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Enfants Perdus

by Ailish M. Nic Phaidin
Brevard Technical Journal

June should be pronounced by somebody in a position of authority as "help troops" month. Their position in the fields of battle is becoming more and more akin to the French military term "Enfants Perdus," which means "troops in a hopelessly dangerous position." Mostly, they are doing their job in the best way they have been trained.

On the home front, we have, at best, a stake in helping them to make a bad situation better, and at worst, to make a bad situation even more incredibly dangerous than it is already.

Brevard County, along with every other county in the nation, is home to the creeping and crawling Hummer vehicle. The Hummer is rapidly creeping onto our roads and highways from a once-off sighting to an hourly sighting. They must maintain, but rarely do, the suburban speed limits of between 30 mph to 45 mph. Even if they do manage to stay within the legal speed limits, their awesome power and size on our roads has spawned a whole raft of Web sites that display a growing displeasure with their use on our roads.

These vehicles get about 11 miles per gallon and have a smaller fuel tank, in spite of their great size, than some of the comparable vehicles. Arnold Schwarzenegger owned the first commercially available Humvee, which cost well over $100,000. Schwarzenegger had the money, the influence and the political clout to allow him this dubious luxury.

The military vehicle, the Humvee, is in daily use by our troops on the battlefield. Our Hummer is in daily use on our roads. The optimists amongst us have the attitude, "well, if I can afford it, I'm darned well going to buy it." There is little wiggle room for compromise with such an attitude.

Owning a Hummer is like a fashion statement. Recently, I was at a meeting where a Spanish buyer was inspecting a U.S. product. The product owner took us to lunch in a fancy Miami restaurant in his "all-the-bell-and-whistles" Hummer. I noticed a cooling of relations as soon as the Hummer was brought to the front of the building. The Spanish buyer was very inquisitive about the reasons his U.S. host decided to own such a vehicle. Suffice it to say that the Florida-manufactured product was not bought. The decision whether or not to buy our product was obviously not based solely on the ownership of one Humvee; however, the buyer's decision was, I feel, in many ways tainted by the "well, if I can afford it..." attitude.

It is becoming increasingly difficult for our country to trade globally and safely. The safety of our troops to trade their way through their mire is an hourly hazard of gargantuan proportions. Our safety, and ability, to trade our way through the mire of global competition is also fraught with danger (of the very real physical kind), as well as through the mire of growing anti-U.S. sentiment in many parts of the world.

When we meet our customers, either at home or abroad, we are likely to be confronted by questions about our wastefulness (perceived or otherwise), particularly when it comes to the areas of gasoline - a finite, scarce natural resource; it is plausible that we will, at the very least, have reference made to our gas-guzzling life styles, and at the very most, find ourselves questioned closely on these habits. Sometimes, it is simply the questioner trying to understand our culture. More often it will mean that our guest or host does not have the same sense of political correctness to which we aspire.

This is either a very defensive posture or it is a very aggressive posture. You must choose before you are confronted. Neutral is not an option.

If you choose an aggressive posture, may the wind always be at your back.

Before you board your flight to see your overseas client, or before your overseas guest arrives, educate yourself on several burning global issues. It will be most helpful to read several pages of the State and Commerce Department's Web sites. They are filled with helpful suggestions and recommendations. It might also be helpful to read the Geneva Conventions and at least two Web sites of your guest's, or host's, national media. They are often indicative of a goodly proportion of the national thinking in that country. They may very well be wrong in relation to the attitude of your guest or host.

Solidly researched and thoughtful positions, as opposed to purely patriotic and often emotional positions and reactions, will, more often than not, earn you favorable and friendly responses. Getting the contract is your key task - whatever that takes, do it. Just remember to be ethical and honest in your dealings.

We must also be ambassadors for our nation during our overseas business trips. Our knowledge and our respect for the environmental, and other attitudes of many of our global partners are always helpful to our troops in the field. Wasteful habits and arrogant attitudes may be endangering our ability to trade, and perhaps the lives of our service men and women. Creeping along in our Hummer could be endangering both.

Should we look at a "help troops and trade" month instead? Let us choose not to make a bad situation worse.