[VtwinVince]

Interesting thread, and I believe the scores of some Experten certainly need intense review. I can only offer an anecdotal story from my personal research involving my uncle, Major Dr. Albrecht Ochs. He was posted as 'Abschuss-Offizier' to JG27 in 1942 (probably officially Major beim Stabe) and as such had some role in the 4. JG27 fraud involving Sawallisch, Bendert, Stigler et al. I corresponded with Edu Neumann as I had a copy of a Beurteilung about my uncle which states 'vor dem Feind besonders bewaerht', which seems to imply that he flew patrols in the desert. Neumann was very unhelpful with me, to the point of open hostility, and stated that my uncle had been posted out of theatre because he 'wasn't physically able to cope with desert conditions'. His posting out of Africa almost exactly coincided with the apparent suicide of Sawallisch, and since my uncle was in civilian life a lawyer, I think he ran afoul of some covering-up by Neumann and the staff. Also, when I met Stigler here in Canada over the years, he was always very wary around me, I believe due to my family connection to the JG27 scandal. This is also why I have always been very sceptical of the story of the B-17 which Stigler allegedly didn't shoot down and which became a much celebrated media event in the 1990's. Anyway, I know this doesn't involve the 'top scorers', but it does throw light on the difficulties we have in trying to disseminate fact from fiction in the claims made by the Jagdwaffe.