Chaim Laskov - 5th Chief of Staff of the IDF.Chaim was born in Belarus in 1919 and immigrated with h
Chaim Laskov - 5th Chief of Staff of the IDF.Chaim was born in Belarus in 1919 and immigrated with his family to Mandatory Palestine in 1925. As a teenager, Laskov volunteered in the Haganah and later joined the British Army (reaching the rank of Major) to fight in WWII. After the war, he remained in Europe in order to assist Jews illegally immigrate to Israel.Before the War of Independence, Laskov oversaw the training of new recruits and established the first officers’ course. During the war, Laskov commanded the IDF’s first armored battalion. In 1951, he assumed command of the air force, and was appointed Chief of Staff in 1958. Aside from small squabbles with Syria, Laskov maintained relative quiet and peace throughout his tenure. Under his command, Israel obtained their first submachine gun, greatly improved their air force, and just before he resigned from office, Ben Gurion announced the completion of the nuclear reactor.After his career in the army, Laskov was appointed director general of the Israel Ports Authority, during which Israel’s main port in Ashkelon was built. In 1972, he became the head of Israel’s first Soldier’s Ombudsman, a position he held for ten years until his death on December 8, 1982.My Nation Lives עמי-חי -- source link