Abstract
The primary military value of submarines conies from stealth offered by the opacity of seawater to electromagnetic radiation. This advantage, however, places severe restrictions on submarine communications. Although blue-green light suffers extreme exponential attenuation in seawater, radiation having frequencies higher or lower than those is attenuated at a rate orders of magnitude greater. Noting, as have others, this window in the ocean, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has, over a number of years, been developing the technology necessary to provide laser-based communications to submerged submarines.
© 1986 Optical Society of America
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