Transponded Architecture Considerations in Protected MILSATCOM

There is a growing and recognized need for additional SATCOM capacity to serve forward deployed users. This paper surveys some of the considerations that need to be accounted for when planning communication missions on system architectures based on analog transponders. The utility of an analog transponded architecture is strongly dependent on the mix of user terminals, data rates each terminal must satisfy, weather conditions, and the level of anti jam (AJ) protection required. This sensitivity is driven by the need to support the most & least capable terminals on the same transponder. Additionally, transponders may be susceptible to unique out of beam interference that is enabled by practical design considerations. Finally, transponders typically require a ground processing site and do not support point to point user communications. The ground hub, which routes all system traffic represents an additional vulnerability. This paper quantifies the potential degradations introduced by the above considerations on a notional analog transponder and evaluates their impact to the loading of a notional scenario onto the transponder considered.