The first U2 flight took place on the 4th or July which was also his birthday. He bore no U.S. markings or identification, and was ordered to eat a cyanide pill if he had to eject.

The Russians had him on radar the whole length of the Soviet Union but the U-2 was too high to hit. When he landed, his fuel tank was crushed from wind (the U-2 was basically made of tinfoil), and it leaked gas all over the runway.

The runway crew tried to drag him out of the plane before it caught fire and he would not move until he filled out his flight log. “I just flew the length of the Soviet Union,” he said, “I’m not concerned about a leaky gas tank.”

He was tortured every day by a guy they named, “Big Ug.” Since he was the commanding officer, he was tortured the most. For 18 months he lived in solitary confinement and as he says, “lost his humanity.”

Eventually he was put back in a normal cell and some young private nursed him back to life. To remember how to read and write they made books out of t-shirts and underwear. To entertain the men he had contests to see which pilot had the highest ejection, the lowest ejection, the fastest ejection and the slowest ejection. They communicated these stats through morse code on the plumbing.

When he got back to the states he held no grudge against the Vietnamese. He said something like, “It was a war, what do you expect?” I think the only person he despised was Jane Fonda.