On Wings Of Eagles (1990)

prison.

There had been times, in business, when EDS had been ready to admit defeat but had gone on to victory because Perot himself had insisted on going one more mile: this was what leadership was all about.

That was what he told himself, and it was all true, but there was another reason for his trip. He simply could not sit in Dallas, comfortable and safe, while other people risked their lives on his instructions.

He knew only too well that if he were jailed in Iran, he, and his colleagues, and his company, would be in much worse trouble than they were now. Should he do the prudent thing, and stay, he had wondered--or should he follow his deepest instincts, and go? It was a moral dilemma. He had discussed it with his mother.

She knew she was dying. And she knew that, even if Perot should come back alive and well after a few days, she might no longer be there. Cancer was rapidly destroying her body, but there was nothing wrong with her mind, and her sense of right and wrong was as clear as ever. 'You don't have a choice, Ross,' she had said. 'They're your men. You sent them over there. They didn't do anything wrong. Our government won't help them. You are responsible for them. It's up to you to get them out. You have to go.'

So here he was, feeling that he was doing the right thing, if not the smart thing.

The Lear jet left the desert behind and climbed over the mountains of western Iran. Unlike Simons and Coburn and Poche, Perot was a stranger to physical danger. He had been too young for World War II and too old for Vietnam, and the Korean War had finished while Ensign Perot was on his way there aboard the destroyer USS Sigourney. He had been shot at just once, during the prisoners-of-war campaign, landing in a jungle in Laos aboard an ancient DC3: he had heard pinging noises but had not realized the aircraft had been hit until after it landed. His most frightening experience, since the days of the Texarkana paper-route thieves, had been in another plane over Laos, when a door right next to his seat fell off. He had been asleep. When he woke up he looked for a light for a second, before realizing he was leaning out of the aircraft. Fortunately he had been strapped in.

He was not sitting next to a door today.

He looked through the window and saw, in a bowl-shaped depression in the mountains, the city of Tehran, a mud-colored sprawl dotted with white skyscrapers. The plane began to lose height.

Okay, he thought, now we're coming down. It's time to start thinking and using your head, Perot.

As the plane landed he felt tense, wired, alert: he was pumping adrenaline.

The plane taxied to a halt. Several soldiers with machine guns slung over their shoulders ambled casually across the tarmac.

Perot got out. The pilot opened the baggage hold and handed him the net bag of tapes.

Perot and the pilot walked across the tarmac. Howell and Young followed, carrying their suitcases.

Perot felt grateful for his inconspicuous appearance. He thought of a Norwegian friend, a tall, blond Adonis who complained of looking too impressive. 'You're lucky, Ross,' he would say. 'When you walk into a room no one notices you. When people see me, they expect too much--I can't live up to their expectations.' No one would ever take him for a messenger boy. But Perot, with his short stature and homely face and off- the-rack clothes, could be convincing in the part.

They entered the terminal. Perot told himself that the military, which was running the airport, and the Ministry of Justice, for which Dadgar worked, were two separate government bureaucracies; and if one of them knew what the other was doing, or whom it was seeking, why, this would have to be the most efficient operation in the history of government.

He walked up to the desk and showed his passport.

It was stamped and handed back to him.

He walked on.

He was not stopped by customs.

The pilot showed him where to leave the bag of television tapes. Perot put them down, then said goodbye to the pilot.

He turned around and saw another tall, distinguished-looking friend: Keane Taylor. Perot liked Taylor.

'Hi, Ross, how did it go?' Taylor said.

'Great,' Perot said with a smile. 'They weren't looking for the ugly American.'

They walked out of the airport. Perot said: 'Are you satisfied that I didn't send you back here for any administrative b.s.?'

'I sure am,' Taylor said.

They got into Taylor's car. Howell and Young got in the back.

As they pulled away, Taylor said: 'I'm going to take an indirect route, to avoid the worst of the riots.'

Perot did not find this reassuring.

The road was lined with tall, half-finished concrete buildings with cranes on top. Work seemed to have stopped. Looking closely, Perot saw that people were living in the shells. It seemed an apt symbol of the way the Shah had tried to modernize Iran too quickly.

Taylor was talking about cars. He had stashed all EDS's cars in a school playground and hired some Iranians to guard them, but he had discovered that the Iranians were busy running a used car lot, selling the damn things.

There were long lines at every gas station, Perot noticed. He found that ironic in a country rich in oil. As well as cars, there were people in the queues, holding cans. 'What are they doing?' Perot asked. 'If they don't have cars, why do they need gas?'

'They sell it to the highest bidder,' Taylor explained. 'Or you can rent an Iranian to stand in line for you.'

They were stopped briefly at a roadblock. Driving on, they passed several burning cars. A lot of civilians were standing around with machine guns. The scene was peaceful for a mile or two; then Perot saw more burning cars, more machine guns, another roadblock. Such sights ought to have been frightening, but somehow they were not. It seemed to Perot that the people were just enjoying letting loose for a change, now that the Shah's iron grip was at last being relaxed. Certainly the military was doing nothing to maintain order, as far as he could see.

There was always something weird about seeing violence as a tourist. He recalled flying over Laos in a light plane and watching people fighting on the ground: he had felt tranquil, detached. He supposed that battle was like that: it might be fierce if you were in the middle of it, but five minutes away nothing was happening.

They drove into a huge circle with a monument in its center that looked like a spaceship of the far future, towering over the traffic on four gigantic splayed legs. 'What is that?' said Perot.

'The Shahyad Monument,' Taylor said. 'There's a museum in the top.'

A few minutes later they pulled into the forecourt of the Hyatt Crown Regency. 'This is a new hotel,' Taylor said. 'They just opened it, poor bastards. It's good for us, though--wonderful food, wine, music in the restaurant in the evenings ... We're living like kings in a city that's falling apart.'

They went into the lobby and took the elevator. 'You don't have to check in,' Taylor told Perot. 'Your suite is in my name. No sense in having your name written down anywhere.'

'Right.'

They got out at the eleventh floor. 'We've all got rooms along this hall,' Taylor said. He unlocked a door at the far end of the corridor.

Perot walked in, glanced around, and smiled. 'Would you look at this?' The sitting room was vast. Next to it was a large bedroom. He looked into the bathroom: it was big enough for a cocktail party.

'Is it all right?' Taylor said with a grin.

'If you'd seen the room I had last night in Amman, you wouldn't bother to ask.'

Taylor left him to settle in.

Perot went to the window and looked out. His suite was at the front of the hotel, so he could look down and see the forecourt. I might hope to have warning, he thought, if a squad of soldiers or a revolutionary mob comes for me.

But what would I do?

He decided to map an emergency escape route. He left his suite and walked up and down the corridor. There were several empty rooms with unlocked doors. At either end was an exit to a staircase. He went down the stairs to the floor below. There were more empty rooms, some without furniture or decoration: the hotel was unfinished, like so many buildings in this town.