Military operations in Iraq have been a good source of revenue for satellite operators, network providers and equipment manufacturers for several years, and as President Obama sets his date for pulling U.S. troops out of the country, the talk among the satellite sector is what this means for capacity demand in Iraq and the rest of the Middle East region.

The removal of many U.S. troops may mean that the Pentagon will not need as much bandwidth in the region, but there will be plenty of other government and private organizations eager to take over the capacity. Any unused satellite capacity will be in demand by government organizations tasked with rebuilding Iraq, private companies ready to rebuild businesses as the country recovers and others – and there is  no guarantee that the U.S. military won’t continue to be a heavy user of satellite bandwidth in the Middle East for years to come.

With hardly any terrestrial infrastructure in place, Iraq will continue to use all the satellite capacity that can be found, regardless of whether the need is for military operations or peacetime rebuilding efforts, and as the country is rebuilt, that capacity will be taken over for daily business operations and for the use of a grateful population eager to return to some sense of normalcy.