--information relating to the Mid East and Eastern Europe available on SW

Last updated 1999/03/25
What one thing did more for SW in the last 25 years than any other event? If you said the 1991 Gulf War you would be right. SW allows the average Joe to find out what is really happening in unusual international event situations, and now that we have an on again/off again 'shooting' war, the past 'flare up' with the US bombing Sudan, and the dramatic demonstration that countries need to develop other methods of conflict resolution than killing innocent people (sorry -- couldn't resist the political comment!) in the former Yugoslavia to keep our interest in the SW media.

The present 'crisis' keeps heating up and cooling off, at somewhat unpredictable intervals, and the only way to reliably keep up with things when the dometic media is more interested in 'sex lies and little blue dresses' or what the latest greatest B2b bomber has done in its flight from Outer Frostbite MN on its way to Kosovo, is the international media.

In the mean time, as we have said repeatedly, you can wager that this isn't over, and these area of the world will continue to be worth watching!

Below are some links to East Europe and the Mid East SW Broadcasters' schedules, but you should also be aware that one of the most interesting 'primary' sources of information is also available on SW, and on SW only -- aircraft and other military coms.
If you have a radio capable of receiving Upper Sideband you have what you need to monitor this kind of transmission. Try the following frequencies first: 

Air Mobile Command (Air Force) frequencies:
Freq (kHz)        Freq (kHz)        Freq (kHz)        Freq (kHz)
4724              8968              10780             13200
                  8992              11176*
6712              9016              11244             15016
6739              9023              11271
                  9037                                17976

Navy High Command voice frequencies:
Freq (kHz)        Freq (kHz)
6697              11267

Also, during the Gulf War, the Military airlift command frequency
of 14.606 saw a bit of use.

According to Chuck Ripple on the east coast
"8.992 and 9.016 was pretty busy last night when I checked (12/November/1998)"
so it appears that despite claims that the HF comms would be less this time
around are not coming to fruition....
While a lot of military traffic has gone 'on the birds' since 1991, when satellites fail or when redundancy is desired, they fall back to the 'tried and true' HF channels listed above. The 11176 kHz channel has seemed the most active, and frequently has activity 'in the clear' (unencrypted) during the East Coast daytime.

Another possibility is that the military wants to keep some of this traffic on HF and in the clear just to let the other side know that it isn't sitting doing nothing. Intimidation effects you know.

Give a listen and tell us what you are hearing in

  • our local discussion group!

    Here are some links to the schedules of SW Broadcasters from the Mid East who broadcast in English. (There are some that only use Arabic....) and also a couple to some of the more directly related Eastern European broadcasters as well: (Use your browser's "back" button (the left arrow in LYNX) to return here)

    Here are some links to the schedules of SW Broadcasters from elsewhere but who usually have lots of coverage of events in the Mid East. These too are English language broadcasts. (again, use your browser's "back" button (the left arrow in LYNX) to return here:



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