I’m wondering what is the feasibility of fielding effective EMP weapons disguised as satellites and the probability that such weapons are already in orbit.
From my readings, I gather that the optimal altitude of an EMP burst is low earth orbit, where the US, Russia, and other countries routinely operate satellites. It seems logical to me that if the best height for EMP deployment is one that is also well-established for legitimate use, then it is virtually assured that such weapons are already up there. (Let’s set aside the fact that the Partial Test Ban Treaty bans nuclear weapons in space, unless there’s a good reason to believe that such a violation would be trivial to detect.)
So what’s wrong with my theory? Is there any reason we can rest comfortably in the knowledge that we don’t have nuclear weapons constantly whizzing over our heads?
Satellites in low-earth orbit have a relatively short lifespan (on the order of several years) until their orbits decay, unless you boost them every so often. Boosting a satellite is the sort of thing that attracts attention, and letting a satellite with a nuke on it make an uncontrolled re-entry to who-knows-where on the globe would attract even more attention.
As Chronos said, a low orbit isnt good. But you can avoid that by putting it into another higher orbit and just drop into a lower orbit and detonate when you need to. The time to do that could be under an hour, so its not like a higher orbit makes it a no go.
It would not remotely surprise me that some are lurking up there right now. I dont think its a given, but IMO its certainly not a small fraction of percentage chance either.
So orbit them higher than LEO, at say the height the old Cosmos reactor cores were boosted to. From what I remember, within reason, EMP weapons work over a wider radius the higher they detonate.
What I think would be the sticking points are the batteries and tritium decaying—hard to service a weapon orbiting at ~1000 miles—and being able to pick up gamma rays or other decay spectra.
question - could you shield the bomb to avoid high radiation level from that satellite? Would the shielding be light enough to be practical? Or are there no real limits on the weight of the satellites on those orbits?
It would be feasible for a major power to service a satellite with a remote vehicle but by doing so it would reveal itself. Since delivery of an EMP is no different than any other weapon the satellite serves no purpose. What should be of more concern are unstable nations with rockets capable of launching a conventional nuke off the coast from a boat. If the boat is destroyed in the process then it becomes difficult to trace the point of origin.
Magiver, perhaps suddenly exploding it from satellite prevents the target nation from observing the missile launch and spending a few minutes doing something about it, while the missile flies? Or you think that there is nothing particularly useful that can be done in those several minutes before the EMP occurs?
MAD assures a similar response and a satellite has the same verifiable return address. An EMP would do immense damage to civilian infrastructure but zero damage to silo’d missiles.
I know you’re a real fan of this boat-launching scenario, but in order to cover any significant area, an EMP burst needs to be at an altitude that is 5-10 times higher than the useful blast radius of the weapon. To put it in terms of hard numbers, 200 miles is the most effective altitude for an EMP burst but the weapon has a max blast radius of 10 miles even if it’s a very large nuke. If it detonates low enough to destroy the boat, the EMP affected area is very small. If it detonates high enough to cover a large area, then the boat is not destroyed.
You could disguise it as a LEO launch instead of a missile launch. If a satellite is launched that other countries don’t already know what it is for, they’ll plan to watch it to figure it out, not assume it’s an EMP nuke.
There’s plenty you can do to protect against EMP, even in a very short time, but de-orbiting the satellite would at best only be twice as quick as launching from the ground. 20 minutes vs. 40 minutes really wouldn’t make any difference: In either case, any system prepared for an EMP will survive, and any system not so prepared would not.
How much attention, and is it enough attention to really care about?
Would it attract undue attention if they simply arranged for controlled re-entry into the ocean and replaced it with a newly launched weapon every few years? Again, if this is a routine thing for low-earth satellites, why would it be any different for weapons?
It would be a case of expending money to launch something that can’t be easily maintained and requires recovery. Better to let a missile sit in a cozy silo where it can be pampered and not studied up close by passing satellites.
A controlled re-entry or an orbital boost are both the sort of thing that any industrialized nation (like the presumed target of our EMP attack) would be guaranteed to know about. And once they know about it, you’ll have a hard time constructing a cover story that holds together. Just what is in that satellite, that requires it to be so big, and hasn’t produced any results we know about?
Where is this satellite going to get the energy for such a massive thing like a tactical EMP burst? Nuclear weapons are really the only effective way to deliver this kind of thing. Essentially, your plan sounds like hiding nukes in satellites and dropping them at the right time. Any country would interpret that as the start of a nuclear war.
Nukes are not particularly big. I have no doubt you could put on in a satellite that actually did something else. Hell, the Hubble would make one good cover story now wouldnt it? WHY do those astronauts keep going back to that thing?
IMO a nuke in a sat for an EMP strike most likely does NOT make a good first strike weapon (or at least not much better than land launched missles). But it does IMO make for at least a decent backup/fuckyouto weapon.
IMO its marginally useful enough that somebodies somewheres on all sides thought there was some possibility one might be needed someday. That mindset and some money is all it takes for a decent chance for one to be out there now.
Who’s to say that a cover story is necessary? If I recall correctly, the exact launch window of many space shuttles is classified for “military reasons” (though everyone eventually knows the exact launch time). What’s to stop a country to say that they’re launching a satellite that is a little heavier than usual, and needs to be either boosted or grounded at a particular time, and the exact reason is none of your business? Or is this sort of thing just not done?