Hmmm

So it's OK to carry on reading El Reg in an 'unprotected' environment then

Well...

Surely the CIS wouldn't want to let anyone near EMP weapons designs, especially since there entire military consists of droids...oh, right, wrong CIS...damned Star Wars...

But but but it was on Spooks last week!

The nasty people used EMP weapons to take out our heroes Range Rovers in Spooks last week. Are you trying to tell me that Spooks isn't real????

EMP yes please

Lets see - 1 every 15 mins outside DVLA, all Police sites, Tax office, government, ID and Passport offices - sounds great.

Back in physics lessons....

Back in good old physics class, the ones that thaught anyone with a reasonable IQ just how easy the design of nuclear weapons are (its the materials that are difficult) - one of the other things we learnt is that EMPs can be generated in several different ways.

The easiest of which is discharging 2 large capacitors into each other. This does tend to also make them pop and give off the magic smoke that makes such components work. Not to mention this relatively small discharge is severely limited by the inverse square law, but still good for a radius of about 1m with 1 farad caps.

Obviously this was purely exerimental and I'm sure no one hear would want such dangerous technology falling into the hands of the Freedom Against Gatsos Society...

F22 - By Anonymous Coward

What Australia actually lacks is a good reason to buy the kit mentioned in the first place.

just a thought.

@ Anon Coward

The threat to Aus is Indonesia and its recent 5 billion dollar purchase of the latest russian kit including the latest generation Sukhoi's.

And whilst F/A-18's are on par with Sukhoi's (if not better) the difference is numbers. We dont have a huge airforce, Indonesia DOES! At a 20:1 ratio we need air superiority fighters that are not just slightly better but supremely better then what the Indonesian's have!

Anyway the real reason that Aussies want to get the F-22 is not so much for the air superiority role but to maintain the threat that the F-111's currently provide of being able to strike the heart of Indonesia without the need for in-flight refueling, neither the F/A-18's or F-35's have this capability... It's called maintaining the strategic balance (ie you have more forces, we have better forces - war will hurt everyone and gain neither side anything!)

British Army has been testing this sort of weapon for the last 4 years

I live on the edge of Salisbury Plain, in one of the houses closet to the live firing range, a few years ago, my computer, microwave and DVD player stopped working, the PC had a fried BIOS chip, as did most of my neighbours, also, when driving past Netheravon camp a year ago in my Peugeot, I lost all my Dashboard display as well as my radio, the engine continued to work though, after driving for a 100 yards, it all came back, this has happened on a number of occasions to several people in the Upavon, Rushall, Urchfont areas, but when you ring the army to complain about their new EMP weapon, they naturally deny all knowledge, however, Salisbury Plain has a number of byways you can legally drive along when there isnt live firing on, and on numerous occasions there have been strange antenna arrays set up which have got nothing to do with the Bowman trials, also, cant remember which camp had it, but there was an array that you could park a tank in, turn on the device and it would fry the tanks electronics and this is going back years, so god knows what they have now.

Do we need another standard?

Plausablity measured in tin foil hats. 1 Tin foil is rated at the plausability of 9/11 being a goverment job.

1) The likely hood of the USA currently having effective EMP weapons is 2 tin foil hats.

2) Brett's comments that he had slept with Paris Hilton was rated at 40,000 tin foil hats.

Fission Chips

Lets see - 1 every 15 mins outside DVLA, all Police sites, Tax office, government, ID and Passport offices - sounds great.

Even better aimed at the chavs who insist on parking (if you can count screeching to a halt & braking, or accelerating away later as parking manoevers, threatening law abiding citizens & young children) at the rear of the retail park backing on to my house, who generously allow us to share their taste in music all through our houses & kick footballs against the rear of Currys all weekend, whom the police are powerless to act against.

Half a dozen fried chav mobiles & accompanying stereo systems, bring it on.

Alas

Alas how do you think the US took down the relatively modern well designed Serbian Air Defence System when they bombed the Chinese Embassy back in the days of the Clinton Administration !

However the most effective weapon is the detonation of megaton plus bombs above the 50 mile mark , the down side means that low orbital satellites unless well shielded will be destroyed by the trapped radiation belt generated by the explosion like "Starfish Prime" test in 1962 ?

But then again also why do you think the Russians put so much time and effort in the design of their agile fighter aircraft giving them both rough strip handling and ability to withstand high EMP bursts and power to burn through ECM at ranges of up to 15 miles where as the English preferred the use of versatile concrete ballast instead in the good old first production GR1 models !

Re: RE US aiding Australia

"Is there any oil in Australia?"

Oh a little bit, lots of LNG (including what we swindled from Timor), and a SH!t load of Uranium... Think the septics would bother turning up for that?

@anon

@anon , I suggest you check carefully for the venerable old Sukhoi SU-27 Flanker powered by Lyulka AL-31F engines which was designed back circa 1969 and prototypes started flying 1977 is a big heavy day night long range fighter whose dry weight is more then one ton heavier then the equivalent Phantom 2's !

Alas in the past three Asian War games the variant as piloted by the Indian Air Force has shot out of the sky the best graduate pilots from the US Air Force Nevada Top Gun School flying a bevy of Hornets , Falcons and late model advanced Eagles with equal aplomb !

The former East German MIG-29's export models flying in NATO war games post 1989 until sold to the Polish Air Force on almost every encounter literally shot the best planes RAF(crap aircraft or pilots?) had like the Rolls Royce powered Phantom 2's(flying bricks) , Panavia Tornado's , Sepecat Jaguar's and English Electric Lightning's right out of the sky for minimal losses and even the French Air Force had a lot of trouble trying to subdue them as well !

If the best graduate Nevada Top Gun pilots flying Hornets could not even touch the lowly old 27 model at first base then the more advanced 30 through 37 models would shoot them out of the sky before they even left home plate to come out and play !

Whilst the latest US Air Force Fighter War Game results in Alaska with the F22 , it would only just put them on par with the older SU-27 , so it would be an even money bet between the two aircraft in real combat !

Slow

They're taking their bloody time. Kopp first presented this lecture ten years ago. I came across a fully annotated and detailed copy of it online back in 1999. Unsurprisingly, the website hosting it disappeared not long after 9/11.

Indonesia has four Su27 / Su30 - and they're quite old "export" versions

Plus they have a grab-bag of F-16s, BAe Hawks etc.

Not massively terrifying, unless you're the intended target - Indonesians who may not be keen on staying Indonesian.

The Indonesian Army could, in theory, prove difficult for Australia (and New Zealand - since we'd have no choice but to support Australia) due to their vast manpower potential. However, there is rather a large stretch of that blue wet stuff between the Indonesian Army and Australia. Indonesia would have to gain air supremacy, then naval supremacy, then invade what is essentially a very, very large desert and then try to bash their way around the coast. All while suppressing insurgencies at home - most likely a great many. (Especially if Australian and NZ special forces manage to slip into Indonesia.)

All up, Indonesia is better off just trading with Australia rather than attempting to invade.

Assuming they didn't manage to cut a deal with our US friends on divvying up the non-US owned parts of Australia, of course. (Australians must be terrists' cause they have all that ooranium.)

EMP, Cryptonomicon & Pringles tubes

In Neal Stephenson's book "Cryptonomicon" some hackers rig up an EMP generator in the back of a van and fry the hero's laptop by accident. I once heard an ObUL (Obligatory Urban Legend) that such a device could be made by generating a nice fat spark inside an insulating cylinder coated with a thin layer of metal - a Pringles tube.

Ob Victim: my neighbour's iPhone.

Fly Hard, Die Hard baby

Who cares that the Aussies get F35's, as long as John McClane isnt on the enemies side you should be fine (see Die Hard 4 for more info)...

Re: British Army has been testing this sort of weapon for the last 4 years

"the PC had a fried BIOS chip, as did most of my neighbours"

I'd be less worried about EMP bombs and more concerned that PC-based droids are living in your village.

the web is full of all sorts of interesting developments in EM

my favorite are recent tests using conventional explosives. One was about the size of the Mk-83, IIRC. Instead of using capacitors, it had a core of lots of wire wrapped around. Before dropping it was charged from the parent aircraft like a big capacitor. On the nose were microwave antennas. when it reached a certain altitude, the rear of the bomb would explode, rapidly compressing the core so that it's stored voltage increased dramatically and shorted out thru the antennas, producing a very powerful EM pulse in the microsecond before the device disintegrated.

Basically it had a "footprint" big enough to pulse out a large building complex or small city block (unshielded). And it went off high enough that, other than breaking windows and bomb casing debris, no collateral damage. One problem was charging the thing-current fighter bombers don't have an electrical system powerful enough, so they'd have to sling an auxiliary power source instead of carrying another bomb-not sure if the Super Hornet could handle it, and I don't think it'd fit internally in the F22.

The biggest downside however is, it is *very* easy to shield against EMP especially in military gear. EM devices are only good against civilian targets of sufficiently advanced nature. Russian (or soon to be Soviet again under Putin) Korean, American, EU..you get the picture. Nothing to offend the historically multicultural and religiously tolerant Muslim nations (choke) of course, since all the financial and royal systems are military grade and shielded.

Tinfoil hat time: Anyone, as a kid, who owned walkie talkies, remember the labels on the back, and on many other home electronics as well, that had the FCC regulation: (paraphrased) "This device must not cause interference with other devices and must accept interference from other sources"? I wonder if that was part of the MAD style agreements with the Soviets that America seemed unilaterally to follow (like agreeing *not* to put bomb shelters in with the Interstate Highways program as Civil Defense had initially designed)

@John Smith

WTF??? How do we go from "US EMP Weapon by 2012" to "Aussies should admit perceived Human Right's Abuses"? Am I the only puzzled?

On a more pertinent note. Anyone remember an article detailing a short range emp pulse toy (theoretical) involving injecting a reasonable energy radio signal into a coiled antenna then a highly controlled explosive charge detonating and destroying the coil? It was short range and very directional. Can't for the life of me remember. Was an entertaining idea but dubious on the science. Another Pentagon "what if special"?

Posting anon for obvious reasons *grin*.. sorry.. someone at the door... taxi to Gitmo anyone?

Had an idea for a prank once

I once had an idea for a prank involving building a large capacitor (several farads), a huge coil, a broadband beam antenna array and a high-voltage PSU; mounting all this kit on the back of a Land Rover (with all-mechanical engine, naturally) and firing it into the engine control systems of modern cars, just to see what happened.

Never built it, but I used to know someone who was almost mad enough to try .....

back on-topic

Sadly, Lewis P has merged two completely different classes of device in his rambly article. EMP is easy to produce and does not suffer from the inverse square law. HMP is an order (or two) of magnitude more difficult to produce and does so suffer. There are people in UK actively researching both.

Popular media reference: in the George Clooney remake of Ocean's Eleven the English tech 'geezer' provides a brief disruption tactic by discharging an EMP 'weapon' to disrupt the electrical distribution system for a couple of blocks around the "Bellagio".

I want one! Peace time applications.

By 2020 all cinemas and train 'quiet carriages' will have a cut down version of this device installed. Any selfish patron whose mobile phone rings in said public auditoria will have their electronics and brains fried simultaneously. Severe damage will result for the hardware and the clearly limited electrical activity in the offender's brain, once interrupted, may result in an agonising death.

Two new idioms will be coined:

"Don't EMP me, bro!" and

"Pulsed out, man."

Tasers too will be modified to include an EMP setting and distributed to the police, train attendants and cinema cast members for use in appropriate situations.

Re: Ah! The old chupacabra rises once again...

Heh. I always get giggles as this is the only 'Mexican myth' that seems to have gone international.

EMP's can be made with current tech, but I think the range isn't just feasible (a few meters) for them to be practical. The only proven one would be the high-altitude nuke, it seems.

Then again, who needs EMP when we have the etherkiller?? Cheap and most effective on frying electronics ;)

Maybe the BOFH will develop the real EMP???

RE: Modern Russian AA systems

"This wasn't just a little over-the-border excursion, they came in over the Mediterranean and flew over most of the country to get to the installation, then returned out to the Med."

The BBC Reported:

"In the early hours of 6 September a number of Israeli jets appeared to enter Syrian airspace from the Mediterranean Sea.

Later, unidentified drop tanks, which may have contained fuel from the planes, were found on Turkish soil near the Syrian border, indicating a possible exit route.

Witnesses said the Israeli jets had been engaged by Syrian air defences in Tall al-Abyad, north of Raqqa and near the border with Turkey."

Was it ever found out that they flew out through Turkey or not? Nonetheless it still makes me laugh at the air defense.

Re: Back On-Topic

If EMP does not obey the inverse square law, what one does it obey?

There are a lot of really BIG sources of EMP out there beyond our air bubble.

@morely @snow

@morely have not heard of the old Serbian Air Defence multiple Microwave oven trick end of that problem as more emitters then the fleet had missiles in storage available hence the use of a sticky powdered graphite bombs to destroy power supply sub stations instead !

@snow the Israeli Air Force actually used the longer ranged heavier F15 Eagles advanced models which flew in from the Med with long range drop tanks on standard international air routes using fake radar transponders corresponding to subsonic commercial jumbo jet passenger aircraft !

At the same time in northern Israel massive interference on both the C and K band Satellite TV was reported even though the aerials were pointed south to the equator away from action area .

@rob just how slow do you think modern high performance F15 jets travel when cleaned of drop ordinance we are looking at a Mach 2 exit speeds so if the given AA Missile battery from first alert if it has an acquisition target range of maximum 20 mile secure kill radius to eradicate and burn through ECM clutter! The lower the height the shorter time and target acquisition range numbers ! The time it takes for a jet fighter to traverse that range travelling at 1200 mph is traversed in under one minute for every 20 miles travelled , you would need a top notch fully alert ground crew to acquire and track multiple out bound bogeys with fake civilian radar transponders as well !

Do the maths !

Eastern Promise..... Western Delivery

"The Penis: meatier than the sword, I think you'll find." And Amen for that Discovery2.

And who knows who may have played more than just a few restful bars where that was manufactured work ........ 42 Please, Please Me with EMPathy.

The Curse of the Butterfly is to be perceived as One, is it not, whilst the Power in ITs Beauty is to be treasured for ITs KISS.