Borat Sagdiyev said:
Terrorist suspects and suspected al Qaeda members are often arrested throughout Europe. Even if all the surviving members did stage some simultaneous attacks, they would not be able to seriously harm European economy or military installations. Sure, they could kill a few thousand people, but in a war, this is not a table-turning event.
The attack will not only come from just the terrorist cells themselves, it will come from the general Muslim populace as a whole.
Just say there are 5 million Muslims in a country, lets be consevative and say only 10% answer the call to final jihad (I think more will), 10% will still equal to 500,000 fanatics wreaking havoc. If each one were to kill one European that would be 500,000 dead Europeans. Let's say they are not that lucky and only 1 in 5 kills a European that still would equal to 100,000 dead Europeans. Not to mention the chaos and confusion it will cause, drawing resources from the military that will be needed at the front.
Are you assuming European intelligence services, AWACs and whatnot will not notice a huge massing of troops outside Europe's borders until the launch of the EMP ordnance? Also, are you going to be more specific about borders? Do you mean the Bosporus? The straight of Gibralter? The entire North-African coast? Byelorussia, Russia, the Ukraine and Balkans???
I wasn't assuming anything, the EU will know they are massing at the border.
They will mass at the Turkish border. With their myriad of cheap naval vessles on standby to take the Med simultaineously, to try and open up a second and third front (Spain and Italy). If anything else simply to draw resources away form the main attack.
Even in that seemingly small space at the Turrkish border about a 100 miles wide, they could mass several army groups. They could lauch some 400 to 1000 divisions against the West possibly only around 40-60 divisions at this time before full mobilization can take place. The EMP will futher delay mobilization by weeks if not months. This will be the time then need to out attrition these forces for an eventual break through.
The EMP in combination with in-country jihadist will buy them time to do what they need to do.
Another side-effect of the nuclear EMP blast, will be to supercharge the ionosphere, wrecking most if not all radio transmissions for days if not weeks
This will actually hamper NATO command and control to coordinate a defense. The enemy on the other hand can go by pre-set battleplans until the airwaves clear up. With the number of men they have, they can afford for not having all those plans work out, but no doubt some will.
You said it yourself: Switching equipment off could spare it from an EMP. If said missile is detected by European air surveillance, and everybody has been warned of the possibility of such an attack, they could quickly broadcast warnings on all frequencies causing everybody who listens to shut down their electronic equipment.
Your assuming that there is EMP defense plan in place, right now there isn't one.
I could see it happening within the military, but as far as the civilian sector goes it would be extremely difficult to near impossible. You are talking about shutting down every single power grid across Europe, thats just for starters, that doesn't include railway, vehicles, and airliners.
If they were to put an EMP defense plan in place they would have to take this threat very very seriously, considering what thay have to do.
Most likely they won't. My biggest proof of this right now, is actually YOU. You--yourself aren't even taking this seriously enough, how do you expect the whole rest of liberal minded Europe will take this threat. They won't. Chances are there won't be an EMP defense plan, not for the civilian sector.
I mentioned American and European equipment among middle eastern armed forces in response to your claim that most of their forces will be immune since they use Soviet equipment that is immune to EMP. Nothing to do with money-back policies.
No offense, but I was being sarcastic.
Simply stated the less electronically dependent the equipement, the more chaces to survive an EMP attack.
I actually mention a while back in one of the post that alot of their gear may come from the West, however the vast majority will still be Russian/Soviet stuff.
But considering the amount of men they have, even if only a small precentage of their gear is from the West, that could very well still mean they have as much Western main battle tanks as the EU itself, that alone is a threat.
Basicly what I see for the overall picture ---everything, or just about everything will be going against the EU (both politically and militarily) to conduct a proper defense to stop this at the onset. Maybe later they can mount a proper defense, but not before full mobilization has occured.