Jewish World War II airmen Mike Kaplan and Paul Schatz, plot to fly weapons to the virtually unarmed Jews living in Palestine, to defend themselves against five Arab nations who vowed to annihilate them when the 1948 United Nations Partition goes into effect.
Facing fines, prison, and loss of their citizenship for breaking an Arms Embargo, they purchase a fleet of surplus cargo planes and assemble a volunteer group of American pilots, called Machalniks, the Hebrew acronym for Volunteers from Abroad.
Under F.B.I. and State Department surveillance, and their aircraft about to be confiscated, the Machalniks whisk the planes out of the country. Reaching Czechoslovakia, Shatz and Kaplan begin a clandestine smuggling operation, flying munitions into Israel.
Beginning days after Israel’s declaration of Statehood, with the only four combat planes the Jews possess, Kaplan and the Machalniks battle the Arabs for air superiority. With the fate of a nation beneath their wings, they risk their lives in air to air combat, and give birth to the Israeli Air Force.
