The eastern front of the Nato is still getting stronger. The Ministry of Defense of Romania chose the South Korean self-propelled howitzer K9 Thunder da 155 mm for the country’s armed forces. Bucharest will therefore purchase a total of 54 howitzers from South Korea, with the related equipment, for a total expense (unspecified) which should be around 4.2 billion leu (i.e. 910 million dollars). Let us recall that last March the Romanian government started construction work for what, once completed, should become the largest military base European Union of the Atlantic Alliance, confirming the commitment made by this country to secure NATO’s eastern border.
New howitzers for Romania
The decision to purchase the aforementioned howitzers, produced by Hanwha Aerospacewas announced on June 19 at the end of a meeting held by the Romanian Minister of National Defense Angel Tilvar and its South Korean counterpart, Won Sik Shin, visiting the European country. The South Korean company was designated as “winner of a competitive procedure for the purchase by Romania of three battalion-level 155 mm howitzer systems, comprising 54 K9 Thunder self-propelled howitzers, support equipment and an initial quantity of specific ammunition“, according to the ministry in Bucharest.
According to the portal The War Zone, competing to sell similar armaments to Romania were other international players, including the German Krauss-Maffei Wegmann with the Panzerhaubitze 2000 and the Turkish BMC with its T-155 Fırtına. The site Defense News wrote that the South Korean offer of industrial cooperation with the Romanian defense industry played an important role in convincing local decision makers to select the K9, combined with its delivery time relatively short.
The white smoke will therefore allow Romania, a NATO member country, to carry out the largest acquisition of weapons in the last seven years. Shin and Tilvar agreed that military cooperation between Russia and North Korea threatens the security of Europe and Asia and that close collaboration with the international community to address the issue. In April, South Korean and Romanian leaders held a summit and pledged to strengthen defense cooperation.
Strengthening NATO’s Eastern Front
Romania’s decision to purchase K-9 howitzers, following in the footsteps of Poland, will expand the footprint of South Korea’s defense industry in Europe. Speaking of Seoul, Shin and his Romanian counterpart exchanged views in areas of mutual interest, including military education and training, sports and culture exchange, information and experience exchange, defense industry and science and technology. It is worth underlining that, again last April, the presidents of the two countries signed the Defense Cooperation Agreement.
The order will consist of 54 K9 SPH and 36 K10 ammunition refueling vehicles (ARVs), both produced by Hanwha Aerospace. Once the contract is signed, Romania will become the sixth K9 operator in Europe, after Poland, Turkey, Norway, Finland and Estonia.
Not only K-9 howitzers. As mentioned, Romania intends to build a military facility within the framework of a project with a value of 2.7 billion dollars aimed at widening the 57th Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base of the Romanian Air Force, which is located near the Black Sea port city of Constanta. The new site will have a perimeter of nearly 20 miles, cover about 11 square miles and house approximately 10,000 NATO personnel and their families.
Bucharest has long been a key hub for the Atlantic Alliance’s operations in the region, with American fighter and surveillance aircraft regularly operating within the country as part of NATO’s policing operations.
