This is driven by the proliferation of nuclear weapon capabilities and the attractiveness of nuclear weapons as an offset to U. These include the shift to commercial-off-the-shelf COTS based electronics, aging of key systems, the growing reliance on historically "soft" C4ISR2 assets, the general neglect of nuclear hardening as a requirement, and the general neglect of nuclear environments as a factor in gaming and exercises.
The bottom line is that commanders and planners cannot be assured that today's weapons platforms, command and control C2 , intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance ISR , and associated support systems will be available should a nuclear detonation occur. Underground testing of nuclear devices done in at the Nevada Test Site were designed to research protection techniques to harden military systems against HEMP effects resulting from a nuclear exchange.
Since then, testing to calibrate the effects of large-scale HEMP on the critical infrastructure has been restricted. The design of new simulators to help measure these effects would call for complex computations to represent the large number of possible interactions between components found in the circuit boards, network connections, wireless systems, hardware modules, and operating environments of modern electronic systems that support the critical infrastructure.
Weapons now being developed by the U. Other HPM weapons being tested by the military are portable and re-usable through battery-power, and many are effective when fired miles away from a target.
These weapons can also be focused like a laser beam and tuned to an appropriate frequency in order to penetrate electronics that are heavily shielded against a nuclear attack. The deepest bunkers with the thickest concrete walls reportedly are not safe from such a beam if they have even a single unprotected wire reaching the surface. During the Cold War, the US Military designed an innovative communications system to relay emergency messages between strategic military areas in the continental United States, using signals that travel by means of low frequency ground waves—electromagnetic fields that hug the ground—rather than by radiating into the atmosphere.
However, the hardware was reportedly transistor based, leaving the system with some level of vulnerability to EMP. In addition, the fixed locations of GWEN sites were known to adversaries, and thus vulnerable to direct attack. As the Cold War ended, the U. Reportedly, several potential U. In , Iran reportedly acquired several medium and intermediate-range ballistic missiles from North Korea, with a range of 2, miles.
While these explosions could have been the result of a missile self-destruct mechanism, Iran has officially described the tests in as fully successful. It was noted by witnesses at a hearing of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security, that this event could indicate that Iran may be practicing for the execution of an HEMP attack.
However, other observers caution that these and similar actions might simply be a scare tactic used by Iran, but without much substance. A discussion of asymmetric warfare and anti-satellite weapons, at a June 25, , hearing by the House Armed Services Committee, included the possible example of the United States being targeted for attack by China using EMP. The report also noted that China's leaders view offensive counter space weapons and other space-based defense systems as part of inevitable scenarios for future warfare.
Also, China may replace 20 of its current ICBMs with a longer-range missile by the end of this decade, or sooner. Since then, Russia has reportedly made extensive preparations to protect their infrastructure against HEMP by hardening both civilian and military electronic equipment, and by providing continuous training for personnel operating these protected systems.
What is the United States doing to protect critical infrastructure systems against the threat of electromagnetic pulse? What is the appropriate response from the United States to a nuclear HEMP attack, where there may be widespread damage to electronics, but relatively little, or possibly no loss of life as a direct result? After experiencing a HEMP effect, the United States may retain its capability to use strategic weapons for nuclear retaliation, but will the U.
During such time, would the United States be capable of a making an effective response should other nations chose to make military advances in other parts of the world? A large percentage of U. However, some observers believe that possible HEMP and HPM vulnerabilities of military information systems are outweighed by the benefits gained through access to innovative technology and increased communications flexibility that come from using state-of-the-art electronics and from maintaining connections to the civilian Internet and satellite systems.
However, the application of the results of these studies has been uneven across military weapons and communications systems. Some analysts argue that U. Some analysts reportedly state that limited testing has shown modern commercial equipment may be surprisingly resistant to the effects of electromagnetic pulse, and some military systems using commercial equipment have been retrofitted to increase resistance to EMP. As part of its risk analysis mission, the Department of Homeland Security DHS has developed a set of 15 National Planning Scenarios, which depict a diverse set of high-consequence threat scenarios of both potential terrorist attacks and natural disasters.
These 15 scenarios are designed to focus contingency planning for homeland security preparedness work, at all levels of government, and with the private sector.
These scenarios form the basis for coordinated federal planning, training, exercises, and grant investments needed to prepare for emergencies of all types. A single nuclear device exploded at an appropriate altitude above the continental United States could possibly affect our industrial capacity, economic stability, and military effectiveness.
Does knowledge of this vulnerability, combined with the proliferation of nuclear technology, provide a new incentive for potential adversaries to develop or acquire a nuclear weapons capability? Will countries now view the development and acquisition of nuclear weapons, even a small arsenal, as a strategy for cyber warfare? During the Cold War, a HEMP attack was viewed as the first step of a nuclear exchange involving many warheads, but the threat of mutually assured destruction provided a lasting deterrent.
Today, the proliferation of nuclear technology makes the threat of HEMP attack more difficult to assess. Would the leader of a rogue state be motivated to use a small nuclear arsenal to launch a crippling HEMP strike against the United States, with no resulting fatalities, if it believed the U. Would a HEMP strike over a disputed area during a regional conflict be seen as a way to defeat the communications links and network centric capability of the U.
A smaller-scale HPM weapon requires a relatively simple design, and can be built using electrical materials and chemical explosives that are easy to obtain. One device was developed that could be broken down into two parcels so it could be shipped by regular mail, for example, from one terrorist to another.
The second HPM device was constructed to fit inside a small vehicle. It is difficult to assess the threat of a terrorist organization possibly using a smaller-scale HPM weapon against the United States critical infrastructure. It could be argued that an HPM bomb by itself, may not be attractive to terrorists, because its smaller explosion would not be violent enough, and the visible effect would not be as dramatic as a larger, conventional bomb.
Observers have reported that the leadership of some terrorist organizations may increasingly become aware of the growing advantages from an EMP attack launched against U. In addition, the use of a new weapon directed at U. HEMP and HPM energy weapons primarily damage electronic systems, with little or no direct effect on humans, however, these effects may be difficult to limit or control.
As HEMP or HPM energy fields instantly spread outward, they may also affect nearby hospital equipment or personal medical devices, such as pace-makers, or other parts of the surrounding civilian infrastructure. The deadline for the submission of the final report of the Commission has been extended to November 30, Michael Sirak, "U.
Daniel G. William Graham, et al. Military and Civilian Infrastructure , October 7, A nuclear explosion produces gamma rays, which interact with air molecules in a process called the Compton effect. Electrons are scattered at high energies, which ionizes the atmosphere, generating a powerful electrical field. This EMP effect is strongest at altitudes above 30,m, and lasts so briefly that current cannot start flowing through a human body to cause harm to people. For example, microwaves with wavelengths about 5.
A Flux Compression Generator consists of explosives packed inside a cylinder, all of which is contained within a cylindrical copper coil structure. The explosive is detonated from rear to front, causing the tube to flare in a wave that touches the copper coil, which produces a moving short circuit.
This compresses the magnetic field and creates an electromagnetic pulse that is emitted from the front end, which is then directed by a special focusing antenna.
Kenneth R. Timmerman, "U. Experts may disagree on whether the damaging effects of HPM actually diminish following the familiar inverse-square-of-the-distance rule.
Some experts state that the severity of HEMP effect depends largely on the bomb design, so a specially-designed low yield bomb may pose a larger HEMP threat than a high yield bomb. EMP Threats to the U. Electrical systems connected to any wire or line that can act as an antenna may be disrupted. Kilovolts per meter is the standard measure for describing the strength of an EMP field.
In layman's terms, the statement that a Russian Super-EMP weapon could generate kilovolts per meter means that a conductive object exposed to the EMP field will experience a surge of , volts for every meter of its length. So if the object is 2 meters long, it gets , volts. If 3 meters long, it gets , volts, and so on. Stephen Shankland, Rackable's portable data center goes on sale, CnetNews.
Instant Access Networks, LLC, provides a commercial off-the-shelf, portable data center that meets or exceeds military specifications for EMP protection.
Charles Manto, et al. Admiral Richard W. Joseph Farah, Iran plans to knock out U. Why, after obtaining a nuclear weapon, would they not simply use the blast to kill hundreds of thousands of people directly?
Franks argued that the American dependence on modern technology poses a unique vulnerability enemies might exploit, unlike the common vulnerability every human being has to their flesh being disintegrated by fire and heat. High-altitude nuclear EMPs were discovered as part of the atmospheric Operation Fishbowl testing series in The electromagnetic pulse was far-reaching, shutting down some streetlights in Oahu almost miles away from the detonation.
The partial test ban treaty of meant that the Fishbowl series were the last live explosion high-altitude tests by the United States, but the potential of using a nuclear weapon blown up high in the sky to disable electronics became a dedicated part of nuclear war planning for ever afterward. By the s, EMP effects were fully incorporated in the U. In response, Richard Garwin, who in wrote one of the first theoretical papers at the Los Alamos National Laboratory on the origin of EMPs from nuclear explosions, sought to dispel the unique fear of EMPs in a letter to the editor published by the Times.
This hardening included the communication links for the nuclear chain of command and the hardening of the silos and aircraft themselves against the dangerous effects from the pulse. That some electronics would fail in the event of a high-altitude EMP attack on the United States did not mean that the whole of the nuclear enterprise would be rendered inert, no matter how many hyperbolic pronouncements claimed it would be a Pearl Harbor-style event.
That arsenal, now Russian, remains the primary concern of nuclear forces. Russia, like the United States, maintains a standing arsenal of over 1, deployed nuclear weapons. The destruction to electronics, as in Hiroshima, would be a very low-level concern compared to the charred bodies of children and cities on fire.
For the rest of the nuclear-armed world, with total arsenals estimated at between 35 to warheads, using one of them for an EMP effect makes even less strategic sense. What is known about nuclear weapons is the damage they cause to people, to cities, and to physical objects from physical force.
These are the effects that haunt our understanding of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A nuclear blast is an unsubtle form of harm. Focusing on EMPs outside the context of a broader nuclear war assumes a wholly unique strategic calculus, one that sits outside any understanding of war or even terrorism. It ascribes nearly supernatural powers to electronics and the threatened loss thereof.
And it assumes that detonating a nuclear weapon in orbit over a country would not be met with the same immediate and hostile reaction as detonating a nuclear weapon in a city. To fear the EMP is to look at the vast military strength of the United States, and see, as Franks did, that strength as a surrogate for a unique vulnerability.
It is perverse and irrational, and it is assuredly not necessary or foreordained. That is a lot to unpack, but it is emblematic of the public fight over EMPs. There is nothing uniquely American about not wanting to die in a fiery inferno.
But there was, at least for a time, an idea that alone among nations, the United States would be unable to function without telephone lines or a functioning power grid. They also include a large number of military situational awareness satellites and the International Space Station. Four years ago, DTRA rounded up research into 16 high-altitude nuclear detonations during the Cold War that damaged or destroyed at least eight satellites.
While most low-earth-orbit satellites would avoid being immediately knocked out by an EMP, the presence of radiation exposure over the long term is a "serious long-term hazard" that "could seriously hamper any war effort, particularly in remote regions ," the agency noted in a report. Little is known about effects of EMP at higher altitudes, above or so, or below 60 miles.
For a ballistic missile defense system that successfully strikes and detonates a nuclear ICBM at high altitudes, "strategies may risk being designed on the basis of inappropriate levels of nuclear effects, at least for detonations in the upper half of the mid-course battle space," the report added. At high orbits, spy satellites from the National Reconnaissance Office, military communications satellites, and ballistic missile detectors — plus the Global Positioning System — are already heavily shielded from radiation.
Radiation injected by a weapon at high orbits would also decay within days instead of years like in low orbits, lessening the effect further. There are several things you could do to make satellites more survivable, though. The risk of starting Armageddon is still the same. What makes EMP so different? First published on Medium. Shusha was the key to the recent war between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
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