1964 was also the first year of limited production for what was to become the H&K MP-5 subnachinegun, known as Project 64 jn the days of its early development. Though the West German army had chosen a FN-produced version of the Isreali UZI as their future standard army subgun, there was still a respectable market among the paramilitary German Border Police, as well as a hefty market among multiple German state and regional police forces, as well as the reaktion teams os some of the police forces of some of the larger cities and towns. About the only domestic competion for the H&K offering was the MPL and MPK versions of a neat little stamped Walther design, and a now nearly-forgotten prototype machinepistol from Mauser. Since the H&K SMG followed the layout and opheerating controls of the German army's H&K G3 rifles, it was the usual choice.
For the most part, they sat in police armories, taken out for firing a few times a year- and then the Munich Olympics of 1972 came along, with the Olympic Massacre by Arab terrorists that put the little gun on the front pages of news magazines worldwide. A few years later, the British SAS used theirs during a counterterrorist raid at a London embassy that had been taken over, and every SWAT team worth its boots wanted some.
In this country, the gun became notorious when one in the hands of a Border Patrol agent on loan to Immigration and the Federal US Marshall's Service was shoved in the face of a kid named Elian Gonzales in Miami. For the most part, the feds have replaced theirs with shorty M4 or M16 carbines, and some ex-fed MP5 variants have been torched and are showing up in pieces at Denver and Wyoming gun shows.
They're not a bad little gun and are fun to shoot. though the magazines are a bit on the flimsy side. But they deserve a better end than being chopped into junk, and their collectable status offers at least some hope for some of them ending up in the hands of someone who'll appreciate and care for them.
