The storm wails around the car as if the whole land had risen up and was screaming at us, screaming with a rage that went right down to the center of the planet.
The conductor manages to get the lights on. The air is dirty tan, the dust already so thick we cannot see the front of the car.
We are so small in this rocking, shaking train, nothing but a few tattered bits of bone and flesh, eyes flashing in brown murk.
There is a squeal and a jerk, and the train stops.
“There’s a shelter in the Shawnee Elementary School,” one of the trainmen shouts. “Everybody out the second car. Hurry up, and take your stuff.” Shawnee is a suburb of Kansas City. I wish we had made it to the center of town.
We form a human chain across the street, our way lit by tiny orange dots that must be streetlights. Somebody in fall radiation gear is up ahead, waving a flashlight. I can hear the wind whipping his loose coverall. Then I see a black building. I am choking on dust, I can feel it getting deep into my lungs, smell the odor of dry earth, taste dirt.
As we enter the school, the wind whips through the open door, and the dust is soon thick in the hall.
“This way, keep moving, this way.” A policeman with another flashlight ushers us down some metal stairs and we find ourselves in the basement.
It’s well lit, and the roar of the storm is more distant. Still, the building shudders, and I can hear windows shattering somewhere upstairs.
All around me, sitting in neat rows on the floor, are children.
I’m stunned. I didn’t expect a functional school. But why not? Kansas City still exists. There are people who didn’t leave, and these must be their children.
“I’m your civil defense warden,” a young woman in jeans and a cream-colored shirt says. “Welcome to Shawnee Shelter Number Twelve.” She looks at us, forty-odd scared people. “I’m Joan Wilson. I teach third grade.”
Two more policemen come in. They have a geiger counter, which they proceed to sweep over our group. The ticking tells us that we have picked up a light dose.
I find that I take it like I might another blow in a place that has been hit a lot.
Other teachers have been bringing their classes down, and now the room is full. I realize from the blackboards and the desks that have been pushed aside that it is also Joan Wilson’s classroom.
“Let’s talk to her,” Jim says.
“Talk?”
“To the warden. Might be interesting.”
Also, it might take my mind off what has just happened to us.
Being triaged can make you feel very naked at a time like this.
Joan Wilson isn’t forthcoming, which is understandable, considering that she’s got eighteen third-graders to worry about, not to mention the unexpected crowd from our train and the six or seven who have come in off the street.
She will not give us an interview. We have to content ourselves with a few quick questions.
“What are living conditions like here?”
She looks at me. She does not smile. “It was getting better.”
“Do you have many dust storms?”
“This isn’t a dust storm. It’s the land, don’t you understand that?”
“The land?”
Her voice is low and fierce. “The plains themselves are blowing, right down to their core. There’s never been a dust storm like this.
But I’ll tell you something, mister. I don’t care how bad this storm is, or the next one or the one after that. I am staying here. I was born in Kansas City and I am not going to leave, and I’m not the only one. We made this place grow, and we’ll make it grow again.”
She turns away. She doesn’t want to keep talking. But there is one more question. In spite of her feelings, I must ask it. “What about the children, Miss Wilson?”
She looks at me. The air between is brown now, as if a polluted fog had crept into the room. Wind screams outside. In the distance something clatters, maybe a tin roof blowing through the streets.
“The children?”
They do not look like the kids Andrew went to school with.
They are as hard and tight as their Miss Wilson—quick, serious little people with sharp eyes. When I meet those eyes, they do not look away and they do not smile.
Soon one of the other teachers begins reading a book for the benefit of the whole student body, which counts perhaps eighty children. It is Beauty and the Beast. They listen in silence.
Kansas City—Children’s Thoughts
Essays on spring from Miss Wilson’s third grade, Shawnee Elementary School.
SPRING RAIN INSTRUCTIONS
If it rains get inside right away. And if you get wet you have to go to the office for geiger, then showers and get rid of your clothes.
If you don’t have any more you have to be in your underpants. You have to be careful, but spring rain is also nice.
I LOVE SPRING
The frogs croak and the mayflies fly. Mommy prays for the cabbages, which are just now coming out of the ground. They say spring is the time of hope. We read about lilacs.
SPRING RAIN DANGER
I got inside to keep it off me. I saw it go down on Barko. They won’t let me have Barko. Spring rain danger. My daddy tried to keep it off our onions but he got all wet himself and there wasn’t enough plastic from the allocation. Rain from the east is good, but if it comes from the west, just say your prayers, like it did Thurs-day.
RAINBOW
Lord Jesus sent a rainbow to say its OK, folks. Dad and Mom went on the cleanup. I was scared, I was home alone all night. Then Miss Wilson came and said come to the cleanup. They taught me how to get the particles with the Dustbuster, and I got a lot. They paint a red circle around them. Then you suck them up. Then you go to the next one, until your Dustbuster is out of juice. The Dustbusters are heavy because they have lead on them.
OUR FARM IN SPRING
Our mare is getting ready to foal. I am going to help deliver her with my dad. Mom and Dad said God gave us this foal, but I think War Cloud and Joanie did it when they jumped on each other last year. And we also have pigs.
WARM DAYS
To me spring is warm days. The sun is out and we don’t have to worry about the coal. We are OK on money. I am often in the garden. We have a general permission because my mom is a garden freak. She makes salad all spring and summer. We sit outside on the back porch and shoot rabbits to eat with it. And I do not hurt when it is warm.
Documents on Limited War and the Limited Economy
Red wine in the sunlight,
May weather—
While white fine fingers
Break the thin biscuit…
—Osip Mandelstam, from Stone
LET THEM EAT WORDS
The official word from the Federal Complex in L.A. on the economy was one of cautious optimism.
In fact, there is no single American economy. It is possible to define the two big ones of East and West, but beyond those there are many, many more.
As we crossed the country from the prosperous valleys of the Pacific Coast to the dark Northeastern ports, we encountered dozens of economies. Life has focused down: people don’t think in terms of long-range movement and trade anymore, outside California anyway. The concern is the farm on the hill, the plant down the street, the condition of one’s own belly.
The following three documents illustrate how we have refocused to microeconomics because of the suddenness with which the macroeconomy disintegrated and the deep consequences of the shortages that resulted.
The document on the effects of the electromagnetic pulse on Warday is in one way curious: it suggests that there has been steady recovery in such areas as communications and data processing, beginning shortly after Warday. But our lives tell us differently. Even today the overall amount of recovery seems smaller than indicated. It is probable that the document was prepared by people living and working in Los Angeles, who assumed that their local experience was being mirrored across the country,
and wrote their projections accordingly.
The paper on shortages tells a central truth: the mineral resources upon which the fabrication of high-technology devices depends are no longer available in substantial quantities to the United States. In losing the electronic superstructure of our economy, we also lost the means to rebuild it, and we must now look to the outside for help.
There is also a report on the state of agriculture. If a bureaucrat could write a dirge, this is a dirge. It is about 450 words long.
With twenty-nine million dead in the famine, that is over 64,000 lives per word.
* * *
CLASSIFICATION CANCELED
INTERNAL DJSC DISTRIBUTION ONLY
SUMMARY OF EFFECTS INDUCED BY ELECTROMAGNETIC PULSE IN THE OCTOBER 1988 ATTACK BY THE SOVIET UNION, AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS FOR RECOVERY
Defense Joint Systems Command
28 April 1991
1.0 OBJECTIVE
This report summarizes studies completed in the last seven months regarding multiple high-altitude nuclear detonations by the Soviet Union on 28 October 1988 over the United States of America. These detonations created powerful electromagnetic energy fields, known as electromagnetic pulse or EMP, which in turn produced widespread damage in both military and civilian enterprises. Data utilized in this report were supplied by the Department of Defense Joint Task Force on Nuclear Weapons Effects; Headquarters, Aerospace Defense Command; and the National Security Agency.
2.0 BACKGROUND OF THE SOVIET ATTACK
The nuclear attack in October 1988 by the Soviet Union against the continental United States was initialized by the detonation of six large weapons in the 8–10 MT range some 200–225 miles above the U.S. Comprehensive studies of the attack and its effects are limited because of critical wartime conditions, though it is believed, according to limited data from intelligence satellites, that as many as 12 large MT weapons were targeted by the Soviets as EMP devices. Only six such weapons actually detonated, however.
Nuclear weapons detonated at such high altitudes produce extraordinary electromagnetic fields, which in turn travel within the atmosphere and then strike the surface of the earth, where they can either severely damage or destroy sensitive electronic devices. A single weapon, detonated at a predetermined altitude, can affect an area of hundreds of thousands of square miles. The purpose of the Soviet attack, therefore, was to “blanket” the United States with preemptive levels of electromagnetic energy designed to destroy or severely cripple communications, data storage and processing, and electronic intelligence/detection capacities. Studies have shown that each detonating weapon apparently produced a peak field in excess of 100,000 volts per meter. Precise data are unavailable, though the energy fields thus produced far exceeded prewar military estimates of theoretical attacks. There were collateral effects on both surface installations and spaceborne intelligence satellites.
The six EMP weapons detonated in a pattern roughly forming two unequal triangles covering both halves of the continent. The effects were most pronounced in the U.S., but Canada, Mexico, and several Central American countries reported effects to one degree or another. There were substantial effects absorbed by both military and civilian populations.
A second attack wave followed, with strikes directed at three large urban centers and selected ICBM/SAC targets in the upper Central states. Recent data suggest that as much as 300 MT of total destructive yield were realized in this second and ultimately final movement. The Western, Southwestern, and Central states were unaffected directly, though it is not known at this time whether this limited attack pattern on the part of the Soviets was the result of retaliatory American counterattacks or equipment failures in Soviet weaponry, or whether it was simply one phase of a larger but uncompleted Soviet attack strategy.
3.0 EMP EFFECTS
3.1 General
EMP forces generate enormously high voltages, which destroy the atomic structures of earthbound or space borne objects containing electronic circuitry. This energy, which lasts only several billionths of a second, is sufficient to ‘burn out’ most circuits such as those utilized by microchips and similar devices.
Consequently, six 9–10 MT Soviet weapons, detonated over 200 miles above the United States, produced a nearly simultaneous energy field that destroyed close to 70 percent of all microelectronics in use by both military and civilian organizations.
Shielding, such as that employed in the late prewar years by both the military and industry, was largely ineffective in coping with blasts and subsequent EMP forces of such magnitude. The two areas most severely affected by the EMP effect, for both the military and civilian populations, were communications and electronic data storage/processing.
Brief summaries of the damage sustained by EMP are described in the following sections.
3.2 Military
3.2.1 Overview
Five broad areas within the military system sustained the most severe damage from EMP-generated effects:
AREA PERCENTAGE OF DAMAGE SUSTAINED
Communications 75%
Data storage/processing 75
Guidance systems 65
Intelligence-gathering systems 60
Detection systems, including radar 70
3.2.2 Discussion
Overall assessment: Nearly catastrophic at 70-percent level.
The substantial dependence by the military establishment on microelectronics is demonstrated by the severe damage rates cited above. Prewar shielding procedures and methods proved to be largely ineffective. The failure to sufficiently employ “hardened” microchips is only one explanation, however. Although experiments were conducted before the war to measure EMP effects, all experiments failed to consider the massive EMP forces created by large MT weapons geostrategically placed. As demonstrated above, most communications, guidance, and information storage/processing capabilities were destroyed. Continental radar systems were similarly affected and, because of orbital satellite conditions and in-flight aircraft locations, substantial intelligence-gathering capacities were destroyed.
Communication facilities utilizing lasers, buried light fibers, and similar equipment survived relatively unharmed. Guidance systems in ICBMs in hardened silos also survived.
Electronic equipment utilizing non-microelectronic components received little or no damage.
3.2.3 Recovery Projections
Recovery of microelectronic capacities is dependent upon three critical factors: (1) the ability to replace/convert damaged components and systems with stockpiled prewar components/systems; (2) the capacity to replace damaged systems with new systems utilizing imported microelectronic components; and (3) the long-term capacity of the United States to rebuild its microelectronic industries.
Given these three factors, the following projections have been made:
- PERCENTAGE OF RECOVERY IN AREA CAPACITY TO DATE PERCENTAGE OF CAPACITY NONRECOVERABLE
Communications 25% 45%
Data processing/storage 20 65
Guidance systems 60 22
Intelligence-gathering systems 18 72
Detection systems 24 40
The “Percentage of Capacity Nonrecoverable” statistics suggest estimated requirements for both imports and internal U.S. rebuilding efforts.
3.3 Civilian
3.3.1 Overview
This study has identified 12 major civilian business/industry/public enterprise areas most affected by EMP-generated effects:
TYPE OF ENTERPRISE PERCENTAGE OF DAMAGE SUSTAINED
Computer/information systems 87%
Defense industry 57
Electronic/telecommunications 73
Financial industry 41
Government (all levels) 67
Heavy industry 31
Manufacturing 28
Petrochemical 38
Power/utilities 57
Service industry 39
Transportation 60
3.3.2 Discussion
Overall assessment: High-end damage at 50-p
ercent level. The nation’s civilian enterprises were affected almost as significantly as the military, perhaps because of inadequate shielding provisions. Although no precise figure can be calculated, it is believed that over 50 percent of the nation’s civilian microelectronic capacities were destroyed by EMP.
As with the military, the prewar civilian groups, including government, made extensive use of microelectronics, largely in computer applications for information storage and processing, and to a lesser extent in systems for manufacturing, airplane guidance, radio and television communications, and the like.
Unfortunately, because of national defense and reconstruction needs, few prewar surplus components are available and current import allocations are limited. As a consequence, the rate of recovery is lower than that for the military.
3.3.3 Recovery Projections
Projections for civilian recovery are based on factors similar to those outlined in 3.2.3 above. They are as follows:
- PERCENTAGE OF RECOVERY IN AREA CAPACITY TO DATE PERCENTAGE OF CAPACITY NONRECOVERABLE
Computer/information systems 24% 55%
Defense industry 27 57
Electronics/telecommunications 37 72
Financial industry 21 60
Government (all levels) 32 45
Heavy industry 15 40
Manufacturing 15 57
Petrochemical 39 46
Power/utilities 42 37
Service industry 18 69
Transportation 26 59
4.0 SUMMARY
Prewar estimates of EMP effects have proven to be vastly understated and to some extent unforeseen. EMP effects are centered on microelectronic components, and all levels of both military and civilian populations were affected. Prewar efforts to shield sensitive systems were, to an unfortunate degree, ineffective. Only large-scale prewar efforts to stockpile critical components have permitted the constrained recovery which has occurred to date. There remains a severe shortage of these components and systems, which only accelerated Allied imports and long-term rebuilding can overcome.
Warday Page 23