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Fighting Back Stan Andrews And The Birth Of The Israeli Air Force From Jeffrey Weiss · Arroe Collins Like It's Live

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  Speaker 1: Hey, there's a podcast network I would love for you
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  Speaker 1: to check out. It's Ero dot net, A R r
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  Speaker 1: o e dot net. It's not just one podcast, it's
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  Speaker 1: twenty different suggestions. One of my favorites is that voice.
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  Speaker 1: How about those conversations as it was happening. It's just
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  Speaker 1: outside the blind auditions growing forward, that voice only on
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  Speaker 1: ero dot net, A R r oe dot net. Enjoy
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  Speaker 1: your exploration. Hello and good morning everybody.
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  Speaker 2: Hi, how are you. This is Jeff Weiss, Jeff boy.
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  Speaker 1: I've been waiting to have a conversation with you because
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  Speaker 1: you're doing something that I wish more of us would do,
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  Speaker 1: and that is preserving history and showcasing stories that are
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  Speaker 1: I want to say, long gone and forgotten, but you
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  Speaker 1: stumbled across it and now it's part of our conversation again.
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  Speaker 2: Well, thank you so much.
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  Speaker 3: And it is a passion for me and I feel
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  Speaker 3: the same way that you do. It is wonderful to
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  Speaker 3: rediscover history that has been forgotten.
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  Speaker 1: You know, we are in an age where we don't
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  Speaker 1: understand who, what, where, I when and how? And then
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  Speaker 1: when I study what you did with Stan Andrews and
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  Speaker 1: how that whole entire thing came together, all of a sudden,
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  Speaker 1: I'm getting a better understanding of basically the entire process
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  Speaker 1: and not my assumption.
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  Speaker 2: I really appreciate that.
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  Speaker 3: I think you know, for me, it was quite a
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  Speaker 3: journey of discovery, first kind of hearing the bare outline
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  Speaker 3: of his story, and then really digging deeper and finding
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  Speaker 3: people who had known him back then high school classmates,
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  Speaker 3: college classmates, World War Two squadron mates, squadron mates from Israel,
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  Speaker 3: and really were able to fill in kind of the
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  Speaker 3: whole picture of who he was and what motivated him.
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  Speaker 1: Well, there you go, let's start off there, and then
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  Speaker 1: we'll start building a picture what motivated him because he
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  Speaker 1: felt something in his heart that fed his feet and
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  Speaker 1: he made a move that I don't think the average
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  Speaker 1: person would do. But he changed history very.
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  Speaker 2: Much, so very much so.
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  Speaker 3: He was a World War Two veteran, flew bombers in
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  Speaker 3: the Pacific over forty combat visions against Japanese forces. Returned
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  Speaker 3: to the States after the war, and like so many
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  Speaker 3: Gis was looking to essentially create his post war life.
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  Speaker 3: Was studying for, in his case, a master's degree on
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  Speaker 3: the GI Bill, and then I was watching news events
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  Speaker 3: about events playing out in the Middle East where Isra
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  Speaker 3: was about to be declared as a state, and it
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  Speaker 3: was clear to everybody watching that there would immediately be
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  Speaker 3: a war that israeld be invaded on all sides and
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  Speaker 3: would need a modern air force along a great many
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  Speaker 3: other things to be able to defend itself.
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  Speaker 2: And so he.
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  Speaker 3: Decided that as a as an experienced flier and someone
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  Speaker 3: who cared about what was going on there, that was
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  Speaker 3: where he needed to be.
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  Speaker 1: And so he went, yeah, but didn't people say, but
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  Speaker 1: you are, you are, you are, And it's like they
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  Speaker 1: tried to write his own story. And it's almost like,
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  Speaker 1: when did somebody say, Okay, I'll listen to you. Oh
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  Speaker 1: my god, what a plan. I will invest in what
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  Speaker 1: you're thinking.
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  Speaker 3: Well, that's the thing I think he really, you know,
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  Speaker 3: on his own, really kind of came there.
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  Speaker 2: It was in avol thing for him.
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  Speaker 3: He had started to become concerned about the anti semitism
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  Speaker 3: of nineteen forties America that he had encountered and felt
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  Speaker 3: strongly that this was a singular time in history where
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  Speaker 3: the Jews had an opportunity to stand up for themselves
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  Speaker 3: and fight for their freedom, and he felt like that
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  Speaker 3: was something that he needed to be a part of.
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  Speaker 3: But you know, at the same time, I think to
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  Speaker 3: your point, that's one of the things that makes him
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  Speaker 3: such a source of admiration for me, because he didn't
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  Speaker 3: just think that it was something that perhaps he should consider.
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  Speaker 3: He actually took decisive action at great personal risk.
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  Speaker 1: You know what's so interesting about this is that inside
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  Speaker 1: my heart, you know, I, first of all, I can't
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  Speaker 1: believe how much time has gone by so quickly, and
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  Speaker 1: you're showing us that, yes, it has gone by quickly.
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  Speaker 1: But there's things in here, the breadcrumbs of this path
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  Speaker 1: that we can study from. Because I remember being at
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  Speaker 1: Billing Senior High School and our foreign exchange students that
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  Speaker 1: came in we're from Israel. That's what opened up my
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  Speaker 1: eyes to what was going on in Israel. I've never
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  Speaker 1: been the same because they sacrificed their lives they build upon.
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  Speaker 1: It had to start somewhere, dude, exactly.
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  Speaker 3: And at the start of that war, Israel did not
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  Speaker 3: have a single fighter plane in the entire air force.
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  Speaker 3: The first ones arrived at two weeks later, and Stan
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  Speaker 3: arrived right around the same time as those planes, and
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  Speaker 3: so really the Israeli Air Force started to take shape
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  Speaker 3: during the course of that war, which was about a
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  Speaker 3: year long affair, and by the end it actually was
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  Speaker 3: quite a powerful arm of the Israeli military had some
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  Speaker 3: good planes, some absolute terrific pilots, all World War two veterans,
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  Speaker 3: some with really tremendous records.
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  Speaker 2: Of accomplishment during the prior war.
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  Speaker 3: And I think a lot of what we see today
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  Speaker 3: in terms of focus on pilot excellence, on first rate equipment,
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  Speaker 3: I think a lot of those seats were planted way
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  Speaker 3: back in nineteen.
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  Speaker 1: Forty eight, and that goes all the way back to
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  Speaker 1: what I was sharing in the very beginning, because we
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  Speaker 1: would not be in this present place of right now
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  Speaker 1: if someone like Stan Andrews did not take that hands
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  Speaker 1: and to help turn a vision into a reality. Because
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  Speaker 1: I am amazed at what has been happening over the
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  Speaker 1: past couple of years here, because I've never seen anything
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  Speaker 1: in my lifetime like it.
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  Speaker 2: I agree with you.
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  Speaker 3: I think, look, history is made by there's that great
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  Speaker 3: motto of the British Special Air Service the sas Fortune
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  Speaker 3: favors the bold, and of course history is made by
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  Speaker 3: people who take action against hi odds in a compelling
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  Speaker 3: way and they're actually able to do terrific things, and
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  Speaker 3: Stan was one of those. He became one of the
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  Speaker 3: very first fighter pilots in the Israeli Air Force, and
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  Speaker 3: among a great many of the things, actually designed the
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  Speaker 3: logo for that first fighter squadron, which is still used
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  Speaker 3: to this day.
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  Speaker 1: You know, a lot of people run to Los Angeles
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  Speaker 1: because they've got big Hollywood dreams. Stan had bigger dreams.
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  Speaker 1: He left Los Angeles to go to Israel to do
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  Speaker 1: something that changed the planet.
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  Speaker 3: It's funny that you say that, because at one point
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  Speaker 3: he actually did have a Hollywood drum, and I think
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  Speaker 3: that was part of what brought him to Los Angeles.
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  Speaker 3: He was an extraordinarily talented artist. He was also an
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  Speaker 3: extraordinarily talented writer, and in fact, in the course of
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  Speaker 3: our research, we found short stories that he wrote in
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  Speaker 3: high school and college in between the two wars.
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  Speaker 2: So he did actually have aspirations.
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  Speaker 3: Of becoming part of the entertainment industry, but then decided
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  Speaker 3: that this was more important.
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  Speaker 1: Please don't move. There's more with jeff Weiss coming up next.
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  Speaker 1: The name of the book fighting Back. We are back
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  Speaker 1: with author and historian Jeffrey Weiss. Stan Andrews. That's the
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  Speaker 1: one we're talking about the name of the book is
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  Speaker 1: fighting Back. Here's the thing. Did he think of himself
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  Speaker 1: as a tom cruise top gun because he did have experience,
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  Speaker 1: I mean authentic, unbelievable experience.
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  Speaker 2: Now he really didn't.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, in other words, he knew he was He
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  Speaker 3: knew that he was a talented pilot. He knew that
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  Speaker 3: he could make contribution. But he was not somebody who
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  Speaker 3: talked tough. He was not someone who was boastful. He
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  Speaker 3: was not somebody who in general had a military inclination.
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  Speaker 3: He was proud of what he accomplished in World War Two,
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  Speaker 3: but it was not the thing that defined him. There
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  Speaker 3: were people who went back then who I think part
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  Speaker 3: of their motivation was to kind of recapture the glory
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  Speaker 3: days of the Second World War, Folks who, you know,
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  Speaker 3: three years after the end of World War Two were
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  Speaker 3: still perhaps struggling in some ways to adapt to post
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  Speaker 3: war life, and for them this was a return to
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  Speaker 3: you know, kind of a great struggle against the forces
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  Speaker 3: that were trying to commit, you know, something awful. But
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  Speaker 3: I think it stands case it really went way beyond
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  Speaker 3: that and had a lot more to do with how
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  Speaker 3: he saw history evolving.
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  Speaker 1: So how did you find it inside your heart? And
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  Speaker 1: the reason why I bring this up is because my
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  Speaker 1: grandparents they're all gone from World War One, World War two.
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  Speaker 1: My father is gone, and it's like here you come
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  Speaker 1: in this modern day and you and you're speaking of
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  Speaker 1: a war and you're and you're really making sure that
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  Speaker 1: this does not become something that we forget or the
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  Speaker 1: unspoken war like the Korean War. No, no, we can
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  Speaker 1: talk about this. And that's what you're saying. Get the
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  Speaker 1: conversation started. And Stan is a great starting point, dude, Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Very much so.
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  Speaker 3: And you know, I think I've always been drawn to
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  Speaker 3: the history of that period, the history of that world
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  Speaker 3: working period and this you.
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  Speaker 2: Know, so called Greatest Generation.
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  Speaker 3: And they truly did live extraordinary lives, having you know,
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  Speaker 3: lived through grown up during the depression and then going
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  Speaker 3: off to this great struggle, this war that you know,
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  Speaker 3: really was just you know, the scope of it is
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  Speaker 3: is really.
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  Speaker 2: Difficult to imagine. And then in Stan's case, going off
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  Speaker 2: to our second time.
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  Speaker 3: I just find that to be inspiring, and I especially
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  Speaker 3: find it inspiring for people, you know, for someone like Stan,
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  Speaker 3: for whom this was not an obligation and it was
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  Speaker 3: not something that he was raised to want one day
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  Speaker 3: to do. It just was something that based on that
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  Speaker 3: he was seeing and reading and his kind of assessment
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  Speaker 3: of the world, he just felt like, this is something
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  Speaker 3: I have to do, and he did it.
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  Speaker 1: Did you get to read his journals or his handwriting?
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  Speaker 1: And the reason why I bring that up is because
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  Speaker 1: this man lived the story, and I just feel inside
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  Speaker 1: my heart that I felt like that he wrote the
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  Speaker 1: story too, because you had to have a plan. This
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  Speaker 1: stuff doesn't just come out in an improv situation.
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  Speaker 2: Well, it's funny.
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  Speaker 3: I think when we started the research, I wasn't sure
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  Speaker 3: that we would be successful. I wasn't sure that we
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  Speaker 3: would find enough material to really fill the story out
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  Speaker 3: and over time, and it took quite a long time,
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  Speaker 3: I think started I first found his family in two
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  Speaker 3: thousand and seven, and it took I think over fifteen
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  Speaker 3: years to complete the fourteen fifteen years to complete.
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  Speaker 2: The research project. But by the end we did have.
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  Speaker 3: Stories that he'd written, including one that, in a pretty
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  Speaker 3: remarkable way, foreshadowed his final mission. His letters from World
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  Speaker 3: War Two, letters from Israel, his letters from between the wars,
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  Speaker 3: including two letters that he sat right before he went
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  Speaker 3: to Israel, went to his older brother, and went to
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  Speaker 3: his best friend, explaining his motivation. So by the time
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  Speaker 3: we reached the end of the research, we really did
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  Speaker 3: feel like we had great insight into who he was,
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  Speaker 3: what motivated to him, and what did he actually do
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  Speaker 3: during his time over there.
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  Speaker 1: We're talking about the very first step here. Who is
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  Speaker 1: Stan Andrews. Now, you look at what's going on in
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  Speaker 1: the world today. The israelis my God in heaven. They
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  Speaker 1: are blessed with the opportunity to have a lot of
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  Speaker 1: knowledge about drones. What would Stan think of these drones
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  Speaker 1: and the activities we've got going on with them.
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  Speaker 2: Well, it's interesting.
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  Speaker 3: He he certainly. In one of his last letters, if
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  Speaker 3: not actually his last letter, he expressed great pride in
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  Speaker 3: having been part of what was taking place in Israel
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  Speaker 3: and the country's survival of this tremendous onslaught across all
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  Speaker 3: four of its borders. And to see that the Jews,
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  Speaker 3: who you know, only three years before had one third
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  Speaker 3: of all living Jews in the world, were murdered during
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  Speaker 3: the Holocaust, and there was this general perception that Jews
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  Speaker 3: could not stand up for themselves, defend themselves, that they
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  Speaker 3: had gone like sheep to the slaughters. So for him
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  Speaker 3: it was a source of immense pride. And I think,
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  Speaker 3: you know, if he looked at what the Israeli Air
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  Speaker 3: Force has become, whether it's planes, whether it's drones, I
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  Speaker 3: think he would be enormously proud that this was something
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  Speaker 3: that perhaps, you know, in his way, he helped set
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  Speaker 3: in motion. I think he would be really pleased with
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  Speaker 3: how things have played out.
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  Speaker 1: Who's talking to you about doing a documentary or actually
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  Speaker 1: doing a real story here, because this is something that
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  Speaker 1: is not going to go away. You're starting a conversation
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  Speaker 1: here that's going to create a wave.
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  Speaker 3: Well, I'd love to see something like that happen. There
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  Speaker 3: was a documentary, a wonderful one that that Nancy Spielberg
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  Speaker 3: made a number of years ago, Above and Beyond about
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  Speaker 3: a group of four or five of these American volunteer
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  Speaker 3: stand was not the only one, And I had the
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  Speaker 3: privilege of being in there as well to talk a
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  Speaker 3: bit about the history because I had written a prior
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  Speaker 3: book called I'm My Brother's Keeper that was about the
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  Speaker 3: larger group of North Americans.
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  Speaker 2: Who went over to Israel.
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  Speaker 3: They were about a thousand or so, and she just
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  Speaker 3: did a wonderful job at won a bunch of film
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  Speaker 3: festival awards, and I certainly encourage folks to watch it,
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  Speaker 3: and I think it gives a nice insight into this
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  Speaker 3: incredible group of people and the things that they were
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  Speaker 3: able to do.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, where can people go to find out more about you?
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  Speaker 1: Because you said it yourself, You said you love going
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  Speaker 1: into the depths of these stories and bringing them forward,
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  Speaker 1: So there's got to be more that people can dive into.
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  Speaker 2: Absolutely.
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  Speaker 3: I'm an author website Jeffreywiss author dot com, and I
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  Speaker 3: encourage people to visit it and to reach out and
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  Speaker 3: love to connect with folks.
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  Speaker 2: And then the book.
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  Speaker 3: Itself, of course, can be purchased on Amazon, whether it's
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  Speaker 3: a hard softcover or a kindle or audiobook.
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  Speaker 1: So I got a question for you, And maybe this
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  Speaker 1: is a selfish question because you're you're so in love
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  Speaker 1: with that era and how it's affected everybody. One of
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  Speaker 1: the things that I guess I'm blind to so many
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  Speaker 1: times is when people from the UK as well as
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  Speaker 1: Israel talk to me about the effects of war, and
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  Speaker 1: we here in the States have never seen anything like that.
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  Speaker 1: So therefore I often wonder if the authors or the
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  Speaker 1: journalists will step forward and share the stories of how
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  Speaker 1: mentally that we have dealt with war and that after
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  Speaker 1: World War One, two, Korean War, Vietnam War, what has
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  Speaker 1: happened to the generations after. I want to know the families.
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  Speaker 1: I want to know the effects of that war and
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  Speaker 1: what it does in the years after.
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  Speaker 3: I think it's a fantastic question, and I think it
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  Speaker 3: is something worth pursuing for sure.
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  Speaker 2: You know, honestly, it's not something that I have focused
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  Speaker 2: on to this point.
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  Speaker 3: I've always been more drawn to individual stories about people
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  Speaker 3: who went through extraordinary ex experiances and wanting to capture those.
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  Speaker 3: But I think it's most exciting when the person who
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  Speaker 3: has done that actually has in some compelling way been
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  Speaker 3: able to record what they were going through and their
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  Speaker 3: feelings and thoughts about it.
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  Speaker 2: And so for Stan, to me, he was kind of.
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  Speaker 3: The perfect subject for this because he was so thoughtful
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  Speaker 3: about what he was doing and so expressive about it
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  Speaker 3: and left behind a very very rich trail from which
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  Speaker 3: we were able to harvest.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, I'm so proud of you for doing this, Jeffery.
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  Speaker 1: You got to come back to this show anytime in
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  Speaker 1: the future. I love where your heart is, and I'm
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  Speaker 1: just so proud of you for taking these steps.
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  Speaker 2: Well, thank you so much.
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  Speaker 3: I really really really appreciate that it really has been
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  Speaker 3: and of course it's a cliche, but it really has
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: been a labor of love every step of the way.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, fifteen years, dude, come on, you're not getting that
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  Speaker 1: time back. So therefore, you know what you're doing is
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  Speaker 1: you're investing in the next fifteen to fifty years here.
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  Speaker 3: Absolutely, absolutely now. Definitely for me, it was very important
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  Speaker 3: to record his story and this piece of history.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, be brilliant today.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, sir you two, thank you so much. I've really
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: enjoyed our conversation.