Wireless Opens Tactical Horizons

Drawn by the potential of wireless technologies, military specialists
are experimenting with a wide range of methods for deploying
massive amounts of data in fast-moving tactical situations.

Drawn by the potential of wireless technologies, military specialists are experimenting with a wide range of methods for deploying massive amounts of data in fast-moving tactical situations.

The many projects underway include mobile WiMax, mobile ad hoc wireless networking and local area networks over terrestrial microwave radio links.

The Army, for example, recently conducted a trial of WiMax, or Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access, which provides wireless data over long distances while augmenting the capabilities of previous wireless communications on the 802.x standard established by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). (See MIT, January/February 2008, page 16.)

Following are three recent examples of other initiatives, which use different technologies but share the common goal of increasing command and control communications capabilities on the modern battlefield.

Mesh Networking - the Battlespace

A new grant from a Pentagon “quick reaction” technology program will support development of a powerful, mobile, broadband command and control technology that functions with the same sort of transparent movement between cells of a cellular telephone system.

Roger W. Kuhn Jr., an engineer with the Navy’s Combat Direction Systems Activity, Dam Neck, was selected recently to receive a $1.4 million grant from the Office of the Secretary of Defense to develop, prototype and deliver a prototype mobile ad hoc wireless network for deployment in the wireless tactical battlespace.

Kuhn will provide government oversight to the project, which will be executed by Fortress Technologies. That company will serve as the vendor that will deliver the 10 prototypes or ES520 Secure Wireless Bridges with software modifications to support advanced meshing capabilities.

“Within the 12 month timeframe allotted by this grant, we will rapidly develop, prototype and deliver 10 environmentally ruggedized, secure wireless access bridges that support an improved form of Tactical Mobile Peer-to-Peer or Ad Hoc wireless network (MANet) for deployment in the mobile, wireless tactical battlespace,” said Kuhn.

Quick-reaction grant recipients must deliver a military-specific prototype application within six to 12 months of being funded.

Kuhn identified a need to seek an alternative to current Department of Defense MANet developmental efforts.

“Current efforts involve adapting ‘centralized scheduler’ architectures that are normally employed in a wired environment, such as open shortest path first based routing, which is inefficient in terms of network performance and survivability in a tactical, mobile wireless environment,” Kuhn said. “Hence, an alternate IEEE 802.11 mobile mesh wireless protocol-based system needs to be developed and deployed having ‘ad hoc on demand’ capabilities developed specifically for a mobile, wireless battlespace.”

What this could mean for the warfighters in theater is a reliable, robust, scalable, dynamically mobile tactical C2 system in which to operate.

“Mesh networking” is a way to route data, voice and instructions between nodes. It allows for continuous connections and reconfiguration around broken or blocked paths by “hopping” from node to node until the destination is reached. A mesh network whose nodes are all connected to each other is a fully connected network. Mesh networks differ from other networks in that the component parts can all connect to each other via multiple hops, Mesh networks can be seen as one type of ad hoc network, but they generally are not mobile.

“The integration of mesh into our military’s deployable communications systems will enable the effective support of converged networking on the battlefield through resilient, high performance communications—the linchpin to net-centric warfighting,” said Fortress Technologies President Janet Kumpu. ♦