Bio: Franz J. Gayl enlisted In the Marine Corps in 1974, serving as an 0351 and leaving as a sergeant in 1979. Following college, he was commissioned in 1983, serving as an 0302 infantry officer and retiring as a major in 2002. He then served as a GS-15 science and technology adviser in Headquarters Marine Corps, retiring in 2022.

1. Four synchronized 1st Island Chain HEMP detonations: 40 km altitude and 715 km horizon LOS.
   
   The Marines and Sailors executing Expeditionary Advance Base Operations (EABO) may be ill-equipped to survive High-Altitude Electromagnetic Pulse (HEMP) attacks. In contrast, the U.S. Army may be better prepared to succeed as stand in forces in the First Island Chain. Relinquishing the EABO mission could free the Fleet Marine Force to return to its globally oriented MAGTF charter.
   
   Currently, EABO anticipates that the Marine Corps will contribute to the defense of Taiwan and containment of China. Since both activities threaten China’s stated core national security priorities of maintaining territorial integrity and sovereignty, China could very well be prepared to wage what it doctrinally refers to as unrestricted warfare. With Total Information Warfare (TIW) as the doctrine’s primary enabler, HEMP is the preferred TIW technique to gain and maintain the operational initiative. It only makes sense that the closer to China enemy forces are, the greater the chance that China would employ HEMP.
   
   FD 2030 requires Marine Corps Littoral Regiments (MLR) to operate on a high intensity conflict battlefield within China’s weapons engagement zone (WEZ). Considering China’s TIW doctrine, it seems critical that MRL training, education and legacy and new equipment enable it to fight through Chinese HEMP attacks. The question posed to the FD 2030 team is, are MRLs up to the task?
   
   HEMP attacks will paralyze electronics-dependent USMC forces if they are illuminated by the E1 short pulse and E3 heave wave components of HEMP. HEMP attacks are also unforgiving of any gaps in electromagnetic protection. Absent factory built-in hardening or after-the-fact shielding of MRL electronic systems, the EABO mission may be poised to fail early and dramatically.
   
   At a minimum, digital systems will suffer upset and latch-up interrupting operations and access to data. At worst HEMP will cause arcing, overheating, fusing, and other forms of irreversible burn-out in microcircuits. Many electric starters, unmanned systems, tactical RF comms, ISR sensors, precision weapons, munitions fuses, and lifesaving medical gear will malfunction. Position, navigation and timing devices could also be rendered inoperative.
   
   The damage to electronic systems would be indiscriminate and widespread. In an instant an unprepared MLR executing EABO could be rendered combat ineffective.
   
   The FD 2030 team may dismiss any concerns for HEMP. They may cite recent Administration comments regarding Russia that employment of nuclear weapons in any capacity crosses a threshold that will lead to “devastating [U.S.] consequences.” To avoid a nuclear counterstrike China will not risk employing HEMP.
   
   In fact, the Chinese do not consider a HEMP attack as nuclear warfare. Rather it is viewed as a non-kinetic, non-lethal, inaudible, and possibly unobserved weapon of TIW. It is an attack to which China anticipates the U.S. would hesitate to respond in kind. U.S. escalation hesitancy with respect to Russia in Ukraine reinforces that view. HEMP has long been China’s tool of choice for employment against Taiwan, United States forces in the Indo-Pacific, and if required, a strategic first strike option against the U.S. homeland. The employment of HEMP on one or more remote islands in the South China Sea is within the realm of the highly possible.
   
   Due to HEMP’s attractive utility in war, the Chinese have also fielded what are referred to as Super EMP weapons. They are low-yield, low mass, boosted nuclear fission physics packages that when detonated exhibit greatly enhanced prompt gamma ray emissions, the root trigger for the HEMP phenomenon.
   
   Marines on EABs will man Tomahawk Missiles and conventional Naval Strike Missiles, both of which the Chinese may fear are nuclear capable. They will also conduct unmanned air, ground, and undersea vehicles, and small boat manned reconnaissance. EABs and their local, though vast surrounding seas are cost-effective candidates for Chinese HEMP attacks with little to fear of collateral damage.
   
   Still, the FD 2030 team may express satisfaction that EABO has been comprehensively red-teamed. Critical electronics-dependent vehicle systems like the Joint Light Tactical Vehicle have certainly passed EMI and EMC testing. Other contractors delivering non-developmental COTS vehicles such as the Ultra-Light Tactical Vehicle and Whiskey Multi Mission Reconnaissance Craft may have assured the FD 2030 team that their respective vehicles will also survive HEMP due to similar testing.
   
   But EMI and EMC tests are not HEMP survivability tests. At best, GOTS systems are built to survive the old DoD EMP shielding standard of 50kV per meter. Chinese Super EMP weapons are expected to produce E1 fields of up to 200kV per meter, overmatching protections for most if not all non-strategic U.S. systems. As for both GOTS and COTS vehicles, it is unlikely that any have been stressed at those HEMP E1 extremes.
   
   In accepting red team conclusions did the FD 2030 team ask if modeled and simulated HEMP attacks were included and scored by EMP experts? If so, were Super EMP E1 fields of up to 200kV per meter simulated?
   
   Adding to concern, there is no evidence that the increasingly likely Chinese employment of HEMP is being conveyed to Marine students in basic comms operator curricula. It is also unlikely that the latest tactical systems such as the Marine Air-Ground Task Force Common Handheld, Networking-on-the-Move or the L3Harris Falcon IV family of man-pack and handheld radios have been tested at 50kV per meter, much less 200kV per meter.
   
   USMC interest in EMP hardening waned with the end of the Cold War. However, the U.S. Army never lost sight of the threat. During the Cold War the Army focused on fighting and winning in the European theater. During and since the 1960s an escalation to tactical nuclear warfare and the associated game changing nature of EMP were incorporated into Army training, education, tour exposures and equipping. The Army built EMP hardening into the requirements of its tactical systems, and EMP considerations became as natural to Soldiers as fire support coordination is to Marines.
   
   The USMC has always leveraged Army acquisitions as much as possible to benefit from an economy of scale. Therefore, thanks to the Army many USMC tactical systems came with EMP protection before the 1990’s. When the Cold War ended, EMP protection in USMC Service-unique requirements was at best an objective nice-to-have or not included at all. But EMP and other nuclear battlefield effects protection remained central to the Army’s role and mission. A comparison might be the USMC’s consistent inclusion of saltwater resilience as a threshold weapons and equipment requirement. It properly reflects the USMC’s roles, missions and anticipated battlefield environment.
   
   Continue Reading Part 2: https://www.colmikehoward.com/article/Part+2+Part+1+US+Marine+Corps+EABO+is+Not+Prepared+for+a+HighAltitude+Electromagnetic+Pulse+HEMP+Attack