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| Middle East |
| Hutzpah |
| 2003-12-12 |
| From a long, worth reading article in the Jerusalem Post about Israel’s naval strategy there was this anecdote that demonstrates hutzpah rather well and also reminds us why the marines were in Beirut. In the summer of 1958, Lt.-Col. Uri Yarom was testing out an S-58 Sikorsky helicopter. Father of the first Israeli helicopter squadron, Yarom took the new aircraft over the Mediterranean sea. One thing led to another and Yarom soon found himself running out of gas. Not wanting to lose the new helicopter with a sea landing, he scanned the horizons for someplace to set down. Suddenly he saw it, the flight deck of the USS Wasp CVS-18. Down below was the huge American aircraft carrier, known among its crew as the "Mighty Stinger." President Dwight D. Eisenhower had dispatched the World War II-era vessel to the eastern shores of the Mediterranean as Marines landed in Beirut to prop up that country’s independence during a civil war. But all this didn’t matter to Yarom. He needed a place to land, quickly. And with pure Israeli hutzpa he did so, setting down on the USS Wasp’s flight deck. He jumped out as startled, angry and curious naval officers and crew surrounded him. The captain demanded to know just what he was thinking landing on an American aircraft carrier?! "Oh, I am sorry," Yarom told him. "I thought it was one of ours." |
| Posted by:phil_b |
| #2 I thought it was one of ours! Ha Ha! |
| Posted by: The Commissar 2003-12-12 8:34:57 AM |
| #1 I always thought that story was urban legendjoke. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2003-12-12 7:41:34 AM |