Do you know that one missile, properly targeted, could degrade
the electronic grid of the entire continental United States?
Do you also know that even North Korea has weapons capable of doing
this?
Here's how it would work. Rather than target the warhead at land,
enemies deliver their payloads from 25 to 300 miles above the
Earth's surface. There, radiation from a nuclear explosion would
interact with air molecules to produce high-energy electrons that
speed across the earth's magnetic field as an instantaneous,
invisible electromagnetic pulse. Such an explosion would release a
pulse strong enough to disrupt power grids, electronic systems and
communications over the lower 48.
The United States never has prepared for this threat because
experts long assumed it wouldn't matter. An EMP attack, the theory
goes, would come as a precursor to a full-scale nuclear exchange
with our Cold War nemesis, the Soviet Union. At that point, the
state of the power grid would be the least of our problems.
But today, we must consider a giant electromagnetic pulse (EMP) a
significant threat on its own. The congressional Commission to
Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse
Attack, calls EMP "one of a small number of threats that has the
potential to hold our society seriously at risk and might result in
defeat of our military forces." A scientist who has studied the
issue says an effective EMP attack could set back countries
dependent on 21st century technology by 100 years or more.
The commission's report stressed that the United States needs to
figure out who, among both states and non-state actors, is capable
of launching such an attack. Also, we need to know where we are
most vulnerable, how we'd recover from such an attack and what it
would take to protect our military and civilian systems.
Our military needs to retrofit some equipment to resist such
attacks and insist that more new purchases come EMP attack-proof.
Of course, the best defense against an EMP attack would be an
effective missile-defense system that intercepts the missile before
it reaches the United States.
It won't be easy, and it will be costly. Protecting electronics
infrastructure requires that entire systems be encased in a
metallic shield. Antennas and power connections must be equipped
with surge protectors, windows must be coated with wire mesh or
conductive coating and doors must be sealed with conductive
gaskets.
Fiber optic cable is not vulnerable to EMP, so it's in our interest
to replace as much copper cable with fiber optic as possible. We
also need to protect the switches and controls that guide
microelectronics in conjunction with fiber-optic cable.
In the future, such protections can be engineered into these
products and structures, at an added cost of 1 percent to 5 percent
of the price.
One step the United States can take for free is to develop a policy
-- and publicize it -- that it would respond with devastating
effect against anyone that launches an EMP strike. We also should
ensure that portions of our military are protected against EMP,
field active defenses (such as a missile shield) and passive
defenses (such as switching to fiber optic where possible) to
reduce the damage done by such an attack and increase the risk for
a would-be aggressor. Hopefully, these changes, taken together,
would deter anyone from launching such an attack.
We should make it a priority to develop a plan not only to respond
to such an attack but to recover as quickly as possible -- and do
so soon. All over the world, countries are attempting to join the
nuclear club. Most would not be considered America's allies.
Failure to address this significant vulnerability only encourages
leaders already hostile to us to attempt to exploit this
weakness.
There is real danger here. The technology that makes us the leader
among the world's nations only makes us more vulnerable. We're
unprepared now. That needs to change.
--Jack Spencer is a senior policy analyst for defense and
national security in the Davis Institute for International Studies
at The Heritage Foundation (heritage.org).
Distributed nationally on the Knight-Ridder Tribune wire