[Johnny B.]

Seems highly unlikely. EMP would not destroy the entire infrastructure, just the local area.

With a decent-sized nuclear warhead, it would effect everything in line-of-sight of the explosion. The Starfish Prime test over the Pacific, did considerable damage in Hawaii, 800 miles away from the spot under the explosion (and that was before microelectronics came in to common use).

A 100KT bomb about 200 miles above Kansas would cover the entire continental United States.

Here is a good summary of the EMP effects from nuclear bombs.

[edpc]

Starfish Prime was 1.4 MT. Your scenario has a warhead of significantly less yield. Don’t think the results would equal your claim.

[emax]

But how many nations have that kind of bomb ? And the rogue nations of concern are probably a decade or more from getting technology that powerful.