PACE OF OPERATIONS INCREASES DEMAND ON
SATCOM ON THE MOVE
By Richard Kusiolek
To operate in today’s theaters — with 38,000 NATO and 47,000 U.S. troops in mountainous Afghanistan
and 115,000 U.S. troops in the deserts of
Iraq — the military needs even lighter
and more capable ground systems that
provide beyond-line-of-sight communications. With the restrictive protocol of
limited troop engagement, the need for
real-time linkage on surveillance platforms
and command and control structures has
been elevated. What are the latest efforts
to meet the warfighter’s needs, and how
are these efforts being impacted by growth
in the use of communications-on-the-move, communications-on-the-pause and
networking-on-the-move terminals? Will
the future yield high-power, commercial
X-band communications satellites designed
to meet growing commercial and military
bandwidth demands? What spectrum
will help satisfy the U.S. military’s huge
demand for space-based centric warfare?
Photo credit U.S. Air Force Communications Agency.
PENTAGON’S INSATIABLE
DEMAND FOR BANDWIDTH
With the cancellation of TSAT, the U.S. Air
Force’s advanced satellite communications and
the expected move away from space-based
projects in future Department of Defense budgets, it appears one of the primary means of
closing the expanding bandwidth gap of the
warfighters could be X-band provided by com-
The Wideband Global Satcom system (WGS) aims to provide essential communications services for combatant commanders to command and control their tactical
forces, providing high-capacity connectivity into the terrestrial portion of the Defense
Information Systems Network.
mercial operators. David Cavossa, vices presi-
dent of operations for CapRock Government
Solutions, says, “Now that the reality of the
TSAT cancellation has set in, there are two
segments of opportunities. One, is X-band
and Ka-band. The Department of Defense
needs more commercial X-band and Ka-band,
and … that’s where CapRock is positioning
