The EMP Threat

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The EMP Threat

Postby nomo » Mon Sep 29, 2008 4:16 pm

Vids: http://raymondpronk.wordpress.com/2008/ ... st-weapon/

Image

Choice article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1218241 ... :c0.228876

Imagine you're a terrorist with a single nuclear weapon. You could wipe out the U.S. city of your choice, or you could decide to destroy the infrastructure of the entire U.S. economy and leave millions of Americans to die of starvation or want of medical care.

The latter scenario is the one envisioned by a long-running commission to assess the threat from electromagnetic pulse, or EMP. The subject of its latest, and little discussed, report to Congress is the effect an EMP attack could have on civilian infrastructure. If you're prone to nightmares, don't read it before bedtime.

An EMP attack occurs when a nuclear bomb explodes high in the Earth's atmosphere. The electromagnetic pulse generated by the blast destroys all the electronics in its line of sight. For a bomb detonated over the Midwest, that includes most of the continental U.S. Few, if any, people die in the blast. It's what comes next that has the potential to be catastrophic. Since an EMP surge wipes out electronics, virtually every aspect of modern American life would come to a standstill.

The commission's list of horribles is 181 pages long. The chapter on food, for instance, catalogs the disruptions up and down the production chain as food spoils or has no way to get to market. Many families have food supplies of several days or more. But after that, and without refrigeration, what? The U.S. also has 75,000 dams and reservoirs, 168,000 drinking water-treatment facilities, and 19,000 wastewater treatment centers -- all with pumps, valves and filters run by electricity.

Getting everything up and running again is not merely a matter of flipping a switch, and the commission estimates that many systems could be out of service for months or a year or more -- far longer than emergency stockpiles or batteries could cover. The large transformers used in electrical transmission are no longer built in the U.S. and delivery time is typically three years. "Lack of high voltage equipment manufacturing capacity represents a glaring weakness in our survival and recovery," the commission notes.

Many industries rely on automated control systems maintained by small work forces. In emergencies -- say, during a blackout -- companies often have arrangements in place to borrow workers from outside the affected area to augment the locals and help with manual repairs. After an EMP attack, those workers would be busy in their home regions -- or foraging for food and water for their families.

The commission offers extensive recommendations for how industry and government can protect against the effects of an EMP attack and ensure a quicker recovery. They include "hardening" more equipment to withstand an electromagnetic pulse; making sure replacement equipment is on hand; training recovery personnel; increasing federal food stockpiles; and many others.

If not, our vulnerability "can both invite and reward attack," the commission's chairman, William Graham, told Congress last month. Iran's military writings "explicitly discuss a nuclear EMP attack that would gravely harm the United States," he said. James Shinn, an assistant secretary of defense, has said that China is developing EMP weapons. The commission calls an EMP attack "one of a small number of threats that can hold our society at risk of catastrophic consequences." The threat is real. It's past time to address it.
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Postby elfismiles » Mon Sep 29, 2008 4:38 pm

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Postby justdrew » Mon Sep 29, 2008 5:08 pm

That would have to be one hell of a bomb to have that much effect. Exaggerations and fear mongering.
That being said, it's possible to build a fairly safe man-portable non-nuclear EMP weapon out of readily available stuff. No-one's bothered. why? Many items have been hardened, no one has any idea how much would REALLY fail, how much protection being inside a building would offer, etc.
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Postby SonOfKitty » Mon Sep 29, 2008 5:31 pm

nomo wants us to bomb Iran. What a jackass!
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Re: The EMP Threat

Postby elfismiles » Tue Dec 10, 2013 4:55 pm

I just posted in this thread (US nearly detonated atomic bomb over N Carolina secret doc) about a conspiracy meme which ties in to the EMP-Terrorism meme and the sci-fi theme of a post-EMP world:

US nearly detonated atomic bomb over N Carolina secret doc
by seemslikeadream » 21 Sep 2013 01:18
viewtopic.php?p=528570#p528570
viewtopic.php?p=528572#p528572

... the gist of which seems to be Dr. Jim Garrow's claim that the intention for the nukes was to use them simultaneously with the "scheduled" solar magnetic pole-shift to create a REVOLUTION style EMP to disable at least America and perhaps the world, a la Snake Plissken in ESCAPE FROM LA:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ed6Yr81jZ6g

See also these RI threads:

extensive exageration re nuke EMP in orbit
by justdrew » 13 Apr 2013 02:40
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=36251

EMP scenario for a novel--written by friend of Newt G.
by pepsified thinker » 07 Jul 2009 01:38
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=24443
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Re: The HEMP Threat

Postby tazmic » Tue Dec 10, 2013 6:00 pm

You need to change the title:

"High-altitude EMP" or "HEMP" is the term used for a nuclear detonation creating large amounts of EMP.

http://standeyo.com/News_Files/NBC/EMP.protection.html

Apparently, in 1989, cars were like Faraday cages - so we could all drive around for a bit looking for food to redistribute.
"It ever was, and is, and shall be, ever-living fire, in measures being kindled and in measures going out." - Heraclitus

"There aren't enough small numbers to meet the many demands made of them." - Strong Law of Small Numbers
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