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South Korea’s Hanwha Aerospace inked an export deal with Vietnam for the 155-mm K9 self-propelled howitzer last month, marking the first-ever South Korean arms sale to the country. The $250 million deal will see Hanwha deliver 20 howitzers to the Vietnamese armed forces, the 11th customer of the internationally exported system. The K9 is reportedly also being billed to the U.S. Armed Forces as part of the Self-Propelled Howitzer Modernization (SPH-M) solicitation. The 155-mm howitzer fires M107 high-explosive (HE) shells, HE rocket-assisted projectiles or K307 projectiles. Powered by an MTU MT 881 Ka-500 8-cylinder water-cooled, 1,000-hp diesel engine, the howitzer can reach top road speeds of 42 mph (67 kph) with a range of 224 mi (360 km).

The Cabinet of Ukraine approved the request for a loan from the U.K. government for approximately $2.275 billion (GBP1.7 billion) earlier this summer for the purchase of additional weapons to prosecute the ongoing war with Russia. The loan was intended primarily to cover the purchase of air defense and missile systems, including the Lightweight Multirole Missile (LMM), also known as the Marlet. This British guided weapon is designed to target low-flying aircraft and unmanned systems, lightly armored vehicles and fixed installations. The LMM uses components from the Starstreak and Starburst missiles, including the tail assembly of the Starstreak. The missile is armed with a 7-lb (3-kg) blast-fragmentation/shaped-charge warhead. A modular warhead design can also be integrated. Development of the Lightweight Multirole Missile began in January 2007, and initial flight tests were conducted in December 2007. The missile has since been ordered by the U.K. Ministry of Defense and sent to Ukraine as part of British military aid packages.

On Aug. 14, the Australian Department of Defense announced Kongsberg Australia had received two export deals to send Naval Strike Missile (NSM) launchers and command and control consoles to Europe. The two deals, valued at $80 million, are the first export from Kongsberg’s production facilities in South Australia and the first manufacturing of NSM launchers outside of Europe or the United States. With investment support in munitions supply chains from Canberra, Kongsberg announced a contract to build an NSM and Joint Strike Missile (JSM) manufacturing factory on April 2. The NSM is an anti-ship missile first deployed by the Norwegian navy in 2012, which has since been exported to 14 countries, including Australia and the United States. The standard missile measures 13 ft (3.96 m) and weighs 897 lb (407 kg), including a 280-lb (125-kg) explosive warhead. The missile can strike targets at a range of 217 nm (250 km), travelling at speeds of Mach 0.95. The JSM is an air-launched variant of the missile. The NSM can also be fitted into a Coastal Defense System (CDS) used to strike littoral and coastal targets.