by Alan Bristow
‘I’m sure it could be done,’ I said. ‘But you’d have to be prepared for a thirty to forty per cent casualty rate, and it would cost you a lot of money to bribe enough people to make it feasible.’
‘How much would you need to do the job?’
I thought for a few seconds. ‘Well, given the fact that the hostages have been dispersed all over Tehran because of your last venture, I’d say I’d need $100 million, plus all my own expenses.’
‘That’s a lot of money,’ Nixon said.
‘Corruption is a way of life in Iran and anything is possible if you have enough money,’ I said. ‘But you’d have to be prepared for significant casualties and possibly complete failure, because they’ve been alerted and they’ll be expecting you to try again.’
Nixon thanked me for coming, and I went down with Charles to his office. Forte, it turned out, had an interest in the publishing house that was handling Nixon’s memoirs. I went back to Redhill and heard no more about it. I never discovered on whose behalf Nixon was acting; it was unlikely to have been the Carter administration, but it may have been part of some advance planning by Ronald Reagan, who became President just a couple of months later. The American hostages were released just after Reagan took the oath of office, so whatever he had up his sleeve stayed there.
Bristow Helicopters’ Iranian subsidiary was wound up, and our relationship with Princess Fatima lapsed. She was a remarkable woman, a jet pilot who’d learned to fly helicopters at Redhill. When her husband was still alive I bought them a farm in Sussex and a London town house in Holland Park. I’m fairly sure they knew what was coming; even in the early 1970s Fatima was already talking about her husband’s retirement. The Sussex farm cost more than they had authorised me to pay, but it fitted their specification so well that I bought it anyway, and she loved it. She had two boys at school in England and often lived at the farm, although I don’t think General Khatami ever stayed there. When he died, they said he’d been murdered in an arranged accident. He was hang-gliding over a lake, towed up by a motor boat. The tow parted at a critical time and he went straight into the side of a mountain. Fatima came to live as a widow in England, then moved to California where some of her close relatives lived. She died of cancer in her fifties.
The evacuation of Iran stands as one of many proud moments in the history of Bristow Helicopters. Our stock rose throughout the world because of it, and it stood in stark contrast to the apparent impotence of governments to protect their people or influence events in the face of violent revolution. It was possible because we had the will to carry it out, I had the support of the shareholders and ultimately of my executive directors, and because every man in the team played his part.
I haven’t been to Iran since, and I have no desire to go.
CHAPTER 22
Resignation
From the earliest days, it was clear to me that Bristow Helicopters Ltd would not be able to continue indefinitely providing helicopter support services to the oil industry in developing countries that would ultimately wish to take over the business themselves. Often BHL was in the position of training the people who would become its competitors for contracts – local pilots, engineers and administrators who would then transform themselves into helicopter service providers that the oil companies would be ‘encouraged’ to use. My response to this threat was multi-faceted. BHL provided the training as required and, where possible, formed partnerships with local companies who were destined to take over the work, or offered management arrangements in place of full service contracts. BHL always had to remain flexible in its approach, subsuming local interests and keeping politicians and senior civil servants happy. While ultimately Bristows lost a number of contracts to local companies, the process took much longer than I had feared. In some cases we continued operating for twenty years after I had identified local moves towards self-sufficiency. At main Board meetings I regularly voiced concern about this threat to the business while explaining why BHL was working so hard to obtain military training and United Nations contracts. I explained some of our partnership arrangements and plans for management contracts. ‘Half a loaf is better than no bread,’ I would say. ‘We have to share the workload and the profits, if any, with local interests.’ Nick Cayzer and the directors seemed sanguine about it. They were satisfied that the money was still rolling in; they were less interested in the arrangements we had put in place to keep the cash flowing. Had I been told the whole issue would blow up in my face and would lead to my departure from the company I had built, I would not have believed it.
In countries like Malaysia, the process of getting foreign companies out became overt national policy. In other countries it was tacitly understood that they felt increasingly capable of taking over the business for themselves. The issue had been raised in the Persian Gulf in the 1950s when it was suggested to me that BHL might be looked on more favourably at re-bid time if it employed more local talent. At that time it meant making sure that relatively unskilled jobs went to Arab workers, but as their sophistication increased, so they wanted to see their people given more responsible posts. The Arabs were already running their own airline out of Bahrain using Herons and Doves, with a very able English-speaking Arab in charge. We had to accept we were on a hiding to nothing when we were bidding against newly established local companies.
Handling change was sometimes difficult; the Egyptians cancelled Bristows’ contracts as soon as we had trained enough pilots for them to take on the job themselves. The pilots were ex-military jet jockeys and most of them were very capable. They experienced a few minor problems, but generally they did a good job of servicing the Red Sea platforms safely and efficiently. We were able to get our helicopters out easily enough, but for some reason the Egyptians simply would not release our stock of spares. We had more than £1 million worth in the warehouse and it took us the best part of a year to get them home. BHL had an excellent Chief Pilot in Egypt in Bob Brewster, one of the men I’d inherited from Fison Airwork, and he remained in Egypt long after the helicopters had gone, dragging his piece of paper interminably from office to office trying to find the man who could sign for the release of the spares. It’s not that they were of any value to the Egyptians – they’d gone over to new Bell 212 helicopters – but it was a good example of the bureaucratic problems involved in doing business in certain countries. It was thinly disguised blackmail. Eventually Brewster did manage to get most of our spares out, and if he had to adopt an unorthodox approach in order to do so, it was only because he had exhausted all other avenues.
Creeping nationalisation in our established markets was having a significant effect on revenue, and I looked to the western Pacific Rim to find growth. In Malaysia we were lucky enough to partner with Malaysian Airlines, but even so we encountered constant political problems. We were operating S61s in support of Esso, but Esso fell out with the Malaysian government over some joint venture that went sour and operations were stopped. We brought some of the crews back to England, retrained them and put the S61s to work on the North Sea. Eventually, politics became such an issue that it was expedient for Malaysian Airlines to take over our contract and arrange for BHL to manage the work. At the time I was a little upset, but as it turned out I managed to negotiate better revenue and a greater profit from being a management company than I’d got as the owner of the helicopters. We sold Malaysian Airlines the helicopters they needed, together with enough spares to keep them running, and ran them on a five-year management contract that was eventually extended several times. But even management contracts had to be looked on as short-term. Eventually, they would want to do the whole thing themselves. Nor was it simply a matter of helping third world countries to step up. We were under a great deal of pressure in Australia to employ local people. Their Director General of Civil Aviation, Sir Donald Anderson, kept telling me that while Bristows operated on an Australian AOC and under Australian air law, we ought to be using Australians to do the work. He was particularly keen that we t
rain up helicopter engineers, so we took on a number of fixed-wing aircraft engineers and taught them all about helicopters.
The wind blew the same way all over the world, although less strongly in some parts. We managed to maintain our Nigerian operations almost intact at a time when the market was growing enormously, and we had contracts from Shell, Mobil, Texaco and others. It was expedient to train Nigerians, and we trained several Nigerian pilots at BHL’s flying school in Redhill. To my surprise, they were a success. They identified with the Bristow ethos and became good company men. BHL’s partners in the region were Banjo Solaru, Ayo Oni and Ademola Edu, the latter being the lawyer son of Chief Slee Edu. Chief Edu was held in high regard by everyone and held several important positions in the military governments with which we dealt.
Helping out with a child’s education was something I was occasionally asked to do; in fact BHL put the daughter of a Malaysian official through university in London at the time of the management contract there. I had to go to Nick Cayzer and have a conversation about it.
‘Nick, I’ve had to do something a little bit unorthodox,’ I said.
‘Oh, God,’ said Nick.
‘It’s not that bad,’ I went on. ‘We are going to be paying for the education of this gentleman’s daughter. It will probably be for a four-or five-year period, and we’ll have to pick up the tab.’
‘Don’t tell me any more about it,’ said Nick. ‘Just get on with it.’
That was his stock reply to almost everything. But I had to tell him, and anyway, I didn’t want to be the only one bearing the cross if questions were asked about unusual payments. In those days, such arrangements were not uncommon. No money changed hands. Both sides got a square deal. Not only did the contract go smoothly but the young lady got a good philosophy degree, so it was money well spent. We always had a very good relationship with her father, who retired as Managing Director of Malaysian Airlines.
We were being squeezed from all sides because just as these countries were moving to take control of helicopter service operations, so I was finding it increasingly difficult to find growth. With the exception of the Soviet Union and Alaska, wherever there was offshore oil Bristow Helicopters was already flying. The two major untapped markets in which I thought BHL had good prospects were Indonesia and China. I sent John Odlin to China in 1980 to sound out that closed and mysterious Communist monolith, and we set up a company in Hong Kong with a view to operating there. That turned out to be a mistake – we should have gone straight to China proper – but John Odlin’s market research established that concessions would be granted in the South China Sea to certain companies including BP, Amoco, Shell and Esso. Nick Cayzer was able to arrange for me an introduction to Adrian Swire, head of an enormously wealthy and long-established Hong Kong family. I went there with Chris Fry, and we were shown into a most opulent office building. We were told rather abruptly that the appointment was for me alone, so Chris Fry had to remain outside, which was rather embarrassing. The Swire boardroom was truly enormous, magnificently appointed and with stunning views over Hong Kong. Conscious of the power and influence of the Swire clan, I was impeccably turned out, smart as a pin.
By way of pleasantries Mr Swire and I discussed shipping companies – the Swires owned Jardine Matheson – and the enormous potential for development in China over coffee and biscuits before getting down to business. I proposed to Mr Swire that Bristows join with one of his companies to bid for helicopter support service contracts in China. He heard me out, but made it clear immediately that he had no interest in the helicopter industry and would not involve himself in it. He would, however, introduce me to a Japanese agent who could help me get into China. I had not been a fan of the Japanese since my encounter with them in the Bay of Bengal and I would have preferred some alternative arrangement, but men like Mr Swire will say these things only once and I graciously accepted his offer, shook his hand and left.
Phil Hunt, John Willis, Chris Fry and I went to see this Japanese agent in Guangzhou. The flight into China was memorable for the fact that none of the seat belts on the aircraft were attached to the seats, the stewardess came round offering lollipops, and on arrival, Chinese Customs were solely interested in whether or not we had any bibles with us. They were very concerned to ensure that we were not missionaries.
I couldn’t help laughing at the irony of me having a Japanese fixer in China, especially after the way the Japanese had behaved there during the war. Nonetheless I knew that Mr Swire would not recommend an agent who could not perform, and we were eventually invited to meet a military General who was apparently the man who decided these things. We had put together bid documents on the basis of what John Odlin had been able to find out, and we knew there were several French and American companies bidding for the same work. We were staying in a big hotel called the White Swan, and on the morning of our presentation I woke up and looked out of the window to see thousands of blue denim-clad people flowing by on bicycles – very impressive. Then Chris Fry knocked on my door in a state of great excitement.
‘Look what’s just been shoved under my bedroom door!’ he said.
He handed me a sheaf of papers. It was our competitors’ bids. I couldn’t believe it. One from Petroleum Helicopters, one from an Australian helicopter company called Airfast ... We looked at the prices and it was immediately clear to me that ours was the best bid. We didn’t have to change anything, although Chris wanted me to. He had no experience of contract bidding at that point. I told him just to be sure that our presentation materials were in order – we had created a video presentation – and leave the rest to me.
We set off in a car with an interpreter to the airport, a joint military-civilian field, to meet the General. I was asked what aircraft I’d flown in the war. Seafires, Spitfires and Sea Furies, I said.
‘What, no jets?’ scoffed the Chinese General. He clearly felt he’d scored a big point over me as he’d just completed a MiG course in Russia. I asked the interpreter to tell the General that I’d run an airline with BAC 1-11s, Britannias and Viscounts, and he nodded. Chris Fry had set up the TV and started the video, but there was interference from somewhere. Lines kept streaking across the screen. Chris was in a sweat trying to fix it. He turned the TV on and off, jiggled the wires, ejected the video and started again, but he couldn’t make it work. The General began to laugh. I asked the interpreter to tell the General that I didn’t find it funny, and he laughed all the more. This was grave loss of face for the BHL contingent, who couldn’t even get their TV to work. Then the General picked up his telephone and shouted into it, and interference on the screen suddenly disappeared! What on earth was going on? The interpreter explained.
‘The General has ordered Air Traffic Control to turn off their radar!’
Perhaps to guide aircraft in, they kept on turning the radar on and off, and each time the screen would go haywire and the General would laugh some more. It was a total fiasco. Right at the end, a little boy came past, dropped his trousers and had a crap right in front of the picture window, which pretty well summed up the whole thing. But it turned out that the General was even more important than we’d realised, being not only a military commander but the Governor of the province. He really enjoyed the one-upmanship and told the interpreter to tell Mr Bristow to see the Civil Aviation Authority of China, and to tell them ‘we will be doing business with him.’
The contrast between the opulence of the Swire boardroom and the gloom of the CAAC offices could not have been more stark. It was little more than a barracks – the urinal was a ditch that ran through the middle of the building. It was dusty and bare; echoing corridors opened onto tiny offices with grimy windows. We were conducted to a large room with a long table at which were seated a number of near-identical men in identical grey suits. They sat bolt upright and remained expressionless while I made my presentation. We had been provided with a very good interpreter and I was able to get all my points across, but even so we had to work hard over seve
ral days before they gave us the licences we needed to operate in China. They were just bureaucrats really, but very powerful. The General trumped them all, of course, and we had his blessing. And so it was that we sent two Super Pumas to support Amoseas in the South China Sea, the first of several contracts we were able to win there.
Indonesia was my second main target. We had first worked there as far back as 1969, when BHL sent out a young man called Barry Newman who used to work for Fison Airwork. He did a very good job of setting up our first contract with Caltex Pacific Indonesia, but unfortunately he was killed in the crash of a Vickers Viscount operated by one of the internal airlines. Mike Ratcliffe took over for a short time, and things were looking quite bright there with expanding geological and geophysical programmes. Indonesia was attracting the big boys – Shell, Esso, Agip, Total – which was a very good sign in terms of market opportunity. One had to move quite quickly to secure one’s place in the market because competition was fierce, to say the least. Flying conditions were very, very demanding. Often one had to fly into clearings made only a few hours before, along a geophysical line where they were doing the seismic work. I actually flew into a clearing one day just as the local labour were laying the last trunks of the trees to form a landing platform. As the helicopter hovered over the site, the rotor downwash blew around all the foliage they had cut down and made a hell of a mess. But that was typical of what our chaps had to put up with.
Politically the market seemed quite stable under the presidency of Suharto, who had taken over from a Communist-backed regime and was encouraging foreign investment. My job was to make sure that the right people were in the right place with the right equipment, and we were blessed with a team of very keen young men who put up with appalling conditions to begin with. I spent several nights in one of the Portakabins in the jungle and it was hideously uncomfortable. The air conditioning didn’t work, which I was told was not uncommon – it really was a sweatshop. It’s amazing how well these strong characters stood up to such discomfort while retaining a sense of humour and a tremendous determination to get the job done professionally. The conditions were in many ways even more difficult than in Bolivia. We had JetRangers in Indonesia doing geological work, and these were some of the fifteen helicopters George Fry had bought while I was at BUA. They had a very poor reputation for reliability, and to be frank it’s amazing that they didn’t kill anybody. The skill of the pilots was such that several of them survived difficult landings when the Allison engines failed. Jack Woolley was constantly complaining to Allison about the failure rates that we were suffering. From a logistical support point of view, Allison was very slow indeed, and could have cost us our reputation but for the ingenuity of the field engineers.