South Korea's army and Hanwha plan an eastern maintenance hub to service exported K9 guns

South Korea's army and Hanwha Aerospace plan to build a second field maintenance support centre, this time in the eastern part of the country, and to turn it into a hub for servicing South Korean weapons sold abroad. Hanwha disclosed the plan on 9 November after a meeting that Army headquarters hosted the same day at the ROKAUS venue in Yongsan, Seoul, on growing arms exports and developing the army's maintenance, repair and overhaul work through cooperation between the military and industry.

According to THE ELEC and Munhwa Ilbo, the meeting brought together the army's logistics staff, the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, the Korea Defense Industry Association and Hanwha Aerospace. The army briefed participants on the results of a maintenance seminar it held in Poland in September, and the two sides discussed how to turn that into concrete cooperation on weapons systems that South Korea has already exported.

The most immediate step involves Poland. From mid-November, the army will send its own personnel to Poland to run travelling training courses meant to improve how Polish units operate the South Korean systems they have bought, the reports said. The two countries' militaries will also turn their logistics cooperation council into a body that meets on a regular schedule, which Bridge Economy described as the basis for standing support rather than occasional visits.

Field maintenance support centres are forward facilities where the army and defence companies work side by side to carry out quick maintenance on major weapons. At present only one operates, in the western region. The planned eastern centre would be a joint civilian and military maintenance hub, and the partners want to develop it into a key node of an overseas maintenance network for South Korean equipment.

The new centre is meant to handle field maintenance of major export systems such as the K9 self-propelled howitzer. The army and industry also intend to use what they learn there to offer maintenance business to the countries that buy South Korean weapons. A working-level task force made up of military and company representatives is due to be formed soon to draw up detailed plans, the reports said.

Major General Ha Heon-cheol, who heads the logistics staff at Army headquarters, said cooperation between the military and defence firms mattered both for expanding exports and for raising the share of equipment that is ready for use, and that the army would back the export drive as a contribution to national competitiveness. A Hanwha Aerospace official said the company would answer the army's support by working to lift the global standing of South Korean maintenance services.

Poland is the clearest test of that ambition. Under two executive contracts it has bought 364 guns of the K9 family, 218 K9A1s and 146 of the upgraded K9PL version, Defence24 reported in July, when the first K9PLs left Hanwha's plant in Changwon. The second contract, signed on 1 December 2023, was supposed to transfer technology so that Polish industry could maintain, overhaul and modernise the guns, but Defence24 said concrete details of that arrangement were still missing.

The reports from the 9 November meeting did not give a location, cost or opening date for the eastern centre, and they did not say how many army trainers will travel to Poland or which units they will work with. They also did not name any importing country other than Poland as a target for the maintenance offer.

For South Korea's army, the plan links two jobs that are usually handled separately: keeping its own artillery and armour available at home and supporting the same equipment in foreign service. The working group's detailed plan will show how much of that support is carried out by soldiers and how much by Hanwha and other contractors.