Barkhorn: claims vs. victories

[Johannes]

Dear Gabor and Boris

I have checked Batz's claims against other pilots he flew with, and am surprised that I cannot say he had a system going with other pilots, a little bit of a match with Peter Düttmann, lesser with Otto Fonnekold and Walter Wolfrum, but as these were all high scorers anyway one would expect a little matching. But then again he become Kommandeur and from then on there are no matches with other pilots, again I believe that somehow Kommandeur can somehow self confirm there claims, or have a profound hold over their wingmen. Again if this proves to be true, only some abused their power.

So this is how it's done.

1. I scratch your back, like Rudorffer/Tangermann, Nowotny/Loos/Dobele i.e I'll confirm your if you confirm mine......actually now proved to have happened!

2. I scratch your back, for some other reward.......none proven, but likely, rank plays a part in this!

3. I am Kommandeur and can self witness(no evidence of this, but we can keep looking)

4. I am Kommandeur and you will witness(trouble with this is that post-war somebody would have blow the whistle.)

5. The whole Staffel or even Gruppe were scratching each others backs.....in my opinion this did happen with certain units over certain periods of time. But if you look your find certain Staffel grossly outperforming others of the same Geschwader/Gruppe under exactly the same circumstances like 6./JG5, 9./JG52 e.t.c.

Yet Heinrich Bartels of low rank took his bad habits from JG5 to JG27, a difficult one to explain.

Keep well

Johannes