Our CEO is a retired Marine officer whose last assignment before retirement was training the Afghan National Army for NATO. He spent his career as a light infantry commander of special ops capable troops. What he told me was that, as a combat commander, anytime his troops were encamped and not on the move he would have a BiB up for ISR if he had one. He said that whenever he was NOT in maneuver it was his presumption that any modern opponent--terrorist, irregular or regular--would be aware of his position. Apparently ever since WWII modern warfare is about maneuver and not hunkering down in fixed positions. Fixed positions, like Forward Operating Bases, are a common thing in Afghanistan so we see a proliferation of ISR aerostats.
IMO what is great about the WASP as a complement to the BiB, is that the WASP's utility is increased during maneuver--it extends the range not so much of voice transmission but data transmission. Our military is betting on the intelligence and initiative of our individual soldiers and marines and now delivers information to them that, in the past, was not even available to Colonels and Generals. The articles posted by Sami show that the satellite approach to getting them this information failed badly--there just isn't the bandwidth.
This high bandwidth data is also usually microwave frequency so it tends to be line of sight. Two approaches these articles mention are our WASP and a gator that can drive (or be helicoptered) to the top of hills and extend the network. But, in civilian terms, it is all about giving Smartphone data capability to individual troops fighting over a large area. The amount of front a unit covers has been increasing rapidly since the Civil War when 500 troops might only hold 200 yards of front. The battle density has decreased rapidly so our troops are much more dispersed upon maneuver.
Hence, if they want 3G/4G equivalent data they need a "cell phone tower" within line of sight. Manned aircraft can do this, unmanned aircraft can do this, masts and gators on hills can do this and, of course, an aerostat 20-30 miles back on level terrain can do it. In my experience, soldiers and marines prefer to have something they take with them into battle as opposed to something they have to beg for from the Air Force or higher levels of command. Some of the vets here can probably comment on that mindset. Hope that helps--secondhand information but from a good primary source IMO. BTW neither the Army nor WSGI were smart enough to come up with two aerostat applications for encampment (BiB) and maneuver (WASP)--that was just sheer dumb luck. IMO it will play out to be good luck. JMO. Best regards, IJO
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