I think that's intentional. As I understand it Jewish humour is typically self-deprecating, which explains the irony of saying that about language in Yiddish; a

I think that's intentional. As I understand it Jewish humour is typically self-deprecating, which explains the irony of saying that about language in Yiddish; a language which has neither a navy, an army nor a country (except for a short time during the Soviet era), and was generally dismissed as "just broken German" similarly to AAVE. Considering the history of the quote it's probably a direct dismissal of the "just broken German" assertion (because German had an army and a navy but Yiddish obviously did not).