Against All Odds - The Magnificent Trio That Built the Israeli

Against All Odds - The Magnificent Trio That Built the Israeli Air Force

1947 â€“ The UN declares that the British Mandate over Palestine will come to an end. In May 1948 Israel and Arab Palestine will be divided into two independent states. The Arab world reacts immediately: There will be no Jewish state; it will be driven into the sea! Sixty-five million Arabs against six hundred thousand Israeli Jews. Britain has washed its hands of the problem. The United States, under the guise of the Neutrality Act, makes it a felony for any American to supply either side with any arms. Americans Al Schwimmer, Hank Greenspun, and Charlie Winters boldly defy the Neutrality Act and risk convictions by purchasing twenty-three former Nazi Messerschmitt Bf-109s in Czechoslovakia, painting out the swastikas on the tails with Jewish stars of David, and smuggling them to Israel; founding a â€œPanamanianâ€ airline and flying seven large aircraft out of Panama â€œto do an aerial survey,â€ but never returning; securing a huge cache of ammunition from a sympathetic junk dealer in Hawaii; smuggling weapons to Mexico on a hijacked yacht, and ultimately shipping them â€œto Nationalist Chinaâ€ â€“ via Israel. Stripped of most of their rights as US citizens, Schwimmer is recruited to start a small aircraft maintenance plant in Israel, which will become Israel Aircraft Industries, a billion-dollar-a-year operation; Greenspun purchases a defunct newspaper, which he turns into the Las Vegas Sun and is among the first to call witch-hunting Senator Joseph McCarthy to account; Winters returns to importing and exporting fruit and diamonds between Israel and the United States. After the 1967 Six-Day War, when France reneges on its commitment to sell Israel fifty advanced fighter jets, the trio manages to â€œstealâ€ plans from a friendly engineer in Geneva. Within six months Israel turns out its own homegrown Mach 2 fighter aircraft. And thatâ€™s just the beginning. International best-selling author Hugo N. Gerstl has crafted a tantalizing, rewarding, magnificently readable tour de force based on the true life stories of three of Israelâ€™s most unheralded heroes, cementing and enhancing his reputation as a master storyteller.

Country	USA
Author	Hugo N. Gerstl
Binding	Paperback
Brand	Brand: Samuel Wachtman's Sons, Inc.
EAN	9781888820317
Feature	Used Book in Good Condition
ISBN	1888820314
Label	Samuel Wachtman's Sons, Inc.
Manufacturer	Samuel Wachtman's Sons, Inc.
MPN	black & white illustrations
NumberOfItems	1
NumberOfPages	486
PartNumber	black & white illustrations
PublicationDate	2012-08-30
Publisher	Samuel Wachtman's Sons, Inc.
Studio	Samuel Wachtman's Sons, Inc.
ReleaseDate	0000-00-00

Against All Odds - The Magnificent Trio That Built the Israeli Air Force

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