The pilots who flew these bush-type aircraft were a motley group of men, often serving as agents or go-betweens with the Chinese National guerrillas and the opium buyers. Some were former Nazis, others part of the band of expatriates that emerges in countries following any war.7 Helliwell and his compatriots had created a model for trafficking in drugs that would result in the formation of Air America—the CIA fleet of planes that transported opiates and cocaine during and after the Vietnam Conflict.
