First Step to Mitigating EMP Threat Is Discussing It.

First Step to Mitigating EMP Threat Is Discussing It.HT: Heritage.
The InfraGard National ElectroMagnetic Pulse (EMP) Special Interest Group (SIG) will host the event “Mitigating High-Impact Threats to Critical Infrastructure” on December 6. The symposium will focus on EMP and other realistic physical and cyber threats to the U.S. infrastructure, as well as ways to address them.

An EMP is created when high-intensity energy is released and trapped in the earth’s atmosphere, resulting in a disruption and destruction of electronics and electrical systems. This occurrence can be created by a solar storm or nuclear detonation in the earth’s atmosphere. Although detonating a nuclear device is a difficult achievement, North Korea has had help in gaining this ability. A nuclear warhead could be delivered to the U.S. via intercontinental ballistic missile or short-range ballistic missile launched from a freighter off the U.S. coast.

In 2012, the Department of Homeland Security admitted that it is unprepared for an EMP.

Not taking the EMP threat seriously could have devastating effects. Disruption of the U.S. electrical grid could result in an “American Blackout” scenario. It wouldn’t take long after an extended blackout for electronic gizmos and smartphones to cease functioning.

The Global Positioning System (GPS) would become irrelevant, and those requiring emergency medical assistance may never receive help. Public services would come to a screeching halt—police and fire departments would not be dispatched to critical localities.

The first step to mitigating a natural or manmade EMP is discussing the threat, such as will be done at EMP SIG’s event next week. Aside from discussions, action to mitigate the effects of an EMP needs to be taken. Developing an EMP threat assessment and implementation plans in the event an EMP ever occurs could yield positive results.

As discussed by James Carafano and Richard Weitz, having a resilient electrical grid, catastrophic planning, and global communication redundancy could all mitigate the effects of an EMP.
Those interested in attending this event either in person or by webcast can do so by going to the information and registration page.


John Collick is currently a member of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation. For more information on interning at Heritage, please click here.

The post First Step to Mitigating EMP Threat Is Discussing It appeared first on The Foundry: Conservative Policy News Blog from The Heritage Foundation.

Report: Pyongyang Developing EMP Bomb technology, could be shared with Iran.

Report: Pyongyang Developing EMP Bomb technology, could be shared with Iran. (INN)

According to French press agency AFP, South Korea's intelligence services claim that North Korea is using Russian technology to develop nuclear electromagnetic pulse (EMP) weapons aimed at paralyzing Seoul's military electronic equipment.

Seoul's National Intelligence Service (NIS) said in a recent report to parliament that the North had purchased Russian electromagnetic pulse (EMP) weaponry in order to develop its own versions of the weapon, for possible use against South Korea.

EMP weapons are detonated at high altitudes to damage computers and other electronic equipment across a very large territory, effectively sending the affected area into the Stone Age without directly killing anyone.


Arutz Sheva analyst Mark Langfan, who has been warning of the EMP threat for a long time, notes that North Korea and Iran have long been cooperating in the nuclear field, and that technology that reaches Pyongyang can be assumed to have reached Iran as well.

Langfan recently predicted that Iran will use an EMP bomb to take control of the Shiite-majority areas of eastern Saudi Arabia where almost 100% of Saudi oil is located.

One Iranian EMP bomb can knock out the Saudi and American defenses in Saudi Arabia, he noted.


Former CIA Director, Ambassador R. James Woolsey, and Dr. Peter V. Pry, warned in a recent article that EMP “is a dimension of the cyber threat that is not usually considered a cyber threat in Western doctrine, but is in the playbooks for an Information Warfare Operation of Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran.”


“Our cyber and information warfare doctrines are dangerously blind to the likelihood that a potential adversary making an all-out information warfare campaign designed to cripple the U.S. electric grid and other critical infrastructures would include an EMP attack.”


The Washington Times reported last week that the commander of U.S. military forces in the Pacific said that North Korea’s KN-08 missile — a new road-mobile, intercontinental-range weapon — is a serious threat with the potential to hit the United States with a nuclear warhead.


The comments by Navy Adm. Samuel Locklear were made as a report provided new details on the six KN-08 missiles — initially thought in 2012 to be mock-ups — that now appear to be hard-to-locate and easy-to-fire mobile intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).


“From a military planning perspective, when I see KN-08 road-mobile missiles that appear in a North Korean military parade, I am bound to take that serious, both for not only the peninsula, but also the region, as well as my own homeland, should we speculate that those missiles potentially have the technology to reach out,” Adm. Locklear said.Carl in Jerusalem has more on this story.