a duplex laser communication transceiver , and a method for its operation , in which the effective rates of data transmission on a transmit laser beam are adaptively controlled in response to detection of the instantaneous power of a receive laser beam . variations in laser beam power caused by atmospheric turbulence are sensed in the transceiver , and effective data transmission rates are controlled appropriately to avoid or minimize data errors . data bits input to the transceiver for transmission are stored in a data buffer ; then retrieved at a rate that is varied in accordance with the instantaneous power . the transmit data rate is decreased or suspended when the laser beam power is low , and increased again when the laser beam power is high . data signals recovered from the receive laser beam are also buffered , to obtain an output data stream at a uniform rate .