Modern tactical and strategic forces depend heavily on the reliability and capability of their supporting command, control and communications systems for successful operations. As the electronic battlefield has matured, it has become increasingly difficult to fulfill all the critical requirements placed on the communications system. In the past several years, lasers, millimeter waves and various forms of propagation modulation and signal encryption have been developed to meet these requirements. None have been 100% successful. Early work with a neutron particle beam, however, indicates that there may be a single solution to fulfilling those critical requirements. The special operations communication system (SPOCS), uses a pulse stream of neutrons from a neutron generator as a secure means of communications. The technique applies to uses on the earth's surface as well as in space. The neutron was chosen as the medium with which to transmit information because it is a noncombining neutral particle, and as such, is unaffected by magnetic fields which occur due to the earth's influence, or magnetic fields which are generated in space. It is also unaffected by weather, smoke, blast, emp effects, or electronic countermeasures.
