Posted on 06/18/2012 3:33:12 PM PDT by Iam1ru1-2
Dr. Peter Vincent Pry is the Executive Director of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security for the Congressional Caucus on EMP (Electro-Magnetic Pulse) that endeavors to carry on the work of the EMP Commission. He is also the Director of the United States Nuclear Strategy Forum, an advisory body to Congress on policies to counter weapons of mass destruction.
Dr. Pry has served on the staffs of the EMP Commission, the Strategic Posture Commission, the Commission on the New Strategic Posture of the U.S., the House Armed Services Committee and the Central Intelligence Agency.
For those unfamiliar with what an EMP (Electro-Magnetic Pulse) attack is, please view the segment on the topic from the Clarion Fund’s Iranium by clicking here.
The following is RadicalIslam.org’s national security analyst Ryan Mauro’s interview with Dr. Pry:
Ryan Mauro: How long will it take to get critical infrastructure back up and running after an EMP attack?
Dr. Peter Vincent Pry: Given the current state of U.S. unpreparedness, after a nuclear EMP attack that collapses the electric grid and other critical infrastructures, the U.S. might never recover. The Congressional EMP Commission--that investigated the EMP threat for nearly a decade and produced the most definitive analysis of the threat--estimated that within one year of a nuclear EMP attack, about two-thirds of the U.S. population, about 200 million Americans, would likely perish from starvation, disease and societal collapse. Iranian military writings openly describe making an EMP attack to eliminate the United States as an actor on the world stage.
Mauro: Have past nuclear tests in the air produced an EMP?
Pry: Past exoatmospheric nuclear tests have produced an EMP, such as the 1962 STARFISH PRIME nuclear test. The nuclear burst must occur at high altitude, above 30-40 kilometers, to produce the EMP effect. During the Cold War, the Soviet Union conducted high-altitude EMP tests over part of their own territory that collapsed electric grids. Fifty years of empirical data from nuclear tests and EMP simulators proves that an EMP attack would have catastrophic consequences.
Mauro: How could the U.S. government protect us from this threat? How much would it cost?
Pry: The Congressional EMP Commission produced a plan for protecting all U.S. critical infrastructures from nuclear and natural EMP (such as would be generated by a great geomagnetic storm, like the 1859 Carrington event) that could be implemented in 3-5 years at a cost of $10-20 billion. This would provide robust protection. At minimum, the 300 EHV transformers that service the biggest U.S. cities, where most of the population lives, could and should be protected, at a cost of $100-200 million, or about one dollar for every life that could be saved. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission estimates that the national electric grid could be protected from EMP at a cost to the average rate payer of 20 cents annually.
Mauro: How much dispute is there over the science behind the horrific scenario you depict? A skeptic once sent me a report by Oak Ridge National Laboratories/Metatech about “myths” regarding the EMP threat.
Pry: Among the numerous official Congressional and USG studies on nuclear EMP attack--that includes reports by the Congressional EMP Commission, the Congressional Strategic Posture Commission, the Department of Energy and National Electric Reliability Corporation and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (which includes the Metatech report), there is an official scientific and technical consensus that an EMP attack would have catastrophic consequences. Even the most optimistic "best case" scenario involving a nuclear EMP attack by a primitive low-yield nuclear weapon would be an unprecedented catastrophe and could collapse the national electric grid and other critical infrastructures that sustain modern society and the lives of millions.
Indeed, the entire purpose of Congressional Commissions is to, if possible, resolve controversy and achieve consensus on matters of national security concern. Two Congressional Commissions staffed by our nation's best experts and supported by the vast resources of the defense department, the intelligence community and the national nuclear weapons laboratories have independently arrived at the same consensus that a nuclear EMP attack would be catastrophic--so as a matter of public policy, the existential character of the nuclear EMP threat is not controversial, but an established fact.
There are some individuals, usually in academia, who claim the EMP threat is exaggerated. But these people are not EMP experts and are simply ignorant or politically motivated, as when the New York Times ganged up on Newt Gingrich for trying to warn about the EMP threat during his presidential bid. Nonetheless the press, uneducated about EMP itself, keeps quoting these non-experts.
Nothing could be further from the truth. I know well Dr. William Radasky, the team leader of the Oak Ridge/Metatech report, and he would certainly agree that a nuclear EMP attack on the U.S. would be an unprecedented catastrophe--and this is the conclusion of his report. If you read the report, it warns that an EMP event could collapse the electric grid and other critical infrastructures and require 4-10 years to recover. Can you imagine trying to survive for years in the aftermath of a nuclear EMP attack that deprives you and millions of your fellow citizens of food, water, transportation and other necessities for life? Sounds pretty catastrophic to me.
But it should not take a genius to realize that when a falling tree branch can cause the great northeast blackout of 2003, any nuclear EMP attack would certainly have catastrophic consequences. Iran, North Korea, China and Russia all certainly understand this, as reflected in their military writings.
Ryan Mauro: How far away is Iran and other enemies of the U.S. from having the capability to carry out this kind of attack? Some experts say that Iran would still need a year to construct an actual nuclear bomb after acquiring the necessary highly enriched uranium and would need years after that to develop a nuclear warhead that can fit onto a ballistic missile.
Dr. Peter Vincent Pry: Any state or group possessing any nuclear weapon and any missile capable of reaching an altitude over 30-40 kilometers can make an EMP attack. An ICBM is not necessary. An EMP attack can be delivered by a short-range missile launched from a ship, such as a commercial freighter, operating near U.S. shores. Iran has practiced such a delivery mode. Iran already has missiles, such as Scuds and its Shahab-III, capable of delivering a nuclear warhead.
Officially, the Obama Administration claims that Iran does not yet have nuclear weapons. Personally, I have written several articles warning that Iran might already have the bomb. Our intelligence on Iran's nuclear weapons program is not good. Historically, our intelligence community has a bad record on predicting the advent of new nuclear weapon states and was taken by surprise by the development of nuclear weapons by Russia, India, Pakistan and North Korea.
Supposedly, Iran has been trying to develop nuclear weapons for 20 years, yet during World War II, the U.S. Manhattan Project developed the world's first nuclear weapons using 1940’s era technology in just three years. Why should Iran, with access to the now declassified Manhattan Project papers and copious other U.S. documents on nuclear weapons design and helped by North Korea and others and equipped with modern technology, not be able to accomplish in 20 years what the U.S. accomplished during the 1940’s in just three?
The difficulty of miniaturizing a nuclear warhead for missile delivery is often exaggerated. Pakistan deployed nuclear warheads on its Ghauri missile just one year after its first nuclear test. Israel, according to the respected Wisconsin Project, has developed a sophisticated array of nuclear weapons, including thermonuclear warheads and weapons miniaturized for delivery by missiles and artillery--all without nuclear testing.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ryan Mauro is RadicalIslam.org's National Security Analyst and a fellow with the Clarion Fund. He is the founder of WorldThreats.com and is frequently interviewed on Fox News.
“We’ll jump across some friggin’ kind of wires and fire them puppies back up.”
If Iraq can do it, certainly we can do it: http://iraqslogger.powweb.com/index.php/post/3131/Photo_of_the_Day_Man_Battles_Web_of_Wires?PHPSESSID=c5aa4044714cf600c5a3785c5c8aefed
Good grief, man.
All that technology is documented ad infinitum
If computers and calculators no longer worked, would it take decades to manufacture mechanical calculators while we rebuild. I don't think so.
Most of the monumental works of American exceptionalism (the the Obum wants to take credit for) were built long before the age of computers and microelectronics.
My life has spanned both eras, and I refuse to join the luddites.
EMP has the potential to impact anything with sensitive circuits unless it is shielded by a faraday cage or its electronics are built to be resistant.
Yes, the tech is documented. But you have to have the tools to make the tech, and in case of EMP frying microchips, you need working tech from before the chip era. So, you’re talking mid-1960s tech. Except, to make THAT tech, you need the tools that built it, which haven’t been made or used for a generation plus.
It’s the “chicken or the egg” problem, writ large. . .you need a sufficient base of the machines to build the machines, and enough skilled operators to run them.
Oh. . .and how much of the documentation is physical, and how much was scanned and burned to CD/DVD to save space. . . or merely disposed of, by corporate. . .
Meanwhile you’re fighting to find something to eat. Doesn’t leave a lot of time to figure out how to make a toy.
I need to dust off that list I made of the top 50 targets. Most would need only one; a few might need five.
We have the means.
We can satisfy any and all koranimal death wishes in the world.
Simultaneously.
I am totally confident that we are talking about months, not decades.
With no more worries of any kind about a no longer existing enemy, incredible human resources can be brought to bear.
For just a few million grant money this alarmist will study something and a write a report or something.
“Until half of those with the knowledge die from lack of medicine or bad food. “
We have had major electrical outages many times. Millions didn’t die, riots didn’t destroy cities wholesale, and, GOSH, the electricity came back on. EMP will not wipe out all things electrical or electronic and the limited damage it might do is easily repaired. Besides, the ONLY country that can lob a nuke into our atmosphere is Russia and they’re not exactly aiming to do that anytime soon.
“EMP has the potential to impact anything with sensitive circuits unless it is shielded by a faraday cage or its electronics are built to be resistant.”
No, it doesn’t. That is the biggest line of bullsh*t the urban legend types pass around about EMP. If that were the case then maybe you can explain just how we got all those videos and other electronic measurements long before we even knew EMP accompanied nuclear devices. I thought EMP was supposed to wipe out all things electric and electronic.
This is a case of when not if, in 1859 a solar storm caused an EMP that took out telegraph lines. Big solar storms happen.
ping
Perhaps you can answer a question I have had about an EMP attack:
We have deep underground warehouse complexes, such as SubTerra and SubTropolis in the KC MO area and others in the WV region. It has seemed to me that utilities/factories could store replacement components, even transformers, down there that would protected. Those cave warehouse systems are huge. I have read that in just one of them manufacturers already store 10% of our processed non-fresh food supply. I have also read that DOD uses space in these complexes.
Do you know if anyone is storing components and vital infrastructural parts in such places?
“No doubt. All we have to do is crank up our production facilities, which of course run on electricity. Oh wait...
Hey how about using any left over liberals and chain them to a treadmill?
To cover the whole country with that level of damage, you would need a multi-megaton warhead, detonated from orbit, or several smaller (but still 100KT+) warheads at lower altitude. To accomplish this, we are talking about a major nuclear strike by a major power (Russia or China). The W49 warhead weighed 1,640 pounds. Lofting that payload into orbit is within the capabilities of only a few.
We don't make much in the way of chips in the US right now. Most chips are made overseas (outside the reach of EPA bureaucrats). The equipment we use is mostly made elsewhere. We would have to buy a bunch of stuff and wait for shipment, but it would be there.
ONE of the problems with EMP, involves the way IC chips are made: microscopically thin gold wires connect the actual silicon chip to the pinouts on the IC packaging. Certain types of EMP run sufficient current through those wires to melt them. The chip itself isn’t hurt, but since it’s not connected to the case anymore, and it’s molded and epoxied shut, you can’t break the chip back open without cracking the silicon slab and TRULY destroying the chip. . .
“Certain types of EMP run sufficient current through those wires to melt them”
Those wires are waaaay toooooo smaaaalllll to pickup that level of voltage to generate enough heat to melt the solder. The induction from EMP wouldn’t cause enough heat to matter. EMP also has an extremely short duration, hence long wire requirements.
Peter Pry is on right now on Coast To Coast AM radio show:
http://www.coasttocoastam.com/shows/upcoming
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