From: Paul Hughes (planetp@aci.net)
Date: Wed Feb 10 1999 - 18:11:18 MST
Billy Brown wrote:
> The problem is unlikely to start with, because most embedded chips don't use
> date information for anything especially critical - your reports might come
> out looking strange, but the machinery will probably keep running.
That is a very important point, and I hope your right. Because the central
point of my entire scenario is a us wide power outage. If one does not occur,
then my scenario becomes much less likely. I think the truth on this point
needs to be found. Does anyone know a very knowledgeable person in the power
industry?
Without further information, I still doubt your assessment. It is my
understanding that they use embedded chips for maintenance and shut down
cycles. In otherwords, if a particular power station has not received a checkup
after a certain period of time it *shuts down*. So if it read 1/1/1900, the
station will think it hasn't had a checkup in 100 years, and it will shut down.
If this is true, then if a critical minimum of them shut down they should take
the rest of the grid down with it.
Please correct me if I am wrong about this. :-)
> It is not uncommon for a hurricane, earthquake or other natural disaster to
> knock out an area's power for days or even weeks. The response is nothing
> like what you predict - people just band together to cope as best they can.
> Americans aren't going to start looting and pillaging unless people start
> starving to death, which would require a complete paralysis of all
> transportation lasting at least 4-6 weeks.
If a US wide power outage does occur, transportation *will* stop, and people
will starve. So I think are only point of disagreement is over weather a
nationwide power outage is likely.
> You can only do that in foreign countries - attempting it in America would
> be political suicide for the President. Besides, they can't possibly
> conduct such a search in any reasonable amount of time, and I doubt that the
> troops would comply with such an order anyway (at least, most of the service
> personnel I know say they would refuse). It violates too many
> Constitutional provisions for even today's politicians to stomach.
A military coup is a military coup, and Clinton and the rest of the politicians
become totally irrelevant. Its quite possible, they may be the first to bite
the bullet from Martial Law.
> Even if everything you outlined happened, 'They' still don't have control -
> because there is no 'They'. The military isn't going to establish a
> totalitarian government because its members don't want to. The President
> can't seize power because the armed forces won't follow such orders. Who
> does that leave?
According to the military people I know, their saying its the military their
most afraid of. The military is a totalitarian government all to itself already
and therfore not a big stretch to enforce their way on everyone else. The
military is not a democracy , it's chain-of-command, and its leaders could give
a rats ass whether its members want to or not. Most infantry do what their told
or face the threat of court martial or even death if they don't.
Although these are the points we differ, I hope I'm wrong and your right about
this. I look forward to your next response.
Paul
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