North Korea claims to be able to hit the United States mainland with ballistic missiles and an EMP weapon. It is long past time to not only start taking the threat of an EMP attack far more seriously, but to educate yourself about what the impact of an electromagnetic pulse will truly be.
For eight whole years, the Obama administration shrugged off the threats shouted by North Korea as merely gibberish from a lunatic that could never come to fruition. We now know how much of a true threat the technology amassed in North Korea, is to our way of life.
In September, 2017, North Korea won a massive victory against the American people. You were not aware of this victory? I am not surprised. The mainstream media rarely ever covers EMP issues and is too busy debating President Trump’s tweets about the rogue Communist nation to report and news of substance to viewers.
During a national security meeting at the Pentagon, the Congressional Commission to Assess the Threat of Electromagnetic Pulse to the United States of America – the EMP Commission, was indefinitely shut down. The team of volunteer engineers, scientist, and security experts was created in 2000 to study, identify, and asses EMP risks to our infrastructure and military.
There have been a handful of politicians over the years who have fought hard to put the EMP issue on the front burner and to do something to harden our power grid, stockpile necessary components to repair it after an Earth-directed X Class solar flare or EMP attack, but have met road block after road block and never really got anything accomplished.
Like many so many commissions and task forces before it, no real results ever came out of EMP Commission recommendations – that was the fault of the various career politicians in charge of Congress, and not based upon the validity of the reports produced by commission members.
The EMP Commission was made impotent during the Barack Obama years, leaving America without even a targeted task force to deal with the emerging threat from North Korea, and beyond.
The House Committee on Armed Services created the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from EMP Attack as a part of the National Defense Authorization Act for 2001 Hearings were held and recommendations were uttered in both 2004 and 2008. The hardening of power grid transformers was a top item on the agenda, but for some reason, even though simple low-tech solutions exist to do so, the tasks just never made it into the budget.
Hardening the transformers would not prevent the catastrophic impact of an EMP attack on modern vehicles, all the sensitive electronic devices we own, or businesses and utilities we use to function. Yet they are the best bet at saving or mitigating damage to the power grid.
The work conducted by the EMP Commission revealed key risks to both our general infrastructure and the power grid. The risks revealed also included threats to the functionality of the federal government and to our nuclear power stations.
In the type of irony that can only occur in Washington, D.C., just a few days before the EMP Commission was officially shut down, General John E. Hyten, the commander of the United States Strategic Command, uttered warnings about an EMP attack and the effect it would have on the country.
General Hyten referred to an EMP attack as both a “dangerous” and “realistic” threat to America. The Strategic Command leader described what would happen if a high altitude EMP was set off quite simply. Hyten aptly noted that every light would go off around the country, every car would stop working (accurate if it was not at LEAST manufactured before 1970, perhaps 1950) and all of our smart phones would immediately stop working.
The good general did not sugarcoat his urgent warning about the impact of an EMP attack, which was quite refreshing honesty, even if few ever got to hear his words. Hyten said it would take months to “years” to repair the damage caused by the electromagnetic pulse attack.
Yet, in the wake of these substantial and fact-supported warnings, Congress still decided to nix the EMP Commission…why?
The answer might boil down to pure politics. The EMP Commission had faced some stiff opposition from the energy industry, including the North American Energy Reliability Commission (NERC) and Federal Energy Reliability Commission (FERC), among others. Could lobbyists have been putting immense pressure on the politicians who supported the EMP Commission disbanding? Were political contributions at stake? Maybe..probably.
You see, dear readers, the federal government neither owns nor completely controls the nation’s power grid. In fact, no single entity, government or otherwise, can make rules relating to the power grid, that the entire energy industry, has to follow. Making strong suggestions about this vital piece of infrastructure, is about all that they can do, in many cases.
The federal government has fare more control over the coal industry through environmental mandates, than it does over the power grid that could be destroyed by an act of war in the blind of an eye, causing the deaths of tens of millions of people, and changing life as we know it in America for an unknown amount of time.
EMP Myths?
What is the biggest EMP myth of all time? That the United States federal government is prepared for such a cataclysmic, TEOTWAWKI, SHTF, apocalyptic long-term doomsday disaster. Yes, I threw in every prepper buzzword there is, because I feel it necessary to firmly drive home the FACT that an EMP would change life in this country both immediately and perhaps, forever.
This report is going to focus on the boldly pushed myths that we are safe, the government is prepared, and the power grid is sound and protected. The information you are about to read should frighten you. By the time these myths are proven true, the worst doomsday disaster known to man will have occurred …and it will be far too late to begin preparing for it.
The EMP Attack from North Korea is Real
Last year the world learned North Korea launched two satellites into orbit that are capable of creating an EMP attack. Both the trajectory and the altitude of the satellites allows them to quite possibly evade the scanners used by the United States National Missile Defense system, according to Peter Vincent Pry. The national security expert is now a member of the NOAH project, (as is the big daddy of the prepping movement, William R. Forstchen and Newt Gingrich) but before dedicating himself to educating the public about the real EMP threat, he was a government official.
Peter Vincent Pry is also the executive director of the Task Force on National and Homeland Security and the director of the U.S. Nuclear Strategy Forum, both are Congressional Advisory Boards, and Pry served on the Congressional EMP Commission, House Armed Services Committee, was a CIA analyst, and a member of the Congressional Strategic Posture Commission. The man knows of which he speaks.
Bill Forstchen’s cult classic and prepping handbook, One Second After was even cited on the floor of Congress during an EMP Commission hearing as an example of what America would face – and the likely result, of an EMP attack. The bestseller should be required reading of every man and woman running for Congress, perhaps then something might be done to protect our great country. Sadly, I doubt half the populace even knows what EMP stands for or why they should care.
Even though some mainstream scientists in America mocked the first underground nuclear test by North Korea, that too should send chills up your spine. The explosion was not substantially large, it was a less than 1 kiloton blast – far less than what our nuclear bombs are capable of producing. But, a 1 kiloton blast is powerful enough to trigger an EMP incident…and the tests by North Korea has significantly increased since then.
North Korea may not yet be able to detonate a nuclear bomb over the American mainland, but the same devastating effect, perhaps an even worse outcome, would happen if they unleash an EMP weapon. A surface nuclear bomb would destroy a city and the surrounding geographic area, but an EMP weapon could destroy the United States from coast-to-coast in an instant.
Even if it only took 12 months to repair the power grid, as some government agencies claim is the worst case scenario, the entire nation would be as vulnerable and desperate as a newborn baby until deployed military could arrive back to protect the nation, and an outside entity, like the United Nations, stepped in with food, water, medical, and fuel aid…for starters.
Information the Mainstream Media and Politicians are ‘Shielding’ Us From
The mainstream media tries to downplay the impact an EMP attack would have on our daily lives – while attempting to convince us the odds of it actually taking place are slim to none. They are not only wrong on both counts, but THEIR MYTHS about EMPS could cost lives if such a man-made or natural incident occurs.
Career politicians from both sides of the aisle also try to convince us there is nothing to really worry about when it comes to EMPs. They largely claim such an event is unthinkable, but if it does happen, the government will be there to help and get the power grid up and running again in a reasonable amount of time.
THEIR MYTHS could also cost lives and ultimately, the collapse of not only our economy, but the eventual loss of freedom when the power vacuum created our crumbled federal government paves the way for local, regional, or state governments to spring up in its place. Have you seen the now canceled show, Revolution? That will give you a pretty detailed glimpse into what life under brutal warlords and post-power grid failure, can look like.
So…What is an EMP?
An EMP is a sudden burst of electromagnetic radiation that could stem from several causes: a solar flare – coronal mas ejection (CME) a fluctuating magnetic field, or a powerful high energy explosion, like a nuclear explosion, or from a man-made EMP bomb or similar weapon.
A tremendous power surge creates and sends high voltage pulses and fluctuating electrical currents that change electrical fields throughout our electrical grid. The sensitive tech gadgets that now run our daily lives and government, would IMMEDIATELY be reduced to nothing more than useless and expensive paperweights.
Top 5 Government EMP Preparedness Myths
1. It Can’t Happen Here – False. This may actually be the mother of all EMP myths. Anyone who thinks that or tries to convince you of that, is speaking from pure ignorance or is motivated to hide the truth. Attacks on our power grid have already happened.
During the summer of 2013, a power grid attack happened in Arizona. Don’t recall hearing about this shocking event? You are not alone, most Americans didn’t, thanks to the mainstream media and politicians who should have been spurred into action by this potentially devastating act, but were not.
It the homemade bomb placed beneath a large 50,000 diesel tank at the power grid substation had detonated as planned, a minimum of 30,000 Americans would not only have been left without, they would have been thrust into an off the grid existence until all of the horrendous damage, could be repaired.
The Arizona facility was deemed a “critical transformer substation” by experts quoted by the local press. It was located along our southern border with Mexico. The potent bomb did not require transport by a big Uhaul truck, quite to the contrary, the explosive device would have fit in the bomb of your hand.
Was this, and similar incidents in Tennessee and California acts of terrorism? We will never know, the culprit still remains at large.
2. The Power Grid is Protected – Wrong again. The power grid stations throughout America are not fortresses, not by a long shot. The criminals, or terrorists, who garnered access to a power grid facility near Nogales, Arizona, simply had cut a hole in a fence and walk right inside to try to wreak havoc.
The Tennessee TVA Watts Bar Nuclear Plant power grid attack happened during the wee hours of the morning in March of 2013. A gunman a security guard was unable to catch, rowed a boat up the waterway that runs adjacent to the facility and just walked right inside.
That same year, Unknown criminals, again, possibly terrorists, garnered access to California’s Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) Metcalf substation in South San Jose, around 1 a.m. – through manholes. After cutting fiber optic cables, the suspects caused the disruption of not only landlines, but 911 service to the local area and cell phone blackout. Before they left, the still unknown culprits fired about 100 rifle rounds into transformers at the power grid facility. Oil leaked out of the transformers and caused the essential electrical service component to overheat and fail.
At the time, California Congressman Henry Waxman, declared the attack on the California substation was an “unprecedented and sophisticated attack” on the power grid, complete with “military style weapons.”
Anytime a semi-automatic rifle is used, liberals are quick to refer to the firearm as being “military style” or an “assault rifle.” It would have been far more accurate and informative to tell the masses the suspects shot up an unprotected vital piece of infrastructure, 17 transformers to be exact, without any real resistance or even awareness, that they were there until it was too late.
Calling the suspects “snipers” who used military-style weapons was surely meant to make the people behind the attack sound scary, in what was possibly an attempt to distract the public from the truly frightening aspect of the incident…that it all could unfold both so quickly and easily and how much worse it could have been if truly skilled snipers or hackers, had been involved.
Have many more similar or more severe attacks at power grid substations taken place since 2013? Well, none that the mainstream media or the government is really telling us about, at least.
I think our power grid is protected just about as well as our borders.
3. The Power Grid Is Fully Functional – If you ever hear someone, either in person on on the news trying to convince you of this, know now that it is an outright lie or they have tricked into believing their deceiving words.
Just because you flip a switch and the lights come on every day, does not mean the power grid is fully functional. The antiquated system is massively overly taxed, strained to the max, and highly vulnerable to surges and the additional drain placed upon it during extremely storms, heat waves, and winter weather.
The demand on the nation’s electrical grid has grown more than tenfold in the past decade, but expansion and repairs to the system have not kept pace.
The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) “grades” all vital pieces of national infrastructure at regular intervals. NONE of our essential services, facilities or roads scored well, making the honor roll is still a dream for nearly all of them.
The one piece of infrastructure that is vital to our health, economy, and daily live, the power grid, scored only a “D+” grade after the engineering review. Does that make your feel safe and secure?
North Korea, other rogue nations, and terrorists have shouted their hatred of America from the rafters, disavowed our way of life, covet what we have (except our freedoms) and are both eager and willing to do anything within their means to destroy us.
The American people know this. The politicians know this. Yet, the “glass jar” of our infrastructure, the power grid, remains overtaxed, unprotected, and increasingly vulnerable to attacks.
Billions of dollars earned by hard-working Americans are sent abroad to give aid to non-Americans, even those in countries that have shouted rants of hate against our country, but there is not enough money in the budget to harden the power grid?
Tens of millions of dollars are spent on pork projects annually, like safe tunnel crossing for turtles venturing across the highway and the mating habits of crabs, but there is not enough money available to fix the power grid?
Until the American people force the public servants sent to Washington to represent our interests, that the power grid and protection from an EMP is a priority for us, it is impossible to think it will every become a priority for enough of them to get this gaping hole of a problem, fixed.
4. If the Power Grid Fails, the Government can Fix it – The government might want to be able to fix it, but the collective “they” do not currently possess the means. Although President Donald Trump is working to fix the self-destructive trend, hardly anything is made in America anymore – and that include transformers and other necessary power grid repair parts.
If an EMP attack happens, some government maintenance guy somewhere, is not going to be able to stroll over to a nearby warehouse and load all the parts he needs into a truck and go fix the power grid.
Either a naturally occurring EMP SHTF disaster, like a solar flare, or an EMP man-made bomb, could take down the power grid not only in the United States, but on a worldwide scale.
Some of the most vital power grid components are manufactured overseas in Germany. Unless most of the parts and pieces needed to repair the power grid are protected by a Faraday Cage, they will be uses pieces of junk, too.
Official estimates by government agencies and officials claiming that the power grid could be repaired and go back on line within a matter or days or weeks, is not based on sound logic or currently available resources. It will take months, in an extremely best case scenario and months to years, in a far more likely series of events.
It wouldn’t even require an EMP to take down our power grid. Shortly after leaving her post as the Department of Homeland Security Secretary, Janet Napolitano said it was a matter of “when” not “if” an act of cyber warfare substantially impacted the power grid.
There are entire offices filled with cyber hackers attempting hack into our power grid, with the ultimate goal being to take it completely down, in not just rogue but “frienemy” countries like Russia and Iraq – both of which American taxpayers are footing the bill for humanitarian aid to in an annual basis.
Upgrading power grid component to include more sensitive electronics and to function with “smart meters” adds even more venues of attack open to cyber hackers. An EMP and a cyber attack are two entirely different animals, but each could prompt the same TEOTWAWKI result – a downed power grid that sens American and everyone living
here, in an 1800s existence for an undetermined amount of time.
Nearly every year, sometimes twice a year, I have the displeasure of writing a headline that reads something like,”Earth dodges a Bullet, Solar Flare Near Miss.” Solar flares powerful enough to take down or disrupt the nation’s electrical grid happen on nearly a routine annual basis.
Since 1859, we have been lucky enough to avoid an X Class Earth-directed solar flare, but how long will our luck hold? Telegraphs, the most advanced technology of the time, not only burst into flames when the CME hit, so did the papers on the desks of their operators.
An Earth-directed CME missed our planet by only a couple of days in 2012. If Earth has passed through the CME only slightly earlier, we would all be living life just like the Founding Fathers did, once again.
5. The Death Toll Won’t Be Too High – This deadly power grid EMP myth will likely cause a lack of preparedness or death, of tens of millions of our fellow Americans.
Although the somewhat fluctuating EMP death toll estimate by FEMA states otherwise, preparedness experts, like Forstchen, and former government officials brave enough to speak out, like past CIA Director James Woosley, staunchly disagree. The non-government EMP and power grid down experts estimate up to 90 percent of Americans would be dead within 12 to 18 month after such a SHTF event.
During a chat with Bill Forstchen, we talked about one of the least discussed causes of EMP death – killed by airplane. Even though Bill informed me there are about 7,000 airplanes flying in the sky above our head at any given moment, passenger and crew deaths were not the primary cause of death focused upon during our conversation.
When an EMP happens, the sensitive electronics in the various aircraft with abruptly cease to function, causing 7,000 or so plane crashes. When those planes crash, firefighters will not be able to roll their engines and rush to the rescue, leaving the jet-fueled flames to rage unchecked.
People and livestock will not be able to out run all of the fires, causing more deaths and casualties in need of ambulances which will also not be coming.
We all watched in horror, either live or during the thousands of replay footage, when radical Islamic terrorists turned planes into bombs and rammed them into buildings. Even though the building the crashing planes will be hitting this time will be unguided, the end result will be the same.
Dirt may not burn, but the crops growing in the fields the sparked brush fires roar across, will be ruined. Waterways, the only source of the essential liquid after a power grid failure, will become contaminated with debris – including floating corpse of people running for their live to put out the flames on their clothing while trying to escape the pain.
Even if, by some miracle, the federal government could get the power grid back on just a few weeks after an EMP attack, in spite of all reasonable thinking to the contrary, the death toll and economic impact by the fires, would be monumentally crushing for the nation.
Ponder for a moment, what society will devolve into if no electricity is available on a nationwide scale for only a few weeks – which is a fairy tale time frame for the necessary repairs to take place.
Power Grid Down and EMP Fatality Causes
- Starvation
- Exposure
- Rioting
- Looting
- Lack of Medical Care
- Fires – caused by the EMP, airplanes, intentionally by rioters, and innocently by people simply trying to stay warm, boil water to purify it, or cook food.
- Lack of Water
FEMA and other federal government agencies, conduct drills to prep for an EMP, many of which are merely tabletop drills. This tiny step in awareness is a good idea, but does nothing to mitigate the underlying problem, the fragility of the power grid nor does it create EMP-hardened vehicles to deliver food, water, and medicine to the people.
It is highly doubtful the government agencies have taken into consideration the violence, deaths, and the creation of territories controlled by powerful warlords that are created when prison inmates and mental health patient are once again free to roam the streets.
Prison officers, hospital staffers, police officers, firefighters, and EMTs are local heroes, but it would be foolish to think they will all survive the initial days of the EMP, can get to work, have any vehicles or tools to do their jobs after the disaster, or be willing to leave their own families in the unsafe post-SHTF world.
The Carrington Event Television Series Trailer
Do you honestly think the federal government has enough emergencies supplies to stockpiled to deliver to the masses to begin with? Emergency aid response has improved since Hurricane Katrina, but the wave of hurricanes in the summer and early fall of 2017 clearly illustrated how quickly depleted the stored resources can be and how long it can take them to get delivered…when vehicles are still functional and resupply from store shelves is feasible.
The 90% of the population death toll prediction after a power grid failure and/or EMP disaster, is entirely realistic, despite what the federal government wants us to believe. Only those who are prepared with both skills and stockpiled preps to live off grid, are located away from a city or major highway, will have a solid chance at survival.
If you have not read One Second After and Forstchen’s two follow up books and the Lights Out Saga by David Crawford, consider digging into them immediately essential power grid and EMP myth debunking, survival homework
Lights Out Saga Movie Trailer:
It would be inaccurate to state the United States federal government has not embarked on ANY solid EMP preparedness plan. They have…for themselves.
There are three (that we know of) EMP-proof underground facilities for government officials and their loved ones to flee too in case of a SHTF scenario like the one being posed by North Korea.
1. Mount Weather Emergency Operations Center in Virginia – The public has never had access to images, videos, or tours inside Mount Weather. Had it not been for an airplane crash into the mountain during the 1970s, I doubt we would even know it existed. The bunker encompasses about 500 acres approximately a 1-hour drive from Washington, D.C. It reportedly functions like a mini-city and even includes its own fire department and law enforcement entity.
2. Raven Rock Mountain Complex in Pennsylvania – This facility is also referred to as “Site R” and is located about six miles from Camp David. It has long been rumored that an underground bunker tunnel connects the presidential retreat with the Cold War complex. President Truman signed off on the creation of the Raven Rock Mountain Complex in 1950. It has long been dubbed the “Second Pentagon.” Multiple additions and improvements have been made to the complex since then, including a $13.5 million upgrade in 1989. It is rumored to contain presidential living quarters and enough space and resources to house approximately 3,000 people for at least 30 days.
3. Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado – If the heat signature coming out of North Korea increases, the staff inside the mountain will know if first and almost immediately. If shooting down a missile with an EMP weapon on it is going to happen, the alert will almost assuredly come out of the Cheyenne Mountain NORAD complex. Will they be quick enough? Would it work? There is simply no way to know…until it happens. A tour of the facility is extremely rare, but it has happened, and some nondescript photos are floating around the internet.
A few non-mainstream media reports prior to Donald Trump’s election as the President of the United States, maintained the three Cold War ere bunker facilities designed to protect government officials and their families in case of a nuclear attack were getting upgrades.
What do you think life will be like in America after a power grid failure or EMP attack?
