Check Six: F-86 Ace Hal Fischer, An Interview (China Sky Book 2)

"It's always better to have a MiG at your six o'clock than no MiG at all."

He still seemed like the pleasant Iowa farm boy he once was, but in the cockpit of his F-86 fighter, Harold E. "Hal" Fischer turned into a tiger. After flying 105 ground support missions in F-80 fighter-bombers, he wrangled a second Korean combat tour in the F-86. He racked up MiG kills quickly. It appeared likely that he would become the highest-scoring ace of the Korean war.

Fischer's tenth victory came on his 66th mission; on his 70th, his luck ran out. In a fight over Manchuria, he damaged three MiGs before becoming the victory of Chinese MiG-15 pilot Han Decai.

Fischer would spend the next two years as a POW. He managed a brief escape, only to find himself in the bleak landscape of Manchuria - in winter - the only non-Chinese for hundreds of miles around. The Chinese finally released him in May 1955, long after the war was over.