electricity in a renewable. build these plants in the desert or wherever we can do in response to its way to create a part of the economy that doesn't exist now and that will mean jobs and prosperity. and various other areas of sustainability and waste management that are now being looked at as opportunities, economic opportunities as well as opportunities to heal planet and save the environment. so i think that it is a matter of pointing out those aspects of the environmentally responsible way of conducting business and conducting government and conducting hour deily lives and linking that to economic prosperity. that's the message that needs to be gotten across because i think it is valid. ..

>> because both have a cost and a substantial one not doing anything will have a cost in terms of prosperity in fairly short order because we will begin to experience in our children's lifetime

certainly some very substantial e facts. there is already a way we do not a bang calculate these comparisons. look at the health cost of our mode of transportation. we know people who live near a freeway have higher incidence of cancer and lung disease and we know our children are experiencing more respiratory problems or as much and so forth. all of that can be linked to our e emissions from our vehicles. here is that costs being borne by the people were building these vehicles are selling that fuel? no. if we are subsidizing the cost their insurance rates, is suffering, government and taxes are subsidizing the cost. we can say we have cheap gasoline from a cheaper than anybody else in the western

world but it is not cheap it is just that we pay a different line item. if we look at the true cost of not taking action we would see that. >> host: i agree. my final question when you traveled and presented your book, has any of the breeders have reactions? >> i would say more gratified and maybe because people who were attracted to the event are already green minded but what i am hearing is this day and age we would be planning new cities and what can we do to try to influence policy makers not to go forward as described. a lot of enthusiasm about the vehicles such as the designs

that are cleaner and greener and and will this idea of protecting endangered species which has been very controversial has been embraced because people don't want polar bears to be extinct and they don't want important landscapes to vanish. there was an attempt to paint people who want to enforce the endangered species act outlawed because they want to compete development or stop logging of forests and that makes them an outlaw but in fact, there advocating zero obeying the laws that we have. and following the endangered species act of really follow the laws we have on the books would be in a much better place but the problem is we has been breaking the law so many years and that message as resonated did we have tools

that when we put them to work to heal our landscape. >> host: thank you very much. >> guest: my pleasure. >> i am the president of the foundation for the defense of democracies and is a two formed just after 9/11 refocus on terrorism the ideologies and regimes and movements that drive terrorism based in washington d.c.. today my guest is 59 a military historian, the the author of 40 books including six i believe that is

co-author with the new gingrich part of and his most recent book is "one second after" it is a novel but also being made into a motion picture from warner brothers. the subject is america after an electromagnetic pulse attack. thank you for being here. i am afraid there are many people watching who perhaps don't know what and electromagnetic pulse attack is or would be. maybe you explain that he was sure. emp is a shorthand for electromagnetic pulse. first realized it was tested in the sixties before we go further i know this sounds like science fiction. so you in the audience and folks watching this later if this sounds like science fiction go on to the internet

and google emp and here are some of the things you should look up and was the american test of designating a weapon in space which blew out a fair part of the power grid in hawaii also does so be a test 184 and finally also look up the carrington event which was triggered by a solar storm. to go back to answer your question emp, a electromagnetic pulse a byproduct of detonating a nuclear weapon. here is a scenario that is terrifying for me with relationship to america the debt and a weapon approximately 250 miles above the center of the united states you do not need a high megaton rainn jlo kilo ton range a little more than what they're curious detonated several weeks ago will do it. the gamma ray bursts when it hits the upper atmosphere t.a.r.p. starts eight the

chain reaction. imagine a couple rolling downhill triggers an avalanche by the time it hits the earth service at the speed of light is in electromagnetic discharge its fees to the power grid all of the wiring, antenna become picking up the electrical overload. blows out the entire power grid of the united states. game over. >> host: you have one missile instead of hitting a target and wiping out this is you have a missile go high above the united states detonate the warhead there and people on the ground would not feel they think? >> guest: no. >> host: but you would try the electric grid takes place suddenly they find out that nothing electrical works and every car on the highway has stopped anything that is

computerized is dead, stalwart, refrigeration, everything. >> guest: it is all gone. it is a variety of scenarios. some people talk about a three web been detonation one on the east coast one on the center and one on the west coast. there are a number of various scenarios delivery by a cargo ship a couple hundred miles off of the gulf of mexico. you do 90 precision guidance when you deliver a emp weapon we have to get out of cold war thinking. you have to do a general often to the area and a dozen a then the cascading effect starts. congressional studies done 2004, 20081 of the gentleman testified 90% of all americans would be dead after the emp event it. >> host: explain why not because of the force of the explosion but because of the

absence of infrastructure that means food begins to rock, medicine goes bad, you cannot deliver anything, no emergency vehicles, no planes flying, no helicopters. >> guest: let's talk about planes we're doing this program right now but this moment there is about a quarter of a million americans in transit a couple of thousand commercial planes you can have capt. celly and of for unseat the fifth but suppose the loss is electrical along with his power? the would be holding a stick that is useless. will make it 9/11 kempe lael -- palin significance when compared to what will happen in the first minutes. >> in your novel the president is in air force one and it falls out of the sky. >> guest: i have not only worked with the unclassified

affirmation. so i cannot speak directly as to what condition airforce one is but i prayed they have upgraded but that was seven years ago. i mean heartening. >> host: i do not want to jump too far ahead but let's just mentioned this and we will come back to a. of your word about the possibility of a emp attack there are two things one should think about magazines to me and one is to move ahead rapidly towards comprehensive and effective missile defense so that a missile going up could be destroyed before it detonates are does damage the other is the hardening of the electrical grid in the united states so it is not clear that everything would be knocked out by any emp attacks. >> let's go with that analogy aircraft carrier world were to have the capability of

defending itself from the aircraft fire fighter protection of what happened? then you go into damage control. we need to things which i hope this book triggers a little bit we need ballistic missile defense but also the damage to troll now in place the hardening of our infrastructure to withstand because an interesting point* you have to consider if the systems are not hardened would that not embolden some enemies you think that they can try this? >> guest: exactly we all love the fact rio blackberry's an ipod and our cars are more computerized. >> host: but what i am saying it is weird develop a more sophisticated but more vulnerable society than we

have ever had because as we have these technological achievements that are more widespread we become more, not less mobile. in your novel there are a few cars that are working they are all a antique cars that do not rely on computer technology. you have a plane that works because it is antique. those hold up against this sort of attack in a way that does not happen with the highly sophisticated and fragile system we are now building to one imagine a graph one line could represent the research going into increase the gamma ray bursts coming off of the nuclear weapon that is classified information. one can assume it is being done. point* #2 which i think we're all familiar with, think about a cellphone if you could afford 1/3 years ago, it was the size of a shoebox.

we have built a fabulous and wonder what incredible infrastructure but in so doing we have become more and more reliant on micro precision electronics fatter ever increasingly susceptible to a emp overload. go back to a soviet test 184 it is reported some of the ignition systems and the cars underneath this burst into central asia we're talking 1962 soviet car which i think was slightly overbuild compared to a vehicle today that is loaded with electronics. the ever increasing vulnerability with the ever increasing potential of damage from a small nuclear weapon. >> host: you and i are aware of this, most people in the country who don't know a lot about it, an important point* is we are not alone in being aware this is a dangerous weapon.

there is such a thing as a emp congress there is some talk of reinstating the commission but it is going out of business as we discuss this if i am correct? particularly important to understand for example, the iranian regime which has as is rallying cry death to america they know about emp as a congressional emp commission found out and if i am correct they have been working come with the iranian regime has been working on developing the capability to launch emp attack. is that correct? >> now you're getting to the core issue that is part of the book. there has been testing going on from barges from the caspian sea doing a vertical launch then declaring that as

a failure. there is only one profile that fits a vertical launch four years. this is the equivalent of we're on a cruise off the waters of japan october 1941 and we see torpedo planes during low passes. we may say that looks like a gear up for a strike on pearl harbor. we're looking at a potential future pearl harbor. if there are test vertical launch off of a barge to fit that scenario. >> host: the reason to use a barge you do not needed long-range missile with the unincorporated site missiles to hit israel or europe but that does not matter they could put on a barge or a freighter or a large ship it also comes out if they wanted to do is such a way there are no fingerprints they could turn the barge over to a hezbollah crew or al qaeda or

whoever wants to do with the ship could be scuttled afterwards or maybe slink away in the middle of the night while everybody is confused but in your novel it is not clear who has done this. >> guest: one of the things that concerns me is we have to get out of the cold war paradox the world i grew up was duck and cover. growing up in the new york city area many smile and remember i show it to my students every year. i remember the cuban missile crisis we practiced every day. remember mutual assured destruction worked. i often say now thank heavens of the opponents at that time were communist and atheist because they are very pragmatic they're not going to inherit the smoking gun we're dealing with a situation now in iran that mutual assured destruction is an

encouragement. >> host: i know this because i was in exchange did in the soviet union years ago and many of the soviets were evil but not irrational they did not believe in the idea of moscow being destroyed that was terrifying to them but the dean of islamic studies said it you have the religious ideology of the mahmoud ahmadinejad, if you believe that god will return to the earth only when people are screaming in agony than the idea of mutually interred destruction becomes the inducement you can i use that as we did in the cold war you have the iranians working to develop the capability the seat -- california has translating documents specifically dealing with the idea of emp capability and how they would obtain and this is from the regime that says

death to america is the goal and a world without america is obtainable. despite this there was a large piece in the new republic saying all of this the bill fortune -- william forstchen is talking about it is science fiction in a crazy scenario we should not talk about but the first thing that occurs to be is 1999 we had been hearing talk about the possibility of 19 radical middle easterners coming to the u.s. with box cutters bringing down the world trade center and popping goals in the pentagon to take down the capital one white house people may have said that is crazy york paranoia or science-fiction they could not get away with it. do you agree? >> guest: i had a wonderful friend, one of the old godfathers of science fiction

and have a great story how 19417 gentlemen came in and sat down and said you are no longer to write anything on the following subjects. uranium, plutonium come at the center remaking an atomic bomb? they took him into another room and said if you keep up this conversation you'll spend a lot of time in south dakota and then there was the terrible results in hiroshima and nagasaki four years later this is not a science fiction the capability is there we could be emp today. i do not want to panic longer or this is not just to move a book. do not read the book but go out there and do the research. go on line and look up emp i will say this a second time look up starfish prime which was the american test in 1962 and the soviet test 184 that

is the data that shows you the potential of what can be done to the united states right now. >> we should read your book because it is entertaining but also gives and education and also work on a history of technology and my next question is put those together generally speaking in history any weapon developed generally has been used. right? a. >> guest: we have heard the cry if this weapon is so terrible we hercules a big catapult is so terrible it has been that way throughout history look at world war i common poison gas come and machine guns and is a terrible we will not do it but all weapons systems are eventually used. >> host: it also makes maximum use of a single weapon or a small number 214 a long

time right to. >> host: it was thought of 100 nuclear weapons were launched we may not be able to defend but one or two we can but not necessarily if it is used in this way to plunge us back to a couple hundred centuries to when i have to say something that sounds rather cruel is paying for the buck. is at this moment if a hiroshima size weapon was detonated over a building may be the capital our probability of survival would be pretty small so we would deal with the horror that would pay off 9/11. that same weapon if used as emp the initial results would be the loss of the aircraft but take a look at this, where does this water come from? i am asking you right now? word is it come from? >> host: a reservoir.

>> guest: imagine washing t8 -- washington d.c. in 24 hours with no water and imagine washington d.c. 21 days with no uprooted is uninhabitable you have the hierarchy of needs and within 48 or 72 hours this would be worth its weight in gold. then why? >> host: this deserves mention beyond an attack a purposeful attack there is the possibility that you talk about of having emp even to take through days take place through natural means 51 nasa just put out a report three or four weeks ago looked up and ask the/nola harrington, a carrington event. we have been in a low period a solar activity for the last five years in 2003 in north carolina we were watching the northern lights some of you

may recall that put our systems on the fritz carrington event is where telegraphy wires melted, collapsed and melted and railroad crossties burst into flames. electrical sparks were shooting out of the telegraphy systems. it blew out part of the system in the northeast. if that level of a solar storm happen today it could emp the whole world if it lasted 24 hours one rotation of the earth 24 hours that would be most of the world but let me provide an analogy one of my great heroes that is developing this is a representitive from maryland to head up from the republican side and let me emphasize this is a bipartisan issue i just wish we could get out of partisan politics on this issue and agree that we will all be in the same sinking ship. the issue of ballistic defense

may not excite you may be the green or environmental issues do therefore please look at the carrington event. such a solar storm would do the identical thing we are talking about. the congressman analogy is would any of us dared to in-house and not spend $1,000 per year on insurance? all i am asking for is good heavens if we could spend one-tenth of 1% of what has been thrown out in the last six months of hardening of defense would be easier. >> host: let's be specific there are two things that can be done to defend ourselves against emp attack whether from the enemy or the solar event. one is too hard in the electrical grid to be resistant. the other is missile defense. that's be clear we are not aggressively doing either of these. >> guest: that is right. >> host: we're not targeting their grid and it appears that

congress is on track to spend less on missile defense, not more at a time when we have iran being provocative, north korea being provocative testing nuclear weapons in pakistan has missiles and nuclear weapons is on a precipice you cannot guarantee those cannot come loose. on a bipartisan basis, members of congress of the administration would say our primary duty is to defend americans so let's make this a high priority and neither are these our priorities by just the opposite the 12 of the main characters in my novel, is rather conservative another is rather liberal and four weeks after this event they both comment how foolish and how stupid it seems of what divided us.

what we're arguing about now back then four weeks ago it was moved compared to what we're facing today. we tend to forget how divided america was with public opinion in of 1941 into our entry of world war ii there were things done by franklin roosevelt that today he would be impeached. go look of "chicago tribune" december 5, 1941, it is a friday look at the political cartoons on the cover that announce the war hysteria in washington is on the front page. that's ended at 755am december 7, 1941 hawaii time we were united. i want us to see us united before we have another december 7th. >> host: one more question the nablus take questions from our guest. we have the technology, do we

not? let me be clear we have the technology to tell any regime iran, north korea, anyone that your missiles are a wasted investment because they will never hit their target. we have the technology to destroy missiles before they hit their target anywhere in the world. am i correct? that would create a layer of land-based see based and if we want to do it right we need a space-based missile defense system where the technology is called brilliant pebbles as a lot of rubbish like a garbage can. >> guest: and the pebbles program is generations ahead of what was talked about and eighties now it is precision tracked by very small munitions that can be placed in space i do not know the exact specs but in dozens of moving platforms and they are not weapons.

weaponization no-space it is carrying a nuclear warhead. >> host: but what you are doing with the missiles debt into space you destroy them before they can hit their target we have the technology but we are not proceeding on that track a? >> guest: son may remember the rand corporation in the '50s and '60s with four games in the area and again we do mutually assured destruction. if i know there is 100% probability i can inflicted damage on a you, i may be tempted if you are -- if he would fight any serious disagreement but if you have a shield bible think twice or three times before taking that step. minimal investment now can save millions of lives. let say americans survived emp can we afford the minimum of 23 days two or $3 trillion to

rebuild the power grid? that does not include casualties. >> host: i cannot introduce everyone but i will introduce to very briefly and ask for comments or questions genl barranca is a there days retired lieutenant general and his last assignment was director and general william sanders is here with us as well. or admiral. i should have known that immediately. also a missile defense experts and we're very pleased to have them with us. . .

and i would emphasize there was no collusion between you and i before this meeting in my response to this. ronald reagan proposes sdi, so it was 1982 -- 83. strategic defense initiative which and weeks was remarkably referred to as star wars and the remark became a matter what system we use, if we knock out the boost phase, transition phase, reentry phase, with merging and all these other technical terms which sound like they're coming from dr. strange

love can suddenly put 10,000 missiles over the united states, missile defense is useless. but one or 2% get through we are all dead anyhow. well, that's cold war thinking. today missile defense is everything one to three max, maybe five max. that is viable and can be done. the technology has gone generations and 30 years. so there is a difference what was going on 30 years ago, 25 years ago and now. and also at a fraction of the cost of sdi was being discussed about back in the 1980's, and what is so frustrating for me, sir, is the technology is there. all that is needed now is funding to finish the development. for me that's the insurance policy congressman bartlett talks about. >> i think relevant to the question as an old criminologist

the arms control approached the problem works if you have two sides that want to freeze -- they don't want to spend more, they don't want to do more but it doesn't work so well with a regime like that which came to power in 1979. the solution is to spread its revolution around the world. it is not at this point -- it has not come to the point in this revolution when it thinks we will be happy with comey's in this country. it is aggressive outside and i don't know how you sit down and do arms control approach with such a regime. admiral, did you want to say something as well? >> bill, my name is peter and i want to thank you for being an inspiration to the lunch we had on capitol hill with congressman bartlett along with david clark, as you know is a democratic

congressman, congressman from brooklyn who is co-sponsored with benny thompson, home and security committee, piece of legislation to harden their electric circuits every year the next five years at a cost of four or $5 billion trying to urge the administration to take that money out of the stimulus package and spend it on something we desperately need as a smart agreed because actually if you do the smart grade and as you know you will make the situation worse. but i want to thank you and being inspirational within primus' that accompanied sponsored the lunch we had. there is a bill in the house. we are trying to get a senate companion bill done. , to people that are not soulmates, yvette clark, and also bartlett, the congressman from maryland as basically the inspiration is to go to bennie thompson and try to get him as

chairman of the homeland security committee that bill, you've been the inspiration to do this and i want to thank you. there is a bill if we can get our act together to get this passed and we will try to take care of the missile defense issue but my honorable friend said the administration on fortunately is going backwards by the cuts they've had in the missile defense system and the kind of in the air when you talk about being able to detect a freighter. we have the technology to do that but our navy isn't crazy about doing pickett duty as they call it. we have the ability to shut down a freighter unless we happen to have a cruiser for example right there and that would have to get pretty lucky by identifying the freighter before it gets there. >> would you mind repeating one thing? how much you talking about per year as an insurance policy? >> danny thompson's people have estimated we could do not everything but we could ensure the survival of the electrical grid of the cost of 4 billion or

$5 billion a year every year over a period of four or five years. there is question as whether to order all parts to do the work you can't do it all at once by you could do a significant amount every year over a five-year period and pre-the threat doesn't materialize until then. >> i have to respond to one thing and i am not trying to do this as some sort of over dramatized emotional appeal that part of the inspiration for this novel is we had to hurricanes crisscross my town five years ago. ivan was one of them. blue everything out. my father was in the last weeks of his life and the nursing home and asked me to help out for the night because have the staff was gone and my father was a bad crisis. now of course an emergency generator was kicking on, however in an emp evin and the generator would be gone. i was sitting in my father's room with this storm and i was starting to think about this book and i finally asked one of

the staff, i said okay, if the power goes off, the respirator my father is on, what do we do? and they said well, we have some bobbled a year. i said suppose we've run out of all cold air what happens? they said we give you a squeezable you put on your face. and then i said in other words until i become so tired i stop and then my father dies. they said jack. that's what we are talking about. that's the reality i try to bring to the book. that is what we are all personally confronted with our parents, friends, neighbors and four or $5 billion a year could be the difference? >> peter, do you know or how would you characterize where the congress is on this issue? first of all, can you say if you don't mind is congress more or

less educated on the issue? and second, is it divided on a partisan basis or not entirely and is the inclination let's cut a little, let's cut a lot? how would you characterize congress on this right now? >> i would say there is a sense among republicans this is a deftly, serious issue. the problem comes with the democrats who say you just want to push missile defense. it's like immigration. don't talk about illegal immigration. it's too tough to stop, okay? so then it's not a problem. you are worried about the solution because it is tough. >> then let's talk about the event. kleeb mixup. >> benny thompson was convinced by roscoe bartlett. they are good friends. he's from mississippi. he's a democrat. he's got everything from a to z on homeland security. he gets it. yvette clark is the chairman of the subcommittee that deals with threats and terrorism and so

forth, so i would same maybe there's 10% of the democratic party may be 20%, jim marshall and others inclined to support missile defense any way. this is a way to get around the conundrum. and then what we do with missile defense, we either get it right or we don't get it right. in the senate you've got joe lieberman, jeff kyl, ben nelson, evan bayh and mr. begich, democrat from alaska, was on the armed services committee, they get it. there isn't a companion bill yet but then again joe lieberman and sue collins i think could be persuaded to put in a homeland security bill but the denny thompson's bill is you've got 800 billion in stimulus money? what's 20 million? it's over three years, fiscal ten, 11, 12. spend $15 billion your 60% of the way of solving a problem, not everything but again it is going to require people like bill and others -- deer is no substitute getting on the phone and going up there and banging on doors and giving it over and

over again until they say okay we will do this because i don't know where the administration is on this but by doing heartening we get around the missile defense problem seeing you just want to push missile defense. so congress is in there yet. but on the house side, we have sufficient support bennie thompson could get the bill done i think if the administration came on board, and i have to be honest i don't know where they are in terms of answering some of his letters. i just don't know. >> while we are waiting for that, an interesting fact that i believe is correct is overwhelming majority of americans favor missile defense but they also believe we have it to an extent we do not. they don't understand we are not adequately defend it right now. this question if we were too hard in the electrical grid as peter described or their subsidiaries benefits to that even if there's never any emp attack? >> of course. well, again, what's going back to caring to needn't.

what's the probability iran or north korea is going to launch? we could go across the river and somebody could work the statistics. what's the probability of a solar event hitting knous? 100%. >> so you're just -- >> we better do it now. >> it's a former modernization because we have an antiquated electrical grid at this point patched together over generations really. >> also a system built at will and we are doing this for the first time in history of humanity we don't realize there's a big hole in the gate. so the probability of a solar event, gough, please, look up the nasa n.o.a.h. report. it's going to happen so let's get ready. -- before. i actually read your book and i reviewed it for bob as american spectator. it's called quote polk won

second too late" is my review. i suspect this is the thing he would need to take into congress to be able to answer in doing this and i am sympathetic to your point of view we need to do something about this. one of them is on missile defense the kind of missile defense you need to knock down something coming off a freighter isn't the same as a shooting at a ballistic missile fired from north korea handed to hawaii. the system we have now will deal with the north korean agent but something like the airborne and laser, which is very far along in development and has now been cut in half in the proposed defense budget of the obama administration is precisely the kind of system coupled with a wax would give the opportunity to have patrol and cover a larger area than the cruisers to because if you don't do with them, the missile also if it is headed for 300 miles and going up like this is going to be as sending all the way as an entirely different kind of interception problem than the

systems we have now are not designed to do that. two other quick points on arms control one of the reasons the patriots didn't work as we originally thought they did during the gulf war is they would come down deliberately to comply with arms agreements that limited the deployment of technology we targets were required, the speed of project you va. the was a big problem the other thing of the hardening. it's very good. obviously it is high value on the grade but you also need to think in terms of the end users. computers, millions of computers. you just don't live without them in today's world or as he pointed out your car which is a traveling computer. you need a hardening device on that kind of thing. we saw this with flight 4471 of the things pointed out as these new composite aircraft, they have almost no medal in the and so everything the charge goes in and goes right into the only

metal and some of these aircraft the only medal is the hydraulic type of control systems. but you need some sort of thing. it isn't realistic to put a car in a cage necessarily computer because they are not easy to seal off but to get some kind of the equivalent of a grounding where everybody can put it on the house, where everybody can put it on their car or a round of their computer or what so that economically at the end point people are protected because if not you could have a perfectly well functioning electronic grade and you have cars this bill don't run and computers that still don't compute. >> you know, sir, in response to that you're talking about a multilayered system. let me draw quick analogy. i spent a lot of time working with world war veterans from a course i teach and i remember one gentleman on a carrier used to say when the fighters took off and we could hear they were

engaged 30 miles out and got a little worried. when the 5-inch guns started opening up we got more worried and when the 40-millimeter guns started opening up we got really worried and when the 20-millimeter guns started shooting that is when it was time to iran. in other words the carrier had a multilayered defense system that we all see in the victory of the season series and the final point of heartening, it again if the plane hit or the bomb hit, that's when damage control takes over. can you imagine launching a character with is your damage control? we have essentially launched an entire infrastructure with no damage control. >> he's got a question right there. right behind you, mark. >> my name is paul journalist, a journalist and these might be sick questions -- -- basic questions. does this correlate to the strength whatever nuclear weapon is being used?

a couple other ones, do you have this affect with both efficient and a fusion weapon and when this destroys or takes circuitry offline does it actually physically fried in all cases or does it just knocked off line and kanaby revived after that point? i know that's a couple questions -- >> those are great questions. when i was researching this book there was a correlation. the blast on a heavy megaton weapons actually dampen doubt part of the emp affect giving it a low yield weapon produces a higher, more efficient -- this is a real paradox -- lu were yield more dangerous emp. high-yield, lower emp. therefore, simpler technology -- >> it's an inverse correlation. >> it's an inverse correlation. remember to go to fusion you have to start with visions of it is a cheaper dirtier technology and we don't need the precision guidance or anything else

carrington evened the had wires almost melting. almost all of the wire secretary is gone and that's not going to be some sort of spectacular your computer catches on fire. what is all the reaction we have -- all of us have the same reaction when the power goes off. [laughter] and then we called the power company what is wrong with my computer? it might take hours to sit in. there's no particular flash bang it's just suddenly everything stops. >> i think that is one of the things you did brilliantly in your novel. everything does stop. most people have no idea what's going on or why. they don't know if it is localized or everywhere in the country were everywhere in the world. there are characters in your book particularly the hero that has a sense of this is because he had been concerned about it in the past and they began to

recognize what it happens and what it means if the retial doesn't go on or if there are no planes in this gaudy and that they are left entirely alone to their own devices and there will be no help for months or years they have no idea. >> there is one of my great concerns as well about post period emp retirement. we have been since the 50's instant communication. why to the 1850's? after abraham lincoln's assassination the entire north knew those old enough to remember, remember pearl harbor, jack kennedy, challenger going down. line 11, all these crises we have a voice. my world war ii class, i have the recordings of the interrupted program the japanese attacked pearl harbor but the nightly the voice of franklin delano roosevelt telling america we are going to get through this. well suppose we agree to silence. that is unique to the experience

of americans. we've never experienced that. none of us of life experience that. for that matter where is my daughter? i pulled the cell phone out of my pocket where are you right now? well, she could be 5 miles away it would be like she's on the other side of the world. that is one of the dangerous aspects why let me add we need within a hardening a good, solid backup system of telecommunications and media connections, the voice of our leadership can get out and say okay folks -- right now -- is sending in troops with relief

aid and probably won't be leaving and the mexicans have come in and the texas with some relief and troops and probably -- >> i am not necessarily implying anything. we stayed in europe by a few years and help them rebuild. that could be interpreted. >> you're talking about an america that is a third world badly wounded that has few capabilities to defend itself that is entirely laudable to anyone and anything. >> if i can talk about one thing in the book where the characters talking said remember the infomercials we used to say late at night quick turn them off, help the starving children and you are looking at the small children with a dena because the swollen stomach because of starvation deacon and ethiopia doing work and use of children dying. imagine a broadcast help the starving children of america. again we have not seen this in

america, any of us alive have not seen this. >> and it's hard to imagine -- it is hard to imagine, frightful to imagine and it has a ring of science fiction and so a lot of people -- i've heard this even in conversations i don't want to think about this. i don't like to think about this, so i'm not going to think about this but i'm going to say those people who are over the edge and this is just -- this is not in the realm of possibility we should prepare for. >> let me give an analogy. is anybody in this room a smoker? at least one person. i admit occasionally i am hearing and we all know and our kids will show us the photographs over and over that this is what is going to happen if you keep up a light at another cigarette because we don't like to think about it. and we should realize where it is taking us. and i confess this as a part-time smoker. so, yeah, we'll go into a brain lock confronting emp. it's easy to think about it as a science fiction when it's not than to think about it as reality, which it is. there is a wonderful film, bill

nye the science guy put out. we have to overcome hollywood and everyone portrays emp. how many of you saw ocean's eleven? remember the emp will shut down las vegas 30 seconds and then comes back on. there's a foolish movie with john travolta where everybody else has a emp but he turned the ignition off. my favorite where i embarrass my friends in the theater tom cruise running around because the aliens are roping on knous and he says change the car and they change the solenoid and i made a rather rude and loud comment to the embarrassment of everybody with me because millions of people walk out of the theater thinking emp well, just change the sunlight. >> frank gaffney for the american policy is back there. >> server -- >> mr. gaffney, dr. gaffney is a pleasure. you've helped me so much with

this book. >> thank you. very remote. thank you for doing it and the effect it's obviously having and for putting this on the air. i came in late. i apologize. there were two points i want to make sure you did cover and if you did, i apologize and if you didn't please go at it. one is bill bram the chairman of the estimate on loss of lives we would sustain

some of which is specifically earmarked so it would seem as though this is a propitious moment not only to be doing this education but encouraging these members to make sure at least a portion of those funds are in fact applied for hardening the grade at the same time we are planning for its upgrade. thank you. >> dr. gaffney, i must have to do -- i have to say something. remember in the old movies. there is an old teacher her name is diane st. clair and she gets upset when i don't give her the proper quote. she was going through a draft of

my book before it came out and she said bill, what good is a bailout if there is no country to bailout. that has become one of my favorite quotes so thank you, diane st. clair. she thought it up not me in fact newt gingrich says it as well. so i think we are at a crucial alignment at this moment of the funding, government realization, noah and even nasa. the quick point i want to jump on a is the projections are upwards of 90% fatality rate within a year. the soviet union severed about, what, 15% fatality and world war ii. poland, about 20%, 18 to 20%. that trauma has echoed for generations.

it is incomprehensible. again, it starts with water about a week we suddenly see massive gastrointestinal and we start to see a breakdown of the ecological systems and start to see starvation and let's also go with this, if the camera could point around, i'm not going to ask you to come everyone put up your hand who are on some sort of significant medication that might be life saving or life essentials and 30 days from now that supply runs out. we are also a hot house. hot house raised people now. we have been raised by for six generations like a rare tropical plant. he witnessed it in ethiopia. how many americans it something tossed out of ethiopia would be alive after two months for the diseases? >> that brings to this corollary what is the plight of the best health care system in the world if hospitals don't have electricity, if ambulances' cambron and the medicine is

dropping in high temperatures? >> just very quickly i'm still waiting to see i wonder why more people haven't written about what happened in the hospitals and new orleans after katrina and comparing that to a post for emp situation. >> that would be the same. >> thank you for the question. what about on nuclear emp and the capacity for individuals, terrorist organizations, would ever come to put together some sort of large scale capacitive type of broadcast system, drive it into lower manhattan and just completely blow up the financial system's computers, or to take it to the outskirts of a nuclear plant or some other facility and use it on a much smaller scale to create economic or more locally contained chaos? >> exceptional point.

and the technology is there. it's, remember some years ago when we first started getting internet and there was the dark humor you can't figure out how to make a nuclear weapon because it's now on the internet. this is being openly discussed how to make emp generators. in fact, do this. checkout youtube, look out "ford taurus being emp." check it out. >> one more question from peter few could pull the microphone from behind you and and that to him. >> two things, the navy did a study of exactly this problem of taking basically a gizmo the size of this table did an experiment within about 3 miles. so, this hardening would take care of that, too because if you

do to of the things, the natural and the non-nuclear you also protect against the nuclear. the third thing -- the second thing i want to point out is in europe, we often look to europe if they are doing it must be serious. not the government but the private sector in europe apart and 350 of the most critical in europe precisely because of this problem. but they've done with private sector money without direction from the government or the e.u. which is surprising in this country our industry if you ask them have you done anything they are saying is that fema's job or homeland security so they're waiting for the government level but in europe they have the critical financial centers, computer centers and some of your privately owned electrical grids on their own. so if you want evidence of a group of people that make hard decisions they've made these issues and i'm sorry, cliff --