Boots, Bytes and Bombs

It�s called the �e-bomb.� Delivered by a cruise missile, the E-bomb is a warhead that explodes to emit a high-energy pulse that, like a bolt of lightning, will fuse any electrical equipment within range.

THE E-BOMB HAS been more than a little temperamental in testing, and engineers would still like another year to work out the bugs, but on the first night of the war against Iraq, E-bombs will detonate over President Saddam Hussein�s key command-and-control bunkers in and around Baghdad. If all goes according to plan, lights will blink out, computers will melt down, phones will go silent. Saddam and his lieutenants will be left shivering in silent darkness, alone and waiting to die.

This war will be different, say the planners. They use buzzwords like simultaneity, agility and effects-based targeting. What they mean is the creation of a nimble force that can see the whole battlefield and act quickly, using its superior information and its high-precision firepower to strike deep and fast, enveloping and disabling enemy units before they can mount a coherent defense. The concepts, and the high technology to carry them out, have been in the works for some years. But they have never before been tested on such a grand scale. High-tech forces are smart, even brilliant. But they can also be fragile. Sandstorms can blind eye-in-the-sky satellites and crash helicopters, communication links can go down, and some of the new gizmos have never been battle-tested. Indeed, a run through for the war at Gen. Tommy Franks�s new CENTCOM headquarters in Qatar last month was a blizzard of computer glitches.

Link - www.msnbc.com...

The weapons you describe as an EMP device are actually a cover story for other weapons developments. While they certainly have the ability to work as advertised (and dont believe that they need more ironing out, if we have it, it works, far better than will ever be reported), it can do much more.

I meant to post something during the discussion regarding shaped or directional nuclear warheads. If using actual true nuclear devices, actually shaping them would be difficult (requiring some very advance quantum mechanical engineering, and Im not sure we have that ability) if not impossible. Of course, we could just put a normal warhead inside a very hardened "penetrator" casing to penetrate deep into a target.

However, one top secret development associated with the EMP device, is essentially a small scale disposable scalar device. I am not privy to the actual mechanics behind it, however, I do know that it uses upwards of a terrawatt of stored electricity (I believe the bulk of the device is actually a superconducting storage capacitor). It is supposedly capable of directing a stream of energy within a 15 degree cone. A small experimental model is reportedly what actually destroyed the Murrough Federal Building in Oklahoma City.