Michael Wittmann

[sniper1shot]

Actually, from what I can glean from my readings, the Germans never counted planes on the ground and could only claim a "kill" if it was verified by at least 2 others....either a ground source saw it crash or another airman saw it go down.

All Hartmans were air to air.

If no one could claim it then the kill went to the unit.

[Hagen]

Originally Posted by sniper1shot

Actually, from what I can glean from my readings, the Germans never counted planes on the ground and could only claim a "kill" if it was verified by at least 2 others....either a ground source saw it crash or another airman saw it go down.

All Hartmans were air to air.

If no one could claim it then the kill went to the unit.

This is the way I always understood it also.

[Tom Houlihan]

Okay, either I go back and try to find that, or concede the point. I'm absotively sure I read that in a fairly authoritative source, but methinks it'l lbe safer to concede.

Of course, if'n I find it, I'm a-comin' back with guns a-blazin'!!!

[Troy Tempest]

No Tom, I'm siding with everybody else! No ground kills counted towards score total for fighter pilots. No shared kills either, nobody had 22.3 or anything like that.

[Ryne Muller]

My first post!
But back to Wittmanns record never being broke. Didn't Kurt Knipsel Otto
Carius and Hans Bolter already break it?

[Klaus]

Thats what I got from a book. Different books, different numbers... But according to this Knispel, Carius, Bolter broke it


1. Kurt Knispel (s.Pz.Abt 503) -- 162
2. Otto Carius (s.Pz.Abt 502)-- 150
3. Johannes Hans Bolter (s.Pz.Abt 502)-- 139
4. Michael Wittman (s.SS.Pz.Abt 101)-- 138
5. Möbius Karl (Rolf ?) (s.SS.Pz.Abt.101)--125

[sniper1shot]

But Wittmann was made famous because he took on a British unit. More newsworthy. Imagine the audacity of that German Comd to take on the Brits and actually win....(that would be the comments made)

There are Tankers that took on whole Russian units with only 1 or 2 tanks and completely routed the Russian unit, but their names are hardly known.

[Ryne Muller]

It's been suggested elsewhere and I think it makes sense, that Wittmann, being the Nazi Party's darling, grabbed all the headlines rather than an equally deserving whermacht panzer commander. Thus making him more infamous.

[Hagen]

Originally Posted by Ryne Muller

It's been suggested elsewhere and I think it makes sense, that Wittmann, being the Nazi Party's darling, grabbed all the headlines rather than an equally deserving whermacht panzer commander. Thus making him more infamous.

I agree with you Ryne but would also like to suggest, that at the time, (Normandy) the Germans were in real need of a hero in the west, Wittman at Villers Bocage is just what the propaganda ministry needed to give the folks back home some encouragement. And it was quiet an achievment.

[Horch]

Here's a picture of him and crew I haven't seen.