SANTIAGO, Chile — Five months after the Brazilian Army announced its decision to buy howitzers from Israel’s Elbit Systems, the project remains suspended over Brazilian President Inazio “Lula” da Silva’s criticism of Israel’s actions against Hamas in Gaza.
According to military sources in Brasilia, who spoke to Defense News on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, the project remains “frozen” but not formally canceled.
“President da Silva has signed no executive order, neither to cancel the procurement of ATMOS 2000 nor for reopening the tender to select and negotiate another solution”, one source said.
The government in May picked Elbit to deliver 36 ATMOS 2000 self-propelled howitzers in a deal worth $210 million.
The sources said that both the Minister of Defense, Mr. José Múcio Monteiro, as well as the Army chief, Gen. Tomás Miguel Ribeiro Paiva, are working to unlock the project. They hope to persuade the left-wing president to proceed with the deal, which would provide two howitzer samples for testing.
Military officials believe picking another vendor would increase the delay and have a negative impact on several local companies, which have signed agreements with Elbit to participate in the production of parts and the final assembly of the weapons.
Officials at Brazil’s Ministry of Defense and the Army did not return a request for comment.
The decision to procure ATMOS 2000 capped a tender process for the service’s VBCOAP program, short for armored self-propelled howitzer in Portuguese. The other vendors competing under the tender were France’s KNDS with the Caesar, an alliance between Slovak Konštrukta Defense and the Czech Excalibur with Zuzana 2, and China’s NORINCO with the SH-15.
Meanwhile, tensions between Colombia’s government and Israel, also fueled by the Gaza war, have had no effect so far on an order for 18 Atmos 2000 worth $102 million, placed early in 2023 by the South American country.
José Higuera is a Latin America correspondent for Defense News.
