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Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b
Here's an interesting T2K idea -- major units that become disrupted due a breakdown in the radio nets of frequency-hopping radios. I don't know if it's classified anymore (it was when I was in), so I won't say how the frequency "hopsets" are distributed, but if the hopsets for FH radios aren't synchronized, you won't be able to talk to each other any more -- and you won't even know it's happening until you notice the rest of the formerly-chatty net has become silent. That can really disrupt unit cohesion. Are they on a different hopset? Have they been wiped out? Was there a hopset error at higher HQ that screwed up the works (easily fixed, but not if higher HQ has been destroyed)? If you need help, are you going to get it?
Eventually, everyone will be talking in the clear as hopsets and scrambling modules can no longer be synched except between small units, but in between during the Twilight War, there will be a lot of confusion.
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Plus it takes less energy to transmit and receive in the clear than it would with frequency hopping and/or digital radios because the computer in the radio would use energy for the synchronization and/or digital to analogue and analogue to digital conversion. I know when the batteries get low in some of those radios, they resort to "in the clear" transmissions.
Myself, on VHF, it is line of sight dependent as well as depending on height. I can hit ham radio repeaters 10 miles away on one watt with the rubber ducky antenna and once talked about 80 miles across Lake Erie and into Canada with the same setup. I think HT to HT, you can get a half mile to several miles depending on terrain.