Re: ADJ_ust

On Tue, 1 Oct 1996 10:26:12 -0800, Timothy C. May wrote:

>Personally, I think there's a lot of hype about this whole "infowar" thing.
>Sure, security measures and vulnerabilities always need to be looked at,
>but a lot of the rhetoric is being driven by journalists looking for lead
>stories.

This is certainly the case with 99% of the computer industry press!

I certainly have no problem believing that a group of well-supplied
professionals could, with enough time and [political] support, take down a
single target.   For instance, if the CIA,FBI and NSA wanted to hose the 1st
Bank of China, I have a feeling that they would - eventually.   I have strong
doubts that someone would come up with a non-nuke that could destroy stuff
indiscriminately within a useably large area.

#  Chris Adams <adamsc@io-online.com>   | http://www.io-online.com/adamsc/adamsc.htp
#  <cadams@acucobol.com>		 | send mail with subject "send PGPKEY"
"That's our advantage at Microsoft; we set the standards and we can change them."
   --- Karen Hargrove, Microsoft (quoted in the Feb 1993 Unix Review editorial)

On Wed, 2 Oct 1996, Adamsc wrote:

> I have strong
> doubts that someone would come up with a non-nuke that could destroy stuff
> indiscriminately within a useably large area.

Fuel/air bombs.

--Lucky

Mr. Green wrote: 
> On Wed, 2 Oct 1996, Adamsc wrote:
> > I have strong
> > doubts that someone would come up with a non-nuke that could destroy stuff
> > indiscriminately within a useably large area.
> Fuel/air bombs.

     Wouldn't work real good in a city, and would leave most computers
inside buildings working just fine, especially given any predomanance
of underground powerlines.

Petro, Christopher C.
petro@suba.com <prefered for any non-list stuff>
snow@smoke.suba.com

At 8:58 PM -0500 10/4/96, snow wrote:
>Mr. Green wrote:
>> On Wed, 2 Oct 1996, Adamsc wrote:
>> > I have strong
>> > doubts that someone would come up with a non-nuke that could destroy stuff
>> > indiscriminately within a useably large area.
>> Fuel/air bombs.
>
>     Wouldn't work real good in a city, and would leave most computers
>inside buildings working just fine, especially given any predomanance
>of underground powerlines.


By the way, it's a myth of our age that nukes destroy electronics!

The infamous "electomagnetic pulse," or EMP, was discovered by the American
side in the Cold War only during the extremely high altitude bursts over
Johnson Atoll, circa 1962. (This is the test where streetlights in Hawaii,
a thousand or more miles away, were burned out, etc.)

EMP results from the prompt gammas from a nuclear explosion interacting
with the upper atmosphere to produce a wavefront of electromagnetic energy
as the gammas interact with the uppper ionosphere. Ground-level bursts have
no such effects, though I wouldn;t want to be close to one.

The key is that the effects of near-ground-level bursts are _extremely_
localized. Shocking so, no pun intended. The largest bomb in the U.S.
arsenal, believed to be 20 MT, might leave a crater several miles in
diameter, but would hardly be felt 30 miles away. Certainly almost no
electronic devices would be damaged, except if close to the blast center.

--Tim May

"The government announcement is disastrous," said Jim Bidzos,.."We warned IBM
that the National Security Agency would try to twist their technology."
[NYT, 1996-10-02]
We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

Timothy C. May wrote:

| By the way, it's a myth of our age that nukes destroy electronics!

See 'The Effects of Radiation on Electronic Systems' Second Ed
George Messenger, Milton Ash, 1992, ISBN 0-442-23952-1

if you're really interested.  It seems to be the only public textbook
on these matters.  Basicly, Tim is correct.

Adam

-- 
"Every year the Republicans campaign like Libertarians, and then go to
Wasthington and spend like Democrats."

Vote Harry Browne for President.  http://www.harrybrowne96.org