Peter Jenne & Rudolf Zwesken

[knusel]

...sounds intresting.

Do these volumes pronounce the one an only JG300 top ace ?

Michael

[knusel]

...this website says, it was Bretschneider:
https://asisbiz.com/luftwaffe/jg300.html

[knusel]

Originally Posted by Leo Etgen

Hi guys

My impression is that the leading ace of JG 300 was Klaus Bretschneider who is listed with a total of 41 claims, four of these as damaged, in JG 300 Wilde Sau by Lorant and Goyat. I hope this helps and any comments or corrections will be appreciated.

Horrido!

Leo

Good evening Leo,

damaged ? Do you mean HSS ?

Cheers from Switzerland,

Michael

[Johannes]

Hi Michael

Could be Walter Dahl, need to establish with what unit/units he was flying with in 1945, as General of the fighters he claims many "Kills" by simply it would appear turning up at a unit, sometimes it was EJG 2(nine claims) where he flew the Me262, other times his witnesses suggest Stab./JG 300 or JG 301. I am sceptical he states "132" victories in his 1964 book(of which twelve would appear not to have been confirmed) however his 1945 claims come from his Leistungsbuch, which "HE" could simply have made-up between 1945 and 1964. His witnesses were a Leutnant Meyer, Werner Bohnenkamp and Kurt Loos. I have simply listed the unit for them as General der flieger !, there are forty of them, plus twelve the mikrofilms confirm for 1944, so possibly fifty-two.

Otherwise Rudolf Zwesken probably is your man, depends of how successful he was during 1945, but he is rather a vague figure, even his death usually stated as suicide, but he could well have been murdered after his release by U.S soldiers at a bar, and it being covered-up. He may well have made many more than the twenty-one confirmed claims I have for him i.e mikrofilms end 01/01/1945.

Konrad Bauer total thirty-eight (nr18-38 with II./JG 300)many unconfirmed, sixteen with 10./JG 51 and Stab./JG 51, one with 2./JG 3.
Klaus Bretschneider all twenty-two with JG 300 many unconfirmed.
Peter Jenne all we can say is twelve post mid 1942, five with JG 300. Likely more prior to mid 1942.
Kurt Gabler fourteen all with JG 300, plus some unconfirmed.
Ernst-Erich Hirshfeld one with 5./JG 54, seventeen with II./JG 300, quite a few unconfirmed.
Kurt Welter twenty with JG 300 (nr.11-30) but known fraudster.

Kind Regards

Johannes

[knusel]

Good evening dear Johannes,

thanks for your post. Yes, if Walther Dahl's claims after he rose to higher command had been counted towards JG300's total (like Richthofen's claims towards Jasta 11 after he took over command of Jagdgeschwader I), Dahl could certainly be pronounced the top scorer of that unit. That would be suitable because he was its most famous pilot. However, usually the unit designation is usually rather indicated as "General der Jagdflieger".

Do you have the Leistungsbuch page that covers his claims 105-116 ? (If you don't have the scans at all I can send you the pages for 93-104 and 117-130).

I wish you a good start into the weekend, sincerely,
Michael

[Johannes]

Hi Michael

Send me a private message with you email address. Pretty sure I have all.

Kind Regards

Johannes

[Johannes]

This is a question for Russian loss experts.

Dahl's 1945 Russian claims often have exact crash-site details, is somebody willing to take on the task of matching them to actual losses?

He uses Walter Loos as a witness several times, but it's impossible as Loos wasn't even flying at the time. But Loos was certainly known to him.

Kind Regards

Johannes

[knusel]

Hello Johannes,

so many threads have been ruined by those who press the overclaiming issue into them unquestioned.

But now, when you ask for info about that explicitly, nobody answers.

I wish you a good weekend,

Michael

[Nick Hector]

We can't pretend that overclaiming didn't happen as there are far too many primary and secondary sources that show that it did.
Listings compiled by those who ignore that one basic fact and the fact that the age of taking aces' claims completely and utterly at face value is well and truly past, are only of much real use to those compiling them.

For the 20th February 1945, I have no knowledge of losses that would match his claim. But there are losses that match claims by Josten and Brendel.

For the 21st February 1945 there is at least one IL-2 loss but is probably not applicable to Dahl's claim (it it more likely to have been downed by JG 54 pilots).

[Johannes]

Hi Nick

Brendel, Josten along with Günther Schack are the three leading JG 51 aces I have long thought honest, and JG 51 overall better than most large units.
If I list Dahl's 1945 claims would you have a go at matching them. Bear in mind that I suspect they are not even over-claiming, I suspect Dahl just made them up slightly post-war !
I do accept I might be corrected on this, but firstly his witnesses are not flying when he stated them as witnesses, secondly surely as "Head of the fighters" he would be banned from combat. He mentions his huge total in his "rammjäger" book, but his Leistungsbuch might have been faked by somebody else.

Kind Regards

Johannes