Attack helicopters in possession of Nazi Germany during WWII?

I see a lot of backward projection in these arguments, where talk of gunships makes people think of fleets of thousands of sophisticated tank busters of the 80s and onwards. Similarly modern ideas about the expendability of aircrew and machines are being projected back onto the conditions of WW2.

Personally I think that with a few different decisions the Nazis could have come up with the worlds most advanced 1943 helicopter in 1943, probably at the expense of something else of course. And if they did and it showed promise they`d mount weapons on it and have a crack at using it in the fighting. And if a couple of dozen or even a hundred helos and pilots were shot down, then hey, add them to the list of tens of thousands of fliers and planes that were shot down in WW2, then add them to the millions of combat deaths suffered by Germany in WW2.
 
I`ll reiterate, a gunship doesn`t have to be an Apache Longbow, which by the way is also easy meat for an Su30. But since not all areas are dense with Su30s the Apaches, Tigers, Cobras etc don`t get instantly shot down.

Similarly not all areas of WW2 Europe were dense with fighters, so armed helicopters could be used against partisans in the Balkans readily enough.

Im not saying they have to be I was just giving an example of an attack helicopter(which happened to be an apache).
 
Realistically, I can see the Germans spending money and reasources on YET ANOTHR neat looking but impractical for the time toy. That is what an attack helicopter would have been for them at the time.

I am picturing something with about the range of that first Bell Aviation puddle jumper. Not much range and ON cieling.

Now add on guns and armor and the cieling drops and so does the range.

What you have is sort of an attack helicopter, I suppose, if you can call a slow, easy to see bird with a low cieling and short range that is a practical death trap forthe piot an attack helicopter.

And it WOULD have had an effect on the war, for the Allies.

It would have been yet another drain on the Nazi's reasources that could have been used to produce Stukas.

You remember the Stuka, right. a fast scarey low flying CAS aircraft that had already proven to be brutally effective i nthe role the OP is trying to assigne to this theoretical attack bird.

I can see the germans building it, too, this kind of childish distractive production wastage was just their style.

And some Russian with a primitive line of sight shoulder guided rocket would just knock that expensive impractical toy right out of the sky.
 
The Fa223 was fitted with an MG15 in the nose. It could carry two bombs. Since it wouldn't be viable where the enemy had guns themselves, it was never used in a gunship role. Those pesky inaccurate strategic bombers kept destroying production units by accident, but a handful were available for missions. Where would you send it? Keep in mind that a single enemy machine gun could destroy it with little difficulty.

focke_drache_2.jpg
 
The Fa223 was fitted with an MG15 in the nose. It could carry two bombs. Since it wouldn't be viable where the enemy had guns themselves, it was never used in a gunship role. Those pesky inaccurate strategic bombers kept destroying production units by accident, but a handful were available for missions. Where would you send it? Keep in mind that a single enemy machine gun could destroy it with little difficulty.
Exactly, yet another expensive impractical toy for the Germans to wste resources on.

The Attack chopper's day would come, but not until tech caught up with the concept.
 
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