Page 53 - Midas Touch

CHAPTER TWO

The Index Finger

F.O.C.U.S.

“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand.
The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.”

– Alexander Graham Bell

Focus in Battle, in Business, in Life

Robert Kiyosaki

In June of 1971, I walked out to the flight line where my aircraft waited.
This time there was something very different about that helicopter. It
wasn’t the same aircraft I had been training on for the past two years. On
this day, my aircraft was fitted with rocket pods; four side-mounted, pilot-
directed machine guns; and two machine guns for the door gunners. My
real reason for training as a pilot was becoming all too real. My aircraft

had changed, and that meant I had to change, too.

Until that day, I had flown with only one co-pilot and one crew chief, a
total crew of three and no weaponry. Flying a helicopter with two pods of
rockets, six machine guns, cans of ammunition and a crew of five is like
flying a very different aircraft. Not only was it much heavier, which made
it feel very different in flight, but the aircraft did not respond as quickly,
which meant I had to be further ahead of the aircraft. I had to know what

to do earlier, anticipate turning or pulling out of a dive earlier. Flying felt
menacing. My helicopter was no longer a training aircraft. On that day, my
helicopter gunship transitioned from a training vehicle to an instrument of
war, and I knew I had to transition also.

A War Story