Efficiency of Multiparty Networking Protocols Over Mobile Tactical Radios on VHF Bands

Multiparty routing protocols for resource constraint VHF Mobile Tactical Networks are studied by employing a modeling platform that integrates VHF tactical radio signal measurement data and practical network deployment scenarios. The standard approach of Simplified Multicast Forwarding based on the 2-hop neighborhood information and a typical alternative using 1-hop network clustering are compared to examine their overhead cost and their applicability in the tactical network. It is found that the 2-hop neighborhood information based solution may generate high message overhead when disseminating the link status information. The 1-hop clustering scheme, on the other hand, may require improvement on its packet forwarding efficiency.