Posted on 04/25/2005 6:19:49 AM PDT by DJ Taylor
Submarines wouldn't be affected. Tehran would glow for 250 years.
"I think the writer of this article thinks we are stupid"
Agreed. Yet, HE is the one who looks like an idiot to me.
"I guess they are planning to nuke India."
LMAO! Outsourcing terrorist targets? Why not!?
Maybe the Iranians can hire some illegal Mexicans to "do this job that Americans won't do"?
Look up the effects of STARFISH PRIME and ARGUS shots. One over the Pacific and one over the Atlantic.
Both caused lots of EM effects, including disrupting phone service in Hawaii and blowing streetlights. Both not big bombs iirc.
Nobody has done much testing at the altitudes required for EMP because it is too difficult to monitor all the parameters you wish to look at when burning an expensive pit. You need to be 50 to 200 kilometers up and it's hard to find test shots higher than a few k.
Most EMP stuff has been theoretical and backed up by the limited test shots available.
Becasue the Dems and the anti-war luddites would say that an EMP wasn't a true nuclear attack so retaliation is not justified. Retaliation would be a violation of international law, violation of human rights because civillians in Iran would be harmed, etc.
If that wasn't enough, the worst wacko's would claim it was justified for the U.S. imperial hegemony's oppression of middle easterners since Sept. 11 and the U.S. deserves an attack.
These type of profane liberal talking points have been floating around for years. It would be funny though, for the liberal media talking heads on the alphabet networks to be totally frustrated that they couldn't be seen on TV spouting these comments after such an EMP.
they musta watched Ocean's 11 over the weekend.
I don't think it would work, but it would make a great movie.
Just add a few mutated flesh-eating zombies and we have a hit.
Did you ever read on the atmospheric tests our country did in the 50's? We knocked down a grid then and that was during the tube age. Tubes are a lot more resistant to EMP than solid state and even more so IC. It is possibly a real threat, albeit never done in wartime. Whether they can get a big enough pulse in the right area remains to be seen but it could be ugly though probably not the disaster they are talking here.
Tempest has to do with preventing collection of data and voice transmissions and securing communications from eavesdropping - not EMP hardening. DARPANET is not appreciably hardened, this is why we used to have VLF and groundwave comm. The size of the blast does not matter, it is the high altitude placement for max exposure to EMP. Also, most electrical grids and comm are not sufficiently hardened. This methodology has been a part of our strategic offensive planning for years.
I agree with you but would just like to point out the "blast radius" comment is irrelevant to the EMP effects.
The article is sophomoric - it fails on several levels. Not least of which is the fact ALL military-spec systems are impervious to EMP detonations but so are a lot of the major power and communication grids which use shielded Faraday cages and easily-replacable breakers. The ongoing transformation to fiber optics is making these systems much more resistant to EMP effects. Thus, most power and communication networks will be restored within several days at the most and perhaps within just several hours.
Basically, the only long-lasting effect will be on common household goods and motor vehicles. That should make all Americans, including the leftists and Democrats, sufficiently pissed off to approve of complete nuking of Iran.
Sounds like this guy has been watching Dark Angel a little too much.
An EMP burst in the Northeast would mean only one thing too me, that I get to go home early, and watch the news unfold as Iran has just added itself to the list of countries destroyed and conquered. It will not prevent me from taking the family out to eat that night, or buying a used car. In other words the Mullah's would have signed their death warrant because they thought they could destroy the American society.
| Test: | Starfish Prime |
|---|---|
| Time: | 9:00 9 July 1962 (GMT) |
| Location: | Johnston Island |
| Test Height and Type: | Thor Missile Airburst; 248 miles |
| Yield: | 1450 kt |
| Device Diameter (inches): | 20 |
|---|---|
| Device Length (inches): | 54.3 |
| Device Weight (lb.): | 1665 |
This was the second attempt to launch the Starfish test. The original Starfish was launched on 20 June, but the Thor missile engine cut out only 59 seconds after launch. The range safety officer sent the destruct signal 65 seconds after launch, and the missile was destroyed at 30-35,000 ft. The warhead high explosive detonated in 1-point safe fashion, destroying the warhead without producing nuclear yield. Large pieces of the missile fell back on Johnston Island, and more wreckage along with plutonium contamination was found on nearby Sand Island.
Starfish Prime was successful. The Thor missile carried the test instrumentation and the W-49 warhead/Mk-4 RV payload to 248 miles. The test appeared quite spectacular from Hawaii (800 miles away) and at Kwajalein (1600 miles away), with impressive light displays from an artifical aurora lasting up to seven minutes. The electromagnetic pulse (EMP) from this test sent power line surges throughout Oahu, knocking out street lighting, blowing fuzes and circuit breakers, and triggering burglar alarms.
The W-49 warhead used in this test was used on the Thor, Atlas, Jupiter, and Titan missiles, and was a descendant of the versatile Mk-28 thermonuclear bomb.
it isnt wipe us out, but it would play havoc with power, telephones, satellites and TV signals....
EMP pulses are a quick way to hurt your enemy, but while it would hurt us, Iran would be gone about 30 minutes later...
From Iran a Scud could not reach Israel. As for the hybrid missiles from N Korea,going over the pole they can barely reach Seattle. Iran is not in a geographic location to utilise the pole, and the NK missile could not reach mid atlantic let alone the USA.
He's not talking about a surface burst, he's talking about a high atmospheric airburst. In the right area, it would cause a lot of problems.
Target: Oil fields of Saudi Arabia.............
Well,
NYC isn't the entire world, but significant damage would occur. Many business have moved out after 9/11, or at least have built disaster recovery sites in case of such scenario.
It's time the world realize that NYC is a disaster waiting to happen... It's a sitting duck, a relatively easy target...
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