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Mitchell Gant is a fictional character in a series of books written by Craig Thomas. His first (and best known thanks to a successful film adaptation) appearance occurs in the 1977 novel Firefox as a US Air Force major that steals a Russian MiG-31 Firefox fighter aircraft prototype. The prototype uses experimental interfaces between pilot and plane to allow for "thought-activated" flying and combat solutions. Gant, however, has to think in Russian to enable the technology to work.
Gant grew up in Clarksville, a small town in rural America and found himself drawn to flight when as a child after seeing a small airplane land at a local gas station in need of fuel. With few happy memories of Clarksville, Gant found his way into the United States Air Force, becoming a fighter pilot.
While flying combat during the Vietnam War, Gant's F-4 Phantom II was shot down by a surface-to-air missile. Gant ejected and was immediately captured, apparently by guerrillas. The arrival of allied aircraft saves Gant, but also traumatizes him - napalm dropped by one of the aircraft incinerates a young girl travelling with the enemy soldiers. The experience left him with post-traumatic stress disorder, causing him to have frequent flashbacks. He suffers from a recurring nightmare about himself being a Vietnamese and burning in napalm dropped by US aircraft.
After the war, he leaves the military and is recruited by the CIA and works for some time in a menial job in a Los Angeles pizza restaurant while shadowing a KGB cell. Later, he becomes a handyman, a drunk and a hobo. Eventually he is re-recruited by the CIA for their Firefox operation, supposedly because of his knowledge of Russian, his combat experience in Vietnam and his knowledge of flying Russian aircraft; he is already fluent in Russian (his mother was Russian) therefore only requires 3 months of training, learning to fly a replica MiG-25 as well as a simulator of the Firefox.
In Firefox , an Anglo-American intelligence scheme inserts Gant into the Soviet Union in order for him to steal one of the two prototypes of a revolutionary fighter plane, the MiG-31, NATO code name "Firefox" (not to be confused with the real MiG-31, a development of the MiG-25). After crossing the Soviet Union from Moscow to the airbase where the Firefox is being developed, with the help of various MI6 agents and several false identities; dissident scientists involved in the project create a diversion allowing Gant to steal the plane. He then deals with several obstacles and, after dispatching the second prototype in a dogfight, has apparently succeeded in his theft.
In Firefox Down , the immediate sequel to Firefox, Gant realizes that he has not survived his dogfight with the second MiG-31 unscathed. Leaking fuel from a punctured fuel tank, and forced to burn more when confronted by two MiG-25's, Gant lands the MiG-31 on a frozen lake in Finland very close to the Soviet border. The Soviets capture Gant, but not before the plane breaks through the ice and sinks. The Soviets attempt to use brainwashing to determine whether the MiG-31 crashed or landed. Gant escapes from the KGB and with the help of a Russian double agent named Anna Akhmerovna, the Soviet Union as well. Gant and Anna are reluctantly assisted by Dmitri Priabin, a KGB officer who helped coordinate the original hunt for Gant and the Firefox, but is also Anna's lover. Anna is shot as Gant crosses the border. Gant meets up with a team of western intelligence experts that have recovered the MiG-31 from under the Finnish ice, but have not been able to move it to safety. Gant successfully flies the plane home, even though immersion under water has damaged the plane's radar-invisibility.
Gant's next role was in the novel Winter Hawk . Originally, Gant's mission was to smuggle scientist and spy Filip Kedrov out of the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, as Kedrov had information on a Soviet spaceborne directed-energy weapon. However, Gant and Kedrov were both captured by the KGB. Dmitri Priabin, the ranking head of the KGB, still holds a vendetta against Gant due to the death of Anna Akhmerovna. When he learns, however, of a plot by the Soviet military to take control of the Soviet space weapon and use it against an American Space Shuttle, Priabin is again forced to ally himself with Gant in order to warn his civilian superiors in Moscow. With the Soviet Army imposing a security crackdown on Baikonur, even upon the KGB, Gant and Priabin escape Baikonur in a KGB helicopter. Shot down by Soviet helicopters, Gant is forced to escape again with evidence of the Soviet weapon - first on foot, then in a stolen An-2 cropduster, then again on foot when the An-2 is shot down near the Turkish border. Eluding a manhunt by Soviet Paratroopers, Gant is extracted by US Army helicopters.
Gant's final appearance comes in the novel A Different War , in which he is a member of the National Transportation Safety Board. In this novel, he investigates the crashes of two examples of a fictional airliner, and discovers that they were both sabotaged by a former CIA agent working for a rival aircraft manufacturer. In the epilogue, it is mentioned that Gant was awarded a Medal of Honor following the events of the novel. It is also revealed that he was an F-117 Nighthawk pilot and instructor during the Persian Gulf War.
Francis Gary Powers was an American pilot whose Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Lockheed U-2 spy plane was shot down while flying a reconnaissance mission in Soviet Union airspace, causing the 1960 U-2 incident.
The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17 is a high-subsonic fighter aircraft produced in the Soviet Union from 1952 and was operated by air forces internationally. The MiG-17 was license-built in China as the Shenyang J-5 and Poland as the PZL-Mielec Lim-6. The MiG-17 is still being used by the North Korean air force in the present day and has seen combat in the Middle East and Asia.
The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25 is a supersonic interceptor and reconnaissance aircraft that is among the fastest military aircraft to enter service. Designed by the Soviet Union's Mikoyan-Gurevich bureau, it is an aircraft built primarily using stainless steel. It was to be the last plane designed by Mikhail Gurevich, before his retirement.
A dogfight, or dog fight, is an aerial battle between fighter aircraft conducted at close range. Modern terminology for air-to-air combat is air combat manoeuvring (ACM), which refers to tactical situations requiring the use of individual basic fighter maneuvers (BFM) to attack or evade one or more opponents. This differs from aerial warfare, which deals with the strategy involved in planning and executing various missions.
Firefox is a 1982 American action techno-thriller film produced, directed by and starring Clint Eastwood. It is based upon the 1977 novel of the same name by Craig Thomas.
The Albanian Air Force is the air force of Albania and one of the branches of the Albanian Armed Forces.
The MolniyaR-60 is a short-range lightweight infrared homing air-to-air missile designed for use by Soviet fighter aircraft. It has been widely exported, and remains in service with the CIS and many other nations.
Firefox is a thriller novel written by Craig Thomas and published in 1977. The Cold War plot involves an attempt by the CIA and MI6 to steal a highly advanced experimental Soviet fighter aircraft. The chief protagonist is fighter pilot turned spy Mitchell Gant. The book was subject to a 1982 film adaptation produced and directed by Clint Eastwood who also played the role of Gant in the film.
Firefox Down is a 1983 novel by author Craig Thomas. It is a sequel to his novel Firefox. Craig Thomas dedicated the first edition of the novel to actor/director/producer Clint Eastwood, who starred as Mitchell Gant in the film adaptation of the first novel, stating, "For Clint Eastwood — pilot of the Firefox".
Ugolny Airport is a mixed-use military and civil airfield in the Russian Far East located 11 km east of Anadyr, separated from the town by the waters of Anadyrsky Liman. The airfield was originally constructed in the 1950s as a staging base for Long Range Aviation bombers such as the Tupolev Tu-95 and Tupolev Tu-22M. During the Cold War years it became the primary hub for civilian flights in the Chukotka region.
Winter Hawk is a 1987 thriller novel written by Craig Thomas. It is a novel set within a larger continuum linking many of Thomas's other books, including some characters last seen in Firefox Down, itself a sequel to Thomas's Firefox. Though the featured character is Mitchell Gant, the plot is composed of several running subplots surrounding the imminent launch of the Soviets' Space Shuttle and the planned signing of an historic arms reduction treaty between the United States of America and the Soviet Union.
Mirror Wars: Reflection One is a 2005 Russian crime action film directed by Vasili Chiginsky, based on a screenplay by Oleg Kapanets, Alex Kustanovich and Nicholas Waller. The film stars both Russian actors Alexander Efimov and Ksenia Alfyorova, along with other international stars: Malcolm McDowell, Armand Assante and Rutger Hauer, as an effort to court an international audience. The enigmatic title refers to the continuation of a mystery revolving around a top-secret Russian fighter aircraft.
The 4477th Test and Evaluation Squadron was a squadron in the United States Air Force under the claimancy of the Tactical Air Command (TAC). It is currently inactive. The product of Project Constant Peg, the unit was created to expose the tactical air forces to the flight characteristics of fighter aircraft used by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The declassified history of the squadron shows that it operated MiG-17s, MiG-21s and MiG-23s between 1977 and 1988, but it was not formally disbanded until July 1990.
The Cuban Revolutionary Air and Air Defense Force commonly abbreviated to DAAFAR in both Spanish and English, is the air force of Cuba.
Ivan Nikiforovich Stepanenko was a Soviet pilot who became a flying ace with over 30 solo shootdowns during World War II. He remained in the military after the end of the war and went on to fly a variety of MiG aircraft and become a Major-General.
Elmer Royce Williams is a retired United States Naval Aviator. He is known for his solo dogfight with seven Soviet pilots during the Korean War, which, according to The San Diego Union-Tribune, has been called "one of the greatest feats in aviation history" by military experts. A retired admiral and multiple members of Congress have been campaigning for him to receive the Medal of Honor for his exploit. On January 20, 2023, he received the Navy Cross – the highest military decoration given by the U.S. Navy – from Secretary of the Navy Carlos Del Toro.