[rwt_bkk]

Being of the same era as Terry but maybe a little bit more up to date on the Ham side. I think todays comms are the cat's meow.

Year's ago in Burma had a packet network with full encryption running right over the heads of the bad guys. 125 km 100% link with hand helds at both ends.

Commercial sat phone and Pactor III HF links make world wide commo a snap these days. If the rules were a little more wide open the ham community could have all the nice HF FHSS stuff too. Right night it is available for commercial UHF rigs that we use for SCADA comms.

Myself I would love to be able use the available technologies along with the DOD budget!

I would just have only one worry - when all else fails and I have to rely on emergency UHF gear who is going to answer my cry for help? I would be worried if I got patch through to some AF "Air Assets Manager" who would inform me that he doesn't have any slots left on his daily target planning worksheet to accomodate my requests......

My other worst fear is having a real reliable link that is being used 100% by the theater commander telling me to "break contact continue mission" all the while consulting his one over the universerve map to give me the new coordinates to move to.

Don't know if any of you current guys can relate to any of this..