The Walther WA 2000 was a bullpup automatic sniper rifle designed around the 1970s. The sniper rifle is rare and currently unavailable.
Overview
The Walther WA 2000 was first designed as a response to the 1972 Summer Olympics Munich Massacre. The Bullpup design was devised so it would allow for the standard length for a sniper rifle, and yet the overall length would still remain shorter than a conventional rifle.
Peace Walker Incident
- Main article: Peace Walker Incident
During the 1974 Peace Walker Incident, the Militaires Sans Frontières mercenary group procured designs for the Walther WA 2000 after conducting a successful operation against the Peace Sentinel, at a mine base in Costa Rica. The MSF later designed their own version of the prototype WA 2000, eventually producing two enhanced versions.
Post-Peace Walker
In 1982, Walther officially started production of the WA 2000 Sniper Rifle, which saw use with various German Police units. However, due to excessive costs, becoming too expensive to achieve widespread sales, only 176 rifles were actually produced, 15 of which are located in the United States. Two variants of the sniper rifle were produced among that number, which can be easily differentiated by their flash suppressor: the first variant, specifically the older generation, utilized a "can" type flash flash suppressor; the second variant, the newer generation, used the more conventional "flash-hider/compensator" design, and also included other changes that improved the rifle's accuracy. Production halted indefinitely in November 1988.
Behind the scenes
In reality, the Walther WA 2000 was first developed in the late 1970s to early 1980s, several years after its 1974 appearance in Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker.
The Walther WA 2000's history is similar to that of the PSG-1 in previous Metal Gear games, as both were sniper rifles designed by West Germany that ultimately produced far fewer models than expected, due to expensive costs at mass-producing the weapon.
- "A new model of sniper rifle developed to withstand the rigors of Special Forces operations in a world where unconventional warfare is becoming the norm.
The WA2000 is heavy and extremely unwieldy, but compensates for this with low recoil, which gives it exceptional accuracy. Its scope has three levels of zoom to allow targeting at multiple distances, and armor-piercing ammunition makes it an effective weapon against heavily armored enemy troops even at long range.
If long-range sniping battles are your thing, you can't go wrong with this gun." - ―WA2000 weapon description in Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker