CHAPTER 1
ZERO HOUR FOR THE GRID
The car pulled up to the gate of the San Francisco consulate. The guard, recognizing it as attached to the operation, opened the gate and saluted. He then smiled at the driver. The man on the back seat he recognized as the chief of station, in charge of domestic intelligence operations. He did not recognize the second passenger, but her face and clothes said she was from the motherland. He watched the car drive through and then closed the gate. All seemed well at the consulate.
"I was told that your consulate was nicely kept, but I see that was an understatement. It is beautiful and securely private."
"Thank you, we value privacy greatly and who can argue with beauty? Let's step inside I am eager to hear what you bring from the motherland. I know that you are scheduled to deliver a technical paper Analysis of Macroeconomics Using Modern Control Theory. It sounds very technical, even for the director of the the economics bureau."
"Let's talk about it when we are inside."
Inside the consulate they sat in a room shielded electromagnetically and sonically and sipped slowly at their cups of Earl Grey tea. "The paper is not my primary mission. Are you are aware of the nature of the U.S. electric power grid?"
"I know that it delivers the energy to operate nearly everything in the U.S. Including the lights in this room, the stove that brewed this tea and even the pump that put gas into the car that brought us from the airport."
"Let's suppose for a moment that it was shut down."
"It would be a catastrophe unless it could be brought back up quickly."
"Suppose it took three days to bring it back."
"That would be terrible, we would be without lights, heat, even food."
"Suppose it took three weeks."
"My god, hospitals shut down, no police, no food, no communication. Total catastrophe!"
"We are going to take down the grid. That's the purpose of my visit to San Francisco. We need your help in setting the correct action and the timing for maximum effect. Are you with me and your government, or do we have a problem?"
There was a silence in the room. The Chief of Station's jaw hung wide open for several seconds. With a jerk it closed. "You mean that the motherland has decided to punish America by taking down the grid ?"
"That is correct, but you have not answered my question. Are you ready to play your role in this endeavor, or must you be removed back to the motherland?"
More seconds passed. "I am an official of the motherland. I will play my role, but I must ask questions and voice opinions in secret. If my name ever got out, I could be killed."
"Do not worry about your name. You and a few other Chiefs of Station will be referred to by names that designate your location. For example, you will always be Francis in any conversation or communication on this matter. If we have an associate in Philadelphia, he will be Phil. This is absolutely essential for security purposes. The NSA and FBI, as you know, are reading all consulate communications. Thus, any reference to our associates will be in American names. My name will be Randy, because I move about. Also, the triggering event will be named 'Eddy'. Thus a text message to Phil might read, 'Eddy is arriving on American Airlines about 1 pm Monday. Please be sure to pick him up."
"I see, Randy. The message would not look suspicious to either humans or digital 'crawlers' which scour messages. Very simple, very clever. However, we must be careful to communicate only when necessary. The heavier traffic might in itself raise suspicions."
"Very good. Now we will need to talk with a student in Los Angeles. He is already part of the plan. Selected by the chief himself and for this task named Cal. He knows about the plan for the grid. Cal is from the motherland and here on a green card studying electrical engineering for his doctorate. He has a contract to study the vulnerability of the grid. We can drive down after I have delivered my paper. The paper is not a fake, but a good technical analysis and excellent excuse for my traveling."
CHAPTER 2
TECHNOLOGY CONSULTATION
The room in the Los Angeles consulate was a mirror image of that in San Francisco. Randy introduced the third person in the room. "This is Cal, he is a doctoral student at USC on a green card. His thesis is on the vulnerability of the U. S. power grid to total failure. Cal, this is Francis, Station Chief in San Francisco. You can speak openly with him."
"It's an honor to meet you Francis. And especially to meet you Randy, I've learned of your upcoming paper on Macroeconomics. It sounds very interesting."
"It's good to meet you Cal, I compliment you on your thesis work. Tell me, is there tight secrecy around your topic?"
"None. The technologists are aware of the vulnerability. The government is deeply concerned about the effects, but knows of no solution. They are funding some study in hopes of finding a possible solution. That's not in sight now."
Randy looked directly at Cal. "Suppose you tell us how the grid might come down?"
"Well, there are four ways. First, a bombardment from a large sun spot. When such an explosion occurs on the suns' surface, there is a huge burp of charged particles called a coronal mass ejection or CME. It shoots out away from the sun for a brief period. Usually this just goes off into space with no effect on the earth. However, if the hole in the suns' atmosphere is aligned with the earth, this huge stream of CME enters through the earth's atmosphere and induces high electric currents in the grid. This may burn out key pieces of equipment. That happened in 1989 in Canada and took down the Canadian grid."
"How long did it take to get back up?"
"In the Canadian case they had a good stock of spare parts and were up in a few days. However, if large transformers are involved, it can be weeks or months. Those things are huge and very expensive. Spares are rare. Should I explain the sun spots in detail?"
"That's not necessary, although my doctorate was in economics, I've studied physics. I'm with you."
"Well, a second means to take the grid down is by human attack. This was demonstrated in California recently when a substation was shut down by rifle fire that punctured the cooling equipment for the transformers. That was well planned as the rifle cartridges showed no finger prints. It almost took off a portion of the grid in California. A recent study of the U.S. Grid has shown that a simultaneous loss of just nine select stations out of 55,000 could bring down the whole grid."
"How many people do you think were involved in that rifle attack"
"No one is sure, but my guess would be four or five. It was quick and very well planned."
"So to take down nine or ten stations simultaneously by gunfire would require around fifty people."
"Yes and considerable communication between them beforehand. That might be a weakness and it could attract the NSA and CIA."
Cal stopped momentarily and then said, "A third means is by cyber attack, getting into the computer control of key stations and taking them down. It isn't clear how long it might take to recover from this. Studying that is part of my thesis. However, there are a little over 2000 stations that can be communicated with via the internet."
"But we need not attack all 2000 at once, maybe only 10 or 12?"
"That would do it. A fourth means is much less recognized....
