Wideband high frequency

communications provide net-

centric, high-speed beyond
line of sight communications
in Anti-Access/Area Denial
(A2/AD) battlefield
environments
Whether in the field of battle, search-and-rescue or
humanitarian aid efforts, the ability to share real-time,
networked information between ground, sea and airborne forces
is rapidly becoming the defining factor in a mission’s
success. Russia and china have developed
sophiticated Electronic warfare (EW) syatems through which
they can jam satellite and other communications in higher
frequecies. Advancements in HF technologies over the past
two decades, especially automatic link establishment (ALE)
and wideband HF (WBHF), improve the ease of use and
capacity of HF communications.

High frequency communications have been used since the 1930s

as a means to communicate beyond line of sight. HF operates in
the ~1.8 MHz to 30 MHz frequency band by either reflecting
off the ionosphere (called Skywave) or refracting off the
surface of the earth (called Surface Wave). HF’s single
greatest value is its ability to provide reliable short AND
longrange Beyond Line Of Sight (BLOS) communications. It can
support Point-Point and P-Multipoint data rates up to ~10kbps
w/o relays . HF is generally available, rapidly and readily
deployable – requires very little infrastructure and can be
made extremely reliable.

The US has a large installed base of HF radios for

ground, maritime, and airborne operations. For example, there
are more than 4000 fixed and rotary wing airborne platforms
with HF radios installed. The US uses HF to communicate
directly from platform to platform, such as air-to-ship
communications. The US also has fixed and deployable HF entry
station infrastructure for connectivity from deployed
platforms to the Global Grid.

Recent advances in HF radio and Digital Signal Processing

(DSP) technology, along with new U.S. and international
regulatory flexibility in spectrum allocation policies, have
ushered in a new era for terrestrial-based, long-range
communications capabilities. As a result, HF radio is now no
longer limited to agonizingly slow 9,600 bps data transfer
rates – slower than dial-up modems of the early 1990s. Today,
modernized Wideband HF (WBHF) can deliver rates up to 240 kpbs
on a 48 kHz wide channel.

Rockwell Collins demonstrated that its wideband high frequency

(WBHF) communications capability can stream video and digital
audio, conduct real-time chat, and transfer files across a
5,000-mile distance from the east coast of the United States
to Hawaii. The demonstration, which was done in partnership
with the Air Force Research Lab and the Air Combat Command
(ACC), took place in June 2017 aboard a C-17 transport
aircraft. The goal is to provide the capability to aircraft
that have long-haul missions and where there are gaps in those
missions.
Ron Broden, account manager for high frequency systems at
Rockwell Collins, said it is mostly seen as a back-up system
in today’s aircraft as most pilots use satellite links.
Legacy systems use three kilohertz wide channels, while the
wideband system goes up to 48. Wideband high frequency
channels offer users four to seven times more capacity than
the legacy high frequency channels,

“Whether it’s a real time conversation, streamed live video or

the rapid transfer of large data files between an aviation
platform, and support or command and control elements for a
broad range of missions, this technology has the ability to
deliver a true sovereign beyond line of sight communications
capability for defence, and one that complements and hardens
existing networks.”

Rockwell Collins’ modernized HF capabilities, coupled with the

inherent anti-jam nature of the widely dispersed nodes in
Automatic Link Establishment (ALE) based HF networks, create
an ideal alternative to narrow-band SATCOM in Anti-Access/Area
Denial (A2/AD) battlefield environments. “Being able to
transfer secure data via the WBHF radio could provide greater
operational resilience to the Australian Defence Force in the
future, especially in satellite denied environments,” said Air
Force’s Director of Plan Jericho Group Captain Carl Newman.

Rockwell Collins Asia-Pacific vice-president and managing

director Jim Walker said: “WBHF technology is the only
modernised HF solution that will deliver net-centric, high-
speed communications at costs that are in line with today’s
tighter military budgets.”
Since the ionosphere changes conditions, much like Earth’s
weather, there are good days and bad days for using it as a
means of communications. The experiment took place on average
days — not the worst that a radio operator could encounter but
not the best, either, he said.

HF has had its downside too, Dave Schreck, vice-president and

general manager airborne solutions government systems for
Rockwell Collins, acknowledged. For example, it could take
time to establish a link. But today, that problem has been
solved with Automatic Link Establishment (ALE) technology.

The brand new ALE capability, known as 4G ALE, makes HF

linking easier, faster and more reliable than ever before,
while taking full advantage of wider channels. Its 4G ALE adds
the spectral sensing parameter, as well as other signal
enhancing characteristics, to create a new protocol that not
only automatically determines the optimal bandwidth but also
links much faster than legacy 2G or 3G ALE. Spectral sensing
ensures that the established link not only has the best
signal, but also the maximum available bandwidth. And it does
it all without any operator intervention.

WBHF technology applications

Eric E. Johnson Klipsch School of Electrical and Computer
Engineering New Mexico State University discusses a few
example applications in which the higher data rate of the
wider-bandwidth waveforms could offer a qualitative
improvement in mission performance.
Currently, most UAV video is sent via satellite or lineof-
sight radio channels. WBHF offers the intriguing possibility
of beyond line-of-sight communications to and from a UAV via
HF radio. Of course, powering an HF transmitter and mounting
an HF antenna on a UAV pose challenges. A link is established
as soon as the aircraft comes within extended line of sight.
At this extreme range, the path loss may be as much as 100 dB
greater than when the aircraft passes near the ground
transmitter, so the data rate must adapt to the varying SNR
during the link.

A somewhat less challenging opportunity for delivering video

over WBHF arises with ground forces in mountainous or dense
urban terrain, where near-vertical incidence skywave (NVIS) is
used to overcome the lack of line-of-sight between a video
source and its users.

The authors consider their third example application, the one-

to many communication involved in maintaining a common
operating picture (COP) among vessels in a naval battle group.
Propagation is via the (relatively benign) surface wave
channel, but nodes in this HF LAN must share the channel.
Often, a token passing channel access protocol is used.

High Frequency Communication

HF operates BLOS in the 2 to 30 MHz frequency band by either
reflecting off the ionosphere (called Skywave) or refracting
off the surface of the earth (called Surface Wave). Different
frequencies will reflect off the ionized layers depending upon
their height and ionization density which varies depending
upon time of day and solar activity.
Thus, multiple HF frequency assignments are required to
ensure 24/7/365 reliable communications. It is possible to
predict which frequencies will be propagating based upon time
of day and solar conditions as well as physical measurement of
the ionosphere layers via sounding stations.

However, actual propagation performance for frequency channels

will often be better or worse than expected. Thus, automatic
protocols are required to determine which frequencies are
propagating and adapt the waveform modulation and coding to
actual channel conditions, write James A. Stevens and others
from Rockwell Collins.

Automatic Link Establishment (ALE) protocols probe (sound) HF

frequencies to identify good propagating channels
to setup a link. In the past, successful HF
communications required skilled operators to know when to
manually switch
frequencies to obtain or maintain good links to exchange
voice or data. ALE enables radios to automatically determine
which
links are propagating and use those links.

Single sideband (up to 3 kHz bandwidths) channel modulations

support data rates up to 9.6 kbps and independent sideband (6
kHz bandwidth) channel modulations support data rates up to
19.2 kbps. The serial tone data waveform modulations feature
an “autobaud” capability that enables the receiver to
automatically adapt the transmitter’s data rate
and interleaver configuration without operator intervention.
HF link layer protocols dynamically adapt data rate to channel
conditions and improve reliability through acknowledgement and
retransmissions. These link layer protocols support higher
layer applications including email, chat, and file transfer.

New HF Wideband Technology for A2AD

enironment
The lowest data rate modulation for each WBHF
channel bandwidth operates with a Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR)
of
about -9 dB for mid-latitude links. This provides data
rates from 75 bps (3 kHz channel bandwidth) to 600 bps (24 kHz
channel bandwidth). The latter is sufficient for the lowest
data rate Mixed Excitation Linear Prediction – Enhanced
(MELPe)
vocoder and thus provides voice at significantly lower
SNR than possible today, write James A. Stevens and others
from Rockwell Collins.

The lowest data rate WBHF modulation is based upon Walsh codes
that spread the transmitter power out in a wider
channel than the information actually requires. This
means that a transmitter has additional transmit power
reserve.

A WBHF solution leverages existing DoD worldwide

HF infrastructure and platforms with installed HF. Only the HF
radios/modems would have to be upgraded to run the
latest military standards, including ALE and WBHF. This
means that airborne platforms with existing HF only have to
upgrade their radios and could reuse their existing HF
antennas without
having to make costly modifications to the outside of
the aircraft , write James A. Stevens and others from Rockwell
Collins.

WBHF, with its low SNR requirement, operates below the noise
floor and can be used with lower transmit powers for lower
detectability or with higher transmit powers for additional
anti-jam margin.

Anti-Access and Area Denial (A2AD) occurs when an enemy gains

the ability to disrupt command and control to such an extent
that friendly forces cannot control their assets nor risk
sending assets to that region. Example A2AD communications
threats include: loss of communications through satellite
denial, loss of communications through jamming, platform
detection and location from communications transmissions,
and loss of communications due to nuclear effects. Nuclear
events disturb the ionosphere by increasing its electron
density which increases the absorption of lower HF frequencies
and the reflection of higher HF and VHF frequencies .

WBHF mitigates many of the A2AD environment threats, including

jamming, detection, and satellite denial . The HFGCS system
can be used in an A2AD scenario to provide reachback
connectivity if satellite communications are denied. HFGCS can
also be used to heal jammed LOS links in the A2AD area by
allowing forward deployed nodes to communicate via relay
through the HFGCS.

WBHF’s voice service can heal A2AD jammed voice nets like UHF
SATCOM voice; WBHF’s IP data service can heal A2AD jammed
networks like SHF SATCOM; and WBHF, combined with JREAP, can
heal A2AD jammed Link-16, Link-11, and VMF tactical data
links.
References and resources also include:
http://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.a
spx?ID=2280

https://www.rockwellcollins.com/Data/News/2017-Cal-Yr/GS/FY17G
SNR25-RAAF-WBHF.aspx

https://www.rockwellcollins.com/-/media/Files/Unsecure/Product
s/Product_Brochures/Communcation_and_Networks/Communication_Ra
dios/Modernized_High-Frequency_Communications_brochure.ashx

Wideband High Frequency (WBHF) for Anti-Access Area-Denial

(A2AD) Environments; James A. Stevens PhD, Lizy Paul, Timothy
E. Snodgrass, Randy W. Nelson Rockwell Collins Government
Systems