No Kum-sok

No Kum-sok
No Kum-Sok circa 1953
Birth name	Hangul: 노금석 Hanja: 盧今錫 RR: No Geum-seok MR: No Kŭm-sŏk
Born	(1932-01-10) January 10, 1932 Sinhung, Japanese Korea
Allegiance	North Korea
Service / branch	Korean People's Air Force Korean People's Navy
Years of service	1949-1953
Rank	Lieutenant

No Kum-Sok (later Kenneth H. Rowe; born January 10, 1932 in Sinhung, Korea) is a former lieutenant of the North Korean Air Force. A few weeks after the Korean War was over, he defected to South Korea in a MiG aircraft.

A biography of No Kum-Sok was published by Blaine Harden in 2015 as The Great Leader and the Fighter Pilot: The True Story of the Tyrant Who Created North Korea and The Young Lieutenant Who Stole His Way to Freedom (2015). Harden had access to newly released intelligence, and to No.

Defection

On the morning of September 21, 1953, No flew his Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 from Sunan just outside Pyongyang to the Kimpo Air Base in South Korea. The time from take-off in North Korea to landing in South Korea was 17 minutes, with the MiG reaching speeds of 620 MPH. During the flight he was not chased by North Korean planes, nor was he interdicted by American air or ground forces; US radar near Kimpo had been shut down temporarily that morning for routine maintenance. No landed the wrong way on the runway, almost hitting an F-86 Sabre jet landing at the same time from the opposite direction. Captain Dave William veered out of the way and exclaimed over the radio "It's goddamn MiG!". Another American pilot, Captain Jim Sutton who was circling the airport, said if No had tried to land in the right direction he would have been spotted and shot down. No taxied the MiG into a free parking spot between two Sabre jets, got out of the plane and began tearing up a picture of Kim Il-sung he carried.

No received a $100,000 ($890,831 in 2014 dollars) reward offered by Operation Moolah for being the first pilot to defect with an operational aircraft, which he said he never heard of prior to his defection. No explained that North Korean pilots were not allowed to listen to South Korean radio, the leaflets broadcasting the award were not dropped in Manchuria where the pilots were based, and even if they had heard about the reward the amount of money would have been meaningless to the young communists; he said the program would have been more effective if they had offered a good job and residence in America. Eisenhower was against paying defectors.

There were repercussions for No's defection. According to Captain Lee Un Yong, a North Korean air force flight instructor who defected to South Korea two years after No, General Wang Yong, the top commander of the North Korean air force, was demoted, and five of No's air force comrades and commanders were executed. One of those killed was Lieutenant Kun Soo Sung, No's best friend and fellow pilot. No's father was already dead and his mother already defected to the South; however, he had an uncle and the fate of him and his family was never known.

No's MiG-15

After No surrendered his aircraft, it was taken to Okinawa, where it was given USAF markings and test-flown by Capt. H.E. "Tom" Collins and Maj. Chuck Yeager. The MiG-15 was later shipped to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base after attempts to return it to North Korea were unsuccessful. It is currently on display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force.

Post-defection life

In 1954, Kum-sok emigrated to the United States. After emigrating, he anglicized his name to "Kenneth H. Rowe". He was joined in the U.S. by his mother, who had been evacuated from North Korea earlier in 1951. He subsequently graduated from the University of Delaware, with degrees in mechanical and electrical engineering. He married an émigré from Kaesong, North Korea, they raised two sons and a daughter, and he became a U.S. citizen. He worked as an aeronautical engineer for Grumman, Boeing, Pan Am, General Dynamics, General Motors, General Electric, Lockheed, DuPont, and Westinghouse.

In 1970, he learned from a fellow defector that, as punishment for his defection, his best friend, Lieutenant Kun Soo Sung was executed. He learned that four other pilots in his chain of command were also executed by firing squad. One of the pilots and a friend in his squadron became the General of the Korean People's Army. General O Kuk-ryol, who became the vice chairman of the National Defence Commission in 2009, was considered the second most powerful man in North Korea.

In 1996, he wrote and published a book, A MiG-15 to Freedom about his defection and previous life in North Korea. Rowe retired in 2000 after working 17 years as an aeronautical engineering professor at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University.

In popular culture

No's defection is the basis of one of the missions within the video game Chuck Yeager's Air Combat.

Gallery

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  A propaganda leaflet promising a $100,000 reward to the first North Korean pilot to deliver a jet fighter to UN forces.
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  The $100,000 (2014 purchasing power approx. $886,000) check awarded to No Kum-Sok as a reward for bringing the MiG-15 to South Korea.
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  No's MiG-15
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  No's MiG-15 on display at the National Museum of the United States Air Force.
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  No Kum-Sok wearing his flight uniform.

References

• Blaine Harden (2015). The Great Leader and the Fighter Pilot: The True Story of the Tyrant Who Created North Korea and The Young Lieutenant Who Stole His Way to Freedom. Viking. ISBN 978-0670016570.