| As Military Networks become more IP centric, the challenging proposition of maintaining Precedence and Preemption requirements and other Mission Critical requirements can add much complexity to the good virtue of the simple packet forwarding IP network. This paper presents a solution with simplicity as one of its requirement.
This paper first presents a mechanism for conveying the network information to the decision point where it is combined with mission critical information to make decisions. This mechanism shares the approach of ECN (Early Congestion Notification as in RFC 3168) of using the IP header to carry the relevant network information.
The paper then shows how this mechanism is used to build a solution for precedence based admission control and preemption of session based
communication in the Military Precedence and Preemption environment. It builds on the current established internet technology of Differentiated Services, using existing simple building blocks within the Differentiated Services network elements to provide the relevant network information. We provide an example of our solution using SIP for application signaling
in the precedence based admission control and preemption environment.
This solution shows the ease of supporting new Mission Critical requirements when the basic foundation of the packet forwarding IP network
is kept simple, one of the reasons for the success of the current Internet as we know it. This paper applies this philosophy to the Military network. Having the relevant information only in the right place at the right time for making the Mission Critical decisions showcases our approach for handling security requirements, following the ‘need to know basis’ practice of classified military information.
We conclude the paper with some research results on the performance of this solution and mechanism when applied to the Precedence and Preemption requirements. We also provide current status of standardization of this mechanism in the IETF.
|