Slashdot Mirror
Satellite Access in Time of War
miladus writes "Interesting report in the Washington
Post this morning about how the Pentagon is buying access to commercial satellites to meet its bandwidth needs. Most of the commercial access will be used for backup to the military satellites and for non-military tasks. And the Pentagon has to compete on the market with all the news organizations trying to cover the conflict in Iraq."
I know from working at different military installations that commercial services are used quite often for military purposes. All of the projects I've worked on utilizing satellite comms have always been over commercial satellites with Type-1 encryption.
I say let them have it. Better the Pentagon use it for something constructive than biased talking heads for their fluffed up stories.
-You may license this sig for only $6.99.
I've always wondered about the amount of actual bandwidth available to news organizations like CNN, the BBC and the rest. It's one of those things that came to mind whenever I'd see something like the grainy videophone footage we got used to in Gulf War 1.0, that looked like it was shot with a QuickCam using the Sony Pantycam(tm) image enhancement.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
So fast and easy to use, no wonder its number 1!!! Even make use of parental filters!
(ducks)
While information to the citizens is important, the safety of the people that are doing the fighting comes first. They need data to do their job and come home in one piece. THAT is the first priority.
What screwy priorities, there should be *no* issue... ' we need the bandwidth, too bad' ' you |biased| news services can have what is left'.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
With the budget that the Pentagon has, I'm sure that's no competition...
The Pentagon competing with the likes of CNN and the BBC over sattelite time?
:|
"We now cross live to our correspondant, Richard Jones, in the north of Iraq..."
"Affirmative.. unit 4, prepare to advance on the enemy position to your south."
"Ermmmm...."
I know it wouldn't happen, but hey.. at least try and have a little humour at such a bad time
"Hey! Unless this is a nude love-in, get the hell off my property!!"
Find public companies that own satellites inolved in this and invest heavily for one to three weeks.
Deep pockets are going to fight over limited resources - which means a lot of money is going to be exchanged in the short term.
Assuming that they satellite companies don't offer some sort of bargain deal or preference to the military/gov't, then they are looking to make a metric crapload on this.
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
With the military using satelite bandwidth, will this have any effect on SPAM? It would be a shame if the whole SPAMMER infrastructure came to a halt during the war. Most likely I just miss out on re-runs of Gilligan's Island. And as far as politics are concerned, I stopped being ashamed to be an American the day Hill Billy Boy left office.
Use your head, can't you, use your head,
You're on earth, there's no cure for that - S. Beckett
the goddamn size 85 arial fonts should
help the bandwidth problem. Half the
page is only three words.
That's got to help.
Of course I almost had a
seizure when I first loaded it.
-J
Anyone knows about a working webcam in iraq?
I heard that civilian use of GPS may become less acurate, during war. This morning I fired mine up and it says: "You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike."
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
The Pentagon "is hoovering up all the available capacity," said Richard DalBello, president of the Satellite Industry Association, a trade group.
I can't tell if he's amazed or excited. Chances are DalBello is calculating his stock options as we speak. War will always make some people millionaires.
I love the smell of Karma in the morning
It looks like the Govt. is not only buying up bandwidth, but also commercial satellite photography services.
I don't htink USA has any shortage of imaging tech., most probably trying to stop Saddam from buying the images
How are they going to stop bin Laden tho. , how long can they monopolize commercial satellites?
Scary.
.ACMD setaloiv siht gnidaeR
Two things,
1) I would guess (having not read the article) that any information that is encrypted tighter than a whale's bum under water, is either comms stuff, or information that is non-critical, things like before and after shots of Saddam's royal palaces, the before shot might be useful but the smoking crater that is the after shot will be very little use, and almost indistinguishable from all the other smoking holes in the ground
2) As to the civilian satellites being targets, despite what the spin doctoring and hawks would have you believe Saddam would have trouble getting ordinance to hit a barn door at 50 metres, never mind picking satellites off.
--My sig is bigger than your sig--
And the Pentagon has to compete on the market with all the news organizations trying to cover the conflict in Iraq
... We can? Well, thanks!"
"Hello, CBS? We'd like some of that bandwidth you've reserved. No? Well, OK. Say, out of pure curiosity, what are Dan Rather's coordinates?
you are watching videophones runing at 56 K.
Don't these reporters have access to a satellite uplink?
that was a satellite uplink, via a satellite phone.
And if not, why can't they get enough bandwidth over a decent ISDN connection?
antenna size and power budget.
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
I merely said bias.. few, if any simply REPORT the news now, its all commentary based interpretation of the news.
Thus why I said biased. I'm not making judgments of which side is right or wrong.. Only that its no longer simple news reporting.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Time when data is valuable is probably quite short. And decrypting and analyzing data may take quite long.
Bandwidth shmandwidth. This is propaganda control!
...take the attitude which is entirely hostile to the free spread of information."
...electronic media... mediums, of the military above Bhagdad... they'd be fired down on. Even if they were journalists ..."
...those uplinks and satellite phones I was talking about. And control access to the airwaves."
BBC correspondent Kate Adie who is now covering the US invasion reports in an interview on Irish radio about pentegon censorship:
"I've seen a complete erosion of any kind of acknowledgment that reporters should be able to report as they witness. The Americans... and I've been talking to the Pentagon
"I was told by a senior officer in the Pentagon, that if uplinks--that is the television signals out of... Bhagdad, for example--were detected by any planes
Some will argue this is a necessary step in protecting the invaders, but this threat came well before the 'war' started. I for one doubt physical safety is anywhere close the true goal here. Political and public opinion safety is more like it.
And perhaps foreshadowing our buying up extra bandwidth for 'backup' Adie later in the interview says:
"...the Americans are: a) Asking journalists who go with them, whether they are... have feelings against the war. And therefore if you have views that are skeptical, then you are not to be acceptable.
Secondly, they are intending to take control of the Americans technical equipment
Guess she had it right.
A description of the interview with links to audio and other sources can be found here