[Johannes]

Hi Graig

Many thanks for your query, and you are correct, I somehow merged the two claims, details of the claim for 26th August as above, with the exception that it was not a LaGG-3, but a La-5. I'll add another claim into his abschusse list.
In my experience A.S.M claims usually get confirmed, but usually it takes longer than normal, and the paperwork I think gets sent to a different office. I have collected many copies of flugbucher in recent years and judged this on their comments. Most A.S.M claims seem to be because of lack of witness(but usually no comments in flugbuch), but usually have ground witnesses, whereas if a pilot marks a claim as O.Z in his flugbuch, then it never appears on the mikrofilms, which I should think means no ground witness either.........most common for Stab pilots(because they flew alone, or at least in a reduced number) Wilhelm Batz is a good example, Johannes Wiese another.

Seems we two have concluded the same about his flugbuch surviving the war, at least for 1943, and probably 1944, 1945 would be of most help to us. I believe that Josten and Brendel were the highest scoring pilots of 1945, and as far as I can tell were honest guys.

I have been struck though in general about how small a group in the East they generally flew in !

Kind Regards

Johannes