Howa Type 96

The Howa Type 96 is a Japanese 40 mm automatic grenade launcher made by Howa since 1996. It was created to give the Japan Self-Defense Forces a heavy fire support weapon alongside the Sumitomo Type 62 general purpose machine gun and the Sumitomo M2HB machine gun. It can be used by infantry on a tripod or fitted to an armored vehicle on a weapon mount, and it is one of the main weapons carried on the Type 96 armored personnel carrier. A belt of 40 mm grenades loads through a feeding bay on the left side, and the weapon offers single and continuous fire using a blow-forward system in which the barrel moves back and forth to load. It fires a 40x56mm round that is not interchangeable with the 40x53 mm round of the Mk 19 grenade launcher used on the AAV7 amphibious vehicle. A variant with an additional sight was shown in 2011.