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ФФФФФФФФФ>ФФФФФФФФФ>ФФФФФФФФФ>Chop Here>ФФФФФФФФФ>ФФФФФФФФФ>ФФФФФФФФФ>ФФФФФФФФФ There are many fictional books written to be enjoyed for their contents. However, the interest of the reader in the contents of a book is sometimes affected by the realism with which the plot is introduced. Tom Clancy is an author of many books concerning the military. He is one of the most outstanding authors for writing fictional novels to do with military. His novels The Hunt for Red October and The Cardinal of The Kremlin provide insights which will capture the imagination of many readers. Using historical facts, references to real military hardware and believable characters, Tom Clancy is able to develop believable plots. Tom Clancy's insight into history allowed him to write a very realistic and therefore believable plot. His use of historical events which actually took place and were incorporated into his stories allowed him to enhance motives for the fictional conflict. Many people who lost trust and belief in the Communist system defected to the United States and other countries. Through use of historical facts such as defection in The Hunt for Red October (THRO), Clancy is able to advance his plot. Defections for political reasons happened quite often during the Cold War. There were many defections in history starting back in World War II when famous people like Albert Einstein defected to the use because the Germans discriminated again him being Jewish (pg. 124-5, Vol. 9 Funk & Wagnalls Encyclopedia). The more recent occurance of defection to the US of a high ranking deputy chief of staff del PiЄo DЁaz happened in 1987 (pg. 24, "A flight to freedom"). Ramius was the main character in the novel who decided to defect. The character helps Clancy to develop reasons for which such a high ranking commander would defect and later cause conflict to occur between the U.S. and Soviet Union. The use of historical facts common during the Cold War was defection which made Communism infamous and Tom Clancy famous for the believable plot developed. Similarly in TCTK Clancy also uses historical facts to enhance his plot making it believable. Using a historical fact, Clancy shows how cruel the Communist system is with no respect for the humans but only for political power. The landing of a German teenager, Mathias Rust, inside the Red Square and his prosecution is brilliantly used to illustrate the KGB's way of thinking (pp. 226-7, TCTK). In June 1987 a German teenager landed in the Red Square in Soviet Union. He somehow managed to bypass sophisticated air defence systems and causing several bureaucrats to be fired by the Soviet Politburo (p. 24, "Destination Red Square"). The historical fact gave Tom Clancy the ground to make the Communist bureaucrats' characters more sensitive to treason for the fear of losing their position and therefore their power. Tom Clancy exploits the fear of the Communists to make them harder to infiltrate. The difficulty infiltrating the Soviet government is precisely what the author wanted and makes his plot more interesting by making it more complex. The historical facts are not the only way in which believable plot is introduced. The use of realistic characters allows the reader to believe in whatever outcome realism will cause. In THRO the astonishment which Ramius feels through his thoughts being revealed by the author are all realistic. They sound like an average person's reactions to a situation. "They know our name, Ramius was thinking, they know our name! How can this be? They knew where to find us--exactly! How? What can the Americans have? How long has the Los Angeles been trailing us? Decide--you must decide!" (pg. 248, THRO) Ramius wants to defect from Soviet Union and on one of his missions he disobeys orders. Nobody knew about his decision, not even the Americans to whom he wanted to defect. When Ramius received a message from one of the American submarines and mentions his submarine's name, Red October, he was astonished because Americans were not supposed to know about his wish to defect. It is only believable that a person who would not be suspected to know something would be surprised the way Ramius was. The circumstance that makes the entire event more believable is that Ramius also questions American intentions. He does not just decide right away that he will follow their suggestions. It is only after a long consideration that Ramius decided to follow American instructions. Ramius' character is developed in a way that through his conscious decisions Clancy is able to show that Ramius is like a real person. Through the believable character Clancy is also able to advance his plot in a convincing fashion by having Ramius defect. Another main character who is described as living a normal life is Jack Ryan. The character's appearance makes him a believable character. "He was physically unremarkable, an inch over six feet, and his average suffered a little at the waist from a lack of exercise enforced by the miserable English weather. His blue eyes had a deceptively vacant look; he was often lost in though, his face on autopilot as his ind puzzled through data or research material for his current book ... a wife he loved and two children he doted on, a job that tested his intellect..." (pp. 36-7, THRO) "The talent that had enabled him to pick winning stocks Ryan now applied to the CIA." (pp. 44-5, THRO) The normal appearance of Jack and the fact that he was good at predicting winning stocks as a stock broker, made him believable in predicting future which was later his job as a CIA analyst. Jack's success in predicting Ramius' objective was believable, even though his predictions were so far fetched that they were considered crazy by other characters in the book. The actions of Jack Ryan and normal way of living allowed farther development of plot which was completely acceptable to the reader making the story believable. In TCTK the character Colonel Mikhail Semyonovich Filitov is also a believable fictional person. The death of his family and drinking, as many other people in Soviet Union do, made the person realistic enough to be believed in (pp. 58-9, Life in Russia). "The elder [son] had died in Hungary, Vatutin saw. Because of his political reliability he'd been taken from his military academy, along with a number of cadets, and sent to help suppress the 1956 counterrevolution. A crewman in a tank--following in his [Filitov's] footsteps, he'd died when his vehicle had been destroyed... The second--also a tanker, Vatutin noted--died when the breech on the gun in his T-55 had exploded., Poor quality- control at the factory, the bane of Soviet industry, had killed the whole crew ... and when had his wife died? The following July. Broken heart, probably, whatever the medical explanation had been. The File showed both sons had been models of young Soviet manhood. All the hopes and dreams that just have died with them, Vatutin thought, and then to lose your wife, too." (pg. 211, TCTK) His misfortunes caused by the State created a realistic reaction of a human being. Filitov turned against the Soviet Union and became an American spy. The defection was easily accepted by the reader because of Filitov's past and reason for anger and lost trust for the Soviet State. With a realistic character and importance which Filitov held as a spy helped develop a believable plot. Another character in TCTK who greatly contributed to the plot's approval by the reader was the behaviour of a true Communist and a human being, Colonel Vatutin. He, like many other characters, made decisions based on his beliefs about the State and also out of fear for losing power (pg. 209, TCTK). Vatutin was so brainwashed, like other high ranking officials, that he really believed in what he was doing. Anyone speaking out against the government should have been punished. Vatutin also did his job solely to get promoted to higher levels of bureaucracy at one point thinking: "And [I] actually believed that [I] could advance [my] career." (pg. 212-3, TCTK). By convicting the high ranking spy who infiltrated the Soviet Union's military projects Vatutin thought he was going to rise in the ranks. Understanding the circumstances described earlier in the book it would have been a normal human reaction of trying to hold the power like Vatutin did. Most humans would like to have some kind of power and respect and that is why Vatutin is a believable character who wants that power just a bit more than others. Vatutin's character was very believable allowing the reader to accept the plot. The characters presented were not the only believable aspect in the novel. The authenticity of military hardware being referred to bring one of the most convincing aspects of the plot developed by the author. Tom Clancy makes numerous references to the "USS Dallas" as a 688 Los Angeles class nuclear submarine (pp. 4-5, The Hunt for Red October). The actual submarines portrayed in the novel, like the nuclear submarine described actually exists today (pp. 154-5,166 High-Tech Warfare). The ships referred to as "America", "Nimitz" and "Kennedy" are also used in the book (pg. 239, THRO). These ships are actual names of aircraft carriers in service to-date (pp. 152, 156 High-Tech Warfare). All the military weapons are used appropriately for the tasks assigned providing sea support to the characters. The effective use of military hardware allows for the reader's imagination to take over. It is easier to imagine a real life plane lifting off. The references to real military hardware allowed the reader to experience the action by imagining existing machines doing all the action and adding to the realism of the plot. The planes like F-15, F-16 or A-10 are used in The Hunt for Red October to provide air support to the characters in action (pp. 91, 127, 207, TCTK respectively). The authentic planes add to the excitement which allows the reader to imagine existing hardware used strengthening the author's story. The air support also adds to the realism which builds a believable plot. The EC-2 and EC-3 AWACS used in the book are actual planes still used by the military today (pg. 195, US Air Force and pg. 100, Spy Planes). The use of radar planes provides Jack Ryan with valuable information which allows him to make decisions which dramatically but believably change the course of the future (pp. 91, 192, THRO). Jack would have never known the Soviet military movements if the radar planes would never be in the air. The coordination of other planes, in one of which Jack himself was on, also were the responsibility of the AWACS planes without which Jack would probably die because of a Soviet air strike about to happen (pp. 172-3, THRO). The highly militarized operations in the sea which the author describes are supported by existing military hardware which makes Clancy's plot acceptable to the reader. In The Cardinal of The Kremlin Tom Clancy discusses why the character like Narmonov wants to cut a deal with the US to cut on the number of nuclear missiles. The use of real weapons in existence today makes Clancy's job easier because the reader can associate the fictional story to the real situation today. The definitions like ICBMs or nuclear missiles like SS-25 are actual weapons in existence today (pg. 70, US Air Force). The SS-25 were made famous for their role during the Cuban Missile Crisis and many readers would associate their knowledge or simply believe in the description of the missiles Tom Clancy gives. The use of the ground weapons also added to the realism of the setting which made the plot believable. The actual battle fought on the ground by the mudjaheddin rebels who were only armed with US made Stinger missiles made the story more realistic (pg. 16, TCTK). The rebels did not have good ground weapons but they inflicted heavy casualties among the Russians because of the Stinger missiles they somehow managed to get (pp. 120-121, High-Tech Warfare). The rebels were not portrayed as heavy armoured fighters but they did have weapons which actually existed and were used against Soviets at the time. The armament of the Afghan rebels with AK-47 automatic rifles and the Stinger missiles used by them was very convincing (pg. 125, High-Tech Warfare). The realistic weapon combinations that were actually used by the rebels made the author's story many times more believable. Tom Clancy often used specific references to historical facts, characters' personality and references to real military hardware to convince the reader of the believable plot in both novels. Even though much of the book was fiction, Clancy managed to convince the reader through the use of many facts that his plot was real. The believable plot allowed Tom Clancy to gain the reader on his side and made him one of the most unique authors today. Tom Clancy's books like The Hunt for Red October and The Cardinal of The Kremlin mention historical facts, contain believable characters and refer to existing weapons present a very convincing plot. BIBLIOGRAPHY Binyon, Michael. Life in Russia. Great Britain: Hamish Hamilton Ltd., 1983. Bram, L. Leon. Funk & Wagnalls Encyclopedia. Funk & Wagnalls Inc., 1980, rev. 1986. Clancy, Tom. The Hunt for Red October. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1984. Clancy, Tom. The Cardinal of The Kremlin. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1988. Gunston, Bill. Spy Planes: Guide to Recce/Electronic Aircraft. New York: Prentice Hall Press, 1983. Gunston, Bill. Military Helicopters: Guide to Military Rotorcraft. New York: Prentice Hall Press, 1986. Levin, Bob with Austen, Ian. "Destination Red Square." Mcleans, 100 (June 8, 1987), 24. "A flight to freedom." Mcleans, 100, (June 8, 1987), 24. Richardson, Doug and Gunston, Bill and Hogg, Ian. High-Tech Warfare. New York: Crescent Books, 1991. Roberts, Michael. United States Air Force. London: Brian Todd Publishing House Limited, 1989.