North Korean Atmospheric H-Bomb Blast Would Risk Damage To Global Electronics
–by John Lewallen,
January 23, 2017
I sincerely hope that the North Korean government does not carry out its threat to detonate a thermonuclear weapon, or H-Bomb, in the Earth’s atmosphere. Since the most recent atmospheric H-Bomb tests in the 1960s, two factors have made it almost certain that an atmospheric blast today would emit an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) destructive to all electronics in line of sight: the global electronics communication network has become much more widespread and vulnerable to EMP damage, and H-Bombs designed to be “super-EMP” weapons have been developed.
Any atmospheric H-Bomb test anywhere would risk minor to catastrophic damage to global electronics, and might be mistaken as an act of war.
For authoritative information on EMP nuclear weapons, see “North Korea Nuclear EMP Attack: An Existential Threat” by Dr. William R Graham at www.38north.org.
