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 Sometimes
when the air cargo industry awards season rolls around,
we start thinking:
Why isn’t there an
award for all the true-blue, unvarnished, unsung heroes
of air cargo?
There is certainly plenty
of recognition and (even self-aggrandizing) advertising
extolling the virtues of great companies and people, and
also superior programs, all of which are vying for air
cargo industry awards.
But in an increasingly commercial
venture, we do wonder where a selfless effort, beyond
award-driven individuals and companies, can be recognized
just for the sheer decency of saluting a job well done?
So rather than just gripe
about industry awards, here begins a series celebrating
people, companies and events in the air cargo experience.
The aim here is to tell
stories that touch the heart of our global air cargo audience,
which, after all is said and done, may be the best award
of all.
William R. (Bill) Boesch
is a high-level executive who has been in the transportation
and logistics industry for almost 50 years.
He entered the field of
global transportation and logistics in 1965 as a graduate
student working for Seaboard World Airlines, a pioneering
cargo carrier serving the U.S., Europe, Africa, and Asia.
He held various marketing
and operations management positions with the company before
becoming its Vice President and Director of Worldwide
Sales in 1978.
Mr. Boesch assumed similar
responsibilities at Flying Tiger Line after it merged
with Seaboard in 1980.
He joined Emery Worldwide
in 1982, a major airfreight forwarder, aircraft operator,
and logistics provider, as Vice President of its International
Division.
He became Senior Vice President
and General Manager of Emery in 1985 and Executive Vice
President and General Manager in 1987, before leaving
the company to become Pan American World Airways’
Senior Vice President of Cargo.
Mr. Boesch assumed broader
responsibilities as Pan Am’s Senior Vice President
for Passenger and Cargo Operations at the beginning of
1988, but left later that year to become American Airlines’
Vice-President of Cargo, a division AMR wished to expand.
He became President and
CEO of the Cargo Division in 1991 and Chairman of the
Cargo Division in 1996.
Under Bill’s direction, American became a world
leader in the air cargo and logistics business, with annual
revenues of over a billion dollars.
Bill served as CEO of DLH/DP
Global Mail in 2004, led the company out of its financial
difficulties, and managed the integration with Smartmail.
He directed the movement
of both companies’ corporate headquarters and the
branding change to DHL Global Mail.
But then Bill did something
a little different, taking on a task (just recently completed)
as a transportation advisor to the U.S. military—first
in Iraq and later Afghanistan.
His work was not at some
military base stateside, either.
He went and lived in both
war zones, operating in places where he was constantly
in harm’s way, to the point where he carried personal
weapons.
But as with all things,
Bill Boesch, who has just recently returned to America
from Afghanistan, is quite self-effacing and even matter
of fact when talking about the high adventure of supplying
the military with a critical skill set after a remarkable
life in air cargo.
“I went to both Iraq
and Afghanistan because I believed that by organizing
tribal transportation companies we could significantly
reduce the number of American casualties.
“The War in Iraq was
on going in 2004 and the military truck transportation
was taking very high hit-rates (as high as 30 percent).
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“The soldiers guarding
the supply trucks, which were mostly coming out of Kuwait
and were driven by USAF personnel or 3rd country nations
(people from India, Pakistan, Philippines, etc.), were
hired by a Kuwait company called Agility and later PWC.
“Many Iraqi people
hated to see these American goods moving on non-Iraqi
trucks with non-Iraqi drivers guarded by U.S. military
gun-trucks, rolling through their villages while their
people were unemployed and their families suffering from
lack of food, clean water, medical attention, and schooling.
“Many transferred
these negative feelings toward Americans who said they
came to liberate them.
“As a result these
convoys were reportedly continually attacked with IEDs,
rockets, or small arms.
“My feeling was, how
do we explain to a U.S. family that their sons or daughters
were killed or mutilated guarding a shipment of Kool-Aid
soft drinks?
“The United States
Secretary of Air Force, Mike Wynn, asked me to study the
culture of Iraq and see if this gave us a hint on how
to improve the trucking operation.
“Right away, the analysis
needed to take into consideration that, in addition to
being Americans in a foreign country and the challenge
of foreign language and cultures, the complexity was doubled
by Sunnis and Shiites fighting each other hand to hand,
which included pulling each other off trucks, with beatings
and killing running rampant
“The Sunnis also viewed
the U.S. as supporting the Shiites after Sadaam Hussein’s
departure, which resulted in the Sunnis in the West and
North supporting Al Qaida.
“As a counter the
Shiites were teaming up with Iran. So the cultural complexities
within Iraq were extreme. Our studies showed us that the
tribes were strong and could protect the trucks.
“So my task in Iraq
and later in Afghanistan was to reduce number of American
casualties by working with the tribes to get them to transport
our materials.
“I went into Iraq
as a civilian businessman trying to find and talk with
the top tribal sheiks, who were mostly hidden because
of fear of being killed by the U.S. forces.
“After many months
we penetrated the tribes and set up tribal companies to
transport U.S. goods in al Anbar within the so-called
‘Triangle of Death.’
“The operation worked
and the trucks did not suffer any attacks or loss of goods.
“We then expanded
to the Shiite area in the South and finally to the mixed
regions in the north.
“During the 3 years
of the Iraq Transportation System’s operation within
Iraq, there were no attacks on any of our operated trucks.
“Further the system
is now credited with taking over 300,000 U.S. soldier
man/days out of harm’s way.
“I truly believe that
many of our soldiers came home because of the work my
team accomplished.
“As time goes on and
peace finally comes to this region, the hope is that someday,
with all of the facts on how our mission was conducted,
people will recognize the scores of very brave people
who risked their lives every day.
“They are the true
heroes in my view.
“Because Iraq was
so successful, once again we were down on the ground attempting
the same type of program in Afghanistan.
“Right away we found
out that Afghanistan is quite a bit more culturally complex
than Iraq.
“The tribal system
was not as strong as in Iraq, so we had to deal with village
and tribal elders all along the truck routes.
“We formed a program
to only go to the most dangerous areas in Afghanistan,
which were those areas that the normal, military-contracted
trucks (Host Nation Trucking, which was replaced by National
Afghan Trucking) would not go even with full security.
“So to get supplies
to those areas, either air or military convoys were used.
“Our elder operation,
Afghan Trucking Network, put together the elders and started
operations with local village owner operators in the west,
then went into the SW and connected the two regions going
through the highly dangerous drug smuggling regions. Again,
the systems were successful, with the result that ATN
is credited with taking over 16,000 U.S. soldiers out
of harm’s way, with an on-time delivery of goods
reliability at 98 percent.
“For the moment,
expansion of this program has been put on hold for technical
reasons so I am back in the U.S., but think daily of those
brave man and women fighting an unseen enemy in the mountains
of Afghanistan.
“Looking ahead there
is no reason why the program cannot eventually be resumed
to the South and the highly dangerous Eastern areas of
Afghanistan.
“The need is great
with so many American lives at stake.
“I cannot ever forget
the personalities and faces of our brave young soldiers
in these two conflict zones, with the abiding wish to
continue to help insure that many more soldiers are taken
out of harm’s way so that they might safely come
back home.
“The realization that
my experience might help save even one soldier’s
life has led me to believe giving back and helping others
is in fact the best work of my life.”
Cultural and sociopolitical
factors form a balancing act that is difficult to the
extreme in the case of the Middle East, and it would be
one thing if that were all Bill had to deal with. But
unfortunately, sometimes the simplest things, like common
practices for best efficiency along the cargo chain, become
mangled in the process.
“The military moves
long-haul air cargo mostly through AMC (Air Mobility Command),
which uses its organic aircraft (C130s, C17s and C5s).
Most of the heavy-lift cargo is moved on these aircraft
along with palletized cargo.
“AMCs organic lift
is supplemented with CRAF (Civil Reserve Air Fleet) using
mostly palletized cargo on commercial 747s—in both
peacetime and during conflicts. CRAF can take all the
committed aircraft assigned to the program depending on
the scale of the conflict.
“Within Iraq, cargo
was carried by a few commercial carriers who bid daily
on the movements using mostly low-cost Russian aircraft
(An12s or IL76s) and crews.
“The problems that
I saw with the movement of military cargo were low utilization
of cube and weight.
“I can understand
this happening from time to time on hot incoming cargo,
where it would be against the mission to delay material
by waiting for additional cargo to fully utilize the cube
and weight, but I cannot understand why this is happening
with outbound cargo during the drawdown in both Iraq and
Afghanistan.
“The military fully
utilizes the trucks so there must be some reason why they
do not do the same with aircraft.
“Many pallets are
built knee-high and in a commercial operation, that would
never be acceptable.
“Also, the booking
and performance systems need to be centralized and done
through one system, as the systems in many cases are different
and cannot synchronized with each other. An example is
that it is difficult to book outbound cargo because one
of the systems does not have a code for that.
“Operations like AMC
try to do their best to move cargo, but are never-the-less
criticized by the in-country operations, which appear
to have lack of control or oversight of the situation,”
said Mr. Boesch.
With admiration for companies
like Emirates, it’s no surprise that after forty
years in the business, Bill believes innovation technology
is the key to making cargo a better business on the global
scale.
“There have been many
improvements.
“The industry needs
to keep on target with its IT systems and find ways to
be more customer friendly and to be compensated fairly
for product; it needs to have a top focus on revenue per
tonne mile rather than load factor; and it needs to work
with world governments on security that protects both
the public and the vital air cargo industry.”
With his service having
lasted “five LONG years,” Bill is finally
ready to settle a little bit at his beach house in Treasure
Island; he’s most looking forward to “getting
to know my two girls again.”
We have in our minds the
idea of what makes a good soldier—Strength, Efficiency,
Caution, Intelligence—but we seldom talk about the
other side of being a soldier: Hope.
Without Hope, you couldn’t
see the possibility for changes, you wouldn’t dare
to make any, and you would miss the most important part
of the job: coming home.
It sounds to us like Bill
is a true military patriot.
Geoffrey/Flossie |
Meet
Hayman Burhan, Unit Manager Corporate Communications at
the Jeddah-based Saudi Airlines Cargo Company.
U.S.
Army designated it the J-2.
The
barbeque was served family style on plates by the
side of the road, when beef ribs were almost too
big to lift and bread this size was a wonder. 
