Over 100 air to air kills (The 100 Club)

[Johannes]

Hi Guys

Am back from holiday.

Thought my "100" list might provoke some discussion. I will go through each reply and try to explain any queries away.

Firstly regarding Thyben, no revision, I just had a senior moment and missed listing him, everything indicates that he made 157 confirmed claims.

With Marquardt he was very, very active in April 1945, but lost his last flugbuch, a lot has been written about his last claims, but the only really reliable data comes from Elmar Aremsmeyer's own flugbuch where he lists claims of pilots he was witnessing claims to, foremost amongst these was Marquardt, Arensmeyer's information gives aircraft type and claim number for these pilots, also as they flew together it's possible to workout an approximate time from the flugbuch flight time entry.

Regarding my own totals compared to those generally accepted, I say how are they generally accepted, mine use an almost faultless mass of Luftwaffe claims, flugbucher and unit claims boards. However I list claims facts, not in reality were actual shoot-downs. The Luftwaffe were no less reliable than other Nations, in fact not back amongst them, just an elite few wanting fame, glory and decorations.....it's human nature.

With Gerhard Barkhorn and his claims, personally it would appear he may have had some claims not actually crash, but It looks more like he was mistaken rather than deliberate over-claiming. In life as a leader he was a disciplinarian, for example sometimes a staffel would make a claim that could not be assigned to any one individual......a Staffel claim, one staff pilot worked-out that he could later do the paperwork to claim these.....why let them go to waste, Barkhorn discovered the fraudulent claims and put a stop to it. I wouldn't say that that makes him perfect, I have worked with people who attack others to cover their own incompetence, but I do not believe this is the case with Barkhorn. The research into his claims would suggest he was honest, though with the last few it's difficult to understand how a check can be made as all we have are dates and types, most 1945 claims details are not established as not mikrofilms, so flugbucher are the only really form of establishing claims...….most are missing or lost forever. Sad thing is that Barkhorn regarded his Schwerter as a failure i.e no Brillianten, same goes for Rall, if the claims against Graf/Gollob/Nowotny and Hartmann are perfectly true, then both Rall and Barkhorn were cheated of their rightful Brillianten, so I guess we could say that both were ambitious in some respects.

Kind Regards

Johannes