Israel Trains German Air Force on Afghan Drones

Irony is not lost on participants, but Germany is now a "very, very good friend, if not the best friend of Israel today in the world".

German drone pilots eye Afghanistan... from Israel
(Dan Williams, 7/27/2010 Reuters AlertNet)

"EIN SHEMER AIR BASE, Israel, July 27 (Reuters) - As World War Two raged in the years before Israel's founding, colonial British planes were scrambled here to fend off German forces. Now the German Luftwaffe is back, preparing for a far more remote fight with the modern equipment and expertise of the Jewish state established after the Nazi Holocaust.

"Worried by insurgent ambushes on its soldiers in Afghanistan and return fire that sometimes kills civilians or local allies, Germany last year ordered a small fleet of Israeli Heron spy drones designed to provide real-time images above a battlefield.

"That has brought German jet pilots to coastal Ein Shemer air base for accelerated retraining on the unmanned propeller planes, already daubed with their flag and Iron Cross emblem.

"...Israel is a pioneer of combat drones, having deployed them in Lebanon in the Palestinian territories. Heron's manufacturer, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), says it is also used by Canadian, French and Australian forces in Afghanistan.

"Yet the fact Israeli know-how may now be saving German military lives offers up a unique historical irony lost on none.

"The Defence Ministry in Berlin declined to allow the Luftwaffe trainees to be interviewed about such symbolism, but one of them described how they took time off to visit the central Holocaust memorial at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Dressed in civilian clothes while in Israel, trainees on an earlier course stood at attention for annual commemorations in April of the six million Jews killed in the Nazi genocide.

"As a Jew, I felt very proud at this specific moment," said Tomer Koriat, deputy director of the IAI training programme, who praised the Germans' mastery of the Heron within intensive courses lasting just three-and-a-half weeks.

"All of us have learned that today we are talking about another Germany than what we used to know ... A very, very good friend, if not the best friend of Israel today in the world."" [The entire article at the link above.]

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