Total Blackout-USAF tests defences against EMP attacks amid fears that ONE weapon could wipe out entire power grid

edOur military forces, bar none, have the capacity to destroy any nation that rises up against us but for one problem it takes command codes to launch which will be rendered useless by a well-placed EMP attack -

While the dangers of an EMP attack are real, that part is actually not true. U.S. links to its nuclear arsenal are just about the best shielded in the world.

And most American submarine launched nuclear missiles would be unaffected by such an attack anyway.
 
TOTAL BLACKOUT:
US Air Force tests defences against EMP attacks amid fears that ONE weapon could wipe out entire power grid

US Air Force tests defences against EMP attacks amid fears that ONE weapon could wipe out entire power grid (thesun.co.uk)
12 Mar 2021 ~~ By Harry Pettit

THE US military is shielding itself from a new type of weapon capable of knocking out entire power grids for extended periods.
An Air Force base in Texas will soon test its systems against a simulated electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack, according to reports.
EMPs use a powerful electromagnetic wave to knock out all electronic devices in its wake, including mobile phones, radar technology are more.
According to US news site NextGov, at Joint Base San Antonio in Lackland, Texas will be among the first Air Forces bases to test EMP defences.
The site needs to do preliminary surveys to design future tests.
The work is in adherence to a Trump-era executive order requiring the military to put more resources into defending against EMP attacks.
A request for quote for an EMP-tailored survey of the a complex at Joint Base San Antonio was issued last month, NextGov reports.
That complex includes an underground pipeline that connects two areas of the base, which house multiple buildings.
It's not clear when the base plans to launch its EMP defence tests, or precisely what those tests will entail.
According to the Air Force request, the tests won't include the use of actual electromagnetic waves.
~Snip~
Trump moved to protect the US from the emerging threat of EMP attacks with an executive order issued in 2019.
The federal government must provide warning; protect against, respond to and recover from the effects of electromagnetic pulses through planning, investment and stakeholder engagement, Trump's directive stated.
"It is the policy of the United States to prepare for the effects of EMPs through targeted approaches that coordinate whole-of-government activities and encourage private sector engagement," the order said.


Comment:
Obviously to the detriment of the U.S. Military Chyna Joey Xi will kill the Exec Order of Trump and place America's National Security in jeopardy.
Our military forces, bar none, have the capacity to destroy any nation that rises up against us but for one problem it takes command codes to launch which will be rendered useless by a well-placed EMP attack - pretty much, I think, reducing us to the level of neanderthals throwing rocks and spears.
The military has been hardening its sites against EMP attack, However, the national grid has never been hardened. As the author has stated one nuclear EMP bomb over America could shut down the electrical grid and put us all into the dark ages.
  • Any electronic equipment that is turned on and unshielded at the time of the EMP is destroyed. That means that complex computer-run systems go offline, like water utilities, internet, hospitals, and food distribution. The circuits inside of your car’s computer instantly melt from the electromagnetic surge.
Good post...
Most of the major bases have auxiliary generation available but even those need to be shielded from an electromagnetic field anomaly.
Conventional generation depends upon the establishment of electromagnetism in the generating assembly in order to push a current forward. Without that magnetism you cannot generate.
 
1. the US will die from within long before any foreign attack
2. who's capable of delivering those weapons? you would need long bombers, yes? so the initial defense would be the Navy, USAF, EWS, AWACS, etc
How about a nuke onboard a satellite?

Satellites make really poor nuclear platforms. They're next to impossible to hide. They can't be re-targeted easily, and they can't be hardened against attack.

They share the disadvantages of missile silos with the impossibility of defending them against attack.
You probably would never have to re-target a nuke onboard a satellite designed to be an EMP weapon.

I am sorry, but you have no idea what you are talking about. Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit. They are rarely geostationary because of the distance involved.
I am aware of that. Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation. For example North Korea could explode a satellite nuke when it was above our nation.

For example:

North Korea Satellite Orbit

Suspect Super-EMP Orbit Over United States​

ByKen J.Updated on04/08/2013
50 Comments

Given the recent nuclear threats from North Korea directed at the United States, the satellite orbital map shown above indicates the track of the KMS 3-2 “satellite” this week from APR 8 – APR 16, which coincidentally just so happens to orbit along the eastern half of the U.S.

Some believe or suspect that this “satellite” may actually be a Super-EMP nuclear device…

No one knows for sure of course, but people like Dr. Peter Vincent Pry with credentials from the USAF Weapons Laboratory believes that North Korea indeed may have the capability or may even posses Super-EMP nuclear weapons.

On December 12, 2012, the Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) was launched into space on a polar orbit, and is said to be an “Earth observation satellite”. The satellite was not placed perfectly and is evidently tumbling every 17 seconds while it orbits the earth. From an EMP nuclear weapon perspective, the tumbling is apparently irrelevant.

The altitude of orbit is approximately 500 km, or about 300 miles, the perfect altitude for EMP detonation for maximum range and damage. Coincidence?
Do you have any clue as to how large this Super-EMP device would have to be to have any effectiveness? Apparently not!
 
Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit.

Absolutely they do. And EVERY red force on this planet (from Red China to ISIS) has intel on what satellite will be where and when.

Because satellites travel according to Newton's well-documented laws, it is very easy to predict with great accuracy where they will be at any given time.

The first thing we did in submarines before coming to periscope depth was consult the documentation to see if we were in the window of Soviet spy satellites.

A geosynchronous nuclear satellite would be twice as useless as one in LEO. They sit out at 36,000 Km, there would have the same, or greater travel time as land or sea-based missiles. Without the advantage of surprise. Detection would be instantaneous.
What sub were you on and when?
 
1. the US will die from within long before any foreign attack
2. who's capable of delivering those weapons? you would need long bombers, yes? so the initial defense would be the Navy, USAF, EWS, AWACS, etc
How about a nuke onboard a satellite?

Satellites make really poor nuclear platforms. They're next to impossible to hide. They can't be re-targeted easily, and they can't be hardened against attack.

They share the disadvantages of missile silos with the impossibility of defending them against attack.
You probably would never have to re-target a nuke onboard a satellite designed to be an EMP weapon.

I am sorry, but you have no idea what you are talking about. Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit. They are rarely geostationary because of the distance involved.
I am aware of that. Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation. For example North Korea could explode a satellite nuke when it was above our nation.

For example:

North Korea Satellite Orbit

Suspect Super-EMP Orbit Over United States​

ByKen J.Updated on04/08/2013
50 Comments

Given the recent nuclear threats from North Korea directed at the United States, the satellite orbital map shown above indicates the track of the KMS 3-2 “satellite” this week from APR 8 – APR 16, which coincidentally just so happens to orbit along the eastern half of the U.S.

Some believe or suspect that this “satellite” may actually be a Super-EMP nuclear device…

No one knows for sure of course, but people like Dr. Peter Vincent Pry with credentials from the USAF Weapons Laboratory believes that North Korea indeed may have the capability or may even posses Super-EMP nuclear weapons.

On December 12, 2012, the Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) was launched into space on a polar orbit, and is said to be an “Earth observation satellite”. The satellite was not placed perfectly and is evidently tumbling every 17 seconds while it orbits the earth. From an EMP nuclear weapon perspective, the tumbling is apparently irrelevant.

The altitude of orbit is approximately 500 km, or about 300 miles, the perfect altitude for EMP detonation for maximum range and damage. Coincidence?
Do you have any clue as to how large this Super-EMP device would have to be to have any effectiveness? Apparently not!
Do you read links? The links I provided were full of info. Just because I am patient I will give you a couple more links.


 
Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation.

Satellites in LEO are anywhere from 200 to 1000 Km above The Earth. According to publicly available data, the optimum detonation altitude from a nuclear EMP is about 30 Km above The Earth. Of course, no one knows for sure, this weapon, unlike nuclear weapons has never specifically been tested. The effect are purely theoretical.

But, even if the optimum altitude is as high as 60 Km, just detonating the satellite in earth orbit wouldn't work. There would still have to be a launch from the orbital platform to the detonation altitude. Also, since satellites are continuously tracking over The Earth, that launch could only occur when the orbital platform is in a specific launch window. It would literally take hours from the decision to launch the weapon to actually launch... unlike missile-based nukes that can be RTL within minutes of a decision to strike. This leaves the nuclear platforms VERY vulnerable to being destroyed prior to launch.

That means that a nuclear EMP weapon is only effect as a first-strike, surprise attack weapon. As someone, very rightfully, pointed out earlier, a nuclear EMP attack from China or another nuclear / space power, would be immediately invoke an all-out nuclear retaliation from us ... targeted at people and cities, resulting in megadeaths. The attacking force couldn't even maintain plausible deniability. We would know precisely where the EMP weapon platforms are and who put them up there.
I suspect one reason Trump created the Space Force was EMP weapons. There may be techniques to disable such weapons.

I doubt that either China or Russia would use such a weapon for a first strike because of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). I am not so sure about North Korea or Iran.
 
So
1. the US will die from within long before any foreign attack
2. who's capable of delivering those weapons? you would need long bombers, yes? so the initial defense would be the Navy, USAF, EWS, AWACS, etc
How about a nuke onboard a satellite?

Satellites make really poor nuclear platforms. They're next to impossible to hide. They can't be re-targeted easily, and they can't be hardened against attack.

They share the disadvantages of missile silos with the impossibility of defending them against attack.
You probably would never have to re-target a nuke onboard a satellite designed to be an EMP weapon.

I am sorry, but you have no idea what you are talking about. Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit. They are rarely geostationary because of the distance involved.
I am aware of that. Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation. For example North Korea could explode a satellite nuke when it was above our nation.

For example:

North Korea Satellite Orbit

Suspect Super-EMP Orbit Over United States​

ByKen J.Updated on04/08/2013
50 Comments

Given the recent nuclear threats from North Korea directed at the United States, the satellite orbital map shown above indicates the track of the KMS 3-2 “satellite” this week from APR 8 – APR 16, which coincidentally just so happens to orbit along the eastern half of the U.S.

Some believe or suspect that this “satellite” may actually be a Super-EMP nuclear device…

No one knows for sure of course, but people like Dr. Peter Vincent Pry with credentials from the USAF Weapons Laboratory believes that North Korea indeed may have the capability or may even posses Super-EMP nuclear weapons.

On December 12, 2012, the Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) was launched into space on a polar orbit, and is said to be an “Earth observation satellite”. The satellite was not placed perfectly and is evidently tumbling every 17 seconds while it orbits the earth. From an EMP nuclear weapon perspective, the tumbling is apparently irrelevant.

The altitude of orbit is approximately 500 km, or about 300 miles, the perfect altitude for EMP detonation for maximum range and damage. Coincidence?
Do you have any clue as to how large this Super-EMP device would have to be to have any effectiveness? Apparently not!
Do you read links? The links I provided were full of info. Just because I am patient I will give you a couple more links.


So tell me, when did any other country develop a yield sufficient to produce an EMP capable of have widespread impact? How can such a heavy payload get on a satellite in orbit?

I was a nuclear weapons officer in the Navy. Your sources are exaggerating the capability.
 
I suspect one reason Trump created the Space Force ..

President Trump didn't 'create' Space Force'. He changed the hierarchy of Space Command, established in the 1980's, under President Reagan, to make it a stand-alone service.

Do you think President Truman 'created' The Air Force in 1947?
 
What sub were you on and when?

USS Nathanael Greene (SSBN 636) Blue Crew -- '77 to '81. -- one patrol TDY on USS James Monroe (SSBN 622).
I was on John C. Calhoun (SSBN-630) for my midshipman cruise in 1980. First midshipman to qualify submarines.

Funny story, sometime in 1980, we were on post shipyard sea trials and we had a group of Midshipmen on board. Apparently, they had laid on quite a few events for them, including a TORPEX and two SSBNs coming together so they could observe a submarine surfacing, something I had never seen in six years in the Navy. We did crash dives and a surfacing broach. All of which was very cool to me. However, none of the Midshipmen on board had any interest in subs, they all wanted to be airdales, so, when they announced things over the 1MC, they just stayed down in their racks.

The old man was so pissed off by this that he ordered the Midshipmen to attend the events.
 
What sub were you on and when?

USS Nathanael Greene (SSBN 636) Blue Crew -- '77 to '81. -- one patrol TDY on USS James Monroe (SSBN 622).
I was on John C. Calhoun (SSBN-630) for my midshipman cruise in 1980. First midshipman to qualify submarines.

Funny story, sometime in 1980, we were on post shipyard sea trials and we had a group of Midshipmen on board. Apparently, they had laid on quite a few events for them, including a TORPEX and two SSBNs coming together so they could observe a submarine surfacing, something I had never seen in six years in the Navy. We did crash dives and a surfacing broach. All of which was very cool to me. However, none of the Midshipmen on board had any interest in subs, they all wanted to be airdales, so, when they announced things over the 1MC, they just stayed down in their racks.

The old man was so pissed off by this that he ordered the Midshipmen to attend the events.

Because all submariners have to be volunteers, I had heard that the sub force really rolls out all stops for the middies when they come aboard.

Is that true?
 
So
1. the US will die from within long before any foreign attack
2. who's capable of delivering those weapons? you would need long bombers, yes? so the initial defense would be the Navy, USAF, EWS, AWACS, etc
How about a nuke onboard a satellite?

Satellites make really poor nuclear platforms. They're next to impossible to hide. They can't be re-targeted easily, and they can't be hardened against attack.

They share the disadvantages of missile silos with the impossibility of defending them against attack.
You probably would never have to re-target a nuke onboard a satellite designed to be an EMP weapon.

I am sorry, but you have no idea what you are talking about. Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit. They are rarely geostationary because of the distance involved.
I am aware of that. Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation. For example North Korea could explode a satellite nuke when it was above our nation.

For example:

North Korea Satellite Orbit

Suspect Super-EMP Orbit Over United States​

ByKen J.Updated on04/08/2013
50 Comments

Given the recent nuclear threats from North Korea directed at the United States, the satellite orbital map shown above indicates the track of the KMS 3-2 “satellite” this week from APR 8 – APR 16, which coincidentally just so happens to orbit along the eastern half of the U.S.

Some believe or suspect that this “satellite” may actually be a Super-EMP nuclear device…

No one knows for sure of course, but people like Dr. Peter Vincent Pry with credentials from the USAF Weapons Laboratory believes that North Korea indeed may have the capability or may even posses Super-EMP nuclear weapons.

On December 12, 2012, the Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) was launched into space on a polar orbit, and is said to be an “Earth observation satellite”. The satellite was not placed perfectly and is evidently tumbling every 17 seconds while it orbits the earth. From an EMP nuclear weapon perspective, the tumbling is apparently irrelevant.

The altitude of orbit is approximately 500 km, or about 300 miles, the perfect altitude for EMP detonation for maximum range and damage. Coincidence?
Do you have any clue as to how large this Super-EMP device would have to be to have any effectiveness? Apparently not!
Do you read links? The links I provided were full of info. Just because I am patient I will give you a couple more links.


So tell me, when did any other country develop a yield sufficient to produce an EMP capable of have widespread impact? How can such a heavy payload get on a satellite in orbit?

I was a nuclear weapons officer in the Navy. Your sources are exaggerating the capability.
Despite your background you seem to be believe that an EMP weapon must be HUGE, POWERFUL and HEAVY.

There haven’t been many tests of EMP weapons so there are disagreements on the size of the weapon but most experts do not believe you must have let’s say a 100 megaton blast.

*****

The most routinely cited estimates come from a pair of assessments put together by the Congressional EMP Commission in 2004 and 2008. The commission had access to classified research and was allowed to conduct some testing of its own in a laboratory environment. Its findings weren’t optimistic.

According to the 2008 report on critical infrastructure: “The cascading effects from even one or two relatively small weapons exploded in optimum location in space at present would almost certainly shut down an entire interconnected electrical power system, perhaps affecting as much as 70 percent or possibly more of the United States, all in an instant.… Should significant parts of the electrical power infrastructure be lost for any substantial period of time, the Commission believes that the consequences are likely to be catastrophic, and many people may ultimately die for lack of the basic elements necessary to sustain life in dense urban and suburban communities.”

The following year, the chairman of the EMP Commission told Congress that the damage in areas within the blast radius would be an order of magnitude worse than what Hurricane Katrina inflicted on the Gulf Coast in 2005—and that a 90% fatality rate nationwide within a year due to starvation and systems breakdown was plausible.
(emphasis added).

Since then, public officials, including a former CIA director, have routinely given credence to the 90% figure. But experts in the scientific community have dismissed this figure, along with a number of other commission findings, as speculative and/or contingent on factors that are basically impossible to model.


********


EMP Threat from Satellites

While most analysts are fixated on when in the future North Korea will develop highly reliable intercontinental ballistic missiles, guidance systems, and reentry vehicles capable of striking a US city, the present threat from EMP is largely ignored. An EMP attack does not require an accurate guidance system because the area of effect, having a radius of hundreds or thousands of kilometers, is so large. No reentry vehicle is needed because the warhead is detonated at high-altitude, above the atmosphere. Missile reliability matters little because only one missile has to work to make an EMP attack.

For instance, North Korea could make an EMP attack against the United States by launching a short-range missile off a freighter or submarine or by lofting a warhead to 30 kilometers burst height by balloon. While such lower-altitude EMP attacks would not cover the whole US mainland, as would an attack at higher-altitude (300 kilometers), even a balloon-lofted warhead detonated at 30 kilometers altitude could blackout the Eastern Grid that supports most of the population and generates 75 percent of US electricity.

Moreover, an EMP attack could be made by a North Korean satellite. The design of an EMP or even a super-EMP weapon could be relatively small and lightweight, resembling the US W-79 Enhanced Radiation Warhead nuclear artillery shell of the 1980s, designed in the 1950s. Such a device could fit inside North Korea’s Kwangmyongsong-3 (KMS-3) and Kwangmyongsong-4 (KMS-4) satellites that presently orbit the Earth. The south polar trajectory of KMS-3 and KMS-4 evades US Ballistic Missile Early Warning Radars and National Missile Defenses, resembling a Russian secret weapon developed during the Cold War, called the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System (FOBS) that would have used a nuclear-armed satellite to make a surprise EMP attack on the United States.
(emphasis added).
 
What sub were you on and when?

USS Nathanael Greene (SSBN 636) Blue Crew -- '77 to '81. -- one patrol TDY on USS James Monroe (SSBN 622).
I was on John C. Calhoun (SSBN-630) for my midshipman cruise in 1980. First midshipman to qualify submarines.

Funny story, sometime in 1980, we were on post shipyard sea trials and we had a group of Midshipmen on board. Apparently, they had laid on quite a few events for them, including a TORPEX and two SSBNs coming together so they could observe a submarine surfacing, something I had never seen in six years in the Navy. We did crash dives and a surfacing broach. All of which was very cool to me. However, none of the Midshipmen on board had any interest in subs, they all wanted to be airdales, so, when they announced things over the 1MC, they just stayed down in their racks.

The old man was so pissed off by this that he ordered the Midshipmen to attend the events.
There were three of us on board. We were on a special Spring Cruise because our school went on the quarter system, so we were off from March to June if we chose, and we did. My roommate and I were asked to go, as we were the top two freshmen, and a third middie was added. My roommate wanted to be an airedale like his Dad, but wasn't physically qualified to be a pilot so he dropped out of ROTC. He is a VP at Bank of America, The other guy became a best-selling author after he graduated and had dropped out also. Being prior enlisted, I didn't have that option. My writer friend and I completed the sub qualification process and he dropped out immediately upon our return to school in the summer. He didn't even stick around long enough to get his dolphins, but he was an incredible friend and writer. I wore my dolphins as my primary warfare qualification until I got my SWO "water wings" as a J.G.
 
So
1. the US will die from within long before any foreign attack
2. who's capable of delivering those weapons? you would need long bombers, yes? so the initial defense would be the Navy, USAF, EWS, AWACS, etc
How about a nuke onboard a satellite?

Satellites make really poor nuclear platforms. They're next to impossible to hide. They can't be re-targeted easily, and they can't be hardened against attack.

They share the disadvantages of missile silos with the impossibility of defending them against attack.
You probably would never have to re-target a nuke onboard a satellite designed to be an EMP weapon.

I am sorry, but you have no idea what you are talking about. Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit. They are rarely geostationary because of the distance involved.
I am aware of that. Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation. For example North Korea could explode a satellite nuke when it was above our nation.

For example:

North Korea Satellite Orbit

Suspect Super-EMP Orbit Over United States​

ByKen J.Updated on04/08/2013
50 Comments

Given the recent nuclear threats from North Korea directed at the United States, the satellite orbital map shown above indicates the track of the KMS 3-2 “satellite” this week from APR 8 – APR 16, which coincidentally just so happens to orbit along the eastern half of the U.S.

Some believe or suspect that this “satellite” may actually be a Super-EMP nuclear device…

No one knows for sure of course, but people like Dr. Peter Vincent Pry with credentials from the USAF Weapons Laboratory believes that North Korea indeed may have the capability or may even posses Super-EMP nuclear weapons.

On December 12, 2012, the Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) was launched into space on a polar orbit, and is said to be an “Earth observation satellite”. The satellite was not placed perfectly and is evidently tumbling every 17 seconds while it orbits the earth. From an EMP nuclear weapon perspective, the tumbling is apparently irrelevant.

The altitude of orbit is approximately 500 km, or about 300 miles, the perfect altitude for EMP detonation for maximum range and damage. Coincidence?
Do you have any clue as to how large this Super-EMP device would have to be to have any effectiveness? Apparently not!
Do you read links? The links I provided were full of info. Just because I am patient I will give you a couple more links.


So tell me, when did any other country develop a yield sufficient to produce an EMP capable of have widespread impact? How can such a heavy payload get on a satellite in orbit?

I was a nuclear weapons officer in the Navy. Your sources are exaggerating the capability.
Despite your background you seem to be believe that an EMP weapon must be HUGE, POWERFUL and HEAVY.

There haven’t been many tests of EMP weapons so there are disagreements on the size of the weapon but most experts do not believe you must have let’s say a 100 megaton blast.

*****

The most routinely cited estimates come from a pair of assessments put together by the Congressional EMP Commission in 2004 and 2008. The commission had access to classified research and was allowed to conduct some testing of its own in a laboratory environment. Its findings weren’t optimistic.

According to the 2008 report on critical infrastructure: “The cascading effects from even one or two relatively small weapons exploded in optimum location in space at present would almost certainly shut down an entire interconnected electrical power system, perhaps affecting as much as 70 percent or possibly more of the United States, all in an instant.… Should significant parts of the electrical power infrastructure be lost for any substantial period of time, the Commission believes that the consequences are likely to be catastrophic, and many people may ultimately die for lack of the basic elements necessary to sustain life in dense urban and suburban communities.”

The following year, the chairman of the EMP Commission told Congress that the damage in areas within the blast radius would be an order of magnitude worse than what Hurricane Katrina inflicted on the Gulf Coast in 2005—and that a 90% fatality rate nationwide within a year due to starvation and systems breakdown was plausible.
(emphasis added).

Since then, public officials, including a former CIA director, have routinely given credence to the 90% figure. But experts in the scientific community have dismissed this figure, along with a number of other commission findings, as speculative and/or contingent on factors that are basically impossible to model.


********


EMP Threat from Satellites

While most analysts are fixated on when in the future North Korea will develop highly reliable intercontinental ballistic missiles, guidance systems, and reentry vehicles capable of striking a US city, the present threat from EMP is largely ignored. An EMP attack does not require an accurate guidance system because the area of effect, having a radius of hundreds or thousands of kilometers, is so large. No reentry vehicle is needed because the warhead is detonated at high-altitude, above the atmosphere. Missile reliability matters little because only one missile has to work to make an EMP attack.

For instance, North Korea could make an EMP attack against the United States by launching a short-range missile off a freighter or submarine or by lofting a warhead to 30 kilometers burst height by balloon. While such lower-altitude EMP attacks would not cover the whole US mainland, as would an attack at higher-altitude (300 kilometers), even a balloon-lofted warhead detonated at 30 kilometers altitude could blackout the Eastern Grid that supports most of the population and generates 75 percent of US electricity.

Moreover, an EMP attack could be made by a North Korean satellite. The design of an EMP or even a super-EMP weapon could be relatively small and lightweight, resembling the US W-79 Enhanced Radiation Warhead nuclear artillery shell of the 1980s, designed in the 1950s. Such a device could fit inside North Korea’s Kwangmyongsong-3 (KMS-3) and Kwangmyongsong-4 (KMS-4) satellites that presently orbit the Earth. The south polar trajectory of KMS-3 and KMS-4 evades US Ballistic Missile Early Warning Radars and National Missile Defenses, resembling a Russian secret weapon developed during the Cold War, called the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System (FOBS) that would have used a nuclear-armed satellite to make a surprise EMP attack on the United States.
(emphasis added).

I disagree. Your links show that in order to be effective, the weapon must have a significant yield. No other nuclear power other than Russia or China has demonstrated the ability to even have weapons much much powerful than those we used in WWII.
 
I suspect one reason Trump created the Space Force ..

President Trump didn't 'create' Space Force'. He changed the hierarchy of Space Command, established in the 1980's, under President Reagan, to make it a stand-alone service.

Do you think President Truman 'created' The Air Force in 1947?
You win. What Trump did was similar to what Truman did. Congrats.
 
What sub were you on and when?

USS Nathanael Greene (SSBN 636) Blue Crew -- '77 to '81. -- one patrol TDY on USS James Monroe (SSBN 622).
I was on John C. Calhoun (SSBN-630) for my midshipman cruise in 1980. First midshipman to qualify submarines.

Funny story, sometime in 1980, we were on post shipyard sea trials and we had a group of Midshipmen on board. Apparently, they had laid on quite a few events for them, including a TORPEX and two SSBNs coming together so they could observe a submarine surfacing, something I had never seen in six years in the Navy. We did crash dives and a surfacing broach. All of which was very cool to me. However, none of the Midshipmen on board had any interest in subs, they all wanted to be airdales, so, when they announced things over the 1MC, they just stayed down in their racks.

The old man was so pissed off by this that he ordered the Midshipmen to attend the events.

Because all submariners have to be volunteers, I had heard that the sub force really rolls out all stops for the middies when they come aboard.

Is that true?

I have to say that's true. I had never seen another time when they laid on special operations for visitors. Not even Rickover got that kind of treatment.
 
I suspect one reason Trump created the Space Force ..

President Trump didn't 'create' Space Force'. He changed the hierarchy of Space Command, established in the 1980's, under President Reagan, to make it a stand-alone service.

Do you think President Truman 'created' The Air Force in 1947?
You win. What Trump did was similar to what Truman did. Congrats.

And yet ... President Trump was excoriated and mocked in the press for doing so. Truman was never criticized for what is, essentially, nothing more than an administrative re-organization.
 
So
1. the US will die from within long before any foreign attack
2. who's capable of delivering those weapons? you would need long bombers, yes? so the initial defense would be the Navy, USAF, EWS, AWACS, etc
How about a nuke onboard a satellite?

Satellites make really poor nuclear platforms. They're next to impossible to hide. They can't be re-targeted easily, and they can't be hardened against attack.

They share the disadvantages of missile silos with the impossibility of defending them against attack.
You probably would never have to re-target a nuke onboard a satellite designed to be an EMP weapon.

I am sorry, but you have no idea what you are talking about. Satellites have a ground track that varies with the orbit. They are rarely geostationary because of the distance involved.
I am aware of that. Are you aware that a nuke on a satellite can be detonated at any point chosen by the controlling nation. For example North Korea could explode a satellite nuke when it was above our nation.

For example:

North Korea Satellite Orbit

Suspect Super-EMP Orbit Over United States​

ByKen J.Updated on04/08/2013
50 Comments

Given the recent nuclear threats from North Korea directed at the United States, the satellite orbital map shown above indicates the track of the KMS 3-2 “satellite” this week from APR 8 – APR 16, which coincidentally just so happens to orbit along the eastern half of the U.S.

Some believe or suspect that this “satellite” may actually be a Super-EMP nuclear device…

No one knows for sure of course, but people like Dr. Peter Vincent Pry with credentials from the USAF Weapons Laboratory believes that North Korea indeed may have the capability or may even posses Super-EMP nuclear weapons.

On December 12, 2012, the Kwangmyongsong 3-2 (KMS 3-2) was launched into space on a polar orbit, and is said to be an “Earth observation satellite”. The satellite was not placed perfectly and is evidently tumbling every 17 seconds while it orbits the earth. From an EMP nuclear weapon perspective, the tumbling is apparently irrelevant.

The altitude of orbit is approximately 500 km, or about 300 miles, the perfect altitude for EMP detonation for maximum range and damage. Coincidence?
Do you have any clue as to how large this Super-EMP device would have to be to have any effectiveness? Apparently not!
Do you read links? The links I provided were full of info. Just because I am patient I will give you a couple more links.


So tell me, when did any other country develop a yield sufficient to produce an EMP capable of have widespread impact? How can such a heavy payload get on a satellite in orbit?

I was a nuclear weapons officer in the Navy. Your sources are exaggerating the capability.
Despite your background you seem to be believe that an EMP weapon must be HUGE, POWERFUL and HEAVY.

There haven’t been many tests of EMP weapons so there are disagreements on the size of the weapon but most experts do not believe you must have let’s say a 100 megaton blast.

*****

The most routinely cited estimates come from a pair of assessments put together by the Congressional EMP Commission in 2004 and 2008. The commission had access to classified research and was allowed to conduct some testing of its own in a laboratory environment. Its findings weren’t optimistic.

According to the 2008 report on critical infrastructure: “The cascading effects from even one or two relatively small weapons exploded in optimum location in space at present would almost certainly shut down an entire interconnected electrical power system, perhaps affecting as much as 70 percent or possibly more of the United States, all in an instant.… Should significant parts of the electrical power infrastructure be lost for any substantial period of time, the Commission believes that the consequences are likely to be catastrophic, and many people may ultimately die for lack of the basic elements necessary to sustain life in dense urban and suburban communities.”

The following year, the chairman of the EMP Commission told Congress that the damage in areas within the blast radius would be an order of magnitude worse than what Hurricane Katrina inflicted on the Gulf Coast in 2005—and that a 90% fatality rate nationwide within a year due to starvation and systems breakdown was plausible.
(emphasis added).

Since then, public officials, including a former CIA director, have routinely given credence to the 90% figure. But experts in the scientific community have dismissed this figure, along with a number of other commission findings, as speculative and/or contingent on factors that are basically impossible to model.


********


EMP Threat from Satellites

While most analysts are fixated on when in the future North Korea will develop highly reliable intercontinental ballistic missiles, guidance systems, and reentry vehicles capable of striking a US city, the present threat from EMP is largely ignored. An EMP attack does not require an accurate guidance system because the area of effect, having a radius of hundreds or thousands of kilometers, is so large. No reentry vehicle is needed because the warhead is detonated at high-altitude, above the atmosphere. Missile reliability matters little because only one missile has to work to make an EMP attack.

For instance, North Korea could make an EMP attack against the United States by launching a short-range missile off a freighter or submarine or by lofting a warhead to 30 kilometers burst height by balloon. While such lower-altitude EMP attacks would not cover the whole US mainland, as would an attack at higher-altitude (300 kilometers), even a balloon-lofted warhead detonated at 30 kilometers altitude could blackout the Eastern Grid that supports most of the population and generates 75 percent of US electricity.

Moreover, an EMP attack could be made by a North Korean satellite. The design of an EMP or even a super-EMP weapon could be relatively small and lightweight, resembling the US W-79 Enhanced Radiation Warhead nuclear artillery shell of the 1980s, designed in the 1950s. Such a device could fit inside North Korea’s Kwangmyongsong-3 (KMS-3) and Kwangmyongsong-4 (KMS-4) satellites that presently orbit the Earth. The south polar trajectory of KMS-3 and KMS-4 evades US Ballistic Missile Early Warning Radars and National Missile Defenses, resembling a Russian secret weapon developed during the Cold War, called the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System (FOBS) that would have used a nuclear-armed satellite to make a surprise EMP attack on the United States.
(emphasis added).

I disagree. Your links show that in order to be effective, the weapon must have a significant yield. No other nuclear power other than Russia or China has demonstrated the ability to even have weapons much much powerful than those we used in WWII.
My links did not show that at all. For example from one of my links:

The design of an EMP or even a super-EMP weapon could be relatively small and lightweight, resembling the US W-79 Enhanced Radiation Warhead nuclear artillery shell of the 1980s, designed in the 1950s. Such a device could fit inside North Korea’s Kwangmyongsong-3 (KMS-3) and Kwangmyongsong-4 (KMS-4) satellites that presently orbit the Earth

Have a good day. I see no good reason to carry on this discussion.
 

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