BlueRidgeForum

Today national-security commentator Ken Timmerman reports that - - -

“Iran has carried out missile tests for what could be a plan for a nuclear strike on the United States, the head of a national security panel has warned.

In testimony before the House Armed Services Committee and in remarks to a private conference on missile defense over the weekend hosted by the Claremont Institute, Dr. William Graham warned that the U.S. intelligence community ‘doesn’t have a story’ to explain the recent Iranian tests.”

Long-time Mid-East watcher Timmerman spelled out Graham’s thinking:

“Another troubling group of tests involved Shahab-3 launches where the Iranians ‘detonated the warhead near apogee, not over the target area where the thing would eventually land, but at altitude,’ Graham said. ‘Why would they do that?’

Graham chairs the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) Attack, a blue-ribbon panel established by Congress in 2001.

The commission examined the Iranian tests ‘and without too much effort connected the dots,’ even though the U.S. intelligence community previously had failed to do so, Graham said.

‘The only plausible explanation we can find is that the Iranians are figuring out how to launch a missile from a ship and get it up to altitude and then detonate it,’ he said. ‘And that’s exactly what you would do if you had a nuclear weapon on a Scud or a Shahab-3 or other missile, and you wanted to explode it over the United States.’”(Underscoring Forum’s.)

Readers are encouraged to digest the entire Timmerman report here.

Some EMP Background

Early this month, we wrote about the dangers of a nation-disabling attack from an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) burst here.

In their 2004 report, the U. S. EMP Commission put the threat in a nutshell here:

“Briefly, a single nuclear weapon exploded at high altitude above the United States will interact with the Earth’s atmosphere, ionosphere, and magnetic field to produce an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) radiating down to the Earth and additionally create electrical currents in the Earth. EMP effects are both direct and indirect. The former are due to electromagnetic ’shocking’ of electronics and stressing of electrical systems, and the latter arise from the damage that ’shocked’—upset, damaged, and destroyed—electronics controls then inflict on the systems in which they are embedded. The indirect effects can be even more severe than the direct effects. The electromagnetic fields produced by weapons designed and deployed with the intent to produce EMP have a high likelihood of damaging electrical power systems, electronics, and information systems upon which American society depends. Their effects on dependent systems and infrastructures could be sufficient to qualify as catastrophic to the Nation.” (Underscoring Forum’s.)

Maryland Representative Roscoe Bartlett has been the national point man here in calling public and governmental attention to the EMP threat. Click here to read Representative Bartlett’s take on a projected “$34 - $770 Billion Blow to the Baltimore-Washington, DC – Richmond Economy from EMP Attack.”

Conservative dean Paul Weyrich last month explained here the crucial need for passive (ability to survive and recover) as well as active (missile) defense against such an attack:

“America needs a plan to carry out the systematic recovery of key infrastructures. We must demonstrate the will and ability to recover from any attack. Toward that end we need a special team which frequently reports to Congress. We need to define the responsibilities of the Federal, state and local governments. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) needs to develop a plan for the country in conjunction with local governments and the Pentagon needs a clear plan to keep the Armed Forces functioning in the event of an attack. DHS must establish a senior leadership position with the accountability, authority and appropriate resources to defend against the most serious threats. Graham says that an EMP attack is a credible, potentially catastrophic threat to the United States. He says that the U.S. strategy should balance prevention, preparation, protection and recovery.”(Underscoring Forum’s.)

Free Congress CEO Weyrich counseled - - -

“. . . [I]t would behoove Bush to spend his remaining six months in office implementing Graham’s recommendations. He cannot begin a moment too soon.”

We believe the president himself needs to spend time now coming to terms with the EMP danger. This peril is not a matter that can be wholly delegated to a committee of bureaucrats each with their own institutional interests, nor even to one or two cabinet members. Perhaps a senator from each party could personally underscore to the president the urgency of his participation in a counter-EMP strategy.

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