Reevaluating Our Comms Plan

Since post my last post Baofengs In War something has kinda bothered me.

Now remember I’m just armchair quarterbacking this and obviously I am probably only get 1/100th of what’s going on in the Ukraine war.

The Ukraine and the Russians and BOTH running Baofengs. So why are we not hearing about troops being killed everytime they key up this unsecure analog radio?? I’ve looked and looked and have so far have not found one account of anyone getting a missile shoved up their ass. Now I’ve seen both sides get killed over their cell phones (take note).

We know Russia has a huge EW element but for some reason hasn’t deployed it much. The Ukraine is getting real time intelligence from the U.S. Still no one is getting killed for keying up that simple Baofeng radio.

Could it be that using an unsecure analog radio isn’t as big as a threat as we thought?? I’m starting to think it is not…. sorta

Don’t get me wrong a DMR, P25, DPMR radio is ALOT more secure than a standard analog radio. If you have already gone this route then you are already ahead of the game. This is for the people still working on their comms plan or just have a Baofengs in their group.

Let’s just look at a team in a urban area where the power is still on. You have your normal FM radio stations running. You have LEO radios on their frequencies. You have local businesses on their frequencies. You have the hospital on their frequencies. You have the transportation dept on their frequencies. You have locals on FRS/GMRS frequencies. You have the internet of things on their frequencies. You have HAMS in their frequencies.

So with all that traffic do you think anyone is going to notice your 30 second message you sent to a team member using your Baofeng and a tablet running ANDFLMSG?? I seriously doubt it.

Now on the flip side if you are a small guerrilla group in a rural area with a zero RF in that area and are being pursued by a nation state that is flying a SIGINT plane over head or using HawkEye 360 to catch you slipping you may want to be leary of keying up that radio no matter what kind of radio it is.

So where am I going with all this?

I know alot of people don’t have the money for an Anytone AT-D878UV or similar digital radio. Lots of people just won’t spend that kind of money on a radio even if it will basically triple their security.

I think 90% of the people could get by with a standard Baofeng UV-5R, a yagi antenna, and a tablet running ANDFLMSG. You need to have an SOI. Follow your SOI. Transmit only when needed and make it as short as possible. Lower your RF signature. You need to use brevity codes or one time pad. Don’t just give information away. Make the enemy work for it.

Yagi antenna should be a team’s primary antenna not secondary antenna.

No one is going to hit you with a missile or DF you within a 30 second transmission (unless its a nation state that is specifically targeting you and your group)

Having said that remember analog radio are EASY to intercept. My Uniden BCD436HP does this at amazing speeds when connected to an outdoor antenna at 20 ft. Thats where the brevity code or OTP comes in along with the tablet doing a 30 second data burst.

If you don’t want to go with a Baofeng and tablet you could also use Meshtastic which is 256 AES encryption and really cheap. Just make sure you use a tablet for your messaging device and not your phone. Also I would have multiple nodes to put up around your area to make sure you have full coverage. GoTenna would be another mesh network option as well.

I want the take away from this article to be a positive one. I want you to know that even if you can’t afford a high end radio you can have fairly secure comms as long as you put in the work. I want you to get out there and put the information I put out into practice. See if I’m wrong or right. If I’m wrong I have no problem accepting that.

May 28th and 29th is my Guerrilla Comms Weekend here in SW Wyoming. It will be TacComms on the 28th and HF Operations on the 29th. We will be putting much of this into practice. If you are interested in signing up email me at johny1time@protonmail.com

The time to get training is running short and you don’t want to have to learn this when things go hot.