South Korean Hawnha Aerospace won tender for developing trajectory correction fuze kit for 155mm artillery ammunition under CCF (Course Correction Fuze) program. They are designed for use with K9 SPH.
Company in cooperation with South Korea's Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) will implement project through 2032. Over this time they plan to spend 164.2 billion won, approximately corresponding to €100.3 million, or $115.9 million.
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It is declared CCF kit is designed for converting standard 155mm shells into precision ones. It is installed on ammunition front part and corrects its trajectory in flight using GPS satellite navigation.
Hawnha Aerospace claims this will supposedly enable reducing deviation to 1/6 of current level. Thus possibility of engaging and destroying targets using fewer shells while preserving barrel life will exist.
Defense Express notes satellite guidance on artillery ammunition has long been used, like on same M982 Excalibur shell, or M1156 Precision Guidance Kit (PGK). Specifically, according to available information, CCF will be analog of the latter.
Precision ammunition relying on GPS genuinely shows good results on battlefield, which could even be seen in Ukraine in 2022-2023. However they have quite noticeable disadvantage: during active EW asset employment their accuracy significantly drops.
Thus on russian-Ukrainian war battlefield their effectiveness decreased, while alternatives with laser guidance, which can receive illumination from drone, returned to relevance. Naturally, overall one cannot say satellite guidance is obsolete and unnecessary, but weakness is worth remembering.
Regarding development primarily for K9, this is quite obvious, as this is South Korea's main SPH, for which new versions are actively developed. It also serves in 10 more countries with 2 more countries placing orders. However quite likely kit can be used from other systems.
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