EMP Attacks--What the U.S. Must Do Now.

• Author: Handley, John
• Position: Electromagnetic pulse

Among the few Americans who anticipate disasters and plan for their mitigation, Drs. Carafano and Weitz take on a man-made event that could produce a return to the "'new' Dark Ages" resulting from the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) emitted by a nuclear weapon detonated from 40 to 400 kilometers above the Earth's surface.

To illustrate the results of such an attack, their scenario assumes a rogue state targets the United States with a missile strike that would, in sixty seconds, destroy trillions of dollars of electronic equipment and bring down the U.S. electrical grid. The sudden loss of our ability to use or to access electronics, telecommunications, and information technology would lead to the immediate failure of "the energy sector, banking and finance, petroleum and natural gas, transportation, food services, water, emergency services, and space systems." Damage to onboard computers would immobilize the rail system, ground air traffic, and disable 130 million cars, 90 million trucks, and farmers' harvesting equipment, leaving food to rot in the fields since harvesting equipment no longer worked and the transportation system, both truck and rail, no longer functioned. Without access to the banking system, the U.S. would become a barter nation overnight. Lacking food, potable water, access to emergency services, and energy, millions would soon die. Those are only a sample of the results.

A decade-long study by the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse Attack has done little more than affirm that an...