MODERNIZATION EFFORTS ... - Air Force Network Integration Center

By Maj. John Caranta
611th Air Communications Flight
TIME MACHINE
REMOTE COMM
PIONEERS BRIDGE ALASKA - D.C. GAP FROM
TELEGRAPH TO TROPOSCATTER TO SATCOM
ELMEndORF AIR FORCE BASE, Alaska
— Military communications in Alaska has historically
come with numerous challenges. At the turn of
the 20th Century, official messages between
Washington, D.C., and Alaska took between
two and six months to be delivered.
Gen. Alphonus Greely, chief of the Army
Signal Corps, began making plans to connect
Alaska to the rest of the world by telegraph.
Due to several issues, the plan had fallen
severely behind schedule, and he called on a
young signals officer by the name of 1st Lt.
Billy Mitchell to turn it around.
Eventually connecting 1,497 miles of line across
the wilderness and 2,128 miles of undersea cable, the
telegraph brought the first long-haul comm to Alaska.
Comm between the remote sites and
the command structure was significantly
improved by the Air Force in the 1950s with
the White Alice Communications System.
It used troposcatter and microwave line-ofsight
to connect early warning systems to
command and control facilities. At the time,
WACS was state-of-the-art, but it quickly
became obsolete with the arrival of satellite
communications.
A few years after the original North
American Aerospace Defense Command
agreement, the Alaska NORAD Region, or
ANR, was established here in 1961. Its initial
mission was to maintain vigilance over North
America to deter the threat of long range
bombers from the Soviet Union.
Through numerous changes in name, organization,
and reporting chain, 11th Air Force has been
constantly joined with NORAD as one of three
regions with a single commander for both the numbered
air force and the region.
Almost 50 years removed, notionally not much has changed.
Alaska is still remote; SATCOM is still the only means of getting
comm from the remote radar and forward operating sites; the
need for ANR to guard the skies still exists; and the need to
Mitchell
troposcatter
integrate and diversify comm between the remote sites and C2
facilities is growing.
Two separate organizations have traditionally
performed Alaska’s communications integration.
The 611th Air Support Squadron’s mission is to ensure
Alaskan warfighters have continuously
mission-ready forward operating locations,
reliable radar coverage, flexible communications,
and wing readiness for homeland
defense protection along the entire Pacific
Rim. To do this, they orchestrate contract
operations and maintenance efforts of 455
contractors under six separate government
contracts.
Commanded by a Canadian Forces
captain, the comm-electronics flight’s portion
of that mission is to work directly with
DOD and commercial providers to deliver
communications system support, computer
security, and technical advice for the two
FOLs, Eareckson Air Station, and 17 remote
radar sites.
That support includes long and short
range radar, telephone and computer networks,
UHF/VHF radios, and military and
commercial circuits via long-haul SAT-
COM.
The other organization, 611th Air
Communications Flight, is tasked to operate
as the focal point for 11th AF/SC and
the Alaskan NORAD Region/A6.
They maintain and administer the ANR
Secret Releasable to Canada enterprise network
providing Global Command and Control
System and Theater Battle Management
Core Systems connectivity with NORAD.
They also develop plans and programs to provide C4
systems to 11th AF, ANR, and Alaskan Joint Forces
Air Component Commander.
Lastly, the 611th ACF provides comm support to
611th Air Operations Center. In 2006 the Air Force
directed the reorganizing of many of the AOCs
worldwide. As a result, these two communications
units will combine to form the 611th Air Communications
Squadron.
telegraph
NEWS BRIEFS
remember
PARTICIPANTS
COMMEMORATE
BATAAN MARCH
THE BATAAN Memorial
Death March is commemorated
every year at
White Sands Missile Range
just outside of Las Cruces,
N.M. The march covers 26.2
miles via paved road and
sandy trails, and includes
participants from all military
branches, ROTC, retired
personnel and civilians.
This year military members
from Germany, Holland and
Canada also marched.
Of the 4,000 participants,
26 were members of the
566th Information Operations
Squadron from Buckley
AFB, Colo., who marched
in the light division and
heavy division (with 35pound
rucksacks). Afterwards,
a few of the surviving
Bataan prisoners awaited all
the participants to congratulate
them on the success of
their grueling march. — Airman
1st Class Alejandro
Rosas / 566th IOS
JOINT TACTICAL AIR
Controllers from the
Air Force, Marine Corps
and Canadian Air Force
recently trained on new
battlefield technologies
during Atlantic Strike V at
Avon Park, Fla.
They trained on the
Remotely Operated Video
Enhancement Receiver, or
ROVER, and the Venom,
a remote-controlled, laser
designator rangefinder
telescoping mast system.
ROVER can receive video
Courtesy photos
Members of the 38th Engineering Installation Squadron practice comm skills
during a spring deployment to a mock bare base.
exercise exercise exercise
COMM UNIT TRAINS FOR WAR AT MOCK IRAQI AIRFIELD
THE 85TH ENGINEERING Installation
Squadron from Keesler Air
Force Base, Miss., deployed in the
spring to a mock “Talil Airfield, Iraq”
for exercise Road Warrior 07-03.
“This was the first phase II exercise
for the 85th EIS in the last decade, as
well as the first since aligning with Air
Combat Command. This exercise laid
the foundation for future deployments,
exercises and peacetime contingencies,”
said Staff Sgt. Matthew Bricker, 85th
EIS ground radar systems.
The week’s activities included
training on alarm conditions, contamination
control areas, post-attack
reconnaissance, security forces defense
posturing, self-aid buddy care, and
battlefield technology
ROVER, VENOM SYSTEMS HELP JTACS TARGET QUICKER
and telemetry data from
manned aircraft, remotecontrolled
unmanned
aerial vehicles and the
Venom system, to display
on a laptop or television
monitor.
This capability allows
ground commanders to
see around corners, over
hills or on top
of buildings.
The JTACs
on the
ground
need
to see the battle picture to
positively identify targets.
ROVER cuts down the
talk-on-target time (from
hours) to 10 minutes
or less. Before ROVER,
JTACs had to have their
eyes on the target and
relied on verbal communication
between themselves,
aircraft
and the Air
Support
Operations
Center.
JTACs
convoys. During the bare base portion,
the team installed network systems,
and copper and fiber infrastructure
used to provide secure and non-secure
command and control communications.
Capt. Gary Rualo, 85th EIS electromagnetics,
was assigned to a radio
directional finding team to identify frequency
interferences that interrupted
radio communications.
“It was vital to get troops into the
proper mindset for real-world events in
a deployed environmen. It familiarized
our Airmen with the procedures and
was a good overall experience,” he said.
— Tech. Sgt. Chuck Marsh, Keesler AFB,
Miss.
provided the target, which
the ASOC then confirmed
before the aircrew would
execute.
When fitted with a
ROVER transmitter, the
Venom can send its images
to ROVER systems,
adding a line-of-sight
image to the aerial image
a JTAC receives from an
aircraft. When in laser
tracking mode, Venom
also allows units to identify
and lock onto a target,
while moving out of the
area avoiding discovery.
— Staff Sgt. Amanda Savannah,
USCENTAF/PA
intercom✭ June 2007 C4ISR ✭Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance
Online ✭public.afca.af.mil
VENOM
intercom ✭ June 2007