Interconnecting the Oceans: Progress and Potential for Terrestrial Lightwave Systems and Universal Information Services

This conference will certify that in the near future the oceans will be spanned by lightwave submarine cables in which all traffic will be carried in digital form. It is unlikely that there will be further deployment of conventional analog coaxial submarine cables. As this digital capability is being put in place across the oceans, the terrestrial telecommunication networks of the world will be gradually converted to digital format also. This paper will describe some of these terrestrial facilities in the United States, and how it is expected that ISDN will be widely accepted.