America 1982-Chapter 86 - 8: Reasons for Leaning Towards the White Robe Society_2
After leaving IBM in 1962, he founded EDS Company. By 1968, EDS went public and within three days, EDS’s share price soared from $16 per share to $165 per share, landing him on the cover of Fortune Magazine, where he was called the fastest money-maker and the richest Texan.
The internal network of Boston University, where Tommy had previously studied, whether it was hardware or software, from construction to maintenance, was all managed by Ross Perot’s EDS Company. Moreover, EDS’s clients included not only Boston University but many large companies, banks, and government institutions.
If Tommy had indeed decided to start a business and designed a decent piece of software, he’d rather submit his business plan to the office of Ross Perot than to other software tycoons in Silicon Valley. Ross Perot was a typical pragmatist, and Tommy, who also believed in pragmatism and shared the same view of the world, could probably communicate more easily with him.
This guy saw no factions, no positions; as long as he deemed it helpful, he put it to use. When he founded EDS in the sixties, the United States was filled with hostility towards China, and Ross Perot also lacked a favorable view of China. However, he distributed free English editions of Mao’s writings in his company and had his employees study them seriously. When opponents criticized him for possibly supporting China, Ross Perot’s response to the interview was:
"China’s existence is indeed a threat to the United States, but this book isn’t. It is a tool for me to learn to think in another way. Those who criticize me don’t know what’s happening in the world. They haven’t even read this book; they find a reason to criticize me just because the author is Chinese, thinking it will cause me headaches. But in reality, such tactics are nothing to me, and those people, they can only wait powerlessly to be completely wiped out by me, who is continuously evolving and gaining strength. The greatest pleasure I get from doing business is eliminating such narrow-minded and short-sighted low-level businessmen for the United States."
Compared to the IT moguls like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, Ross Perot’s fortune may have been far less, but mainly because that guy had no intention of wasting his life on making money. From the start to the end, what he always wanted to do was to change America; it just so happened that changing America required money, so he went along and made some. In fact, he was once an angel investor for Jobs. 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖
Furthermore, in terms of influence among the middle and lower classes in the United States, those two IT giants held no persuasive power compared to Ross Perot. Let’s put it this way, if you write the names of these three individuals on a piece of paper and show it to Tommy’s dad and his coworkers, a hundred percent guaranteed, those uneducated workers could recognize Ross Perot’s name and even recount his legendary experiences.
The more grassroots Americans are, the more they yearn for heroes in this world, and to many Americans, Ross Perot was a hero.
In 1978, the Iranian Government imprisoned two senior officials of EDS’s Iran branch on charges of bribing government officials, demanding a staggering bail of $12,750,000 for each person.
At that time, Iran had not yet undergone its revolution and maintained good relations with the United States. The United States suggested that Ross Perot’s company should pay the bail because those two had indeed bribed Iranian officials for the company’s business. After posting bail, the embassy could help bring the people back to America. This statement also represented the failure of official diplomatic negotiations, and after Ross Perot confirmed that the United States Government was unable to provide help, he indeed chose to pay the money himself.
However, he did not pay the bail to Iran but hired retired United States Army Special Forces Colonel Arthur Simons as the commander, forming a rescue team of seven retired U.S. Special Forces elites. In Texas, they constructed a replica of Iran’s Ministry of Justice prison to simulate the operation and developed a detailed battle plan, preparing for an armed rescue.
What truly made Ross Perot considered a hero by countless Americans was that he did not hide in the United States; instead, when the rescue team set off, he chose to accompany them into the heart of Iran, solely to rescue his two employees.
As expected, the outcome was a cause for celebration; after enduring countless hardships, the rescue team successfully extracted the two employees. They broke through the Iranian border and reached Turkey while all employees of EDS Iran division simultaneously evacuated from Iran.
After the fact, during an interview, Ross Perot stated that no matter what, he would not abandon his EDS colleagues, and he wouldn’t give a dime to those trying to extort money from us.
This event brought fame to Ross Perot and his EDS overnight.
Every American wishes that their boss could be as committed as Ross Perot, not abandoning their employees, but such a thought is nothing but a pipe dream, so they grow even fonder of Ross Perot, who would not give up on his staff. American television networks, newspapers, and novels all heavily reported on this rescue mission, and the film industry was planning to bring his story to the silver screen over the next couple of years.
"Ross Perot, he’s a member of the White Robe Society. I hope to meet him at one of the Fraternity’s events over the next four years, to get a signed photo with him as a gift for my father. My father idolizes him." After a few seconds of consideration, Tommy finally came up with a barely plausible reason.
It’s quite normal for a boy from a small-town lower class to admire an American hero praised by the elders, but saying this out loud might make Stephen realize the difference between them. After all, a significant portion of upper-class Americans and politicians don’t consider Ross Perot a hero but a grandstander and a hypocrite, someone who didn’t want to spend the money on hefty bail. Getting mercenaries to rescue people was cheaper, and that guy simply seized an opportunity to conduct a successful PR campaign for himself.
