Tag #146704 - Interview #78109 (Naum Kravets)

The five of us were taken to the navy school base. We were taught the navy courses. We had to learn the statute. In two weeks there was a board meeting of the mandate committee of the school. The chairman of the board was the general-lieutenant Kvade. I must have looked feeble because the members of the board suggested teaching me weaponry, signaling, and tooling. Finally the headmaster of the school asked me what I wanted to do. I said firmly that I would like to be an aircraft mechanic. Everybody burst into laughter. Somebody said that I wouldn't reach the airscrew. Then one of the members of the board, Captain Danchenko, asked to transfer me to him. He heard the objection saying that I was feeble and had no stamina for big physical exertion. The doctor who was also a member of the board asked me to squat for ten times, then he checked my pulse, and then he asked me to squat again. He checked my pulse again and said: 'By looking at him he seems feeble, but his heart is working like a clock.' After his words I was sent to Captain Danchenko. Four of my friends were already with him. We were trained to be operators of aircraft radar stations for the USSR Navy. He picked five people, because there were five fleets in the USSR, so one of us for each fleet. We studied for half a year, until December 1942. We graduated as air navigators-radar operators in the rank of master sergeant.