With the increasing usage of mobile devices for communication, the need for wireless base-stations deployed in strategic locations is becoming increasingly important. The increased bandwidths being transmitted between the base-station and the mobile device has mandated that enhanced transmission formats and techniques be deployed, and, in order to operate correctly, these techniques require a tight synchronization in both time/phase, and in frequency, between the various base-stations serving a general area. Due to the need to establish the geographic location of the mobile device with a high degree of accuracy, it is also necessary to establish the location of the serving base-stations with a high degree of accuracy. The invention disclosed herein provides robust and practical methods for synchronizing base-stations, as well as providing for accurate location, by leveraging the usage of global navigation satellite systems receivers in conjunction with network based schemes for packet-based (time/phase/frequency) synchronization.