Re: EMP weapons?!?

[Ryan Pendergast <pender@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

aircraft fall out of the sky, burning up laptops, and killing the engines 
of running cars.  I have an article from Jane's somewhere that I can dig 
out if further info would be helpful.

that would be quite cool :)


The following is from the 18 March 1999 edition of Jane's Defense 
Weekly.  The typos are all mine.

"Russian scientists have developed a compact high-current electron 
accelerator that could potentially stop car engines and destroy the arming 
and firing circuits of bombs, according to a U.S. military analyst.

"Dr. Ira Merritt, of the advanced technology directorate at the US Army 
Missile Defense and Space Technology Center recently told the Congressional 
Joint Economic Committee (JEC) that the device, called RADAN, is smaller 
than an attache case, weighs about 8kg, has a directional antenna, and a 
12V rechargeable battery.

"It can stimulate the output of lasers, x-rays, wideband radio frequencies 
(RF), and high-power microwaves.  RADAN has a pulsewidth of two nanoseconds 
and a output pulse bandwidth from 1 MHz to 5 GHz.

"Dr. Merritt's testimony was part of a JEC hearing on the proliferation of 
RF Weapons technology.

"US Army scientists have long been monitoring Russian, French, and Swedish 
programmes in this area to more fully understand the vunerabilities of US 
battlefield electronics and computer systems to RF weapons.

"France's Gramat Research Centre "has dedicated significant assets to study 
the effects of electromagnetic energy on electronics," Dr. Merritt said.

"He also highlighted reports in France that several years ago Thomson-CSF 
published some brochures in which they stated they were developing RF weapons.

"'There is an increasing variety of equipment capable of generating very 
short RF pulses that are capable of disrupting sophisticated electronics," 
Dr. Merritt said.

"These types of pulses - which may last a sub-nanosecond - are not 
considered in many current electronics design standards and will require 
new forms of RF and electromagnetic interface protection.

"He said that the USA so far has not been able to definitively confirm 
Russian claims of effective compact explosive-driven RF munitions.

"Russia has claimed that it has such weapons ranging from the size of a 
hand grenade to a 155mm artillery shell in either high-power microwave or 
ultra-wideband pulse.

"The army centre is working to bring to the USA some Russian pulsers and 
underground imaging sensors developed at the Ioffe Physio-Technical 
Institute in St. Petersberg to assess their ability to detect land mines."


Also, found this in the 2 February 1998 issue of FOR YOUR EYES ONLY:

"The Swedish military is testing a Russian-built High Power Microwave (HPM) 
bomb.  The "briefcase-size" bomb, which does not actually explode, can 
produce a 10-gigawatt pulse able to damage or destroy computers or 
electronic components (e.g., radars, power stations, telephone exchanges) 
within a dozen or so meters.  A larger truck-mounted version has a range of 
"a few hundred meters," and a smaller version the size of a pistol can 
destroy a single computer from point blank range.  The weapon bought by 
Sweden cost less than $100,000; Australia and other nations have bought 
similar weapons for tests.  This weapon is a major concern to security 
agencies around the world.  No treaties or sanctions cover such 
"non-violent weapons," which would be highly useful to terrorists.  It 
cannot be detected by sensors designed to sniff explosives or detect 
radiation.  The target may not even know it has been attacked until a 
detailed study of the mysterious failure is completed."

Hope this helps.
Ryan