We are almost a week past Field Day 2025 as I write this. I believe I had a successful Field Day operation as a 1E station (translation: a single transceiver running from home on emergency power). I ran on battery power being charged by solar cells. I was able to have about 7-8 hours of operation (active transmitting and receiving) while I had a total of 11 hours of uptime for the batteries before they were drained. I ran between 10-25 watts and strictly digital since you get 2x the QSO points as you would with voice on single sideband. I operated both FT8 and PSK31–which made me consider something for how points are allocated. First, let me preface this with that I run FT8 a lot. It’s probably my primary mode of operation since I can run it while doing other things in the shack. It’s semi-automated when making QSOs, so the process is pretty straightforward for hams to operate easily. The point allocation for Field Day for the past number of years has been 2 points for CW QSOs, 2 points for digital mode QSOs, and 1 point for SSB phone QSOs. The 2 points for digital and CW are likely an incentive for hams to operate those modes more while voice QSOs are “easier” or at least just needing a mic and your voice. I think that’s where the ARRL may want to look at how points are allocated. FT8 is a weak signal mode (in spite of those running at 100+ watts), so it should be able to pull signals near the noise floor–which is good for operating QRP or if your antenna isn’t the most efficient. That plus the semi-automatic ability to make QSOs, and it makes operating digital modes fairly trivial–versus SSB phone where either you have to work a pileup or squint your ears to hear a station that is right at your noise floor. In my opinion, it’s harder to work SSB phone than it is working digital modes–especially FT8! Now, again, don’t take this as hatred towards the mode. I think it’s great for what it is and how it works. I just think the way points are scored should be based on difficulty. Perhaps it could be allocated as: 3 points for CW (not trivial since you’re having to listen, decode, and transmit on a key), 2 points for SSB voice, 2 points for other digital modes, and 1 point for FT8. I think sending and receiving CW is an art (assuming that folks aren’t using keyboard and computer to decode/encode CW transmissions)–it takes understanding the rhythm of what is being sent and received to complete a contact. I believe both SSB phone and other digital modes (like PSK31, RTTY, etc.) can be put into the same category–like I said, hearing distance voices at the noise floor takes time and patience to pull out their Field Day exchange. As for other digital modes, well, they are still fairly manual. Macros in fldigi and Ham Radio Deluxe help, but you still have to try to pull out the signal from a crowded band or through the noise. Anyway, those are just thoughts about the points. My hope is to make improvements to my emergency power setup and see if I can make my battery power budget go a bit further for next year. Until next time… 73 and GL

The American Radio Relay League (ARRL) is the national association for amateur radio, connecting hams around the U.S. with news, information and resources.

IBM announced the IBM z17, the next generation of the company's iconic mainframe, fully engineered with AI capabilities across hardware, software, and systems operations.

‘I reserve the right to be Jeff Goldberg.’

After the demeaning public treatment of Ukraine’s President by the leader of the Free World on Friday—requiring Volodomyr Zelensky to publicly assent to false descriptions of his country’s plight and then criticizing Zelensky for hostility toward Putin before throwing him out of the White House and demanding an apology—Administration hostility to Ukraine is clear. It was a devastating day for the United States of America. A shameful day. A day that will collapse confidence by America’s friends and give succor to our enemies. Nor was it a moment that can be papered over. Zelensky does not believe he owes the powerful men who humiliated him an apology. Ukrainians are drawing pride from their president’s unwillingness to be bullied by either Putin or Trump. All the President’s Men lined up to blame President Zelensky and defend their favoritism of Russia. The White House organized a barrage of supportive statements from Republicans in Congress. The President’s advocates call for Ukraine’s President to resign for having the temerity to defend the dignity of his country’s sacrifices. All of which disgraces us and none of which can produce the big, beautiful settlement of the war President Trump claims to want. They seem to forget that Ukraine will have to sign the deal, as well as Russia. But Friday was also a devastating day for Ukraine. The United States is the largest donor of weaponry to Ukraine, much of which cannot be substituted by other arms producers. US intelligence has been consequential in Ukrainian military operations and keeping safe Ukraine’s political leadership. American diplomacy has forestalled Russian escalation, possibly including to employ nuclear weapons against Ukraine. American companies—most especially Starlink, owned by Trump favorite Elon Musk—provide communications services not easily replaced. American military forces are considered by Europeans essential for underwriting eventual European military deployments to Ukraine. All of these forms of assistance are likely to cease. The breach with America comes at a very high price for Ukraine. And at a very bad time. The sand is running through the hourglass for both Russia and Ukraine. Russia’s manpower constraints have been relaxed by provision of North Korean troops, while Ukraine has no prospect of internationalizing its side of the fight and has a smaller population base to draw from. Russia can source its artillery from North Korea, its drones from Iran, and its defense industry supplies from China, while Western countries have already provided much of what exists in their inventories to Ukraine and have not shifted their economies to wartime production as has Russia. Most consequentially, Russian strategy has been rewarded for holding out until Western support faltered. There should be no reason to expect Vladimir Putin to compromise on his objective of Ukrainian destruction. Without American aid, Ukraine cannot continue fighting as it has these past three years. They will not have the material basis for their current operations. But that does not mean they cannot fight on. Warfare is about adaptation. Who wins wars depends not just on what they’re fighting with but who they’re fighting with. And after the depredations and war crimes committed by Russia in Ukraine, no Ukrainian government could concede its sovereignty to Russian occupation. Nor has Ukraine been whistling past the graveyard over the past year as Trump and Vance have been diminishing Republican support for aid to Ukraine. Their situation is too dire not to be shoring up their position. Good strategy is about turning fixed constraints into variables, and Ukraine has been building its domestic defense industry to reduce their reliance on outside aid: 90 percent of casualties imposed on Russian forces are now inflicted by Ukrainian-made drones. America’s European allies have also understood that US aid for Ukraine—and probably also for NATO—can no longer be relied on, at least as long as the MAGA movement dominates Republican politics. They quickly rallied support for Ukraine by gathering leaders to surround Zelensky and pledging their support. Whether that political support manifests into taking hard domestic choices by those leaders remains to be seen. But at least they demonstrated American abandonment didn’t leave Ukraine isolated. Ukraine will have to fight a different kind of war without the US. Its cities will experience more destruction and its citizens more civilian casualties without the air defenses the US has provided. They should expect Russian tactics developed in Syria to be employed, such as follow-on strikes at hospitals to maximize casualties. And their military will be subject to artillery barrages they will be unable to counter. But Ukraine has proven incredibly resilient and inventive as they have fought Russia to a near stand-still, and we shouldn’t doubt that they will find ways to exploit Russia’s many vulnerabilities. It will be to America’s lasting shame that we won’t be helping. **Learn more:**Has World War III Begun? | America Opens the Door to Its Adversaries | Why Biden’s Foreign Policy Fell Short | What Trump Doesn’t Understand about the Military