RFC1217

Network Working Group V. Cerf Request for Comments: 1217 CSCR

                                                           1 April 1991

     Memo from the Consortium for Slow Commotion Research (CSCR)

Status of this Memo

  This RFC is in response to RFC 1216, "Gigabit Network Economics and
  Paradigm Shifts".  Distribution of this memo is unlimited.

To: Poorer Richard and Professor Kynikos

Subject: ULSNET BAA

From: Vint Cerf/CSCR

Date: 4/1/91

  The Consortium for Slow Commotion Research (CSCR) [1] is pleased to
  respond to your research program announcement (RFC 1216) on Ultra
  Low-Speed Networking (ULSNET).  CSCR proposes to carry out a major
  research and development program on low-speed, low-efficiency
  networks over a period of several eons.  Several designs are
  suggested below for your consideration.

1. Introduction

  Military requirements place a high premium on ultra-robust systems
  capable of supporting communication in extremely hostile
  environments.  A major contributing factor in the survivability of
  systems is a high degree of redundancy.  CSCR believes that the
  system designs offered below exhibit extraordinary redundancy
  features which should be of great interest to DARPA and the
  Department of Defense.

2. Jam-Resistant Land Mobile Communications

  This system uses a highly redundant optical communication technique
  to achieve ultra-low, ultra-robust transmission.  The basic unit is
  the M1A1 tank.  Each tank is labelled with the number 0 or 1 painted
  four feet high on the tank turret in yellow, day-glo luminescent
  paint.  Several detection methods are under consideration:

    (a)  A tree or sand-dune mounted forward observer (FO) radios
         to a reach echelon main frame computer the binary values

RFC 1217 ULSNET BAA April 1991

         of tanks moving in a serial column.  The mainframe decodes
         the binary values and voice-synthesizes the alphameric
         ASCII-encoded messages which is then radioed back to the
         FO.  The FO then dispatches a runner to his unit HQ with
         the message.  The system design includes two redundant,
         emergency back-up forward observers in different trees
         with a third in reserve in a foxhole.

    (b)  Wide-area communication by means of overhead
         reconnaissance satellites which detect the binary signals
         from the M1A1 mobile system and download this
         information for processing in special U.S. facilities in the
         Washington, D.C. area.  A Convection Machine [2] system
         will be used to perform a codebook table look-up to decode
         the binary message.  The decoded message will be relayed
         by morse-code over a packet meteor burst communications
         channel to the appropriate Division headquarters.

    (c)  An important improvement in the sensitivity of this system
         can be obtained by means of a coherent detection strategy.
         Using long baseline interferometry, phase differences
         among the advancing tank column elements will be used to
         signal a secondary message to select among a set of
         codebooks in the Convenction Machine.  The phase analysis
         will be carried out using Landsat imagery enhanced by
         suitable processing at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.  The
         Landsat images (of the moving tanks) will be correlated
         with SPOT Image images to obtain the phase-encoded
         information.  The resulting data will be faxed to
         Washington, D.C., for use in the Convection Machine
         decoding step.  The remainder of this process is as for (b)
         above.

    (d)  It is proposed to use SIMNET to simulate this system.

3. Low Speed Undersea Communication

  Using the 16" guns of the Battleship Missouri, a pulse-code modulated
  message will be transmitted via the Pacific Ocean to the Ames
  Research Center in California.  Using a combination of fixed and
  towed acoustic hydrophone arrays, the PCM signal will be detected,
  recorded, enhanced and analyzed both at fixed installations and
  aboard undersea vessels which have been suitably equipped.  An
  alternative acoustic source is to use M1A1 main battle tanks firing
  150 mm H.E. ordnance.  It is proposed to conduct tests of this method
  in the Persian Gulf during the summer of 1991.

RFC 1217 ULSNET BAA April 1991

4. Jam-Resistant Underwater Communication

  The ULS system proposed in (2) above has the weakness that it is
  readily jammed by simple depth charge explosions or other sources of
  acoustic noise (e.g., Analog Equipment Corporation DUCK-TALK voice
  synthesizers linked with 3,000 AMP amplifiers).  An alternative is to
  make use of the ultimate in jam resistance: neutrino transmission.
  For all practical purposes, almost nothing (including several light-
  years of lead) will stop a neutrino.  There is, however, a slight
  cross-section which can be exploited provided that a cubic mile of
  sea water is available for observing occasional neutrino-chlorine
  interactions which produce a detectable photon burst.  Thus, we have
  the basis for a highly effective, extremely low speed communication
  system for communicating with submarines.

  There are a few details to be worked out:

    (a)  the only accelerator available to us to generate neutrino
         bursts is located at Batavia National Laboratory (BNL).

    (b)  the BNL facility can only send neutrino bursts in one
         direction (through the center of the Earth) to a site near
         Tierra del Fuego, Chile.  Consequently, all submarines must
         be scheduled to pass near Tierra del Fuego on a regular
         basis to coincide with the PCM neutrino signalling from
         the BNL source.

    (c)  the maximum rate of neutrino burst transmission is
         approximately once every 20 seconds.  This high rate can be
         reduced considerably if the pwer source for the accelerator
         is limited to a rate sustainable by discharging a large
         capacitor which is trickle charged by a 2 square foot solar
         panel mounted to face north.

5. Options for Further Reducing Effective Throughput

    (a)  Anti-Huffman Coding.  The most frequent symbol is
         assigned the longest code, with code lengths reducing with
         symbol probability.

    (b)  Minimum likelihood decoding.  The least likely
         interpretation of the detected symbol is selected to
         maximize the probability of decoding error.

    (c)  Firefly cryptography.  A random signal (mason jar full of
         fireflies) is used to encipher the transmitted signal by
         optical combining.  At the receiving site, another jar of
         fireflies is used to decipher the message.  Since the

RFC 1217 ULSNET BAA April 1991

         correlation between the transmitting and receiving firefly
         jars is essentially nil, the probability of successful
         decipherment is quite low, yielding a very low effective
         transmission rate.

    (d)  Recursive Self-encapsulation.  Since it is self-evident that
         layered communication is a GOOD THING, more layers
         must be better.  It is proposed to recursively encapsulate
         each of the 7 layers of OSI, yielding a 49 layer
         communications model.  The redundancy and
         retransmission and flow control achieved by this means
         should produce an extremely low bandwidth system if,
         indeed, any information can be transmitted at all.  It is
         proposed that the top level application layer utilize ASN.1
         encoded in a 32 bit per character set.

    (e)  Scaling.  The initial M1A1 tank basis for the land mobile
         communication system can be improved.  It is proposed to
         reduce the effective data rate further by replacing the
         tanks with shuttle launch vehicles.  The only slower method
         of signalling might be the use of cars on any freeway in the
         Los Angeles area.

    (f)  Network Management.  It is proposed to adopt the Slow
         Network Management Protocol (SNMP) as a standard for
         ULSNET.  All standard Management Information Base
         variables will be specified in Serbo-Croatian and all
         computations carried-out in reverse-Polish.

    (g)  Routing.  Two alternatives are proposed:

              (1) Mashed Potato Routing
              (2) Airline Baggage Routing [due to S. Cargo]

         The former is a scheme whereby any incoming packets are
         stored for long periods of time before forwarding.  If space
         for storage becomes a problem, packets are compressed by
         removing bits at random.  Packets are then returned to the
         sender.  In the latter scheme, packets are mislabelled at the
         initial switch and randomly labelled as they are moved
         through the network.  A special check is made before
         forwarding to avoid routing to the actual intended
         destination.

  CSCR looks forward to a protracted and fruitless discussion with you
  on this subject as soon as we can figure out how to transmit the
  proposal.

RFC 1217 ULSNET BAA April 1991

NOTES

  [1] The Consortium was formed 3/27/91 and includes David Clark,
      John Wroclawski, and Karen Sollins/MIT, Debbie Deutsch/BBN,
      Bob Braden/ISI, Vint Cerf/CNRI and several others whose names
      have faded into an Alzheimerian oblivion...

  [2] Convection Machine is a trademark of Thoughtless Machines, Inc.,
      a joint-venture of Hot-Air Associates and Air Heads International
      using vaporware from the Neural Network Corporation.

Security Considerations

  Security issues are not discussed in this memo.

Author's Address

  Vint Cerf
  Corporation for National Research Initiatives
  1895 Preston White Drive, Suite 100
  Reston, VA 22091

  Phone: (703) 620-8990

  EMail: [email protected]