HughesNet Case Studies - HughesNet in Iraq
With two Network Operation Centers (NOCs) and more than 1,000 dishes already in the region, HughesNet satellite Internet broadband offers an inexpensive, high-speed and reliable alternative to other satellite solutions and the DoD's Non-Secure Internet Protocol Router Network (NIPRNet).
The images from old war movies and TV shows are immediately familiar...military personnel in the field waiting for "mail call," hoping for a letter from home that has been weeks or even months in transit. With the advent of the digital world, such a scenario is, of course, a vestige of the distant, low-tech past.
According to field personnel such as Staff Sergeant Jose Matias of the 124th Infantry, today's reality isn't actually all that different. To most soldiers in Iraq, the lack of access to quality personal communications can leave one feeling that they're living in the Dark Ages. Letters take three weeks to arrive, phone time is allocated a few minutes every few weeks to each soldier, and using e-mail means first finding a location with available access, and then waiting in line and hoping for a turn.
Art Newsome, a Chief Warrant Officer with the 101st Airborne, offers similar experiences.
"For e-mail, NIPRNet is pretty much the only game in town, and when your turn comes, you have to hope that you're not bumped by someone who has to place a parts order," he explained. "I think most people consider themselves extremely lucky if they get to briefly check their AKO e-mail once a week. And getting enough time to regularly do anything else, like pay bills or check hometown news, is unlikely."
Today's military personnel come to the field accustomed to having ready access to the Internet at home, so they are keenly aware of what they're missing. That makes the lack of personal communications capability in the field, and broken links with their stateside lives, even harder to accept.
Searching for a cost-effective solution
Many military leaders are recognizing the detrimental effect that loss of personal communications can have on their troops, and are seeking realistic solutions. Major General David Petraeus of the 101st Airborne, stationed in Northern Iraq, was one who identified a potential opportunity to improve performance by providing soldiers with the quality of Internet connectivity that most enjoyed at home. He assigned Signal Corps technician Art Newsome to help make it happen.
Newsome researched the possibilities, looking for a solution that was robust and reliable, while inexpensive enough to deploy for every soldier at every field location. His research, he says, identified the capabilities of Hughes, a company that is the world's leading supplier of broadband satellite solutions to businesses and consumers, but is less well-known in government and military circles. The commercially oriented pricing and performance of the HughesNet system seemed to be a good fit for the 101st.
"HughesNet is perfect for our needs," he said, offering the 101st all the features needed for high-quality Internet access in the field without the costly add-ons common to standard military satellite solutions. "The other bids we received would have made it much more expensive, and were not as well suited to this specific purpose," he said.
Fast and frequent e-mail access, live chat, even video and voice for every soldier.
One of the many things the 101st liked about the HughesNet system is its speed of deployment, with operation often established within hours.
"I think we might have set some speed records in deploying those dishes," laughed Newsome. "Believe me, when on-site people hear what's in those crates, they make getting the system up and running a TOP priority-regardless of the 140° heat." "I think we might have set some speed records in deploying those dishes," laughed Newsome. "Believe me, when on-site people hear what's in those crates, they make getting the system up and running a TOP priority-regardless of the 140° heat."
The 101st set up "cyber tents"-the field version of stateside Internet cafes-at their more than 40 sites, with upwards of twenty PCs connected to each HughesNet dish. Soon, every soldier had nearly unlimited leisure-time access to e-mail, live chat, instant messaging, Internet browsing, even streaming video, all at speeds of up to 2 Mbps.
According to Newsome, personnel now had connectivity that was as good or better than what they were used to at home. They were able to readily access not only their AKO e-mail, but also personal e-mail addresses established through portals like Yahoo or their stateside ISPs. They managed their bank and brokerage accounts online, caught up with events through their hometown newspapers, and even ordered gifts via on-line purveyors. And, he said, live chat was most popular of all, giving soldiers the capability to easily "talk" in real time to loved ones a world away.
With a similar HughesNet system in operation at his base in Northern Iraq, the 124th's Matias was especially pleased with the system's ability to establish Voice over IP (VoIP) and real-time video/voice conferencing via webcam.
"I now get to talk with my wife just about every day, and to see my kids jumping around in the background almost brought tears to my eyes," he said.
"The difference in performance is just night and day," added Newsome, discussing his experience at the 101st. "With all we were putting on it, NIPRNet speed had just about slowed to a crawl. I heard of high-level officers switching from NIPRNet to HughesNet to answer their large volumes of military e-mail. The speed of HughesNet just makes it a lot easier, faster and more efficient for them, I'm sure. The service is working great, and it's making a lot of people very happy."
Newsome's 101st Airborne and Matias' 124th Infantry are only two of many units throughout Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Middle East/European theater who have used HughesNet. Others have included the 82nd Airborne, 1st Armored Division, 4th Infantry, a number of Coalition partners, and the Coalition Provisional Authority. The dishes are portable enough to be "thrown on the back of a truck" if a unit needs to redeploy, and are considered so inexpensive that individual military units, even smaller ones, can easily buy their own. Hughes reports there are more than 1,000 dishes currently in operation in the region, backed by a proven local support infrastructure, including maintenance and help desk services. Fully committed to the region, Hughes even maintains two local Network Operations Centers, one in Dubai, UAE, and one in Griesheim, Germany.
Potentially, a new standard for military MWR
Major Nancy Bodick, stationed with the 101st, says that a system such as HughesNet offers a new level of Morale, Welfare and Recreation (MWR) service to personnel, one which she believes will be increasingly in demand. "When you're out in the field on an extended deployment, you're doing practically the same thing every day, and morale starts going downhill. The military is always looking for ways to break that slide, and giving people daily access to e-mail was one of the most immediately successful actions I've ever seen," she said. "I expect this to become more commonplace because you have to do things to keep people concentrating on the tasks at hand and not thinking 'I haven't spoken to my kids in weeks.'"
"I think this kind of connectivity, with a system actually up and running for the soldiers quickly at a minimal cost, will become the standard," added Newsome. "Some people might say that Internet access is not a necessity, but I'm in communications and I'm here to tell you, for people stationed away from home for a year, it is a necessity."
