Battlefield: Air Force Lends Army a Helping

By Guest Column —— Bio and Archives October 26, 2009

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LOGAR PROVINCE – Shoot, move and communicate. That's a Soldier's motto on the battlefield, but without stable internet connection, communication would not be possible. Staff Sgt. Jeremy Emond does his part in aiding Soldiers communicate by providing internet access. "Here I'm supporting the war fighters at ground zero," said Emond.

Although having internet access may not seem to be important, nearly everything from tacking intel reports, planning ops, and tracking troops outside the wire depend on internet connectivity. "Before he came out here the Secure Internet Protocol Router was really slow, and with most of my job I use SIPR," said Spc. Daniel T. Bailey, HHC, TF Spartan intel analyst. "Since he's come, everything has been really fast." Emond is one of nearly 80 Airmen from around the world that deployed to various locations in Afghanistan. "This is probably the most fun I'll ever have on deployment," said Emond. "It's given me a chance to see how the war is being fought from inside a command post." VSNAP is a system developed early this year to provide Soldiers in remote locations with internet connectivity. "It's a great system because the disc can be set up in about 15 minutes and you can probably be passing traffic in half an hour," said Emond. "It can pull power of a running Humvee; you don't even need a generator to operate the system."