Russia and China testing US’s HAARP like Radar, for weather modification or jamming american submarines

Rajesh Uppal June 1, 2019 Electronics & EW, Threats Comments Off on Russia and China testing US’s HAARP like Radar, for weather modification or jamming american submarines 7,599 Views

The U.S. Navy and DARPA ran a facility–the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) in Gakona, Alaska—before it was passed to the University of Alaska in 2014. HAARP was a research program to study ionosphere and its response to high frequency excitations from ground. “The official objective of the joint Air Force and Navy HAARP was to conduct basic, exploratory, and advanced development research programs leading to the use of emerging ionosphere/radio science technology for next-generation systems by characterizing the physical processes produced in the ionosphere and space via interactions with high-power radio waves,” said Dr. Craig Selcher, the senior research physicist and former Air Force HAARP program manager. “With the completion of these efforts for the Department of Defense on the horizon, handing the torch to the UAF Geophysical Institute allows for the continuation of the ground-breaking research that only the HAARP facility can perform.”

During HAARP’s military tenure, experiments investigated possibilities of turning the ionosphere into a giant antenna for Extremely Long Frequency (ELF) radio waves. Unlike shorter radio wavelengths, ELFs travel through water and can be picked up by submarines at operating depth as deep as several hundred feet and several experiments tested this methods sub-aquatic communication abilities. It was also hypothesized that ELF could detect mines or interfere with enemy satellites.

South China Morning Post also points this use, “These waves can travel long distances through seawater and reach submarines in the deep ocean, which means the technology could be used to send instructions to the subs from the base without the need for them to approach the surface to receive them.” The extremely high power of the facility could also Jam the ELF communications of American submarine operations in the South China Sea. At least a dozen of recent scientific papers have looked at ELF radar for investigating underground features, finding natural resources, and locating pipelines.

Many considered HAARP as tool for weather warfare that could be used to triggering Earthquakes and mind control. Rosale Bertell, president of the international institute of concern of physical health said that HAARP operates as ‘a gigantic heater that can cause major disruptions in the ionosphere, creating not just holes, but long incisions in thee protective layer that keeps radiation from bombarding the planet’.

The HAARP system is fully operational and in many regards dwarfs existing conventional and strategic weapons systems. While there is no firm evidence of its use for military purposes, Air Force documents suggest HAARP is an integral part of the militarisation of space.

China and Russia have also carried similar experiment by modified an important layer of the atmosphere above Europe to test a controversial technology for possible military application, according to Chinese scientists involved in the project. A total of five experiments were carried out in June. One, on June 7, 2018 caused physical disturbance over an area as large as 126,000 sq km (49,000 square miles), or about half the size of Britain. The modified zone, looming more than 500km (310 miles) high over Vasilsursk, a small Russian town in eastern Europe, experienced an electric spike with 10 times more negatively charged subatomic particles than surrounding regions.

In another experiment on June 12, the temperature of thin, ionised gas in high altitude increased more than 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit) because of the particle flux. The particles, or electrons, were pumped into the sky by Sura, an atmospheric heating facility in Vasilsursk built by the former Soviet Union’s military during the cold war. The Sura base in Vasilsursk is believed to be the world’s first large-scale facility built for the purpose. Up and running in 1981, it enabled Soviet scientists to manipulate the sky as an instrument for military operations, such as submarine communication.

The Sura base fired up an array of high-power antennas and injected a large amount of microwaves into the high atmosphere. The peak power of the high frequency radio waves could reach 260 megawatts, enough to light a small city. Zhangheng-1, a Chinese electromagnetic surveillance satellite, collected the data from orbit with cutting-edge sensors. The pumping and fly-by required precise coordination to achieve effective measurement. When Zhangheng approached the target zone, for instance, the sensors would switch to burst mode to analyse samples every half-second, much faster than usual, to increase data resolution.

The results were “satisfactory”, the research team reported in a paper published in the latest issue of the Chinese journal Earth and Planetary Physics. “The detection of plasma disturbances … provides evidence for likely success of future related experiments,” the researchers said. Professor Guo Lixin, dean of the school of physics and optoelectronic engineering at Xidian University in Xian and a leading scientist on ionosphere manipulation technology in China, said that the joint experimentation was extremely unusual. “Such international cooperation is very rare for China,” said Guo, who was not involved in the experiment. “The technology involved is too sensitive.”

In the China-Russian experiment, researchers found that even with a small power output of 30MW, the radio beam could create a large abnormal zone. But they also found that the effects dropped sharply after sunrise, as the man-made perturbation easily became lost in the noise created by sunlight.

China building HAARP like Radar, a weather modification tool or jam american submarines

During his visit, Li Shushen, vice-president at the academy, urged scientists to use the facility to serve China’s “strategic needs” and pursue “frontier issues” in space. By analysing the radio waves bouncing back off the particles, researchers can precisely measure the disturbance in the ionosphere caused by cosmic activity such as the sun’s rays. The data can also be used to correct the radar images collected by spy satellites to gather more information and focus more precisely on a specific target. By fine-tuning the high-energy beam, scientists could also stimulate the lower ionosphere to generate low-frequency waves and send these back to Earth.

One important difference between two facilities is that unlike HAARP which was located in Alaska, the Chinese facility is on the densely-population island of Hainan. It’s an unusual location, according to Sue Mitchell of the University of Alaska Geophysical Institute, who says its high-power transmissions could have big city complications. “These can interfere with commercial radio stations in the area,” Mitchell told Popular Mechanics. “Siting it near a major city could cause issues.” There’s also the question of air traffic. HAARP’s radio beam would have serious effects on any passing plane’s electronics.

HAARP

The modern research facility is established in 1993 near Gakona, Alaska, USA [62.39N, 145.15W]. The program is managed by the AFRL, ONR of NRL, DARPA and participated by the University of Alaska, Stanford University, University of Massachusetts, ULCA, MIT, Penn State University, University of Tulsa, University of Maryland, SRI International, Geospace Inc and others. Prime contractor for building the facility is M/s BAE Advanced technologies.

U.S. has operated two other research sites, one in Puerto Rico and the other (HIPAS) in Alaska near Fairbanks. What makes HAARP unique is its electronic beam steering capability, wide frequency coverage and very high effective radiated power. According to the official HAARP website, “HAARP is a scientific endeavor aimed at studying the properties and behavior of the ionosphere, with particular emphasis on being able to understand and use it to enhance communications and surveillance systems for both civilian and defense purposes.” The ionosphere is the delicate upper layer of our atmosphere which ranges from about 30 miles (50 km) to 600 miles (1,000 km) above the surface of the Earth.

The High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program facility near Gakona includes a 40-acre grid of towers to conduct research on the ionosphere. The facility was built and operated by the U.S. Air Force until August 2015, when ownership was transferred to UAF’s Geophysical Institute.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks Geophysical Institute is planning its first research campaign at the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program facility in Gakona. At the end of February, scientists will use the HAARP research instrument to conduct multiple experiments, including a study of atmospheric effects on satellite-to-ground communications, optical measurements of artificial airglow and over-the-horizon radar experiments.

Even though USAF officially transferred its control of HAARP in 2015, it is speculated that there are other HAARP systems out there in the form of radar communication and surveillance systems that are rigged on top of mobile platforms that are deployable in any international waters around the world.

HAARP’s use of the ionosphere through radio frequencies, explains Dr. Nick Begich, co-author of Angels Don’t Play This HAARP, also triggers earthquakes and volcanoes. Begich quotes Clinton’s Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen, who said in 1997 at a conference on terrorism: “Others are engaging even in an eco-type of terrorism whereby they can alter the climate, set off earthquakes, volcanoes remotely through the use of electromagnetic waves.

Report by Russian State Duma that says that US plans to carry out large-scale experiments under the HAARP programme [and] create weapons capable of breaking radio communications lines and equipment installed on spaceships and rockets, provoke serious accidents in electricity networks and in oil and gas pipeline, and have a negative impact on the mental health of entire region,

Another strategic importance of HAARP is that it is part of DARPA’s “Radiation Belt Remediation” (RBR) plan to Safeguard the US Space Assets, particularly the LEO satellites through damage caused by HANE detonation. Other military applications are that it generates extremely low frequency waves for communications with submarines, creating RF reflecting layers (mirrors) for OTH communications, incoming missile defense shield, creating an artificial ionosphere for HF ducted communications and underground imaging.

HAARP Military Applications

Submarine Communication: Generates extremely low frequency waves for communications with submarines. Replace the huge Extremely Low Frequency (ELF) submarine communication system operating in Michigan and Wisconsin with a new and more compact technology

Long Range Communications: Creating RF reflecting layers (mirrors) for OTH communications in the ELF to 2 GHz frequency range. Be used to replace the over-the-horizon radar system that was once planned for the current location of HAARP, with a more flexible and accurate system.

Electronic Warfare:Provide a way to wipe out communications over an extremely large area, while keeping the military’s own communications systems working. Be used to detect incoming low-level planes and cruise missiles, making other technologies obsolete

Missile Defense: “Creating a “full global shield” that could destroy ballistic missiles by overheating their electronic guidance systems as they fly through a powerful radio-energy field (Alaska Conservation Foundation, 1996).” There is much speculation that this technology is being used for other and possibly more sinister purposes. One of the main “unofficial” uses for HAARP is as an incoming missile defense shield that is effective against missiles from Russia or China. It is believed that the decision to build HAARP was one of the major reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Union. HAARP works by knocking down missiles and aircraft by affecting their guidance systems and creating atmospheric disturbances that lead to them crashing. At lower power levels, it has the ability to look down from the ionosphere and detect cruise missiles and other incoming objects. The shield can be put down to fire weapons, and then put back up to defend against incoming missiles.

Underground Imaging : Another suggested use for HAARP technology is to detect and image subterranean features such as tunnels, bunkers, and other potential military targets. Research into the feasibility of using HAARP for this purpose is still underway. Provide a wide area earth-penetrating tomography which, if combined with the computing abilities of EMASS and Cray computers, would make it possible to verify many parts of nuclear nonproliferation and peace agreements Be a tool for geophysical probing to find oil, gas and mineral deposits over a large area

HAARP: Fears

Weather Warfare: Directing huge amount of energy at a single area can create earthquakes, tsunamis and hurricanes (Smith, 1998). HAARP has also been associated with the ability to control global weather and use it as a weapon. This includes climate modification, polar ice cap melting, ozone depletion, earthquakes, and ocean wave control.

Mind Control: There are health concerns associated with the use of radio frequency and microwave radiation (as in HAARP) in the form of chronic, nonthermal effects. These effects include behavioral aberrations, neural network disturbances, birth defects, cataracts, altered blood chemistry, and changes in the endocrine and immune systems. More insidious than these effects is the concern that this technology can be used to manipulate and disrupt human mental processes (mind control) of a very large population in selected regions over an extended period of time. The frequency needed to detect subterranean features is within the same range that is disruptive to human mental functions. HAARP transmits extremely low frequencies (ELF). The Air Force documents indicate that these weapons [HAARP] can be used for mind control, inducing heart attacks, causing electronic failures [e.g. power outages] and creating computer malfunctions (Dr.Begich, 1996).

Earthquake: Shooting a billion watt electromagnetic beam into the ionosphere which would reflect back the waves toward the crust. If you build up resonance, you can add lots of energy to some rock layers. The tallest buildings: Cities are really heavy. We are adding some significant weight on the city ground. Some geologists (2005) claimed that the second tallest building of the world, the Taipei 101 (Tawain), with a weight of 700 000 metric tons, was inducing seismicity on a long dormant fault.

Strategic Importance of HAARP in protecting LEO Satellites from Nuclear Detonations

High Altitude Nuclear Detonation (HAND) generates charged particles which get trapped in earth’s magnetic field. These trapped charged particles oscillate between the Earth’s magnetic north and south poles and survive for a very long time. These charged particles are catastrophic to satellites. Enhanced radiation environment (many times more than active solar flares generated effects) would degrade LEO assets quickly leading to their destruction.

Pentagon’s Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) attempted to predict the results of various hypothetical scenarios involving the use of HANEs against LEO satellites in 2001. The shocking conclusion: a single low-yield nuclear weapon (10 to 20 kilotons, the size of the Hiroshima bomb) detonated between 125 and 300 kilometers above the earth’s surface “could disable—in weeks to months—all LEO satellites not specifically hardened [protected] to withstand radiation generated by that explosion.” K. Dennis Papadopoulos, a plasma physicist at the University of Maryland who studies the effects of HANEs for the U.S. government, puts it slightly differently: “A 10-kiloton nuclear device set off at the right height would lead to the loss of 90 percent of all low-earth-orbit satellites within a month.”

A high-altitude atomic explosion could raise peak radiation levels in parts of low earth orbit by three to four orders of magnitude, the DTRA report found. Models cited by the Defense Department study group indicate that radiation flux levels could remain elevated for two years. Any satellites in the affected region would accumulate radiation exposure much more quickly than they were designed to do, slowing electronic switching speeds and raising power requirements. The first subsystems to go, according to the study, would most likely be a satellite’s attitude-control electronics or its communications links. “Eventually,” it states, “the active electronics fail and the system becomes incapable of performing its mission.” Although some un-shielded satellites would survive, their useful life spans would be shortened dramatically.

Meanwhile the high radiation levels would preclude the launch of replacement spacecraft. The study notes that “the manned space program would have to stand down for a year or more as radiation levels subside.” It also concludes that the side effects of a HANE could lead to more than $100 billion in replacement costs—and this estimate does not even begin to account for the damage to the global economy from the loss of so many crucial space assets. Despite the recent scrutiny, however, the threat of HANEs has not been given “anywhere near the attention it deserves,” cautions Representative Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania, a longtime advocate for missile and nuclear defense on the House Armed Services Committee.

HAARP as Radiation Remediation tool

It has been concluded that human control of radiation belt is possible and is one of the technique to protect LEO assets from natural (extreme solar activity) and manmade injection of high energy electrons (HAND). Radiation Belt Remediation (RBR) is termed for such man made action. When a VLF electromagnetic wave travels in its whistler mode in the magnetosphere, it can interact with the trapped energetic particles, altering the pitch angles of their motions. If a particle’s pitch angle is decreased below the loss-cone angle, it will precipitate on its upcoming bounce.

ELF/VLF waves have been successfully generated by high frequency (HF, 3-10 MHz) heating of the lower ionosphere (60-100 km altitude), which changes the atmospheric plasma conductivity. In the presence of natural currents such as the auroral electrojet, ON-OFF modulation of this HF energy can impose an ELF/VLF alternating current onto those natural currents. This technique turns the lower atmosphere into a large antenna, which radiates energy downward into the Earth ionosphere waveguide and upward into the magnetosphere.

DOD budget documents refer to the SOH program as “a proof of concept demonstration” of technology to mitigate the HAND enhanced trapped radiation by accelerating the rate of decay of trapped radiation from the LEO environment by a factor of ten over the natural rate of decay.

Two types of RBR experiments have been configured- first from space by involving a constellation of micro satellites which would transmit VLF waves which would precipitate the energetic electrons ; second method is exposure from the earth’s surface (HAARP). High power high frequency electromagnetic waves generated with such facility can interact with electrons such that their altitude of their magnetic reflection is lowered to upper atmosphere where they encounter collisions with the plentiful neutral particles and lead to depopulation (or “remediation”) of the radiation belt along that magnetic flux tube.

This becomes more important as major component of future warfare will be Space Warfare. Therefore the most important application of such project will be human control of Radiation Belts or Radiation Belt Remediation.

HAARP design

The facility consisted of two essential parts: A high power transmitter and antenna array operating in the High Frequency (HF) range.

The HAARP facility presently houses high power HF [2.8 – 10 MHz] transmitters with 180 crossed dipole antenna elements which is capable of radiating power of about 3600KW. The transmitter is capable of delivering up to 3.6 million Watts to an antenna system consisting of 180 crossed dipole antennas arranged as a rectangular, planar array.

The facility has several diagnostic suits for supporting ionosphere research including UHF ionospheric Radar, optical observation dome etc. Output from these instruments is readily available world-wide in near real time over the internet. During active ionospheric research, the signal generated by the transmitter system is delivered to the antenna array, transmitted in an upward direction, and is partially absorbed, at an altitude between 100 to 350 km (depending on operating frequency), in a small volume a few hundred meters thick and a few tens of kilometers in diameter over the site.

During active ionospheric research, transmitted power is absorbed in a few 100 meters thick layer at an altitude between 100 – 350km (depends on Tx frequency) having exposure over a diameter of few tens of Kilometers. Intensity of HF signal in the ionosphere is about 3 microwatts per cm² with the present system.

HF Antenna system

HF antenna system to be used for Active Ionospheric Research at the HAARP site has been designed to optimize or restrict the transmission pattern to lie within a narrow overhead region. To achieve this desirable antenna pattern, the HAARP system uses an “array” of individual antenna elements. The HAARP antenna array is similar or identical to many other types of directive antenna types in use for both military and civilian applications including air traffic control radar systems, long range surveillance systems, steerable communication systems and navigation systems.

Each of these individual antenna elements, in turn, consists of two upper and two lower crossed dipole antennas mounted to a mast (or tower) above a wire mesh ground screen. The upper or lower crossed dipoles are selected depending on the desired operating frequency range. Because the design of these elements is mechanically complex, the drawings used in the following discussion have been simplified to include only half of the crossed dipoles making up each element. (The other dipoles would be going into or coming out of the page.

There is one transmitter cabinet (see Transmitter Information) dedicated to each antenna mast. The complete IRI consists of 180 antenna masts and 180 transmitter cabinets. Each transmitter cabinet contains two identical transmitters, each of which is capable of producing a maximum output power of 10 kW. Thus, the maximum power that can be delivered to any of the array elements (or masts) in the array is 20 kW.

Each element making up the HAARP antenna array consists of four selectable dipole antennas (two are shown here), which are aligned very nearly north-south and east-west. The dipoles are mounted to an aluminum tower 72 feet high which is supported at its base by a passively refrigerated piling (or thermopile) for reliable and long-lasting stability in the marginal permafrost soil conditions found at the HAARP facility. A wire mesh, ground screen is attached mechanically and electrically to the tower at a height of 15 feet above the ground.

Some Performance Parameters for the HAARP Antenna System