Challenge for 2015

Amb. Henry F. Cooper, Chairman Lt. Gen. Daniel Graham, Founder

High Frontier . . Building Truly Effective Defenses . . . Reagan’s Vision Lives!

E-Mail Message 141229

Challenge for 2015

By Ambassador Henry F. Cooper

December 29, 2014

Dear Friends,

As you know, High Frontier seeks to explain to all who will listen that America is vulnerable to an existential threat, and that we are doing little to counter it~~but we can!

Recent news reports have been full of stories about North Korea’s recent cyber attack on Sony, and the vulnerability of American commercial and critical infrastructure to such attacks. This comes on the heels of November testimony before the House Intelligence Committee by Admiral Michael Rogers, the Commander of U.S. Cyber Command and Director of the National Security Agency (NSA), that he expects a major attack on the U.S. power grid by China and/or others—and that we are unprepared to deal with it. And Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said yesterday that China knew about the North Korean attack.

If we lose the electric grid for an indefinite period, the loss of electricity would bring our “just in time economy” to a full stop—with dire consequences for all Americans. Most would die within a year.

Even more threatening than a cyber attack on the grid is a national grid shutdown caused by the electromagnetic pulse (EMP) from even a single nuclear explosion high over the United States—an attack that could be accomplished by North Korea today and Iran if, most likely when, they get nuclear weapons to mate with their existing long-range ballistic missiles. If either provide a nuclear weapon to surrogate terrorists, even they could launch such an attack with short range missiles from vessels off our coasts—and we are unprepared to counter it.

A cyber attack would no doubt be a precursor to an EMP attack, intended to delay our ability to respond in time to defeat the more widely and catastrophically damaging EMP attack. We must be prepared to deal with both.

I urge you to read the recent brief Forbes interview of former CIA Director R. James Woolsey, in which Jim addresses in easily understood language the nature of this threat. In short, he argues:

An EMP attack is a real threat that even terrorists could execute quite easily;
Two-thirds to ninety-percent of all Americans could perish within a year;
North Korea learned from Russia how to build specially designed EMP nukes [no doubt shared with Iran];
Cold War Deterrence strategy will not work against “irrational” state or non-state actors [e.g., suicide bombers with nukes];
The grid could be hardened against such threats for $2-20 billion, insignificant as compared to the damage of an EMP attack;
No one is in charge of countering this existential threat—the President should lead in dealing with the cyber and EMP threat.

Click here for our webpage presentation of this important interview. And click here for an important letter to the President, sent 18 months ago, discussing the EMP threat and recommending how to deal with it, including hardening the grid and building effective defenses. I co-signed this important letter from the Directors of the Foundation for Resilient Societies. It is still unanswered.

A quick review of our past email messages, posted on www.highfrontier.org, will inform you of many details related to the manmade and natural EMP threats and how we can protect America against them. Yes, we also remain vulnerable to the EMP caused by a major solar storm that will one day surely create this threat condition—and we are not dealing with it.

As you consider your year-end giving, please include High Frontier for a generous contribution to help us continue this important work. Next year we expect to be working to inform a more receptive congress (and others) about these urgently important problems and what can be done about them. They take office at the end of the coming week.

I hope you will help us with our urgently needed efforts, which I will be discussing in future messages. Click here to make your tax deductible gift. If you prefer to mail a check, be sure it is post marked by December 31st. Our address is: 500 North Washington Street, Alexandria, VA 22314.

Happy New Year! And may God bless America!