Korea must adapt to NATO-aligned defense ecosystem to win contracts: experts

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, left, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, second from left, attend a roundtable meeting of the North Atlantic Council during the NATO summit in Ankara, Wednesday. The summit comes at a critical moment for the 77-year-old transatlantic alliance, as U.S. President Donald Trump presses members to honor their pledge to boost defense spending amid Washington's pullback from Europe. UPI-Yonhap

With Korea's failure to secure Canada's multibillion-dollar submarine procurement contract being the latest in a string of high-profile defense export losses in Western markets, experts advise the country to make a fundamental shift in how it approaches buyers aligned with NATO.

The Canada deal, which went to a German-Norwegian consortium largely on grounds of NATO interoperability, followed a series of similar setbacks. In June, Hanwha Aerospace lost a 900 billion won ($599 million) French multiple-launch rocket system upgrade contract to a U.K.-French consortium. In May, it lost a 6 trillion won contract for Romania's next-generation infantry fighting vehicles to Germany's Rheinmetall. In November 2025, Hanwha Ocean lost an 8 trillion won bid for Poland's next-generation submarine program to Sweden's Saab.

After losing the Canadian submarine deal, President Lee Jae Myung said the competition demonstrated the potential of Korean defense products, while a senior Defense Acquisition Program Administration official pledged to focus on improving product quality and technological competitiveness to overcome what he called a "strategic barrier."

Cheong Wa Dae also said on Wednesday during Lee's participation in the NATO summit in Turkey that Korea and NATO would begin discussions on Korea's entry into NATO's procurement market worth 15 trillion won annually.

However, experts say that the problem runs deeper than product quality, and that Korea needs a long-term strategic vision rather than a deal-by-deal approach.

Sean Nottoli, a visiting fellow at the Danube Institute, said Korea already has the products — but what it lacks is the surrounding ecosystem.

"Korea produces trusted, world-class weapons platforms already fielded by NATO countries. If it really wants to compete, Korean firms will need to invest more in training systems, maintenance networks and long-term political relationships," Nottoli told The Korea Times.

He noted that the deeper significance of aligning with NATO goes beyond winning individual contracts.

"Deterrence in the 21st century increasingly depends not only on military capability, but for the ability for allies to produce and maintain and operate equipment together,” he said. "If Seoul wants to become a major supplier within NATO, it should continue investing in joint production, licensed manufacturing, technology sharing and industrial partnerships with its North American and European allies, rather than viewing exports as one-time transactions.”

Yu Ji-hoon, research fellow at the Korea Institute for Defense Analyses, echoed that view.

“Seoul must comprehensively assess the purchasing nation's security environment, policy priorities, alliance networks and industrial strategies and approach them with a state-level cooperation package. This is especially valid for strategic weapon systems like submarines, which are deeply related with a buyer's security identity and long-term defense strategy,” Yu said.

Jennifer Parker, principal of Barrier Strategic Advisory, said interoperability is often the primary consideration in defense acquisitions, regardless of platform capability.

“Decisions around defense exports and defense acquisitions are often made based on strategic relationships," she said, adding that the NATO alliance is getting stronger.

She argued that demonstrating the ability to integrate with European- or U.S.-based systems would go a long way toward quelling those concerns.

“But in many ways Korea has come a long way in that. Korea is a key part of the IP4 (Indo-Pacific Four, or the four NATO partners in the Asia-Pacific), which is very much featured in a NATO meeting,” she said.

Kim Dong-yup, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies, cautioned that the interoperability challenge carries particular complexity for a divided country like South Korea.

"The interoperability that Korea has maintained to deter conflict on the Korean Peninsula is structurally distinct from the standardization required to plug into NATO's anti-China and anti-Russia deterrence network," Kim said.

To address this, he called for a detailed strategy that accounts for NATO's strategic deterrence posture toward Pyongyang, Moscow and Beijing before Seoul deepens integration with NATO.

Korea Times reporter Bahk Eun-ji contributed to this article.