Posted on 06/22/2006 2:41:23 PM PDT by RDTF
Karachi, 22 June (AKI) - (by Syed Saleem Shahzad) - The next terror threat facing the United States is not a nuclear or gas attack but an electro-magnetic bomb or e-bomb - which would shut down telecommunications networks, disrupt power supplies, and destroy countless computers and electronic gadgets, yet still leave buildings, bridges and roads intact. This is according to Khalid Khawaja, a former Pakistani intelligence officer who once worked closely with Osama bin Laden. "The e-bomb shall be the new threat for the USA, not the nukes or gas attacks," said Khawaja in an interview with Adnkronos International (AKI).
Khawaja was a senior official of Pakistani secret service ISI when they were fueling jihadi resistance movements against the Soviets in Afghanistan, and after being forced to retire from the air force, he went to Afghanistan and fought along side with Osama bin Laden. the leader of the al-Qaeda terrorist network.
Khawaja told AKI that he overheard the reference to the e-bomb in several conversations among Arab fighters in Afghanistan over the years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States in 2001.
“I never heard Osama or Dr. [Ayman al-] Zawahiri discuss a nuclear attack on the USA," he said "and neither did I hear that from any other person."
(Excerpt) Read more at adnki.com ...
"Ah yes my good man. However if you were to get a classic thermoheat conducting element, say a beef burrito, and insert an paperclip with 3 plastic coffee stir sticks, ala McGiver, aguh-hey! Then read adjust the osolation point of the thermomanic field, you would effectively create a burratic energy wave that could melt a cube the size of a gorilla." A-hay, ggirva nurf 
The delivery would have to be controlled and positioned precisely, a skill not demonstrated by any third world nuclear power.
Finally, it would have to get off the ground. And, of course, the responsible country would be just as vulnerable to the same sort of damage, plus the more intimate up-close and personal type, delivered courtesy of the Air Force and Navy.
Oh right. We haven't even thought of this possibility. We don't have hardened assets. /sarc
You may be right. However, I find it difficult to believe that the NYSE doesn't have backup computers able to come back on line without enormous delay.
Nope.
I think as a weapons system it is highly over rated – but it does make great headlines.
They do have extensive backup computers and files kept offsite. The delay would be about a day, but that day delay represents a loss of around 1 trillion dollars in transactions that can not be cleared. If after the one day delay you then have a flight to safety, ie. a selloff into cash or bonds or commodities it could be about 5 trillion dollars in capital out of stocks and the market even with the circuit breakers wold drop a bunch.
Terror isn't about real harm its about the perception in the victim's mind and their reaction to it. Kill one terrorize a thousand.
How did you get my picture????
Hmm.. It seems I'm woefully behind on the subject. :-/
Everything old is new again.
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