[Johannes]

Hi Guys

Know we should be sticking with Kittel, but some good points raised.
Starting with Kittel, was he reliable, I have not heard to the contrary. Using Beißwenger, perhaps his honesty made him popular, therefore somebody wanted to honour his memory with witnessing/doing the paperwork.
Regarding Nowotny, seems to was belittling the "kill" "I got four, but my wingman two" these would have been A.S.M claims, which needed further investigation, his report would have recorded the witnesses name(for his own), but then witness lost, probably got away with it as the crash-sites(supposed) could not be investigated as behind enemy lines. There A.S.M reports sometimes came back with reference to the wingman being lost months after the claims.
I think we have established with TOCH that your could not make false claims alone. I would be suspicious of ALL super successful schwarms, but not all will be guilty. Also be suspicious of stabst pilots, but again not all. I think Wilhlem Batz was honest with the stabst JG 52 like Hrabak, but a little later on had the opportunity to make false claims, his earlier claims(with Stabst) include a high percentage without witnesses, because they were generally flying alone, or as a pair, but there were ground/sea witnesses, who have no motive for confirming his claims.

I know decorations were often followed by a short break, but if the Kommandeur is honest there was a fair chance he would suspect false claims going on, and Hartmann didn't get his eichenlaub or schwerter until way pass the point that he should, by memory Rall got his schwerter for "200", Nowotny "218", no matter how many claims Rall made Nowotny was always going to claim more than his contemporaries until his got his brillianten!

I would guess that Kittel was an honest guy, by that I means that 65-70% of his claims actually crashed. He was actually well regarded by troops, as the top Il-2 destroyer he would have a tendency to be flying very low, which was the cause of his death i.e having a Fw190 flying low heavy with fuel.

Kind regards

Johannes