The bit error rate (BER) performance of an optical soliton communicati
on system is analyzed. Based on the jitter variance equation and the c
hi-square distribution for the amplified spontaneous emission noise, a
n analytic expression for the BER calculation is obtained. We have inv
estigated the effects of Gordon-Haus fitter which is due to the random
phase shift of the soliton individual central wavelength induced by t
he amplified spontaneous emission noise of the amplifiers. Very good a
greement has been obtained between our theory and the reported experim
ental results.