Survive and Tell (cont.)

I returned to routine work at the battalion, this time as Major and Battalion Commandant, graduate of the Infantry Company Commanders Course. I could not accept the fact that we had to hold shooting drills in the middle of Tel Aviv with all the bother involved when, if fact, it was possible and necessary to install the computer in a mobile wagon and execute the shooting drills as a part of regular routine procedure at an antiaircraft firing range near the Dora camp, where "Beit Goldmintz" stands today. We searched for an appropriate mobile wagon and I found out how hard it is to make H.Q. officers take responsibility. Each one wanted the approval of another officer and would only add his signature upon receipt of this approval.

Communications Officers Course

One day I was called to Chief Artillery Officers H.Q. and was asked to do a service for the corps in order to "Capture" the position/status of Major. At that time the Major of the Artillery was a Battalion Commandant. The Chief of the Artillery Corps was just a Colonel and the Highest Artillery Officer in a Division or even a territorial command was not higher than Lt. Colonel. The ranks at the Infantry and Armored Corps were higher by one rank at each of the command levels. The scarcity of positions for promotions in the Artillery prompted the initiative to "Capture" every possible position.

At the Artillery School there was a communications branch with the rank of Major and the Communications corps wanted to man this position, which was traditionally manned by the communications corps and, now, "yours truly" had to conquer the post.

The Communications Corps claimed that Chief communications branch must have a high technical background, or at least be an electronics technician. The Artillery Corps pulled out their only officer with a technical background at that time, Major Shalom Eitan.

The Corps entered me as a candidate, but being that I was not at all familiar with communications and communications planning, I was summoned to attend a special Officers' Communications Course, in which I even earned the title of Exemplary Cadet.

I did not want the position, but this is what I had to do for the corps. When I finished the course, to my delight, it seemed that they had reached an agreement without the need to use my services. I returned to the battalion with a certificate of Exemplary Cadet and authorized as an Artillery Communications Officer.

I began to think about changing jobs. There was no point in continuing routine duties. And, in actual fact, I had done something that was the very opposite of routine, but this is an interesting episode that I will describe anon.

Assisting Rafael (Armament Development Authority) Experiments

Rafael had developed air to air and air to ground missiles which they had to test in order to accumulate real-time data with regards to the performance of the missiles from launch to strike.

Some engineers approached me in order to test our radar to be eventually used as an instrument for performance measurements. They were impressed with the equipment and asked that I assist the project. With the permission of my authorities, I accepted with great enthusiasm.

I organized a team of excellently trained and experienced operators and technicians and we left in 4 vehicles to an area that, today, is known as "Shdemah", approx. 100 kilometers north of Eilat and the same distance from Mitspeh Ramon. When I reached the area, I met a colleague from the RADAR course, now Dr Yaacov Ziv, whom I had not seen since Course. He was in charge of communications at Rafael. Dr. Yonathan Mass was in charge of the experiment. The codename of the air to ground missile was "Bardelas" (panther). I do not remember the name of the air-to-air missile.

Our Radar was supposed to lock onto the missile that was due to be released from the belly of the plane and follow it throughout the process.

The people from Rafael had installed stopwatches in the radar and filmed the dials and clocks on a camera. The films were deciphered later on. This was a very primitive procedure using this kind of equipment, but it fulfilled its purpose.

Israel is famous for improvising, it gives it its strength, but some times relying on improvisations when planning is possible or even imperative, has caused many mishaps as well.

Armament development was a sphere that I very much wanted to enter and here is where I got the idea of studying engineering, paid for by myself. In spite of my age, I would use all my operational experience and engineering knowledge in order to deal in testing weapon systems.

AAA H.Q. Operations Officer

Upon my return to the battalion, I began to investigate the possibility of being transferred to the Armament Development Unit, affiliated to the General Staff. While I was with the battalion in Herzlia, there was an operations officer serving there by the name of Major Mordechai (Motke Bishbin) Barmo. He tried very much to befriend me since I replaced him at Sirkin when he began studying for his matriculation. Now, he pleaded with me to replace him at H.Q., because they had promised that he would become the Battalion Commandant of the 882^nd Battalion, the sole regular army battalion in the antiaircraft array. For the meantime, we had come to an agreement between ourselves that every evening I would give him my car to travel home to Ramat HaSharon and, in the morning, he would return it so that I could drive to my battalion. This arrangement strengthened our friendship and I was able to form an opinion about him. Biri, whom I respected very much, was fond of Motke and loved his family dearly. My relationship developed only later and I understood Biri's warm attitude. The Chief AAA Officer at that time was Lieutenant Colonel - Yossef Tirosh (Strauss), the former Dutch Officer.

One day, Yochanan, my deputy, came to my room and hesitated before speaking to me, which was very unusual for him. He was very nervous, excited, stuttered and finally plucked up the courage to tell me that he had a special request to ask of me. A request that he was sure I would refuse. Yochanan told me that he had received an offer to go to Germany to be a Jewish Youth Leader in one of the cities and, in exchange, they would fund his medical studies. Answering his request would mean releasing Yochanan from his obligations from permanent army service. I surprised Yochanan and promised to do all I could to help him fulfill his dream and my reasoning stunned him. I explained to him the importance of passing on the message of Zionism to the Jewish youth and especially to those whose parents has made the decision to stay in the Diaspora. I added that what was even sadder was the fact that they lived in Germany. In view of my belief in Yochanan's capabilities, his honesty and his talents, I saw him as an excellent messenger for this purpose. And I did release him from his contract.

Yochanan went abroad but, when he reached Germany, it became clear that they had not told him the whole truth and, therefore, angry, frustrated and ashamed or afraid that I would think he had "duped" me, he went on to Vienna, studied and completed his medical studies.

In Vienna, Yochanan met his future wife and they had a daughter together. Their daughter is named Anat, the same name as my eldest daughter whom he loved very much.

On January 1961 I reported for duty at the Air Force H.Q. in Tel Aviv, for the position of AAA HQ Operations Officer, which was the right arm of Lt. Col. Yossef Tirosh. I have already described my special relationship with him, which, at the beginning, was not very good but later on mutual admiration and trust prevailed between us. It was very pleasant to work with him.

I had transferred the battalion over to Moshe Tamir, formerly Langer. Moshe was not acquainted with the heavy antiaircraft artillery. He had always dealt with smaller caliber weapons. He was Deputy Battalion Commander in the 882nd Battalion and, later, AAA H.Q. Logistics Officer or, as he laughingly called it, "Officer of equipment and "Shkarpeten " (Socks). In order to be promoted the rank of Major, he was appointed to command my battalion. I was pleased about his appointment, because we were good friends but also because he didn't like the "tenant" 883^rd when he served as deputy commander of the 882^nd battalion.

When I transferred the battalion over to him, I recommended that he invest time and effort to materialize what I, to my regret, had not – to install the computer in the mobile wagon. I passed on all the information with regard to what I had accomplished and promised to help him as much as possible from the H.Q.

Personal Adjutant to the Prime Minister of Nigeria

I received a message from the Officers Personnel Department that I had been appointed Adjutant to the West Nigerian Prime Minister for a period of ten days, during his visit to Israel.

For this purpose, I was assigned to the team from the Foreign Ministry that had prepared for the visit. The Ambassador, Hanan Yabor, preceded the delegation and gave us the background details of the visit. His daughter Yael, a soldier in the IDF, was attached to the team in order to be with her father and to act as escort to the Prime Minister's wife.

In view of this visit, I went to the homes of Ben Gurion in Tel Aviv and Moshe Dayan, in Zahala. During this briefly held position, I attended very interesting meetings, for instance: with Transportations Minister Ben Aharon, Deputy Defense Minister Shimon Peres and the Minister of Finance Levy Eshkol, and other dignitaries at the highest level of government.

We visited many places all over the country. The visitors were treated like kings everywhere we went. We ate meals according to protocol. We stayed at the best hotels in the country at that time – "Dan" in Tel-Aviv, "King David" in Jerusalem and "Zion" in Haifa. The event was widely covered by the press.

The ten-day visit of the Nigerian Prime Minister, Chief Akintula, to Israel was a most interesting experience for me and was another episode that helped to formulate my character in adult life and prepare me for positions that I was to hold in the future.

The meeting with the "big-knobs", including visiting their homes and listening to their conversations, put everything into perspective, which, beforehand, had been distorted. Just as Moshe Dayan's speech had helped me overcome my difficulties with regard to the language, this visit released me from "unnatural" behavior amongst "big-knobs". Till then, in spite of the fact that I had met with the most senior of officers, I felt nervous. I found out that people are concerned with food, seating arrangements, presents and, mostly – they do not always quote other peoples clever words and most definitely do not utter pearls of wisdom every time they open their mouths. Levy Eshkol, to whom I gave the presents I had prepared, spoke to me in Yiddish and I felt very much at home. I had to tell him who the man with the scarred face was, what was his position and his level in the hierarchy. During the two visits to Ben Gurion's home, I was in his presence for only 2 to 3 minutes. Paula made sure that I did not stay longer. She confined me to the kitchen, gave me a cup of tea and explained to me just how unimportant I was. In all, no one was important except Ben-Gurion. I was very uncomfortable in her presence and felt that she enjoyed humiliating people. She had forced even the famous photographer, Berger, to leave the room.

We were the guests of Migdal HaEmek. All the residents and, especially, the children filled the streets in festive clothes and waved Israeli and Nigerian flags, even though neither the children nor the adults knew anything about Nigeria.

We visited the "Amcor", "Tnuva" and "Shemen" factories, the holy places in Nazareth and David's Tomb in Jerusalem. The visit was very important for the Government but there were two problems that made the visit unsuccessful. Chief Akintula represented a minority in Nigeria and his continued reign was doubtful but, in principle, he was disappointed that he was not granted the aid that he had hoped for to the amount of 2 million dollars. In 1961, this was an enormous amount, and our financial capacity at that time was limited, to say the least. However, the African states thought of us as a super-power and had great expectations from us.

The visit was over. Ben-Gurion and some of his ministers bade farewell to the Chief during the full State Ceremony. The guests got on the plane and we returned to routine.

A little while later we heard that there had been a revolution, a cruel war had erupted and that the Prime Minister and most of his ministers had been brutally murdered.

Guard of honor for the visiting Prime Minister

Gen. Moshe Dayan showing his archeological findings to the Chief

David Ben-Gurion and Pola waving farewell to the leaving Chief Aquintula

Amb. Yavor briefing David Ben-Gurion

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