Source: US Military System
South Korea designed the K9 to operate on the rugged mountains of the demilitarized zone with North Korea, and accordingly gave it advanced hydropneumatics suspension to overcome the rocky terrain. Despite weighing more than the U.S.-built M109 Paladin, which has been in widespread use across the globe since the 1960s, the K9 is faster (at forty-one miles per hour), has a higher power-to-weight ratio thanks to its thousand-horsepower engine, and has a nearly 40 percent greater operational range of three hundred miles before requiring refuelling. While the gun isn’t stable enough to be fired on the move, it can be deployed for firing in just one minute.
