When Jim Miller returned to his home in the Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights the day of his retirement party, he spent the afternoon tending to his garden and drinking beer. Two weeks later, when he realized that he had accomplished everything in his garden that he wanted and was now left with simply drinking beer, he realized he had made a mistake. He went online and it took him less than an hour to make contact with an air cargo carrier based in Moscow that had a single 747-400F cargo freighter in its inventory and needed an experienced pilot. Within a week he was on his way to Russia and a new career.
Moving had been easy for him. He had no family. Jim Miller was a gay man. He had briefly married at the age of 29 during the final year of his short tenure as a C-141 pilot in the USAF. After leaving the air force, an offer to join United Airlines was eagerly given and eagerly accepted. But the marriage ended two years later when his wife ran off with the man she was sleeping with. He was grateful at the time that he had no children, but had often regretted it since.
Miller came out of the closet a few years after his divorce in a time when the budding gay rights movement was colliding with the growing backlash of the straight world’s reaction to AIDS. Like all gay men of the era, he was at first appalled and then increasingly angered at the anti-gay hysteria characterized by the “Gay Plague” headlines of the day. The loss of friends to the disease did nothing to lessen the anger. But the fear of catching the disease was especially frightening to a pilot. By 1986, FAA licensed physicians were beginning to test pilots for the recently discovered virus, HIV, and this fact created a new fear for Miller. A positive test meant a death sentence of another kind, the immediate revocation of your pilot’s license.
Captain Jim went through his period of sexual profligacy, always careful to practice safe sex in the process, but eventually fell in love at the age of 42 and lived with his partner for the next sixteen years, until the day his partner died in a motorcycle accident. Since then, Jim lived only to fly. He was very good at it, and by relocating to Russia he was able to continue his life doing what he did best.
Jim Miller realized quickly that the standards maintained in a small Russian cargo carrier were something less than what he had experienced at United. When he found out that the company had decided to sell the 747 he was flying only five months after he arrived in Moscow, he thought hard about whether or not to return to the States. But weighing against his concerns and his homesickness, Miller was widely respected in the company for his skill as a pilot. The company no longer had a 747, but it had half a dozen Ilyushin 76 aircraft, and the owner offered to pay Miller to learn to fly the old Soviet-era workhorse. He accepted the proposal and was elevated into the captain’s seat after six months flying as co-pilot. To his surprise, he found that he enjoyed flying the older plane. It made him feel like it was his skill that made all the difference, not a computer making decisions as was all too often the case in a modern plane.
Miller’s Jewish ancestry never came up in any of his cockpit discussions or nights spent at restaurants in cities across the Middle East and Asia. No one ever asked him because no one cared. It reflected the overwhelmingly agnostic or atheistic views of the Russian flying community. Nor did anyone ask him about his sexuality. Miller realized that the latter fact was, unfortunately, a reflection of his age. The American’s hair had gone completely gray and had thinned significantly over the prior 15 years. The fact was that he had been essentially asexual since the death of his partner. Neither his religion nor his sexuality were reflected in his personnel file. Miller often thought that business practices in Russia had to be similar to what things were like in the United States during the growth years after World War II, before regulations and litigation had turned every single process into a pre-defined set of forms to be followed to the letter.
Miller spent the next year flying as the chief pilot of whichever Ilyushin 76 required his skills. He was satisfied and being well paid — nothing like what he made in his final years at United, but enough to make him feel good. He didn’t need the money anyway; it was the flying that mattered to him.
But change often comes in the strangest form and at the most unexpected times. Captain Jim was enjoying a beer in a Moscow bar that catered to English speaking expatriates. The crowd this particular evening consisted of a group of Indians, three Brits, two Canadians and Jim Miller, who sat alone, one ear listening to the Canadians and the other listening to the Brits. A man came in and sat down two seats over from the pilot, ordering a draft Spaten pilsner, German beers being a popular drink in Moscow. After a couple of sips, the man struck up a conversation with the American. The man spoke English, though not particularly well. After some discussion about nothing important, the man asked Miller if he ever attended synagogue. The question was in Hebrew. Jim Miller had not spoken the language since his Bar Mitzvah and had forgotten most of what little he knew.
The simple question opened the door for Jim Miller to make a meaningful turn in his life. The man who asked the question was officially an Israeli embassy employee. In reality, the man was a recruiter for Mossad. The question led to a meeting in Miller’s small Moscow apartment, and that led to a long discussion on life, religion and the state of world affairs. After two more meetings, the offer was made: If Jim Miller was interested, there was a job waiting for him in the United Arab Emirates doing what he loved. The pay would be a little better and Dubai would be a lot warmer, but the real reason to make the change was that Captain Jim would have the opportunity to serve the state of Israel. Jim Miller accepted. He was in the UAE three weeks later.
Now on this late summer day, with the temperature outside well into triple digits, Masrov surveyed his gathered team with great satisfaction. So many pieces had been put in place. Swiss-Arab Air Cargo was doing business in countries all across the region, its success in gaining business driven by very aggressive pricing. The profit and loss statements were a disaster as the company added expenses with seemingly careless abandon, but it was growth and market penetration that Gennady Masrov cared about. The accounting department, which worked in downtown Dubai in the office space leased by Masrov, kept the books faithfully. The company controller, a young Emirati with a recent MBA from the University of Michigan, kept warning his boss about the growing rate of losses, but no one was concerned about their jobs. When cash in the bank fell below $3 million, a wire transfer from Switzerland for $15 million showed up in the account. The money appeared to be endless.
Masrov had the team assembled in its new hanger building. Negotiations were already underway to lease yet another hanger at the airport. The Russian owner called everyone to order and praised their growth and success in winning business since his prior visit earlier in the summer. He had a projector set up on a folding table and turned the floor over to a young Emirati who had been leading the effort to build their new website. The meeting was to introduce the website to the team. It had been promoted from their development server to the live Internet the night before. After a twenty minute presentation of the site and what it could do for customers and employees alike, the audience applauded as it had the first time Masrov was onsite. The team was highly motivated.
That night, Gennady Masrov took his a small group of managers and senior pilots out to dinner in Dubai. Everyone in attendance was a new employee added since the acquisition. He raised a toast to his team. “I am very proud of all of you,” said the Russian in English for the benefit of Jim Miller. “Once we acquire some Midas aircraft, we will be where we need to realize our vision.” Glasses were clinked all around.