U.S. Needs To Prepare For An EMP Attack or CME Event

[Knight Templar]

The United States govt. should began immediate preparations for an EMP attack (from a nuclear weapon exploding in space 200 miles or so above the U.S.) and/or a Coronal Mass Ejection event from the sun.

Either could fry electronic devices all across the U.S. (including car ignitions) and leave at the very least tens of millions of Americans dead when the U.S. power grid goes down for years.

A CME has happened before. Less than 200 years ago. Today one would be immensely devastating.

An EMP attack could happen anytime. It would not be difficult at all. Just load a SCUD missile aboard a container ship and launch it into space above the U.S. from offshore.

SCUDs were built specifically to carry early nuclear warheads.

The first stages in preparing for these events would be costly though easily affordable by the U.S. federal govt. One of the first would be ordering replacement transformers for the ones that would be destroyed by either event to speed reconstruction of the power grid. Other steps would be ensuring cities and communities had reliable communications and information available.

It has been estimated that preparing for such events would cost around 10 billion dollars a year give or take. Big money, but more than reasonable within what the U.S. federal govt. already spends annually.

 

[Kemaiku]

Cool story, bro.

 

[BillJ]

Sources?

I saw talk of this on Doomsday Preppers, but they put the cause being a coronal mass ejection causing the disruption with outlandish odds. A nuclear blast two-hundred miles up wiping out the entirety of U.S. electronic infrastructure? I'd bet it would have to be a pretty big blast, mega-ton wise.

There's a story here about it: http://www.wnd.com/2007/09/43455/

But it says that one done with a SCUD would inflict city-wide damage.

A new report says a SCUD-type missile launched from a small ship 200 miles from the coast of the United States could unleash a nuclear-generated electromagnetic pulse over Washington, D.C., that would leave behind $771 billion in damage.

 

[Kemaiku]

Sources?

I saw talk of this on Doomsday Preppers, but they put the cause being a coronal mass ejection causing the disruption with outlandish odds. A nuclear blast two-hundred miles up wiping out the entirety of U.S. electronic infrastructure? I'd bet it would have to be a pretty big blast, mega-ton wise.

The Tsar Bomba (spelled that wrong, I know) is currently the biggest working thermonuclear device, Russia has less than a dozen and although it's 50MT, several miles reducable to nothing in the blast, it can't produce much of an EMP.

The drop off is substantial and renders only something like 30-40 miles of EMP interference. Most of that literally inside the blast zone, which it destroys anyway.

 

[Roger Wilco]

Government issued tinfoil hats for everyone!

 

[Gaseous Anomaly]

Government issued tinfoil hats for everyone!

You have to make your own!

 

[Starkers]

I'm not sure a Scud could go high enough to be honest, it's effectively an artillery rocket rather than a true missile.

Besides all you really need is a Goldeneye satellite...

 

[Caliburn24]

We have have some EMP hardened systems in the military, and the added weight and size of such systems is a pain when you have to work with them day to day. But if the Russians and Chinese are to be believed it won't really matter.

From testimony before the US Senate

Russian and Chinese military scientists in open source writings describe the basic principles of nuclear weapons designed specifically to generate an enhanced-EMP effect, that they term "Super-EMP" weapons. "Super-EMP" weapons, according to these foreign open source writings, can destroy even the best protected U.S. military and civilian electronic systems.

Rather than hardening military and civilian infrastructure against EMP attacks of strengths we cannot predict, I favor stockpiling crucial replacement components for infrastructure around the country, and have a set plan to rapidly repair any damage. DHS is getting 40 billion of our dollars a year, they should already be working on this.

And just on a personal note, vacuum tube based electronics are much more resistant to EMP than solid-state electronics. But I am not giving up my solid state stuff, no sir.

 

[nightwind1]

Government issued tinfoil hats for everyone!

But those won't protect against chemtrails! Or HAARP!

 

[Mary Ann]

Eh, the Lizard People are coming to wipe us all out in December anyway. But if anyone's interested, I have a roll of tin foil I'll sell for £50...just in case.

 

[Amaris]

The United States govt. should began immediate preparations for an EMP attack (from a nuclear weapon exploding in space 200 miles or so above the U.S.) and/or a Coronal Mass Ejection event from the sun.

Either could fry electronic devices all across the U.S. (including car ignitions) and leave at the very least tens of millions of Americans dead when the U.S. power grid goes down for years.

A CME has happened before. Less than 200 years ago. Today one would be immensely devastating.

An EMP attack could happen anytime. It would not be difficult at all. Just load a SCUD missile aboard a container ship and launch it into space above the U.S. from offshore.

SCUDs were built specifically to carry early nuclear warheads.

The first stages in preparing for these events would be costly though easily affordable by the U.S. federal govt. One of the first would be ordering replacement transformers for the ones that would be destroyed by either event to speed reconstruction of the power grid. Other steps would be ensuring cities and communities had reliable communications and information available.

It has been estimated that preparing for such events would cost around 10 billion dollars a year give or take. Big money, but more than reasonable within what the U.S. federal govt. already spends annually.

I'm ready.

 

[Shaytan]

Eh, the Lizard People are coming to wipe us all out in December anyway. But if anyone's interested, I have a roll of tin foil I'll sell for £50...just in case.

Maybe I should tell the space lizards that I'm not free on the 21st of december because they still send me the "11:11 waves".

 

[JustAFriend]

All you could do is kiss your butt goodbye....

a) We have zero technologies to deal with a CME. None. Zip. Nada.

b) NO one ever produced an EMP weapon. The little research done by Teller was stopped. The only knowledge we have of EMP effects is from a couple of space nuke tests in the 60s that only caused minor problems, nothing major.

Hysteria is a waste of your lifespan.

 

[RAMA]

Stopping EMP...if you have warning, unplug your electrical components...simple. Have spare parts for items that might get damaged, EMP isnt going to harm your spare parts. Survivalists have hardened their equipment for years from EMP. They use various methods that can be found online if you look for them. The military hardens itself to EMP to a great degree, there are probably a dozen different ways to do it. This goes for vehicles as well buildings.

Nah Scuds wouldn't do the trick, it would take a very large bomb, and not just a MIRVed warhead, and at the right altitude. Even so, the general area affected would be fairly small.

RAMA

 

[Locutus of Bored]

The only countries that could possibly hope to take out large regions of the US with an EMP attack would be Russia and China, and what would they have to gain? China would be partially disabling and going to war with its single largest trading partner (unless you count the EU as a single entity, who would likely be joining in the inevitable subsequent war effort and would cut off trade as well). Russia and the US don't have a significant amount of trade compared to others (though again, the EU would likely cut them off in case of any such attack, which would hurt them), but the Russians would be equally vulnerable to our retaliatory attack (since there's no way they could disable our entire nuclear force), and would be crippled themselves. What's the point in risking going nuclear for so little gain?

State-sponsored and religiously-motivated terrorism and rogue states like Iran might have the will to undertake such an attack and not care about the consequences, but lack the technology, delivery systems, and warhead-size needed to damage anything more than possibly an individual city or key location at worst. A briefly crippling blow, to be sure, but entirely recoverable in a relatively short time and not damaging to the US military response in any significant way.

 

[Kelthaz]

Dude, the Cold War is over. You can come out from under your desk any time now.

 

[brian577]

Sources?

I saw talk of this on Doomsday Preppers, but they put the cause being a coronal mass ejection causing the disruption with outlandish odds. A nuclear blast two-hundred miles up wiping out the entirety of U.S. electronic infrastructure? I'd bet it would have to be a pretty big blast, mega-ton wise.

The Tsar Bomba (spelled that wrong, I know) is currently the biggest working thermonuclear device, Russia has less than a dozen and although it's 50MT, several miles reducable to nothing in the blast, it can't produce much of an EMP.

The idea is that by detonating it high the in atmosphere the EMP is reflected by the Earth's magnetic field over a much larger area.

But again, not gonna happen

 

[Knight Templar]

All you could do is kiss your butt goodbye....

a) We have zero technologies to deal with a CME. None. Zip. Nada.

b) NO one ever produced an EMP weapon. The little research done by Teller was stopped. The only knowledge we have of EMP effects is from a couple of space nuke tests in the 60s that only caused minor problems, nothing major.
.

They only caused major problems because a great deal of electronics in the early 1960s was still vacuum tube based. Which is 1,000 times more resistant to EMP damage than solid state electronics.

And a huge nuclear weapon is not required for large scale EMP damage. Only about 500 kiloton IIRC and those are a dime a dozen worldwide.

 

[Knight Templar]

It has been estimated that 300-500,000 Americans would be killed in the hours immediately after an EMP attack over the Eastern portion of the U.S.

 

[brian577]

^You seem to be missing the point that no country with the capability would do it.