Anyone who reads enough of my posts can probably tell that I’m a kook. As I get older, I become more and more of a kook. I have some theories as to why people in my position inevitably become more and more weird as they get older but that’s for another conversation.
Former speaker Newt Gingrich has a fantastic article pointing out something that many people who follow this stuff are not just well aware of ut preparing for but is probably news to most Americans: There is a pretty good chance that in our lifetime we will suffer a catastrophic terrorist attack in the form of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP).
Newt’s full article is here:
http://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/gringrich_emp_weapon/2009/03/29/197257.html
As he says:
On Feb. 3, Iran launched a “communications satellite” into orbit. At this very moment, North Korea is threatening to do the same. The ability to launch an alleged communications satellite belies a far more frightening truth. A rocket that can carry a satellite into orbit also can drop a nuclear warhead over any location on the planet in less than 45 minutes.
Far too many timid or uninformed sources maintain that a single launch of a missile poses no true threat to the United States, given our retaliatory power.
A reality check is in order and must be discussed in response to such an absurd claim: In fact, one small nuclear weapon, delivered by an ICBM can destroy the United States by maximizing the effect of the resultant electromagnetic pulse upon detonation.
An electromagnetic pulse (EMP) is a byproduct of detonating an atomic bomb above the Earth’s atmosphere. When a nuclear weapon is detonated in space, the gamma rays emitted trigger a massive electrical disturbance in the upper atmosphere. Moving at the speed of light, this overload will short out all electrical equipment, power grids and delicate electronics on the Earth’s surface. In fact, it would take only one to three weapons exploding above the continental United States to wipe out our entire grid and transportation network. It might take years to recover from, if ever.
Now personally, when I say there’s a good chance, I am saying that the odds are probably a bit better than 1 in 10. But that’s still an awful big chance in my book if you have the resources to do something about it. That’s why I’ve looked into Faraday cages and the new house I’m building is designed to be self-sufficient if necessary so that if something like this happened, my family and friends wouldn’t starve.
Consider this: Look at your own household and tell me how long you could survive without going to the grocery store for food. 2 days? 3 days? An EMP pulse, that North Korea or Iran is likely to be capable of producing in the next 5 years, would, as Newt says, take out our infrastructure for years.
What does that mean? It means it would probably be a solid week before city water came back on-line. Electricity would likely be offline for months. But the real killer would be food. That’s because food must be shipped and an EMP would wipe out all cars and trains. I have no idea how long it would take for food to start getting re-distributed but unless you lived in a major urban center where emergency supplies could be distributed, you’d be in big trouble (in other words, if you live in the subs, you’re going to likely die of starvation). If this sort of thing happened in the Winter, you would likely be looking at millions of deaths.
So when friends come over to “Future House” and see the bee hives and the apple orchard and the gardens (my wife won’t let me have chickens unfortunately) along with the “Kook” supplies (i.e. the capability to defend our physical assets effectively) hopefully we’ll all have the benefit of just laughing at how weird I’m getting. Hopefully I’ll always be just a kook as opposed to a survivor. 