- "So anyway, the other day I was at an airbase in Yuktobania, and I was watching these nuggets training on this helicopter of sorts, only one problem: it was flying upside down! I asked the mechanic if it was supposed to be flying upside-down, and all he said was, 'Of Course! We refuse to conform to the standards of Imperialist Aviation in our GLORIOUS Mother Yuktobania, so f--- taking off straight UP! WE will take off straight DOWN!"
- —"Smart Alec" Felsen Sr. quoting an unnamed Yuktobanian Air Force mechanic who was promptly sent off to the Gulags when his apparently patriotically jingoistic statement made it into his "Just Plane Dumb" Comedy tour in 1970.
The HA-1 "No-bra" was an attempt by the Union of Yuktobanian Republics to build an attack helicopter to match Osea's then-new AH-1 Cobra (this eventually became the Mil Mi-24 "Hind" and Mi-28 "Havoc" as well as the Kamov Ka-50 "Black Shark" and Ka-52/55 "Hokum"). At the time, progress on that was marginal, so the Yukes stole the design and copied it...sort of.
Development[]
Sometime in the late 60s, a new factory for the AH-1 was opened up, and so a new set of blueprints were shipped out to the factory. At the same time, a bomb was packaged up and addressed to Cinigrad, Yuktobania. As this was during the Great Postal Service Strike of 1969, the packages were deliberately switched. The bomb arrived at the factory and destroyed it. sixty-nine gerbils trained to provide power to the factory were severely injured, and the resulting lawsuits by the gerbils' families cost the Osean government millions.
The plans for the helicopter arrived at the Politburo's doorstep, oddly enough on the Chairman's birthday. After sending a "Thank You and F--- You!" card to the Osean President, he sent the plans off to his cousin Boris' factory, but as the Yukes' postal service was on strike too, this was rerouted to his OTHER cousin Nicki's Vodka Plant. After reading the attached letter, Nicki set his factory to work building a prototype, but there was a problem:
He had read the blueprints UPSIDE-DOWN, and so the resulting helicopter could only be operated when flown upside down. The Yuke president was not impressed, but due to the budget constraints at the time, he gave the go-ahead for production, but not before his general asked what it should be called. The President made a comment about how his secretary wasn't wearing a bra and that her cleavage was distracting him, so the name "No-bra" was applied.
Testing and Service[]
The aircraft was tested and flown by a team of ten trained chimpanzees at Dresdene Engineering College on April 1st, 1970, and needless to say, the sight of helicopters taking off upside down from the underside of Tu-95 Bear bombers and crashing into the ground as gigantic fireballs was quite a sight to behold. One western observer, a Bakan Commedian named Edward "Smart Alec" Felsen Sr. was so amused that he incorporated the supposedly-classified tests into his comedy routine when he returned to Osea for his "Just Plane Dumb" Stand-Up tour. Embarrassed, the YAF didn't want to lose face and so forced the helicopter into service.
It was used in the 12 Day, 16 Minute Oran War, Kalugan Revolt, USEA Teen Rebellion, Bigger Ozone War, Usean Continental Breakfast War, Circus Pacific War, Even Bigger Ozone War and beyond, and surprisingly enough had a fairly low casualty rate of just 75%, most of those occuring during training, ensuring that the remaining 25% were the cream of the crop and allowing the ersatz aircraft to perform surprisingly well, if only because those faced by it were too busy laughing at the spectacle of "upside-backwards rotor flight" to try to shoot back. Bailing out in the instance of a crash was still difficult, however. By 2030, the No-Bra had mostly been replaced in service by the Kamov Ka-B00M "Flying Blender", and was relegated to reserve service or sold to the U-WHO (Universal War-Hippies Organization).
Specifications[]
- Speed: Never properly measured
- Mobility: Enough to get it to the scene of the crash
- Defense: Falling
- Stability: Define "Stable"
- Air-to-Air: Does not compute...
- Ait-to-Ground: Crashing and Asploding into a Giant Pile of S---
- Spility (WTF!?): No, I don't know what this means either
- Climb Rate: IT'S UNDER NEGATIVE 9000!!!
- LOL Factor: It's flown by Chimpanzees and powered by Gerbils, YOU tell ME what its LOL Factor is!!!
Aces[]
- Vladimir Bananas (the first Chimpanzee to fly it without getting killed by the inevitable crash