High Frontier l SC Grass Roots Getting On Board!

The first step in solving any problem is identifying it!

Last Saturday, Dr. Peter Vincent Pry and I discussed the vulnerability of the electric power grid at the SC Citizens in Action—Palmetto Panel Conference 2015 on the campus of Clemson University—my Alma Mater. We were well received, and the South Carolinians there want to help in addressing our—and hopefully your—concerns. Our panel discussion can be viewed by clicking here. The final Q&A session, in which we received several excellent questions, can be viewed by clicking here and going to about 37 minutes into the section.

Peter discussed the nature of the existential threat posed by the loss of the grid for an indefinite period, caused by direct physical and cyber attack and by natural and manmade electromagnetic pulse (EMP), and I emphasized what can be done about them, especially in South Carolina. The charts from Peter’s briefing can be viewed by clicking here, and mine by clicking here.

The audience, mostly citizens of South Carolina, are frustrated that a number of issues of concern to them are not being addressed by their elected representatives in the Federal and their State governments. They are now well apprised of the existential threat of loss of the electric grid, and many are anxious to engage the local and federal “powers that be” and press then for solutions.

Thus, I consider this to have been an important step in my plan to encourage South Carolinians to work this problem from the bottom up, emphasizing the role of the local and state authorities and involving a critically important role for the National Guard. And my top priority issue is to encourage the private, state and federal authorities to assure that the nuclear power plants power can operate through a massive attack (or solar event) and help to restore quickly other components of the state’s and the nation’s electric grid.

I briefed elements of my recommended “plan for South Carolina,” which includes the following tasks:

Assure that no direct attack on the grid like the 2014 attack on the Metcalf Substation near San Jose, California, can take out “essential” South Carolina substations needed for critically important grid operations. Following that attack, former Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Jon Wellinghoff observed that taking out only nine (9) identifiable substations (of about 55,000 in the U.S.) could shut down the entire U.S. grid for 18 months. The consequences would be catastrophic. Appropriate SC authorities should make sure none of South Carolina’s substations are on this “list of nine.”
Assure that key elements of the SC grid are protected against Cyber attacks. NSA Director ADM. Michael Rogers recently testified he expects a catastrophic cyber attack within a decade. China, Russia and other peer competitors currently have such capabilities, as do rogue states—North Korea and Iran, as well as competent terrorist hackers. At least this problem has been identified and the federal government is beginning to focus on the issue. Appropriate state and local authorities must also get involved; study the issues and engage qualified university and key commercially available expertise to address the associated problems—particularly for South Carolina with appropriate links to the nearby U.S. Army Cyber Command in Augusta, GA. An appropriate state authority should be charged with integrating these efforts.
Protect against manmade and natural EMP threats. Appropriate authorities should assure the electric grid is hardened against EMP and that we have effective ballistic missile defense (BMD) systems to counter all plausible ways a threat ballistic missile or space satellite can deliver of a nuclear weapon to be detonated in space over the U.S. The National Guard—particularly the 263^rd Army Air and Missile Defense Command (AAMDC) in Anderson, SC—should be given a greater operational role in planning and executing this critically important mission. The 263^rd is already engaged in aspects of this mission—and its role should be expanded by the state and federal powers that be to assure a comprehensive operationally viable solution.

Tabletop exercises at last December’s Dupont Summit in Washington, DC concluded that plans for an effective response to attack scenarios in any of these threat conditions depends on having effective local plans and response capabilities. That condition in turn requires competent advance planning and exercises by appropriate local and state authorities to assure readiness to deal with any of the possible attacks. In my opinion, the SC Governor and Legislature should assign this role to the Adjutant General—who in turn should assure serious engagement of the SC National Guard in such planning and operational exercises—in concert with neighboring and nearby regional states.

As implied above, the 263^rd AAMDC is uniquely positioned to take on a major portion of such planning, for the reasons stated in the following chart from by briefing to Saturday’s conference.

I hope that, in the very near future, the SC Adjutant General’s office will support a conference in the Anderson area of South Carolina—to put some “flesh on these bones” of an idea for how we should proceed. The 263^rd AAMDC already has a unique role to play, not only in the defense of South Carolina but the entire nation—its connections to First Air Force and First Army and through them to the commander of Northern Command (NORTHCOM) give it a uniquely important opportunity to lead in defending our entire nation.

As discussed in last week’s message and in Saturday’s conference (See below.), the Commander of NORTHCOM, Admiral Bill Gortney, clearly understands the EMP threat and supports initiatives to harden key system elements to assure the survival of our ability to provide warning of an EMP attack—the longstanding NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense command) Cold War mission. That mission is being funded by the Pentagon—recent upgrades costing over $700 million. Hopefully, he will also support hardening infrastructure critical to his NORTHCOM Homeland Defense mission—especially the currently vulnerable electric power grid .

One of the important issues that ADM Gortney should address is the threat from the South—either from a nuclear weapon detonated on a satellite as it passes over the United States or on ballistic missiles launched from vessels in the Gulf of Mexico.

Here the 263^rd has an important role as it already directly reports to the Commander of First Air Force on Tyndall AFB in Panama City, Florida—an optimum location for basing an Aegis Ashore site as I have previously discussed—and illustrated in my briefing last Saturday, as shown below. ADM Gortney could provide a formal requirement to the Pentagon acquisition authorities to fund this mission area for which he has responsibility as NORTHCOM commander.

An Aegis Ashore site on Tyndall AFB in the Florida panhandle could be the first of several sites around the Gulf of Mexico, and set the operations precedence and pattern to be followed under NORTHCOM command for subsequent sites—e.g, in Pascagoula, Mississippi; Corpus Christi, Texas; and Homestead AFB near the tip of Florida—which do not have current command linkage to NORTHCOM. No new R&D would be required for this proposed plan—except for whatever might be required to satisfy unique local issues associated with siting. We are funding such a site in Romania—operational this year and a site in Poland—to be operational by 2018. We should defend the American people from Iran, too.

Finally, in my presentation last Saturday, I emphasized my opinion that we in South Carolina should give top priority to assuring that our nuclear power plants can operate through an EMP event—and be available to revive portions of the nation’s grid should it suffer a major shutdown. We should work with other states in the “Eastern Interconnect” which has most of the nuclear power reactors and overall produces most of the nation’s electric power. See below.

I urge that the SC Governor and State legislators make meeting this objective a clear priority for the appropriate state and local plans and operations, appropriately linked to federal plans and operations. And I would assign the role of integrating all of the associated activities to the SC Adjutant General.

Bottom Lines.

As argued last week, NORAD/NORTHCOM has a critically important role in providing concrete recommendations to the Washington “powers that be” on how to assure the viability of the electric grid, based on its experience associated with its NORAD mission. Also, under its NORTHCOM role, it could incentivize the need for all key federal, state and local authorities to train and operate in ways to prepare for a major grid shutdown, especially from a major natural or manmade EMP event. For starters, NORTHCOM should press the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for a planning scenario that all federal, state and local authorities can plan and train against. This would be in concert with an anticipated congressional initiative, the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act. And he should provide a formal requirement to the acquisition authorities to defend against ballistic missile and/or satellite attacks from the South.

I believe we have a limited time in which to act to address Iran’s existential threat to the “Great Satan” America—as recently again emphasized when Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei insisted that sanctions be lifted, while his audience chanted “Death to America.” His response, “Of course, yes, death to America, because America is the original source of this pressure” of the sanctions. (Click here.)

Time’s awasting ….

Near Term High Frontier Plans.

We will continue working with South Carolina folks to build a coalition to engage constructively with private citizens and their local and state representatives and other authorities to work with the SC National Guard in understanding and responding to this serious threat. We will expand this effort to neighboring and other states. We expect support from Cong. Jeff Duncan (R-SC) whose district includes my SC farm—who is a member of the Congressional EMP Caucus seeking legislation to counter the EMP threat.

We will be working with members of the EMP Coalition and others who are seeking to take our message across the country—especially with Bob Newman, a former Adjutant General of Virginia to help us link our SC plans more broadly and especially into the National Capital region.

What can you do?

Join us in praying for our nation, and for a rebirth of the freedom sought, achieved and passed to us by those who came before us.

Help us to spread our message to the grass roots and to encourage all “powers that be” to provide for the common defense as they are sworn to do.

Begin by passing this message to your friends and suggest they visit our webpage, www.highfrontier.org for more information. Also, please encourage your sphere of influence to sign up for our weekly e-newsletter.

Encourage them to review our past email messages, posted on www.highfrontier.org, to learn about many details related to the existential manmade and natural EMP threats and how we can protect America against them. 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, Please send it to 500 North Washington Street, Alexandria, VA 22314.

E-Mail Message 150421