Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!ncar!csn!ub!dsinc!casbah.acns.nwu.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: danj1@ihlpa.att.com (Daniel Jacobson) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: CNN from Baghdad Message-ID: <16551@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 29 Jan 91 22:28:04 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 159 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 80, Message 1 of 10 = [This is a recording.] The following netnews may interest you. No = feedback to me is necessary unless you are getting overloaded with = these forwarded articles. The views below are not necessarily = endorsed or even thoroughly read by me [except if I wrote them = myself]. Dan_Jacobson@ATT.COM From: klg@george.mc.duke.edu (Kim Greer -- rjj) Newsgroups: rec.radio.shortwave Subject: Re: CNN from Baghdad Date: 29 Jan 91 16:35:17 GMT Organization: Duke University Medical Center, Durham, NC Can we please put an end to this? If you don't read any thing else in this message, please at least read this next list of *reasons* why I continue to keep saying the four-wire used during the initial days of audio-only from Baghdad was *wires* and not ham radios, or Inmarsat or smoke signals or flashlights or whatever - Short version: 1. a CNN engineer told me on the phone the 4-wire was *wires* 2. Shaw and Holliman themselves described it as *wires* 3. a report on p. 60 of the January 21 issue of "Communications Week" describes it as *wires* 4. a Time magazine description of the setup (I know that calling something "four-wire" doesn't make it actual wires, but read or listen to the descriptions.) Long version: 1. I just got off the phone talking to an engineer at CNN. The company policy is to not give out names. You can call them yourself at 1-404-827-1500 and ask for engineering. The man I spoke to said that yes, the initial days of contact was by *wires* running from Baghdad to Amman. On questioning, he said that *that* phase of reporting was by *wires* and *not* satellite or cellular phones or any other goddamn thing. Whatever Peter Arnett is using now is not under discussion; nobody cares if he is now being shown in front of a satellite dish. He said there is a very good report of it in last week's Time magazine. That's *wires* as in "copper strands". So that there was no possible confusion of terms, he said after specifically asking about satellites, cellular phones, etc : (paraphrase): "No, it was a set of wires". 2. Interviews with Shaw and Holliman on Larry King Live (once they were back in the US) : S & H said that they were using a dedicated line that everyone else wanted to use, that they could not use the satellites. If you don't believe me, then write to the Larry King Live show and pay for a transcript of the show. I wish I had taped it. 3. From a posting made by Larry Johnson: On p. 60 of the January 21 issue of "Communications Week" ("The Newspaper For Network Decision Makers") there is a short article titled "Dedicated Line Pays Off For CNN." It says: ...Charles Hoff, managing director of CNN News Beam, explained it this way. In addition to regular telephone connections, CNN installed a dedicated, four-wire circuit from its Baghdad hotel room to an Iraqi-provided telephone switch. CNN also arranged a priority overseas connection with AT&T.... The line was "hard wired" so the connection did not travel through relay points, Hoff said. During a power failure, dedicated circuits are more likely than regular switched phone connections to keep working. In fact, when the fighting started, he said, normal telephone communications had ceased. (end quote from posted article) 4. Time magazine article - look it up for yourself. The CNN engineer I spoke to described it as "a very good article" - his exact words. Now skip the rest if you are as tired of this as I am. In article <3633@anasaz.UUCP> john@anasaz.UUCP (John Moore) writes: >Uh... before you get too carried away... Don't really think I am. I'm just tired of idle speculators trying to contradict (with no evidence whatsoever) everything that so far has been published and broadcasted. >A four wire is a telecommunications and broadcasting term for a >full duplex link, where there is a separate circuit for each direction. >The term comes from the old technology days where there were literally >four wires running between the end points: in broadcasting, between the >studio and transmitter. Today, however, "four wire" >means that the telecommunications terminal provides 2 600 ohm, wide >band equalized circuits - one in each direction. It does NOT mean >that four wires (or any wires at all) are used. I never said that it had to be wires. I'm saying that all the published articles and broadcasts that I've seen and heard said that it was wire. >For example, the Arizona National Guard has a VHF repeater system >that is statewide (and for which I designed and now manufacture >the control system). Guess what they call the terminals that >come out of the microwave backbone? Yep... "four-wire." And yet, >in that case it is clearly microwave. ... and Arizona National Guard is not CNN. Mostly irrelevant. >This is not to say that they didn't use telephone lines. It is to say >that your evidence for same is worthless, since all it depends on is >the definition of "four wire." I say that I have a lot more evidence on my side. And please don't try to confuse the issue by now calling it "telephone" lines. >your evidence for same is worthless I guess we will all have to stop listening to CNN broadcasts, CNN correspondents, CNN engineers, Time magazine and Communications Week. Where is your evidence to contradict all of these people and organizations?? > your evidence Where is yours ??? You have none. I've spelled mine out. >VSAT (Very Small Aperture Terminal) systems can provide "four wire" >service - typically on Ku band. Because they can does not mean VSAT *was* used. No "evidence" anywhere that I've seen said satellites were used. All evidence specifically and pointedly says just the opposite. See above. > It is possible that they were using this. Pure speculation. Please back it up with something that says they were. >As far as that making it a target - the ECM aircraft have >sophisticated systems for discriminating between radars, command links, >and other systems. They really don't want to waste an expensive >missile on someone's VSAT uplink. I don't think that CNN was in >much danger from radiating 10 Watts in a tight beam up to a satellite >(if in fact that is what they were doing). Military satellites in the above-Iraq area, AWACS and probably F117A's can "see" ten watts of microwave. And they most likely are not going to eavesdrop long enough to see if the originator is Iraqi or foreign. With pinpoint strikes of microwave dishes possible, who would be stupid enough to use them? >John Moore HAM:NJ7E/CAP:T-Bird 381 {ames!ncar!noao!asuvax,mcdphx}!anasaz!john >Opinion: New protest song:All we are say...ing.... is... Give BOMBS a chance! Finally, John, we can agree on something. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Kim L. Greer Duke University Medical Center klg@orion.mc.duke.edu Div. Nuclear Medicine POB 3949 voice: 919-681-5894 Durham, NC 27710 fax: 919-681-5636