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Capt. Stroh and the squadron mission report both state that his “flight” was jumped by twenty enemy fighters: four P-47s versus twenty FW-190s, with the 190s having positional and energy advantage at the onset. (The mission report actually states, “Blue flight was bounced by 20 plus FW-190’s.”) At low altitude and forced to jettison their bombs, the P-47 pilots fought for their lives. It was a melee, a “fur ball.” It was impossible for the vastly outnumbered Americans to saddle in on any one bandit without they themselves becoming predictable targets for the bad guys. They could make only slashing attacks using short gun bursts, then immediately turn away. In the pandemonium, it is remarkable that Stroh was able to get hits on “several” of them, but there were no opportunities to “follow the kills” and document them with gun camera film. Nor were his wingmen in any position to verify kills. The FW-190 was quite vulnerable to fifty-caliber machine gun fire. The P-47s’ converging gunfire was concentrated at the point of impact for a target in range. So if a target took any hits from a P-47’s eight .50 cals, it took a lot of hits. Stroh’s guns were working fine, as he used up nearly all his ammunition.  All things considered, it is feasible, even likely, that Capt. Stroh had multiple kills that day. But the rules for kill claims were very specific and strictly enforced; the actual physical destruction of the aircraft or the bailout of the pilot had to be visually witnessed or documented by gun camera film. And Capt. Stroh, by his very nature and code of honor, would never have “pushed” a claim. Likewise, it was so in character of him to credit his rookie wingman in the day’s work. In a letter to his father, he remarked wryly that “they are the ones that withdrew, even outnumbering us 5 to 1.”