Schneier on Security

"problematic because they would be indistinguishable from nuclear weapons"

You see problems, Cold War veterans see a new way to win Global Thermonuclear War: "At this speed, our nuke will detonate and EMP their nukes before theirs hit the atmosphere! Their own nukes will just fall out of the sky!"

@ HJohn

"A weapon that would disable nukes rather than just hit targets while the other side's nukes hit theirs would obviously be a good thing."

Sure, that would be nice, but in this case the EMP comes from the detonation of the nuke on foreign soil and the probable murder of thousands to millions of civilians. So, maybe it's not so great, eh?

"could send... back to the 18th century"

Well, it *could* but our infrastructure is very resilient... discounting the power grid. Generally, the EMP will just fry all the electronics in a particular area, perhaps devastating that area but the rest of the country is fine. If the area that's fried has nationally-critical systems and there are no offsite backups, then the country is screwed. Otherwise, damage is isolated, money begins to flow, and rebuilding occurs by ordering/installing new electronics.

Well, the situation might be more severe for nuclear control systems, first responder radios or people in hospitals hooked to life support machines. A friend of mine showed me an illustrative EMP scenario in the game Modern Warfare 2. A Hind is about to kill the main characters when a Russian nuke explodes in the sky over Washington. It kills all comms, lights, and planes/choppers drop around you as you move to cover. The games realistic & imaginative rendering was a nice surprise, but I imagine a similar real-life scenario wouldn't be as pleasant.

@ Paul Vincent

"Will they be able to fly through volcanic ash?"

lol. I'm sure they will during the first pass around the earth, but not the fourth or fifth. So, firing an hour or so before the target location is confirmed is not advised. ;)

@ dob, HJohn, and BF Skinner on Nostromo

Don't jump the gun. She might be right: we could draft everyone, scramjet nuke major areas, convert entire economy to military and strategically knock down the competition. Perhaps a 0.01% chance under ideal conditions. Possible. Probability seems similar to elephant nearly dying from huge drop but saved by grabbing a flower with its trunk.

Real issue: it would never come to that. They'd just hit us where it hurts without launching a single missile before our war even began: embargo of all electronics, cheap materials, etc.; make infowar a reality; asymmetrical warfare by some of the millions of Eastern immigrants; offering ten million job openings in China for Hispanic "guest workers" willing to emigrate from US; liquidate US holdings/investments. These and other tricks would crash the US economy and level it overnight.

So, *realistically*, you guys are on the mark: even among semi-retarded trolls like herself, Nostromo's radical views would hold no water. If it didn't work for the old Rome, it won't work for the "New Rome"... ;)

"like rededicating the 90% of our urban/suburban workers back to growing our own food"

Yeah, this was what I was thinking about. Dependence was a strategic move where we accepted the risks to get the benefits of globalization. The only way to mitigate the risk is, as you pointed out, total self-sufficiency. In one light, we'd go back to what China was 20 years ago. ;)

"300M against 5.7B? Even those blinded by hormonal rush should be able to do basic math."

Idk, BF. Your battle numbers look eerily similar to those of a past battle. I think I know some Greeks in a perpetual hormonal rush who might like those odds. This time they'd say, "This... is... AMERICA!" then kick the enemies off the Grand Canyon. HELL YEAH!

@ Moderator

Sure thing.

@ Roger

It's dangerous to assume our enemies won't have that capability. For one, this is a generic weapon that may be used in non-nuclear or nuclear applications later on against any potential adversary. We can't assume they won't target someone capable of retaliating quickly and massively. The Pentagon doesn't always make logical decisions, such as their winnable nuclear war strategies.

Additionally, there actually is a need for a weapon like this. It's not our most pressing need right now, so it's probably counterproductive. But, there is a need. We have been using missiles like the Tomahawk cruise missile during the past ten years. It's a nice strategic weapon that lets us take a site out without getting close to them. Doing it quickly isn't always about radar warnings: the target may leave during the flight of the slow, traditional missile. This solves both of these problems.

Alas, it creates a new one: cost. I've noticed a trend in the US military that costs keep going up. Enemies that used to take about ten thousand dollars to kill now take millions. Considering the dead tangos are replaced quickly, I don't think it's productive. Now, they want to be throwing supersonic missiles at this problem? I think UCAV's are more productive: they reduce costs to fuel and cheaper missiles, plus a fixed overhead. The costs of operating the UCAV are amortized over all of its missions. The real world anecdote is the success of Predator drones outfitted with Hellfire missiles. Using them on a target is a *lot* cheaper than a multi-million dollar cruise missile.