![]() In 2004, Russia admitted that North Korea had recruited several Russian nuclear and EMP scientists to develop its attack capabilities. Iran and North Korea are two countries eager to expand their nuclear programs, so they are also threats. For the U.S., the biggest threats would come from Russia, China, and Pakistan. Any nation that has nuclear weapons would be capable of posing an EMP threat to the United States.Ĭurrently, that means any country in the nuclear club could launch an EMP attack. If we set aside an “attack” by the sun in the form of a geomagnetic storm, an EMP would most likely come from the high-altitude detonation of a nuclear weapon. This raises the next question… Who Could Attack the United States with an EMP? Watch this video featuring a retired Navy SEAL for a summary of what would happen should an EMP strike hit the U.S.: George Cotter, the former chief scientist of the National Security Agency, wrote in his April 2015 white paper (titled Security in the North American Grid – A Nation at Risk) that, “ when such an attack occurs, make no mistake, there will be major loss of life and serious crippling of National Security capabilities.”Īnd for good measure, when such an attack does finally occur, FEMA agency administrator Craig Fugate stated that the US does not have the tools required to get the grid back up and running quickly. grid was not a question of if, but of when. General Lloyd Austin, commander of CENTCOM, stated that an attack to take down a major section of the U.S. Their report was called The Report of the Commission to Assess the Threat of the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack.īuy a paperback copy of the Commission’s report. government assembled a panel of scientists (chaired by William R Graham – the premier EMP researcher in the country) from a variety of EMP, nuclear, and national defense-related disciplines to analyze the threat level of an EMP attack. NORAD is the nation’s first line of defense against enemy attack. In April of 2015, the Pentagon relocated the North American Aerospace Defense Command’s (NORAD) computer systems to a bunker buried deep beneath Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado. government to protect itself against EMP attack. The effects could be the same, but there is a growing movement within the U.S. electrical grid (believing a cyberattack is more likely). Ted Koppel, author of Lights Out, considers an EMP attack to be the least likely way an attacker would attempt to take down the U.S. There is no question that an EMP is real and serious threat, but there is a wide variety of discussion on how likely of a threat that it is. Contemporary US society is not structured, nor does it have the means, to provide for the needs of nearly 300 million Americans without electricity. Is an EMP an Actual Threat?Įssentially every aspect of American society requires electrical power to function. If the same event were to happen today, the impact on modern society could be nothing short of devastating. This was at a time when the world was far less dependent on electrical devices, however, so the impact did not disrupt everyday life. In fact, it’s happened before, the most notable time being the 1859 Carrington Event, which filled the sky with a celestial light show – and sent massive currents through electrical wires, destroying telegraph machines. However, non-nuclear directed energy devices and specialized conventional weapons (such as SCUD missiles) could also be used to generate an EMP ( source). The likely threat of an EMP would be from a high-altitude nuclear blast. It causes actual hardware damage resulting in the failure of any unprotected electrical devices. #3 – Protect Vital Electronic EquipmentĪn electromagnetic pulse, or “EMP” for short, is a sudden burst of energy that overloads the fragile components within an electrical system, causing them all to short out.#2 – Have Alternative Communication Plans.7 Things You Can Do to Prepare for an EMP.What Would Happen Long-Term After an EMP?.What Would Happen Within a Week of an EMP?.What Would Happen in the Immediate Aftermath of an EMP?.Who Could Attack the United States with an EMP?. ![]()
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