In late July 1943, the Gruppenkomnadeur of I./JG 52 Hptm. Johannes "Bazi" Wiese fell ill and was forced to relinquish his command. Hptm. Gerhard Barkhorn was called in from 4./JG 52 to assume this position temporally.

When Wiese returned to the front on 30 August he took the back seat flying mission, probably due to still being unwell. It was not util 13 October that Major Wiese filed his next two abschusse, both Il-2 thereby reaching 112 confirmed victories.

By this time he could look back to a successful career, first flying as a reconnaissance pilot during 1940-41. Then he was transferred to Stab II./JG 52 as their Adjutant in June 1941. He would calming his first, a DB-3 on 23 September 1941.

A slow starter Wiese was promoted to Hauptmann and appointed Staffelkapitän of 2./JG 52 on 26 June 1942. By that date ha had amassed seven confirmed victories. However flying as a leader of a Staffel his scoring would took off and his 33rd victim was downed on 25 October, followed by his 50th on 25 December 1942. And on 3 January 1943 Hptm. Johannes Wiese was awarded the Knight's Cross for a total of 53 confirmed victories.

After being appointed as II./JG 52 Gruppenkommandeur he would take part in Unternemen Zitadelle, the battle of Kursk and on 5 June, the first day of the assault he wrote in a letter home: "Great events cast their shadows before them! Jump by jump, we crawl towards where we are meant to go; the coming days will hopefully give you new courage."

Twelve days later, on 17 July he was greeted by the jubilant personnel of this Gruppe after landing at Besowka. Flying a morning mission "Bazi" had had downed four Il-2s within a period of seven minutes thereby achieving his victory no 100 to 103.

In his own word in a letter to his wife on this date: "I obediently report my 100th, 101st, 102nd, and 103rd aerial victories! Today between 5:35 and 5:50 a.m. The many congratulations and expressions of true joy, genuine camaraderie, and loyalty have hardly been appreciated, but what does war care about after that?!"

Up to the date Wiese was shipped off or treatment in Germany he had up to 23 July filed claims over Kursk for a total of 17 VVS aircraft, twelve Il-2s, three Yak-1s and two La-5s.

After being appointed commander of Jagdgeschwader 77. He would fly his last combat mission on 25 December 1944. Being shot down in combat with a Spitfire near Euskirchen. His parachute had ruptured 80 meters above the ground and he was seriously wounded with a back injuries.

He remained in a military hospital until the end of the war. On 6 September 1945, Wiese was handed over to the Soviets by the British and remained a Soviet as a prisoner of war until 1949.

Note that Bf 109 G-6 was earlier the machine flown by Hptm. Gerhard Barkhorn, clearly one could detect the overpainted White no 5 after the Black Double Chevron, a typical markings used by Barkhorn.

Please note that during the last week I have been able to write 79 captions for my next profile book, Book No 16. This profile and caption (later edited) would be included in this book.