Word: swarttouw
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...Frans Swarttouw, former chairman of the Fokker aircraft company and one of the Netherlands' most colorful businessmen, bid an unusual farewell to his countrymen a few weeks ago. Stricken with throat cancer, the executive, 64, who once characterized an entrepreneur as "a guy who works hard, drinks himself into the ground and chases women," said he had stopped his painful therapy and opted out of a life-saving operation that would have left him an invalid. "I want to be able to draw the line myself," he said on TV. Three days later, he was put to death...
...touch of bravura was uniquely Swarttouw, but the candor about voluntary death was typically Dutch. While euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide remain taboo subjects in much of Europe and are contentious topics in the U.S., they have been openly debated and researched for more than 20 years in Holland, which has a record of pragmatism in dealing with thorny social issues like drugs and abortion. Euthanasia is still, under Dutch law, a crime punishable by up to 12 years in prison. But in fact, the Netherlands has tolerated the practice for more than a decade, and the number of cases...
When Frans Swarttouw took over the sleepy Dutch aircraft manufacturer Fokker a decade ago, he predicted the little company would survive only "if it dares to start digging in the front garden of the American airplane manufacturers." Never has the garden been greener than now. With U.S. airlines expanding their fleets and replacing aging jets, the two major American aircraft makers, Boeing and McDonnell Douglas, have enough orders to keep them busy through the early 1990s...
...likely to become a familiar sight on U.S. runways. Fokker is negotiating with United Airlines for the sale of as many as 200 planes, and with Delta for 100. Says Fokker's Swarttouw, 56, who plans to retire soon: "We have secured a future for Fokker of 15 to 20 years...
...even Boeing, which has manufactured 55% of all commercial planes now in service in the non-Communist world, can afford the escalating prices of building a replacement aircraft. As a result, the company is discussing plans with potential Japanese partners to help pay the development costs. But last week Swarttouw was also in Japan looking for another partner...