From: sdr57@cas.org ()
Subject: Re: 21st Century Soldier
Organization: Chemical Abstracts Service, Columbus, Ohio
Date: Mon, 14 Sep 1992 13:46:09 GMT

In article <BuH0JM.5E4@watdragon.uwaterloo.ca> jdnicoll@watyew.uwaterloo.ca (James Davis Nicoll) writes:
>In article <1992Sep11.230936.14718@cas.org> sdr57@cas.org writes:
>
>       On using small nuclear devices to produce EMP  to destroy
>high-tech gadgets:
>
>
>       Hmmm. Anyone  know if EMP-enhanced weapons are available?
>A  non-nuclear EMP device might be very useful in a near-future war,
>as well. Only problem is that producing EMP weapons may require
>First World grade industry, in which case the Third World may find
>it hard to get their hands on them.
>
Generating an electromagnetic pulse can be done without a nuclear device.
It requires lots of power and an interesting array of wires. There is an
EMP setup big enough to put whole airplanes into at Kirtland Air Force
Base in New Mexico (it was, and presumably still is, used to evaluate
the vulnerability of aircraft electronics to emp - military electronics
are designed to survive with the possibility of exposure to EMP in mind).
It is big - not portable - and the aircraft has to be inside. Its use
did not disrupt electronics in Albuquerque, which is adjacent to the
site. In short, if you want to generate an EMP under battlefield conditions,
you will need a nuclear device

>       It might be difficult to justify a nuclear strike on someone
>who EMPed troops if the EMP wasn't associated with a nuclear weapon.
>
>       EMPing them back would be OK, though, and cities are pretty
>vulnerable to such attack.  Kinda the opposite of how  the popular
>media used to misrepresent neutron bombs: Leaves the people standing
>and destroys part of the industrial infrastructure.
>
If they had used one of their nukes to "EMP" us, and only to "EMP" us,
(implying detonation in the atmosphere or near space, not on/near the
ground where it would cause direct casualties), we probably wouldn't
need to "EMP" them - remember the original discussion dealt with
tactical nukes, indicating that we are fighting in their part of
the world - they would have "EMPed" themselves at the same time
as they "EMPed" us (and, of course, civilian electronics are
very vulnerable to this sort of thing). This would leave us with
our critical (and therefore radiation- and EMP-hardened) military
systems up, while they would have killed their own civilian
infrastructure (and possibly that in adjacent countries, as well).

They might kill their own electronics as well - especially
communications gear if they were "low-tech" - which would
put them at a big disadvantage as far as coordinated action.

Low-tech armies have, as their major advantage, less need for
supplies than high-tech armies. High-tech armies tend to have
all the other advantages. Look at the Korean conflict. The
low-tech Chinese People's Liberation Army was able to achieve
tactical surprise because of their short logistics "tail."
This gave them initial victories. But once the UN forces
got their communications network/fire support system going,
the Chinese stopped winning, and their defeats became increasingly
bloody.

******************************************************************************
Renegade academician. They're a dangerous breed when they go feral,
academics are...a chemist, too.
		    -(James P. Blaylock in "Lord Kelvin's Machine")

My organization hasn't agreed with any of my opinions so far, and
I doubt they'll start now.

Stanley "Ya nee speon" Roberts