WarSclerotic

Mark Langfan

Iran’s Supreme Religious leader has repeated his fatwa against nuclear weapons and the country’s foreign minister made much of it for foreign media.

Much has been, and will be, said about that Iranian Supreme Leader Khamenei’s February 2012 informal speech to a group of Iranian nuclear scientist’s wherein he is translated in English to have said:

“There is no doubt that the decision makers in the countries opposing us know well that Iran is not after nuclear weapons because the Islamic Republic, logically, religiously and theoretically, considers the possession of nuclear weapons a grave sin and believes the proliferation of such weapons is senseless, destructive and dangerous,” the Leader said.

(4/8/12 PressTV, “Iran never seeks to produce, maintain, use nuclear weapons: Lawmaker” http://www.presstv.ir/detail/235155.html)

Most importantly, the United States apparently gave great gravitas and optimistic meaning to Khamenei’s informal talk in 2012.

In direct response, in the run-up to the latest round of P5+1 talks in Istanbul, the US Secretary of State Hilary Rodham Clinton characterized the “grave sin” statement as the very basis of the P5+1 Talks by stating, “We are meeting with the Iranians to discuss how to translate what is stated belief into a plan of action.”

Consequently, in the follow-up it continues to appear that the recent Istanbul P5+1 Nuclear Talks and its progeny, if not the very P5+1-Iranian Nuclear “Plan of Action” itself, are elementally based on Khamenei’s “grave sin” informal comment.

Well, before one gets too rapt in the Iranian religious untouchable that “Nuclear weapons are a “grave sin”” , 1938 Munichesque euphoria, one should remember that back in 2006, Mullah Mohsen Gharavian, a disciple of the ultra-conservative Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, widely regarded as the cleric closest to Iran’s new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, issued an actual religious fatwa that it is “only natural” to have nuclear bombs as a “countermeasure” against other nuclear powers. (2/16/06 The Telegraph, “Iranian fatwa approves use of nuclear weapons” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iran/1510900/Iranian-fatwa-approves-use-of-nuclear-weapons.html)

So at a minimum, there seems to be some “religious” disagreement in Shiite theological circles over how many angels can dance on the head of a Uranium 235 nucleus.

However, even taking Ayatollah Khamenei’s words at full face value, and believing them to be the “final word of Iranian law” to mean that having a “destructive” nuclear weapon like the one dropped on Hiroshima is a “great sin,” a totally new type of game-changer modern nuclear bomb has been invented that doesn’t kill any human beings or animals or destroy buildings.

Instead of killing people, the new nuclear bomb burns out all the electronic equipment and the modern defense systems that rely on electronics through the nuclear generation of Electromagnetic Pulse (“EMP Nuclear Weapon”).

This EMP Nuclear Weapon is detonated at a technically easily reachable high-altitude of about 50 kilometers above a given targeted battlefield area, doesn’t harm a fly, destroys all the electronics within about 750 kilometers of the blast radius, and leaves non-electronic World War II-vintage weapons like regular guns like Kalashnikovs and Katyushas totally unaffected.

Such an Iranian EMP Nuclear Weapon wouldn’t kill even a bird, but with the element of surprise would allow the Iranians to follow on such a high-altitude nuclear EMP burst with a conventional blitzkrieg overwhelming type of ground attack on a “localized area.”

In fact, such an EMP nuclear bomb that didn’t kill a single person, but enabled Iran to then conventionally attack and conquer Eastern Saudi Arabia and liberate 5 million Shiite Muslims from the heretical yolk of Sunni rule, couldn’t possibly be described as “destructive” and “pointless,” and therefore, even under the strictest interpretation of Khamenei’s words would be 100% Sharia-compliant.

(For more historical and analytic EMP nuclear information, please see my first draft monograph at www.marklangfan.com/fizzlekriegfirstdraft.pdf.)

An Iranian EMP Nuclear Weapon that doesn’t kill even a single bird, but destroys all our high-tech weapons and satellites US and Saudi Arabia depend on to maintain their military edge over Iran enabling Iran to hostage 30,000 living US soldiers as POWs??? “Crazy” you scoff!! “Lang-sanity,” you guffaw!!??!!

Well, before one gets oneself too much into stitches, one should read what the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency and USSTRATCOM website has to say about this new type of nuclear weapon:

On the DTRA website as of March 30, 2011, the DTRA stated:

“One of the dangers of a nuclear weapon – even one too small or too far away to kill or harm anyone – is the electromagnetic pulse, or EMP. While a blast of radiation might not do anything to properly protected troops, it would “fry” anything electronic: laptops, sensors, our highly computerized planes, even a simple cell phone. A weapon that doesn’t kill a single person could still destroy our technology.” [Bold added]

http://dtra.mil/Missions/NuclearDeterrenceDefense/RadiationHardenedTechnology.aspx

If that doesn’t put a crimp in your guffawing, try reading the super-secret 2005 report (recently declassified in 2011) by the US Army Intelligence branch called the National Ground Intelligence Center (NGIC) reported that China actually might successfully use such a High Altitude EMP Nuclear Weapon (“HEMP”)to attack Taiwan and US Aircraft Carrier Battle Groups (“U.S. CVBG”) as a winning “Trump Card” against the US, and state

NGIC Assessment, 8/17/05, Page 1
http://media.washtimes.com/media/misc/2011/07/22/ngic-emp.pdf

NGIC Assessment, 8/17/05, Page 6
http://media.washtimes.com/media/misc/2011/07/22/ngic-emp.pdf

But the 2005 NGIC 2011declassified Report didn’t really break new ground in 2011 because on June 12, 2009, Kim Myong Chol, the unofficial spokesman of the Late Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-il, wrote a definitive, explicit, and precise essay on North Korea’s nuclear strategy which was published by the Asia Times in June 2009 entitled “Nuclear war is Kim Jong-il’s game plan” and stated that:

Nuclear war is Kim Jong-il’s game plan

By Kim Myong Chol

The third possible attack, a high-altitude detonation of hydrogen bombs that would create a powerful electromagnetic pulse (EMP), would disrupt the communications and electrical infrastructure of the US, the whole of Japan, and South Korea.

Many of the essential systems needed to survive war would be knocked out, as computers are instantly rendered malfunctioning or unusable.

Military and communications systems such as radars, antennas, and missiles, government offices, would be put out of use, as would energy sources such as nuclear power stations and transport and communications systems including airports, airplanes, railways, cars and cell phones.

Ironically the ubiquity of high-tech computing gadgets in the US, Japan and South Korea has made them most vulnerable to EMP attacks. (Bold added for emphasis.).

Kim Myong Chol is author of a number of books and papers in Korean, Japanese and English on North Korea, including Kim Jong-il’s Strategy for Reunification. He has a PhD from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’s Academy of Social Sciences and is often called an “unofficial” spokesman of Kim Jong-il and North Korea. [Bold added]

(See 6/12/09 Asia Times, Nuclear war is Kim Jong-il’s game plan, http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/KF12Dg01.html)

These authorized public North Korean EMP nuclear weapon statements only followed and confirmed the North Korean nuclear tests of 2006 and 2009, where the world’s pre-eminent former CIA nuclear weapons EMP expert, Dr. Peter Vincent Pry has called the 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests likely successful new “Super EMP nuclear weapon tests.” (See 6/16/11 Newsmax article, North Korea Tests ‘Super-EMP’ Nuke, http://www.newsmax.com/KenTimmerman/super-emp-emp-northkorea-nuke/2011/06/16/id/400260)

But again a declared North Korean EMP Nuclear weapon in 2009 was really no surprise, because in 2005, a bright, prescient young major in the US Air Force wrote and published an open-source thesis for his Air War College degree exactly outlining that in 2010, US and South Korea forces would face an offensive first-use EMP nuclear weapon attack by North Korea entitled “Scenario #2: North Korea Levels the Playing Field.” EMP 2010 Threats (Col. Miller is now the current Commander of the 46th Test Wing, Eglin Air Force Base, Fla.) where he stated that:

Even a small, relatively crude nuclear device detonated above the Korean peninsula would generate an EMP with field strength well above 10 kV/m, ensuring wholesale destruction of unprotected electronic systems. [Bold added]

(November 2005 Report, Electromagnetic Pulse Threats in 2010,

http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cst/bugs_ch12.pdf

Critically, through the lens of North Korean and Iranian development of a deliverable EMP nuclear weapon, alleged Iranian and North Korean nuclear and ballistic missile test “failures” actually become EMP nuclear weapon’s “successes.”

For instance, the recent North Korean “failed” ballistic missile was a perfect EMP nuclear weapon-type of due south trajectory over South Korea which reached at least 50 kilometers altitude and therefore was a total success for a test EMP nuclear delivery launch.

Given Kim Myong Chol’s explicit 2009 EMP nuclear weapon plank of North Korea’s nuke plan, it is certain that Iran is equally attuned to the EMP nuclear weapon’s battlefield capabilities, and delivery requirements. Again, open source EMP nuclear expert Dr. Pry has, in fact, explicitly cited Iran’s ballistic missile tests as perfect EMP nuclear bomb missile trajectories as well. (See Jane’s Missiles and Rockets, May 2005)

Practically, if Iran attacked Saudi and US forces in the Persian Gulf with an EMP nuclear weapon, Iran would have two easy military objectives:

1) occupying the Saudi Easternmost Shiite-majority provinces that hold 99% of all of Saudi Arabia’s oil which are all located within 100 kilometers of the western shore of the Persian Gulf, and

2) capturing 30,000 living US soldiers as POWs that are now defending the Persian Gulf who will have all there modern high-tech weapons and communications equipment electronically burnt to a crisp at H-Hour plus 3 nanoseconds.

Iran’s military task will be greatly aided by the fact that there are now thousands of Iranian “sleeper” cells among the five (5) million Shiites that form the majority in the very Easternmost Saudi Persian Gulf provinces and other Sunni Kingdoms. Armed with the element of surprise, with an EMP nuclear weapon, Iran could militarily very well hand the US a fait accompli on the battlefield before Washington even knew what happened.

This is because an Iranian detonated EMP over the Saudi Peninsula would not only blind all of the US military spy satellites, but would likely burn out all the US CENTCOM Saudi Theater communications back to the Pentagon.

The White House would not even know Iran’s EMP attack had begun, before it was all over.

Plus, who, in their right mind, is brave enough in this White House to disturb President Obama’s weekend golf outings.

With 30,000 living US soldiers as POWs by Iran, the US ability to launch an unconventional counterattack would be checkmated. With the Iranians armed with an EMP nuclear weapon, any ability of the US to mount a conventional counterattack would impossible.

No US President could possibly mass offensive formations of US troops anywhere close to the Persian Gulf if those offensive force concentrations could be attacked by another EMP nuclear weapon, or a Hiroshima type nuclear weapon. Think: Saddam with “one nuclear weapon” when he invaded Kuwait. There never could have been a deploying Desert Shield which enabled the attacking Desert Storm, and Kuwait would still be called the Kadhima, the 19th Province of Iraq.

On the diplomatic UN front, Iran with its nuclear umbrella lock-grip of the entire supply of Persian Gulf Oil would be guaranteed a veto from China at the Security Council in return for a “guaranteed” 25 year supply of oil at a fixed price. China now gets most of its oil from the Persian Gulf and Iran anyway, so for the Chinese they couldn’t care whether they buy their oil from a Sunni King, or an Iranian Shiite Mullah. “Oil is oil is business is business” to the Chinese.

And the Iranians know that if they cross the Chinese, the Chinese will have no qualms with nuking them with “grave sin” types of nuclear-tipped missiles.

Also, in the wake of an Iranian attack on Saudi Arabia, Oil would soar to $700 a barrel breaking the backs of the Europeans who would do anything to buy the Iranian controlled oil, now that the Saudi oil was “no longer available” to flood the market.

In short, with an EMP nuclear device-armed Iran, practically overnight and “on any given Sunday,” the world could wake up with Iran in total and irreversible control over 56% of the world’s oil reserves. With Chinese-total UN backing, the Saudi Peninsula will be called Khomeini, the 32nd Province of Iran.

And as for Iran’s using an EMP nuclear weapon as a “grave sin,” Iran would be “liberating” five million of its Shiite “brothers and sisters” from the gross “tyranny” of Sunni Muslim heretical rule in strict keeping with Obama’s world “Democracy” drive.

What could be more politically correct and glatt kosher to an Obama White House? And Iran would be liberating her Shiite brothers at a cost of almost no US military deaths since an Iranian EMP nuclear weapon wouldn’t kill anybody, only the halal Iranian follow-on conventional blitzkrieg would kill people and US troops.

Did the United States nuke Vietnam when North Vietnam violated the Paris Peace Accords and overran South Vietnam? Of course not!!! If Iran didn’t think it was a “grave sin,” and was strictly halal to murder 3,000 US soldiers and maim 10,000 with the IEDs Iran sent in to blow up US soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, then how can it be a “grave sin,” and not perfectly glatt kosher halal to religiously liberate millions of Iran’s Shiite brothers where almost no US soldiers will be killed.

Iran will also more than happily return their 30,000 living US POWs upon the US explicitly agreeing that the US will not retaliate, attempt to reinvade the formally recognized and renamed “Iranian Peninsula,” formally agreeing that the Islamic Republic of Iran is the rightful and actual Custodian of the Two Holy Places, and also to add a “freebie” to round things out, Obama will agree to send Iran a bucket of dirt from the White House Rose Garden, and barrel of water from the Potomac River.

As for the EMP-ignorant nuclear “experts” who have “omnisciently” advocated that Iran will never use a nuclear weapon because of the Cold War Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) theory, an Iranian modern-type EMP nuclear weapon renders any possible deterrent to Iran’s EMP nuclear weapon first-use meaningless.

Critically, as the Defense Committee of the House of Commons recently concluded, once any state gets any nuclear weapon, they can easily make an EMP nuclear weapon.

On February 8, 2012, the United Kingdom House of Commons Defence Committee issued a report, Developing Threats: Electro-Magnetic Pulses (EMP) that stated:

42. On the basis of the evidence received, it seems likely that at present only those states with a known nuclear capability would be able to utilize an HEMP weapon. However, certain states such as Iran could potentially pose a realistic threat in the future, even if it does not currently do so, if nuclear non-proliferation efforts are not successful. (pg. 18, Bold in original)

(See House of Commons Defence Committee, Developing Threats: Electro-Magnetic Pulses (EMP)
www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201012/cmselect/cmdfence/1552/1552.pdf) In fact, once Iran gets an EMP nuke, as the NGIC report concludes, Iran has an incentive and a window of opportunity, not a deterrent, to using an EMP weapon against Saudi Arabia and the US to conquer the Saudi Peninsula before Saudi Arabia acquires an EMP resilient hardened second-strike nuclear weapon. In effect, an Iranian EMP nuclear weapon renders any Iranian MAD deterrent theory INSANE!

So Iran’s possessing even “one nuclear weapon” means Iran could launch an EMP nuclear attack on the Saudi Peninsula at a moment’s notice. This will not create “stability” as the mad MAD advocates claim, but a hysterical compounding vortex of instability.

In conclusion, before pundits go out, and write inane, fatuous articles about nuclear “life and death” matters, and interpret make-believe contradictory Iranian fatwas, they should have, at least, done a touch of research, and read the open source US Government military declassified reports on what an Iranian EMP nuclear weapon could irreversibly do to the free world.

“Nuclear weapons are a grave sin” in 2012 sounds almost as good to those pundits as “Peace in our time” sounded to the useless idiot pundits in 1938. This time, let’s hope with NGIC’s forward-thinking “Intelligence today,” the world doesn’t get suckered into a losing “Tomorrow’s fight” against an unstoppable Iranian EMP nuclear weapon attack.

Mark Langfan is an attorney and writer, whose opeds have been posted on Arutz Sheva and who has created an original educational 3d Topographic Map System of Israel to facilitate clear understanding of the dangers facing Israel and its water supply. It has been studied by US lawmakers and can be seen at www.marklangfan.com.