GPS Guide

With concern to military applications, GPS allows accurate targeting of various military weapons including ICBMs, cruise missiles, and precision-guided munitions.  It is used to navigate and coordinate the movement of troops and supplies.  The GPS satellites also carry nuclear detonation detectors which form a major portion of the United States Nuclear Detonation Detection System.

Accurate and to-date information on the location of the enemy as well as our own forces is one of the most critical information a military commander seeks. In today’s fast paced electronic battlefield such information, if disseminated timely, can act as a major force multiplier. The dawn of the space age has led to the development of several dual use technologies, which find extensive application both in military and civilian fields.

Global Positioning System (GPS) is one such technology. Military forces the world over are using GPS for diverse applications both during wartime and peacetime. These include navigation, targeting, rescue, guidance and facility management. With war clouds looming all over the world, the US led forces are likely to showcase weapon systems, which rely heavily upon GPS for their accuracy and lethality.

Human beings have always looked towards the skies for navigation. Till today celestial bodies like sun and stars are used for finding out the directions. This assumes more importance if you are a soldier moving in unknown enemy territory. The significance of locating one’s position in the world cannot be more important than for a soldier, as this could mean the difference between life and death, defeat and victory.

With the coming in of the space age, mankind has tried to replace these celestial bodies with artificial satellites so that navigation is possible both during day and night. Global Positioning System (GPS) is one such dual use technology, which has found extensive application both for military and civilian purposes in area of navigation and others.

GPS has given military forces the lethal combination of precision strike with adverse weather performance, standoff range, and operational flexibility - all at a low marginal cost.

There are really four things that are extremely important in a GPS system that the military needs it to be:  accuracy, all-weather, easy-to-use, and portable.  The GPS system currently in service meets these requirements fully except for the fact that ultimately it is a system run for the US military and if you happen to be their adversary then you may be in some problem as the power to introduce intentional error in the signal rests with them.

Although the US Department of Defense’s policy of “Selective Availability” (under which intentional noise was added to GPS signals to make them less accurate) has been removed last year, its reintroduction is still in their hands.

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