Military Auxiliary Radio (MARS)

If you were in the service in "the old days" before Roshan minutes, mobile phones, Twitter, Facetime, Skype, AOL IM, E-Mail, Sniper Hill, and the many other communications devices now available then you may recall the Military Auxiliary Radio System or MARS. Soldiers used to go on year-long deployments (Vietnam and Desert Storm come to mind) and never get to make a phone call. Mail (yes, snail mail) could take months to arrive. However, as cumbersome as it seems looking back, MARS offered quite a morale boost on long deployments. MARS is still around. Read more in "MARS volunteers supporting Soldiers with radio communications", Army.mil, September 30, 2014.