
When Salter wrote The Hunters his use of Low as a model for Ed Pell was obvious. Controversy over the depiction remained low key until release of the film, which transformed Pell's character into an immature but likeable pilot who redeems himself after losing his wingman. F-86 aficionados sought to get the "whole story" and interviewed Low, who then got in his own shots. Low disparaged Salter as a poor fighter pilot, a "Hudson High boy" (West Point graduate) who had an aversion to combat and implied that Salter's dislike of him was his actual motivation for the Pell character. Whether consciously or not, this rebuttal mirrored the scene in the novel in which Pell disparaged Cleve to Imil: "I don't think he goes for this combat flying too much."
The character of Dutch Imil is more difficult to place, and like many fictional characters with real-life counterparts, apparently a composite. While Col. Thyng was superficially similar to Imil in combat experience, and the tone of Salter's recollections in Gods of Tin and Burning the Days indicates at least an ambivalence of feeling toward Thyng, Salter flew many of his missions with the wing commander and clearly respected him. Moreover Thyng was a small man physically (Salter says he "looked like a fading jockey
"), and not boisterous. Imil was based largely on Major Zane S. Amell, commander of the 335th FIS when Salter arrived in Korea, with whom Salter flew his first missions and who accompanied Salter to Japan on leave in April in a manner similar to DeLeo. Amell/Imil share identical physical and personality characteristics in Salter's writing.
The largely sympathetic character of Monk Moncavage is superficially based on Col. Walker "Bud" Mahurin
, a noted World War II ace who like Moncavage took over the job of group commander about the time of Salter's arrival in Korea. Like Moncavage he had no kills in the 4th FIW, and had recently transitioned into jet fighters after several years of staff work, but unlike Moncavage he had been transferred from the other F-86 wing, where he had shot down 3 MiGs. Salter liked Mahurin and regularly mentioned him in his reminiscences.
The communist ace Casey Jones was an "urban legend
" that sprang up among U.S. pilots in Korea: "an exceptional non-Asian pilot, perhaps a former Luftwaffe
pilot, who attacked lone F-86s in a MiG painted with... fuselage stripes". A pair of top-scoring Soviet Air Force
pilots, Nikolay Sutyagin
and Yevgeny Pepelyaev
, both finished their missions only weeks before Salter arrived in Korea.
magazine in March 1956 before its first printing as a book.
In 1958 the novel was adapted with significant plot and character alterations as a film released by Twentieth Century Fox.
James Salter
James Salter is an American novelist and short-story writer. Once a career officer and pilot in the United States Air Force, he abandoned the military profession in 1957 after successful publication of his first novel, The Hunters.After a brief career at film writing and film directing, Salter...
's debut novel
Debut novel
A debut novel is the first novel an author publishes. Debut novels are the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to publish in the future...
about USAF
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...
fighter pilot
Fighter pilot
A fighter pilot is a military aviator trained in air-to-air combat while piloting a fighter aircraft . Fighter pilots undergo specialized training in aerial warfare and dogfighting...
s during the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...
, first published in 1956
1956 in literature
The year 1956 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:* Writing under the pseudonym of Emile Ajar, author Romain Gary becomes the only person ever to win the Prix Goncourt twice.*Iris Murdoch marries John Bayley....
. The novel was the basis for a 1958
1958 in film
The year 1958 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* February 16- "In the Money" by William Beaudine is released on this date. It would be the last installment of The Bowery Boys series which began back in 1946....
film by the same name starring Robert Mitchum
Robert Mitchum
Robert Charles Durman Mitchum was an American film actor, author, composer and singer and is #23 on the American Film Institute's list of the greatest male American screen legends of all time...
and Robert Wagner
Robert Wagner
Robert John Wagner is an American actor of stage, screen, and television.A veteran of many films in the 1950s and 1960s, Wagner gained prominence in three American television series that spanned three decades: It Takes a Thief , Switch , and Hart to Hart...
with a very different storyline.
Under his birthname James A. Horowitz, Salter himself was a fighter pilot with the rank of Captain who saw combat from February to August 1952. He kept a detailed diary
Diary
A diary is a record with discrete entries arranged by date reporting on what has happened over the course of a day or other period. A personal diary may include a person's experiences, and/or thoughts or feelings, including comment on current events outside the writer's direct experience. Someone...
of his tour and the novel closely follows a chronology of events he experienced as an F-86 Sabre
F-86 Sabre
The North American F-86 Sabre was a transonic jet fighter aircraft. Produced by North American Aviation, the Sabre is best known as America's first swept wing fighter which could counter the similarly-winged Soviet MiG-15 in high speed dogfights over the skies of the Korean War...
pilot with the 4th Fighter-Interceptor Wing
4th Fighter Wing
The 4th Fighter Wing is a United States Air Force unit assigned to the Air Combat Command Ninth Air Force. It is stationed at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, where it is also the host unit....
, based at Kimpo Air Base
Gimpo International Airport
Gimpo International Airport , commonly known as Gimpo Airport , is located in the far western end of Seoul and was the main international airport for Seoul and South Korea before it was replaced by Incheon International Airport in 2001...
, Korea
Korea
Korea ) is an East Asian geographic region that is currently divided into two separate sovereign states — North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by the People's Republic of China to the northwest, Russia to the northeast, and is separated from Japan to the...
.
Salter was 31 when he published the novel and made his protagonist, Captain Cleve Connell, the same age. He describes 31 as being "the end for him" as a fighter pilot: "...not too old, certainly; but it would not be long. His eyes weren't good enough any more. With an athlete, the legs failed first. With a fighter pilot, it was the eyes." Salter himself resigned from the Air Force soon after the publication of The Hunters to pursue an alternate passion, writing.
New to war
On a frozen February evening in FuchūFuchu, Tokyo
is a city located in western Tokyo Metropolis, Japan. As of 2010, the city has an estimated population of 255,394 and a population density of 8,700 persons per km². The total area was 29.34 km²...
, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
, Captain Cleve Connell restlessly waits for assignment orders completing his transfer to Korea. Billet
Billet
A billet is a term for living quarters to which a soldier is assigned to sleep. Historically, it referred to a private dwelling that was required to accept the soldier....
ed for four days in a warehouse
Warehouse
A warehouse is a commercial building for storage of goods. Warehouses are used by manufacturers, importers, exporters, wholesalers, transport businesses, customs, etc. They are usually large plain buildings in industrial areas of cities and towns. They usually have loading docks to load and unload...
, he has tired of seeing Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
– and of watching others come and go – and his clean laundry is nearly gone. He walks to dinner at the Officers Club
Mess
A mess is the place where military personnel socialise, eat, and live. In some societies this military usage has extended to other disciplined services eateries such as civilian fire fighting and police forces. The root of mess is the Old French mes, "portion of food" A mess (also called a...
reflecting on his ability as a flyer (he's a good one, with a reputation among his peacetime peers), his reluctance to leave the Air Force although pressured by civilian friends to do so, and his desire to test himself in combat. He senses that his feelings of time lost and lack of accomplishment are corrosive.
He shares dinner with a fellow pilot en route to the war and while they are discussing women, the war in general, and the tedium of waiting, a group of loud young lieutenant
Lieutenant
A lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer in many nations' armed forces. Typically, the rank of lieutenant in naval usage, while still a junior officer rank, is senior to the army rank...
s enters the club. One stands out from the rest, however, emanating cool confidence amidst their obvious insecurity, and mildly harasses a pretty Japanese bar waitress. Cleve's companion chastises the lieutenant, who reluctantly backs down, resisting just enough that Cleve catches his name in the discussion: Pell. Cleve shrugs aside the episode and the next morning receives his orders.
He arrives in Korea on a frigid afternoon and despite a feeling of exhilaration, his first impression of Korea is a dreary, impoverished country made drearier by the slow-moving military bureaucracy. Assigned to an elite fighter
Fighter aircraft
A fighter aircraft is a military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat with other aircraft, as opposed to a bomber, which is designed primarily to attack ground targets...
wing
Wing (air force unit)
Wing is a term used by different military aviation forces for a unit of command. The terms wing, group or Staffel are used for different-sized units from one country or service to another....
at the primitive Kimpo air base, Cleve arrives to find it abuzz with an outgoing mission
Military operation
Military operation is the coordinated military actions of a state in response to a developing situation. These actions are designed as a military plan to resolve the situation in the state's favor. Operations may be of combat or non-combat types, and are referred to by a code name for the purpose...
and talk of a bad end to a bad week: the leading ace
Flying ace
A flying ace or fighter ace is a military aviator credited with shooting down several enemy aircraft during aerial combat. The actual number of aerial victories required to officially qualify as an "ace" has varied, but is usually considered to be five or more...
in the wing has just been shot down and killed. He meets pilots he knew in Panama
Panama
Panama , officially the Republic of Panama , is the southernmost country of Central America. Situated on the isthmus connecting North and South America, it is bordered by Costa Rica to the northwest, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. The...
, just after the end of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, including Carl Abbott, now a major
Major
Major is a rank of commissioned officer, with corresponding ranks existing in almost every military in the world.When used unhyphenated, in conjunction with no other indicator of rank, the term refers to the rank just senior to that of an Army captain and just below the rank of lieutenant colonel. ...
. Cleve is mildly shocked to find that his young comrade of just a few years ago now looks old, out of shape, and lacking in spirit. Though genuinely glad to see Cleve, Major Abbott's effectiveness as a combat pilot is gone; he has been put out to pasture and does not care.
That evening, in the officers club, he greets his wing commander, Colonel Imil, a former squadron commander in Panama. Imil is a larger-than-life personality who shows off Cleve to the veterans as a "real fighter pilot", and enthusiastically introduces him to Colonel Moncavage, a former ace just returned to flying. Moncavage's cool response prompts Imil to goad him, revealing a competitive friction between the two commanders.
Erosion of confidence
Cleve is put through a brief period of training. One morning, he goes to the operations office to follow the progress of a mission over the radio. The operations officer is Desmond, another old friend. In their discussion, he learns that Desmond also feels that Abbott "doesn't have it any more", and the conversation turns to the quality of their MiG opponents. While nearly all are poor adversaries, a few are very good, particularly one nicknamed Casey JonesCasey Jones
John Luther Jones was an American railroad engineer from Jackson, Tennessee, who worked for the Illinois Central Railroad...
, the only MiG pilot to best Imil in a fight. Desmond reassures him that Casey Jones isn't seen on missions any more, his tour apparently over.
Cleve begins flying missions as Desmond's wingman. They encounter MiGs in large numbers on one mission and although seemingly everywhere, the clashes are so fleeting that Desmond's flight is unable to ever catch up to any. Cleve has a feeling afterwards that perhaps his flight was "playing it safe" and makes the mistake of saying so to Desmond, offending him. At the post-mission debriefing, they learn that a pilot, Robey, has claimed his fifth MiG. Another pilot asks Desmond, "Did he really get this one for a change?", prompting Desmond to relate to Cleve that Robey had once gotten Imil to cajole a reluctant wingman
Wingman
A wingman is a pilot who supports another in a potentially dangerous flying environment. Wingman was originally a term referring to the plane flying beside and slightly behind the lead plane in an aircraft formation....
into confirming a kill he had not witnessed. Even so, Cleve notices that news of the fifth kill gets around quickly, and that he, like everyone else, feels a "mystic fulfillment" at being a part of the same fight.
Imil makes Cleve a flight leader despite his having flown just eight missions. The flight consists of two veteran pilots, DeLeo and Daughters, and two untried replacements, Billy Hunter and Pettibone. All are aware of his reputation as a flyer and accordingly respectful, but it becomes apparent that he has been made flight lead because the flight has yet to shoot down any MiGs. Though nothing goes wrong in their first mission together, he is left with the strong feeling of a "wasted mission", until he learns that nobody in the wing saw any MiGs. Just as he is about to recover his good humor however, he encounters a new pilot in their barracks and assigned to his flight, Ed Pell, the loud lieutenant from Japan. Cleve is acutely disquieted. Pell upsets the balance of things; Cleve becomes uncomfortably aware that he is the leader, and much is expected of him.
A quarter of the way through his tour, he has yet to see combat, and on days when the wing is in a fight, Imil chides him for missing it. Trapped by a feeling of helplessness, his growing self-doubt begins to gnaw away his confidence as he fears he is not just unlucky but possibly lacking something vital. The feeling worsens when Major Abbott, about to be exiled from the Wing, comes in to say goodbye and begins sobbing uncontrollably, possibly foreshadowing his own fate. Other missions go by without combat until one day Colonel Moncavage, who also had lacked success, shoots down two MiGs, eviscerating Cleve emotionally.
Redemption and leave
The bad feelings vanish when Cleve, with Billy Hunter on his wing, shoots down a MiG. Both exultant and relieved, he learns at debriefing that Pell, too, has shot down a MiG and almost gotten DeLeo killed in the process: DeLeo accuses Pell of flying off on his own in the middle of the fight and leaving his leader to the mercies of the enemy. Pell denies the accusation and Cleve tries to smooth over the situation as a misunderstanding in the heat of battle. He discovers that his redemption is short-lived when, five days later, a big fight occurs after Cleve left himself off the schedule. The doubt and ominous fear return immediately. Then he finds that Pell has shot down another MiG. DeLeo remains hostile and skeptical of Pell, but Daughters confirms the kill.The arrival of spring brings a long spell of bad weather that shuts down almost all combat missions. Cleve and DeLeo decide to go on leave
Leave (U.S. military)
In the United States Military, leave is permission to be away from one's unit for a specific period of time.- Entitlement :Under normal circumstance, all personnel are granted 30 days of leave per year. This time is usually used for vacations and other extended time periods away from the service...
to Japan "to enjoy civilization". The night before the leave they head into Seoul
Seoul
Seoul , officially the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea. A megacity with a population of over 10 million, it is the largest city proper in the OECD developed world...
for a steak dinner at the plush officers club of Air Force Headquarters, where they run into Abbott who insists with a pitiful obsessiveness on hearing the details of Cleve's MiG kill. Cleve realizes that the other pilots hated Abbott because they saw themselves in him.
Reaching Tokyo, their leave starts as a typical R&R
R&R
R&R may refer to:* R&R , a music trade magazine* R&R , acronym for Rest and Recuperation* "R&R" , an episode of the science fiction TV show*R&R , a fictional nightclub in EastEnders...
with martini
Martini (cocktail)
The martini is a cocktail made with gin and vermouth, and garnished with an olive or a lemon twist. Over the years, the martini has become one of the best-known mixed alcoholic beverages. H. L. Mencken called the martini "the only American invention as perfect as the sonnet" and E. B...
s and steak for breakfast, followed by an afternoon nap, then an evening of hopping from cocktail lounge to cocktail lounge. DeLeo disappears to make a phone call and while he's gone the fragrance of perfume from a passing woman makes Cleve realize that he has suppressed all physical desires. DeLeo has booked them a night at Miyoshi's, a well-known Soapland
Soapland
A ' is a Japanglish and indicates a paradise for men in Japanese. It is said, since in Japan prostitution is officially prohibited by the government, that it is a type of brothel in Japan where male clients can engage in sexual activity with female prostitutes, although officially the clubs do...
-style brothel
Brothel
Brothels are business establishments where patrons can engage in sexual activities with prostitutes. Brothels are known under a variety of names, including bordello, cathouse, knocking shop, whorehouse, strumpet house, sporting house, house of ill repute, house of prostitution, and bawdy house...
, that is spent in samisen
Shamisen
The , also called is a three-stringed, Japanese musical instrument played with a plectrum called a bachi. The Japanese pronunciation is usually "shamisen" but sometimes "jamisen" when used as a suffix . -Construction:The shamisen is a plucked stringed instrument...
music, saki
Saki
Hector Hugh Munro , better known by the pen name Saki, and also frequently as H. H. Munro, was a British writer whose witty, mischievous and sometimes macabre stories satirised Edwardian society and culture. He is considered a master of the short story and often compared to O. Henry and Dorothy...
, the baths, and sex
Sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse, also known as copulation or coitus, commonly refers to the act in which a male's penis enters a female's vagina for the purposes of sexual pleasure or reproduction. The entities may be of opposite sexes, or they may be hermaphroditic, as is the case with snails...
with two young Japanese women. Cleve waxes philosophically about such luxury in contrast to their spartan existence in Korea, and DeLeo warns him that while "trying" (to get MiGs) is enough for DeLeo, he knows it won't be enough for him.
The next night while making the rounds of the clubs, they run into a former friend of Pell's during cadet training, an obvious admirer whose drunken praise confirms all of Cleve's misgivings about Pell's deviousness and ambition, and he knows he has entered "a dark, ultimate battle." The next day, as a favor to his father, he searches for and finds Miyata, a Japanese artist, whose brother was a friend. Despite losing his life's work in the fire raids, Miyata is not only not bitter but seems above the miseries involved in living. They find a common interest in film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
s and Miyata introduces Cleve to his daughter Eiko.
He spends the next day with Eiko. She draws him out, asking him about his ambition. He replies that he has chased many ambitions of his own choosing but now has had one forced on him: to become an ace. He explains that he knows it is the result of a fatal pride but that flying fighters becomes first a sport and then a refuge. Finally he tells her that he wants to be remembered for something, a real performance akin to her aspiration to act in a great movie, and that in the final analysis his ambition is "Not to fail." Beyond that, he has no answers. With two days of his leave remaining, they make plans for the next day.
Back at his hotel, he hears important news. There was a big fight the day before over the Yalu River
Yalu River
The Yalu River or the Amnok River is a river on the border between North Korea and the People's Republic of China....
, with eight MiGs shot down and three pilots lost, including Desmond. He feels sickened and helpless having missed it again, but there is more: Casey Jones is back. DeLeo tries to talk him out of it, but Cleve immediately goes back to Korea, followed by his reluctant, disgusted wingman.
Challenged
Cleve returns to Kimpo before dawn and puts his flight on the morning mission. In the locker room after the briefing, he is surly with Pell, who is not only cocky but full of suggestions on how the mission ought to be flown and somewhat contemptuous of its veteran pilots. In an ensuing dogfight, Cleve gets on the tail of a MiG, cripples it, and just as he is about to make the kill has to break off to rescue Pell, who mysteriously fell behind and is under attack by two other MiGs. One of the attacking MiGs spins out of control and crashes. Pell claims it as a kill. Pell has Imil's ear now, and despite the fact that the kill was only confirmed by Cleve, suggests that he lacks the stomach for combat and leaves hanging in the air his belief that he ought to be leading the flight. Later, he insinuates the same to Cleve and taunts him when rebuked.Behind his back, Pell undercuts Cleve with the other rookies of the flight. His resentment of Pell blinds Cleve to Pell's intentions when Daughters tries to support him, plus he is distracted by all the talk regarding Casey Jones. He wants to be free of competing for MiGs but he's only too aware that he's expected by everyone, even Daughters and DeLeo, to match Pell's accomplishments. Cleve's flight is scheduled for three missions the next day, a reconnaissance
Reconnaissance
Reconnaissance is the military term for exploring beyond the area occupied by friendly forces to gain information about enemy forces or features of the environment....
and two MiG sweeps. He assigns himself to the sweeps and puts Daughters, with Pell as wingman, on the early morning reconnaissance, where nothing is likely to happen.
To his anguish, the recon flight is jumped by six MiGs and shoots down two. Worse, only three ships of the flight return. They ran into Casey Jones, DeLeo says, who had him cold a dozen times but never fired. Daughters — with only a handful of missions to go — was shot down in flames. Pell got both MiGs and DeLeo accuses him of failing to do his assigned job: warning Daughters that MiGs were behind him. Pell protests his innocence, but when Cleve tells him he's going to ground him for abandoning his leader, Pell just smirks confidently. Imil, caring only about MiG kills, supports Pell and angrily accuses Cleve of trying to wreck the outfit, insinuates that he's shirking combat, and says that he "and that Italian...have got it in for Pell". Cleve realizes he's lost Imil's support. Imil lionizes Pell, and when the new ace tries to ease his conscience with rationalizations of how Daughters might have gotten himself killed, Imil refuses even to listen.
Pell is sent to Japan as a reward for making ace and, curiously, asks that Hunter and Pettibone accompany him. No one except Cleve realizes (or cares) that Pell is making them acolytes to undermine Cleve's authority. Cleve imagines Daughters' terror at being shot down, and in the realization of his own mortality, comes to believe that his salvation will be in killing Casey Jones. When Pell returns, now a celebrity, he holds court for the other pilots, using Hunter as his Boswell
James Boswell
James Boswell, 9th Laird of Auchinleck was a lawyer, diarist, and author born in Edinburgh, Scotland; he is best known for the biography he wrote of one of his contemporaries, the English literary figure Samuel Johnson....
. Cleve comes to hate Pell in a way that seems to wipe out everything else from his life, and when Imil admits he was wrong and tries to apologize, Cleve doesn't back down from his desire to ground Pell, angering the colonel even more. DeLeo finishes his tour; two new pilots join the flight and immediately become Pell's disciples. Hunter, who has ambitions of his own, remains loyal to Cleve, but clearly admires Pell.
The Hunters
In June, when Cleve has only six missions remaining, the entire group is briefed for an anticipated huge air battle. A major attack on a North Korean dam has been ordered and hundreds of MiGs are expected to defend it. Every plane in the group is sent, but Cleve is put in the last flight, with Hunter as his wingman. Large numbers of MiGs react, yet the strike is unopposed. Cleve and Hunter, the last in the area, almost stay too long trying to make contact and start back low on fuel. Cleve spots four MiGs and heedless of his fuel state turns toward them. Unexpectedly four more appear above them and break into pairs; Hunter reports that the leader has black stripes.The MiGs try to corner them, but Cleve is determined to take the fight as far south as he can, in case the MiGs are also low on fuel. In their twisting, evasive turns they get off some bursts, descend to an altitude where their jets perform better, and the MiGs lose their advantage. Cleve seizes an opportunity and closes in behind Casey Jones. The fight becomes a battle of wills and descends near the ground, where Casey tries an impossible diving maneuver. Cleve somehow follows him through it and shoots him down.
Their fuel tanks nearly empty, Cleve and Hunter climb to 40,000 feet to attempt to glide back to base, a too-common practice. He notifies Kimpo about their dire situation. Imil asks if they got any MiGs. Cleve tells him "they" got one. Out of fuel and without power, they try to land. Cleve makes it, but the less experienced Hunter stalls and crashes just short of the field.
Imil wants to know about the kill; Cleve is intoxicated, knowing it was Casey Jones. Then he learns Hunter was killed in the crash and that his own gun camera
Camera
A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the camera obscura , an early mechanism for projecting images...
failed to function. Imil laments there is no way to confirm the kill. Cleve tells him it doesn't matter; it was Casey Jones. Pell objects strenuously that there is no way to confirm the kill. Imil, who has proclaimed that no one less skilled than himself could ever get Casey, quickly agrees with Pell.
Cleve responds in a way he had never conceived possible, and finds his destiny. "I can confirm it," he declares suddenly, "Hunter got him."
Two missions later Pettibone loses sight of Cleve, who does not return to base. Pell, back after his seventh kill, tells a correspondent interviewing him that Cleve was one of the best, who taught him everything about air combat, but never got lucky himself. Cleve was like his brother. "But don't write any of that," he says.
Characters
- Captain Cleve Connell – a career pilot, embarking on his first combat tour of dutyTour of dutyIn the Navy, a tour of duty is a period of time spent performing operational duties at sea, including combat, performing patrol or fleet duties, or assigned to service in a foreign country....
after 7 years in the Air Force - Cleve's flightFlight (military unit)A flight is a military unit in an air force, naval air service, or army air corps. It usually comprises three to six aircraft, with their aircrews and ground staff; or, in the case of a non-flying ground flight, no aircraft and a roughly equivalent number of support personnel. In most usages,...
members:- Bert DeLeo – a career pilot from West VirginiaWest VirginiaWest Virginia is a state in the Appalachian and Southeastern regions of the United States, bordered by Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Ohio to the northwest, Pennsylvania to the northeast and Maryland to the east...
in his late twenties - Jim Daughters – a married reserve pilotMilitary reserve forceA military reserve force is a military organization composed of citizens of a country who combine a military role or career with a civilian career. They are not normally kept under arms and their main role is to be available to fight when a nation mobilizes for total war or to defend against invasion...
and World War II veteran, once a high schoolHigh schoolHigh school is a term used in parts of the English speaking world to describe institutions which provide all or part of secondary education. The term is often incorporated into the name of such institutions....
coachCoach (sport)In sports, a coach is an individual involved in the direction, instruction and training of the operations of a sports team or of individual sportspeople.-Staff:...
, has the most missions - Billy Hunter – brand-new, an artless TexasTexasTexas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
boy, but a capable flyer - Pettibone – a new lieutenant, and a poor pilot
- Ed Pell – newly assigned, Pell calls himself "Doctor" and quickly shows a penchant for MiGMig-Industry:*MiG, now Mikoyan, a Russian aircraft corporation, formerly the Mikoyan-Gurevich Design Bureau*Metal inert gas welding or MIG welding, a type of welding using an electric arc and a shielding gas-Business and finance:...
-killing
- Bert DeLeo – a career pilot from West Virginia
- Colonel Dutch Imil – Cleve's wingWing (air force unit)Wing is a term used by different military aviation forces for a unit of command. The terms wing, group or Staffel are used for different-sized units from one country or service to another....
commander, a World War IIWorld War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
aceFlying aceA flying ace or fighter ace is a military aviator credited with shooting down several enemy aircraft during aerial combat. The actual number of aerial victories required to officially qualify as an "ace" has varied, but is usually considered to be five or more...
and hero - Major Carl Abbott – a career pilot, World War IIWorld War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
ace and former squadron mate - Robey – a patronizing, newly minted ace in Connell's squadron
- Colonel Monk Moncavage – GroupGroup (air force unit)A group is a military aviation unit, a component of military organization and a military formation. Usage of the terms group and wing differ from one country to another, as well as different branches of a defence force, in some cases...
commander and second-in-command of the wing, newly returned to flying from a staff position - Desmond – Connell's squadronSquadron (aviation)A squadron in air force, army aviation or naval aviation is mainly a unit comprising a number of military aircraft, usually of the same type, typically with 12 to 24 aircraft, sometimes divided into three or four flights, depending on aircraft type and air force...
operations officer - Guthrie – a pilot from another squadron
- Miyata – a Japanese artist in his late 40es
- Eiko – Miyata's 19-year-old daughter and an aspiring actress
- Casey Jones – a legendary, much-feared MiGMig-Industry:*MiG, now Mikoyan, a Russian aircraft corporation, formerly the Mikoyan-Gurevich Design Bureau*Metal inert gas welding or MIG welding, a type of welding using an electric arc and a shielding gas-Business and finance:...
pilot whose aircraft is marked by five diagonal black stripes
Note: these are the character names in the 1990s re-release edition. Several names were changed from those used in the original edition.
Style and theme
Salter has been praised for his descriptions of flight in this novel, including comparisons to Antoine de Saint-ExupéryAntoine de Saint-Exupéry
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry , officially Antoine Marie Jean-Baptiste Roger, comte de Saint Exupéry , was a French writer, poet and pioneering aviator. He became a laureate of France's highest literary awards, and in 1939 was the winner of the U.S. National Book Award...
(New York Times Book Review), but until the next-to-last chapter, scenes involving flying are few and brief. Most of the progress of the narrative takes place in dialogue or in Cleve's impressions, where the journey is more through his soul
Soul
A soul in certain spiritual, philosophical, and psychological traditions is the incorporeal essence of a person or living thing or object. Many philosophical and spiritual systems teach that humans have souls, and others teach that all living things and even inanimate objects have souls. The...
than the combat missions. Salter's prose has been characterized as "spare... but also lush", and relies heavily on simile
Simile
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two different things, usually by employing the words "like", "as". Even though both similes and metaphors are forms of comparison, similes indirectly compare the two ideas and allow them to remain distinct in spite of their similarities, whereas...
in descriptions of surroundings and impressions.
He occasionally employs the patois
Patois
Patois is any language that is considered nonstandard, although the term is not formally defined in linguistics. It can refer to pidgins, creoles, dialects, and other forms of native or local speech, but not commonly to jargon or slang, which are vocabulary-based forms of cant...
of the air war in Korea to give the flavor of the experience, but does not use technical jargon
Jargon
Jargon is terminology which is especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, group, or event. The philosophe Condillac observed in 1782 that "Every science requires a special language because every science has its own ideas." As a rationalist member of the Enlightenment he...
at all. In the entire text neither the designation "F-86" nor the nickname Sabre are ever mentioned, the slang
Slang
Slang is the use of informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's language or dialect but are considered more acceptable when used socially. Slang is often to be found in areas of the lexicon that refer to things considered taboo...
term "ships" used instead, and only once is "MiG" expanded to be "MiG 15" and that in a character's dialogue. In all flying scenes, the point of view is that of the pilots, not the airplanes, using the nominative pronoun
Pronoun
In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun is a pro-form that substitutes for a noun , such as, in English, the words it and he...
"they".
Salter's biographer William Dowie calls The Hunters a "variation on the theme of man's desire for glory in the face of death." In giving the MiG kill, which is his finding of glory, to Billy Hunter, Cleve transcends his own ambitions and finds instead something more "authentic": leadership, the part of himself he had feared was lacking."
Dowie also notes that the protagonist of The Hunters was originally called "Cleve Saville," as is the main character of the film adaptation. When interest in Salter's earliest novels, unavailable for decades, resulted in a 1997 re-issue of the novel, Salter made several revisions, the main of which is changing Cleve's surname to "Connell" with no indication why this was done.
Background and controversy
335th Fighter Squadron
The 335th Fighter Squadron ' is a United States Air Force unit. It is assigned to the 4th Operations Group and stationed at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina....
when it was one of the leading MiG-killing units in Korea, scoring 28 victories. As with circumstances in the novel, Salter joined D Flight before its members had registered any MiG claims but unlike the novel, flew as a wingman and not as flight lead, until near the end of his tour he flew as a leader, which was the situation on July 4, 1952, when he achieved his single MiG kill on his 89th mission. This occurred ten days after the attack on the Sui-ho Dam
Attack on the Sui-ho Dam
The attack on the Sui-ho Dam was the collective name for a large series of air attacks by United Nations Command air forces on thirteen hydroelectric generating facilities that took place June 23 and June 24, 1952, during the Korean War...
on which the climax of The Hunters is based, but in which no MiG combat actually occurred.
Three of the eight pilots with whom Salter flew became aces, including 2nd Lt. James Low. Low joined the flight in April, about eight weeks after Salter, after D flight's pilots had begun racking up their score. The flight leader, Captain Philip E. "Casey" Colman, had a unique policy that allowed anyone in the flight to shoot MiGs, rather than only flight and element leads. Low appears to have taken advantage of that policy to his own aggrandizement.
Almost from the first Low garnered a reputation for breaking away from his formation to pursue MiGs; his element lead, future ace James H. Kasler, was nearly shot down when Low broke away during a dogfight and shot down his first MiG. However, just as depicted in The Hunters, the 4th Wing's commander Colonel Harrison Thyng
Harrison Thyng
Brigadier General Harrison Reed Thyng was a fighter pilot and an officer in the United States Air Force with the rank of general. He is notable as one of only six USAF fighter pilots to be recognized as an ace in two wars...
"went to bat for him" because he wanted MiG kills. Within a month Low had scored his fifth kill, the only second lieutenant
Second Lieutenant
Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces.- United Kingdom and Commonwealth :The rank second lieutenant was introduced throughout the British Army in 1871 to replace the rank of ensign , although it had long been used in the Royal Artillery, Royal...
in Korea to become an ace. A month after that, following his sixth kill, Low was sent back to the United States on temporary duty to lecture on the radar
Radar
Radar is an object-detection system which uses radio waves to determine the range, altitude, direction, or speed of objects. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. The radar dish or antenna transmits pulses of radio...
gunsight, of which he was undoubtedly an expert. When he returned to Korea in October he found himself something of a pariah among the new leadership in the 4th Wing. He shot down three more MiG's in Korea, then was sent home, and some pilots alleged it was for losing his wingman.
When Salter wrote The Hunters his use of Low as a model for Ed Pell was obvious. Controversy over the depiction remained low key until release of the film, which transformed Pell's character into an immature but likeable pilot who redeems himself after losing his wingman. F-86 aficionados sought to get the "whole story" and interviewed Low, who then got in his own shots. Low disparaged Salter as a poor fighter pilot, a "Hudson High boy" (West Point graduate) who had an aversion to combat and implied that Salter's dislike of him was his actual motivation for the Pell character. Whether consciously or not, this rebuttal mirrored the scene in the novel in which Pell disparaged Cleve to Imil: "I don't think he goes for this combat flying too much."
The character of Dutch Imil is more difficult to place, and like many fictional characters with real-life counterparts, apparently a composite. While Col. Thyng was superficially similar to Imil in combat experience, and the tone of Salter's recollections in Gods of Tin and Burning the Days indicates at least an ambivalence of feeling toward Thyng, Salter flew many of his missions with the wing commander and clearly respected him. Moreover Thyng was a small man physically (Salter says he "looked like a fading jockey
Jockey
A jockey is an athlete who rides horses in horse racing or steeplechase racing, primarily as a profession. The word also applies to camel riders in camel racing.-Etymology:...
"), and not boisterous. Imil was based largely on Major Zane S. Amell, commander of the 335th FIS when Salter arrived in Korea, with whom Salter flew his first missions and who accompanied Salter to Japan on leave in April in a manner similar to DeLeo. Amell/Imil share identical physical and personality characteristics in Salter's writing.
The largely sympathetic character of Monk Moncavage is superficially based on Col. Walker "Bud" Mahurin
Bud Mahurin
Colonel Walker Melville "Bud" Mahurin was a retired officer of the United States Air Force . During World War II, while serving in the United States Army Air Forces , he was a noted flying ace....
, a noted World War II ace who like Moncavage took over the job of group commander about the time of Salter's arrival in Korea. Like Moncavage he had no kills in the 4th FIW, and had recently transitioned into jet fighters after several years of staff work, but unlike Moncavage he had been transferred from the other F-86 wing, where he had shot down 3 MiGs. Salter liked Mahurin and regularly mentioned him in his reminiscences.
The communist ace Casey Jones was an "urban legend
Urban legend
An urban legend, urban myth, urban tale, or contemporary legend, is a form of modern folklore consisting of stories that may or may not have been believed by their tellers to be true...
" that sprang up among U.S. pilots in Korea: "an exceptional non-Asian pilot, perhaps a former Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe is a generic German term for an air force. It is also the official name for two of the four historic German air forces, the Wehrmacht air arm founded in 1935 and disbanded in 1946; and the current Bundeswehr air arm founded in 1956....
pilot, who attacked lone F-86s in a MiG painted with... fuselage stripes". A pair of top-scoring Soviet Air Force
Soviet Air Force
The Soviet Air Force, officially known in Russian as Военно-воздушные силы or Voenno-Vozdushnye Sily and often abbreviated VVS was the official designation of one of the air forces of the Soviet Union. The other was the Soviet Air Defence Forces...
pilots, Nikolay Sutyagin
Nikolay Sutyagin
Captain Nikolay Sutyagin was a Russian fighter pilot in the Second World War and the Korean War.Nikolay Vasil'yevich Sutyagin was born in 1923 near Nizhniy Novgord. His parents were actors, and eventually they moved to the city of Gor'kiy when Nikolay was 11...
and Yevgeny Pepelyaev
Yevgeny Pepelyaev
Colonel Yevgeny Georgievich Pepelyaev is a Soviet fighter pilot of the Korean War, tallying 20 kills, second only to his compatriot Nikolay Sutyagin's 21.- Early years and world war II :...
, both finished their missions only weeks before Salter arrived in Korea.
Adaptations
The Hunters was serialized in Collier'sCollier's Weekly
Collier's Weekly was an American magazine founded by Peter Fenelon Collier and published from 1888 to 1957. With the passage of decades, the title was shortened to Collier's....
magazine in March 1956 before its first printing as a book.
In 1958 the novel was adapted with significant plot and character alterations as a film released by Twentieth Century Fox.